What Family Means Part 7

He paused, and she stopped next to him. The wind whipped at their faces and her eyes smarted.

"I don't mean to sound formal. I just think it's incredible that we've run into each other again, Deb, and I'm at a loss for what to say to you. My family was so unbelievably rude-"

"Stop." She placed her gloved hands on his arm. "That's so far in the past, Will. I don't want to talk about it. We're in Paris, for heaven's sake! People are more open-minded here."

His eyes reflected the glint of the streetlamps off the water.

"Deb, you were my best friend growing up. I'm still angry at myself for allowing my mo-"

She held up her hand. "No, I mean it, Will. If we're going to be friends here, I don't want to talk about it. Deal?"

She lowered her hand and offered it to him.

He grasped her fingers and even through her wool gloves she felt the charge of awareness course between them.

"Deal."

He held on to her hand a beat longer than necessary. Debra tugged it free. She'd have to be very careful or she'd end up believing she and Will were more more than childhood friends. than childhood friends.

"Where did you have in mind for dinner?"

"I have a favorite place near Saint Chapelle. It's small, loud and cheap. Oh, and the food's great." His teeth flashed in the evening light.

"Lead the way."

CHAPTER EIGHT.

Present Day Buffalo, New York Debra "YOU SOUND AS THOUGH you aren't surprised." I had the phone tucked to my shoulder as I folded laundry. We'd already discussed Vi's health and were on to the children. The day had dawned bright, and sunlight danced on the snow-covered ground. you aren't surprised." I had the phone tucked to my shoulder as I folded laundry. We'd already discussed Vi's health and were on to the children. The day had dawned bright, and sunlight danced on the snow-covered ground.

"They're young and in love. We've been there, haven't we, baby?" Will's baritone tickled my ear even over the phone, thirty-five-hundred miles away.

I sighed.

"Yes, but our circ.u.mstances were quite different."

"Honey, I know you're worried about Angie. But I have a feeling this will all work out. Yes, our circ.u.mstances were different. To many folks they still are."

"What about to you, Will?"

"You know me, Deb. I don't give a flying-"

"I know you don't care what others think." I cut him off before he blistered my ear. "But I want you to tell me what you you think. Has it been worth it?" think. Has it been worth it?"

"Worth it? You mean you're not sure?"

"I am as far as you and I are concerned. But the kids, Will, are they still paying the price?"

"They had every comfort growing up, including the best education possible. It wasn't easy for them being mixed, but life's hard, sweetheart. And they had it a h.e.l.l of a lot easier than we ever did."

I'd angered him. Will was so defensive about the decision we made to share our lives. To raise the kids with all the love and support we'd both missed in our own childhoods. Never mind the issue of mixed race. Will prided himself on having taken the best lessons from his own childhood to use as a measure of how he'd been as a father to our children. He always took it personally when I mentioned my concerns about the kids and their childhood.

"Yes and no, Will."

"What are you wearing?" He'd lowered his voice and I smiled into the receiver.

"Nothing. I'm folding laundry in front of the kitchen windows, buck-naked." I looked down at the fuzzy sweats and slippers I wore.

"Mmm, I want you to fold me me up." up."

I couldn't help laughing.

"Day after tomorrow, Will. And we're not done with this conversation."

"I didn't expect we were."

Again I laughed. Will knew me best. I had to talk everything out to the last detail. He was more of an internal-operations type when it came to emotions.

"Still arriving at the same time?"

"Yeah, the red-eye. But maybe you'll take a nap with me when I get in?" Will hated flying at night. He treasured his own bed, and having me to snuggle up with.

"I'm working out of the home studio all day tomorrow."

"See you then, babe. Love you."

"Love you, too."

After we hung up I finished folding the laundry and headed upstairs to get dressed for the day. For the moment I put my frustration on hold-Will always tried to distract me with s.e.x when he didn't want to deal with the conflicts between us.

I carried the laundry basket upstairs with me and left it on the bed. I would put away the clean clothes later.

I yanked the yellowed doily my grandmother had crocheted over sixty years ago off the top of the long cedar chest at the foot of our bed. Cedar chests were one of my indulgences over the years. They were the best kind of storage for my artwork and items of knitted clothing I couldn't bear to part with after long hours of knitting, ripping out, reknitting.

The aroma of cedar, wool and baby rose from the chest when I opened the lid. It was as if the old chests breathed. In a sense, they did. They were alive with memories.

Knitting had been my refuge through most of my life.

I couldn't remember what I was wearing or how my hair looked on any given day. But I did remember exactly where I was when I knit each sweater, each pair of socks or mittens, and of course, all my wall hangings. Just the feeling of a project took me back to that particular time.

So many different wools and other fibers brushed my fingers as I dug through the chest, but I ignored them. I was on a mission. I wanted to find the baby items I'd knitted for Angie.

When was the last time I'd been in this chest?

I hadn't even looked in here when Blair and Stella got married, or when they started talking about babies. The twins' items were all in a different chest, in the guest room that they shared as boys.

My fingers rubbed against the soft fuzzy yarn I knew was Angie's layette.

Eager to remember how small she'd been and how my st.i.tches had formed these tiny outfits, I pulled on the bundle of cloth, mindless of the layers I disturbed.

I smiled in antic.i.p.ation of my long-ago treasure.

I was wrong. In my hands I held some of Angie's baby clothes, but my gaze didn't rest on the pink-and-white cardigans. I stared at the bright red scarf that had been knit by my five-year-old hands.

