Читать книгу Spark Of Desire - Christa Maurice - Страница 6

Chapter 3

Jessica stood in front of Meechan’s Kitchen watching the road for Kevin. She was at least ten minutes early, and she wouldn’t recognize his car if it ran her over, but she couldn’t stop herself from looking. Her head felt as if it would never stop spinning. Three days ago she’d been shelving reference, bemoaning her fate, and now she was about to start training to join the fire department. Diana and Sonya waved from the other side of the street before strolling into the grocery store. This morning she’d borrowed all three of the study guides from the store, but they were sitting in her car at her apartment. She’d got home from work and not bothered to even go inside before hurrying down here to be too early. Since he offered to help her, she hadn’t been able to sleep from the excitement, and she almost had herself convinced it was the fire department and not the firefighter that was keeping her awake. She saw him walking down the street and stepped into the middle of the sidewalk.

There was a woman with him, tall and thickly built with short curly blond hair, and she was laughing. Jessica suffered an unwelcome stab of jealousy. When Kevin said he’d asked a female friend to help, she’d envisioned a hatchet-faced, grizzled woman with a gray crew cut, not a pretty blonde. Jessica envied how the other woman carried herself with such grace and confidence. Jessica had always felt a little uncomfortable with her size. This woman seemed to have no such problem. She also seemed to have no problem chatting with Kevin, who grinned and shook his head at something the woman had just said.

“Jessica, you’re here.” Kevin smiled. “This is Bobbie Kelly. I told you she might help us out.”

“Hi, Jessica.” Bobbie shook her hand. “Why do you want to be a firefighter?”

Jessica blinked. She’d been considering the question in quiet moments, expecting someone to ask, but hadn’t expected to be asked so soon. “I want to help people?”

Bobbie raised one eyebrow. “What, don’t you like sirens?”

“That’s a perk.”

Bobbie laughed.

“Ladies, can we go inside?” Kevin asked.

“Ladies? Marshall, do you have a fever? I don’t get that out of you unless I’m wearing a dress.”

Kevin rubbed his forehead and reached for the door handle. “Come on. All the good tables are going to be gone.”

Meechan’s was a neighborhood fixture. Most of the residents ate at least one meal a month there, if not more, despite the cramped dining room and lack of air-conditioning. The three of them jostled around a too-small table. Jessica hung her purse from the back of her chair and noticed Bobbie hadn’t carried one. She wasn’t sure if it mattered or not, but it made her uneasy.

Bobbie picked up a menu from the rack on the center of the table and studied it. “Nice place here, Marshall. You always take me to the best greasy spoons.”

“Kelly, quit complaining.” Kevin put his elbows on the table, looked at their position relative to her, and dropped his hands into his lap.

Jessica noticed Kevin didn’t look at a menu. Regulars knew it by heart. She wondered why she hadn’t noticed him in here before. Glancing around the packed dining room, she saw all the usuals. The woman who tried to bum a cigarette off every person she saw every time she saw them, even when they’d repeatedly told her they didn’t smoke. The old man with the fedora he wore rain or shine all year long and doffed to every woman he met. The weird artist girl with the piercing blue eyes.

“So.” Bobbie snapped her menu closed. “You want to be a firefighter. Let me tell you the single most important thing about being a woman firefighter. Never wait to take a leak.”

“What!” Kevin protested.

“It never fails, you gotta wiz and you get a call. There is no place at a fire for a chick to take a p—”

“Bobbie!” Kevin slapped his hand on the table, rattling the condiments in the center. “Oh my God. You are so crude.” His face was bright red.

“It’s a hazard of the job. Crudeness.” Bobbie shrugged. “You’ll get used to it.” She patted Jessica’s hand.

A waitress sidled up to their table and took their orders.

“Have you ever started a chain saw?” Bobbie blurted out as soon as the waitress turned to leave. The waitress hesitated, decided the question wasn’t directed at her, and left.

Jessica blinked at Bobbie. “A c-chainsaw?” She shook her head. “With a rip cord? No.”

Kevin dropped his head into his hands, groaning. Jessica eased back in her chair so he wouldn’t elbow her in the chest.

