“Did I only bring it up three times?” Zack joked when she finished writing.
“Yes, and I agreed all three times, but we were supposed to be thinking of ideas for the early part of the evening.”
It hit him then what he’d noticed earlier when she was writing on the index cards, and he complimented her on it: “Your handwriting is so precise, it looks as if the words have been typeset.”
“Which isn’t surprising,” she replied with a smile over her shoulder, “since I spent years working on it. While other thirteen-year-old girls were starting to drool over you in your early movies, I was staying home, perfecting my handwriting.”
He sounded dumbstruck at such a waste of effort. “Why?”
Turning slowly on the stool, Julie looked up at him. “Because,” she said, “I was completely illiterate until I was almost twelve. I couldn’t read more than a few words and I couldn’t write anything other than my name and that not legibly.”
“Were you dyslexic or something?”
“No, just illiterate from lack of schooling. When I told you about my youth, I left that part out.”
“Purposely?” Zack asked, as she got up and walked around the counter to get a glass of water.
“It might have been deliberate, although I didn’t consciously decide to hide it from you. Funny, isn’t it, that I could easily admit to being a petty thief, but my mind recoiled from saying I’d been illiterate?”
“I don’t understand how that could happen, not to someone as bright as you.”
She gave him a look of jaunty superiority that made him long to snatch her into his arms and kiss it off her soft lips as she said loftily, “For your information, it can happen to anyone, Mr. Benedict, and being bright doesn’t have a thing to do with it. One out of every five women in this country is functionally illiterate. They missed school when they were little because they were needed at home to help with siblings or because their families were itinerant or a dozen other reasons. When they can’t catch up, they decide they’re stupid and they just quit trying. Whatever the reason, the results are always the same: They’re condemned to a life of menial jobs and welfare; they’ll stick with men who abuse them because they feel helpless and unworthy of anything better. You can’t imagine what it’s like to live in a world filled with information that’s beyond your understanding, but I remember how it was. The simplest things, like finding your way to the right office in a building, is completely beyond you. You live in a state of fear and shame. The shame is unbearable, and that’s why women hide it.”
“Were you ashamed, as young as you were?” Zack asked, reeling from this new insight into her childhood.
She nodded, swallowing some water, then she put the glass aside. “I used to try to sit in the front row when I did go to school, so I wouldn’t have to see the other kids’ faces when they laughed at me. I convinced the teachers that my eyes were bad.”
Zack hardly knew how to cope with the emotions raging inside him at the thought of her as a little child, trying to bluff her way through life in a sprawling, dirty city where no one cared. Clearing his throat, he said, “You said lack of schooling was the initial cause of the problem. Why weren’t you sent to school?”
“I was a sickly child, so I missed a lot of first and second grade, but the teachers liked me, so they passed me to the next grade anyway. It’s an idiotic, counterproductive thing for a teacher to do, but it happens all the time, especially to ‘good little girls.’ By third grade, I knew I couldn’t keep up, so I started cutting school and hanging out with kids on the streets. The foster parents I stayed with had their hands full with other kids, and they didn’t catch on until I got picked up for truancy. By then, I was in fourth grade and hopelessly behind.”
“So you decided to specialize in hot-wiring cars and picking pockets until the Mathisons straightened you out?”
She gave him an abashed smile and nodded as she started back toward the stool she’d vacated. “A few months ago, by accident, I discovered the janitor’s wife couldn’t read. I started tutoring her, and pretty soon she brought me another woman, and that woman brought another, and now there are seven, and we’ve had to move into a regular classroom. When they first come to class, they don’t really believe I can help them. They’re humiliated, defeated, and completely convinced they’re hopelessly stupid. In fact my hardest task is convincing them otherwise.” With a soft giggle, she added, “I had to bet Peggy Listrom that I’d babysit for her for an entire month if she couldn’t read all the street signs and shop signs in Keaton by springtime.”
