Beth opened the door to see her husband's nieces, Colleen and Mary Ellen.
"Come in," she said, happy to see them.
"I thought I'd see if I could be of any use to Kara," Colleen said. "And Mary Ellen came with me."
"What a sweet thing to do," Beth said. "So many people have been so helpful."
Kara came downstairs after Beth went up to get her.
"You look so thin," her cousin Colleen observed.
"I hate it," Kara said. "I want to be like I was before and start playing volleyball."
"That's good," Colleen said. "You wouldn't believe some of the patients I see who think it's good to be sick if it's something that causes them to lose weight." Colleen was a licensed counselor, and she had a lot of anorexic clients. "I'm glad that's not affecting you."
"I'm used to being active," Kara said. "I want to get back to that."
"Are you going to be able to play volleyball?" Mary Ellen asked Kara.
"I sure hope so. My treatments are done. I already feel a little better. The doctor says take it easy, but I can try to get into it."
"I'm glad," Mary Ellen said. "You know, you're an inspiration. Would you like to have me do an article? I could go into what happened and how you're fighting it."
"It will look like nepotism, though," Kara said. "We have the same name."
"It shouldn't be, news is news," Mary Ellen said. "If it happened to someone else, I'd do it. What do you say?"
"OK," Kara said. "Could you mention everyone who has helped me?"
"But of course. Who is that?"
"My parents, of course, Oksana, Amanda, Branwyn, but mostly Peter."
"Her boyfriend," Colleen told Mary Ellen.
"We'll talk about all of them," Mary Ellen said. "I'll pick you up after school. Or better yet, I'll come to practice one day. Would that be too distracting?"
"No, I don't think so," Kara said. "If you don't make too big a deal of it."
"OK, no big deal," Mary Ellen laughed.
Duane went to Sarah's apartment. She had invited him over to dinner. He knew there was more to it than that. He wasn't ready to deal with it, but he knew he never would be.
She poured him a glass of wine.
"I drove over," he said, trying to refuse the glass.
"You aren't going home for a long time, Duane," she said. "you can handle this."
He sighed.
"I can cook, too, can't I?" Sarah said. "I even have all the old fashioned virtues."
"You cook like a doctor," he said.
She laughed and said, "See, you can't go wrong with me."
She had turned on some music. "Do you want to dance?" he asked.
"Thank you, I thought you'd never ask. I thought you only danced with Patti Polk."
"I was dancing with you a long time at Jakes!"
"Oh, but that was just so I wouldn't beat you at pool."
"Oh, so it doesn't count, does it?"
They danced awhile. He felt the silkiness of her hair, and the firmness of her body. He wasn't used to that kind of body, at least, not for the past fifteen years. He was out of his league.
Deal with it, he told himself. Figure out a way. There had to be a way to get out of here without sleeping with a girl twenty years younger than himself.
He had to quit worrying about that. Like Alexis said. Quit blaming that.
He felt helplessly vulnerable, because he knew he was going to try to trust her.
He was kissing her the next minute.
She responded warmly, passionately. He wondered where the line was. Was she going to change her mind? He'd tried it when he first kissed her, here in this apartment, just to figure out if she wasn't just teasing and wouldn't really want to be involved with him like that in reality. But she had. Now, it didn't seem very probable that Sarah would suddenly be unwilling. So that one would not work. Talking to her never worked, she just out-argued him.
"You should have been a lawyer," he said. "But then," he said, realizing, "you'd have to be able to argue both sides of a question."
"Yes," she said, kissing his neck, slowly.
"So try to get me to leave."
"I'm not a lawyer," she said, between her kisses, going on, and massaging his back with those hands.
Clay was in his dorm room doing some studying. Suddenly, he had an idea.
He opened his laptop and started a letter. Dear Branwyn. I am dating two guys. One knows, the other does not. Now they run into each other a lot. They sort of work in the same place. How do I tell the one who doesn't know? Just come out and say it? Break it one step at a time? Sincerely, Torn Between Two Lovers.
He could put it into his sister's backpack, he thought. Or, maybe she expected them to come from a particular box at school. He tried to think if he still had any contacts at the school other than Taryn or Branwyn. Maybe he could talk his cousin Kara into it. Maybe he could talk Branwyn herself into it. He could even write the answer for Branwyn. Or have Branwyn send the answer to Taryn without publishing it.
For a moment he thought he should abandon the plan. But then, he printed the letter out, thinking there must be some way for it to work.