Anyone but You

Chapter 2

Nina stretched and squinted at the clock on the mantel. Eleven. Time to wake up, put Fred out and go to bed.

Fred?

Fred wasn't next to her anymore. She leaned off the couch to look under the end table, but he wasn't there. Suddenly the apartment seemed too quiet, and she went from bedroom to kitchen to living room calling Fred's name.

He was gone. She'd fallen asleep, and he was gone. She stuck her head out the window and searched the yard anxiously for him.

No Fred.

She crawled out the window and ran down the two flights of fire escape, desperately searching the pavement below for Fred's broken body.

No Fred.

She paced the backyard in the dark, inch by inch, looking behind and even in the Dumpster, just in case Fred had developed aspirations and had managed to climb inside.

No Fred.

The back gate was still locked, and the fence was too high for any dog to have jumped over, let alone the aerodynamically challenged Fred.

Nina climbed back up the fire escape, her throat tight with fear and loss, and crawled through the window, not sure what she was going to do next. She sank into her big armchair and tried to think.

Call the pound. Call the police. "I've lost my dog. He's part basset, part beagle, part darling."

"Oh, Fred," Nina mourned out loud, and then jumped when someone knocked on her door.

The guy at the door was tall, blond, broad-shouldered and boyishly good-looking, and when she blinked up at him and said, "Yes?" he leaned against the doorjamb, loose-limbed, careless and confident. He nodded at her. "Would you be Fred Askew's mother?" he asked, and then she looked down and saw Fred sitting bored at his feet, his little silver ID tag glinting in the light from the hall.

"Fred!" Nina shrieked and dropped to her knees to gather him into her arms. "Oh, Fred, I thought I'd lost you forever."

Fred slurped his tongue over her face and then struggled to get free of her. Nina let him go and stood up, wiping her hand across her face to get rid of most of Fred's spit. "Thank you." She beamed at Fred's rescuer. "Thank you so much. Where did you find him?"

"He was sitting on my couch when I woke up." He held out his hand. "I'm Alex Moore. I live in the apartment below you."

Nina wiped her fingers on her skirt and shook his hand, a little dazed. "On your couch? He was sitting on your couch?"

"Surprised me, too." Alex grinned at her. "I think he came in from the fire escape."

His grin was a killer, broad and friendly and a little evil, and Nina felt her pulse flutter in response. No, she told her pulse and turned to frown down at Fred. "I told you, it's two flights. You have to climb all the way to the third floor, Fred. You can't just pick any window and climb in."

Fred did the dog equivalent of a shrug and walked away.

Alex raised his eyebrows. "You trained him to climb the fire escape?"

Nina bit her lip. "I was hoping no one would notice. I'm sorry. I-"

"No, I think it's great. Weird, but great." He grinned at her again, and Nina was struck once more by how attractive he was. Not handsome or distinguished like Guy. Just comfortably good-looking.

Warmly good-looking. Stirringly good-looking.

And he couldn't possibly be thirty yet.

This was a bad sign. It was also understandable since she'd been celibate for a year, but it was still a bad sign. This guy was a child. If she kept this up, she'd be buying a Porsche and cruising the local high schools.

"I can't thank you enough, Mr. Moore," she began and stopped when he shook his head.

"Alex." His eyes went back to Fred. "How long has he been climbing the fire escape?"

"Just since this afternoon," Nina said. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be." His eyes came back to hers, brown and kind and alive with intelligence and humor, and she clamped down on any strange thoughts she might be having. "If Fred hadn't climbed in my window, I wouldn't have met you," he said, "and I think knowing your neighbors is important. Of course, I haven't met you yet. Let's try this again." He held out his hand again. "I'm Alex Moore."

"Oh." Nina took his hand, flustered. "I'm Nina Askew.

"Hello, Nina Askew." His hand was large and warm, and he had lovely long fingers, and Nina pulled her hand away as soon as she realized she was having thoughts about his fingers.

"Hey!" he said, and Nina flinched before she realized that he was looking beyond her. She turned just in time to see Fred fling himself out the window, and she said, "No, Fred!" as Alex moved past her.

