Just Joe (5 page)

"I don't like to be
touched," Mattie defended tightly, on uncertain and sensitive ground.

"I know that. And
we'll talk about it later."

"That's what you
think, buster," Mattie mumbled beneath her breath, but Joe ignored her.

"But I was talking
about a different kind of touching, and you know it."

"I don't like to be
touched in
any
way," she warned him forbiddingly, chin defiant.

"You don't like to be
touched—or you're afraid to be touched?" Joe demanded perceptively.

"I'm not afraid of
anything,"
Mattie insisted with childish bravado. "But even if I were, not liking
and being afraid are the same thing, aren't they? If you're afraid of
something, you don't like it."

Joe shook his head at that
convoluted piece of logic. "Oh no, Mattie. I won't let you get away with
that one. Many times the things we fear are those we like—or need—the most.
It's human nature."

Mattie felt cornered by
the gentle, nonjudgmental logic and backpedaled furiously.

"Nevertheless,
I don't like to be touched."

"Mattie..."
Joe's voice was gentle, but his hands were trembling. "Friends touch. It's
part of the friendship. I.. .care for you. You can't believe I would ever hurt
you."

"I've never had a
friend like you," she admitted hesitantly, wanting so badly to believe.
"I don't know much about it."

With a solemn look on his
face, Joe moved his hands to cup her face. "Lesson one, then. Friends
touch—and it doesn't hurt, sweetheart. If it does, you have only to say one
word—one word, Mattie—and I'll stop touching. Okay?"

"I'll try, Joe,"
Mattie's voice was tight. "But—"

"Trying is enough,
Mattie. Right now, it's everything." His hand moved to gently brush a
strand of hair from her flushed cheek. "Sometimes you seem so young,"
he murmured, almost to himself.

"Sometimes I feel
young," Mattie replied, shrugging, carefully moving away from his touch.

Joe's hands dropped to his
side. "And other times?" he probed.

Mattie drifted away, her
answer muffled. "Other times I feel as old as the earth... and as dead as
those trees."

It wasn't a dramatic,
practiced line. The statement was curiously flat, emotionless, weary. Joe was
struck by the melancholy of an unmistakable truth.

He moved to stand behind
her, a beckoning support, but he did not touch her. "Those trees aren't
dead, Mattie. They're just in hiding against the winter. When spring comes,
they'll be bigger and stronger than ever. Stronger because they survived the
winter."

Mattie turned to meet his
eyes intently. "When the spring comes."

In the days and weeks that
followed, Joe learned a lot about Mattie. They spent a great deal of time
together—in between his practice sessions and Mattie's photography
assignments—building on their friendship. They both treated it as a precious
flower blooming out of season and requiring all the loving nourishment they
could give. Each day, each hour, each minute they were together, Joe discovered
another piece of the puzzle that was Mattie Grey.

Mattie was enjoying the
movie they'd rented hugely... until Superman invited Lois Lane to his place.
Joe chuckled uproariously, not noticing Mattie's sudden discomfort or the way
her hand froze in the depths of the bowl of popcorn that lay between them as
they sprawled on her living room floor. They had decided to spend a quiet
evening at home. Making the popcorn had been Joe's idea and it had been fun.
Half of it still decorated the kitchen floor as evidence of the food fight he
had initiated.

And now Superman was
putting the moves on Lois....

From Mattie's point of view,
the evening was all downhill from there. She squirmed restlessly as Superman
baked a souffle with his X-ray vision, opened a bottle of champagne without
benefit of a corkscrew and exchanged a hot blue gaze with Lois as a prelude to
seduction. When Lois excused herself to change into something more comfortable,
Mattie gave up all pretense of composure. Pushing a pillow over her face, she
muttered a muffled, "Oh, my God."

Joe's eyes shifted from
the screen to study her question-ingly. "Mattie? Is there something
wrong?"

Mattie gulped a deep,
calming breath and pulled the pillow from her face. "I think I'll go—make
some more popcorn!" she said desperately, grabbing the half-full bowl
between them without meeting his confused gaze.

She bolted for the safety
of the kitchen, thankfully missing the blatantly intimate gaze Superman
directed toward his bed as he led Lois away. Joe missed it, too. His eyes were
following Mattie thoughtfully.

After a moment of
consideration Joe ejected the tape and trailed Mattie into the kitchen. He
found her standing at the wide open refrigerator door, favoring a carton of
milk with an intense scrutiny.

"Is it whispering the
secrets of the universe?"

Joe's drawl from the
doorway caused Mattie to jerk around in fear, slamming the door on her fingers.

"Damn!" she
muttered feelingly, prying her abused hand from the door and studying her
fingers in an effort to avoid Joe's probing eyes. "I was checking the
expiration date of the carton," she lied blatantly, vaguely amazed at her
own ability to prevaricate.

Joe's mouth twisted with
distaste. "Milk and popcorn do
not
go together."

Privately Mattie couldn't
agree more, but sometimes, she decided in muddled defiance, it's better to cut
off your nose and bite your face. "It's a wonderful taste sensation,"
she insisted stoutly. She poured a tall glass of milk and grabbed a large
handful of popcorn. Somehow, the two substances landed in her mouth almost
simultaneously, and Mattie choked awfully.

