A Nantucket Wedding(60)
She found a spot to park on Federal Street, by a jewelry store.
“I’ve always wondered why this street isn’t called Centre Street instead of the street one block over,” Jane said as they strolled down to Main Street. “I mean, this street is more accurately at the center of town.”
“I’m sure there’s some significant historical reason,” Ethan said, and reaching out, he took her hand.
Her breath caught in her throat, but she kept her hand in his.
The vitality of the town was different at this time of night. Children were in bed, and many of the adults were out of their sporty beach clothes, wearing chic dress clothes instead. The scent of expensive perfumes drifted by.
“Hungry?” Ethan asked.
“Kind of. Maybe we could have tapas with our drinks.”
They were given a table on the terrace at the Boarding House, where they sat in the fresh evening air, and for a while they amused themselves watching all the fabulous people stroll by. They ordered specialty drinks, the Sunburned Peach, a concoction of vodka, coconut water, and white peach for Jane, and Summer Fog, made of gin, muddled cucumber, and mint for Ethan.
“Oh, wow,” Jane said after taking a sip of her drink. “I’d forgotten how cocktails are much more potent than wine. We’d better order some food.”
So they ordered spicy grilled octopus, and crab dip with sea salt chips, and angel hair pasta with Romano parmesan and pepper. At first they ate hungrily, savoring each bite, but by the time they’d finished the king oyster mushrooms, they were sated. They leaned back in their chairs and licked the salt and olive oil from their lips.
Jane was aware that she was slightly intoxicated—by the drinks and the food and the anything-is-possible atmosphere of the fresh, warm Nantucket night air. She decided to go with it.
“Tell me about your daughter,” she told Ethan.
He smiled. “My favorite subject. Canny is nine years old and precociously clever. She’s a beauty, like her mother, but more than that, she’s got a kind of self-possession, a poise, that amazes me. She speaks three languages—English, Spanish, and Portuguese, because Peru borders Brazil. And more than anything else in the world, she wants a baby brother or sister.”
“Will she get one?”
“Not from her mother. Esmeralda is obsessed with her country, working to create some reason and stability in the chaos of politics. From me, I don’t know. I take being a father and a husband seriously, but I also feel committed to my summer children’s program. I suppose it all depends on whether or not I meet a woman who wants children and could tolerate me.”
“Are you so terribly bad?” Jane asked.
“Not bad. Just eccentric.”
“I want children,” Jane said, then stopped. She had shocked herself by saying those words to this relative stranger. “Relative stranger,” she said, amused. “That’s what we are, relative strangers. See? Because of our parents, we’re going to be relatives, but really, we’re strangers.”
Ethan smiled. “I think I’ll order coffee for both of us.”
“Good idea.” Oh, Lord, Jane thought, Ethan thought she was drunk. And she was, a little bit. “But it’s true, I do want children. At least a child. I didn’t think I ever would, but over this past year I’ve started longing for one and Scott won’t hear about it. We agreed when we married we’d have no children, and he’s furious at me for changing my mind. My heart. Whatever, and I didn’t change it. It changed me.”
“So that’s why he’s in Wales and you’re here.”
“Yes.” Jane put one elbow on the table and propped her chin on her hand. “I don’t know how we’re going to resolve this. We’re both stubborn. And now we’re both angry.”
“Why doesn’t Scott want children?” Ethan asked.
“Because they’re a hindrance to the life we had thought we wanted. We both love to travel, and we work hard and like our work and we’re becoming kind of rich, which means a lot to both of us. Neither of us grew up wealthy. We weren’t poor, but there were times when I could sense that money was a problem for my parents, and for heaven’s sake, my stepfather was a doctor! I think it was a drain on them, sending both of us to college. And Scott wasn’t…close…to his parents.” She wouldn’t say more than that about Scott’s childhood. She felt guilty enough just telling Ethan this much about her husband. “He had to pay his own way through school. He got some scholarships, but mostly he had to take out student loans, and I know he felt like he’d never, ever, be out of debt. But we are out of debt now, we’re very nicely in the black. Our circumstances have changed but Scott won’t see it.”
“That’s too bad,” Ethan said. “You would have beautiful children. And I’ll bet if you got him in bed and propositioned him just the right way, he’d do anything you want.”
Jane met Ethan’s eyes. “That’s the sexiest thing anyone has ever said to me.”
Ethan said softly, “I want to kiss you.”
Whoa, Jane thought. Whiplash. One moment she was whining about Scott and Ethan was a sympathetic friend, and suddenly he was sweet-talking her and it was working. She wanted to crawl over the table and into his lap.