She followed him to the window and watched with him as Fred waddled down two flights of stairs to the backyard where he promptly watered the Dumpster.

"Smart dog." Alex quirked an eyebrow at Nina. "Did you teach him to do that?"

"I taught him the stairs," Nina said. "He already knew how to lift his leg."

"Smart woman," Alex said, smiling into her eyes.

Oh, boy. "Would you like a Coke?" Nina asked and then kicked herself for asking. The last thing she needed was an incredibly sexy underage male drinking Coke in her kitchen.

"Love one," Alex said.

For an ugly dog, Fred had a very cute mother.

Once Fred had scrambled back through the window, Alex followed Nina into the kitchen, trying not to admire the swing of her round hips in her wrinkled brown skirt. He was pretty sure she'd just woken up: her short dark curls were rumpled and her big dark eyes were still a little sleepy and her pale pointed face was creased from a pillow somewhere. Pillows made him think of beds, which only led to one thing, and he told himself to knock it off or he'd end up like Max.

Of course, Max was a pretty happy guy.

Alex sat down at the table, trying not to stare at the soft curves in front of him. Very attractive woman, Fred's mother. He owed Fred.

She took two blue-checked mugs from the cupboard and opened the freezer door, automatically putting her free hand up to push the large glass-covered pot on the top of the fridge farther back. Then she scooped ice into the mugs and nudged the door closed, and Alex admired her efficiency and her arms at the same time.

When she took two cans of soda out of the fridge and put the mugs and cans in front of him on the round oak table, he saw her face clearly for the first time, the tiny lines around her dark brown eyes, the softness in her face. She was Max's age, maybe a little older. Her face looked settled, not serene exactly, but not the searching, anxious look that Debbie's face had. She looked wonderful and comfortable and centered in herself, and he wanted to tell her so, but he stopped in time. She might think it was a pass.

Which it would be, come to think of it, and that would be a bad idea since she lived right above him, and if she took offense, there'd be tension whenever they met. And if she didn't take offense at the pass, she would later when he explained he didn't want to get married. He had enough problems; no point in screwing up the only place he could come to escape.

"Thank you," he said, and she said, "Thank you for bringing Fred home." Then she smiled at him, and he felt a little dizzy for a minute.

"I'm sorry Fred came through your window," she said.

"I'm not," Alex said. "This way we get to talk. It's a nice building, and now it's nicer because you're here." She flushed, and he thought, not used to getting compliments, huh? and wondered if there was a man in her life and if so, why wasn't she used to getting compliments?

"I haven't met the other people yet." She poured herself a Coke before she sat opposite him. "Well, I've met the landlord on the first floor, of course. And I hear somebody go by on the way up to the fourth-floor apartment sometimes, but I hate to open the door and introduce myself. It seems pushy."

Alex laughed. "The fourth floor is Norma Lynn. She loves pushy. In fact, I think she invented it. She's seventy-five-"

Nina blinked. "And she's on the fourth floor? That's awful!"

"No, it isn't." Alex sat back and watched her outrage. Nice woman. "Norma had her pick of apartments when this place was first chopped up."

Nina seemed confused. She looked good confused, too. "She wanted the fourth floor?"

"Norma is in better shape than you and me put together," Alex said and then thought, Well, not in better shape than you, and squelched the thought of the two of them put together. He had to stop hanging around with Max; he was turning into a rat. "She climbs those stairs at least twice a day on her way to yoga and to her self-defense class, which is why, as she will tell you, she has the quadriceps of a sixteen-year-old. She also has an exercise bike that she keeps on the fire escape, which is illegal, but she doesn't care. If you put your head out the window at daybreak every day, you can see Norma peddling away. Norma is going to outlive us all."

"Good for her," Nina said. "Maybe I should take her some tea or something. Does she get lonely?"

"Norma? She plays bridge on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, teaches piano on Mondays and Wednesdays and holds a readers' group on Friday nights. I know because she's invited me to all of them."

Nina smiled, delighted with Norma, and Alex smiled back, delighted with Nina. "Did you go?" she asked.

