The Trouble with Joe Read online

  Questions behind a question. She knew what he really wanted to know. Was the last day of school particularly hard this year? Was it painful to leave the children behind? Was she going to make it through the summer without the sound of childish laughter?

  “All right,” she said. “How about yours?”

  “The seniors trashed the lawn and poured ball bearings in the hallways. Sometime this week somebody spelled out Dean Lambert Sucks on the football field. In herbicide. The grass died today.”

  “That’s it?”

  “If we’re lucky.”

  She slipped her arms around his waist. Joe had a quarterback’s physique—long muscular legs, trim hips and waist and broad, broad shoulders. He looked equally good in a suit or bathing trunks, but he looked his very best in nothing at all.

  She leaned back so she could see his face. His features were striking and strong, straight off the steamship from northern Italy, with only a Slovenian grandmother to dare reconfigure the Giovanelli gene pool. His hair was shining black and his eyes as dark as his most secret thoughts. When he smiled his face came alive. Or it had once upon a time.

  “Thanks for taking the time to come over here,” she said.

  “It was either this or chopping out sod on the field. I thought Lambert should chop, since he’s the one who enrages the kids.”

  “Al wouldn’t know what side of a hoe went where.”

  “Actually, he’s got all the juniors who still owe detention hours doing it.”

  “Great. That way he can be sure the same thing will happen next year when they’re seniors.” Reluctantly she moved away. They couldn’t stand in each other’s arms all afternoon, no matter how good it felt. “I’ve still got next week to finish cleaning the room. Do you have to go back to school, or can you come home with me?”

  “I’ll follow you back.”

  She was so surprised that for a moment she didn’t know what to say. “Well, fine,” she said at last. “Maybe it’ll be cooler there.”

  “Don’t count on it.”

  “We can stand under the ceiling fans and drink iced tea.”

  “Do you need help with those?” He nodded toward two cardboard boxes beside the door.

  “Just a few little things to keep me busy this summer. Some new textbooks to look over. The workbooks the board’s decided we’ll be using next year. Some music to learn, since the music teacher’s been cut to half-time and now we’ll be teaching music as well as everything else in the classroom.”

  “Overworked and underpaid.”

  “The definition of a teacher,” they finished together.

  “I’ll get the boxes,” he said. “Do you need to stop by the office?”

  She nodded. “I’ll meet you in the parking lot.”

  He started toward the door.

  “Joe?”

  He looked over his shoulder.

  “The roses were the loveliest thing to happen to me in a long time.”

  His smile was brief and lopsided. But it was a smile. Hope stirred inside her. He had been gone a full minute before she collected herself and started for the office.

  * * *

  JOE FIT BOTH boxes in the trunk of his car. It was an American sports car, shiny black and low slung with more horsepower than the North Carolina blacktop could handle. He had bought it six months ago without consulting Sam. When he’d brought it home she had said all the right things, but her expression had told him what she really thought.

  He didn’t know what had possessed him to buy a car that every boy in the high school would sell his soul for. He had seen it in the lot, a visible symbol of everything masculine and powerful, and he had signed the papers that afternoon. The psychology behind that decision was perhaps best left unexplored.

  Killer—Sam’s name for the car—bounced when he slammed the trunk. Joe had parked under a magnolia tree in full bloom, and a welcome breeze waltzed the scent through the air. A piano tinkled through an open door to the cafeteria, and children’s voices sounded from the playground on the other side of the school. He leaned against the car and crossed his arms. Despite the sensory attractions even the short wait made him restless.

  He scanned the school yard for something to look at. A squirrel attempted the leap from one tree to another and managed admirably. A mockingbird squawked at the intruder, then made a faulty dive bomb when the squirrel didn’t take the hint. Just beyond the school grounds a car pulled from its parking place and drove down the empty street.

  Joe tapped his foot and drummed his fingers against his arms. Pressure built inside him. He was so seldom idle that now he felt as if someone had tied him, hand and foot. He thought of a million things he needed to be doing, and wished he could do them simultaneously.

  Suddenly a small figure crawled from behind one bush to another under the windows of the classroom closest to the parking lot. The landscaping was overgrown, and there was almost no room between the flourishing juniper and holly and the brick wall. At first Joe wondered if he had fantasized the child as an antidote to unaccustomed inactivity. He took off his sunglasses and squinted at the bush where he thought the child had gone. Nothing moved, but there was the tiniest scrap of red visible between one evergreen branch and another.

  He started forward.

  “Joe?”

  He held his finger to his lips, but Sam, coming toward him from the other side of the building with a loaded box topped with a vase of wobbling dandelions, didn’t see.

  “Joe, grab this vase, will you, before it falls?”

  He abandoned hide-and-seek and went to meet Sam. Twenty-five yards from the car he took the box and let her carry the vase.

  “There’s a kid hiding in the bushes over by the sixth-grade classrooms,” he told her.

  “Why?”

  “Who knows? It’s been a while since I was a kid.”

  “I don’t see anybody.”

  “This kid knows how to hide, you’ve got to give her that.”

  “Her?”

  “I caught a flash.”

