Harm Moves On
Chapter 3
Saturday, January 24, 2004
1630 Local Time
Los Angeles International Airport (LAX)
Harm was dressed civilian casual in a white three-button polo shirt with a dark blue blazer over dark gray slacks and black penny loafers as he waited at LAX for Joanne's flight to land.
For the whole past week all during his non-working hours, all Harm thought about was Joanne. She finally called on Friday morning to tell him of her arrival time on Saturday. As he happily waited in the terminal for Joanne's flight to disembark, Harm thought to himself, and not for the first time; 'I am going to avoid all the mistakes I made with Sarah Mackenzie. Granted she wasn't a big help by one, hiding her marriage to Ragle from him and everyone else and two, not really letting him know what made her happy or exactly what her wishes were." He thought back to her comment of "No woman wants to be a mind reader." Well Mackenzie or now Chegwidden, neither does any man.'
He got up from the bench when he saw the United Airlines 767 pull up to the jetway. Joanne was among the first group of passengers to debark. She was wearing her "peanut butters" with its impressive array of fruit salad on her left breast. She spotted Harm's tall figure immediately and rushed right over to him.
Harm opened his arms for Joanne. As they wrapped their arms around each other, she said, "I'm glad you're dressed in civvies."
"Why's that?"
"So I could do this," Joanne answered just before she captured his lips with hers for a deep kiss. Harm returned the kiss with as much fervor thanking that they were well away from the exit line.
When they broke apart by mutual agreement Harm asked, "So you upgraded to first class?"
"Well, I was upgraded by the crew. I was the only service person aboard and since they had an empty seat in first class, near a window by myself mind you, I couldn't say no after all."
"No of course not," Harm said as he looped his arm across her back until his hand rested on her hip. He asked, "Do you have much luggage?"
"No just one more piece besides this carry-on," Joanne replied.
They went to the luggage conveyor and retrieved Joanne's Valpak military garment bag. They walked out to Harm's Corvette and stowed her bags in the trunk.
As he drove out of the airport Harm asked Joanne, "Are you hungry?"
"Yes, I am. I haven't had anything to eat since before I boarded in Honolulu. The meal they served on the plane was just unappetizing."
"Well, I have reservations in a nice place on Mission Beach. Your place is right on the way if you want to change," Harm offered.
"You know, I'd like that. This will be our first date. The only thing, can we make it an early night so I can get over the jet lag," Joanne asked.
"Whatever the lady wants," Harm said.
Joanne smiled in obvious delight as she shook herself in a shiver of pleasure at being called a lady.
It wasn't long before they pulled up to Joanne's cottage on Windansea Beach. Harm carried the bags up the walk and into the door after Joanne unlocked it.
"Harm could you please bring the bags into the master bedroom? You know where it is since you used to live here," Joanne said cheekily.
Harm smirked at her as he brought the bags along into the bedroom. While he did that Joanne went through the mail that she picked up on the way in. She also checked her answering machine. That gave her time for Harm to come out of the bedroom before she went in. She rightly didn't want to be in the bedroom with him this early in their relationship. When Harm did come out she smiled and patted his cheek on her way in.
While Joanne changed Harm looked around the house. It had the same galley kitchen with the dining area between it and the living room that he remembered. The living room was carpeted and Spartan with no TV installed and only an arm chair, two end tables on either side of a sofa, and a coffee table but he could see the feminine touches Joanne made to make it seem more comfortable. He glanced into the bedroom that used to be his and saw that she made it into her home office/study with a computer and the TV hooked up to cable. Her desk had a pile of documents while there was a love seat with a couple of quilts folded neatly over the back. There was another coffee table with two pole lamps with built-in glass tables on either side of the loveseat.
Harm saw that there were the usual aviation-oriented magazines with Sports Illustrated and a few issues of Cosmopolitan on the study's coffee table.
When Joanne came out of the master bedroom she found Harm standing in the study flipping through the latest Sports Illustrated.
"I'm ready," Joanne said.
Harm looked up and smiled as he liked what he saw. Joanne had let her hair down so that it fell to just below the collar of her ivory bolero jacket that she had on over a black silk dress that came down to mid-thigh. She wore stockings with black Farrah pumps.
"Very nice Joanne…" Harm began until she interrupted him with, "Oh you can call me Jo."