"She trashed me at bridge and told me I was tone-deaf at the piano," Alex said. "I haven't faced the readers' group yet. I don't read much."

"Maybe I'll go up some evening," Nina said, and Alex shook his head, hating to mess up such a nice plan but knowing Norma wouldn't appreciate it.

"Don't do it. Rich comes to call in the evenings. Every evening."

"Rich?"

"Her younger man." Alex watched Nina's face flush again and thought how pretty she looked flushed. "He's sixty-two. Norma says most guys can't keep up with her, but Rich has no problem. Of course, Rich also runs the marathon every year and finishes in the top fifty, so he's no slouch, either. They're both great, but I wouldn't drop by there uninvited at night for anything. They like their privacy."

"I'll just have to open my door when she's going by sometime, then," Nina said. "She's not shy, right?"

"Right."

"What about dogs?" Nina looked anxious again. "Will she be upset about Fred?"

"Only if he pees on her exercise bike," Alex said. "Norma's pretty easygoing."

Nina looked down at the pile of bones and skin that Fred melted into every time he collapsed somewhere. "Don't pee on Norma's bike, Fred."

Fred snored.

"I think he's got it," Alex said. "Sharp dog."

"And don't go in Alex's window, either," Nina went on, and Alex said, "Well, let's not get carried away here. I can always use the company."

Nina smiled at him again, warm and serene and welcoming, and he blinked, wondering why he was having such a hard time remembering his place in the conversation. There was no reason for her to be confusing him like this. He was hardly over his relationship with… with…

Oh, hell.

Nina said, "Are you all right?" and he thought, Get out of here, Alex, she's fogging your mind. Who the hell had he been dating? She'd been blond, he remembered that. Time to get out. He stood up and said, "I'm great, but I'd better go now. Thanks for the Coke."

She followed him to the door, thanking him again for returning Fred, while he tried to remember the name of the woman he'd been seeing for six weeks. Why couldn't he remember? It had to be age. He was going to be thirty tomorrow, and already the mind was going. What's-her-name had had a narrow escape; their kids would have done lousy on the SATs, and she was the type who would have cared. What the hell was her name?

"Debbie," he said, and the woman in front of him said, "No, Nina."

He blinked down into her dark, dark eyes, which was how he'd gotten in this mess in the first place.

"I know you're Nina, I was just trying to remember the name of my…uh, dog."

"You have a dog?" Nina beamed. "That's why Fred came through your window. Looking for a friend."

"No. Debbie was my…never mind." Alex shook his head. "Anyway, Fred had the right idea. I could use a friend, myself."

She held out her hand. "Well, you've got two upstairs now. We really appreciate you coming to the rescue."

He took her hand, trying to ignore how soft and warm it was while he appreciated her, too. Knock it off, he told himself and dropped her hand. "Got to go. See you, Fred," he called back over his shoulder and then he escaped into the hall and down the stairs.

On the way down, he met Rich, looking disgustingly healthy in jeans and a gray-striped shirt that matched the gray in his hair, on his way up to Norma's with a pizza.

"Hello, Alex." Rich punched him in the arm. "Not making time with my woman, are you?"

"Rich, you know Norma wouldn't look twice at me. I couldn't keep up her pace." Alex nursed his bicep where Rich had pounded him. Rich had a mean punch. "I was in three, meeting the new tenant."

"Ah." Rich nodded. "I saw her the other day. Very nice-looking." He squinted at Alex. "She's older than you are."

"You should talk," Alex said.

"No, no, that's good." Rich leaned closer. "Older women know things."

Alex hated to ask, but he had to. "What kind of things?"

Rich raised his eyebrows. "Things. You'll find out." He sighed. "Of course, she's no Norma. They broke the mold when they made Norma."

"I always figured Norma broke the mold because she didn't want the competition," Alex said, and Rich roared with laughter.

"Didn't want the competition. Wait'll I tell Norma. She'll love that one."

"Yeah, and if she doesn't, she'll come down and beat the tar out of me," Alex said, and Rich laughed again and went jogging up the stairs with Norma's pizza.