  “What exactly did you see?”

  “Blond hair. Red shirt.”

  “Corey.” Sam set the vase on Killer’s hood and started toward the bushes. “Corey,” she called, “come on out and meet Mr. Joe. You’re going to get all scratched up back there.”

  There was no telltale rustle. “Corey?” She moved closer, but not quickly. Joe guessed that Corey was easy to spook. Sam would know from experience.

  “Come on, Corey,” she said softly. “Nobody’s mad at you. We just don’t want you to get hurt. That’s no place to play.”

  There was a flash of red at the far end of the row, three classrooms and more than two dozen scratchy evergreens away. Sam straightened. Joe turned his head just in time to see a little girl dressed in a long-sleeved shirt and corduroy pants—too worn to be appropriate any time of year—crawl out from behind the last bush. She stood and stared at him. Even from a distance he detected suspicion in the dark eyes that took up half the child’s face. Then she turned and made a run for the sidewalk in front of the school. She disappeared around the corner before Sam could say anything else.

  “So that’s Corey.” Joe went to stand beside her.

  “That was Corey. I’m sorry. I’ve talked about her so much I wanted you to meet her.”

  He stuffed his hands into his pockets. “After all the stories I’ve heard, I can wait until high school before I’m forced to get to know her.”

  She smiled, but he saw the tinge of sadness in her eyes. “You just might like her, Joe. The two of you have some things in common.”

  “Yeah?”

  “You both love me.”

  He wanted to touch her hair, to tell her that Corey obviously had exquisite taste, but instead he shifted his weight to his h
eels, not quite moving away from her. “What else?”

  “Neither of you has the slightest idea how to cope with your feelings.”

  He stared at her. The remark was so unlike Sam that for a moment he was at a loss for words. “What brought that on?” he asked at last.

  She looked away. The breeze lifted a lock of her long blond hair and blew it against her cheek. He had always loved her best like this, when something unexpected ruffled her calm exterior. Now he wanted to tuck the hair back in place—almost as much as he wanted to insist she take back her words.

  “I’m sorry.” She didn’t elaborate.

  “So it has been a tough day,” he said.

  “Yes.”

  “I know you hate to say goodbye to your kids.”

  “Not my kids, Joe.” She sighed. “I really am sorry. It’s just that it’s hardest of all saying goodbye to Corey. She has such potential. Her IQ is so high Dr. Ray went back and hand-graded the test after the results came in. Nobody but me believed she could be that smart.”

  “You’re going to have a Corey every year in every class.”

  “And is it that easy for you to stay distant? It never used to be.”

  “You learn.”

  “You know what? I hope I don’t. I hope my aptitude for cutting myself off from people is so low the psychologists have to hand-grade my results, just to be sure.”

  She had managed a smile, but he couldn’t make himself smile back.

  “I guess I need to get out of the sun,” she said. “Let’s go home and have that iced tea. I’ll make something special for dinner tonight. How about your mother’s manicotti?”

  He looked at his watch. “No dinner for me. I’ve got Kiwanis tonight.”

  She searched his face. “Is it really important? We haven’t had a night together in a long time.” She moved a little closer. “We could test out the pond and see if it’s warm enough for swimming. And if it’s not...”

  He knew the rest of the sentence. They could keep each other warm.

  “I’m sorry, but I promised to give a report, so I can’t skip.” He looked at his watch again, as if it might help something. Anything. “And I hate to say it, but I didn’t realize it was getting as late as it is. I’m not even going to have time to go home first. I’ve still got some work to do at school before the meeting.”

  “Can’t it keep?”

  “I wish.” But he didn’t, because he didn’t want to go home anymore. He wanted to be busy. He wanted to do a thousand things at once.

  “Why, Joe?”

  He pretended he didn’t understand. “Why what?”

  “Why did you come here this afternoon?”

  “I came to see how your day had gone.”

  “I think the part that’s already finished is going to be the best part of it.” She started toward her car, parked several rows from his.

  “This is always a busy time of year,” he said.

  “Which makes it the same as every other time.”

  He caught up with her. “We’ve got all day tomorrow.”

  She stopped. “We have a houseful of people coming for our housewarming.”

  “We’ll find some time alone.”

  “No, we probably won’t.” She stopped beside Killer and got the vase she had left on the hood. The dandelions had shriveled in the sun until they were nothing more than stems.

  “Go home and get some rest.” Joe leaned over and kissed her cheek. For one moment he was close enough for anything, for kissing or shaking or sobbing in her arms. Then he pulled away. “I’ll try to get home early.”

  She didn’t answer. She just turned and walked away.

  Chapter Two

  SOMETIMES THE SILVER-LINING theory of human existence had merit. Sam and Joe’s house was a perfect example. One hundred years before, it had been a general store, weathered wood and flapping tin roof, with a wide front porch where customers could practice spitting tobacco or watermelon seeds into the ragtag bushes below. From those days of relative prosperity it had fallen onto harder times. The proprietors had departed soon after the advent of the automobile. There hadn’t been a need for a store on Old Scoggins Road when everyone could go into Foxcove for a wider variety of merchandise.

