Chapter 24
Twenty-Four
PETER’S PLACE
It was a little past midnight when Goldie awoke in Peter’s bed.
He was breathing heavily, tired and satisfied from their lovemaking.
He was fit and smooth-skinned with little body hair and a smaller penis than Markie’s, but his experience and knowledge in bed were certainly equal.
Not wanting to disturb him, she slowly got out of bed, spotted a dark-green V-neck sweater lying across a chair, and slipped it on.
It covered a few cute moles on her stomach and her round bottom and stopped about six inches above her knees.
She had a slight case of bedhead, but her unruly dark-brown, long hair looked sexy.
With her arms crossed, she looked over her shoulder at her sleeping lover as a naughty new headline popped into her head for the article he’d written about her:
Reporter dips pen in journalist’s inkwell.
She smiled a little, then stepped out of the bedroom.
Peter’s house was built in 1868 but wasn’t one of the larger Victorian-style two-story houses like his parents, or Martha Eggleston’s, or Jason Shirk’s.
It was a single-story miner’s cottage, and the town still had about a dozen of them standing.
Most had been washed away during the dam collapse and flood of 1884.
The cottage was about 900 square feet and consisted of a living room with a fireplace, a small kitchen in the back, an added-on bathroom with a shower but no tub, and a bedroom.
The living room had once been divided into a living room and a second bedroom for children, but this second bedroom had been removed to expand the living room.
Peter told Goldie that once upon a time, a family of five used to live in the small house.
But now, half of the living room had a sofa facing the fireplace where pine logs still glowed with subtle orange heat, while the other half had been converted into an office with a desk, chair, telephone, radio, typewriter, and a bookcase filled with books.
Between the books at his office and home, it was very obvious that Peter was a voracious reader.
Goldie looked at the fire for a moment and decided to add another log from the brick hearth.
She wandered around the living room, trying to get a better sense of Peter’s life.
Her knees and bare feet were a little cold on this December night, but her curiosity about the man she had just had sex with superseded the chill.
She noticed he had no Christmas decorations up but made no judgment about that.
She wandered into the kitchen, figuring he probably had some liquor somewhere.
After turning on a light and opening a couple of cabinets, she found a bottle of Jack Daniel’s and made herself a whiskey on the rocks.
After that, she left the lights on in the kitchen, went back into the living room, and, just as she had at his office, began to examine some of the books on his shelves.
A couple of Manila folders were sitting on top of the books.
She picked one up, set her drink down on the desk, and then sat in the chair behind it.
She reached over and pulled the chain of a small desk lamp for light.
Opening the folder, she looked inside. It was apparently the beginning of either a short story or a novel Peter was writing.
Interested, she picked up her drink and started to sip and read while the fire on the other side of the room began to crackle back to life.
About thirty minutes later, Peter awoke, realized he was alone, and rolled out of bed.
He went to his closet and slipped on a blue robe, then emerged from the bedroom to see Goldie standing with her back to him in the living room.
The room was now dark except for the light from the fire, and she was staring out at the night from one of his two living room windows on either side of the front door.
The evening was still and frozen with the snow occasionally sparkling from a waning moon that peeked in and out of clouds.
He saw that the fire had been resurrected and that there was an empty glass sitting on a small table at the end of the sofa.
Then he glanced over at his desk. The desk light was off, and everything was as he had left it.
“Hey,” he said warmly. “What’re you doing?”
She looked over her shoulder and smiled. “Just watchin’ the night. It’s so peaceful and there’s a few snowflakes floatin’ around here and there; romantic and forbiddin’ all at once. It’s like we’re the only two people in the whole world.”
He came up behind her while she continued to look out the window and cupped her breasts with his hands, then noticed she was wearing his sweater, which really appealed to him.
“You were absolutely incredible tonight,” he said softly, kissing her neck. “You took my breath away.”
“Did I?” she asked with uncertainty. “I haven’t been with another man except my former boyfriend for a long time. I don’t know what you must think of me now.”
“What do you mean?” he asked, still holding her close.
“I don’t know about the morality of this—” she was going to say “time,” but paused and changed it to “town.”
“It’s pretty much like anywhere else,” he replied softly.
“There are liberal views and conservative views. The norms of society might say that a ‘good girl’ waits until marriage to be intimate with a man, but that doesn’t always happen.
Especially with a war on. It certainly doesn’t mean the good girl is anything less. It just means she’s human.”
“You’re a gentleman to say it.” She patted his hands, still holding her breasts, but wanted to move away, so he let go.
“I have no idea if I’m a good girl or not,” she continued, “but I certainly needed tonight. There’s been a lot of weird things happenin’ in my life and I—well—it was nice just to be desired and held for a while.”
“Oh, you were definitely desired,” he affirmed.
She looked toward the bedroom. “I’ve gotta get dressed. You’ve gotta get me back to the hotel.”
“What? No. Stay the night.”
“I can’t. People are already goin’ to talk about how late I returned to my room. I don’t even know if the front doors at the hotel are still open this late.”
“I think somebody is usually at the front desk all night,” he said.
“Then, I need to get back.”
