Read Online Sweet Memories by Lavyrle Spencer - Free Book Online Page A

knowing you were all out there listening. Thanks, all of you, for coming.”
    Jeff looped an elbow around Theresa’s neck, faked a headlock and a punch to the jaw and grunted, “You did good, sis.”
    Margaret took command then. “We have a tree to decorate yet tonight, and you know how your father always has trouble with those lights. Let’s get this party moving home!”
    They headed toward the parking lot, and Theresa invited, “Does anybody want to ride with me?” She could sense Amy reserving her reply until she heard what Brian answered.
    “I will,” he said, moving to Theresa’s side and taking the violin case from her hands.
    “I will too—” Amy began, but Margaret cut her off in midsentence.
    “Amy, you come with us. I want you to run into the store for a carton of milk on our way home.”
    “Jeff? Patricia?” Theresa appealed, suddenly feeling as if she’d coerced Brian into saying yes, since nobody else had.
    “Patricia left her purse in the station wagon, so we might as well ride with them.”
    The two groups parted, and as she walked toward her little gray Toyota, Theresa suddenly suspected that Patricia had had her purse with her all along.
    In the car she and Brian settled into the low bucket seats and Theresa put a tape in the deck. Rachmaninoff seemed to envelope them. “Sorry,” she offered, and immediately pushed the eject button. Without hesitation, he reseated the tape against the heads and the dynamic Concerto in C-sharp Minor returned.
    “I get the idea you think I’m some hard-rock freak. Music is music. If it’s good, I like it.”
    They drove through the moonlit night with the power and might of Rachmaninoff ushering them home, followed by the much mellower poignance of Listz’s “Liebestraum.” As its flowing sweetness touched her ears, Theresa thought of its English translation, “Dream of Love.” But she kept her eyes squarely on the road, thinking herself fanciful because of the residual ebullience of the performance and the occasional scarlet, blue and gold lights that glittered from housefronts as they passed. In living-room windows Christmas trees winked cheerfully, but it wasn’t just the trees, it wasn’t just the lights, it wasn’t just the concert and not even Jeff’s being home that made this Christmas more special than most. It was Brian Scanlon.
    “I saw your foot tapping,” he teased now.
    “Oh?”
    “Sure sign of a dancer.”
    “I’m still thinking about it.”
    “Good. Because I never get to dance much anymore. I’m always providing the music.”
    “Never fear. If I don’t go, there’ll be plenty of others.”
    “That’s what I’m afraid of. Rhythmless clods who’ll abuse my toes and talk, talk, talk in my ear.”
    “You don’t like to talk when you dance?” Somehow she’d always imagined dancers using the close proximity to exchange intimacies.
    “Not particularly.”
    “I’ve been led to believe that’s when men and women whisper ... well, what’s known as  sweet nothings .”
    Brian turned to study her face, smiling at the old-fashioned phrase, wondering if he knew another woman who’d use it.  “Sweet nothings?”
    She heard the grin in his voice, but kept her eyes on the street. “I have no personal knowledge of them myself, you understand.” She gave him a quarter glance and lifted one eyebrow.
    “I understand. Neither do I.”
    “But I’ll give it some thought.”
    “I already have. Sounds like not a half-bad idea.” She felt as if her face would light up the interior of the car, for it struck Theresa that while she had no knowledge of sweet nothings, she and Brian were exchanging them at that very moment.
    They made it home before the others, and Theresa excused herself to go to her room and change into jeans, blouse and loose-thrown sweater again. From the living room she heard the soft, exploratory notes of the piano as a melody line from a current Air Supply hit was picked out with one finger. She came down