Julia walked over to him wearing an old Selinsgrove High School T-shirt and a pair of running shorts that had St. Joe’s cheekily sewn onto the seat.
(To Paul’s eyes, she was Helen of Troy in leisurewear.)
“You can’t sleep, either?” She pulled out a chair to sit next to him.
“Dad had a problem with one of the cows. Heath Bar Crunch?” He dished up a large spoonful of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream and held it out to her.
It was her favorite flavor. She gently took the spoon out of his hand.
“Mmmmm,” she groaned, eyes closed. She opened her eyes and handed back the spoon, resisting the urge to lick it clean.
Paul put the spoon in the bowl and stood up. She blinked at him and instinctively moved back in her chair.
“Julia,” he whispered, pulling her to her feet. He pushed her hair behind her shoulders, noting that she didn’t flinch when he did so. Their upper bodies grazed one another. He looked into her eyes with an expression of heated intensity. “I don’t want to say good-bye.”
Her face crinkled up into a smile. “We won’t be saying good-bye. We’ll email and talk on the phone. If you come to Boston, we’ll see each other.”
“I don’t think you understand.”
Julia freed her wrist from Paul’s hand, stepping back. “It’s because of Allison, isn’t it? I don’t want to create trouble for you. Dad and I can make the trip by ourselves.”
She waited patiently for his response, but instead of looking relieved, he looked conflicted.
“This isn’t about Allison.”
“It isn’t?”
“Do you really have to ask me that?” He took another step toward her. “Don’t you know?”
Leery of rejection, he raised his hands slowly and cupped her face. Her fine features were engulfed by his large hands. He held her tenderly, worried about such fragility underneath his grasp, and slowly began to stroke her face with his thumbs.
Julia tore her eyes away from his. “Paul, I—”
“Let me say this,” he interrupted forcefully. “Just once, let me tell you how I feel.” He inhaled and waited until she met his gaze again before he spoke.
“I’m in love with you. I don’t want to be apart from you because I love you. The thought of having to leave you in Cambridge is tearing me up.”
Julia inhaled slowly and began to shake her head.
“Just hear me out. I know that you aren’t in love with me. I know it’s too soon. But do you think that you could be—in time?”
She closed her eyes. Her mind raced ahead to envision a future she hadn’t previously considered—a crossroads of possibilities. She thought of what it would be like to love Paul, to be held and kissed by him, to have him take her to his bed upstairs and make love to her, gently and sweetly. For she knew above all things that Paul would be sweet.
He would want marriage, of course, and children. But he would be proud of her academic career and support her in it.
She found herself unrepulsed by these images, for they were good. She could have a contented life with a decent man who had never done her ill and who, she knew, would probably never so much as hurt her feelings as long as he lived. She could have a good life with him.
He lifted her chin and she opened her eyes.
“There won’t be drama and fights and exes like Professor Pain. I will treat you respectfully, and I will never, ever leave you.
“Choose me,” he whispered, his eyes deep and intense. “Choose me and I will give you a happy life. You’ll never have to cry yourself to sleep again.”
Tears began to stream down her face. She knew that what he was saying was true. But knowing the truth and wanting the truth are two very different things.
“I’m not like him. I’m not an inferno that blazes and dies out. I’m constant. I’ve held back because I knew that you only wanted to be friends. But just once, I’d like to be able to show you what I feel without holding back.”
He took her silence as acquiescence and wrapped his arms around her. He bent down so their lips could meet and poured all his passion and love for her into a single kiss. Paul’s mouth was warm and inviting. What began as a gentle contact quickly became urgent with desire.
With a split-second decision, she opened to him, tentatively, and his tongue quickly entered and met hers, his hands ending up in her hair. There was no domination, no pressing of boundaries, nothing overwhelming or crass.
Paul kissed her for as long as he could without becoming obscene, then slowly lessened the pressure of his lips on hers, pecking her briefly before moving his lips to her ear. “I love you, Julia. Say that you’ll be mine. You won’t regret it.”
