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  Her emotional responsibility lay elsewhere.

  He sighed. He had to accept that if Sarah and Rashid wanted to sleep together, it was their choice and none of his business. She could do worse, and had, by far. At least he wasn’t Jay. When Emerson forced himself to admit it, Rashid was a nice guy. Honest, with a good heart. He wouldn’t cheat on her, abuse her, or do drugs. He worked hard and had a sense of duty and responsibility. Sarah should be with someone who made her happy, and if it couldn’t be Emerson, shouldn’t it be someone he approved of?

  Yeah, right.

  Wimp, Emerson told himself. He should be angrier. His best friend with the love of his life? He should be furious. He’d been keeping his distance since the embrace on the porch, but it was nearly impossible to stay mad at someone so guileless, so innocent in his steadfast belief that Emerson still wanted to be his friend.

  Finally Sarah returned, somber, carrying spiced tea and a huge slice of warm apple pie with vanilla ice cream. It smelled wonderful. It was exactly what he wanted, or what he would have wanted if he’d thought about it. She set the tea and the pie on a little table next to his chair, returned with a mug for herself and sat on the floor in front of him.

  Her focus seemed completely on him, her gaze brown and inviting.

  “I was looking out the window and—” Flustered by his sidetracked train of thought, he reconsidered his entry point. If he made the girl the focus, Sarah would think he came over because the situation aroused him. Which was true, but it wouldn’t be fair to unload that on her. Instead he told her how he came to stop writing Dirk Blade. About meeting the last deadline and hanging up the leather jacket.

  “I thought it would be easy.” He warmed his hands on the mug, noticing that there wasn’t a single chip on it. Or hers. “You know, you’re ready to make a change in your life and the pieces should just fall into place. But it’s like...he’s torturing me for it. He won’t let me go.”

  He stopped to sip tea and have more pie before it got cold and the ice cream got too soupy, and because he couldn’t bear to listen to himself whine.

  Sarah looked at him for a long time with those big, soft eyes. Maybe she was thinking about how pathetic he’d become and was glad he’d stopped seeing her.

  “Maybe you shouldn’t have stopped,” she said.

  He raised his eyes from his fork.

  “Maybe there’s a reason you need him. Maybe you and Dirk just have to find some way to coexist inside the same person.” She tightened her fingers around her mug. “And anyone who wants to be in your life is just going to have to get used to it.”

  * * * * *

  They talked long into the night, killing the rest of the pie, and Emerson began to feel better, less like a sexual freak and more like someone who merely needed an outlet for old wounds that hadn’t healed right. It was a relief to have Sarah’s support, to be able to discuss Dirk with anyone, and so clinically, instead of the way Daisy liked to talk about him, which was kind of furtive and disturbing.

  He crawled in at five a.m., accustomed from his odd work shifts to coming in late and being quiet, but was surprised to find Rashid in the kitchen, surrounded by breakfast preparations and already dressed for his day in a white shirt, striped tie, and pressed trousers.

  “You were called into the infirmary?” Rashid looked concerned. “There was a problem?”

  “Yeah. But it’s under control now.” No need to tell Rashid he’d been at Sarah’s, although the temptation needled him.

  “I am making french toast, can I make extra for you?”

  He probably should have a real breakfast after all that pie, but Emerson had no urge to sit at the table and watch Rashid stir his tea five times counterclockwise, cut french toast like a surgeon, and imagine him making love to Sarah with the same tidy precision. He should probably start avoiding both of them for a while.

  “No thanks,” Emerson said. “I already ate.”

  Chapter 38

  A day went by, two, three, and not a word out of Emerson. Sarah called to check on him. He wasn’t home. She didn’t want to disturb him at the infirmary, so she left a message with one of the Jordanians. He didn’t call back.

  She’d been feeling so connected to him, like they were becoming friends again since Jay had inadvertently brought them back together, giving her a chance to heal what her carelessness had torn.

