Lead Me Not. James B. Johnson
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said, “Well, he was all right.”
“His writing turned much better,” said Aloha, “after he married an American girl. Caroline Starr Balestier in 1892. ’Course, after that in 1907 he won the Nobel prize. Took her influence a few years to take hold.”
Rudd was astounded at Aloha.
Aloha finished her steak and pushed her plate away. “Sorry, folks, didn’t mean to monopolize the conversation.”
“Your insights are different,” Amanda said, picking at her uneaten chicken.
“Guess my date ain’t gonna show. Reckon I’ll see him later?”
“Beats me,” said Rudd.
“Boy I sure hope so. ‘Bye, Amanda. Maybe we can visit again sometime.” Aloha stuck her hand out.
Amanda took it. “If you go to college, and it’s FSU, I’d like you to be in my American lit survey class.”
Aloha looked startled and regained her composure. She did her big, wide grin. “Thanks for dinner, Rudd.” She was fumbling under the table. She’d taken her shoes off. A supremely self-confident move, under these circumstances and in the Silver Slipper.
As she was pushing her chair back, Rudd rose and pulled it our for her.
She leaned over to him as she did on her arrival, but this time she kissed him lightly on the lips. Then she turned and walked out of the dining room, obviously enjoying the fact that every man in the room had his eyes locked on her and their heads all swiveled as she went.
Amanda moved her barely touched food aside. “Six, who the hell was that and what the hell was that all about?”
Rudd usually did not avoid the truth, but in this case he certainly wasn’t going to admit having an affair with a girl more than likely underage.
“Aloha is a very bright person and she’s playing some kind of game,” he said. But he thought, With Aloha’s potential, she’s rough-cut right now and needs some polishing.
“That bombshell is pure sex,” Amanda said. “And every man in this room has a hard tongue. Look, it isn’t any of my business. But there were undercurrents that I almost drowned in.” She raised her eyebrows.
Rudd was self conscious. Usually he was glib enough to talk his way out of most situations. “Some kind of game,” he said lamely. “It’s all I can figure.”
Amanda stood. “Cut the crap, Six. When you grow up and want to play with the big girls, call me. Maybe I’ll be there, maybe I won’t. C’mon, pay up and take me home.” She picked up her purse. “Not only that, but she stuck you with her supper check.”
“She did, didn’t she?”
“Me, too. Let’s go.”
* * * *
When Rudd got home, he drank until midnight. Aloha never came over as she’d hinted.
After a half a fifth of Gordon’s gin disguised as martinis, he fell asleep on the couch.
Only to be awakened by Peter Blaze ringing the doorbell and pounding on the door at eight in the morning.
When Rudd groggily opened the door, Peter handed him a box of folded vests. “This is the first load of Aloha’s clothes. I got more in the car.”
Oh, shit.
CHAPTER SEVEN
HER
Carrying a suitcase, Aloha passed her father on the sidewalk. Rudd was standing inside the doorway looking not very romantic at all, as if he’d slept in his clothes. Aloha wondered what had happened between him and Amanda. If Rudd and the English professor had got laid, Aloha fervently hoped he’d been too drunk to remember it; Amanda sure looked like she’d be great in bed. But right now, Rudd certainly didn’t smell like he’d been with a woman. At least he was here and not at her place. Aloha decided not to mention Amanda. One because it might upset him and she wanted him in as good a mood as possible and, two, because sometimes if you don’t want to know the answer, don’t ask the question.
She stopped in front of him. “Denise here?”
He shook his head. “You going to tell me what’s going on?”
“I thought Denise would have said something,” Aloha said adroitly. Not that she’d told Denise anything—except the overseas part. Certainly not this part, the part about her staying in Tallahassee. If everything worked out according to her plan, nobody’d know she had conned everybody; not her folks, not Rudd, not Denise. And the way Aloha had worded her statement only implied she’d spoken to Denise with all the details.
“Denise didn’t tell me anything.”
“Oh. See my folks are going overseas and I want to stay in my class at Leon High. So I need a place to stay in Tallahassee.”
“Don’t you have any relatives somewhere, Aloha?”
“A stuffy old aunt in Kansas City. But I’d have to move there.” A not-so veiled threat. Either or. This made it his choice. If he chose in favor of her living with him, it signaled more than that choice. It obligated him to a form of commitment, one she so badly wanted.
And while he might be hung over and somewhat ragged this morning, he was no dummy and would figure most of this out. He could keep up with her and that was one of the things she loved about him. She was a very bright girl. No one noticed because of her body and looks; so she didn’t wave her intelligence about. She simply used it like she used her beauty.
Rudd cocked his head. Aloha gave him her most engaging smile. She wore jeans, FSU garnet and gold tee shirt, and her denim vest, same as yesterday at the airport, all calculated to evoke a positive response in him. But this time she wore a bra and her hair was pulled back into a pony tail, both to project the image of an all-American girl. The pony tail was designed to be quite fetching rather than accentuate her beauty.
“This is another one of your games,” Rudd said flatly.
“Nuh uh. The spring semester will be over in a couple of months and I’ll go away,” she said. Give him an easy out. Let him think she’d leave for the summer. That might make his decision easier. “Whatever you want, Rudd.”
“I don’t know what I want.” He looked down into the box of vests he was holding.
Likely it was unfair to crowd him in his obvious condition of a hangover and having just awakened, but Aloha determined that if she didn’t take charge and push, things wouldn’t happen according to plan. Had he and Amanda gotten drunk together? Aloha wondered. —Jealousy doesn’t become you. Bonnie again.
—Sure it does, sweetie, just like that streak of vanity.
—Anyway, that doesn’t seem Amanda’s style, no?
—Excellent point. Aloha cheered up.
She glanced behind her. Her father was coming back up the driveway with another load. She looked boldly at Rudd. “Time to shit or get off the pot, Rudd. What’s it to be?”
CHAPTER EIGHT
HIM
She’d told him plainly that he had a choice: she either moves in right here and right now, or he loses her and she’s off to Kansas City permanently.
As her father slowed to a stop behind her, she said in a louder voice, “Yes, Buddy’s room will be fine.” She pushed past Rudd and headed for the hallway, her father following faithfully behind.
Oddly, Rudd wondered what genetic turn of fate had produced Aloha from two people such as Peter and Mary Blaze. Peter was slender and Mary was a big-boned blonde with slim hips. Perhaps their DNA had arranged a compromise.
Rudd knew he was stalling, not dealing with the situation. He’d have to say something in the next minute or go along with this—convoluted machination.