I park a little ways away from him and get out where he can’t see me. Other cars are coming in. They distract him enough that I can approach him without being heard, using my best Alex-sneaking-through-the-house skills.
“Good book?” I ask, leaning over the hood of his car and talking to his back. Nice back. Broad shoulders. He turns around with a smile. Nice front, too.
“How did you manage that?” he asks.
“Manage what?”
“To slip right past me.” He tosses his book into his car and I peek inside. Tidy in the front, a cyclone of papers and books and oddments in the back. I like that messiness. The same way that I admired his mop of hair when it was working itself out of its ponytail the first time I saw him.
“I drove right by, in a Jeep no less. You looked right at me.” I gesture to my vehicle.
“Not very sporting of you, what with the dark windows,” he teases. He’s come around to my side of the car and reaches for my hand. The Euro-kisses commence, one on each cheek, back, almost to my ear. His cheeks are smooth on mine. He smells wonderful, too. Freshly shaven. Serious stuff, a fresh shave. “Thank you for coming.”
“My pleasure.”
“Would you like to sit at the bar, or would you prefer a table on one of the patios?” he asks as we walk through the main door of the restaurant. I can see the bar, and it’s lovely, but the patios command different views of the ocean and I like a nice view.
“The patio,” I say. He turns and talks to the host, who has someone lead us out to an area that’s practically jutting out into the sea. The sun isn’t behind the horizon just yet, the days having grown longer with daylight savings time in effect. We order drinks. His is a martini, mine a simple gin and tonic with a twinge of guilt. I immediately think of Alex. I probably shouldn’t be drinking, but I’m only going to have one.
“Obviously you had no trouble finding the place,” David says.
“No, not at all. I think that everything is either on the Pacific Coast Highway, or off of it. I’m also beginning to think that Malibu is a very, very small town.”
“Rather,” he agrees. “Have you been exploring much? I never seem to have the time.”
“Well, I can tell you where every grocery store and dry cleaner is from here to the valley,” I tell him, and we laugh. “No, I haven’t had a lot of time for exploration. Well, that’s not true, I’ve done my fair share of shopping ever since taking on the ‘decorating’ project, so I can tell you about several of the antique dealers in the area.”
“I’d love some professional advice. I’m afraid that I haven’t had much time to settle in, either. My home is quite barren at the moment.”
“If you want professional advice,” I tell him, “then you’d better find a professional. I’m strictly an amateur.”
“Why do I doubt that?”
The drinks come and I’m able to avoid the compliment veiled as a question.
“Cheers,” David says, and taps the rim of his glass to mine.
“Cheers,” I repeat. I take a sip and the drink is strong and flavorful, seemingly mixed to go directly to my head. I tell myself to go slow.
“Have you left off going to Payson for a while? I haven’t seen you there,” David says.
“I haven’t had a moment to myself this week. My boss got sick on Tuesday and I’ve been ‘on call’ ever since. I’ll have to give Nyle a call.”
“I hope it’s nothing serious.”
“What, Alex? No. A touch of flu, I think. It’s just that he’s all alone in his house and I didn’t want to leave him to do anything too frivolous.”
“Perfectly understandable.” David takes a sip of his martini. “I imagine he’s better now.”
“He’s managing,” I say. I don’t want to talk about Alex. “And you’ve managed to drag yourself away from finals?”
“Yes, thank God. It’s beyond my comprehension why students, and good students at that, will consistently wait until the very last minute to tell me that they’re going to need extensions on assignments. Better yet, they seem incapable of reading a schedule, so, of course, finals are a rather large and unwelcome surprise to the majority of them.” David laughs out loud. “I’ll be grading papers until autumn, or so it seems.”
“Do you teach many classes?”
“Not too terribly many. Two Humanities courses, one advanced, and a Philosophy course for graduate students. Seven sessions each week.”
“Oh, well, you’re right, that doesn’t sound like it’s taking up your every waking moment.”
“Not at all. It’s everything else that does. The Doctoral program I’m advisor to could be a full time job. But I have several assistants that are quite capable.”
“What brought you to California?”
