Back In the Game by Holly Chamberlin Read Free Book Online Page B

then a bit about our jobs and about another current exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts. After a while, Alfonse checked his watch.
    â€œI’m sorry,” he said. “I have to go. I’m meeting a friend to see a film.”
    We paid for our own coffees. I doubted Alfonse had much money and I was tempted to pay for his coffee, but I didn’t.
    â€œThank you,” I said. “I enjoyed our talk.”
    â€œAs did I. Will you see me again?”
    There was something so sweet about the way he phrased the question. Not “Wanna have dinner sometime?”
    I glanced again at his slim, expressive hand resting on his thigh and at the other one cradling the tiny espresso cup. And I did something entirely shocking.
    â€œYes,” I said. “Let’s get together tonight?”
    Â 
    â€œFace it, Grace. You’re an idiot.”
    I stood naked in front of the freestanding full-length mirror in my bedroom. The mirror was an antique, far too large for the tiny room, but it had been such a deal I just couldn’t pass it up.
    Now, looking at my nearing-forty-year-old reflection in its glass, I wished I had.
    I turned away and grabbed my robe from the bed. It was utterly insane to even consider going on a date with a guy almost half my age! I flashed back to those young girls I’d seen earlier, just before meeting Alfonse at Jefferson’s Paints. Weren’t they more the kind of girl he should be dating: nubile, carefree, and wearing flip-flops?
    But then again, Alfonse had asked me out, not those belly-baring girls.
    Me!
    Was he on drugs? Had the paint fumes altered his perceptions?
    I sat heavily on the bed and took a few deep breaths. It would be easy enough to call Alfonse and beg off, make some excuse and avoid any suggestions about a rescheduled meeting. It would be easy enough; he’d given me his cell phone number. Twentysomethings lived by their cell phones; there was no way Alfonse would miss my call and wind up waiting all alone for me at the restaurant where we’d agreed to meet.
    I reached for the slip of paper on which I’d written his number. It sat on my nightstand, right by the phone. I looked at the neat handwriting and smiled. No doubt about it, Alfonse was sweet. And he was sexy, in that unconcerned, unaffected way some young men have. I was attracted to him. I enjoyed our conversation.
    But could I go out on a date with him?
    Maybe, I thought, I should call Jess and get her opinion. She went out with a much younger guy. I reached for the phone, then stopped. I wasn’t sure reminding Jess about her affair with Seth, the event that had led to the breakup of her marriage, was such a good idea. Besides, I thought, you’re an adult, Grace. You can make this decision on your own.
    An adult. A grown woman with the beginnings of a middle-aged tummy and lines around her eyes and an occasional gray hair. What business did I have spending time with a guy who could—technically speaking—be my son?
    Business. What business? What, I wondered, did having dinner with a man, even a very young man, what did that have to do with business, with right or wrong, with rules and regulations? Was I so—flattened—by years of tending to Simon that I’d completely forgotten how to do something purely for the pleasure of it?
    Yes. Yes, I was so flattened.
    And then the phone rang. I hurried into the living room where the machine was hooked up. I turned up the volume and waited. If it was Alfonse, would I pick up? Maybe he was calling to cancel, and if so I’d be glad, really.
    â€œGracie! Where were you today? I told you I’d be by.”
    Simon. Of course, Simon.
    The sound of a car horn cut off his next words and then, yes, I heard it distinctly, the giggling of a woman, a young woman, the woman for whom he’d bought that expensive bauble.
    â€œJane, stop,” Simon said, and I pictured him halfheartedly pushing away her grasping