Egret by Collins Helen

Author:Collins, Helen [Collins, Helen]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Niantic Press
Published: 2013-07-09T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 10: The Upper West Side Apartment

“Jodi!” Ronald stared, sleepy and amazed, looking at Jodi over the chain still connecting the apartment lock to the doorjamb. For once he seemed to have lost his ability to speak.

“Oh, Ronald, I’m sorry! I didn’t know what to do. I… had… I have no place else to go.” Jodi felt tears coming to her eyes. Whatever would he think of her playing the silly clinging female in distress?

The door closed abruptly. Jodi felt one second’s pang of apprehension, and then realized that Ronald had not shut it in her face as a disdainful dismissal, but was merely opening the chain to let her in. His face was now wide awake, smiling in welcome.

“Just for tonight. I promise. I guess I have no choice. I know you just met me and…I’m really not the type of person who does this sort of thing. I…”

“Jodi! For heaven’s sake, stop! Just come in and relax. Tell me all about it. No, I don’t mean that. Don’t tell me anything if you don’t want to. You’re perfectly welcome anyway. You don’t owe us any explanation. It’s just that if you need to talk I’m ... we’re happy to listen. Oh God, listen to me! Just come in and sit down, will you?” His voice, more than his words, was comforting in its serious concern.

Jodi walked into a large, long foyer. The walls were alabaster white and the floor was tiled in very big bold black and white squares almost startling in their stark simplicity.

Ronald led her into a large stainless steel, copper, and golden-oak kitchen, one of several rooms opening from the foyer. It was huge-at least for a New York kitchen-but intimate at the same time. On the floor, the black and white pattern was repeated but in smaller squares and contrasted flatteringly with the warm copper and wood tones. Ronald sat Jodi at a large round wooden table and turned to put a kettle on the stove.

“I hate to ask after the last occasion, but would you like some brandy, Jodi?” Ronald was more disheveled than ever. His hair stood out at various angles from his head; even his eyebrows were tousled. His mauve silk robe had a million wrinkles. His smile too seemed more crooked than usual but expressed genuine warmth and even worry for Jodi.

“Oh, no. That’s the last thing I need. Tea would be great.” Jodi had planned a feasible story on her way uptown. It would be something quite respectable about lost keys or mistaken agreements or unexpected relatives visiting her roommates. But now, looking at Ronald’s wonderful face and remembering all she knew about him and Aaron and all the ideas and feelings he had expressed in the short but concentrated time she had known them, she knew there was no need to make up anything. She would tell him everything that had happened--almost everything; Morgan was another story altogether, one that would remain untold forever.

“Ronald, I don’t even understand

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