Private Affair(31)
She answered with a tight nod, then asked, “Do you want orange juice?”
“That’s an abrupt change of subject.”
“Subtle, huh?”
He laughed, then asked, “Do you want me to help with anything? I mean, with the breakfast.”
“Get forks.”
“In the left-hand drawer of the hutch, right?”
“Yes.”
As she dished the eggs onto plates, he said, “That’s more than I usually eat in the morning.”
“Me too.”
“Doesn’t a model have to stay pencil-thin?”
“That’s how you see me?”
He suddenly felt like he’d taken a step into quicksand. “No.”
“How do you see me?”
Now he was sinking deeper into the trap he’d created for himself. “Um, as a very attractive woman.” He could have added desirable, but she already knew his thinking on that score.
Her gaze held his for a long moment.
“A supermodel has to stay pencil-thin.”
“You’re saying that’s not what you are.”
“More like a successful model. That’s a whole other level of commitment.”
He resisted the temptation to look her up and down. “Still, you’re breaking your training, aren’t you?” he said.
“Yes. But I like the freedom,” she answered as she set the plates on the table. “And anyway, I read about a new diet in a women’s magazine. You eat what you want five days a week and diet on two.”
“That works?”
“It has for me.”
Deliberately switching the subject away from anything personal, he looked around the kitchen and said, “I guess you all did some remodeling.”
She seemed relieved to get off the topic of diets. “Yes, maybe ten years ago. Right before my mom died. Dad did it for her, so he kind of wasted the money.”
Although he’d vowed to keep the conversation off of anything personal, he couldn’t stop himself from asking, “What happened to her?”
Olivia pulled out the chair opposite him and sat down. “I guess you could say it was bad luck. She was having terrible pains in her chest and abdomen. She was afraid she was having a heart attack, but it turned out to be her gallbladder. She went into the hospital to have it removed and got one of those awful skin-eating bacteria. She died a week later.”
He winced. “Your dad took it hard?”
“We both did. She’d always been a buffer between me and him. With her gone, it was like the two of us were cooped up here.”
Like us, Max thought, but didn’t say it.
“That was in your senior year?”
“Yes.”
“Before or after the party?”
“After.”
When she reached down to fiddle with her fork, he knew she hadn’t wanted to get back to the subject of the party.
“Her dying was a major factor in my getting out of here. It was in the summer, and I was trying to decide what to do. Then I suddenly had some money I could use any way I wanted.” She kept her gaze focused on her food. “Dad and I never really got along, and I knew I had to get out of the house—one way or the other.”
“Why not?”
“He came from a long line of male chauvinists. Rural men who were the breadwinners and the law in their little world. They were pretty isolated, and they could do what they wanted. Maybe he even wished there wasn’t so much modern communication. He had very definite ideas on everything—including the role of women in the family. He wanted things done his way, and Mom and I had to conform.”
“Like what?”
“Well, I remember Mom wanting to bring in some extra money. But he made it clear that it would shame him for his wife to have a job outside the home. Besides, he said she’d be happier staying home where a wife belonged.”
“He dictated what would make her happy?”
“Remember, he thought he knew best. If she wanted to make a difference in their finances, she could do it by saving money. By freezing and canning her own vegetables and fruits instead of buying them at the grocery store. Or by making her own clothes. She made mine, too, actually. She had a natural talent for it. Maybe that’s where I got my early interest in fashion. We’d go to the fabric store together and spend a lot of time looking at the pattern books and the materials. She also made the curtains, and she even made rag rugs.”
“Why did she marry him?” Max asked. Because of his own screwed-up family, he was always interested in how unsuitable couples had gotten together. He’d never asked his mom why she’d married his father. Probably he should have. But he’d avoided the subject because it had been easier to ignore the past. Was that why Olivia avoided talking about that party back in high school?