Too Good to Be True

The fanatical blue eyes narrowed. “I don’t get the impression you’ve truly embraced God, Grace.” He frowned.

Okay. Enough was enough. “Well, Leon, let’s be honest. You’ve known me forty-two minutes. How the hell would you know?”

At the H-E-double hockey sticks word, Leon reared back. “Blasphemer!” he hissed. “I’m sorry, Grace! We do not have a future together! You’re going straight to you-know-where.” He stood up abruptly.

“Judge not,” I reminded him. “Nice meeting you, and good luck with finding someone,” I said. I was pretty sure God would be proud. Not just a quote from the Good Book, but turning the other cheek and everything.

Safely in my car, I saw with dismay that it was only eight o’clock. Only eight, and already I’d been in a fire and condemned to hell…and still no boyfriend. I sighed.

Well. I knew a good cure for loneliness, and its name was Golden Meadows. Twenty minutes later, I was sitting in Room 403.

“Her white satin chemise slid to the floor in a seductive whisper.” I paused, glanced at my one-person audience, then continued. “His eyes grew cobalt with desire, his loins burning at the sight of her creamy décolletage. ‘I am yours, my lord,’ she said, her lips ripe with sultry promise. Reaching for her breast, his mind raced… Okay, that’s a dangling participle if I ever heard one. His mind did not, I assure you, reach for her breast.”

Another glance at Mr. Lawrence revealed the same level of attention as before—that is to say, none. Mr.

Lawrence was nonverbal, a tiny, shrunken man with white hair and vacant eyes, hands that constantly plucked at his clothes and the arms of his easy chair. In all the months I’d been reading to him, I had never heard him speak.

Hopefully, he was enjoying our sessions on some level and not mentally screaming for James Joyce. “Well. Back to our story. His mind raced. Dare he take the promise of forbidden passion and sheath his rock-hard desire in the heaven of her soft and hidden treasure?”

“I think he should go for it.”

I jumped, dropping my tawdry paperback. Callahan O’ Shea stood in the doorway, shrinking the size of the room.

“Irish! What are you doing here?” I asked.

“What are you doing here, is a better question.”

“I’m reading to Mr. Lawrence. He likes it.” Hopefully Mr. Lawrence wouldn’t lurch out of his two-year silence and deny that fact. “He’s part of my reading program.”

“Is that right? He’s also my grandfather,” Callahan said, crossing his arms.

My head jerked back in surprise. “This is your grandfather?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Oh. Well, I read to…to patients sometimes.”

“To everyone?”

“No,” I answered. “Just the patients who don’t get—” My voice broke off midsentence.

“Who don’t get visitors,” Callahan finished.

“Right,” I acknowledged.

I had started my little reading program about four years ago when Mémé first moved here. Having visitors was a huge status symbol at Golden Meadows, and one day I’d wandered into this unit—the secure unit—and found that too many folks were alone, their families too far to visit often or just unable to stand the sadness of this wing.

So I started reading. Granted, My Lord’s Wanton Desire wasn’t a classic—not in literary terms, anyway—but it did seem to keep the attention of my listeners. Mrs. Kim in Room 39 had actually wept when Lord Barton popped the question to Clarissia.

Callahan pushed off from the doorway and came into the room. “Hi, Pop,” he said, kissing the old man’s head.

His grandfather didn’t acknowledge him. My eyes stung a little as Cal looked at the frail old man, who, as always, was neatly dressed in trousers and a cardigan.

“Well, I’ll leave you two alone,” I said, getting up.

“Grace.”

“Yes?”

“Thank you for visiting him.” He hesitated, then looked up at me and smiled, and my heart swelled. “He liked biographies, back in the day.”

“Okay,” I said. “Personally, I think the duke and the prostitute are a little more invigorating, but if you say so.” I paused. “Were you guys close?” I found myself asking.

“Yes,” he answered. Callahan’s expression was unreadable, his eyes on his grandfather’s face as the old man plucked at his sweater. Callahan put his hand over the old man’s, stilling the nervous, constant movement. “He raised us. My brother and me.”

I hesitated, wanting to be polite, but curiosity got the better of me. “What happened to your parents?” I asked.