“Well, wait a minute,” he implored. “Can’t we talk about a few things first?”
“Like what?”
“Uh… did you… I mean, was I…”
“Yes, Peter. You’re a wonderful lover,” she assured.
He smiled and tightened the belt of his robe. “Good… ah, that’s good. Eh… do you have any idea how much longer you’re going to stay in town? Not-not that I want you to leave, or anything.”
“My understanding is I’m supposed to stay until I believe I’ve gathered enough material for my article, and I’ve pretty much done that. I don’t think I can impose on the historical society’s generosity much longer. It’s time to use the rest of my plane ticket.”
“Well, you at least have to stay another week. The Tour of Homes is next weekend. That’s the pinnacle of the Christmas season.”
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
In truth, she wanted to stay longer to see what Evie Hines was going to do. But she couldn’t admit that.
“Then there’s us,” he reminded. “I just slept with you, Goldie. I have no desire to be two ships passing in the night.”
“I don’t see how we could be anything else,” she replied honestly.
“Yes, I know. You’ve said you’ve got concerns. One was distance. But planes fly all the time. Trains are always available, too. Then you said you didn’t care much for my dad. Well, I don’t either. We’ve laid those cards out on the table. We can work around them. At least, I want to.”
“There’s more to it,” she said, starting for the bedroom. “C’mon. We’ve got to get dressed.”
“Like what?” he asked, following after her. Then an idea came to him.
“Oh, I get it. Your old boyfriend. You’re still keeping a candle in the window for him.”
Goldie turned on the bedroom light and pulled Peter’s sweater up and over her head. Now seeing her naked as she looked around for her underwear, he started to become aroused again, but wanted an answer to his question.
“No,” she said, seeing her waist-high panties and slipping them on. “God, these are dreadful,” she mumbled, referring to the underwear. “No. I have no desire to keep a candle in the window for my old boyfriend. Unless I use it to set him on fire.”
“Then what?” he pressed. “Unless you just don’t want the bother of a long-distance relationship.”
She spotted his white boxer shorts on the bedroom floor, picked them up, and handed them to him.
“Get dressed, please.”
The following morning, after breakfast, Goldie came out of the hotel restaurant and into the lobby, which was decorated to the hilt for Christmas.
There was a nine-foot Christmas tree that Josie had decorated where the rounded crimson sofa had been, big red bows hung from the candle-like wall sconces, and pine roping was draped in graceful dips and tacked under the registration counter.
Behind the counter, Maddie lowered her glasses at Goldie as she approached.
“I hear somebody came in very late last night,” she noted in a sing-song voice.
“Yes, but it was all perfectly innocent,” Goldie offered, feeling like she had to say something diffusing. “Did you and Dean go to the dance?”
“No, we were here. But I heard it was a big success. And I hear a woman named Lupe won the gingerbread contest.”
“She did, and she was thrilled,” Goldie confirmed. “It technically wasn’t a gingerbread house, but it was very patriotic and appropriate. Oh, that reminds me. Stephie Banyan lent me one of her dresses for the dance. Would it be possible to get it cleaned before I return it to her?”
“Sure thing, honey. Is it up in your room?”
“Yes, a long black dress with long sleeves hanging on one of the hooks.”
“I’ll make sure it’s taken care of.”
“Thanks, Maddie,” Goldie smiled.
Just then, Josie appeared from a doorway behind the counter, dressed in a long black wig, a full-length blue-and-white gown that looked like it was from biblical times, and a pillow tucked under her outfit so she looked very pregnant. In addition to her costume, she carried a winter overcoat.
“Ah, Mary,” Goldie recognized. “Heading off to Bethlehem?”
“If Joseph ever shows up,” she replied.
“Josie and her beau, Dexter, are doing a nativity play over at the Episcopal church,” Maddie explained. “She even rides a real donkey.”
“Sound like fun,” Goldie enthused.
“Depends on the mood of the donkey,” Josie replied.
“Last year, it kicked one of the performers, and we had to get by with only two wise men,” Maddie recalled.
Just then, Josie’s boyfriend, Dexter, came through the front doors of the lobby. He was wearing biblical robes, his high school varsity jacket over them, and had a beard with a string tie hanging loosely around his neck.
“Hi, everyone,” he greeted.
“You’re late,” Josie answered disapprovingly.
“Eh, sorry. Ran into a troop of Roman soldiers.” He smiled at Goldie. “Some biblical humor there.”
“An oxymoron if ever there was one,” she quipped.
“Have you got your father’s camera?” Josie asked.
“In the car,” Dexter said.
“With the flash attachment?”
“Yes.”
“And color film. They want color film this year.”
“Yes,” her boyfriend replied wearily.
A guest came up to the counter, so Maddie excused herself to wait on them. “Well, good luck. Break a leg or whatever you’re supposed to break.”
As Josie came around the counter, Goldie formulated an idea.
“Hey, would you guys be up for a little adventure? Not today, but soon. There’s money in it for you.”
“Extra money? Sure,” Josie said. “Do I have to dress up as something?”
“No. Not this time.”
“What do we have to do?” Dexter asked.