  But she was starting to feel used and discarded, as if he knew he could come over and unburden himself and then, with a clear conscience, go back to the rest of his life.

  And Daisy.

  Giving him the benefit of the doubt, thinking he might not have gotten the message and realizing she might have used him a few times as well, she called again.

  This time, she got Rashid.

  He sounded so excited to hear from her that she couldn’t bear to tell him she’d called for Emerson. She asked about his research, and he was eager to talk about it. Then he apologized for being too busy to come over and cook for her.

  “But we will do this very soon, yes? Just two friends, no big deal?”

  “Sure,” she said. After a polite pause, she inquired about Emerson.

  “I don’t see him much. When he is home he is very quiet and stays in his room.”

  “Is he writing?”

  “Yes. Nearly every night it’s the same. Just about the time I go to sleep. I hear his friend’s car leaving, and then he begins at the typewriter. Sarah, I’m concerned about this book he is writing. I don’t know who is going to read such a thing, because at the rate he is going I fear it will be terribly long.”

  Still Emerson hadn’t told Rashid what he really wrote. Well, that was Emerson’s problem. And so was Daisy. She exhaled in a rush and imagined Emerson sitting at his typewriter, taking notes as Dirk relived what he’d been doing with Daisy just across the room. It hurt knowing that only three days ago she’d given him her blessing to do exactly that.

  Maybe that was what he’d been looking for. Not a chance to become friends again, but a way to feel less guilty about screwing someone else, until Emerson could get over Sarah for good.

  “You are still there?” Rashid said.

  “Yeah. I was just thinking. About our dinner? How’s next Friday?”

  Chapter 39

  Emerson McCann—passed over and passed by—was not just always older and sometimes wiser and the only native English speaker in the house, but also, for a slight discount in his monthly expenses, collector of rent checks for their landlord.

  The next day was March 1, and he still had an unchecked name in his ledger book.

  Mr. Unchecked was still upstairs, preparing notes for an evening study group.

  Emerson lingered over his supper of leftover pizza, mentally preparing himself to face him. He hated nagging people for money, especially friends, especially people who used to be friends.

  He had little to say to Rashid these days. He’d been fairly good about keeping his distance from both of them. Sarah was easier; she lived a mile away and worked downtown. Rashid was more difficult to avoid. They met in transit—in the kitchen, in the laundry room—and Emerson kept the exchanges as brief as possible, before he could imagine Rashid’s hands on Sarah’s body. Before Rashid could do or say something nice, making it too hard for Emerson to stay angry.

  I’m in hell, Emerson thought. At least the other times when Sarah had new boyfriends, he could find a twisted comfort in loathing them. But it was impossible to hate the guy.

  What killed him was that Emerson had all but forced the two of them together. Talk to him, he’d told Sarah. Set him straight. She’d set him straight, all right. He’d forgotten what talk led to, with Sarah and her tender heart, unable to consciously inflict pain. So many times when they were dating he’d look at her, certain she was about to break it off with him, almost wishing she would just to have it over with, and they’d end up making love instead, leaving him bewildered and insecure about her intentions.

  In charitable moments Emerson
felt obliged to warn Rashid, inexperienced with women and with Sarah, what he was getting himself into.

  This was not one of those moments.

  He had only gotten halfway up the stairs when he caught a whiff of aftershave and saw the younger man quietly closing Emerson’s bedroom door.

  “Oh. There you are.” Rashid’s brief smile seemed a bit forced. “I thought maybe you weren’t home.”

  “You usually go into my room when I’m not home?” Not true, of course, but he needed something to get pissed off about.

  “Never! I would never...I only left you the rent, I didn’t want to leave it downstairs. There is...there is something else I left you, too.” He flicked a second’s worth of frightened brown eyes toward Emerson before averting his gaze. He didn’t look as smug anymore. Emerson felt a charitable moment coming on. “It’s my notice. I will be returning to India after all. The marriage is settled. You will be able to rent my room beginning the end of April.”