Sorrow reached up from the depths of the chest and grabbed me, shaking me hard.

This wasn't some memory I'd shoved down or needed hours of therapy to resolve.

It was what I'd known all my life.

My dad left us when I was five. The last day I saw him, he'd packed his suitcases as he always did before a trip and gave me the usual hug.

"Can you bring me something back, Daddy?"

"Sure, sweetheart. What do you want?"

"A teddy bear. Brown."

"You bet, Debbie girl."

He'd tousled my hair and was gone. I didn't know I'd never see him again, ever. I believed he'd come back, and that he'd bring me my teddy bear. I knitted the scarf for that d.a.m.ned bear, and here it was, fifty-three years later, still alone.

My mother was right, in her coa.r.s.e, matter-of-fact way.

"That sonofab.i.t.c.h didn't have the decency to tell us to our faces that he was going for good. Didn't make sure we were taken care of."

It was a verse ingrained in my life, as I'd heard my mother sing my father's curses until well after she'd met her current husband, Fred. But I was a little girl and he'd been my prince.

I fingered the tiny red scarf. If not for my first prince abandoning me, I'd never have met the real prince of my life.

Will.

"SOY NO-WHIP MOCHA, right?" Phil O'Leary placed the brand-name coffee cup on Angie's desk.

"Thanks, Phil." She looked up at him from the bank of screens that displayed various measures of Buffalo's meteorological status. As the new Director of Operations, Angie knew her staff watched her closely, and she needed to be as informed as they were on the weather.

"My pleasure." Angie noted that, indeed, Phil seemed quite pleased with himself. Her a.s.sistant had fallen all over himself to impress her since she'd arrived four weeks ago.

At some point she was going to have to tell him she wasn't interested, but she didn't want to seem uncaring or unappreciative. One thing she remembered about this city-it was a friendly place.

Unlike the West Coast where she'd lived during her post-graduate years and early career, people in Buffalo treated everyone like family. There wasn't much of a "getting-to-know-you" phase.

The weather grid was typical for a northern New York February-including the possibility of a severe winter storm by the end of the week. Angie loved the thrill of watching the huge system take shape. The weather in San Francisco had its moments, but not the unpredictability of a Buffalo winter.

"I hope you've bought some cold-weather gear since you transferred." Phil chuckled and shook his head at the monitors. "It's going to get dicey over the next few days."

Phil loved talking. Angie did, too, but not at work. And definitely not when she was putting her own forecast together.

"Phil, have you found out any more about the interns from the university? Do we have enough room for them over spring break? And what about the grad students who've requested interviews?"

Phil took the hint and went to his desk, still wearing his benign smile.

Angie's own smile left her face as soon as she turned back to the screens and morning reports. The watch-floor meeting was in fifteen minutes.

The weather team would have their a.n.a.lysis ready, but she liked to form her own opinion first. That way there was less chance of missing an important detail or being off on the timing.

The storm a.n.a.lysis wasn't holding her attention like it usually did. The mess she'd made of her life was distracting her.

The baby proclaimed his or her presence more every day. Her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and belly were visibly swollen and her face was fuller, flushed with the new life inside.

She needed to tell Jesse. Mom was right about that. But she didn't want him to think she'd planned this behind his back or wasn't listening to his opinions and wishes.

Neither of them had wanted children for the longest time, but she'd been feeling the urge to have a baby over the past two years. She'd mentioned it to Jesse, and while he didn't say they'd never never have kids, he didn't want to plan on it for the near future. have kids, he didn't want to plan on it for the near future.

His childhood had been abusive at the hands of alcoholic, drug-addicted parents. Though they were clean and sober now, Jesse didn't want to pa.s.s any risk of addiction to his own children. He had a brother and a sister, both of whom had kids who appeared to be healthy and well-adjusted. But Angie had never been able to convince Jesse that he'd make a wonderful parent, too. He said he was content to be the favorite uncle to his nieces and nephews.

Angie swirled the coffee in her cup. She had to tell him, but she felt it should be in person.

At the right moment.

Hopping a flight to Iraq was out of the question, so she might have to compromise on the "in person" part.

Present Day Buffalo, New York Debra THE NEXT MORNING Will came in before I'd had a chance to start work in my studio. My exhibit was ever present in my mind and I had some finis.h.i.+ng touches to research. I'd planned a display of my different artwork over the years, with black-and-white photos of historical events as backdrops to each piece.

"Debra?" His voice found me upstairs in the oversize reading chair we kept in the alcove off our master bedroom. After all this time, I still felt a little s.h.i.+ver of delight at the sound of his voice.

My girlfriends and I agreed that business trips help keep the home fires burning. We had friends, couples, who'd slipped into such a predictable pattern that they didn't appreciate each other any longer. The respect died, and its bitter embers fueled resentment and loathing.

"Up here."

I quickly cleared off my lap and shoved the baby book under the chair. Will never took well to my reminiscing. He a.s.sumed it meant I was not happy in the present.

Nothing could be further from true. I was just looking for some photos of Angie wearing the outfits I'd finally dug out-after I got over finding Teddy's scarf.

The hallway floorboards creaked under Will's steps. He was a large man, but still lean and graceful on his feet. He'd never been a star athlete but his twice-weekly tennis games with colleagues, combined with our weekend hikes, kept him trim.

And s.e.xy as h.e.l.l.

"Hey, have you been waiting for me?" The twinkle in his eyes sent a tickle through my belly.