Disclaimer: none of these characters belong to me; they belong to Shoot the Moon Enterprises and Warner Bros to whom I am eternally grateful for the opportunity to take them out for a spin and bit of light humour.
This is - finally - my contribution to the challenge I set out a few weeks ago to let a show tune act as a story prompt. This song from My Fair Lady has always seemed to me to be a perfect song for Lee.
Man in the Street
Lee had to laugh when he realized that was what was supposed to be an aimless drive to help him sleep had brought him back to Arlington, not that he was the least surprised. He'd been in a state of near delirium all afternoon and evening, ever since he and Amanda had shared that kiss in the office. Well, kisses really – for a while there, it had sort of been one long kiss since neither seemed to have been able to keep their lips off the other's skin, but clinically speaking it had been more like a series of kisses. Not that there had been anything even slightly clinical about them. Magical, breath-taking, inspiring, giddy, definitely all of those but definitely not clinical. They had almost made up for all those near-misses, those fake kisses, those disagreements that should have been kisses… almost but not quite.
He grinned as the Corvette picked up speed as if he couldn't get there fast enough. He was still a few blocks away when he realized that at this time of night, the distinctive engine noise would wake up everyone on Maplewood Drive, and instantly lifted his foot off the accelerator while he rethought his options. There was a park two blocks away, the one with the baseball diamond that was Phillip's second home in the summertime; he pulled into the small gravel parking lot and unfolded himself from the car, turning back with a head shake and a self-deprecating laugh at the tell-tale tone that told him he'd left the keys in the ignition again. Scooping them into his pocket, he strode off down the street he'd come to know like the back of his hand.
I have often walked down this street before
But the pavement always stayed beneath my feet before
All at once am I several stories high
Knowing I'm on the street where you live
He swung along the sidewalk, long strides eating up the distance until he was finally across the street from 4247. It was ridiculous really - he'd been here a thousand times and for some reason, tonight he felt like he had as a teenager, skulking down the street to stare at the house of the prettiest girl in school, a mixture of embarrassment and a kind of intoxicating happiness that meant he couldn't keep away. It looked exactly like it always did, but for some reason, tonight he didn't seem able to stop himself from drinking in the sight of it. When did it happen, he wondered, when had it gone from dull suburban house to something he considered the closest thing to home? It wasn't the house, he knew, it was Amanda that had become home to him, but 4247 reflected everything about her that he loved: warm, comfortable, welcoming…
Sinclair. That was the moment, he thought, that moment when he'd shown up at her house after his 'funeral', unsure of his reception and she'd launched herself at him in relief, equal parts happy and furious, laughing and scolding as if he were family already. That was the day it had become the place he knew he could always go when he needed somewhere to go.
Got somewhere to go for Thanksgiving? He couldn't hold in the chuckle as he remembered Amanda asking him that when they'd only known each other a few days. Well maybe this year I do. His heart leapt at that idea.
Are there lilac trees in the heart of town?
Can you hear a lark in any other part of town?
Does enchantment pour out of every door?
No it's just on the street where you live
The night air was filled with the scent of rhododendrons and azaleas, another thing he'd come to associate with Amanda over the years. It had taken him months to realize there were always the scent of flowers around her, even in the winter months. It was the subtle fragrances of her perfumes, her shampoo and he wasn't even sure what else – he just knew that he'd gotten used to always being surrounded by the sweet scent. Even when she wasn't around, his car remained faintly perfumed. And that was just in the winter – in the summer, her whole garden smelled of them and she always had fresh flowers she'd picked that day somewhere in the Q Bureau. When they'd met, the type of girls he'd dated had been the type that wore overpowering, dizzying perfumes; it has taken him years to appreciate the gentle subtlety of the scents she wore, and how much they reflected the same gentle subtlety she brought to so much of his life.
And oh the towering feeling
Just to know somehow you are near
The overpowering feeling
That any second you may suddenly appear
The house was dark as he approached except for the hall light and even as he watched, he saw it go out, and Amanda's bedroom light come on a few seconds later.
"Damn it," he thought. "If only I'd gotten here a few minutes earlier."
He leaned against the tree and watched as the curtain parted for a few seconds as Amanda opened the window. "Just this much," he laughed to himself. He eyed the trellis for a moment, wondering if it would still take his weight. He'd only ever tried it once, the night he'd climbed up to try and warn her away from Alan Chamberlain and it had seemed pretty rickety then; now it had been through another winter and if he had to admit it, he'd probably enjoyed a few too many of Amanda's brownies in the past few months… Nah, probably not a good idea.
Why would he even climb up there anyway? It wasn't like they hadn't spent hours together that afternoon and he'd see her in the morning back at the office. He felt the smile cross his face again at the memory of the time they'd spent in the Q Bureau that day. At some point, they'd migrated to the couch, Amanda leaning on his chest, mixing kisses and endearments equally, but both of them with an ear out for footsteps in the hallway that might signal Billy or Francine returning even though the door had remained firmly locked. It had made them both feel like teenagers again, that feeling when you're almost drunk with new love, but wary of parental interruptions. Only Amanda could have reduced him back to this, back to gawky adolescence - and make him love every minute of it.
