Big Stone Gap Part 24

"I guess it came up all of a sudden or something."

"Could be," he says, and opens the door. Jack leans in and turns on the lights. Mrs. Mac has left a note on the front-hall table verifying what I just told him. He reads it and puts it back on the table.

It's as if I'm not even here. He isn't happy to see me, but he's not annoyed either. It's just a cordial indifference. How awful. Or is this a ploy to make me suffer? I've hurt him, so now he has to hurt me? Oh, G.o.d, he's going to make me work for this. I'm going to have to get down on my knees and beg this man to forgive me. I grab the rail on the front-porch stoop and hold it.

"Would you like to come in?" His voice is so monotone that there is no way to read whether he actually wants me to or is just being polite.

"Yes, I would."

I stand in the doorway awaiting further instruction. But he doesn't say a word. He just goes in and out of rooms, turning on lights, dropping off the lunch pail, putting the boots away, and moving the mail from the mantel to the hallway table. It is as though I'm invisible. I wish I were.

"Do you think Mama left any supper?" he asks me, finally. It's the first friendly thing he's said, but I don't trust him.

"I don't know."

"Let's check." Jack Mac goes into the kitchen. I could not feel more stupid than I do, standing here. He pokes his head out of the kitchen.

"Well, come on," he says, and goes back into the kitchen.

I follow him. Sure enough, Mrs. Mac has prepared a meal. The table is set for two, and there is a patio candle, a dark blue one, in white mesh in the middle of the table. The setup makes me feel awkward; it is almost as bad as parents fawning all over their pimply kids on prom night.

"Why don't you heat up supper and I'll start the fire?" He looks at me like I'm a moron, who can't figure out that if I came all the way up here and it's suppertime, we might as well eat. I go to the refrigerator and pull out a ca.s.serole that has the indelible ink and tape strip that says "mac 'n cheese." I preheat the oven.

What am I doing here? This is the worst idea I've ever had. I have to make a move to get out of here, and fast. I would rather die than tell him about the kiss-before-sleeping thing, or how I love the way he smells, or how I'd just as soon rip out Sarah Dunleavy's eyes as lose him to her. Why did I come up this mountain tonight? I should have just bought him a new truck and had it delivered and moved away and forgotten all about him. I am too old to be feeling this out of control. Why is he so calm? He is doing this to me on purpose. I bet he thinks this is funny. Mr. Never Without a Girlfriend. Go ahead, make fun of the Terrified Old Maid.

"I'm going to take a shower. You make the salad." He goes.

Where is the phone? I'll call Theodore and tell him to come and get me. I don't think I can drive in the state I'm in. This man has me completely and totally unglued. My hands feel numb, as though I could snap them off like rubber gloves. Jack Mac sticks his head back into the kitchen. I jump.

"Don't put any radishes in it. I hate them." He goes again.

Jesus, he popped his head in here and scared me like a lurker in a horror movie. He must have seen me jump, because it's the first time I saw him smile tonight. This is torture. Should I just leave? Why don't I? I can't. My feet won't move. Deep inside, I feel my core and it centers me. I breathe deeply and evenly, regulating my nerves and settling my heart. I check my makeup in the toaster. I look good. I can do this. I make the salad. I make the dressing. I find a bowl and put it on the table. I put the ca.s.serole in the oven. Then I choose a seat at the table and sit down. And I wait.

Finally, he comes back into the kitchen. He is freshly scrubbed and looks neat. He is dressed nicely, in a denim shirt and old jeans, but it doesn't look like he's trying too hard. He goes to the oven, pulls out the ca.s.serole, and puts it on the table. He takes a bottle of wine out of the refrigerator. Without asking me, he uncorks it.

"Wine?" he offers.

I put my face in my hands. "I'd rather have an aspirin." Now, why he finds this so amusing, I do not know. But he laughs like he thinks it is the funniest thing he's ever heard. He laughs long enough that I take offense.

"What is so funny?"

"You are."

"I'm mighty glad I'm so entertaining."

"You're more than that." Jack Mac sits down. What is he talking about? What does he mean? I feel like he's speaking a different language. There's a good starting point.

"My father told me you spoke Italian with him."

"I know a little."

"How?"

"From a book. I got the Berlitz book-and-tape series from the county library."

"Why?"

"I wanted to learn it."

"Because of me?"

"You aren't the only Italian in the world, you know."

"I didn't mean it to sound that way. I just a.s.sumed-"

"Well, don't."

I have had enough, and I haven't even been inside this old, ugly, hateful stone house for an hour. But I am not going to bite his head off. I am going to be dignified about this whole thing.

"Why are you being cruel to me?"

He thinks about this for minute. "Maybe it's self-protection."

