Chapter 14

Mark's last workday before the conference dawned dank, cool and gray; on the surface, a not-so-unusual early Friday morning in mid-May. He started up the car and backed down the driveway, turning on the stereo, but leaving the volume low. Shauna, he knew, would be waiting for him, but she occupied only a small portion of his thoughts during this inbound commute.

After arriving at work, throwing his briefcase into his office and locking it back up, he proceeded downstairs. On this morning, his destination was the maternity room, where he and Shauna had had their first encounter several months ago. He opened the door; Shauna was already inside. She ran up to him, and threw her arms around him, and pressed her lips against his. "I'm glad to see you," she said, the warmth in her voice not quite overcoming a slight trace of pensiveness. Mark looked into her eyes, moist and just a little puffy; he got the impression she'd been crying.

"What's wrong? Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," she replied, not very convincingly. "You're here, and so am I. We have a half hour. You'll be away all next week, so let's make the most of it." She began to unbutton his shirt; they settled down onto the sofa.

I need to have a long talk with her, Mark thought to himself. It was mid-morning, and his earlier encounter with Shauna was still fresh in his mind. Never before had her kisses been so fervent, and her lovemaking so tender. But something was missing, and after much consideration, Mark identified the absent entity ... conversation. This was unusual, because in the recent past, their encounters had tended more toward the verbal rather than the physical. But the nature of their relationship, always complex, seemed to be regressing from a part-time but long-term and intense involvement, to an affair whose days were destined to be numbered.

But all speculation aside, he knew without a doubt that something was bothering her. "What if she's figured out that she's not the only 'other woman' in my life?" he said to himself with a shake of his head. He knew they'd have to have a heart-to-heart talk, and he also knew that it would have to wait until the week after next.

His thoughts turned once again to Mandy. He'd spent a sleepless night dealing with the aftermath of the bomb she'd dropped on him. And the irony of the situation was not lost on him; after all, hadn't he been conducting all all-out search on his own computer, just the previous evening? He knew that he'd never allow himself to be as careless as Mandy had apparently been. But if it could happen to her...

When he got down to the core of it, he realized what it was that disturbed him the most about the whole situation. Mandy, more so than any of the others, was a kindred spirit, a co-conspirator. When he looked at her, in many ways, he saw himself. At heart, she was a good, family-oriented woman who just happened to have a dark side. And as a result, her presence in his life permitted him to rationalize his own actions. Now, that rug had been pulled out from under him.

He also knew that there was no possible way that he could allow things to end like that, without making a further attempt to set things right. Maybe, after sleeping on it, Mandy had realized that cutting off contact with Mark was a rash decision. Maybe, if he called her right this minute...

Fully aware that she'd insisted that he not contact her, he found himself dialing her number. He got through to her voice mail, but he wanted to deliver the message personally. He tried again with the same result, and then realized that she might just be screening out his calls. He let a few minutes pass by, and then brought out his corporate calling card from his wallet. He figured that if he used the card to place the call, she wouldn't be able to identify the source on her caller ID. And he guessed correctly.

"Hello?" came the familiar voice on the other end.

"Mandy, it's me ... Mark. I just wanted to–"

"Mark, please. Please understand. I told you not to call me. Don't make this harder than it has to be."

"I wanted to apologize for the pain I've caused you ... and to tell you that I'm here if you ever need to talk."

"You don't need to apologize. Just, please ... respect my situation, and don't call me. I mean it, Mark."

"So, that's all?" Mark tossed out a loaded question in a last-ditch effort to get some dialogue started; but it would prove to be futile.

"Yes, that's all. I love my husband and won't allow myself to cause him any more pain. And I really do need to get back to work."

Mark sighed, bowed his head and ran his hands across his hair. He stood up from his chair; he wished he hadn't bothered to make that phone call. He felt awful. Mandy's brush-off had been cold and flippant, but really, could he have expected anything different? Nothing had been resolved, except perhaps the furthering of closure. Maybe, at some point in the future, Mandy would relent and give him a call; but he knew that he couldn't count on that. He took a few minutes, collected his thoughts and pulled himself together the best he could. Forcing himself to refocus, he convinced himself that it was time to close out that chapter of his life, despite its rather abrupt and unfortunate ending, and move on to his numerous other pursuits.

Unlike the previous day, Mark took an extra-long lunch break. He made a quick trek off to the mall, to pick up a box of chocolates for Shauna. He knew she had a sweet tooth, and would probably share the candy with her boys and her mom. He still didn't know what was going on in her mind, but he wanted to leave things on a positive note before going away for a week. And he knew how much she loved gestures of that nature.

Back from his noontime jaunt, confectionery in hand, he entered the building through the rear entrance, to avoid walking past Shauna in the lobby. Aware of the fact that there was likely a good deal of foot traffic in the lobby at present, he wanted to wait till mid-afternoon before giving her the candy, when it was much more probable that he'd be able to catch her alone.

The phone rang the second he entered his office. He picked up the receiver. "Hi, Lauren. I was just gonna call you." In fact, he was telling the truth. But he hadn't yet come up with a reason for not being able to see Lauren before his trip; his beleaguered mind kicked into overdrive to formulate an excuse.