Julia tightened her arms around him as the tears fell.
Chapter 41
Over breakfast the next morning, Louise Norris looked with concern between her son and the young woman he loved. Her husband, Ted, tried to keep the conversation moving by talking about the ill cow he’d tended to the night before. Tom tried to cram a homemade doughnut into his mouth without appearing like a barbarian, and failed.
After breakfast, the kitchen emptied like a galleon full of rats docking in a new port, leaving Paul and Julia sitting across from one another, each fidgeting with their coffee mugs and avoiding one another’s eyes.
Julia broke the silence. “I’m so sorry.”
“Me too.”
She chewed on her lip as her eyes darted to meet his, wondering if he was angry or bitter. Or both.
But he wasn’t. His dark eyes were still kind, but he appeared defeated. “I had to try, you know? I didn’t want to wait until you’d found someone else. But I won’t bring it up again.” He pursed his lips, and a resigned expression passed over his face. “You don’t need to worry about me embarrassing you.”
Julia leaned over the table and took his hand in hers. “I wasn’t embarrassed. I know that we would have had a good life together. I care for you too. But you deserve more. You deserve to have a life with someone who will love you the same way that you love her.”
Paul released her hand and walked away.
* * *
“Care to explain why he’s so quiet?” Tom turned to Julia as they waited for Paul to come out of the men’s room at a gas station in New Hampshire.
“He wants more than I can give him.”
Tom squinted at something in the distance. “He seems like a good man. He comes from a good family. What’s the problem? Got a thing against cows?”
He was trying to make her laugh, but it had the opposite effect. He quickly held his hands up in surrender. “What do I know? I thought the senator’s son was a good match for you. So I guess I’m a horse’s ass.”
Before Julia could disagree, Paul returned to the U-Haul, ending the heart to heart conversation between father and daughter.
* * *
Two days later Julia stood on the front steps of her new building, saying good-bye to Paul, feeling worse than she had when she rejected him in his parents’ kitchen. He hadn’t been cold, or rude, or resentful. He hadn’t shirked any responsibilities in terms of driving from Vermont to Cambridge, or unloading Julia’s things.
He’d even gone out of his way to set up a job interview for her at the trendy coffee shop across the street. The former occupant of the apartment had just quit her job there. Paul hoped that Julia could replace her, knowing that she needed the money.
He’d slept on the floor in Julia’s small apartment and never complained. He’d been perfect, actually. And that made Julia almost feel as if she should change her mind.
It would be safer, easier, to choose Paul. Her heart would heal with him. But in choosing Paul, she would be settling for the good and not the exceptional. And even if the exceptional eluded her for the rest of her life, it would be better, she thought, to live the life of a Katherine Picton, than to be like her mother. In marrying a good man without loving him passionately and completely, she would only serve to short-change him and herself. And she was not that selfish.
“Good-bye.” He hugged her tightly and released her, watching her expression carefully. Perhaps he was looking to see if she’d changed her mind.
“Good-bye. Thanks for everything. I don’t know what I would have done without you, all these months—”
He shrugged. “This is what friends do.”
Paul saw her eyes fill with tears and gave her a very worried expression. “We’re still friends, aren’t we?”
“Of course we are.” Julia sniffled. “You’ve been a great friend to me, and I hope that we can still be friends, even though…” She didn’t finish her sentence, and Paul nodded as if he was grateful she hadn’t.
With much hesitation he reached out to stroke her cheek one last time. Then he walked toward the car where his friend Patrick was waiting. Patrick was going to drive him back to Vermont.
Suddenly, Paul stopped. He turned around and walked back to Julia, nervously.
“I didn’t want to mention this in front of your father, so I was waiting until after he left. Then I thought maybe I shouldn’t say anything at all.” Paul looked away, up Mount Auburn Street, seemingly struggling with something.
“What is it?”