He was just straightening back up to walk back to his car, when he saw a flicker of light in the living room window that suggested the kitchen light had gone back on. He scanned the bedroom windows, but saw no sign of who might have gotten up. It was late enough that he knew the boys would be sacked out in that deep sleep that only young boys seemed to be able to manage – the kind that lets them sleep through natural disasters – so really it could only be Amanda or Dotty.
"Probably Dotty" he told himself. "Probably just got back up for a glass of milk, or to find her book, or… but maybe…" The light went off again, and he felt a rush of disappointment.
He was halfway across the street before he even knew he'd moved, skulking up the dark driveway, planning to just, you know, check to make sure the back door was locked and that the windows were latched, he told himself. He definitely wasn't going to go sit in the gazebo and inhale the garden fragrances and just watch the house that had become his favourite place in the entire world.
He was still shaking his head, laughing at himself when he reached the back corner of the house. In the darkness and off guard, he never saw it coming, the hand that came out to grab him and haul him tripping over his own feet up against a warm body. A warm body that was leaning back against the house, laughing softly to herself even as she pulled him into her arms, looking up at him with sparkling eyes.
"You're losing your touch, Scarecrow," she mocked him gently, pulling his head down to hers for a kiss.
"Amanda, you almost scared me half to death!" That fact didn't stop him from kissing her thoroughly however. "How did you even know I was here?"
Her warm husky chuckle enveloped him and he thought he might actually have felt his heart skip a beat. "I didn't really, I just felt like you'd be out here even though I couldn't see the 'vette anywhere."
"I left it down at the baseball diamond," he murmured between kisses along her cheekbone. "Didn't want to wake up the neighbours."
"Mmmm, very stealthy," she complimented him, running her hand through his hair and gently running her nails along the back of his scalp. "I was headed to bed and then, I don't know, I just wanted to be out here again to think about today and then I heard you coming up the driveway and thought I'd see if I could surprise you for once."
"Huh – so not so stealthy then," he disagreed.
"Oh no, you were super quiet – I just know what you sound like when you're sneaking. And besides, I was listening for it." She ran a finger lightly over the dimples that had deepened in his cheeks. "Hoping for it." It was too dark to see much, but he knew she was blushing just from the way her voice dropped on those last few words.
"I debated going up the trellis again," he admitted.
"Really?" she giggled. "What made you chicken out?"
"The thought you might make me jump off it like we did off that balcony yesterday," he answered without a beat.
"I wouldn't have done that!" she responded in a mock scolding tone. "Not when you didn't have a nice swimming pool to land in!"
"Couldn't take the chance," he answered with equal mock seriousness. "You might still be mad about losing your favorite lipstick in the deep end."
"It would have been romantic though - very Romeo and Juliet," she said in a thoughtful tone.
"I think we're more Benedick and Beatrice, don't you? At least they're alive at the end of the play," he laughed as he turned his head to kiss her fingertips. Even in the dim moonlight she could see his eyes were sparkling.
"You're awfully well-read for a guy who got tossed out of so many colleges," she grinned up at him. "And we're more Petruchio and Kate, methinks. He spent a lot of time trying to train her to stay in the car too."
"And he never managed it either." His arms had slid around her waist and his face lit up with humour. "Are you in the same nightgown as the day we met?"
"I might be," she laughed as his arms tightened around her. "But I own a lot of them, so probably not."
"Very sexy," he grinned down at her, pretending to recoil as she slapped his chest, then ducking down for a quick peck on the lips. When her lips instantly parted under his, the quick peck rapidly became something longer, his hand tangled in her hair, her hands twisted in the lapels of his jacket to pull him closer still. Neither of them had any sense of how much time had passed until-
"Amanda? Are you out there?"
Amanda pulled away with a gasp of laughter, tightening her grasp on his jacket to keep him from fleeing automatically but for once, he didn't move, simply burying his face in her neck to keep from laughing out loud.
"Yes, Mother! I'm just, uh, making sure the lids are on the trash cans tight because I saw a raccoon out here a few minutes ago."
"Oh that's a good idea," Dotty's voice floated through the darkness. "Honestly between that dog next door and the raccoons, it's a wonder the garbage ever even makes it out to the truck some weeks! Anyway, I just came down to make some cocoa to help me sleep and found the back door open. Would you like me to make you some?"
"That sounds lovely, Mother!" Amanda called back. "I'll be in in a second!"
"I've been promoted from neighbour's dog to raccoon?" chuckled Lee. "Or is that a demotion?"
"Either way, you're a pest!" The insult was softened by the way she pulled him in for another light kiss. "I'll see you tomorrow at work, now scoot before she comes out again!"
There was yet another kiss and then he was on his way back down the driveway, grinning like a fool. He paused halfway down the block to glance back at the unassuming clapboard house, the porch light looking exactly like a beacon calling him home. Not yet, he thought, but maybe soon. He turned away and walked back to his car, humming unconsciously until he finally realized what song was running through his head, and he began to softly sing the words under his breath.
People stop and stare, they don't bother me
For there's nowhere else on earth that I would rather be
Let the time go by, I won't care if I
Can be here on the street where you live.
He shook his head, smiling at his own sentimentality as he slipped into the Corvette and drove away down the dark streets.