The day started off normal enough. Well, normal enough for Melissa Holbrook, if for no one else, including Michael Edward Deford, her riding buddy. Suddenly she stopped peddling, jumped off her bike and sprinted over to a man walking his dog as he puffed on a cigarette. "Excuse me, but don't you know that smoking causes lung cancer and heart disease? Not to mention that it annoys those around you and might cause collateral damage to them. You really should stop."
They had been peddling along on a lightly trafficked, semi-rural road when she saw the man. Straddling the top tube of his custom Seven road bike, Michael watched the scene unfold, somewhat embarrassed. After all, in his book, you didn't tell other people how to live, strangers especially. And that's just what the man told her, cutting off her lecture about Surgeon General's warnings with a lecture of his own on the principle of live and let live. They argued for about five minutes before Melissa gave up and harrumphed her way back to her bike. The man kept puffing away as he watched them peddle down the road.
"You can't get through to some people," Melissa said. "He's killing himself and doesn't know it."
But the man was right—wrong to smoke but right about the live and let live thing, and Michael told her so. "Of course he knows it," he said. "It says as much on the front of every pack of cigarettes he buys. The medical information has been out there for close to fifty years. Believe me, he knows. But he also knows it's his right to smoke without some crusading do-gooder lecturing him on the hazards of taking up a bad habit."
They stood up on the peddles to crest a short but steep hill, then resumed sitting as the road flattened out. Melissa then said, "Maybe you're right. But I still feel compelled to at least reason with people like that. What they're doing isn't rational."
"Nope, but that's the nature of addictions, irrationality to the point of absurdity. I mean, why would anyone do something that's as potentially deadly as smoking? People drink themselves to death, stick needles in their arms, jump off bridges, do all kinds of crazy, dangerous things."
Melissa shrugged, then changed the subject. "So, Michael, any weekend plans?"
"Weekend plans...no, not really. I'll get a ride in, of course. But it's my guess you're asking if I scored a date for Saturday."
"Good guess. Did you?"
"I'm seeing that nurse I told you about. Third date coming up."
"Third date already? Sounds serious." Melissa routinely teased her friend about his checkered social/romance resume: Michael Edward Deford, thirty-nine year old orthopedic surgeon; never married; drops women like a hot iron if he perceives any imperfections, aesthetic or otherwise. In truth, he didn't think he was THAT picky, though Melissa thought otherwise.
"It could be," he responded. "She's got a beautiful pair of gastrocnemius muscles."
"Great calves, you mean," she said proudly. "I read anatomy charts too, Mr. Orthopod."
He believed it, knew that Melissa was a voracious reader of everything, anatomy charts included. And he thought she had some hot looking gastrocnemius herself, firm, shapely, beautifully tapered. In fact, if not for the little inconvenience of her living with a guy she was engaged to, he thought they could be something other than cycling buddies. Sure, her bossy, controlling personality put him off at times. Still, she possessed great wit, made him laugh, and they could discuss things outside cycling: Medicine. Music. History. Food. Philosophy. Sometimes they even got personal—his dating life, her relationship. He got the impression that she was less than satisfied with this guy. Not miserable, not particularly unhappy, but less than satisfied. You spend time with someone, in their case once or twice a week between spring and fall, and a picture forms.
After a series of small hills, they came to a relatively flat stretch of our route. Relatively flat because anyone who's ever ridden a bike knows that there's no such thing as a perfectly flat surface. Cyclists can feel the undulating subtleness of road topography more so than drivers in cars and even pedestrians. This was a fast stretch, a slightly sloping piece of asphalt road that allowed them to ride in their big chain ring while keeping a cadence of around eighty RPMs.
A mile later, the sky darkened and the wind picked up. Then it started raining. "Let's get moving," Michael said. They were about five miles from the parking lot and he figured they wouldn't get too wet if they jacked their pace up to seventeen and the rain didn't escalate beyond a drizzle.
"Go ahead, Michael. I'll stay on your wheel," Melissa said, motioning for him to pull in front of her. Since he was the faster rider, it made sense for him to charge ahead, pulling Melissa along in his slipstream. The air temp felt as if it had dropped a few degrees, still warm enough for the short-sleeve jerseys they wore, though barely. Trees flanked both sides of the road, an ancient wood of thick oaks and poplars, perhaps the most beautiful part of the route. In dry weather, they'd take the time to enjoy it. But the drizzle had morphed into hard rain, so sightseeing was no longer an option.
Melissa pulled alongside him and said, "I think we should find shelter, wait this thing out. It's getting bad. Look, there's lightening." She was right. It was pouring, and riding in electrical storms could get one cooked. Still, if going solo, Michael would have toughed it out and sped to his car, lightening be damned. However, he didn't feel right leaving her alone. One, he was a loyal riding buddy. And two, he knew how pissed she'd be if he left her to fend for herself. Intrepid on the bike, he'd rather face lightening than a woman's scorn.
"Okay, you win," he said, pointing to a house a few yards ahead, just past where the woods gave way to open fields. The house looked to be a century old. It had yellow clapboard siding and a wide porch that wrapped halfway around. The gravel driveway was empty, a good sign the occupants were out.
They hauled their bikes on to the porch, leaning them against the white wooden railing. He admired Melissa's new machine, a black, super light all carbon Scott loaded with high-end Campy parts that cost in the neighborhood of three grand. It was impervious to rust, as was his titanium steed that had served him well for the past few years.
There was nothing to do now but wait until the rain stopped or at least let up. Save for the clash of thunder, it was quiet. Occasionally a car would whoosh by, wipers on full blast, fender wells spitting liquid.
Melissa flapped her arms against her chest and shivered. "I'm getting cold." Goose bumps formed on her smooth, tan skin, and her light brown ponytail, sticking out from beneath her helmet, hung limp and wet.
"Me too," he said, rubbing his arms. "Let's hope this passes over fast." He wanted to wrap his arms around her. They'd both be warmer, though, truth be told, keeping warm wasn't his only reason. He wondered if she was thinking what he was thinking. Her social/romance status gave him pause, tempered his impulse to find out. She gave off no overt signals and besides, getting romantic could jeopardize a nice friendship. So he just stood there, shivering a little himself, watching the storm, debating the pros and cons, when...
"I hope you don't mind," Melissa said, bumping up against him, "but I need to borrow your body. I'm getting really cold." Mind? Hardly, he thought. They hugged each other, sharing body heat as the rain came down and the cars whooshed by and the thunder clapped and lightening lit up the heavens. Melissa was average height for a woman, standing about a half foot shy of his six feet. She pressed the side of her face against his neck. "Your bod feels great, I'm warmer already," she said. He held her tighter, again fighting impulse, this time to lift her face to his and plant a kiss on her full, sensuous mouth.
Just then, a black Dodge Ram pickup pulled up. It drifted just past the entrance, stopped and then backed up into the driveway. Its two occupants, a man and a woman, watched them for a few seconds before alighting from the truck.
Michael and Melissa decoupled fast.
The couple appeared to be in their forties. The woman wore white shorts and a tight v-neck blue short-sleeve shirt, and her fine, dirty blond hair was pinned up in a knot. The man wore jeans and a light maroon rain jacket over a black T-shirt. His reddish brown hair crept below his ears. A cigarette dangled from his mouth.