“You better learn. The guys can just rip that sucker.” Bobbie jerked her hands apart above the table demonstrating and nearly smacking Kevin’s head. “But most women can’t. I was in training with a woman who couldn’t do it. She just couldn’t get it. She quit. I have to put it on the ground and brace it with my foot. For some reason women can’t jerk it like the guys do.”

Kevin groaned again.

“It’s a lack of upper body strength,” Jessica said. She thought she’d been dizzy before, but Bobbie was the human equivalent of the Tilt-A-Whirl. “Most of a female’s strength is centered in her hips. Men’s strength is in their shoulders.”

“Really? That’s neat. Did you know that, Marshall?”

Kevin shook his head without lifting it up. Jessica noticed the tips of his ears were red. Was he embarrassed or angry? Was she failing some kind of initiation?

“There’s a way you can do it. I’ll show you.” Bobbie started spinning her butter knife on the table.

Kevin looked at Bobbie. “Are you finished?”

Bobbie shrugged.

He sighed, staring at Bobbie for a minute before he spoke. “Okay, this is what I found out. I got you an application when I was down at the office the other day—”

“Wasn’t that sweet?” Bobbie batted her eyelashes at him. “Did you go all the way down there just for that?”

“No,” Kevin said. “Jack needed to go in, and I drove him. While I was there I checked a few things. I thought you were finished.” He turned back to Jessica, pulling the application out of his pocket along with a second piece of paper. “You need to fill this out and return it to the office. The address is at the top. The next round of tests starts on September first. That’s the written. The physical is on September third and the oral is on September seventh. There are fifteen openings.” He double checked the notes he’d written before folding the paper into his pocket.

Bobbie whistled. “That’s bad.”

“Why?” Jessica asked, looking from one to the other. She folded her hands into her lap, trying to keep from jostling one or the other of them. Glancing over her shoulder, she discovered if she moved her chair back more than two inches she’d be sitting at another table. She was surrounded.

“You’re gonna have a hundred fifty, two hundred guys going for those fifteen spots. Some of those guys are going to be vets so they’ll get extra points added to their score. Pretty slim odds.”

“There won’t be that many vets. Maybe fifteen,” Kevin grumbled.

“Fifteen is enough to soak up the openings,” Bobbie said.

“There’s no way all of them are going to pass the test. Half are going to fail outright and half the guys that pass aren’t going to score high enough.”

“There’s one other minor thing you seem to be overlooking, Marshall. She’s a girl.” Bobbie pointed at Jessica without looking at her.

“So?” Kevin grumbled.

“Do you know how many women have tried to get into the department? Sixty-four. How many made it?” Bobbie held up two fingers. “Me and Peggy Spinelli.”

“But what’s the percentage of men who’ve succeeded?” Kevin shot back. He leaned across the table, caught up in the argument.

“Probably better than eight percent,” Jessica murmured.

Kevin dropped back in his chair.

Bobbie folded her arms. “It’s not going to be a piece of cake, and you’ve only got a couple of months to train.”

“Six percent chance of success at best. Five, really,” Jessica mumbled looking at the table.

“It is?” Bobbie asked.

Jessica looked up, catching the last flickerings of surprise on their faces before they hid the expressions. She didn’t know what had surprised them, but didn’t think this was a good time to start asking questions. The odds weren’t inspiring, but it was better than nothing, and she didn’t want to give up before she started, not with Kevin defending her so ferociously. “That’s not zero percent, so I might as well try. What do I have to do?”

“Do you run?” Bobbie asked.

“Bobbie, why are you so wound up today?” Kevin growled. “You’re like a caffeine transfusion.”

Bobbie grinned at him and turned back to Jessica. “So, do you run?”

“I jog.”

“How much?”

“Three or four times a week for about a half hour. Two and three miles each time.” Jessica glanced at Kevin. She’d rested her elbow on the table and now his arm was brushing hers, interfering with her ability to pay attention to this woman. There was a test happening here. She couldn’t start failing this early, but with Kevin this close she could barely manage to keep her eyes on Bobbie. Forget where her mind was.

But she wasn’t attracted to Kevin. He was too old.

Bobbie nodded. “You need to up that to about six miles in that half hour. You need to do weight training, too.”

“I can’t believe you’re doing this,” a familiar voice hissed behind her.

