Read Online Full of Grace by Dorothea Benton Frank - Free Book Online Page A

in the mideighties. Luckily, there was no rainstorm in sight. But it was oppressive. I decided the air would be most comfortable if it was moving, so I brought a fan outside with a long extension cord and positioned it on the brick wall.
    “Freaking mosquitoes,” I said to no one, and slapped my leg, reducing the population by one and only a hungry one.
    Little clay pots of burning citronella would keep the nasty things at bay. I took a pack of six from the cabinet over the refrigerator and encircled the table with them. Next I set the table with red-and-yellow batik linens I had bought ages ago in Thailand and put a hurricane in the center of the small round table. How was I going to convince him he was in southern Italy?
    “I’ll break up some Parmesan in a little bowl and drizzle it with olive oil. And music. I’ll play that new CD, um, what the heck is the name of it? Il Divo!”
    I continued talking to myself, working out the logistics for the night. The phone rang, scaring me half to death, and I hurried back inside to answer it.
    “Hello?”
    “Hey, it’s me. Do you mind if I go to the gym for an hour?”
    “No problem. I’m building a little theater here for us.”
    “Dinner outside?”
    “Yep.”
    “What country?”
    “Italy. No, wait. Sardinia.”
    “Ah, so I’m going with you after all. White or red?”
    “A good Chianti or a Pinot.”
    “What are you cooking?”
    “It’s a surprise, Mr. Wonderful. I’ll see you later.”
    I hung up, leaned against the kitchen wall and said to the thin air, “God, I sure do love that man.”
    The smells of sautéing shallots and mushrooms welcomed Michael home, and sweaty as he was from working out, he grabbed me and kissed me all over my neck and face.
    I jumped and shrieked, “Take a shower! You smell worse than a skunk.”
    “No, I don’t! I smell good! Come here!”
    “Trust me on this,” I said. “You absolutely reek.”
    “Does that mean no predinner nooky?”
    “Definitely not! Go!”
    Within the hour, we were enjoying the cool of the evening and popping the cork on a second bottle of wine.
    “So you hated that, right?”
    “Yeah. You little Italian girls should get somebody to teach you how to cook. Seriously.”
    “Yeah, sure. Well, now that you’ve taken a break from stuffing your face, tell me, how was your day?”
    “The normal. It was a bad day for the mice and a good day for mankind. Do we have any more risotto and veal? A little more sauce?”
    “You know it. I can’t cook for any less than twelve. The food gene.”
    I took his plate and refilled it. Michael resumed eating with gusto and was wiping up the sauce with a hunk of Italian bread as he attempted to explain his current work.
    “We’ve got this experiment going on that shoots gold nanoparticles loaded up with reagents that are capable of…Grace?”
    “Hmm?”
    “I see that dull look in your eyes…”
    “Sorry. Please. The bottom line?”
    “It’s gonna cut tumor growth in cancers. Which is fascinating. But in about, who knows…five years? They’ll have little nanobots that they can inject into Joe Blow and they will go directly to the site of old Joe’s tumor, obliterate it, and poof! No tumor! No cancer! All done in about three or four hours! As opposed to stem cells that the body can reject for all kinds of reasons and that still take forever.”
    “I’m sorry, but are you not working in stem cells?”
    “Yeah, but this is a totally different approach that has everybody buzzing. There’s another team of guys working on all these experiments—nanotechnology—could absolutely beat stem cells to Stockholm this year.”
    I assumed he was referring to the Nobel Prizes.
    “Michael? Are you thinking about switching fields?”
    “No! No way. But I have to tell you, Grace, this is some awesome, awesome stuff.”
    “Man. Don’t you just…I mean, sometimes isn’t it completely amazing to be doing this work now? I mean, are we really on the edge of curing