Zack waited until she was standing beside him, then he hid his burgeoning tenderness behind a joke. “That sounds risky.”
“Not as risky as letting her go through life the way she is. Besides, I’ve practically won the bet already.”
“She’s reading street signs?”
Julie nodded, and Zack watched her eyes light with excitement. “Oh, Zack, you just can’t imagine how it feels to watch them start to learn! They go right on believing they’re stupid, until suddenly—one day—they sound out all the words in a short sentence, and they look up at me with such . . . such wonder in their eyes!” She held out her hand, palm up. “Being able to teach them—it’s like holding a miracle in your own hand.”
Zack swallowed against the unfamiliar constriction in his throat and forced a lighthearted note in his voice. “You’re a miracle, Miss Mathison.”
She laughed. “No, I’m not, but I have a hunch that Debby Sue Cassidy is going to be one.” Since he looked interested, Julie added, “She’s thirty, and she looks like the quintessential librarian—straight brown hair, studious features, but she has worked as a house maid for Mrs. Neilson since she was sixteen. She’s smart as a whip, very sensitive, very imaginative. She wants to write a book someday.” Misinterpreting the reason for Zack’s grin, Julie said, “Don’t laugh. She just might do it. She’s already amazingly articulate for someone who’s illiterate. She listens to books on tape from the library all the time. I know because Mrs. Neilson mentioned it to my father. She also mentioned that when the Neilson children were little, Debby Sue used to tell them stories that kept them still for hours. That’s why I was in Amarillo the day we met,” Julie finished, perching on the stool and turning her attention to her scratchpad. “I was raising money to buy special teaching materials. They’re actually quite cheap, but things add up.”
“Did you raise the money?”
She nodded, picking up her pencil and smiling over her shoulder at him.
Helpless to keep from touching her, Zack put his hand on her shoulder and playfully nipped her ear. She laughed, then she tipped her head sideways and lightly rubbed her soft cheek against the top of his hand.
The simple, loving gesture made Zack’s spirits plummet abruptly, because it forcibly reminded him that after tonight there’d be no more gestures of any kind. He should have let her go this morning, but he couldn’t, not when she would have hated him forever, and the longer he kept her with him, the harder it was going to be to let her go at all. Sending her away tomorrow, when there was a chance she’d crack under interrogation, meant that he would have to step up his departure from the United States by over a week, but it was worth the added risk to know she’d be safe from any further helicopter invasions that might not be false next time.
Trying to banish the bleak mood settling over him, he said, “Whatever we do tonight, let’s make it special. Festive.” It took every ounce of acting ability he possessed to keep the smile on his face so she wouldn’t realize he was sending her away in the morning.
Julie thought for a moment and smiled suddenly. “How about dinner by candlelight, followed by dancing—a pretend date, except we’ll have it here? I’ll get dressed up,” she threw in for persuasion before she realized that he didn’t need any persuasion at all: He was nodding with a relieved pleasure that Julie thought was surprisingly excessive for her modest idea.
“Great,” he agreed at once. He gla
nced at his watch. “I’ll use the bathroom in your room and ‘pick you up’ in an hour and a half. Will that give you enough time?”
Julie laughed. “I think an hour is plenty of time for whatever transformation I can make.”
42
HAVING SUGGESTED THE IDEA, JULIE was suddenly determined to dazzle him with as much glamour as she could, and she spent more than an hour getting ready. Hair was one asset she possessed in abundance, and since Zack evidently gave it special notice, she washed it and blew it dry, then she styled the heavy mass so that it framed her face, falling into casual waves and curls from a side part and spilling over her back. Satisfied that she’d done the best she could with that, she pulled off her robe and stepped into a soft knit dress in a vibrant shade of cobalt blue that, on the hanger, had looked rather like a floor-length sweater with a loosely fitted skirt, blousy bodice, and full sleeves with white satin cuffs and sparkling blue crystal buttons. Not until Julie reached behind her back to fasten it did she realize there was no zipper. Although the dress had a wide cowl collar at the front, the collar draped over the shoulders and left a deep oval of bare skin exposed at the back. The deceptive simplicity of the design, combined with the modest front and dramatic back, was irresistibly beautiful, and it made her feel beautiful, but Julie stepped back from the mirror, hesitant to wear so fine—and undoubtedly costly—a dress that also happened to belong to someone else.
