Bad Desire

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Authors: Gary; Devon
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“You’re so tense and keyed up; you’ve been looking at your watch every five minutes.” Her fingers continued to search until finally she touched his hand; gently she closed her fingers on his. “What is it, Henry? I’ve had an awful feeling these last few weeks that you want to tell me something and you can’t. It’s something about you and me, isn’t it?” She tried to smile, but her whole body shivered. “So tell me, Henry … just tell me this is all the silliest damned thing you’ve ever heard of.”
    He knew at once he had nearly revealed too much. “I swear to God, Faith—what are you talking about? There’s a lot of things going on. I’m a little strung out. I’ll be all right.”
    â€œSo you really have nothing you want to tell me? Nothing at all?”
    â€œNo,” he said. “Except I’m going back in there. I have to.”
    He turned his head to look at the rain.
    She saw the back of his neck where the hair whorled into a thin dark fold and it all came flooding back to her, the apartment in Chicago, the roughneck boy she had loved so recklessly, the disgrace and humiliation when he lost everything. “In a minute,” Faith said. “You can go in a minute. But first, is this something I’ve done?” She drew closer to him. “Or have you done something? Why won’t you tell me? Have you fallen in love with someone else?”
    It was unnerving how close she came to the truth. He remembered holding Sheila’s face in his hands and her tentative, young kiss. There were moments when he thought how easy it would be to throw away everything he had worked for and escape with her.
    But not this night.
    His smile came easily. “Faith,” he said. “Who would I fall in love with? Who, but you?”
    Sudden relief swept through her. His face, close to hers, seemed pale but he was smiling; that great warm smile flowed toward her from his eyes, his mouth, the tilt of his head, from all the stretches of the whispering rain. “Oh, I love you so much,” she told him. “I always will. Please don’t scare me like this.” She thought, Whatever it is, my darling, we’ll get through it. Impetuously, she kissed him and clasped him to herself a long time, letting the kindling of her love come again as once, years ago, she had known it, trusting only in that, believing in it and wanting to believe, with all her heart, in him.
    She felt him start to pull away and let him go. “Oh, I nearly forgot,” she said. “Look.” She held out the two ten-dollar bills from her pocket. “Look what I found.”
    He glanced at her outstretched hand and began to laugh. “Christ, Faith, it’s just money. This goddamned place is practically carpeted in ten-dollar bills.”
    â€œYes,” she said, “I know. But these two are mine.” And so are you, my darling. So are you .
    Henry shrugged and then he put his arm around her shoulders. Moving her toward the door, he said, “You shouldn’t stay out here in this rain. Go on in with the others; I won’t be gone much longer.” He opened the door for her and let her pass, and as she stepped inside, ahead of him, Slater looked down at his watch.
    Now .

5
    Beecham laid the room key on the dresser, took up his gym bag and stepped out to the sidewalk, shutting the door behind him. It was ten past eleven. With the wind whipping around him, he went through the hedgerow of rubbery jade plants and, again, studied the low, swarming clouds. The night smelled heavily of rain and electricity. He shoved the oversized bag onto the passenger seat and climbed in behind the wheel of the Mustang. Raindrops were beginning to pepper the windshield.
    Driving toward Canyon Valley Drive, he remembered his own grandmother, who had raised him, and how she had talked to him and read him stories from the Bible. She told him there

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