While Lydia slept, I eased myself off the bed and slipped downstairs. Mom was in the kitchen, elbows deep in a bowl of salad greens.
"Anything I can do to help?"
"Absolutely. Thanks for asking, Kathy." She smiled at me. "There's a package of tuna steaks in the fridge. Can you get them into a marinade? If your father gets home in time, we can grill them outside. And if he's late..." She raised her eyebrows and shrugged her shoulders.
"Yeah," I laughed. The most reliable thing about Dad at supper-time was that he was always unreliable. "We can throw them onto the grill-pan here."
"Exactly."
I got out the tuna and put it in a shallow dish with olive oil and lime juice. I looked at it a minute and ground some pepper over it. "Garlic, you think?"
"No. I think that's just perfect." She brushed salad off her hands and turned to me.
"Have you gotten together with Lydia yet?"
"Oh. Yeah. This afternoon. She's upstairs. We were talking, and she just sort of faded on me. She's sound asleep."
"Poor thing. She must be exhausted." Mom got a serious look in her eyes. "Kathy, she can't just sleep now. She needs to get back on our time. You go up and wake her. Tell her she's welcome to eat with us. Go on, now."
When I got to the top of the stairs, Jack was just coming out of my room, pulling the door softly shut behind him.
"What were you doing in there?" I asked him.
"Looking for you. Keep quiet," he whispered, putting a finger to his lips. "She's way gone."
"Mom says she needs to get up," I said, pushing past him and opening my door.
It took me a minute to fathom what Jack had seen in my room. Lydia was still on her back, sleeping. One leg was stretched straight and the other was bent at the knee, raising her short skirt to her waist. Her breasts, as she breathed, pushed at her tight top. Her arms made a loose circle around her head. She couldn't have looked more enticing if she were nude. I was surprised at the way the sight of her affected me. It hit me then, finally. We weren't little girls any more. Lydia was a stunningly beautiful woman, and I had, well, a few weeks of experience that told me, if nothing else, that I'd never be a little girl again.
I walked over to the bed and looked down at her. I flicked a glance at the door, but Jack was gone.
I leaned over Lydia and pushed a curl of dark hair off her brow. She looked so beautiful lying there. I bent further and kissed her forehead.
"Jack?" she mumbled. Her left arm came up and closed around my neck.
"Just me, Lydia."
"Kathy?" Her arm flew from me and she bolted upright. "I, I guess I must have been dreaming. Ohmigod, what time is it?"
I turned to the clock on my bed-side table, trying to come to terms with what Lydia had said when she woke.
"It's six-thirty," I told her, and looked back at her over my shoulder.