Jessica squeezed her eyes closed before turning around to face Mindi. They were watching her. Kevin was watching her. He would want to know how she reacted in a crisis. Mindi freaking out in a restaurant was a crisis of magnificent proportions. Of course he didn’t know Mindi, so he didn’t know what she could get like. Jessica hoped he would never know. “Mindi, calm down.”

“Calm down? Calm down?” Mindi’s voice rose to an unpleasant screech that rang off the narrow restaurant walls, causing half the patrons to stop eating so they could devote full attention to the floor show. “I can’t believe you’re even thinking about doing this.”

Jessica stood up. “Excuse me.” She seized Mindi’s arm and pulled her out of the restaurant before she could start in on a serious temper tantrum.

* * * *

Kevin watched Jessica tow the cute but distressed blonde outside.

“Maybe she’s an idiot savant with numbers,” Bobbie suggested.

“What?” Kevin couldn’t stop staring out the window. For a few minutes there he’d managed to stop thinking of Jessica as a female, but watching her outside the window with her friend, he remembered again. For a too-young, too-big, unfeminine female, she filled out her short-sleeved blue cotton blouse enticingly. While he watched, she put one hand on her generous hip. Her little friend’s voice carried through the window like the whine of a dentist’s drill. She seemed like a fragile toy next to Jessica. Kevin tore his eyes away from the scene outside the window.

“An idiot savant. You know, one of those people who can do calculus in their heads without notes or anything. What are you looking at?”

Kevin’s eyes had turned back to Jessica and her little friend outside. Jessica brushed her silken brown hair off her face with one hand, remaining calm while her friend did everything but jump up and down screaming.

“Uh oh. Looks like a lovers’ spat.”

Seemingly without his permission, Kevin’s head snapped around to look at Bobbie. “Lovers’ spat?” Ugly coldness developed in his chest and start flowing through his body.

“That’s what it looks like to me. It looks like Jessica has a girlfriend.” Bobbie sneered at him. “So maybe you won’t be getting her into bed after all.”

“A girlfriend?” Kevin stammered.

“Yeah. You know, she’s a woman who wears comfortable shoes. She prefers her women short and sweet. Her middle name is Butch.” Bobbie drew a deep breath, preparing to pelt him with more euphemisms.

“I get it,” Kevin cut in before she could. He looked out the window again. Jessica was still listening to her hysterical friend with an almost perfect calm. Her sweet face focused on the other woman, her hair falling across her cheek and her hands folded in front of her. Two other women walked up to them. Kevin thought he remembered one of them from the coffee bar at the bookstore.

“But then you weren’t interested in her anyway, were you?”

“No, I wasn’t. It’s just… I never thought… She just doesn’t look like the type.”

Bobbie raised one eyebrow. “Oh really. What does the type look like?”

“I don’t know. Not like her.” He stood up. Suddenly the heat of the restaurant was too much to bear. “I have to use the restroom before I eat.” Jessica couldn’t be like that. He stalked toward the back of the restaurant, grinding his teeth. If she was, it made his job easier. If she didn’t like men, she wouldn’t be hitting on him, and he wouldn’t be thinking about it, either. But he wasn’t, was he? If he wasn’t, why was he noticing how her clothes fit? If he did hit on her by accident, would she deck him? Pushing open the door to the men’s room, he noticed his hands were shaking.

In the mirror over the sink, he studied his face. It still looked like the same face he’d shaved this morning, but it didn’t feel like it was attached right anymore. He splashed cold water on it, and discovered the bathroom had run out of towels.

If she was a lesbian, that should make everything easier. There wouldn’t be any messy attraction to get in the way. It would be like working with one of the guys. Cap said she’d have a harder time getting in if they were a couple. This ruled that out. In addition to being too young and too unfeminine, she wasn’t attracted to men in the first place. It also gave him the perfect answer for the guys when they started harassing him . Of course, it would just give them another tack to work from.

Bobbie would have it all over the department in under twenty-four hours.

* * * *

Jessica sat down at the table, looking around. “Where’s Kevin?”

“The john. What’s up with your friend?” Bobbie leaned her cheek on her fist. The waitress stopped next to her and put plates in front of them.

