“‘Hmmm’ is like a sigh that you say out loud. Instead of going, ‘sigh’…you go, ‘hmmm.’”
“Megan Murphy, that’s an evasive answer.”
“Hah! Talk about evasive.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Think about it.”
He slung his arm around her shoulders and propelled her toward the house. He didn’t have to think about it. He knew exactly what Megan was referring to. They were lovers and friends, and they flirted with the idea of being engaged. They even went so far as to pretend they were engaged, but they weren’t engaged. He’d never asked, and she’d never answered, and there’d never been an exchange of commitments.
For the first time in his life he found his supply of easy confidence rapidly dwindling. Med school had been hard, and internship even harder. Now he was on his own with a fledgling practice and a fistful of debts. He wasn’t sure he could afford the responsibility of a wife and child. Even if he could afford a family, he wondered if he’d have the time to be a good father and husband. In a year or two he might be able to take on a partner. Until then his case load would become more and more demanding. And as if that weren’t enough, he was genuinely worried about the “hmmm.”
They looked sideways at each other, silently questioning, debating, the wisdom of their involvement.
Pat was the first to turn away. “How about some coffee?”
At two o’clock Megan and her parents arrived at Pat’s cottage. Megan had dressed casually, in soft brown leather boots, a long, full camel skirt, and a crisp white shirt, accented by an outrageously expensive russet-and-black print scarf. She brushed imaginary lint from her black coat while they waited for Pat to answer the door. She was nervous. She wanted everything to be perfect and she didn’t have a clue as to how to preside over a turkey dinner.
She almost swooned when she entered the cottage. The aroma of roast turkey, savory dressing, and baking sweet potatoes mingled with the rich, smoky smell of the fire crackling in the fireplace. The autumn sky was gunmetal gray, but inside, the little house glowed with the patina of polished pewter chandeliers and copper kettles.
A folding table had been taken from its storage spot in the shed. Now it stretched almost the entire length of the living area, covered with a freshly ironed white linen tablecloth, periodically interspersed with candlesticks and clusters of yellow mums.
Pat took her coat and handed her a cup of eggnog. “It’s traditional in my family that Thanksgiving heralds in the eggnog season. It’s my mom’s special recipe.”
Fresh-ground nutmeg floated on top of the creamy drink, and its spicy smell reminded Megan that Christmas was just a month away. She gazed around the restored cottage fairly bursting with happy people and had a vision of what this house would be like at Christmas, decorated with fresh holly and red velvet bows.
It would be the perfect place to be married, she thought. She didn’t want to walk down a long church aisle in an extravagant gown. She wanted to stand in front of the huge fireplace, wearing a romantic lacy dress, surrounded by family, and exchange vows. She wanted to be married in a house that smelled like turkey and dressing, and she wanted her private marriage ceremony to be followed by a terrific party.
Pat’s mother hugged her hello and pulled her to the stove. “You have to see the bird. It’s magnificent. It’s a monster!” She opened the oven door to display the deeply browned turkey, enveloping Megan and twelve other curious onlookers in a rush of heat.
She gasped at the enormous creature. It was a beast, sitting in simmering splendor, disgorging stuffing from between its colossal drumsticks.
“I think I overstuffed it,” Mrs. Hunter said. “Pat stitched it up with his best surgical skills, but the darn thing split open about half an hour ago.” She lovingly basted it and shut it back up in the oven.
The big brown rabbit hopped across Megan’s feet, with Pat’s nephew in hot pursuit. Timmy gurgled happily from his new walker as he scooted backward over the kitchen floor. A football game could be heard blasting from the television in the bedroom overhead, and Megan helped Laurie fix a platter of crackers and cheese and carried it to the circle of women by the fireplace.
She was able to watch Pat from a distance. His face was flushed from the heat of the kitchen and the excitement of the day. He stooped to give Timmy a kiss while picking up a dropped toy. He surreptitiously took a small swipe of whipped cream from a pumpkin pie and carried a six-pack of cold beer up the stairs.
