Read Online The Thorn and the Blossom: A Two-Sided Love Story by Theodora Goss - Free Book Online Page B

almost at the car door.
    “Evelyn Morgan,” he said. “You know you’re going to get this position, don’t you?” He’d heard that from Michael himself, so he felt confident telling her.
    She looked at him as though not knowing what to say. It had never occurred to him that she would be embarrassed, yet that was exactly what she seemed to be.
    “I know,” he said. “It’s been a long time. More than ten years since I met you in Clews, I’m thinking. Shall we start over?” He held out his hand. “Nice to meet you, Dr. Morgan. I’m Brendan Thorne.”
    He was relieved when she laughed and shook his hand. “It’s nice to meet you, Dr. Thorne.”
    And then he had to explain about Oxford. That was embarrassing, but she didn’t seem to mind. Actually, she seemed glad. Which made him ask, rather boldly he thought, “Listen, assuming you get this position, which you will, can I take you out to dinner to celebrate?”
    “Um, sure,” she said. And smiled. It was the same smile he remembered, the same freckles across her nose. Standing close to her, he could see that she looked older. She had lines around her eyes that hadn’t been there in Cornwall. They made her look—notless beautiful, but more kind.
    “Terrific,” he said. “I’ll see you in September.” He held the door open as she got into her car and then closed it behind her. September was a month away, but he’d waited ten years to see her again. He could wait another month.
    E ven when he knew she had moved into the small white house at Carter’s Corner, he didn’t go visit. Even when he knew she had started teaching, he didn’t stop by her office. Not for a week. Every morning, he looked at himself in the mirror and asked what he should do. He had to tell her about Isabel, but how should he do it?
Listen, I’m married, but my wife’s been functionally dead for three years. Three years ago, the doctor wanted me to disconnect the machines, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. She’d been so alive; I couldn’t be the one who let her die. Do you still want to have dinner with me, Evelyn?
    Telling her would assume too much about the dinner, would assume she had a romantic interest in him. He wasn’t at all sure of that. If that interest ever developed—well, he would tell her then.
    “You’re a coward, Brendan Thorne,” he told himself in the mirror. But he still remembered her screaming in the forest, running away from him. He had just met her again, and although it had been years since they had seen each other, he knew he didn’t want to lose her.
    Finally, he found his copy of
Green Thoughts
and went to her office during office hours. This early in the year, no students would be there, and he wanted to find her alone.
    She was already grading papers. “Dr. Morgan, I presume?” he said. “I believe I invited you to dinner.”
    “You did,” she said, smiling. He would drive her to Richmond,take her to a proper restaurant. Get to know her again. He wanted, very much, to know her again.
    “And, by the way, would you do me the honor of signing my copy of
Green Thoughts
? I had no idea you’d written this, E. R. Morgan. Every third poet is named Morgan in Cornwall. I bought it when it was first published. It’s been sitting on my bookshelf for years.”
    She signed the book, and he asked her about classes. They were going well; she was adjusting to life in a small town. The students were different, of course. Less cosmopolitan, more likely to be the first in their families to go to college. But she’d been assigned a poetry class to teach, and she was enjoying that.
    “I did get a poem on plumbing yesterday!” she said. “It rhymed, too. But what I wanted to say is, I’m going to try writing poetry again, myself.”
    “That’s terrific!” he replied. “You know, I think you have a rare and genuine talent. I wish I had your ear for rhythm. It would have helped me with my translation of
The Tale of the Green