On the other hand, she knew she didn’t have many alternatives. She needed something long to wear because she didn’t have any stockings, and she drew the line at borrowing another woman’s lingerie. With the exception of this lounging dress, everything else in the closet that was ankle length was either very fancy or else it was pants. Moreover, the owner of these clothes was definitely taller than she which vastly limited her choices among those things. Biting her lip, she decided to wear the wonderful blue dress, and she uttered a silent apology to the unknown woman with the gorgeous wardrobe.
A second foray into the closet yielded a pair of matching blue ballet slippers that were a half size too large, but perfectly comfortable. Satisfied that she’d done the absolute best she could with what she had to work with, she fluffed her hair and took a last glance in the mirror. She’d spent more time getting ready for her “date” tonight than she had for her role as a bridesmaid in Carl and Sara’s wedding, but it was time well spent, she decided. The cosmetics with the foreign names that she’d used tonight were much different than the inexpensive ones she’d bought in the drug store in Keaton and then discarded—these were far softer and more subtle. The muted eye shadow and mascara flattered her eyes, even though it looked strange to her, and the touch of blush at her cheeks made her cheekbones seem higher and more prominent, but it was the prospect of seeing Zack and spending a lighthearted evening with him that made her eyes sparkle and her skin glow. All in all, she decided, she’d never looked nearly as nice as this. Leaning forward, she applied some of her own lipstick, then she stepped back, smiled at her reflection, and headed for the bedroom door. She’d find out the address here, she decided, and send a check to cover the cosmetics she’d used and the cost of dry cleaning the clothes she’d borrowed.
The candles were already lit on the coffee table when she walked into the living room, the fire was burning brightly on the grate, and Zack was standing at the counter, opening a bottle of champagne. She caught her breath at how handsome he looked in his borrowed dark blue suit that clung to his wide shoulders and contrasted beautifully with his snowy white shirt and patterned tie. She was about to say something when she suddenly remembered that she’d seen him dressed up once before—only in his own clothes—and she felt a sharp pang of sorrow for what he’d lost. That other time, she’d seen him on television during the Academy Awards ceremony, once when he presented an Oscar and then again when he strode up onto the stage to accept his own Oscar for Best Actor. He’d been wearing a black tuxedo that night with a white pleated shirt and black bow tie, and she remembered thinking how gorgeously, elegantly male he was, so tall and sophisticated. She couldn’t recall what he’d said in his acceptance speech, but she remembered that it had been brief and very witty, because the entire audience had exploded with laughter and kept on laughing while he walked off stage.
The fact that he was now relegated to hiding like a hunted animal and wearing borrowed clothes made her feel like crying.
Even while she thought it, she realized that he never complained and he wouldn’t welcome either her sympathy or her pity. Since this was supposed to be a festive, lighthearted evening, Julie resolved to make certain it was. Feeling a little shy and self-conscious, she shoved her hands into the pockets concealed in the side seams of her dress and stepped forward. “Hi,” she said with a bright smile.
Zack looked up, his eyes riveting on her, and the champagne he was pouring began to spill over the side of the glass. “My God,” he said in an awed, husky whisper, his gaze moving slowly down her face and hair and body. “How could you possibly be jealous of Glenn Close?”
Not until that moment did Julie realize that was exactly why she’d wanted to dress up and put on makeup and fix her hair: She’d been trying to compete with the glamorous women he’d known on more even ground. “You’re spilling the champagne,” she said softly, so pleased she hardly knew how to behave.
