Chapter 24

Sunday, November 11, 2001

Once Dave was finally heading down the New Jersey Turnpike, through the ugliness of the industrial sprawl, he decided he'd better get his thoughts in order a little before seeing Eve.

The Shae question was again back on top of his list, which probably proved something in itself, he thought. In spite of everything it still seemed she might be pushing him a little hard. There were times it seemed like she was even obsessive about it. It was clear in his mind if he'd wanted, he could have been having sex with her this weekend, or even when she was in Bradford a couple weekends ago. He wasn't quite ready in his own mind just yet, but it was clear it wouldn't be far off if they kept up at this rate, too. And maybe he was being unfair to Shae in even suspecting it.

He'd been leery -- and rightfully so -- when she came onto him as hard as she did at his mother's house in Bradford back in September. In fact, cooling it off had been one of the things that had tipped the balance in his own mind toward the decision to return to Bradford at all. Her motives had been just a little different back then, to keep him in the city, so maybe it was premature. If it hadn't been for that episode, he probably wouldn't have worried much about it as close as they were getting now. It was definitely something to talk to Eve about -- but how much Eve would be willing to talk about Shae was open to question. Even though neither he nor Shae had a formal doctor-patient relationship with Eve, there was no telling how much it would enter into the equation. Maybe it was a moot point and he just needed to let nature take its course.

Despite the huge downer Friday, especially Friday night, Dave felt like he was getting his emotions about Julie back under control. The downer Friday came from ugly realities striking home, and he'd pretty much dealt with them. Though he knew there would be bad days to come, the worst seemed over with. But, there were a couple points that refused to go away.

The first was Shae again. No matter what the reality of the subject, he felt guilty about getting so close with Shae so soon after Julie's death. Once upon a time, it had been customary for a mourning period to last a year before getting serious about someone else, or marrying them, and if it was still custom, he'd broken it badly. It was still barely two months, after all; while he wasn't actually committed to Shae nor been intimate with her, neither seemed far away. She'd become something more than a friend and for practical intents a lover very quickly, and Dave just couldn't get shed of the feeling it was, as he'd told Shae, just too soon. Even Eve had cautioned about being in too much of a hurry to put something together after Julie's death.

The second point that refused to go away was the money. He'd known for years that Julie had her own brokerage accounts and played with them on the side, but about all he'd ever heard from her was "they were doing pretty well" with no specific numbers mentioned. Realistically, it was fine with him -- while he liked to have his bills paid and tried not to generate too many of them, he really wasn't a money person, not on that level. Finances on Julie's level were about as pidgin to him as editing fantasy had been to Julie. They could listen courteously to the other talk about their problems without understanding much.

The size of Julie's brokerage account back in September had been a shocker. He'd known his wife had made some money, but he had no idea it had been so much. The revelations from this trip, though, put that shock to shame. Without working too hard, he and Aaron and the brokerage had come up with twice again what he'd found out about in September, and all the nooks and crannies hadn't yet been investigated. It seemed likely the Internal Revenue Service was going to be getting a hell of a check from him next spring. In the past Dave had wondered about why Julie had insisted on filing separate returns, rather than a joint one. Now, he understood why.

But somehow, the money didn't seem real -- it was just numbers that were supposed to apply to him but he couldn't comprehend. It was Julie's money, and that was that. Maybe it was part of the denial he'd been feeling about Julie, and accounted for his mental refusal to step up to that reality. Even with Tietelbaum's help, he still only had a general idea of what was there, and no idea whatever of what the potential opportunities the money would have might be.

Dave had little trouble finding John and Eve's house. The gray brick ranch proved to be in a neat, upper middle class subdivision on the north side of Philadelphia.

Dave had only met John once previously, when the group moved him out of the apartment several weeks before, and so much had been happening then he hadn't gotten to know him very well. Over the last couple months Dave had still occasionally wondered just what kind of a guy would marry a transsexual, but John seemed totally normal as far as Dave could tell. He was short, not much taller than Eve, with dark hair. He was quite intelligent, a graduate engineer, and from what Dave saw, a bit of a nerd, a touch on the shy and quiet side, but genial and friendly. Dave had only heard the outline of the story of how he and Eve had gotten together and understood there was a fair amount of caring and pain involved.

Sergei and Milla were both right in the middle of their terrible twos. They were good-looking kids, but they were into everything. Both Eve and John had to spend some time keeping the little blonde tempests under something resembling control but seemed to enjoy themselves immensely doing it.

While Dave had things to discuss with Eve, there was time to be polite and do some catching up -- not that there was any real news, since most had been passed along from Shae, who had visited John and Eve the previous weekend. "We hear from Shae that you're getting yourself settled into Bradford pretty well," John commented.

"Yeah, I think I am," Dave admitted. "Of course, it helps to have friends and family there. I don't know what I would have done if I hadn't had Emily to get me settled in, though. The more I learn about her, the more amazed I am."

