knew better than anyone that they were just a string of one-night stands. He hadn’t had a serious relationship in years. He was beginning to think he was ready for one now. He knew he hadn’t met the “who” yet, but the rest was coming clear, since the terrorists had taken over the network.
They arrived at the restaurant, and when April saw them getting out of the car, she came out to meet them and helped Jack in. She had given him a table with easy access, and was happy to see her mother. Together they settled Jack on a banquette, with his injured leg on a chair. He said it worked, and Valerie sat next to him on the banquette. It was a cozy table, but everyone in the room had recognized him when he walked in. Even on crutches, he was a striking man. He was six four and still weighed 240 pounds. Her mother was a tall woman, but she was dwarfed beside him, as was April. And of course people had recognized Valerie too. They always did.
April had gained a little weight recently, and she was losing her waistline, but in the apron she wore constantly, so far no one had noticed. It would be a while still before the baby showed. She knew she would have a lot to explain then. No one had any idea what was coming.
Jack ordered all his favorites that night for dinner. He had crab salad, and hot, fresh Maine lobster. Her mother had a cheeseburger, which she said she had been craving for days. And they shared a double order of April’s delicious French fries. And after serious debate between a chocolate souffle and a leftover Yule log, they decided to share a hot fudge sundae instead. Each of them was delighted with what they ate, and spent ten minutes praising April.
“So tell me about your show,” he said to Valerie, as they dove into the hot fudge sundae. And April had left a plate of homemade chocolates on their table for good measure, with truffles and delicate butter cookies she had learned how to make in France. “How did you get to be the authority on everything in the home?”
“God knows. I was a decorator for a few years, and I always had lots of ideas about how to set a beautiful table, and what a home should look like. We didn’t have any money when we started out, and I was always figuring out how to make things pretty on a budget, and making things myself. Friends started asking for advice, and how I could help them. I did a couple of weddings. I wrote some books, wound up on the network, and presto magic, I became the guru for gracious living.” She made it sound a lot simpler than it was. She had put a huge amount of thought into her work over the years, and was always trying out new things and doing careful research even now. And she was willing to work harder and longer than anyone else, and make whatever sacrifice she had to. That had been an important part of her success. She was extremely disciplined about her work.
“Yeah, like I wound up in the Hall of Fame.” He laughed at what she had said. “I kicked a couple of balls around a football field, made a couple of touchdowns, and there I was. Valerie, nobody knows better than I do that it’s not that easy. I worked my ass off in the NFL, and everybody tells me you work like a dog. Just like your daughter, look at her, she hasn’t sat down all night. In the end, I think we both know that hard work wins the prize.” Even as a sportscaster he had worked hard, and the interviews she had seen him do recently were good. The ratings loved him. “Let me ask you something: How many football games have you been to in your life?” She was embarrassed at the question. She knew nothing about sports. “Honestly. Don’t lie,” he warned her with a smile. “I’ll know.”
“Honestly? Two.” And she had never seen him play, although she knew he was a legend.
“Pro or college?”
“College. When I was in college myself.”
“We have to do something about that.” He thought about it for a moment. It was a very different move for him, but why not? They had both just gotten a new lease on life. “How would you like to come to the Super Bowl with me? You can have your own room of course,” he reassured her. “I have to work, but Super Bowl’s about as good as it gets. You might have fun. I’m going to Miami for it in four weeks. I just hope I can get around better by then. But whether I can or not, I have to go. They want me back on deck for that.”
Valerie hesitated for only a fraction of a second and then laughed. “I’d love to. I’ll try to take some kind of crash course before I go.”
“You don’t have to. I’ll explain it to you when we’re there.”
She laughed out loud then. “I’ve been telling people how to do Super Bowl parties for years. You’re going to make me an honest woman.”