“Mindi? She hates not being the center of attention. We’ve been friends since college, but I get the sneaking suspicion she never heard a word I said.” Jessica surveyed her plate. All three of them had ordered burgers and fries. At least she wouldn’t have to change her diet much. She didn’t feel much like eating right now, though. Her stomach still churned from her chat with Mindi. If Diana and Sonya hadn’t dragged her away, they’d still be out there.

“Oh? How do you mean?” Bobbie ignored the food in front of her.

Jessica looked toward the restroom. Where was Kevin? She liked Bobbie, but felt leery of her at the same time. “I guess she’s happy working at the bookstore and husband hunting, and I’m not.”

“Not happy husband hunting?” Bobbie pressed.

“Working at the bookstore.” Jessica poured ketchup on her plate.

“All the guys are going to assume you’re a lesbian.”

Jessica almost dropped the ketchup bottle. “What?”

Bobbie picked up her burger. “The guys. They’re going to assume you’re a lesbian. No regular woman wants to be a firefighter. It’s not a great place to find a husband.”

“I’m not looking.” Jessica’s mouth went dry. Did Kevin think she was husband hunting? What a stupid way to do it. Right about now, that was a secondary concern. Sort of. She hoped to marry someday, but looking at the wedding flowers book was getting more and more depressing. Tall, dark, and good-looking in a tuxedo wasn’t showing up. Locating a husband required finding an acceptable male who was looking for a wife. Joining the fire department she could do on her own, mostly.

“Oh.” Bobbie bit into her burger and then spoke with her mouth full. “So are you?”

“Am I what?” Jessica glanced at the bathroom doors again. What was Kevin doing in there? She needed him to protect her from Bobbie’s insistent and strange questions. Wiping sweat off her cheek with her palm, she had the horrified thought that Bobbie might be flirting with her. Hopefully, Bobbie would supply her with an easy out if she was.

“A lesbian.”

Jessica sighed. As easy an out as possible. “No. If it matters.”

“Doesn’t.” Bobbie shrugged. “Don’t worry. I’m not looking for a girlfriend either.”

“I didn’t assume you were.” Jessica studied Bobbie across the table. Something about this whole line of questioning did and didn’t fit into the rest of her conversation. “You’re doing this on purpose.”

“Doing what?” Bobbie salted her fries.

“You’re trying to throw me off.” Jessica narrowed her eyes. “You keep pitching curve balls.”

Bobbie grinned. “Smart girl. I’m just trying to prep you for the guys. Kevin’s a really nice guy. Too nice. He’d keep encouraging you and pumping you up until you fell on your face. I think it’s better to be prepared before you get kicked in the teeth.” Bobbie leaned her elbows on the table. “They don’t just do this to women. In training, they will put you through hell. They need you to break down early if you’re going to so you don’t kill somebody because you freeze up.”

“Strength of character as well as strength of body,” Jessica murmured.

“Exactly.” Bobbie shoved a french fry into her mouth. “Speaking of strength, what do you bench?”

“I’m not sure. I know some of the boxes we receive are about seventy pounds, and I don’t have any trouble with those.”

“You’re going to need to be able to carry one hundred and sixty-five pounds over your shoulder for about a hundred feet.”

Jessica nodded.

“Don’t worry, Kevin has weights in his basement. Don’t you, Kevin?”

“What?” Kevin slid into his seat. He glanced at Jessica, swallowing hard.

Jessica noticed the collar of his t-shirt was wet. He didn’t seem to want to meet her eyes and when he sat down, he’d moved his chair away from her, crowding against Bobbie.

“Weights. You’ve got a set, don’t you?”

“Sure.” Kevin coughed, busying himself with salt and ketchup.

“She said she can lift sixty-five pounds comfortably.” Bobbie’s eyes shifted from Kevin to Jessica and back again.

Kevin nodded. He started going through a list of physical requirements she’d have to meet, but Jessica couldn’t seem to concentrate. Each of the three books she’d borrowed had a slightly different list of requirements, and she felt pretty confident the department would tell her their set.