"Older women, huh?" Alex said to his retreating back, but Rich was too far away to hear.

"I read an article on menopause yesterday," Nina said to Charity, who was sitting on the oriental rug on Nina's living-room floor, looking elegant and sexy in a black silk catsuit. Nina looked down at her own blue-striped cotton pajamas and sighed. You are what you wear, she told herself, and went back to the feast that she and Charity had assembled on the floor around them: nonfat pretzels, nonfat potato chips and a blender full of chocolate Amaretto milk shake.

And Fred.

Fred was turning out to be a world-class mooch.

Charity rolled her eyes and fed Fred a pretzel, which he took gently in his mouth, dropped on the ground, pushed with his nose, examined closely, and then, deciding it was exactly like the other three pretzels he'd had earlier, ate. "Don't rush into anything, Fred," Charity told him and then turned back to Nina. "Why are you reading about menopause, for heaven's sake?"

"Because I'm forty now." Nina crunched into a pretzel. "'It said that pre-menopause starts in the forties."

"Nina, you've been forty for about forty-eight hours. Estrogen deprivation won't start for at least another week." Charity leaned over Nina's blue-striped lap to grab the potato chip bag. "I can't believe you're torturing yourself like this."

"There was a list of symptoms," Nina went on. "Warning signs. They were awful."

"Hot flashes." Charity nodded. "I get those every time I think of Sean. Only I think it's rage not menopause."

"One of them is that your pubic hair starts to thin," Nina said.

Charity stopped with a chip halfway to her mouth. "I did not need to know this."

Nina nodded. "So I was in the shower last night and I looked, but the thing is, I never paid that much attention before, so I don't have any idea if mine's thinner."

Charity dropped the chip back into the bag. "Nina, loney, you're losing your grip."

Nina stuck her chin out. "I just want to know. I want to be prepared."

Charity shrugged and went back to the chips. "So ask Guy."

Nina shot her a withering look. "Ask my ex-husband to check my pubic hair to see if it's thinned in the year we've been divorced? No, I don't think so."

Charity beamed at her. "Well, there's always Rogaine."

"Thank you very much." Nina slurped up more of her milk shake. "And then there's this thing I'm developing for younger men. I was watching 'Friends' the other night and caught myself wondering what Matthew Perry is like in bed."

"I've wondered that myself," Charity said. "You know, whether he'd stop wisecracking long enough to-"

"Charity, I could have given birth to Matthew Perry."

Charity looked at her with patient contempt. "Nina, Matthew Perry is not a real person. He's an actor. He doesn't count. Now, if you were having hot thoughts about MacCauley Culkin, I'd worry. But Matthew Perry, no."

"He counts," Nina said stubbornly.

"Hell, I think about James Dean and he's dead," Charity went on. "That doesn't mean I'm heading for the cemetery with a shovel. Fantasy is not the same as reality. You don't have to feel guilty about it."

"It's happening in reality, too," Nina said. "I met my downstairs neighbor yesterday, and I was thinking about how much fun he looked and what great hands he had, and I swear, he can't be more than twenty-five. It's only a matter of time until I'm cruising the high schools."

Charity sat up straighter, which made her black silk move against her curves. It was a shame there wasn't a man around to watch Charity move, Nina thought. The whole effect was sort of wasted on her and Fred.

Fred was investigating the potato chip bag.

"Downstairs?" Charity said, pushing Fred's nose out of the bag. "You didn't mention any guy downstairs. Who is he? What does he do? Is he married?"

Nina tried to look quelling. "I told you. He's just a baby."

"I like babies," Charity said. "As long as they're not mine. This could be good. Tell me about him."

Nina glared at Charity and her black silk, a combination that could seduce any man of any age. "You're going to jump my infant neighbor?"

"No," Charity said patiently. "I'm going to talk you into jumping your infant neighbor. If he's not married."

"He's not," Nina said, slumping a little. "At least there was no ring, and he didn't mention a wife."

Charity snorted.

Nina gave her a severe look. "And you're not talking me into anything anyway, so just drop it."

"Is he cute?" Charity asked. "What does he do for a living?"

