She fed Butch and Sundance, crawled into the bath, and flipped through her phone. She ignored the two calls from Eric, and the three calls from Dane. Obviously, Eric had talked to their brother Dane, so best to avoid them. She saw that Trixie had texted her back and had added her vases to the exhibit. God, she loved working with competent people. She also saw that Jesenia had called and probably wanted to go out, or to talk about supplying flowers for the exhibit. Kara would call her tomorrow. So, now was the perfect time for the Josie gabfest.
"It's about time you called! I've been waiting all day." Josie didn't even say hello, but her greeting made Kara smile.
"Hello to you, too, Mary Sunshine! How is life in love and as a mom?" Kara asked, still smiling.
"How's life as a famous artist? Who lives on a secluded forest compound, surrounded by ferocious security dogs, and is now seeing a hot, new Seattle surgeon?" Josie asked.
"Well, when you put it like that, my life rocks," Kara said with a laugh.
"Tell me all about surgeon boy," Josie demanded. "How far around the bases have we gone?"
"What are you? My mother? Geez, Josie!"
"Geez, Kara! You've been holding this really cute guy off for over a month, and last I heard he hadn't even gotten to touch a booby. So, what's the deal?" Kara squirmed in her tub and grabbed her glass of cabernet sauvignon off the floor to take a large swallow. "Are you drinking? Cause if you are, that's not fair," Josie whined into the phone.
"Yeah, well-you're the one who wanted to have a baby, so until you stop the breastfeeding thing, no drinking for you. Serves you right anyway, after asking me all these intrusive questions," Kara said indignantly.
"Intrusive, my ass," replied Josie. "I noticed you sent a whole hell of a lot of ‘intrusive' my way when I first got together with Chance and Sam. I think you just wanted to live vicariously through me," Josie huffed.
"Maybe I did, so sue me," Kara huffed back at her. "Don't tell me that the shine is already off that particular apple. I know damn well that you don't need to be living vicariously through me and Dr. Jim, so what's with all the questions? You're not reporting back to my brothers, are you?"
"Hey, I don't deserve that." Suddenly Josie's voice was serious. "I'm just a little worried about you, Kara. Karen and I both are. It seems like you might be settling."
"So, are you and Karen talking behind my back, or what? Because I just played twenty questions with her this morning!" Kara said indignantly, sitting up straight in the bath.
"Kara, now wait just a minute-"
"I'm sorry, forget I said that. Can you please forget I said that? Please?" Kara waited. There was nothing but silence on the phone. "Please, Josie, I didn't mean to sound like I was in high school. I know you both only have my best interests at heart, I swear I know that." Kara listened intently and heard Josie sniff.
"Ah, Josie, did I make you cry?" Kara asked.
"No," Josie said in a trembling voice.
"Oh, honey, I'm so sorry. I'm behaving like an idiot. This whole thing has me tangled in knots. I don't know how to explain it all," Kara wailed.
"It's okay, honey, just talk. Say whatever comes to your mind, just get it off your chest," Josie encouraged.
"Okay. Remember, you asked for it, and I'm not going to make any sense," Kara warned. "I'm not going to sleep with him next weekend, but I am the following weekend. My dogs hate him. What am I going to do? I like him. He's nice. He smells nice. He's a nice kisser. He's a doctor. He likes me. I'm worried that he might love me. Did I tell you that my dogs don't like him? I have to shower every time I come home from a date with him before they'll let me play with them. Josie, I'm thirty now. I'm going to turn thirty-one this year. I want to get married. I want a baby, too. He's nice. What do I do?"
Kara set the phone down on the side of the tub and hit speaker, and then picked up her bottle of wine and refilled her glass. She took another large sip-not a gulp, just a very large sip-of wine, while she waited for her friend to make heads or tails of what she had just said.
"First, I'm glad he's nice. Nice is really important. What woman wants a deep-down asshole?" Josie asked.