What she didn’t feel confident about right now was Kevin. He’d almost turned away from her in his chair and wouldn’t meet her eyes. She felt herself sinking into a pool of self-loathing. The last time she’d felt this way was her eighth grade dance when she walked into the middle school auditorium in her first pair of high heels only to discover that they made her taller than all the boys in her class. A lot taller.

“So you lift three days a week, jog every day,” Kevin instructed, bringing her back from her adolescent insecurity and plunging her right into her adult insecurity.

“You should do some running, too. Get your speed up.” Bobbie polished off her fries. “You know where that gym up the road from your store is?”

“Yes.” Jessica’s throat dried up.

Bobbie leaned on her fist, squishing her cheek into her eye. “You should join. You can’t be at Kevin’s house every day, and I don’t have good weights anymore.”

“What about the tests I need to pass on the written exam?”

“Don’t worry about that,” Kevin grumbled.

“Why not?”

He met her eyes for the first time since he came back from the restroom. “Because I said so.”

“That isn’t a good enough reason.” Jessica heard herself baiting him and couldn’t believe it. She was provoking him into an argument just to make him look at her. This wasn’t the best way to establish a relationship, even a friendship.

“Trust me. I know what I’m doing,” Kevin snarled.

Jessica drew a breath to snap right back, but Bobbie cut her off.

“Whoa.” Bobbie put her hands up. “Cut it out. It’s not even cute. Jessica, get your strength and stamina up and then we can work on drills.”

“We?” Kevin turned on her.

“Yes, we. You asked me to help, remember. I work a different shift than you, so I can help her when you’re on duty, and I belong to the gym I told her to join.” One side of Bobbie’s mouth curled up. “Jealous?”

“No.” He turned to look at Jessica again, and she saw something flicker in his eyes. When he spoke again his voice was gentler. “We’ll work on drills starting in August. Plan to work out for at least an hour every day and study. The first test is the written.”

“On September first.” Jessica felt his eyes searching hers. A strange surge of emotion welled up that she didn’t want to deal with right now, and she shoved it aside. Mindi showing up had really thrown her off her stride. It had nothing to do with Kevin. It couldn’t have anything to do with him.

He clapped her on the shoulder. “You’ve got better than a five percent chance.”

“Except for the tools,” Jessica said. She had to work to keep her voice even. The spot where his hand had touched her warmed. The waitress came around to pick up their plates and refill their drinks.

“Tools?” Bobbie asked.

“I’m not very good with tools. I can learn to use them, I just can’t tell them apart,” Jessica wasn’t embarrassed by her lack, but it did irritate her. Was Kevin embarrassed by it? Men grew up breathing tools, girls got dolls. When Jessica had been resuscitating her dolls, it hadn’t occurred to her that she might need a crowbar to get the doll out of her overturned Barbie Corvette.

“Take her to the station,” Bobbie suggested to Kevin without looking up.

“No!”

Bobbie and Jessica turned to Kevin. Jessica had started to convince herself that he wasn’t acting odd around her and judging by the look on Bobbie’s face, this was very odd. “Why not?”

“I can’t take her to the station.” Kevin shoved his chair away from the table and it rocked back on two legs. He grabbed for the table, but missed. Jessica caught the back of his chair and tipped it forward.

“Slick move.” Bobbie clapped. “Going for the Olympic Chair Ballet team?”

“No.” He slouched and his face turned pink as he studied his section of table like he wanted to lean on it. Bobbie was leaning on her elbows, and Jessica had her arms folded on her edge. There was still plenty of room if he didn’t mind being close enough to feel her body heat. Apparently he did. He folded his arms across his chest. Jessica found herself annoyed that he didn’t even want to touch her by accident, but pleased he didn’t want to touch Bobbie either. Neither emotion sounded like something a woman who wasn’t interested in a man would feel.

“Well?” Bobbie snapped.

“Well what?” Kevin snapped back.

“Why can’t you take her to the station?”

Jessica held her breath, waiting for the answer. She’d been so caught up watching him not lean on the table she’d forgotten there was a discussion going on. By the look on Kevin’s face, he’d forgotten too. Why wouldn’t he take her to the station? Was he embarrassed by her already?

“They’ll eat her alive.”

“So? They’re gonna do that anyway.”

“No,” Kevin said. He focused on the ketchup bottle. “We’ll go to hardware store in the plaza by the bookstore and look at what they’ve got.”