He was wonderful, she thought. Second only to the turkey, and when the turkey was picked clean, Pat would be the most edible dish in town.
The oven buzzer rang, and they all jumped to their feet. Laurie poked the potatoes bubbling in a caldron on the stove. “Done!” She picked up the electric mixer and stood there poised, ready for mashing.
Mrs. Hunter stabbed the turkey at the juncture of the thigh. “Done!”
Megan’s mother punctured a baked sweet potato. “Done!”
All action stopped while the women stared at the turkey.
“It’s big,” Megan’s mother said.
Mrs. Hunter worried her bottom lip. “The butcher said twenty-seven pounds, but I don’t believe him. Looks more like fifty.”
Mrs. Murphy had two big meat forks in her hands, but she didn’t make a move to lift the turkey. “How the devil are we going to get it onto the platter?”
“Well,” Pat’s sister Laurie said, “Pat bought it. I think he should be given the honor.”
Everyone agreed. It was Pat’s job.
“Hey, Pat,” Megan yelled up the stairs. “You’re needed in the kitchen for bird transfer.”
All the men trooped downstairs.
“No sweat,” Pat said. “Obviously, this is one of those things that requires a man’s cool head and brute strength.” He surveyed the bird and stabbed its midsection with the two forks. “Hold the platter,” he instructed his brother. “Hold the rack,” he instructed his father.
He raised the bird a fraction of an inch and moved it forward. The turkey rotated on the forks, its tender meat disintegrating around the tines, and the beast dropped with a loud thunk onto the open oven door. It jumped off the door and skittered across the kitchen floor, coming to rest toe to toe with Timmy.
“Brrrph,” Timmy said.
Megan’s mother never batted an eye. She set the platter on the floor, grabbed the turkey stem to stern, and hefted it onto the dish with a loud grunt. “Hardly touched the floor. And the thirty-second rule’s in effect. Good thing this floor’s clean,” she said.
Pat’s nephew’s eyes got as big as golf balls. “Oh, neat. It left a grease trail. Looks like slug slime!”
Pat’s niece wrinkled her nose. “Yuk. It fell on the floor! Now it has rabbit cooties. I’m not eating it. Not one single bite. You can’t make me eat rabbit cooties.”
Pat lifted the bird onto the table and grinned. “And to think I was worried something would go wrong today. Silly me.”
When everyone was seated, Pat carved from the top of the turkey, swearing to his niece by the Hippocratic oath that it was impossible for the top of the turkey to have rabbit cooties.
They worked through the mountains of potatoes, sampled all the vegetables, polished off the spoon bread, and ate and ate and ate, but they didn’t make a dent in the turkey. Even after second and third helpings, it was obvious someone would be eating leftover turkey for a very long time.
Megan looked down the table at the butchered carcass and contemplated a marriage ceremony that went: through good times and bad times, in sickness and in health, turkey soup, turkey salad, turkey croquettes…till death do us part. Maybe she should reconsider her relationship with Pat. She could put up with his bizarre sense of humor, and she could live with his rabbit. She wasn’t sure if she could handle the turkey leftovers.
The turkey was replaced by four different kinds of pie, Indian pudding, gingerbread cookies, pecan bars, and the King’s Arms’ fig ice cream. After sampling
nearly everything, Megan pushed her chair back and groaned. “I can’t eat another bite.”
Pat’s nephew burped. “’Scuse me,” he said. “This was great.”
“We should do this again at Christmas,” Megan’s mother said. “We’ll get a nice big Virginia baked ham.”
“Yeah!” Pat’s nephew shouted. “And Uncle Pat can make it slime across the floor. Boy, that was so cool.”
“What about the wedding?” Pat’s niece asked. “When is the wedding? Will I be a flower girl?”
Pat pretended to be serious. “The bride decides things like that.”
Megan wanted to kick him a good one under the table, but he was half a mile away, at the opposite end.
