The Carlton Club (17 page)

“Eventually.”

“When the time comes it might even be a good idea. But that’s years from now.”

It all sounded very easy, as they discussed it in the privacy of their own bedroom, with their virginal daughter safely sleeping two rooms away. They would be rational, they decided, confident that they could allow Leslie the freedom they knew she would need. When she needed it.

But now, looking at James’s motorcycle, both were consumed by irrational emotion. A year before, Susan had done an expose for the magazine section of Seattle’s largest newspaper on the dangers of motorcycles. Susan explored the issues of helmets and the horrible, not quite lethal accidents.

“Mom. Dad,” Leslie said sternly, looking at her parents, surprising herself and them.

“Why don’t you take my car?” Matthew offered.

“No,” Leslie said, starting for the door, planning to dash out to the curb, not noticing that James was already walking toward the house.

“Please!”

It was a please that forced Matthew and Susan to look at the big picture, the picture of their daughter growing up and taking the risks necessary to mature without rebellion or repression. They glanced at each other and shrugged, weakly.

The doorbell rang. Leslie opened it.

“Hi, James,” she said.

“Hi,” he said, looking at her parents, expecting their disapproval.

“James, these are my parents.”

“Dr. Adams,” James said, extending his rough hand to Matthew.

How did James know to call him doctor? Matthew had a doctoral degree in English.

“Mrs. Adams,” he said, nodding to her, but not shaking her hand.

In six months, Susan would complete her Ph.D. in journalism. Then she would be Dr. Adams, too. Leslie wondered if James would somehow learn about that, just as he had learned about her father.

Matthew was tongue-tied. The truly liberal, intellectual parent would say something like, “Great day for hunting” or “Nice bike” or “Have a nice weekend.” All Matthew wanted to say was “No way. Not with my daughter.”

Susan was tongue-tied for another reason. She saw, felt, instantly what it was that made her daughter so strangely silent about James. She realized, as soon as she saw him, that Leslie’s attraction was more than intrigue. It was something much more powerful, more dangerous.

“It’s a lovely autumn day,” Susan sputtered, finally.

James frowned at Leslie for a moment, observing her light windbreaker and school-clothes quality blouse and V neck sweater. At least she wore jeans.

“Do you have a warmer jacket, Leslie?” he asked.

“A ski parka.”

“That would be better.”

“OK.”

All three members of the family turned to the closet, fortunately nearby, to get Leslie’s parka. Susan laughed, lightening the tension a little.

James stood his ground, smiled awkwardly and considered Leslie’s parents’ reaction to him. A little disapproval, especially her father, but mostly just concern about their precious daughter.

I know she’s precious, James thought. Don’t you think I know that? Don’t you know that I will be so careful with her?

James wondered, for a moment, if he should tell them that, to reassure them. He decided not to. It offended him a little that they didn’t know.

“Have fun,” Susan murmured reflexively as they left.

“Oh boy,” Matthew said, as he watched them getting onto the motorcycle.

“We’re about to be tested?” Susan asked.

“I hope not. Leslie can’t really be interested in him,” Matthew said, confidently.

“You don’t see it, either,” Susan said quietly. Matthew didn’t see it. Neither did Leslie’s friends.

“See what?”

“What James has.”

“Nothing!”

“Oh, no, dear. He has everything,” she said, watching as James handed Leslie a helmet.

“Wear this,” James said.

“OK,” she said, trying to remember the current state law about wearing helmets. The law changed from year to year. It was an individual rights issue. The individual should be allowed to have a severe head injury if he so chose. Occasionally the state intervened. The state had to pay for the years—most of the victims were healthy teenagers—of hospitalization and care for the badly damaged victim. It was all in Susan’s article. Leslie noticed that James wore a helmet, too.

It was probably law.

He got on. She got on behind him after he showed her where to rest her feet.

“Ready?” he asked.

She nodded, half shrugging.

But she wasn’t ready. Her arms were at her sides.

“Hold on, Leslie.”

Leslie looked around.

“Where?” she asked, finally.

“Put your arms around my waist and hold on tight. We’ll be on the freeway. So you really have to hold on. OK?”

Leslie nodded and carefully put her arms around his waist. As soon as they started to move, her grasp tightened. It had to. And eventually she had to press her body against his back.

As the wind whipped against her face and she felt the warmth and strength of James, Leslie remembered her rehearsed dialogue, her planned topics and smiled. It was impossible to talk above the roar of the motorcycle and the sound of the wind. Before they reached the freeway, when they stopped at stop lights, they spoke briefly.

“Are you OK?” he asked above the sputtering of the motorcycle.

“Yes.”

“Cold?”

“No.”

“Let me know.”

“I will,” she said. How? She should have said how much she was enjoying it already. Exhilarating. The crisp autumn air. Touching him. She should have said she loved it.

But she didn’t before they got onto the interstate, and after that they rode in silence for an hour.

They traveled east over the Lake Washington Floating Bridge across Mercer Island past Lake Sammamish. Beyond Lake Sammamish, the scenery shifted from urban and suburban to rural. At first there were farms, acres of green grass surrounding red and white farmhouses and alive with cows, horses, dogs and tractors.

After they drove through the village of Issaquah with its Swiss chalet architecture and single main street, the scenery changed again. They ascended into the heavily wooded foothills of the Cascade Mountains, gaining altitude, losing civilization, flanking themselves with dense forest and towering mountain peaks.

