Shakespeares Christmas Page 0,29

to bounce away from each other, frightened by the intimacy. Jack swung away to put on his shirt; I sat down to slide my feet into my shoes. I ran my fingers through my hair, took care of a button I'd skipped.

We were silent on the ride to my house, the bitter cold biting into our bones. When we pulled into the driveway I saw one light burning on the dimmest setting, in the living room. Jack leaned over to give me a quick kiss, and I was out of the car in a wink, running across the frosty lawn to the front door.

I locked the door behind me and went to the picture window. Looking out the small triangle unobscured by the Christmas tree, I saw Jack's car back out and start back to the motel. The sheets of his bed would smell like me.

Once in my room, where my mother had left a lamp on, I slowly undressed. It was too late to shower; it might wake my parents, if they weren't in their room lying awake to make sure I was home safe, like they'd done when I was a teenager. There was no counting the sleepless nights I'd given them.

Fleetingly, I thought about Teresa and Simon Macklesby. How many good nights' rest had they managed in the eight years since their daughter had vanished?

The murders of the doctor and his nurse, the strain of the wedding rehearsal, and the shock of all Jack had told me should have kept me awake. But being with Jack had drained the tension from me. Even if we hadn't had sex, I thought with some surprise, I would have felt better. I crawled in my bed, turned on my side, slid my hand under the pillow, and was immediately asleep.

The next day I had showered and dressed before I came out to have some coffee and breakfast. I'd done some sit-ups and leg lifts in my room so I wouldn't feel like a slug the rest of the day. My parents were both at the table, sections of newspaper propped up, when I got a mug from the cabinet.

"Good morning," my mother said with a smile.

My father grunted and nodded.

"How was your date last night?" Mother ventured when I was sitting with them.

"Fine," I said. My toast popped up, and I put it on a plate.

Dad peered over his glasses at me. "Got home late," he observed.

"Yes."

"How long you been dating this man? Your mother says you told her he was a private detective? Isn't that kind of dangerous?"

I answered the safest question. "I've been dating him for a few weeks."

"You think he might be serious?"

"Sometimes."

My father regarded me with some exasperation. "Now, what does that mean?"

"I think it means she doesn't want to answer any more questions, Gerald," Mother said. She rubbed the bridge of her nose with her thumb and forefinger, hiding a little smile.

"A father needs to know about men who are seeing his girl," my father said.

"This girl is almost thirty-two," I reminded him, trying to keep my voice gentle.

He shook his head. "I don't believe it. Why, that would make me old, gosh dog it!"

We all laughed as the little touchy moment passed.

Dad got up to shave, following his nearly invariable morning routine. He stuck his head back in the door just as I bit into my toast. "Can you make any kind of living as a detective?" he asked, then hurried away before I could either laugh or throw my toast at him.

"The paper says," my mother began when I'd finished my coffee, "that Dave LeMay and Binnie Armstrong were killed right before you and Varena found them."

"I thought so," I said after a pause.

"You touched them?"

"Varena did. She's the nurse," I said, reminding my mother that I was not the only one present when awful things happened.

"That's true," my mother said slowly, as one who has received a revelation of which she's half proud, half dismayed. "She has to deal with things like that all the time."

"That bad or worse." Once upon a time, Varena had given me a graphic description of a motorcycle rider who'd stretched out his arm at the wrong moment and come into the hospital without it. A passerby had had the presence of mind to wrap it in the blanket his dog sat on when it rode in the car and bring it into the hospital. I had seen bad things ... maybe just as bad... but I