“That’s stupid. Sears won’t have an SCBA tank.”

“SCBA tanks aren’t on the exam.”

“How do you know? You haven’t taken the exam in sixteen years.”

Kevin turned to Jessica, ignoring Bobbie. “Why aren’t you asking what an SCBA tank is?” His blush had become a deep red and there was a vein throbbing on his temple.

“Because I know.” Jessica pressed back into her chair. He seemed to dislike her again. She wished he’d make up his mind. If he would make up his mind, she’d at least have an idea where to start making up hers.

“I’ll take her to my station if you’re embarrassed,” Bobbie snorted.

“What makes you think I’m embarrassed?”

Bobbie rolled her eyes. “Don’t worry, Jess. We’ll go over everything until you’re comfortable. Mr. Shy will have to get over it.”

“I’m not shy.” Kevin turned to Jessica. “Really, I’m not shy. I just don’t think it’s going to be useful to drag you into the station prematurely.”

Bobbie put her hand beside her mouth as if she didn’t want Kevin to hear what she was saying and then stage-whispered so he couldn’t help overhearing. “He doesn’t want the guys to see you until he’s ready.”

Kevin groaned. His face glowed red by now. “I’ll meet you at the bookstore tomorrow, and we’ll walk down to Sears. What time do you have lunch?”

“Ten.”

“In the morning?”

Jessica nodded. She had to go at ten or wait until two, but she didn’t feel like explaining that to him.

“Fine.” He stood up and pulled out his wallet. “I’ll meet you tomorrow at ten.”

“It’s not going to help,” Bobbie sang.

Kevin dropped some bills on the table. “I’ll talk to you later.” He walked out.

Jessica stared at the door long after he left, wondering who he was going to talk to later. Her or Bobbie? “He was really mad,” she said.

“No, that wasn’t mad. Mad is much quieter. He was flustered, and it was funny. Kevin doesn’t get flustered. He’s pretty level. This is going to be a blast.” Bobbie grinned. “You can come to my station to play with the toys.”

“Thanks.” Jessica stared out the door, wondering if Bobbie had read him right. He’d looked more angry than agitated. Or had she been too flustered to know what he felt?

Bobbie sipped the last of her drink. She put down the empty glass and started turning it on its ring of condensation. “He’s never done this before.”

“Done what?”

“Helped anybody train to get into the department.” Bobbie didn’t look up from her careful glass spinning.

“Is that unusual?”

The waitress stopped by with the check and picked up Kevin’s empty glass.

“It is for Kevin. He’s quiet. He keeps to himself. Doesn’t date. I tried.” Bobbie grinned, but Jessica thought she saw something odd in it. “For a while I thought there was something wrong with me, but it’s him. I’ve known him for four years and never heard of him seeing anyone. I have to wonder why he picked you out of the crowd.”

Jessica shrugged. “I went to Ireland.” How could a smart, attractive guy like Kevin manage to stay home on a Saturday night? He should be beating women off with a stick, or a crowbar.

“Really? He’d probably be into that. He’s into all the traditional music. He’s a classic firefighter. Irish Catholic, tough, stubborn. You know the type.”

Irish Catholic, tough, stubborn. Why then did he keep changing his mind about her? Why did it matter? “How old is he?” she asked before she could stop herself.

“Not sure. Sometimes he looks older than God and sometimes he’s a big kid. I know he’s been in the department for about sixteen years and the earliest you can join up is twenty-one.”

“So the youngest he could be is thirty-seven.”

“Something like that.” Bobbie stood up and flipped over the check. “That rat.”

Jessica looked at the check and the bills Kevin had left on the table. “What?”

“He paid for lunch. What a guy, huh?” Bobbie dropped a single on the table. “He’s cheap, too. You always have to watch his tips. Hey, are you free Monday?”

“I’m off all day.” Jessica stood up and collected her purse.

“Good. Meet me at the gym at nine. I can show you the machines and get you started. Time’s short, you know?”

