(7)
— Originally publshed in The MacGuffin, Spring 2004
Continued from page (6)
“What’re the rooms like?” she said, breathless. “Must be lush.”
A blonde, tanned waitress came up, smiling.
Roxie glanced at the waitress and said in a small voice to Jamey,
“What’re you having?”
He pondered. “Gimlet.”
“Perfect."”
When the waitress padded away, Roxie sighed. “This is as good as it
gets.”
By the time their drinks arrived, his eyes had wandered to the waves
shattering against crags. “La Mer,” Sissy had said. “You see where Debussy
got it.”
“So cozy,” Roxie said, hugging herself. “Just the three of us. She was
elegant, wasn’t she? Delicate. Dramatic. Ethereal.”
“How did you know?”
“It’s always that way. Never date a widower. Competition holds all the
cards.”
“We’re dating?”
“Hope not. We’d have a sourpuss for a chaperone.”
He shifted away from her toward the horizon. “Stop it.”
“Sorry.” She sucked a few drops into her mouth and set her glass
down. “Bet your room has a Jacuzzi.”
“And a fireplace.”
“Isn’t that a bit much for one guy alone?”
“It’s what we had.”
She squelched a giggle and dug in her purse. “I snitched a brochure in
the lobby. It says the room décor is crimson and ivory with celadon accents.
What’s celadon?”
“Willow-green.”
“Where’d the two of you live?” Roxie asked.
“Berkeley.”
“In the hills? Figures. Bet you had a grand piano next to the glass wall
overlooking the bay.”
He smiled inadvertently. “No.”
“She didn’t play?”
“We had an upright. No glass wall. No view of the bay.”
“She didn’t work?”
He shook his head.
TOM'S TALES