"Well, show shall we be on our way?" Harm replied offering his arm.
"Yes Harm let's," Joanne said hooking her hand into his elbow.
She loved how Harm escorted her around to the passenger side, opened the door and shut it for her after she sat.
As they drove down the road along the beach Joanne fluffed her hair out and let the wind catch it. Harm glanced at her and seeing her with the sun as her backdrop he thought, 'God she is beautiful.'
They arrived at the restaurant in no time. It was an Italian place that featured seafood and vegetarian fare. As they sat Harm said, "I love the eggplant con risotto and the catch of the day is very good." Harm said.
"That's great Harm. Let's see what else they have," Joanne replied amiably.
Just then the waiter came over to ask, "Okay would you like something to drink?"
"Sure I'll have a Dewar's on the rocks," Joanne requested.
"I'll have a Sam Adams lager please and bring a bottle of water. I'm driving tonight," Harm requested.
"I guess no flying tomorrow," Harm asked.
"Yeah, tomorrow I just want to sleep a bit late, get up and go to 11:00 mass, get to the market and stock up my bare cupboard, and then sit on the patio in the back and veg out from all the traveling."
"I can understand that," Harm agreed.
When the drinks arrived they ordered their dinner.
As they waited for the entrees, Harm sipped a little beer before he said, "Jo I want you to know that I would like tonight to be the first of many nights for us to be together. I want us to have a romantic relationship."
"Harm I was hoping for that as well." Joanne happily replied.
Harm sighed in relief as he went on, reaching his hand across the table to gently take hers. "All this past week you were all I could think of every non-working hour."
"Really?" Joanne asked with a very girlish and coy smile.
"Yes really," Harm replied.
He sighed again as he prepared himself to say, "There is something I want to get off my chest before we move on."
Joanne just nodded, letting him take his time.
Harm plunged on with, "When you asked me about Sarah Mackenzie, you probably saw that I became a bit angry."
"Yes I did. I figured that you would tell me about that in your own time."
"Well before she married Admiral Chegwidden, I had planned to ask her to marry me."
"She married the Navy's JAG! Her commanding officer! Wouldn't that have been fraternization?" Joanne asked indignantly.
"They claimed it's not as they only began seeing each other after she was assigned elsewhere. Anyway, I didn't keep up on what they did because right after they announced their plans, I immediately requested and was granted a transfer as the XO at North Island. I even asked that they not send me an invitation to their Christmas Eve wedding. Since I left DC I've made it my mission to not keep up with them or what they are doing. Whenever I called the Roberts, who worked with Mackenzie and me at JAG Headquarters, to connect with them and their son AJ, my godson, I stop Harriet and Bud from telling me the latest news they have on the Chegwiddens."
"You must really hate her for what she did to you."
"Yes I did, but holding onto hate can be very detrimental to your mental health. Instead, I've learned a lesson. Oddly enough it came from the admiral."
"What did he say?"
"He said that when I find a lady I want to love, I should treat her kindly and tell her that I love her."
Joanne smiled and squeezed his hands affectionately as she replied, "I am happy about the first part but what do you say we build up to the love part until we mean it when we finally express that."
"I'd like that," Harm agreed with a smile.
At that moment the waiter came with their orders. They tabled the conversation until they ate a bit.
Joanne finally asked, "So what was it that kept you two apart, and what happened that she finally decided to move on to Chegwidden?"
Harm sighed a bit before he replied, "To be honest, I wasn't the greatest communicator. You see she and I danced around a relationship because we were working at the same command. We went out on a lot of dinners that involved work, mutual friends or just going out. We talked a lot about other things besides our relationship. I thought that my wanting us to be together away from the office was enough to communicate my intentions. I found out that that wasn't true. So I heeded the admiral's advice and came out and told you that I want a romantic relationship with you. I'm very happy that you want the same thing."
Joanne replied with, "I'm glad you laid your cards on the table like that. I have to ask what did the admiral mean when he said, treat her kindly."
Harm's face turned red with embarrassment as he explained, "Mac and I were always sniping at each other, finding new ways to push each other's buttons. More times than not we opposed each other in court and sometimes we let our feelings on winning or losing get the better of us and we traded insulting remarks. There was one time that I didn't engage my filter and I said something that was very unkind. To digress a bit. One of our other colleagues is Cmdr. Sturgis Turner. He is also a classmate of mine from the Naval Academy. One other person who was also a classmate of ours was a woman named Diane Schonke."