  Over the years the store had been used sporadically as a community center, then a storage barn for hay. Most recently it hadn’t been used for anything except marking the halfway point for anyone looking for the Insleys, residents of a prosperous farm just a half mile farther south.

  Turner Insley, the owner, hadn’t seen much need for tearing down the store. It was too far away from anything to be a danger. If it collapsed in the dead of night, chances were good that no one would be nearby to notice. Tearing it down cost good money, and there was always a better use for that. Over the years the store had grown a little more dilapidated, a little sorrier, but nobody had minded much.

  Not until Joe Giovanelli.

  One afternoon Joe had been driving past the store on his way to see Turner about his youngest granddaughter. Nesta Insley was the most vivacious, flirtatious sophomore in a school of close competitors. Southern charm was common enough to be ho-hum in Sadler County, but one flutter of Nesta’s eyelashes and Rhett would have abandoned Scarlett. Nesta had successfully wrapped every teacher around her pert little fingers, but Joe had been immune. Behind Nesta’s vitality and charm he had seen a scared little girl who was cheating her way through school and life in general. Since her parents had claimed to be too busy to meet with him, Joe had been on his way to explain the situation to Turner.

  He’d been a hundred yards past the store when he had applied his brakes and backed up to stop in front of it. In nearly a hundred years no one had seen the store’s potential. But Joe had looked at the old building with the rusting tin and the sagging porch and called it home.

  Conducting himself like the professional he was, Joe had waited until he and Turner had come to an understanding about Nesta. Turner was no fool; all he’d needed was Joe’s professional opinion of his granddaughter and a few observations of his own. He had assured Joe that Nesta would be taken in hand. They had agreed on tighter curfews, supervised study hours and attention to weekly progress reports. Turner’s word was still law in his family. If he told his son and daughter-in-law to shape up, they would.

  Then the two men had gotten down to real estate. No, Turner didn’t need the store, and he didn’t need the land around it. There was a nice spring down behind the store, so he couldn’t let the land go for nothing. No, sir, not for nothing. On the other hand, all he had to sell was the land, because nobody in his right mind wanted the store. Tearing it down was an expensive proposition. Yes, sir, a mighty expensive one, which was why it was still standing.

  So they had bargained for the land. And after the two men had shaken hands on six acres, Joe had told Turner that he planned to renovate the store and make it his home. Turner had seen him out, laughing all the way to the car.

  Sam had been the next hurdle. Now as Sam neared the store-turned-home she remembered the first time Joe had brought her here.

  He had been sheepish, which for Joe meant that he was only half as cocky as usual. He had promised her a drive in the country. Their apartment in town was cramped, and getting out for the afternoon had seemed like a good idea. They had driven south, and Sam had assumed their destination was a lake near the county border. When Joe had turned onto Old Scoggins she had been mildly curious. When Joe had stopped in front of the store and suggested they take a walk she’d been curious.

  When Joe had told her he had bought the store and land she had been furious.

  It had taken a full month for Joe to persuade her they could turn the store into a home. Joe wasn’t an easy man to say no to. He was domineering and brash. As a senior in high school the verbal score on his SATs h
ad been high enough to garner scholarship offers at three different colleges. Polly always said that when Joe was fired up he could wear a body down so completely they’d do just about anything to make him go away.

  But Sam had remained firm. She and Joe were opposites in many ways, but she was no less stubborn when something really mattered to her. Living in the store mattered. She hadn’t been able to imagine that even fifty years of hard work would turn it into a home. Joe had looked at the store and surrounding land and seen a paradise. She had looked at it and seen heartbreak.

  In the end, both of them had been right.

  Today as she turned into the dogwood-shaded driveway, sunshine glinted off shiny tin and fresh white paint. Ivy and petunias spilled out of bright red window boxes flanked by spruce green shutters. A porch swing and three oak rocking chairs with blue calico cushions waited patiently on the front porch for someone to while away the evening sunset, and a hummingbird darted over the trumpet vine that screened one trellised end.

  The scene was idyllic. There was enough sun to grow flowers and enough old trees to provide summertime shade. Red brick framed the flower beds and crisscrossed a walkway to the porch. The grass was soft and green, perfect for barefooted children to romp over. There were no children, but there was a bevy of kittens. Tinkerbelle, an aging calico who was old enough to know better, had presented Sam and Joe with her first and only litter just a month before.

  Despite the kittens, despite Tink’s greeting rubbed lovingly against Sam’s leg, despite the cheery petunias and the newly flowering roses, Sam felt an oppressive loneliness.

  A glass of iced tea, a shower and a change into soft knit white shorts and T-shirt did little to improve her mood. She picked at a muffin and tried the afternoon newspaper, but neither held her attention.

  Finally, with the kittens frolicking at her heels, she started toward the pond. On its shore she reassured Attila, the watch-goose who had never learned to tell the difference between friend and enemy. The sun was dropping too slowly to suit her, but she settled on the soft grass at the pond’s edge and watched its slow descent. There was no reason to go back to the house, no business there that couldn’t wait.