Jessica nodded and followed Bobbie out. As she walked home, she considered Kevin. Irish Catholic, tough and stubborn. Never trained anyone for the department exam before, but offered to help her out of the blue. “Pretty level”, but he’d been half crazed throughout the encounter, and he’d vanished to the men’s room forever, apparently to wash his face. She still wasn’t sure why she’d tried to provoke him. Had she just wanted him to look at her? Acknowledge her? Anything? Was she turning into a child, acting out to get attention?

At her car, she stopped to collect the books she’d borrowed and walked up the rickety stairs to her apartment. She’d been trying to get the landlord to fix them since she moved in two years ago. As she unlocked the door, she heard the phone ring. Throwing open the door she dived for the phone before the machine picked it up.

“Hello?”

“Hi, honey. We got your message. What’s the big news?”

Jessica sank onto the couch. Last night, in a split second of courage, she’d called her parents intending to tell them she planned to take the fire department exam. Unfortunately, her courage deserted her now when her mother decided to return the call. “News?” She stalled.

“You left us a message saying you had news. What’s going on?”

Last night she had hoped her father would answer the phone. He’d be much easier to deal with about this than her mother. Of course, the way Mindi was acting, she should be glad both her parents were in Florida. “Well…” Jessica opened her mouth to say she had started training to take the fire department exam, but that’s not what came out. “I met someone.”

“Really?”

“Yes. Really,” Jessica said through her teeth. So far, she told herself, it wasn’t a lie. She had met someone. Two someones so far. She couldn’t help how her mother took the news. Right?

“Tell me about him. What’s his name? How old is he? What does he do?”

“His name is Kevin Marshall. He’s a firefighter.”

“Oh honey, you always did like firemen.”

“I want to be a firefighter, Mom.” Jessica started picking her fingernails. Her mother had never gotten over the idea that her little girl wasn’t very little or very girlie.

“But honey, it’s so dangerous, and it’s very hard work.”

Jessica remembered now why she’d dropped out of pre-med. Her mother repeating over and over again “it’s such hard work.” She pictured her mother the way she always had, a tiny woman wearing a pastel blouse with a lacy collar, matching slacks, and a permanently perplexed expression on her face. “But Mom, I want to be a paramedic, and you can’t do that without being a firefighter.”

“Honey, I thought you called to tell me about your new boyfriend.”

Jessica gritted her teeth. This is where it curved into lie territory. “Is Dad there?”

“No, he stepped out. I’ll tell him you said hello.”

Jessica kept her groan away from the phone. Her father would have at least listened. He’d been more than willing to put her through med school. He’d encouraged her to go to Ireland. He didn’t think anything was too difficult.

“Did you get your birthday card?”

“Yes, Mom. Thank you.”

“When are you going to come visit? You’re probably going to be busy with your new boyfriend this summer.”

“Probably.” By not correcting her mother she’d managed to lie without opening her mouth.

“You must really like him. How old did you say he was?”

“He’s kind of old. He’s thirty-seven.”

“Baby, that isn’t old. Your father is twelve years older than I am.”

Jessica looked at the family picture hanging on the wall over the television. It had been taken three years ago before her parents moved to Florida when Dad retired. Mom in a pastel pink lace-collared blouse. Herself wearing a burgundy blouse. Dad standing behind them in a black suit with a blue- and red-striped tie. Her dad had been thirty-five when she was born, but her mother had been twenty-three. Twelve years difference.

Kevin wasn’t that much older than her.

“Hello? Jessica?”

“What?”

“You were daydreaming.”

“Just distracted for a minute. How’s Aunt Rose?” Jessica launched her mother on a topic that should keep her occupied for the rest of the conversation. She didn’t want to have to make up more lies about Kevin. At this point, she could dig herself out with very little suffering, but the longer her mother went on, the worse it got.

Eventually she’d have to tell her parents what she was doing. She couldn’t just pop up one day with a badge, but she might as well find out if she could do it first. No reason to panic her mother before she knew if she could handle the training. She was going to be spending most of her summer with Kevin. Flipping open one of the study guides, she listening to her mother babble about her friends at the retirement village. Her mother could believe the white lie about Kevin for a few more weeks. It would make her happy. Give her something to brag about with the other women. If, by her next doctor’s appointment, she was still training, then she would tell them.

Handling her parents was going to be the easiest part.

Figuring out Kevin was going to be a bit trickier.