“The weather,” he tells me, and then he grins. “I’m serious.”
“No you’re not.”
“I am. I would have been perfectly content to stay in England. I had a good position and I’ve lived there all my life. It’s been quite comfortable. But there were two opportunities presented to me ‘round about the same time, and I chose California strictly based on the weather. The other situation was in Michigan, and it seemed rather bleak there.” He takes another sip of his martini and leans in a little closer to me. “So, you see, you and I have that in common. We’ve let the weather dictate our decisions.”
“I suppose so,” I say. My hand fishes in my bag for my cigarettes. There’s an ashtray on the table, so I assume that smoking is allowed. “Do you mind?” I ask David.
“Absolutely not,” he says, and he extracts his own pack of cigarettes and lighter from the breast pocket of his jacket. “You could say we’re a dying breed, but then we’d be playing right into the anti-tobacco industry’s propaganda,” he says with a laugh. Then he leans in closer still to light my cigarette for me.
“Clever.” I take a deep drag on my cigarette and another sip of my drink. I can feel the gin making me mellow already. The effect is combining with the warmth of the sunset and sea breeze, as well as the hypnotic sound of the ocean. There’s music playing in the background, too, some innocuous melodies. “So you don’t miss England?”
“I didn’t say that. I just haven’t settled here as of yet. It’s quite a difference from there to here. Even the ocean. There’s such a calmness here, compared to northern and western Cornwall. The southern shores have some similarity, but still...”
“Is it very beautiful there?”
“Very.” He’s been looking out at the ocean as he spoke, but now he turns to look at me. “But it’s very beautiful here, too.”
“I’m sure,” I murmur, and I’m rescued by the waiter who wants to know if we’d like to order something to eat.
“Have you the time, or must you hurry back to your duties?” David asks.
“I have time,” I tell him. I’ll make time. I have no idea when I’ll have an evening like this again, if ever, where I’m feeling thoroughly flattered and desirable. In fact, I can’t recall ever having that feeling. Memories of Errol threaten to surface and I push them away. Errol was nothing like this. Errol, I can now see, was someone much too solid in my eyes. Solid, secure and mundane. At least that was my perception of him, although reality proved him to be very different. But David, David is something akin to a wicked indulgence. Something almost too rich for my blood.
He dismisses the waiter for a moment while we read the menus. We discuss the selections, both of us recommending for the other. He’s having monk fish, I’m having osso buco. We’re sharing a double order of oysters, that we’re assured will be out to our table momentarily.
Another person comes to the table and fills our water glasses, lights the small candle whose flame can’t compete with that of the two enormous torches that are burning just below our view over the cliffs. After that we’re left in peace for a few minutes.
“Nyle told me that you came to Pepperdine this year. Did she mean this year, or this school year?” I ask.
“This year. I arrived in January, in time for the second term. Ideally I would have liked to start this August past, but the paperwork got into a tangle and the timing wasn’t right for that.”
“What will you do for the summer, once the term ends?”
“Teach the summer term, which is much more intensive. Mostly as part of a graduate program they have. The school runs year round.”
“Hmm. And here I thought that teachers had their summers off, and whiled away their time on the beach.”
“Actually, even though the program is concentrated, I have quite a bit more time off than usual. I tend to fill it with research.”
“How ambitious.”
“Perhaps,” he says with a wry smile. “This year, though, I intend to fill my time with more relaxing pursuits. Research will always be there. I’d like to experience more of what California has to offer.”
“I’d just like to experience more of what Malibu has to offer,” I say with lighthearted sarcasm at my own words. David smiles and gives a little nod.
“It appears to have its fair share of hidden treasures, Siobhan,” he says, and his hand moves, the back of his index finger brushing against my knuckles.
I shiver. I didn’t expect that. I didn’t expect the touch, or the way his voice sounded when he said my name. Caresses, both the touch and the tone. The waiter comes with our oysters and David orders us both a second drink.
I don’t need it, I feel intoxicated enough.
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© 2003 Chandrah, Inc.
© 2003 (*> Baby Bird Productions, Inc.