Okay, now I get it. I hurt him, so he has to decimate me to level the playing field. How childish. How childish for a man with more gray hair than brown.

"I am not going to hurt you." I don't know why I say this, but it seems to me that this is the issue and I should address it.

"Too late for that."

He is really mad at me. I don't know how I'm going to get through to him. Or should I even keep trying? Maybe he wants me to leave, and his genteel Southern manners won't let him throw me out.

"Do you want me to go?" I ask very nicely.

"Do you want to go?"

I hate when people answer questions with questions. "No, I don't," I say to him pointedly. I don't know where that came from; I would have given my right leg to get out of here a minute ago, but somehow, hearing that I have hurt him makes me stay.

"Are you in love with Sarah Dunleavy?"

"Why are you asking?"

"Because if you are, I will take up your offer and leave."

"And if I'm not?"

"If you're not, I think we could work this thing out and you could get very lucky tonight, as your mother is out of town." Where did that come from? Thank G.o.d he's laughing, or I might have to ask where they keep the gun they use to shoot rabid dogs and just turn it on myself.

"Had I known it was that easy, I wouldn't have sold my truck." He gets up and pours himself a gla.s.s of water.

"Why did you sell your truck?" Now I'm standing. I think the two bites of macaroni helped me get my strength back. I'm ready for him now. So I keep going. "It was fully loaded. It was your dream truck. You loved that truck."

"Yeah, but I've loved you since the sixth grade."

He turns to me. I can't move. He doesn't either. He just stands there looking at me. Finally, he points to the floor in front of his feet, indicating that I should walk to him-he is not going to come to me. So I take those twelve steps and fall into his arms. I didn't think this moment would mean so much to me, but once I am in his arms, leaning against this place on his chest that I have dreamed of, there is nothing that could tear me away from him ever again. He kisses me, just like he has in my dreams every night since Iva Lou's wedding. I am so mad at myself for having wasted so much time.

It is early in the evening, and we still have a lot to talk about. We finish dinner (he is hungry, I am not). Then Jack wants to show me the house. He starts with the sunporch, which looks even cozier at night. He shows me his mother's bedroom from the doorway, a simple pale blue room. The parlor. The sitting room. And then he takes me upstairs to show me the attic, a room the size of the whole house. Mrs. Mac's quilting supplies are organized on simple wooden shelves, and there is a long farm table in the middle of the room, with chairs around it. Jack Mac explains that this is where Aunt Cecelia and various friends come and quilt. He leads me to the window, which overlooks the magnificent Powell Valley. I can see for miles; though it is dark, the faraway streetlights give the small pockets of the mountains a twinkling glow.

While we're in the attic room, he shows me some photographs in the family alb.u.m. There are pictures of his mother when she was a girl. I think she looked like Loretta Young in Call of the Wild; Jack tells me his father always thought so, too. He tells me his parents had a real love affair, and how sad she was for so long after he died.

Jack shares a little about his romantic past with me, enough to help me understand but certainly not anything to make me feel uncomfortable or envious. He confides that he was worried I'd marry Theodore and he would miss his chance with me. He has a lot of questions for me, too. He wants to know where I was going when I gave everything to Pearl. I tell him I wasn't sure. I was planning to take a long trip to Italy and then decide where to settle. He asks me if I still want to live in Big Stone Gap. I'm still not completely sure, but I am starting to see that the place didn't make me unhappy; I made me unhappy. I started to view everyday things as a burden, so they became a burden. But I tell him that it had a lot to do with my mother's death.

Jack asks me about Fred Mulligan, with whom I now feel at peace. Jack remembers him as a decent man but very stern. I agree with him. I guess I was lucky; I learned a lot from the bad stuff, too. Who would have thought meeting Mario da Schilpario would help me let go of Fred Mulligan?

I ask Jack about his father. He smiles. "The best thing a father can do for his son is love his mother. And he did that."

I think of Iva Lou telling me that Jack Mac didn't throw himself around town with the ladies indiscriminately. Maybe he's just like his father. He leads me out to the sunporch, taking the patio candle with us. We lie on the couch. He holds me. Then he tells me what's in his heart. "I'd been trying to get your attention at the Drama for years. I was always offering to stay and help with the stage crew, or I offered to bring you home a lot. Do you remember?" Now I do remember. But I never thought he was interested in me that way. I wasn't that kind of girl. I was always so busy. "You always seemed perfectly nice, but you never really paid me any mind." I didn't. I was friendly to everybody, but I never chose favorites. A little of that was Mazie Dinsmore's directing style that I imitated, and part of it was my own brand of shyness with men.

Jack continues, "And then there was that night, when Sweet Sue gave you the champagne and then the cast started teasing us and begging me to propose. That was just about the worst night of my life. Because I wanted to turn to you and say, 'You're the one I want.' Sue knew it too. That's when I decided to just be direct with you. That's when I came over and asked you to marry me."