"You said was," Joanne asked.
"Yes was. She was murdered by another officer who sexually harassed her while she served on the Seahawk. I even investigated that case. You see Diane and Mac could have been twins. Not quite identical, but close enough. Diane and I were more than friends, but not quite lovers. Kind of like what Mac and I were. Diane and I were supposed to meet and discuss that, but she was murdered the night before our date."
"That's awful," Joanne said in empathy.
"Well, when Sturgis got to JAG and saw Mac, he thought there was something between us and just like the nosey hole he was at the academy, he kept asking me about Mac and me. So I passed the unkind remark that Mac overheard, which was "Every man Mac has ever been with is either dead or wishes he was."
"Oh Harm that is awful. No wonder she went to someone else. But what was that a reference to?"
"You see Mac was married when she was eighteen to a guy named Chris Ragle, but she never divorced him. He was in prison when she joined the Marines. Even after graduating from law school, she didn't do anything about it. That is until he came to DC looking for her and for money to pay off a loan shark. Well, he pulled a gun on her and threatened to shoot her. She grabbed the gun to get it away from him, and he pulled the trigger and shot himself. Also before Ragle showed up, she was dating another lawyer, named Dalton Lowne who was killed by a detective who was stalking her. She also had an affair with her first CO in Okinawa after he had her transferred out to law school. She later had to try and convict him for DDO. Then after Ragle was dead and we were in Australia on a case and she couldn't get me to move on with our relationship, she took up with the Australian Navy exchange officer named Brumby who was working at JAG, who also tried to have her put into Mirimar for Ragle's homicide. She became engaged to him, but broke it off when I crashed the Tomcat I was flying rushing to her wedding. She insisted I be there. Well when she wouldn't reschedule the wedding, he broke it off and went back to Australia. Hence the dead or wishing they were dead remark."
"Wow, some story. But I have to ask two things. With her history why would you want to move on with her?"
"And the second?"
"Why didn't you just tell her one way or the other?"
Harm sighed again as he explained, "You know I still can't figure that out. You see we also had a strong friendship. I guess I didn't want to lose that. Then again, it might have been that history I told you about. Maybe there was a part of me that thought she wouldn't be there one day."
"Well, I can understand that. I have to thank you for your honesty. But if we're going to move forward as a couple, I want some things understood."
"Go on," Harm said encouraging her.
"Firstly, unlike Mackenzie, I will tell you what I like and dislike. I only ask, engage your filter a bit more often, at least for my sake."
"I think I can do that."
"Also tell me what you like and dislike. That way I can engage my filter. My Sicilian and Puerto Rican blood may get the best of me. We Latinas can be a fiery bunch of women."
"Well, I hope I get to see the good fiery side of you."
"If we play our cards right, you will," Joanne promised with a coy grin.
"I like the sound of that, We."
It wasn't long after that when they finished their dinner the check was presented and they were leaving. Again Joanne loved how Harm held the car door open for her.
On the drive back to Joanne's cottage Harm asks, "Since you want to relax tomorrow with no flying, what say we get together next weekend."
"Oh you can come by and relax with me tomorrow if you like," Joanne said hopefully.
"I'd like that. You said you wanted to sleep late. What time is good for me to come over?"
"Oh, about 1400 is good. That will give me time to get back from the market after church. That way we can spend the whole afternoon together. I'll even cook you dinner. What do you like?"
"Well I stay away from the red meat, but I'm not adverse to chicken or seafood."
"Okay when I hit the market in the morning, I'll keep that in mind."
Soon they arrived at the cottage. Again Harm walked around and opened the car door for Joanne. They walked to the front door together. When Joanne unlocked it, she turned and putting her arms around his neck said, "One part of me wants to invite you in and the good Catholic girl part of me says wait until we know each other first. So again here is something to remember me by."
She captured his lips in a deep kiss. Harm was a bit surprised, but recovered nicely and returned the kiss with equal fervor.
When they broke apart Harm said, "See you tomorrow?"
"Yes that'd be great," Joanne replied. Then she turned and walked into the house.
Harm turned and practically skipped back to his car. Joanne smiled as she looked out her window and watched him leave.