"Argh!"

"I thought you said
it was a wonderful taste sensation," Joe remarked clinically, after Mattie
had finally regained control of herself.

"Not," Mattie
answered loftily, "when the milk is sour." She dumped her glass into
the sink and immediately followed it with the carton's perfectly fresh contents.

Joe fired a broadside.
"How do you like the movie?" Mattie reacted with great subtlety by
dropping the half-full carton into the sink and taking a bath in milk.

"You don't like the
movie," Joe interpreted sadly, though his eyes were laughing.

"It's very
entertaining," Mattie managed blithely, brushing a drop of milk from her
eyelid.

Joe nodded solemnly and
murmured, "I was kind of hoping we could finish that chess game we started
yesterday. But if you're really enjoying the movie..." He trailed off understandingly.

"No!" Mattie all
but shouted her denial, then calmed herself with effort. "I mean, no. Of
course we can play chess instead. I guess you've seen this film before."

"Yes," Joe lied.
"But if you'd rather watch it—"

"I'd rather play
chess," Mattie insisted in desperation, missing the tenderness in Joe's
eyes.
"Really."

"Great." Joe
brightened, leading her from the kitchen. "As I recall, your queen was in
imminent danger of being captured-"

Mattie turned to face Joe
haughtily. "My queen is gonna stomp all over your face," she informed
him with chilling superiority.

Joe laughed harder than he
did when Superman asked Lois to his place... and promptly lost the match.

Sometimes the things Joe
learned about Mattie brought a fierce tide of joy. And sometimes he ached so
much to hold her and chase the shadows away that he felt a physical pain inside
of him.

Mattie ostensibly studied
the bare branches of the trees and the boisterous children dancing on the grass
around them in the park, then sneaked another glance at Joe. He was still doing
it.

"Uh...Joe?"

"Hmm?" Joe was
distracted.

"Are you all
right?" Mattie was concerned.

"Sure."

Silence, then, "Are
you in pain?"

That brought his head
around quickly to meet the solemn expression on Mattie's face.

"You were making such
funny faces," she explained doubtfully.

Joe looked abashed, a
little boy caught red-handed playing doctor with the girl next door. Mattie was
intrigued.

"Look at that little
girl!" he burst out defensively, throwing out a hand to indicate a
grave-faced three-year-old on the edge of the sand pit.

Mattie looked. The child
was, indeed, standing away from the rest of the lively crowd of children in the
park. Her eyes were focused on Joe with the sad solemnity that only a child can
produce.

Mattie understood at once.
"Trying to coax a smile, were you?"

Joe grinned disarmingly.
"Without drawing undue attention to myself, yes."

Mattie nodded with calm
authority. "What's called for here is subtlety," she informed him
seriously.

Joe watched with great
interest as Mattie—subtly— slipped her thumbs into her ears and waved her
fingers wildly beside her head.

Every child in the sand
pit broke up. The grave-faced girl was rolling on the ground with hilarity and
Joe was laughing appreciatively.

"Mattie, that
was—"

"Subtle," Mattie
finished for him succinctly.

Joe shook his head
wonderingly. "You're so good with kids!"

"Some people would be
unkind enough to say that's because I'm on the same mental level with
them," Mattie returned wryly.

Joe grinned. "You're
going to be such a good mother."

Mattie froze. She stopped
walking. She stopped smiling. Joe jerked to a halt, studying her stiff face
questioningly.

"No, I won't."
The words were delivered in a grim, cold voice.

"Mattie?" Joe
was concerned and reached for her instinctively, but Mattie shrank from his
hand.

"I won't be a good
mother. I won't be any kind of mother. I will never have children."

"But
sweetheart—"

Mattie broke in roughly,
her voice muffled. "Never, do you understand?"

Joe believed he did, and
his eyes were dark as he absorbed her pain. For some reason, he thought, Mattie
was incapable of having children. What must that knowledge have done to her? he
wondered achingly. Did she think it changed the person she was? Did she think
it would change the way he felt for her? Oh lady, he thought desparingly, is
this one of the demons you fight alone?

Aloud he only said,
"Yes, I understand. No children. Never."

Mattie nodded once,
tightly controlled, and said no more.

And then there were the
times when Joe doubted his own sanity, thanks to the crazy, cock-eyed teachings
of Mattie Grey....

"Mattie, the blood is
rushing to my head!"

"That's nice."
Mattie was distracted, staring at her watch.

Joe was silent for a
moment, forbearing. Then he said, "Do we have to do it in this
position?"

Mattie regarded him
patiently. "Don't be a baby. How else are we going to capture the full
glory—"

"Ugh."

"Of the flat-billed
platypus in his natural habitat?"

"I don't even think
there
are
any flat-billed platypuses in Texas, sweetheart," Joe
protested mildly.

"Not if all Texans
are as noisy as you," Mattie agreed promptly.

"And why do we have
to hang upside down on this tree branch?"

"Bats do it,"
Mattie pointed out with a total lack of logic.

"Bats have rabies,
too," Joe told her blandly. "Is catching that next on our list of
things to do?"

Mattie regarded him
solemnly, then sneaked another surreptitious glance at her watch.
"Okay," she surrendered, extricating her tangled form from the tree and
standing on the ground beside his still-upside-down body.