risk her rejection. My pattern had always been the same. When I didn't care whether a woman rejected me, I always took the chance. When I did care and knew rejection would cut me, I always held back.
'What are you thinking about?' she asked.
'Nothing,' I lied. 'My brother I guess.'
'Why don't you tell that story?'
'What story?'
'The other day. You were about to tell me something good about him. The nicest thing he ever did for you. What made him a saint.'
I looked across the table at her. I knew the story instantly but thought about it before speaking. I could've easily lied and told her the nicest thing he did was just love me but I trusted her. We trust the things we find beautiful, the things we want. And maybe I wanted to confess to somebody after so many years.
'The nicest thing he ever did was not blame me.'
'For what?'
'Our sister died when we were kids. It was my fault. He knew. He was the only one who really knew. And her. But he never blamed me and he never told anyone. In fact, he took on half the guilt. That was the nicest thing.'
She leaned forward across the table with a pained look on her face. I think she would have made a good, sympathetic psychologist if she had followed that path.
'What happened, Jack?'
'She fell through the ice at the lake. The same place where Sean's body was found. She was bigger than me, older. We'd gone out there with our parents. We had a camper and my folks were making lunch or something. Me and Sean were outside and Sarah was watching us. I ran out on the frozen lake. Sarah ran out after me to stop me from going too far out, to where the ice was thin. Only she was older and bigger and heavier and she fell through. I started screaming. Sean started screaming. My father and some other people there tried but they couldn't get to her in time…'
I drank from my coffee cup but it was empty. I looked at her and continued.
'Anyway, everybody was asking what happened, you know, and I couldn't… I couldn't talk. And he-Sean-said we had both been out on the ice and then when Sarah came out it cracked and she fell through. It was a lie and I don't know if my parents ever believed it. I don't think they did. But he did it for me. It was like he was willing to share the guilt with me, make it easier by half.'
I stared into my empty cup. Rachel said nothing.
'You might've made it big as a shrink. That's a story I've never told anyone.'
'Well, I think telling it might've just been something you felt you owed your brother. Maybe a way of thanking him.'
The waiter placed a check on our table and thanked us. I opened my wallet and put a credit card down on top of it. I can think of a better way to thank him, I thought.
After we stepped off the elevator I became nearly paralyzed with fear. I couldn't bring myself to act on my desire. We moved to her door first. She pulled the card key from her pocket and looked up at me. I hesitated, said nothing.
'Well,' she said after a long moment. 'I guess we start early tomorrow. Do you eat breakfast?'
'Just coffee, usually.'
'Okay, well, I'll call you and maybe if there's time we can grab a cup.'
I nodded, too overrun with the embarrassment of my failure and cowardice to say anything.
'Good night, Jack.'
' 'Night,' I managed to say before walking off down the hall.
I sat on the edge of the bed watching CNN for a half hour, hoping to see the report she had mentioned or anything to take my mind off the disastrous end of the night. Why is it, I wondered, that it is the ones who mean so much that are the hardest to reach out to? Some deep instinct told me that the moment in the hall had been the time, the right moment. And I had ignored it. I had run from it. And now I feared that my failure would haunt me forever. Because that instinct might never come back.
I don't think I heard the first knock. Because the one that raised me from my dark reverie was very loud and surely not the first effort. It had the urgency of a third or fourth knock. Jarred by the intrusion, I quickly turned off the TV and went to the door, opening it without looking through the peephole. It was her.
'Rachel.'
'Hi.'
'Hi.'
'I, uh, thought I'd give you a chance to redeem yourself. That is, if you wanted to.'
I looked at her and a dozen responses went through my mind, all engineered to neatly put the ball back in her court and make her make the move. But the instinct came back and I knew what she wanted and what I needed to do.
I stepped toward her and put an arm behind her back and kissed her. Then I pulled her into the room and closed the door.
'Thank you,' I whispered.
Almost nothing was said after that. She hit the light switch, then led me to the bed. She put her arms around my neck and pulled me down into a long, deep kiss. We fumbled with each other's clothes and then decided wordlessly to just take off our own. It was faster.
'Do you have something?' she whispered. 'You know, to use?'
Crestfallen by the consequences of my inaction earlier, I shook my head no and was about to offer to go to the drugstore, a trip that I knew would destroy the moment.
'I think I might,' she said.
She pulled her purse onto the bed and I heard the zipper of an interior pocket opening. She then pressed the plastic condom package into my palm.
'Always keep one for emergencies,' she said with a smile in her voice.
We made love after that. Slowly, smiling in the shadows of the room. I think of it now as a wonderful moment, perhaps the most erotic and passionate hour of my life. In reality, though, when I strip the gauze from the memory, I know it was a nervous hour with both of us seemingly too eager and willing to please the other and perhaps thereby robbing ourselves of some of the true enjoyment of the moment. My sense of Rachel was that she was craving the intimacy of the act, not as much the sensual pleasure as the closeness with another human being. It was that way for me as well, but I also found a deep carnal desire for her body. She had wide and dark areolas on small breasts, a lovely rounded stomach with soft hair below it. As we found each other's rhythm her face flushed and became warm. She was beautiful and I told her so. But this seemed only to embarrass her and she pulled me down into an embrace so that I could not see her face. My face in her hair, I smelled the scent of apples.
Afterward, she rolled onto her stomach and I lightly rubbed her back.
'I want to be with you after this,' I said.
She didn't answer but that was okay. I knew that what we had just shared was genuine. She slowly pulled herself up into a sitting position.
'What is it?'
'I can't stay. I want to but I can't. I should be in my own room in the morning in case Bob calls. He'll want to talk before the meeting with the locals and he said he'd call.'
Disappointed, I wordlessly watched her dress. She moved about in the darkness skillfully, knowing her way. When she was finished, she bent down and lightly kissed me on the lips.
'Go to sleep.'
'I will. You, too.'
But after she was gone I couldn't sleep. I felt too good. I felt reaffirmed and filled with an unexplainable joy. Every day you fight death with life and what is more vital in life than the physical act of love? My brother and all that had happened seemed far away.
I rolled to the side of the bed and picked up the phone. Full of myself, I wanted to tell her these thoughts. But after eight rings she didn't pick up and the operator answered.
'Are you sure that was Rachel Walling's room?'