"Thank you!" Kara toasted the phone. "I always knew nice was important," she agreed vehemently.
"But nice is just the flour of a recipe, you know? We still need to add in the other ingredients to make up the dessert. For Olivia, we needed to make up chocolate cake. For me, it needs to be a brownie. For Jesenia, it needs to be a torte almandine. For you and Karen, it needs to be cinnamon rolls. They all need flour, but after that, they all need very different ingredients."
"But we all agree, we have to start with cake flour, i.e. nice," Kara said into the speaker phone, taking another large sip of her red wine. Finally she was feeling the effects of the bath and the wine. The conversation was beginning to tense up her muscles, though.
"All of us can agree that we need nice. We need flour. What else do you need in your treat?" Josie asked.
"Mmmh?" Kara sighed, but the phone picked it up, and Josie heard.
"Kara," she said sharply. "Jim is nice. What else does he do for you?"
"He ummm … he ummm … " Kara bent over the side of the tub and picked up the towel from the floor and put it behind her head, and stretched back, resting her head against the towel. After she was comfortable, she took another large sip-not a gulp-of her wine. Damn, now she had to refill her glass again.
"Okay, let me ask it from another angle. What do you need from your treat? What does your treat, your man, need to provide to you? Provide for you? Do you even know what you want, honey?" Josie asked in a soft and supportive voice.
"Yeah Josie, I do know. I know that my treats have to be here. They have to want to be with me. He-they-won't send me away. They can't say they want to be with me, and then keep finding more important things to do. So, if you ask what Jim provides, well, he wants to be with me. He likes me. He won't leave me. He'll stay with me."
"Honey, you have two dogs that will stay with you. There's got to be more than that," Josie said in that same reassuring tone. Kara lifted her leg out of the tub and watched as the water sluiced down her skin back down into the bathwater. She was taking the time to consider what her friend had said, and then answered straight from her gut, from her heart.
"I want what you and Karen have, I want a family. I've been waiting for a long time for fireworks. But now I just want nice, and a family. Is that so wrong? I've been on eighteen first dates in the last year and a half, and this is the first guy who has made it to the second date, Josie. I'm a picky bitch. I'm going to sleep with him, and I'm probably going to marry him, and count myself lucky."
"But you don't love him," Josie wailed.
"I can learn to love him," Kara assured her. "I've learned how to unlove someone. Okay, two someones. How tough can it be to learn how to love just one someone? Especially when they're nice and smell good?" she asked. Oops, now her voice was beginning to sound sad. No more wine for her.
"All I want is for you to be happy," Josie said softly. Kara was worried she could hear a tremor in Josie's voice.
"Josie, I promise not to do anything foolish. I'm going to think everything through very logically and make the smartest decision I know how to make," Kara assured her.
"That's what I'm worried about," Josie sighed. Kara could hear Lissa crying in the background.
"So when do I get to babysit? I need a Lissa fix," Kara complained.
"Plan on coming over on Wednesday at five o'clock and just spending the night, because I don't know what time the three of us will be home. So, bring the puppies. We have plenty of fenced-in space for them to play. We won't want you driving home so late."
"Josie, it's a twenty-minute drive home, and I've lived here all my life." Kara laughed.
"Sam and Chance will worry. They'll insist on following you home, and then it'll ruin the momentum of the night out, if you get my meaning." Josie giggled, and Kara joined in.
"I don't want to interfere with you and your men's mo-mentum. More like mo-jo, if you ask me! Okay, I'll pack a bag. Are you sure about Butch and Sundance? They aren't really puppies anymore. I can put out their food, and they have their huge doghouse outside, anyway. So, it's fine to leave them alone all night."
"Are you kidding? Sam will love taking them on a run around the lake Thursday morning."
"Yeah, of course he'd enjoy that, because my traitorous dogs like Sam, but they don't like Dr. Jim. Can you please explain that to me, Josie?" Kara demanded. Josie just laughed. Kara heard Lissa crying harder in the background.