They exited off Interstate
90
at Snoqualmie, then rode along rutted country roads and finally turned onto a dirt road blocked by a gate with a large No Trespassing sign on it. Without hesitation James drove along a narrow path around the gate. The dirt road led deep into the woods. After about a mile James stopped and turned off the motor. He and Leslie got off the motorcycle, and James removed the wooden bow and quiver of arrows.

Leslie watched in silence as he strung the bow, using considerable force to relax the bow and slide the string into the notch.

“Do you want to practice?” he asked. “That tree over there makes a good target.”

“You’ve been here before?” Leslie asked. Of course James had been here before. One didn’t simply drive past No Trespassing signs without a moment’s hesitation unless he knew where he was going. Not even James.

“Sure. This”—he gestured expansively—“is all company property. This is where I spend every summer. Logging.”

James disappeared every summer to work. Until now, Leslie hadn’t known where. A logging camp. For Washington State’s largest lumber company. It was a perfect job for James, Leslie thought. Outdoors. Untamed. A man’s job.

“Oh.”

“Have you ever used a bow and arrow?”

“No.”

“I’ll show you.”

Leslie watched as James shot arrow after arrow. All landed within inches of each other in the trunk of a huge pine tree. It looked effortless, a fluid motion that was silent, except for the swish of the arrow as it left the bow and the soft thud as it hit its mark. Beautiful. Primitive. Natural.

“Want to try?” he asked finally.

“Yes!”

Leslie followed James as he moved closer to the tree.

“You should start from here,” he said, handing her the bow and an arrow.

Leslie clumsily hooked the arrow into the bow string, then tried to level it against the strip of leather wrapped around the bow. She tried to imitate what she had seen James do, but she couldn’t. The arrow wavered. She pulled gently on the bow string and met surprising resistance.

After a few moments, she looked at him and started laughing.

“Show off! This is really hard!”

“Takes practice.”

“And strength. And coordination. It looked so easy when you did it.”

“We’ll do it together,” James said. He stood beside her and put his arms around her. His left hand wrapped over hers and held the bow. With his right hand James steadied the arrow and pulled back.

Leslie felt his strength and his closeness as he took her through the fluid motion, as a passenger, with him.

The arrow found its mark in the tree trunk in the center of the other arrows. Then James released her and walked to the tree to retrieve all the arrows.

He put the arrows in the quiver then looked at her seriously for a moment, as if about to say something.

The moment passed in silence.

“Let’s go,” he said finally. “Let’s go find some deer.”

“James? Can I be the hunter?” Leslie felt the same way about hunting as her father. The deer would be safe if she carried the bow and arrow.

“Sure,” he said, half smiling. Then he added firmly, “But I don’t kill animals for sport, either, Leslie.”

“Then what are we doing?”

“Hunting. I thought the daughter of an English professor would know the meaning of the word.” James paused. Then he said, “It means seeking or finding. Not killing.”

“Like hunting for Easter eggs?” Leslie teased as the relief swept through her.

James refused to be amused. He turned and started walking toward a path between the trees. “C’mon. Let’s go.”

Leslie followed, wordlessly. Finally she started giggling. James spun around.

“What?”

“I’ve just never hunted Easter eggs with a bow and arrows.”

“Very cute.”

“Thank you. So?”

“So I like to shoot arrows into tree trunks when I go deer hunting. OK?” James’s voice had a slight edge for the first time. Until then, the teasing had been easy and natural.

Leslie backed off immediately. She realized as she marched behind him through the dense underbrush that she had been teasing him as if she knew him. She had even wrapped her arms around his waist as if he were simply one of the other boys.

But he was James. As they walked on, single file, in silence, Leslie wondered if she had angered him. Or if he just thought she was silly.

Of course he thinks I’m silly, Leslie thought glumly. Silly and trivial. Leslie’s mind searched frantically for future topics of conversation and found none.

The narrow path finally opened into a huge meadow. James slowed his pace as they neared the clearing. He turned to Leslie and put his finger to his lips. Leslie nodded meaningfully.

James saw the deer first and gestured to Leslie. She didn’t see them right away. They were lost in the backdrop of the green-brown underbrush. When she saw them finally, as they came into focus separate and distinct from the background, Leslie gasped.

They were so beautiful. So free. There were three of them—two adults and a fawn—grazing peacefully, unperturbed, unaware, until the scent reached them, of the intrusion.

The adults looked up in unison, alert to the danger, suddenly wary.

Leslie wanted to reassure them. We aren’t here to hurt you! They stared at each other for a while, animals and humans, motionless. Then, almost in slow motion, the deer moved into the woods, disappearing into the brown-green maze.

“They are so beautiful! So graceful. So elegant. I like deer hunting,” Leslie said. Thinking, after she said it, what a silly thing to say.

“It’s beautiful even if you don’t see any deer,” James said as he sat down on a fallen tree trunk, laid down his bow and arrows and lit a cigarette.

“Yes,” Leslie said, taking a deep breath of the delicately pine-scented autumn air. She gazed up at the perfectly formed pine trees towering above her and the light blue sky beyond. In a few moments the pine scent blended with the smell of cigarette smoke.

“Does it taste good?” Leslie asked.

“It’s more than taste. It’s warmth. Especially out here. It’s like having your own bonfire inside you.”

“I admit it smells good. Better here than in town.” Leslie looked at the cigarette hanging casually from the corner of his thin mouth. She watched as the smoke curled around his face. His green eyes narrowed slightly. Leslie had watched her friends trying to smoke cigarettes in a sexy way, inhaling the exhaled smoke back through their nostrils, puffing smoke rings, holding the cigarette casually between their lips, practicing in front of mirrors. Most failed to look sexy despite the practice.