Bright, Precious Days Read Online Free PDF Page A

pink scar that started just above his chin and trailed down his neck.
    “What a lovely surprise,” he said.
    “I didn’t expect to…”
    “I was wondering if I might see you.”
    “I don’t know if you’ve met my friend Casey Reynes. Casey, this is Luke McGavock.” Corrine was all befuddled and couldn’t remember whether they’d met or whether she and Casey had just talked about him, but then she realized they’d traveled in the same circles for years.
    “We’re old friends,” Luke said, gallantly overstating the case. He looked in some ways the same and yet older, less robust, not only because of the scar. It had been, what, more than three years since she’d seen him? He seemed to have accumulated more years than that in the interval; his dark hair now several shades closer to silver, two crescents furrowing either side of his face from nose to lips. And yet, still, she felt a visceral thrill in his presence.
    “Nice to see you again,” Casey said. “Congratulations on this wonderful organization. The fact that all these jaded New Yorkers have chosen to come out for yet another benefit is undoubtedly a tribute to you.”
    “I’m hardly the only one behind this thing, and besides, I’d prefer to think it was a tribute to the cause.” He bobbed his head up and down as he spoke, as if he were agreeing with himself, a nervous tic she remembered fondly.
    “It’s a wonderful cause,” Casey said.
    What cause? Corrine wanted to scream, but she was loath to admit her ignorance at this stage in the game. “The last I heard, you were in South Africa,” she said.
    “About half the year. I invested in a winery and I got more and more involved. I’m back here for a few weeks, for the benefit, taking care of business, visiting Ashley. She’s up at Vassar.”
    “Oh my God, she’s in college!”
    “Well, it was sort of the logical next step after high school.”
    Jesus,
Corrine thought, was there any limit to her insipidity? She hated it when people marveled at the fact that other people’s kids aged instead of magically remaining the same as when the interlocutor had last seen or thought of them. But she was nervous and uncomfortable on several levels.
    “How are the twins?” he asked.
    “Good. Fine.”
    “They’re how old?”
    She had to think a moment. “They’re eleven.”
    If only Casey were to make a dignified exit, they might be able to get beyond this twaddle. Was there anything worse than small talk between two people who’d once exchanged bodily fluids? Her confusion was compounded by the fact that one of his eyes seemed not to be looking at her. What was that about? He’d always had a somewhat manic aspect, a darting field of attention, but this was different.
    “I think I’ll find my husband, and get him to bid on some jewelry,” Casey said. “So nice to see you again, Luke.”
    And suddenly, confusingly, they were alone in the midst of the burbling crowd.
    “You haven’t changed,” he said. “You look beautiful.”
    “Now I’m unlikely to believe anything else you say.”
    “You never did accept a compliment lying down.”
    “Women get suspicious of compliments when they discover the purpose is to
get
them to lie down. And then when they get older, they become so unaccustomed to hearing them that they don’t know what to do with them. I just spent twenty minutes in front of a mirror, and no one knows better than I how much I’ve changed since we last met.”
    “Now I recall that your lack of vanity was one of the things I loved most about you.”
    “I like to think of myself as a realist.”
    “I prefer to think of you as a romantic,” Luke said.
    “Once, perhaps, when I was young. Have you noticed—romantics are like fat people? You don’t meet many old ones.”
    “You’re still young in my eyes,” he said. “After all, you’re quite a bit younger than I, and I insist on seeing myself as youthful.”
    Despite the strangeness of his off-center gaze, she was