But the point was thankfully moot. "I wanted to catch you before you go," Lauren explained. "I'll be filling in for the aerobics instructor tonight. And some girls from class just talked me into going hiking up in the Poconos tomorrow. So we won't be able to get together."

Mark was silently thankful that this potential problem had cleared itself up, but he couldn't let Lauren sense that. "I would have liked to see you before I leave. But it's good that she's letting you run the class again. Ever think of making it a part-time source of income? Maybe open your own aerobics place?"

Lauren had, in fact, thought of doing just that; she was enjoying the instructor role, and only a sense of loyalty to her current instructor was keeping her from considering it more seriously. She was in a chatty mood, and went off on a long spiel about how she may have tapped into a hidden interest of hers. Mark opted to just listen, his thoughts continuing to reign supreme over his being. Lauren, as intuitive as any woman, picked up on it.

"Are you okay, hon? You're quieter than usual."

"I'm fine. A little bit tired, maybe, but fine."

Lauren's voice lowered into a suggestive growl that she only used sparingly. "Well, get lots of rest while you're away, 'cause I might have to devour you when you get back." Then, her voice returned to its usual timber, and she continued, "I'll miss you while you're gone. And remember that I'll be back here pining away for you."

Mark was thoroughly touched by this comment, especially given his current frame of mind. As whiny and bitchy as Lauren could be on occasion, she also had the capacity to be disarmingly sweet. And she'd hit a bulls-eye with those words. "That means a lot to me," Mark replied. "I'll miss you too. And I'll call you while I'm out there."

The second he got off the phone with Lauren, he punched out Katie's number. "Wanna come over and help me write my thesis?" Katie said with an air of frustration, immediately after greeting Mark with her usual cheery hello. "I've run into a roadblock."

"I know how you feel," Mark replied sympathetically. "I went through the same process. It's a shame you can't come out to the conference ... you might pick up some good info that could come in handy."

A brief technical discussion followed, with Mark offering to look for contacts in her field while he was attending the meetings. Soon, the conversation turned to more mundane matters. "I was in San Diego once ... a couple of years ago." Katie offered. "Remember that interview I had out there?"

Mark remembered it well; he'd written a recommendation letter for her, but she'd decided against making the move to the West Coast before they'd even gotten around to making her an offer. "I've never been there myself. What's there to do?" he said, feigning ignorance.

"I love it out there. The La Jolla area is gorgeous. And check out the Horton Plaza shopping center, right in the middle of downtown. It's an outdoor mall ... you won't see anything like that on the East Coast."

Mark was often envious of Katie's experience as a world traveler. "You've been everywhere, haven't you," he laughed.

"Well, I've been all over California, except San Francisco. But we've talked about that lots of times before."

Mark knew that San Francisco was at the top of Katie's personal list of places to visit. She'd been in the airport many times during flight layovers, but never in the city itself. "Who knows, maybe I'll take you there one time. It's one of the few places that I've visited and you haven't."

"If you take me there," Katie said brightly, "I'll be forever in your debt."

Mark was in the process of coming up with a witty retort when Katie added, "And keep your dirty mind out of the gutter." She let out one of her infectious giggles.

It was well past one o'clock by now; he bid Katie an affectionate goodbye, promising to call her from San Diego as well. He spent a few minutes trying to direct his thoughts toward tackling a few last-minute work-related tasks, and then began to eye his poor overworked telephone once again. "Might as well touch base on all fronts," he mumbled as he picked up the receiver.

There was no answer at Angela's home number, so he dialed her cell. It rang a few times before Mark's ear was assaulted with a loud, drawn-out "Do-oooooc!"

"What's the matter? Did I call at a bad time?"

"You can say that again," Angela cackled. "I'm out for a skate in the park. I was going full speed when this damn phone started ringing. I lost control, swerved hard and nearly took out a bunch of kids who were walking by. And I had to dig the phone out of the bushes before I could answer it."

Mark knew that Angela was probably exaggerating just a bit, but he went along with it. "Serves you right for carrying the phone with you. Isn't there some kind of law against that?"

"Oh, you're just full of sympathy today, aren't you, Doc. I wipe out and almost kill myself, and you're joking around. But anyway," she went on, figuratively removing her tongue from her cheek, "when are you flying out to San Diego?"

"I'm leaving early Sunday morning."

"Whatcha gonna do out there when they don't have you chained down? Hitting the beach?"

"I won't have time for that." Mark didn't want to go into any more detail.

"If I was out there," Angela commented, "I'd be on the beach all the time. And that reminds me. I'll have to take you to Coney Island or Rockaway some time over the summer."

Mark laughed. "Or the Jersey shore. Come on, Angela, there's more to the world than the Big Apple." Having gotten in his little dig, he changed the subject. "Are you working later today?"

"I'm going in at four. They have me working the evening shift."

"Then it doesn't look like we'll be able to get together before I leave, since I have a bunch of stuff to do tomorrow. I'll talk to you when I get back, okay? And try not to run into anything in the meantime, skater queen."

"Very funny, Doc. You're just jealous. We'll have a race sometime, and I'll show you how it's done."