"You thought I'd say yes and that would be it?"

"I thought you'd think about it. I didn't think you'd say no and get mad at me. But I didn't know what I was doing. I didn't understand you then. I do now. Things have to be your idea or they don't get done."

"But why then? Why did you ask me to marry you then?"

"Well, I thought I saw something different in your eyes up at the hospital after the explosion in the mine."

"I wanted to drive you home!" I offer.

"Right."

"But Sweet Sue and your mama . . ."

"I couldn't turn them away. And you looked at me as though you understood."

"I did," I say, meaning it.

"When I got home, I sat down and had a long, hard night of thinking. I realized that my life was half over. Sounds simple, but it isn't. Kept me up all night. See, I went in to help Rick, and when I got to him, I realized that at my age I might not have the strength to pull him out of there. I've been in the mines since I was eighteen. That's almost twenty years. I'm not what I was."

"But you were strong! You did save him!"

"Barely," Jack says.

"What does this have to do with me?"

Jack Mac takes a moment. "I didn't want to grow old without you."

I can't speak. As the town spinster, I had no picture of my old age. Being alone gave me a certain timelessness. I don't have the deep worry lines on my face that come from motherhood, or the soft body that comes from holding a lover or a child. I have perfect posture because I never stoop or look down. I froze myself in time, hoping it would not catch me. I was so afraid to love someone for fear I would fail.

"Are you crying?" he asks me.

"I have a feeling I'm just getting started," I tell him. He laughs. "Now, tell me how you decided to bring my family over from Italy."

"See, Iva Lou kept me informed about your search for your father. When you got in touch with him, I thought I'd take you over there to meet him. So I found Gala in the paper and called to arrange a first-cla.s.s trip for the two of us. Then I came over to your house and proposed."

"Apple b.u.t.ter Night."

"What?"

"Nothing," I say quietly.

"You said no, so I was stuck with no pride and a deluxe trip for two to Italy. Iva Lou still insisted you were in love with me. So she suggested we send the tickets over there to bring your father and grandmother over here. But you almost messed that up when you planned your own trip. We told Gala the whole story and persuaded her to invent a phony trip. You wouldn't have gotten anywhere with the tickets she sent you. They were fake."

"I know. Gala told me. But what about Zia Meoli and Zia Antonietta and Uncle Pietro?"

"Well, you saw how things work with Gala. And Iva Lou, for that matter. They s...o...b..ll. But if I was going to do this thing, I was going to do it right. I couldn't bring your father over and ignore all of your mother's people now, could I? So-"

"So," I interrupt. "You sold your truck."

"I sold my truck. The mystery is solved," Jack says simply.

Sort of.

"Why would you still go through with it after I . . ." I don't want to use the word rejected, so I don't.

"Look. I thought about giving up. It was too late; the plans were made. And I'm stubborn. I wasn't ready to give up. Iva Lou kept telling me you were in love with me but you just didn't know it yet. But faith can only go so far. Sometimes you need a little proof."

I never gave Jack a single sign. No wonder he walked away that day when my family came. He probably couldn't believe my reaction. I was grateful when I should have been loving. No man had ever given me such a gift. A priceless gift, really. He looked deep inside me and then set out to fulfill my heart's desire. And I acted as though he had dropped off a jar of apple b.u.t.ter. So he looked elsewhere for affection.

"And then Sarah Dunleavy swooped in."

"You don't know Sarah. She can't swoop. It'd mess up her hair."

"What were all of you doing up here having dinner the night I brought the fabric?"

"My mother knew her mother years ago and invited the girls to dinner. Theodore is on the Faculty Welcoming Committee. We were going to take them to the Coach House, but Mama wanted to cook. You know how she is."

"But you kept seeing her?"

"Not really. She was new in town. She called me to take her places, but I didn't call her. I liked it when you were jealous, though. It was the first sign of life I saw in you regarding me."

"What do you think took me so long?" I ask. "What took me so long to figure out I wanted you too?"

"I wish I knew." We laugh.

It takes a long time to get to Jack Mac's bedroom. (What a gentleman.) We stop and kiss every other step; sometimes we talk a bit, but mostly we just connect and connect and connect. I have dreamt of these kisses for so long that they still aren't quite real to me. I thought I had a pretty good imagination, but I am not so sure anymore. The real thing is so much better, so much more full of surprises than the stories I created in my mind's eye.

Jack's room is simple, with an old four-poster bed heaped with lush quilts, a straight-backed chair in one corner, and three windows that look out onto the long rolling field that drops off down the mountain. I won't let him draw the curtain; the view is so beautiful.