  “The marriage is—” Emerson repeated dumbly. “You’re going through with it?”

  “This is the decision which has been made for me.”

  Rashid ducked his head and started down the stairs. The charitable moment passed. Emerson put a hand out to stop him.

  “What do you mean, the decision has been made for you?”

  Rashid swallowed. “It is just as I have said.”

  “Does Sarah know?”

  “Please. I’m late for my study group.” He pushed at Emerson’s arm.

  Emerson tightened his grip on the stair railing. “Does she even know you’re still getting married?”

  Rashid’s voice was a squeak. “Why are you doing this? I have done nothing to you!”

  “No. It’s Sarah you’re going to be doing it to.”

  “But I would never dream of hurting Sarah!”

  “Yeah. Getting involved with her then sneaking out of the country to marry another woman isn’t going to hurt her at all.”

  This appeared to give the man pause. He glanced down at his shoes and then back up at Emerson, his expression one of pleading. “It’s what I must do. What my family expects, and Sarah knows this. Please. There will be students who are waiting for me, and I have the key to the room.”

  Emerson dropped his arm. Rashid didn’t move. The two men looked at each other. “I’m very sorry if you are too angry with me right now to be my friend,” Rashid said. “But Sarah is my friend. It will never be my intention to hurt her.”

  Emerson softened at his housemate’s deference and from realizing he, too, had been acting like a possessive jerk. “I’m sorry, Rashid. Look. It’s none of my business what you have going with Sarah. But she was my friend first, and if you’re planning on leaving, you ought to be decent about it.”

  “Yes,” he said. “This I will do.”

  * * * * *

  The following Friday, as the newest Indian god of love showered, shaved, and put on too much cologne, Daisy called Emerson and asked him to meet her at the coffee bar in the mall where she worked. He dearly appreciated an excuse to get out of the house, even if it meant going to a place dizzy with neon, gleaming tile, and polished brass samovars. Daisy showed up late, in her work clothes: spiked heels and a dress that would have looked at home atop a Slurpee machine. After ordering the most expensive concoction on the menu, she told him it had been fun, especially the past couple of weeks, but she was going back to her boyfriend.

  Emerson sagged back into his chair. He should have known. Nothing good had ever happened to him at a coffee bar.

  Slowly Daisy licked steamed milk and cinnamon off the length of her stirrer with the tip of her tongue and smiled. “But we can still be friends. Right?”

  Emerson pulled out his wallet and left his last two singles on the table. “No, thanks,” he said. “That’s not what I’m looking for.”

  During the drive home, Emerson thought he should have been more depressed. A pretty girl—with whom he’d been having more than decent sex—had dropped him for an emotionally abusive, drunk-driving Neanderthal.

  Actually, he was a little relieved. She talked too much, and this thing she had going with Dirk was getting too weird. One night she’d even called him Dirk at a really bad time, but she’d been doing something interesting, and he hadn’t wanted to ruin the moment.

  He turned off Erie Boulevard and headed toward his neighborhood. It was a beautiful night, the kind of night he lived for all winter, when it was finally warm enough to smell the earth again. Hazy moonlight glowed from behind still-bare trees. He had to be at the infirmary in a few hours to fill in on an overnight shift, but it seemed a waste to go home and miss this window of magic, this new season unfolding.

  And Emerson felt like celebrating. It was a small victory, an unusual one, and something only Sarah would understand.

  But if he went by the red house with the black shutters, he knew he’d see Rashid’s car in the driveway, so he continued on to the infirmary. Might as well clock in early. He could use the extra spending money; he’d just dropped the last of his cash on a double tall mocha latte.

  As he swung through the doors a few minutes later, the night nurse purred his name, his real name. “Honey, I’m so glad you’re here. I’m on my last nerve.”

  It felt good to be needed. “What’s going on?”

  “It’s Charlie.”