The image of Alex lounging at her table, broad-shouldered and confident, came to mind, but Nina evicted it at once. "Yes, he's cute. I have no idea what he does for a living. Probably something involving a small hat and French-fry oil. He doesn't look too focused."

"That's wonderful." Charity sat back, so enthused she fed Fred a potato chip. Fred ate it cautiously since it wasn't a pretzel. "This is great. Make him your toy boy. If he's got some kind of McJob, you won't end up being a corporate wife, and since he's young, he'll still be interested in sex. This is perfect."

Nina glared at her because the thought was so tempting. "It is not perfect. I'm not dating somebody who's fifteen years younger than I am. I'm not dating again at all, I like being free and not having to go to stupid dinners and dress up for somebody else's career, but if I was going to start dating again, it would not be this guy." She thought again of Alex, loose-limbed and long-fingered in her doorway and way, way too young for her. If she started dating him or, dear God, sleeping with him-she swallowed at the thought-people would say she was in her second childhood. People would look at them on the street and wonder what he saw in her. Guy would sneer. Her mother would roll her eyes. His friends would make jokes about Oedipus Alex. She and Alex would have nothing to talk about. She'd be obsessing over thinning pubic hair, and he'd be playing air guitar.

Worst of all, if she slept with him, she'd have to take off her clothes and her mother was right: her body was forty years old. The whole idea was impossible.

And he wasn't interested in her, anyway. Just what she needed, to start fantasizing about a man who thought of her as a mother figure and who just by existing would make her feel older than she already did. She'd end up literally working her butt off to try to look younger than she was instead of enjoying the freedom she had now. "It would be too humiliating," she finished. "Not Alex. Anyone but Alex."

Charity grinned. "Why not? He's never seen your pubic hair before. He won't notice the thinning."

Nina sighed. "And to think you're my best friend."

"Damn right, chickie," Charity said, going back to the chips. "That's why I'm giving you this great advice. Break the kid's heart. He needs it for the growth experience, and it'll make you feel so much better about the divorce. Trust Aunt Charity. When it comes to romance, she knows. Besides, it'll make Guy crazy."

Nina shook her head and changed the subject before Charity talked her into something stupid. "Forget Guy. My real problems are not with Guy or the infant downstairs, they're with Jessica."

Charity tilted her head in sympathy. "Poor baby. Is this that boring book you told me about?"

Nina nodded. "Some upper-class twit's prep-school memoirs. I thought the rich were supposed to be depraved, but this guy never even short-sheeted a bed. It is the most tedious stuff I've ever waded through."

Charity picked up her shake and stirred it with her straw. "Seems to me, the idea behind a memoir is to have something to remember."

"Not if you're rich," Nina said.

Charity leaned back, thoughtful. "Now, I could write a hell of a memoir. When I think of the trauma I've lived through-" She shook her head in self-amazement and slurped up some milk shake.

Nina snorted. "I should have you ghostwrite this book for this guy. Graft some of your sex life onto his non-life."

"I should write my own book," Charity said. "It's about time I had a career instead of a past."

Nina smiled and fed Fred a chip. That would be one hell of a book: Charity's life between covers, one disaster after another, described the way Charity had described it to her over the years.

Nina stopped smiling. It would be one hell of a book. She looked at Charity. "You're right."

"I'm always right," Charity said. "So why aren't I rich and married and getting great sex nightly?"

Nina leaned forward. "Can you write, Charity?"

Charity looked at her, annoyed. "Of course I can write. I can read, too."

"No." Nina grabbed her arm to get her attention. "I mean, can you write? Prose. Could you write a book?"

Charity blinked at her. "A book?"

"Your memoirs." Nina leaned closer. "I know your breakups must have been awful at the time, at all the times, but you're really funny when you talk about them. Could you write a funny, sexy book about your past love life?"

Charity thought about it for a minute. "I don't know why not. My mom says I write great letters." She met Nina's eyes, her own widening as she absorbed the idea. "Yeah. Sure. In fact, maybe this is what I was meant to do. You know, the first thirty-eight years were just gathering material." She shoved the milk shake away from her. "I could do it like an advice book. One chapter for each guy, with a lesson to be learned each time. It'd be like therapy. Twelve chapters. Would that be enough?"