“My mother died when I was eight,” he said. “I never met my father.”

“I’m sorry.” He nodded once in acknowledgment. “What about your brother? Does he live around here?”

Cal’s face hardened. “I think he’s out West. He’s…estranged. There’s just me.” He paused, his face softening as he looked at his grandfather.

I swallowed. Suddenly, my family seemed pretty damn wonderful, despite Mom and Dad’s constant bickering, Mémé’s stream of criticism. The aunts and uncles, mean old Cousin Kitty…and my sisters, of course, that primal, ferocious love I felt for both my sisters. I couldn’t imagine being estranged from either of them, ever.

“I’m sorry,” I said again, almost in a whisper.

Cal looked up, then gave a rueful laugh. “Well. I had a normal enough childhood. Played baseball. Went camping. Fly-fishing. The usual boy stuff.”

“That’s good,” I said. My cheeks burned. The sound of Callahan’s laugh reverberated in my chest. No denying it. I found Mr. O’ Shea way too attractive.

“So how often do you come here?” Callahan asked.

“Oh, usually once or twice a week. I teach Dancin’ with the Oldies with my friend Julian. Every Monday, seventhirty to nine.” I smiled. Maybe he’d drop by. See how cute I looked in my swirly skirts, swishing away, delighting the residents. Maybe— “Dance class, huh?” he said. “You don’t look the type.”

“And what does that mean?” I asked.

“You’re not built like a dancer,” he commented.

“You should probably stop talking now,” I advised.

“Got a little more meat on your bones than those girls you see on TV.”

“You should definitely stop talking now.” I glared. He grinned.

“And aren’t dancers graceful?” he continued. “Not prone to hitting people with rakes and the like?”

“Maybe there’s just something about you that invites a hockey stick,” I suggested tartly. “I’ve never hit Wyatt, after all.”

“Yet,” Callahan responded. “Where is the perfect man, anyway? Still haven’t seen him around the neighborhood.”

His eyes were mocking, as if he knew damn well why. Because no cat-loving, good-looking pediatric surgeon would go for a wild-haired history teacher who enjoyed pretending to bleed to death on the weekends. My pride answered before my brain had a chance.

“Wyatt’s in Boston this week, presenting a paper on a new recovery protocol in patients under ten,” I said. Good Lord. Where had I pulled that from? All those Discovery Health shows were starting to pay off, apparently.

“Oh.” He looked suitably impressed…or so it seemed to me. “Well. Any reason for you to hang around, then?”

I was dismissed. “No. None. So. Bye, Mr. Lawrence. I’ll finish reading the book when your charming grandson isn’t around.”

“Good night, Grace,” Callahan said, but I didn’t answer, choosing instead to walk briskly (and gracefully, damn it) out of the room.

My mood was thorny as I drove home. While Callahan O’ Shea was completely right to doubt the existence of Wyatt Dunn, it bugged me. Surely, were such a man to exist, he could like me. It shouldn’t seem so impossible, right? Maybe, just maybe, somewhere out there was a real pediatric surgeon with dimples and a great smile.

Not just magicians with tendencies toward arson and religious nut jobs and too-knowing ex-cons.

At least Angus worshipped me. God must’ve had single women in mind when he invented dogs. I accepted his gift of a ruined roll of paper towels and a chewed-up sneaker, praised him for not destroying anything else and got ready for bed.

I imagined telling Wyatt Dunn about my day. How he’d laugh at the bad dates—well, of course, there would be no bad dates if he were a real person—but still. He’d laugh and we’d talk and make plans for the weekend. We’d have a gentle, sweet, thoughtful relationship. We’d hardly ever fight. He’d think I was the loveliest creature to walk the earth. He’d even adore my hair. He’d send me flowers, just to let me know he was thinking of me.

And even though I knew quite well he wasn’t real, I felt better. The old imaginary boyfriend was doing what he did best. I knew I was a good, smart, valuable person. If the dating pool of Connecticut failed to provide a worthy choice, well, what was the harm in a little visualization? Didn’t Olympic athletes do that? Picture a perfect dive or dismount in order to achieve it? Wyatt Dunn was the same idea.