"She's quite a woman; there's no doubt about that," Eve replied. "We don't see her often enough. She and Kevin and Jason and Vicky were here the summer before last, and then we went to Bradford for Jason and Vicky's wedding a year ago September. So, even under the circumstances, it was nice to see her last September."

"I know she thinks very highly of you," Dave observed.

"I'm glad she does. Dave, you have no idea of the fear I had for years about what would happen if any of my classmates found out about me. Then, when it happened, it's all been very much a pleasant surprise. Now, I'm looking forward to seeing some of the gang again."

"Oh?" Dave asked. "You're planning on coming to Bradford?"

"It's a possibility," Eve admitted. "You get the chance to beat Emily to the punch on this. We only got it worked out this afternoon, but we're making plans to visit Chad and Cheryl around the holiday season, and there should be time to make a stop in Bradford."

"Let's see, Cheryl, she's your sister, John? And her husband?"

"Right," John said. "They're out in the Chicago area now. She's teaching math at Northwestern and he's doing it in a community college."

"Yes," Eve added, rather sharply. "I'll grant it was a good move for them, but I'm still rather upset about how it came about."

"How's that?" Dave asked, wondering if he was opening a can of worms he shouldn't.

Eve took a deep breath, perhaps to bring herself under control, and started to reply. "They were both working for the National Security Agency. There were some budget cutbacks and some layoffs. Cheryl's status as a 'T' made her security status questionable, and it was used as an excuse to force her out. It was blatant discrimination, and they have a lawsuit going."

Seeing that Eve was warming up for a rant, John broke in: "It didn't come down all at once, and they were both looking already, so it made things easy for them to jump when the opportunity came, and for more money. Besides, it's in the Chicago area, and they both like it there."

"Yes," Eve added, visibly calmer. "But now we only see them rarely, and we are quite close. That's why we're going to visit them there at Christmas. We're going to take the van, but I'm not so sure how I'm going to like going that far with a pair of two year olds."

"Speaking from experience, that's one of those things you have to put up with when you decide to become parents," Dave grinned. "The good news and the bad news is they don't stay two forever. Anyway, should I tell Emily? If you're going to be near Bradford she might like to organize some kind of get together."

"I'd better call her and tell her myself," Eve smiled. "I've needed an excuse to talk to her anyway."

After talking for a while, Eve commented they might as well get down to business, and suggested she and Dave go out on the enclosed back porch for their discussion. "Or," she added, "We could go out and get in the hot tub. It's harder for me to take notes but considerably more relaxing."

Even the thought of it sounded interesting to Dave. While a hot tub was not anything he and Julie had ever had, he'd always enjoyed them on the rare opportunities he'd been in them. "Sounds good to me, you're the doctor," he smiled.

"I should warn you," she grinned. "The house rules are no swimsuits in the hot tub."

"Shouldn't be a problem," Dave laughed. "Shae has been getting me used to it. She wants to take me to a nude beach sometime."

"Now why doesn't that surprise me?" Eve shook her head with a smile. "After all, she was the one who first took me to a nude beach. And she's mostly responsible for the house rule, anyway."

There were some awkward moments out in the back yard, but they were brief, mostly because there was a cold wind blowing and the sky was spitting occasional flakes of snow. Eve had come out of her and John's room wearing a shortie robe; John had offered a robe to Dave, but it was much too small, so Dave just wrapped a towel around himself and called it good enough. Of course, both the towel and the robe came off before they got in the hot tub, and Dave couldn't help but sneak a glance at Eve.

She figured him out easily. "It's all right, Dave," she laughed, taking her time at getting into the warm water. "You aren't the first person to be curious. There's no visible difference between me and a genetic woman. Back when I was trying out the new equipment, I went to bed with several guys who never knew the difference. Besides, you've seen me nude before, back in the boys' locker room at Bradford after phys. ed. class."

"Yeah, maybe," Dave shook his head. "But it was Denis I was seeing nude, not a beautiful babe. I don't know how to say this, but somehow, I can't manage to put the two of you together in my head. Denis must have been someone else."

"Thank you, Dave," she smiled. "That's very flattering of you to say. What's more, it gives me an opening for an observation maybe helpful to us: sometimes you have to be ready to accept what your eyes tell you is the truth, rather than what your knowledge and experience says is the truth, even if there's some question as to what the truth really is."

"Now, there's a murky statement," Dave smiled.

"Not really," Eve smiled as she sank neck deep in the water, covering up her nicely shaped breasts -- all natural, Dave had been told. "Truth is largely a matter of perception, after all, and I suspect we shall return to the subject. Now, I should probably tell you that Shae ratted you out. She called me while you were on your way here and gave me quite a detailed account of the problems you had this weekend and her perception of them. Now, I'd like to hear your side of the story."

Over the course of the next hour or so, Dave went back over the story of the weekend, especially Friday and Saturday, but also the analysis of it he had made on the drive down from the city. Several times he made a statement that seemed to catch Eve's attention, and they spent some time probing each of those statements and the things that lay behind them. As time went on, one or the other of them would get uncomfortably warm, and would climb up to sit on the edge of the hot tub to let the biting wind and the blowing snow cool them.