Everyone turned to her, waiting for an answer. She narrowed her eyes at Pat, who was obviously exerting every ounce of self-control he possessed to keep from bursting out laughing.
“Well,” she said evenly, “I thought we’d have the wedding Christmas Eve.” She smiled at the little girl. “I’d be honored to have you as flower girl.”
Pat grimaced. Terrific, he thought. Now she’d set a date. This was like playing Monopoly, moving your pieces around the board. What would happen when they got to GO? Would they collect two hundred dollars? Or would they actually get married? He saw a look of triumph flit across Megan’s face, and thought she looked as if she’d just bought Boardwalk.
He was losing the battle of one-upmanship. He was also getting sucked further into his meddling mother’s fantasy. The time was fast approaching when he was going to have to decide if it was his fantasy too.
After the dishes were loaded into the dishwasher, the pots were scrubbed, the food was refrigerated, and the banquet table was folded up and stored in the shed, Pat’s brother and his family said their good-byes and returned to their hotel room. Timmy was bedded down, Pat’s three sisters went off in search of night life, and the four parents sat enjoying the hypnotic sizzle of the fire.
Pat held out Megan’s black coat for her. “Megan Murphy, would you like to go for a walk?”
“Is this a hint? Do I need exercise? Has the pumpkin pie started appearing on my thighs already?”
“You bet it’s a hint. But not about pumpkin pie. It’s about hugs and kisses and privacy for lovers.” He zipped his leather jacket and wrapped a scarf around his neck. “It’s about a romantic moonlight stroll through Colonial Williamsburg.”
They walked east on Nicholson Street. A horse whinnied in the distance. A low haze of smoke from fireplaces hung at roof level. It had been a gray day, and was a black night, with a thick bank of clouds obscuring the moon and the stars. They walked in silence, holding hands, enjoying each other’s company. They strolled past the public jail, and the Coke-Garrett House at the corner of Nicholson and Waller. Candles flickered in the windows of Campbell’s Tavern.
“That would be a nice place for a wedding,” Pat said, pointing to the tavern. As soon as he said it, he stopped dead in his tracks. “Oh, damn, now they’ve got me doing it!”
Megan huddled deeper into her coat. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“Do you?”
“No!” she practically shouted. If they talked about it, they’d have to do something about it. The idea of getting married simultaneously pleased her and terrified her. Deep down, she wanted Pat to propose to her, but she didn’t want to give him an answer.
They followed the dirt path that led around the Capitol building. Oxen lowed not far off, and Megan wondered where the oxen and horses were stabled for the night. She liked animals. When she settled down she was going to have a whole passel of them. One of everything. A dog, a cat, a horse, a rhinoceros.
There was a horse on her rented farm, but she didn’t get to see much of it. It kept to itself in the far reaches of the pasture or hid in the barn. Its owner came regularly to feed and groom it, but she never rode it. Megan didn’t know much about horses, but this one looked sluggish and obese, with a big barrel belly and sleepy eyes.
“Do you know anything about horses?” she asked Pat.
“I know one when I see one.”
She linked her arm through his. “There’s this horse living in my barn.”
“I’ve seen it from a distance.”
“There’s something odd about it. I don’t think it feels well, and it looks much too fat. Someday I’m going to have a horse, and I’m going to keep him nice and sleek.”
Pat couldn’t help wondering if she intended to have children riding on this sleek horse. And did she expect those children to be his? She didn’t want to discuss their trumped up wedding, but she wasn’t denying it as a possibility, either. He suspected they were both struggling through the twilight zone of self-doubt, coming at the problem from opposite ends. Something in her past had turned her against marriage, and many things in his future gave him cause for concern.
He watched the bobbing lights of a Lanthorn tour making its way down Duke of Gloucester Street and slipped his arm around Megan’s shoulders. He was reluctant to start a conversation that might provoke questions he’d rather not answer just then, but his curiosity was getting the better of him.
“Megan Murphy, why are you against marriage?”
“I thought we weren’t going to talk about this.”