The fact that Callahan O’ Shea’s face kept coming to mind was purely coincidental, I was sure.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

“WHO IS JEB STUART?” Tommy Michener suggested.

“Correct!” I said, grinning. His teammates cheered, and Tommy, who was captain of his team, flushed with pride.

“Pick again, Tom!”

“I’ll stick with Civil War Leaders, Ms. Em,” he said.

“Leaders for a thousand. This vice president of the Confederacy was sickly his whole life, never weighing more than one hundred pounds.”

Hunter’s team buzzed in. “Who is Jefferson Davis?” Mallory guessed.

“No, honey, sorry, he was the president of the Confederacy. Tommy, does your team have a guess?” The kids huddled together, conferring.

Emma Kirk, the day student with a crush on Tommy, whispered into his ear. I’d made sure they were on the same team. He asked her a question. She nodded. “Who is Little Aleck Stephens?” Emma said.

“Yes, Emma! Well done!”

Tommy high-fived Emma, who practically levitated in pleasure.

I beamed at my students. Civil War Jeopardy! was a hit. With a glance at the clock, I was shocked to see our time was almost over. “Okay, Final Jeopardy! everyone. Ready? This Pulitzer Prize–winning author, whose book details the rise and fall of the South as seen through one woman’s eyes, never wrote another novel.”

I hummed the theme from Jeopardy! with gusto, strolling back and forth between the two groups of kids.

Tommy’s team was kicking some serious butt; however my favorite student was showing off for Kerry, who was on the other team, and chances were he’d bet it all.

“Pens down. Okay, Hunter, your team had nine thousand points. Your wager? Oh, I see you’ve bet the farm. Very bold. Okay, Hunter. Your answer, please?”

He held up his team’s wipe away board. I winced. “No. Sorry, Hunter. Stephen Crane is not the answer. But he did write The Red Badge of Courage, which is about the Battle of Chancellorsville, so nice try. Tommy? What did you bet?”

“We bet it all, Ms. Em,” he said proudly, glancing over at Kerry and winking. Emma’s smile dropped a notch.

“And your answer, Tom?”

Tom turned to his team. “Who is Margaret Mitchell?” they chorused.

“Correct!” I shouted.

You’d think they’d won the World Series or something—screams of victory, lots of high fives and dancing around, a few hugs. Meanwhile, Hunter Graystone’s team groaned.

“Tommy’s team…no homework for you!” I announced. More cheering and high-fiving. “Hunter’s team, sorry, kids.

Three pages on Margaret Mitchell, and if you haven’t read Gone With the Wind, shame on you! Okay, class dismissed.”

Ten minutes later, I was seated in the conference room in Lehring Hall with my fellow history department members—Dr. Eckhart, the chairman; Paul Boccanio, who was next in seniority; the unfortunately named Wayne Diggler, our newest teacher, hired last year right out of graduate school; and Ava Machiatelli, sex kitten.

“Your class sounded quite out of control today,” Ava murmured in her trademark phone-sex whisper. “So much chaos! My class could hardly think.”

Not that they need to for you to give them an A, I grumbled internally. “We were playing Jeopardy!” I said with a smile. “Very invigorating.”

“Very noisy, too.” A reproachful blink…another…and, yes, a third blink.

Dr. Eckhart shuffled to the head of the table and sat down, an activity that took considerable time and effort. Then he gave his trademark phlegmy, barking cough that caused first-years to jump in their seats until about November. A distinguished gentleman with an unfortunate aversion to daily bathing, Dr. Eckhart was from the olden days of prep schools where the kids wore uniforms and could be locked in closets for misbehaving, if not beaten with rulers. He often mourned those happy times. Aside from that, he was a brilliant man.

He now straightened and folded his arthritic hands in front of him. “This year will be my last as chairman of the history department at Manning, as you have doubtless all heard.”

Tears pricked my eyes. I couldn’t imagine Manning without old Dr. E. Who would huddle in a corner with me at trustee functions or the dreaded Headmaster’s Dinner? Who would defend me when angry parents called about their kid’s B+?