Nina nodded, thrilled that Charity was interested. "Sure. With an intro and a conclusion, shoot for two hundred, two hundred and fifty pages. Do you think you can do this? Do you think you want to do this?"

Charity straightened. "I'm positive. This is a great idea. You think Jessica will publish it?"

She will if I don't tell her what it is until it's done, Nina thought. "Jessica is very supportive of feminist literature," she told Charity. "And this would be a feminist memoir, right?"

"Hell, yes," Charity said. "This is great. Do I get money?"

Nina thought fast. "I need a proposal, nothing too detailed that might confuse Jessica. Just a short outline and a sample chapter, maybe your intro. Then I can go to contract and get you an advance. It won't be much. A thousand tops."

"Dollars?" Charity's eyes widened. "It's a deal." She stood up and grabbed her big black leather bag from the table, annoying Fred who'd been hinting for more chips.

Nina looked up at her, dismayed. "Where are you going?"

"I'm going home to write," Charity said as if it should have been obvious. "I can have that proposal on your desk by Monday if I start right away."

Nina stood and reached out to her, trying to think of a way to calm her down. "Uh, Charity, writing isn't that easy. It takes time. It takes-"

"So I'll have it on your desk by Wednesday. You know, I'm going to love this." Charity had grabbed her coat and was at the door. "This is a great idea." She came flying back to hug Nina. "You're the best!"

Then she disappeared out the door, and Nina was left to contemplate the new wrinkle she'd just put in her future. If Charity couldn't write a book, Nina couldn't go to contract, and she'd just lost her best friend of twenty years. If Charity could write a book, but it turned out to be unpublishable by Jessica's standards, Nina had just lost her job. If Charity could write a book, and Jessica through some miracle published it…

… it would be a hit and Howard Press would be on its way into the black and Jessica would love her and she'd be a success.

"And pigs will fly," Nina said and sat back down to finish off the rest of Charity's milk shake. Fred was in the potato chip bag again, so she pushed him out of it and then absentmindedly ate a chip, trying to think cheerful thoughts. She wasn't sure what she'd started, but she was positive she didn't want to dwell on it or on the impossibly young distraction who lived one floor down, and now she had a whole Friday night all to herself just to dwell on both.

Fred wiped his nose on her leg.

"Hello," she said to him. "I hadn't forgotten you. Want to watch a video? Because no matter how pitiful you look, I am not publishing your memoirs. Not enough sex in your life, buddy." She thought of Alex and his damn fingers. "Or in mine, for that matter." Then she squelched the thought. She was not going to start fantasizing about Alex Moore.

Fred put his paws on her leg and whined at her, so she gave him the last of Charity's milk shake. A scant inch of chocolate and Amaretto couldn't hurt him, and he was so pitiful when he whined. She watched him slurp the last of it, his nose jammed into the glass, and then she stood and threw out the rest of the chips and went back to the table to start on the twit's manuscript.

It was worse than she had remembered, so she was grateful when the doorbell rang. She grabbed her blue seersucker robe and deserted the manuscript with indecent haste, only to feel her heart thump when she opened the door and found Alex leaning in her doorway, this time in a white tailored shirt and navy dress pants, his tie loose and lopsided around his neck.

"Hi," he said slowly and distinctly. "Remember me?"

"Yes." Nina peered at him. He did a little weaving on the doorsill, his eyes bright but half-closed. "Been drinking, have we?"

Alex's laugh sloughed into an exhale. "I don't know about you, but I have. It's my birthday. My whole damn family bought me a drink. One at a time. All day." He frowned at her, as if trying to bring her into focus. "Do you have any coffee? I only ask because you looked like a woman who would have coffee when I was up here last night."

Great. And she'd been thinking hot thoughts about this delinquent all day. God, she was pathetic. Well, somebody had to sober him up. "I have coffee." Nina tied the belt around her robe tighter and stepped back to let him in.

