A Distant Summer by Karen Toller Whittenburg

goodbye.
     

Chapter Five
     
    “What do you mean, you just decided to drive straight through?” Ruth Barnett lowered her bifocals to the end of her nose and directed a reprimanding gaze over her wire rims. “My God, Kris, that’s a fourteen-hour drive.”
    “Eighteen, actually.”
    “You generally have better sense. What possessed you to...?” Ruth paused, slowly taking off the glasses as she perched on the corner of Kris’s desk. “You met someone, didn’t you? By God, you finally met someone. What’s his name?”
    Kris leaned back and tapped a pencil on the tattered arm of her chair, as if her thoughts were a million miles away. They weren’t, but it never paid to respond to Ruth’s questions too quickly. Kris had discovered that if she waited long enough, sometimes Ruth even spared her the trouble of answering at all. Not so, today, apparently.
    “New skirt, Ruth?” she observed dryly. “Nice color. You must have gone shopping while I was on vacation.”
    Ruth smiled and smoothed a crease into the khaki fabric. “You were with me when I bought this years ago. Come on, Kris, tell me the whole story.”
    “Don’t you need to check on business at the shop? How can you leave your employees alone for hours at a time?”
    “I hire dependable, competent people who manage to turn a profit without my continual presence. Now, what’s his name? And what did he do to send you home in an eighteen-hour gallop?”
    Reaching down, Kris pulled out the bottom drawer of her desk and propped her feet on the edge. Then she clasped her hands in her lap, keeping the pencil between them for support or defense, she wasn’t sure which. “His name is Tucker McCain. He lives in Denver, and he didn’t send me home. I left.”
    The green eyes widened; the bifocals paused in mid-swing. “Good Lord, Kris, do you mean he wanted you to stay? And you left?”
    “Thanks a lot, Ruth. Whatever happened to ‘Welcome home, Kris. Good to have you back’?” Kris shook her head. “Do you know not one person in this entire newspaper office has said that to me this morning? I walked in the door a little while ago — two days before I’m supposed to be back from vacation — and passed Gary on his way out. Do you know what he said, Ruth?”
    “I don’t care what he said, Kris. Let’s get back to the man in Denver.”
    Kris frowned her exasperation and ignored the interruption. “Gary took one look at me and said, ‘Where the hell have you been? The computer’s own, and the post office is on fire. Of all the Mondays for you to oversleep!’ Before I had a chance to defend myself, he was gone — to the fire, I assume — so I came in here and phoned the repair service. Back to work as usual. I should have stayed in bed.”
    “Well, don’t expect any argument from me. After driving all the way from Denver without a stop, I’m surprised you could even drag yourself out from under the sheets, much less think about coming to the office.” Ruth placed a hand flat on the desktop blotter and leaned down in a confiding manner. “Why didn’t you stay in bed, Kris?”
    “I wasn’t tired. I slept for hours after I got home yesterday. I couldn’t sleep anymore.” That was true, Kris assured her conscience. There was no point in telling Ruth or anyone else about the dreams that had awakened her at intervals during those hours or about the way her heart had pounded in protest when she’d reached sleepily for Tucker only to realize she was alone. “And I never said I drove for eighteen hours without a stop.”
    “That is completely beside the point. It isn’t like you to risk your health, not to mention your car, in a marathon race. And I’ve never known you willingly to come into work on a day you didn’t have to,” Ruth smiled in smug omniscience. “Now, what happened with the man in Denver?”
    Kris tossed the pencil to the desk in surrender. “I met him, and we went to dinner, did some sight-seeing. Nothing spectacular,