Red Lily

time of year, how you’d hear the cicadas all night.”

    “I used to leave my window open a little ways at night so I could hear them better. I bet y’all got in plenty of trouble.”
    “Probably more than our share. You couldn’t slip much by Mama. She had this radar, it was a little scary. I remember how she’d be in the garden, or in the house doing something, and I’d come around and she’d just know I’d been doing something I shouldn’t’ve been doing.”
    She propped an elbow on the table, cupped her chin in her hand. “Name something.”
    “The most baffling, at least at the time, was when I was with a girl the first time.” He drenched one of the strawberries in whipped cream, held it out for her to bite. “I came home having had my first sample of paradise in the back-seat of my much-loved Camaro, about six months after my sixteenth birthday. She came into my room the next morning, and put a box of Trojans on my dresser.”
    With a shake of his head, he polished off the berry. “She said, and I remember this very well, that we’d already talked about sex and responsibility, about being safe and smart and careful, so she assumed that I had used protection, and would continue to do so. Then she asked if I had any questions or comments.”
    “What did you say?”
    “I said, ‘No ma’am.’And when she walked out the door, I pulled the covers up over my head and asked God how the hell my mama came to know I’d had sex with Jenny Proctor in my Camaro. It was both mystifying and humiliating.”
    “I hope I’m like that.”
    His eyebrows lifted as he coated another berry. “Mystified and humiliated?”
    “No. As smart as your mama. As wise as that with Lily.”
    “Lily’s not allowed to have sex until she’s thirty, and married a couple of years.”
    “Goes without saying.” She bit into the berry he offered, mmm ’d over it. “What happened to Jenny Proctor?”
    “Jenny?” He got a look on his face, a kind of half smile that told her he was looking back. “Why, she just pined away for me. She was forced to go to California to college, and stay out there and marry a screenwriter.”
    “Poor thing. I shouldn’t have any more,” she said when he topped off her glass again. “I’m already half buzzed.”
    “No point in doing things halfway.”
    Angling her head, she sent him a deliberately provocative look. “Is part of the lineup you talked about getting me loose on champagne so you can have your way with me?”
    “It was on the schedule.”
    “Thank God. Is that event coming up soon, because I don’t think I can sit here and look at you much longer without having you touch me.”
    His eyes darkened as he rose, held out a hand for hers. “Here was my plan. I was going to ask you to dance, so I could get my arms around you, something like this.”
    She slid into them. “I haven’t found a single flaw in your plan so far.”
    “Then I was going to kiss you, here.” He brushed his lips over her temple. “And here.” Her cheek. “And here.” And her mouth, sinking in slowly and deeply until that meeting of lips was the center of the world.
    “I want you so much.” She pressed against him, burrowed in. “It takes me over. Take me over, Harper. I’ll go crazy if you don’t.”
    He circled her toward the steps, stopped at the base and looked into her eyes. “Come upstairs, and be with me.”
    With her hand in his, she started up, then let out a breathless laugh. “My knees are shaking. I can’t even tell if it’s from nerves or excitement. I’ve imagined myself with you so many times, but I never imagined I’d be nervous.”
    “We’ll go slow. No rush.”

    Her heart was beginning to trip and stumble, but there was one more thing. “Um, I’m using something—birth control—but I think we should . . . I didn’t bring any of those Trojans.”
    “I’ll take care of it.”
    “Should’ve figured you’d thought of everything.”
    “Be prepared.”
    “Were you a Boy Scout?”
    “No, but I dated a few former Girl Scouts.”
    It made her chuckle, and nearly relax again. “I think . . .”
    She trailed off as she stepped into the bedroom. There were candles waiting to be lit, and the lamp on low. The bed was already turned down, with a single red lily resting on the pillow.
    The romance of it saturated her.
    “Oh, Harper.”
    “Wait.” He walked around the room to light the candles, to turn off the lamp. Then he picked up the flower and