“We’re not going to talk about our marriage. We’re just going to talk about marriage in general.”
“I’m not against marriage,” she said. “I think marriage is great. It’s just not great for me.”
“Is this a recent decision? Do I detect a broken heart hanging in your closet?”
“How do you know about my closet? Have you been snooping?”
Pat stopped in front of the apothecary shop and faced her. “It’s an expression, Megan. Just an expression. What the devil have you got in your closet, anyway?”
“Never mind about my closet.” She tipped her face up into the cold air and walked away from him. “And I don’t have a broken heart,” she said over her shoulder. “I’ve been engaged three times, and I didn’t love any of them enough to get a broken heart. Maybe it got a little cracked and shrunken, but it never broke.”
Pat had to jog to catch her. “Three times?”
“Probably we shouldn’t count the first time. I was five years old, and I got engaged to Jimmy Fee. Two weeks later I caught him carrying Mary Lee Barnard’s lunch box for her. It’s just that it set a precedent.”
Was she serious? he wondered. A precedent at five years old? He was in love with a crazy person.
“My senior year in college,” she went on, “I got engaged to Steve. I didn’t really want to get married, and I especially didn’t want to get married to Steve, but my parents kept pushing.
“There was this philosophy in my house that a girl went to college to catch a husband. If you didn’t get him by the time you graduated, you were destined for spinsterhood and you’d wasted your parents’ hard-earned money on a mere education.
“I can’t even remember how it happened, but suddenly I was engaged. Fortunately, Steve realized his error and skipped town. Took the ring off my finger one day when I fell asleep in the library and left me a note saying he was joining the foreign legion.
“Then there was Dave. My parents thought Dave was the best thing since macaroni. Dave wasn’t really such a bad guy. It’s just that he was in love with my parents, not me. He liked my mom’s cooking and my dad’s choice of television shows.
“We got all the way to the altar. I stood there in my white satin gown with twelve hundred seed pearls embroidered on the bodice, in front of an audience of two hundred friends and relatives, and I turned to Dave and wondered what on earth I was doing there. Dave looked at me, then walked down the aisle and out of the church. Two days later he came over to the house to apologize and watch the ball game with my dad.”
“Are you making this up?” Pat asked.
Her eyes filled with tears. “It was awful.”
He gathered her into his arms and held her close, not knowing what
to say. The thought of Megan’s being left at the altar made his stomach contract into painful knots. He stroked her silky red hair and rested his chin against her head. He wanted to ask her to marry him. He wanted to ask her to come live in his little cottage, where he could keep her safe and secure and loved, but he was afraid of committing the very crime he wanted to prevent. He was afraid he’d hurt her. He wasn’t going to make a very good husband for the next two years.
What were the alternatives? Break off with her? He’d sooner chop off an arm or a leg. A prolonged engagement? If things didn’t work out it would be the third time she’d had to give back a ring. He couldn’t do that to her. Live together? Nope. He was a pediatrician in a small town. He had to set an example. They could be friends. They could have a long, old-fashioned courtship. He sighed. They were way past courtship. “Oh, hell.”
She snuggled into him. “Don’t worry about Dave. I’m fine now. It all worked out for the best.”
“Damn right. If you’d married Dave, I’d have to eat all those turkey leftovers by myself.”
Megan pulled away. She slid her hand into his and started down Duke of Gloucester Street. He was a slippery one, she thought. He was a master at extricating himself from tender moments. They’d talked about her past, but they hadn’t talked about his. She was beginning to wonder how many women Patrick Hunter had left at the altar.
“You ever been engaged?”
“Nope.”
A horrible possibility flashed through her mind. “You ever been married?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
He shrugged. “No time. No money.” He squeezed her hand. “No Megan.”
“Hmmm.”
“There’s that ‘hmmm’ again. Am I in trouble?”
She smiled. “No. That was a good ‘hmmm.’ You gave all the right answers.”
“You suppose your parents would mind if you spent the night with me?”