  Emerson looked up from the time clock. “He’s not—”

  She shook her head. “Nah. That old bastard’s gonna outlive us all. He’s just been fussing up a storm. Must be that full moon. Ten o’clock, I’m trying to get everyone in bed, and he wants to feed the ducks.”

  After getting settled, Emerson found Charlie in the sunroom, in hot debate with one of the young nurses’ aides. She was pretty but kind of uptight, the sort of girl who was looking for a doctor, not an orderly. Dallas blared from the television in the corner.

  “I don’t care,” Charlie rasped, flailing a bony arm. “I heard ’em, I wanna go see ’em.”

  Emerson stepped in. “What’s up, Charlie?”

  The aide’s relief was palpable.

  The canyons in Charlie’s face deepened as he smiled. He pressed his hands together and rubbed his palms. “Hot spit, there’s my boy. Let’s go see them ducks.”

  “But it’s bedtime, Mr. Fitzpatrick,” the aide said. “You have to take your medication.”

  “Why don’t you take it?” He covered his mouth and said toward Emerson, “Maybe it’ll take that stick out of her ass.”

  “That’s not nice, Charlie,” Emerson said, although it was probably true.

  “Come on, wheel me out of here,” Charlie said. “I’m tired of this goddamned henhouse.”

  Chapter 40

  As the invitation had been hers, and because of Emerson’s warning about male culinary pursuit, Sarah refused to let Rashid cook for her. Dinner was take-out Chinese, Indian beer, and awkward stretches of silence. Neither of them brought up the marriage proposal, although it sat in an empty chair, nibbled mu shu pork, and leered at them. Sarah cautioned herself that these things took time.

  After the last fortune cookie had been unwrapped and the leftovers put away, Rashid announced that he had brought a movie, knowing Sarah’s fondness for them. Then he retrieved from his car a poorly reviewed romantic comedy whose ending Sarah could predict after the first five minutes. A second beer, a third, and Sarah was rewriting the script in her head. If she were watching this with Emerson, they’d be making fun of the dialogue and the lame love scenes, the stupid things the characters were made to do in the name of advancing a bad plot, and wondering aloud in which universe the events could believably occur. But Rashid seemed engrossed, all the way to the inevitable end. Sarah had even predicted the final line.

  “I don’t mean to insult your movie selection,” Sarah said, as the tape was rewinding. “But I can’t believe these actors had the nerve to put their names on this film.”

  “It was that bad?” Rashid said, distractedly.

 
; “Weren’t you watching?”

  His eyes rounded with innocence. “Yes. Yes I was.”

  “No, you weren’t.”

  The tape stopped with a click.

  He turned to face her. “Perhaps not. Perhaps because there’s something I must tell you, and I was thinking of how I should do it.”

  Those were never good words to hear, especially from someone who was in love with you and had been told he was not supposed to be.

  Sarah tossed down the last of her beer.

  “I’m going back to India at the end of the semester after all.”

  She blinked at him a moment and lowered her gaze. “Because of me?”

  He hesitated. She felt his eyes on her. “It’s probably for the best.”

  Sarah ached for him, that he thought the only choice available to him was the safe one. What if love didn’t happen like he’d been promised? What if he never got to be in love again?

  “After...I do this, we will not be able to be friends,” Rashid said. “We will not be able to be,” he made vague hand gestures, “anything to each other.”

  She let out a breath. “No, I don’t think your wife would take kindly to you popping over on a jet to have dinner with me every Friday night.”

  He shook his head. “No, I don’t think so.”

  “I’ll miss you.”

  “Will you?” he said, brightly.

  His unflagging enthusiasm for her was hard to resist.

  “Sure. You’re a nice guy, and we’re friends. And you did ask me to marry you.” She smiled. “I’ll never forget that.”

  He averted his gaze. “But I’m not so nice.”

  Self-deprecation in men was harder for Sarah to resist, especially after a few beers. She always wanted to make them feel better. She put her palm up to his cheek, touching him like she had in his car. This time, though, his skin was warm and his eyes sought hers, looking for what she imagined to be salvation.