“It’s about goddamn time. My son always comes down with me. I hope you don’t mind. He’s a great kid. He probably knows even less about football than you do. He hates sports, probably thanks to me. But he thinks the Super Bowl is fun. He used to come when I played. I guess it was pretty rowdy for him. And it still is. Every time I go, I wish I were still playing. It’s hard to give all that up. I played in four winning Super Bowls. It doesn’t get sweeter than that. I’m glad I retired when I did, but I still miss it sometimes. Who wouldn’t? Being a sportscaster is great, but it’s not like being in the game.”
“Sometimes I feel that way,” she admitted to him, “when I see young women just starting out on their careers. It’s hard to get older.” They both looked at April as they said it. To them, she looked like a child, and in some ways she was.
“I used to tell myself I was still young, but this last birthday kind of brought me up short,” Jack admitted.
“So did mine,” she said, laughing ruefully, “especially when they announced it on the radio. I was ready to kill someone when I saw you in the elevator that day, except I felt so sorry for you, all hunched over.”
He laughed now when he thought of it, his night with Catwoman and the disastrous result. “I think that was my last fling with youth. After that, I figured maybe it was time to grow up. Living through the terrorist takeover at the network was an epiphany for me about what matters and what doesn’t. Some of the things I’ve done were pretty dumb. Basically, I destroyed my marriage in order to show off.” What he said struck a familiar chord for her, she had done some of that herself, although Pat had been nice about it. Her day as a hostage and the lives lost had sparked an epiphany for her too. And she realized now that most of her decisions while she was married to him were about what was good for her and her career, not him or their marriage. She couldn’t help wondering now if she’d been wrong, and regretting some of it.
“I pretty much wrecked my marriage in order to build my career,” she confessed ruefully, but with her usual honesty about herself. “Although I was married to the wrong man. It never really worked. He’s a wonderful person, but we were much too different. He admits now that I scared him to death. He wanted more children, and now I wish I’d had them. But I wanted to build an empire, and I did. You sacrifice a lot for that, and I’m not sure it’s worth it. I love my work, and I still have a good time doing it, but that’s not all there is. It’s taken me this long to figure that out,” Valerie said with a candor and openness that impressed Jack.
“Yeah, me too,” Jack admitted. “Life isn’t just about having fun. Or that’s all you wind up with. A lot of good- time Charlies hanging around to cash in on you, and a lot of very pretty empty-headed girls who’re there for a free ride. That gets old. Maybe I did myself a favor on my birthday when I threw my back out. The two weeks I spent in bed feeling sorry for myself gave me time to think.”
“I’ve thought about it a lot in recent years, but by now I don’t know what else to do,” Valerie said quietly. “My marriage has been over for twenty-three years. April’s all grown up and doesn’t need me. Now all I’ve got left is work, and it’s what I do best.” Jack looked at her thoughtfully as she said it. What she said made sense to him too.
“I think what you need in your life now, Valerie, is football,” he teased her again. “We’ll get you a total immersion course in Miami next month. In exchange, you can teach me how to set a table.” But even though he was being playful with her about it, he had enormous respect for the career she had built. Hers was a name that absolutely everybody knew. She was truly the world authority on gracious living. There wasn’t a girl in America who planned her wedding without one of Valerie’s books. It was easy to pooh-pooh it, but she was an industry unto herself. She was a business, a star, an icon, and a legend all her own, just as he was and had been. In their own way, they were both in the Hall of Fame, but in the end, they had both figured out that as exciting as it could be at times, it just wasn’t enough. Pat had figured that out when they split up and he married Maddie, and went on to have more kids with a woman whose greatest joy in life was their family and marriage. They talked about things the way he and Valerie never had. Most of Valerie’s decisions had been unilateral based on what was good for her career. At the time, it had been heady stuff. It was too late to go back and turn it around, and she wasn’t sorry she’d done it. But some of the sacrifices she’d made, and the choices, no longer made quite as much sense.
Jack Adams was in a similar situation to hers. He had opted for a lifetime of fun, and he didn’t regret it, but at fifty, there was no one important in his life, except his son. And he had never slowed down long enough to marry again and have more children. He had told himself he would one day, and the women he went out with were young