He swore under his breath, jerked the bottle upright, and reached for a dish towel to mop it up.
“Zack?”
“What?” he said ruefully over his shoulder, picking up the glasses.
“How could you possibly have been jealous of Patrick Swayze?”
The glamour of his sudden white smile made it clear he was as pleased by her compliment as she was by his. “I honestly don’t know,” he joked.
* * *
“Which singers did you choose?” Julie teased after their candlelit dinner as he slid CDs into the player. “Because if you picked out Mickey Mouse, I’m not going to dance with you.”
“Yes, you will.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“You like dancing with me.”
Despite the playful exchange, Julie was well aware that his mood had been disintegrating during their meal. Although he’d specifically asked her to treat the evening as a festive occasion, there was an indefinable tension and a grimness in his features that were becoming more pronounced as the evening wore on. She told herself it was their discussion of the murder that had caused his strange mood, because the only other explanation that came to her mind was that he was thinking about sending her away, and that she could not bear to consider. Despite her desire to stay with him, she knew perfectly well that the final decision was not going to be hers to make. And even though she was in love with him, she had no idea how he really felt about her, except that he very much liked having her around. Here.
Behind her on the stereo, Barbra Streisand’s voice lifted effortlessly into the first bars of an intensely romantic song, and Julie tried again to shake off her foreboding as Zack opened his arms to her. “That’s definitely not Mickey Mouse’s voice,” he pointed out. “Will she do?”
Julie nodded, smiling with pleasure. “Streisand is my absolute favorite singer.”
“Mine, too.” Zack slid his arm around her waist, moving her closer to him.
“If I had a voice like hers,” Julie said, talking to keep her worries at bay, “I’d sing just to hear myself. I’d sing when I answered the door and used the telephone.”
“She’s phenomenal,” Zack agreed. “Operatic sopranos are a dime a dozen, but Barbra is . . . unique, incomparable.”
Julie suddenly realized his hand was roving slowly up her bare back; she saw the banked fires in his eyes kindling slowly into flame, and deep within her, she felt the answering stirrings of longing begin again—a longing for the tormenting sweetness of his touch, for the stormy insistence of his kiss, and the shattering joy of his body possessing hers. How thrilling it was to know she was going to have all that before the night
ended and to be able to savor and prolong the moment, just as she sensed Zack also wanted to do. But was she going to have all this tomorrow night and the night after, she wondered, struggling to hold down her panic over what her intuition was telling her was behind his somber mood. “Did you know her?” she asked.
“Barbra?”
Julie nodded.
“Yes, I used to know her.”
“What is she like? I read somewhere that she isn’t very nice to people who work with her.”
Zack thought for a moment, trying to explain. “She has a gift unlike anyone else’s in the world,” he said after a moment. “She knows how she wants to use it, and she doesn’t like other people treating her as if they know better than she how to do that. In short, she doesn’t suffer fools easily.”
“You liked her, didn’t you?”
“I liked her very much.”
Julie listened to the poignant words of the song, wondering if he was noticing them, too, or if he, like most men, merely listened to the music and ignored lyrics. “Pretty song,” she said because she desperately wanted him to hear the words as if they came from her.
“Beautiful lyrics,” Zack agreed, trying to steady himself, to tell himself that what he was feeling would soon fade when he was away from her. He gazed at her face, and the words of Streisand’s song seem to pierce his heart:
Those tomorrows waiting deep in your eyes—
In the world of love you keep in your eyes—
I’ll awaken what’s asleep in your eyes.
It may take a kiss or two.
Through all of my life . . .
Summer, winter, spring, and fall of my life . . .
All I ever will recall of my life, is all of my life.
With you.
He was actually relieved when Streisand’s voice faded and a Whitney Houston/Jermaine Jackson duet began to play. But Julie chose that moment to lift her cheek from his chest and look up at him, and as he looked into her eyes and heard the lyrics of the song, he felt his chest tighten.