wife has none of the professor’s time.”
He said, “I slept with you every night.”
“You’ve mentioned that. You said it at the time. Sleeping isn’t one of those chatting times when a couple becomes acquainted and learns what the other person thinks or feels.”
“I felt around on you all night long, just about.”
She agreed, “Here and there.”
He looked at her body. “What did I miss? I thought I’d felt around everywhere.”
Jo corrected herself, “Now and then.”
“You’re still peeved.”
“No,” she replied. “I’ve adjusted. I’m going to enjoy this hiatus. When we say goodbye this time, we’ll do it better.”
“How can leaving me be. better?”
“I’ll know why it didn’t work the first time. Why it’s impossible. I won’t yearn for you.”
Quite soberly, he asked, “Did you? Did you.yearn for me after you’d left?”
She didn’t reply but slowly got off his lap. She removed the towel wrapped around her head and slowly began to rub her hair. Finally she said with some irony, “Chad, I yearned for you while I lived with you.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
She stopped and turned her face to him in disbelief. She just looked at him.
“You did tell me.”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry, Jo.”
“It’s past. Let’s go swim.”
He sat and watched her. “I’ve missed you so terribly. I knew you were there to come home to. After you left, I dreamed of your sweet face and your voice. I missed your body in my bed. I remembered how it was to make love with you. Did you remember that?”
“Yes.”
He was sure. “We had a good marriage.”
“You had a good convenience.”
He watched her. “I love you.”
“Of course. Let’s go swim.”
He considered her, her mood, and he mentioned, “You just washed your hair.”
She shook her head. “It was so stale from being so sweaty that I would have polluted the pool.”
“You always were a stickler. There would be no way that you’d pollute a swimming pool.” Then he asked slyly, “Why did you sweat that way?”
She tilted up her chin and replied with some verve, “I haven’t a clue.”
Chad loved it. He laughed in the way men have when they’re flirting with a woman who pleases them.
That time there were other people swimming. But they were earnest lappers and took up only one side. On the other side, the two lovers played. He had his hands on her one way or another all the time. She smiled and flirted and taunted him.
They went back to their room to shower and dress, then they went out to investigate the highlights of Old Fort Worth. They saw the old cattle yards, and they checked out the railroad stations and the old saloons.
They had genuine TEXAS barbecue for lunch, but it wasn’t. It was meat with a hot sauce. They drank Pearl Beer and learned to roll the warmed tortillas so that the hot butter wouldn’t run out.
And they went to a theatre, which showed the old, early silent cowboy shorts with accompanying piano music.
One short featured a train engine. The heroine was tied to the train rails. She was rescued by the mancovered engine from a set fire that engulfed the forest. The camera people made it appear the heroine took off fifty petticoats so the men could beat out the roaring blaze.
There were other, similar film shorts, and the viewers loved every one. They could read the text out loud and laugh and chat and not bother the reception of the films. It was fun.
While the pair was casually dressed, they were welcomed to a marvelously elite place for dinner. And they talked as they relished perfect food served precisely. The presentation was an art.
When they returned to the hotel, they found a note saying they could make connections for their flights the next day. They should call.
In their room, the ex-marrieds considered each other quite seriously. And they decided they weren’t in that much hurry. So they canceled their reservations at the airport.
Chad called the delay to his college, and Jo reported in to her computer firm in Chicago.
Sharing the cost, they rented a car the next day and drove south to Austin. It is the state capitol. There, they snooped around to hear some great blues and country groups. They viewed the Guadalupe River and picnicked there along that wonderful, lazy waterway, which at one point meandered over a lumpy, white rock bed.
They found out why it’s said that the sunshine spends the winter in TEXAS. Of course, San Antonio brags that the winter sun stays only in their area.
The divorced couple walked all over downtown Austin and viewed the red granite state capitol building. They noted the TEXAS trees, and the fact that they are different from those in the north.
They saw the hundreds-of-years-old oak some person had tried to kill with chemicals. The tree was saved, they say, by putting crystals around it to counter the poison. A baffling act.
But along with the crystals, the state resource used countering chemicals. The money spent in saving the oak would have planted a hundred other trees.
There is no other vista like that of TEXAS. The visitors lounged and talked and laughed and looked. They then drove on down to San Antonio, and it was just like the features shown on TV. How amazing to see it actually.
And the Alamo.
A visitor’s skin still shivers with the intensity of the emotion still locked in that ground.
The travelers went to Fredricksburg and over to Bandera because someone said they should see the towns. And those different places were worth the trip. The two sightseers used up Chad’s entire leave. And it was special.
Unfortunately for Jo, their sojourn was exactly the way she’d expected to share time with Chad. How could he be so perfect? How could he not have shared such time with her during the six years they’d been married?
She felt more cheated than before when she’d only hoped for such a companionship. He was so knowledgeable. That was no surprise. She knew he was curious and erudite. But he was so companionable. How dare he be as magical as she’d always wanted? It made her mourn the lost years.
And it made her wary.
He said, “Quit your job and come home.”
He said that.
Not only could she just quit her job, which she loved and which kept her very well indeed, but he called his house and him…home.
Probably the worst of it all was that she was tempted.
He phoned in to Butler University in Indianapolis, Indiana, and said he was delayed. He was working on a problem. He would explain when he returned. He said his absence would be stimulating to the grad student who assisted him.
And the reply from Butler University was, “Is there any way we can help?”
Chad replied, “Thank you, no. This is a personal problem. I will solve it. But it might take several more days.”
“Call us if we can help.”
“Thank