“Im sorry.”
“Hey, it happens.” She had to remind herself of that. It wasnt life or death, it didnt send her falling headlong into a vale of tears. If a heart couldnt be broken, it wasnt a heart to begin with.
“We were friends. When my dad married Flynns mom, Flynn and I hit it off. Good thing, I guess. Flynn had Jordan and Brad—they were like one body with three heads half the time. So I got them, too.”
Youve still got them, Malory nearly said, but managed to keep silent.
“Jordan and I were friends, and we both really dug reading, so that was another click. Then we got older, and things changed. You want another hit of this?” she asked, holding up her empty glass.
“No.”
“Well, Im having one.” Dana rose, got the bottle from the kitchen. “He went off to college. He got a partial scholarship to Penn State, and both he and his mom worked like dogs to put together the rest of the tuition and expense money. His mom, well, she was just terrific.Zoe sort of reminds me of her.”
“Really?”
“Not in the looks department, though Mrs. Hawke was really pretty, but she was taller, and willowy—made you think of a dancer.”
“She was young when she died.”
“Yeah, only in her forties.” It still brought a little pang to her heart. “It was horrible what she went through, what Jordan went through. At the end, we were all practically camped out at the hospital, and even then…”
She gave herself a hard shake, blew out a breath. “Thats not where I was going. I meantZoe reminds me of how Mrs. Hawke was. Its that good-mother vibeZoe has. The kind of woman who knows what to do and how to do it and doesnt whine about getting it done, and still manages to love it and the kid. She and Jordan were tight, the wayZoe and Simon are. It was just the two of them. His father wasnt in the picture, not as far back as I can remember, anyway.”
“That mustve been difficult for him.”
“It wouldve been, I think, if his mother hadnt been who she was. Shed grab a bat and join in a pickup Softball game as quickly as she would whip up some cookie batter. She filled the gaps.”
“You loved her too,” Malory realized. “I did. We all did.”
Dana sat down, sipped at her second glass of wine. “So anyway, the Hawke goes off to college, gets two part-time jobs up there to help pay his expenses. We didnt see much of him the first year. He came back for summers, worked at Tonys Garage. Hes a pretty decent mechanic. Palled around with Flynn and Brad when he had the chance. Four years later, hes got his degree. He did a year and a halfpostgrad and was already getting some short stories published. Then he came home.”
She let out a long breath. “Holy Jesus, we took one look at each other, and it was like bombs exploding. I thought, What the hell is this? This my buddy Jordan. Im not supposed to want to sink my teeth into my good buddy Jordan.”
She laughed, drank. “Later on, he told me hed had the same sort of reaction. Whoa, hold on, this is Flynns little sister. Hands off. So we danced around those bombs and each other for a couple of months. We were either bitchy with each other or very, very polite.”
“And then?” Malory prompted when Dana fell silent.
“Then one night he dropped by to see Flynn, but Flynn was out on a date. And my parents werent home. I picked a fight with him. I had to do something with all that heat. The next thing you know the two of us are rolling around on the living room rug. We couldnt get enough of each other. Ive never had that before or since, that… desperation. It was incredible.
“Imagine our chagrin when the smoke cleared and the two of us were naked on Liz and Joes pretty Oriental carpet.”
“How did you handle it?” “Well, as I recall we lay there like the dead for a minute, then just stared at each other. A couple of survivors of a very intense war. Then we laughed our butts off and went at each other again.”
She lifted her glass in a mock toast. “So. We started dating, belatedly. Jordan and Dana, Dana and Jordan. It got to be like one word, whichever way you said it.”
Oh, God, she missed that, she realized. Missed that very ultimate link. “Nobody ever made me laugh the way he could make me laugh. And hes the only man in my life whos ever made me cry. So, yeah, Christ, yes, I loved that son of a bitch.”
“What happened?”
“Little things, huge things. His mother died. God, nothings ever been as, well, monstrous as that. Even when my dad got sick, it wasnt as bad. Ovarian cancer, and they found it too late. The operations, the treatments, the prayers, nothing worked. She just kept slipping away. Having someone die is hard,” she said softly. “Watching them die by inches is impossible.”
“I cant imagine it.” Malorys eyes filled with tears. “Ive never lost anyone.”
“I dont remember losing my mother; I was too young. But I remember every day of losing Mrs. Hawke. Maybe it broke something in Jordan. I dont know—he wouldnt let me know. After she died, he sold their little house, all the furniture, just about every damn thing. And he cut me loose and moved to New York to get rich and famous.”
“It wasnt as cut and dried as that,” Malory commented.
“Maybe not. But it felt like it. He said he had to go. That he needed something, and it wasnt here. If he was going to write—and he had to write—he had to do it his way. He had to get out of the Valley. So thats what he did, like the two years we were together was just a little interlude in his life.”
She downed the rest of the wine in her glass. “So fuck him, and the bestsellers he rode in on.”
“You may not want to hear this, at least not now. But part of the solution might be to resolve this with him.”
“Resolve what?”
“Dana.” Malory laid both of her hands on Danas. “Youre still in love with him.”
Her hands jerked. “I am not. I made a life for myself. Ive had lovers. I have a career—which, okay, is in the toilet right now, but Ive got a phoenix about to rise from the ashes in the bookstore.”
She stopped, hearing the way her words tumbled out. “No more wine for me if I mix metaphors that pitifully. Jordan Hawkes old news,” she said more calmly. “Just because he was the first man I loved doesnt mean he has to be the last. Id rather poke my eye with a burning stick than give him the satisfaction.”
“I know.” Malory laughed a little, gave Danas hands a squeeze before she released them. “Thats how I know youre still in love with him. That, and what I just saw on your face, heard in your voice when you took me through what you had together.”
It was appalling. How had she looked? How had she sounded? “So the wine made me sentimental. It doesnt mean—”
“It means whatever it means,” Malory said briskly. “Its something youre going to have to think about, Dana, something youre going to have to weigh carefully if you really mean to do this thing. Because one way or the other, hes part of your life, and hes part of this.”
“I dont want him to be,” Dana managed. “But if he is, Ill deal with it. Theres too much at stake for me to wimp out before I even get started.”
“Thats the spirit. Ive got to get home.”
She rose, then ran a comforting hand over Danas hair. “Whatever youre feeling or thinking, you can tell me. AndZoe . And if theres something you need to say, if you just need someone to be here when you have nothing to say, all you have to do is call.”
Dana nodded, waited until Malory was at the door. “Mal? It was like having a hole punched in my heart when he left. One hole ought to be enough for anybodys lifetime.”
“Youd think. Ill see you tomorrow.”
Chapter Three
THE odds of finding a magic key tucked in one of the thousands of books at the Pleasant Valley Library were long and daunting. But that didnt mean she couldnt look.
In any case, she liked being in the stacks, surrounded by books. She could, if she let her mind open to it, hear the words murmuring from them. All those voices from people who lived in worlds both fantastic and ordinary. She could, simply by slipping a book off the shelf, slide right into one of those worlds and become anyone who lived inside it.