He walked past her and stopped to stare at the papers on the table. "You're working. I don't want to interrupt."

At least he had manners. "It's all right." Nina closed the door behind him. "It's a terrible book. Boring. Turgid."

Alex frowned. "Turgid. He was the Russian, right?"

Oh, terrific. "Not a big reader, I see." Nina pulled out a chair from the table and took his arm to guide him into it. "Coffee coming right up. You sit until it's done."

"I took science courses not lit." Alex took off his tie and threw it on the table. Then he picked up a page from the book and began to read while Nina put a filter in the coffeemaker and poured in the coffee.

Fred wandered over to him, and Nina turned to shoo him away, but Alex said, "Hey, Fred," and leaned down to scratch his ears, and Nina forgave him everything.

Alex was a nice guy. So he wasn't brilliant. Big deal. It wasn't as if she was contemplating a relationship with him; she'd already decided that would be ridiculous. What she needed was a friend, a neighbor.

And Alex was nice to her and good to her dog. What more could she want in a neighbor?

Fred looked as if he could want more. He nudged Alex's hand, looking for potato chips, and then collapsed under the table from disappointment when none were forthcoming. Alex went back to reading the manuscript. "This is terrible," he told her when he looked up. "Why is he writing about some dumb American prep school if he's Russian?"

"He's not Russian," Nina said. "You made that up. How much have you had to drink?"

"Well." Alex leaned back in the chair, keeping one hand on the table as if for security. "I had breakfast with my sister-Irish coffee. Then I had lunch with my mother and that's always a strain, so I had two scotches. Then my stepmother asked me out for a drink, and I hate saying no to her, so I had brandy. Then my dad took me out for dinner." He cocked an eye at Nina. "When my father eats, the liquor flows. I'm pretty sure I had three whiskies. Then he had the cab drop me off at home, and my brother was waiting for me with a six-pack." He shook his head. "He just left and I laid down and the whole room sort of swooped and I thought of you. Pour some caffeine down me and I'll leave."

Nina took two blue-checked mugs from the cupboard and put them on the table. "Couldn't you have had seltzer with a couple of them?"

"No." Alex shook his head and then thought better of it. "Ouch, that hurts. I had to have something to drown out the refrain."

Nina sat down, intrigued. "The refrain?"

Alex nodded, this time more carefully. "They all had different verses, but when we got to the chorus, they all said the same thing. 'Time to decide on a career, Alex.'" He put his head down and looked mulish for a moment. "I don't want to decide on a career. I think they're pushing me."

Nina looked at him with disgust. She had the Peter Pan syndrome, sitting right here in her kitchen. She sighed and began to finish the job his family had started. Somebody had to. "Well, Alex, they may have a point. I realize twenty-five or -six seems young, but-"

"I'm thirty," Alex said. "Today. Happy birthday to me. Is that coffee done yet?"

Thirty? Dear Lord, and he still didn't know what he wanted to do with his life? What was he doing now? Checking IDs? Singing in a rock band? Making sure the fries were hot?

"Coffee?" Alex said again and Nina checked back over her shoulder.

"It's still dripping. You're thirty?"

He gazed at her owlishly. "You thought I was younger, huh? Everybody does. No wonder nobody takes me seriously. And I've got a receding hairline and everything."

Nina squinted at him. "No, you don't."

"Yes, I do." He pulled his hair back off his forehead. "See? It's creeping up on the sides."

Nina leaned closer. "Well, a little. But if you want people to take you seriously, choosing a career would be a better move than flashing a minimally receding hairline.''

Alex groaned. "Not you, too. Listen, I'm happy doing what I'm doing. All I need is a cup of coffee and I'll be ecstatic."

"Coming right up." Nina got up and pulled the pot out from under the drip spout, feeling disappointed and stupid. She'd been attracted to him and that had been ridiculous since he was fifteen years younger than she was. Then it turned out he was only ten years younger, which was not as ridiculous although still ridiculous, but now he was also shiftless and evidently not too bright. Turgid as a Russian novelist? Okay, he was drunk, but still, this was not good. She turned to the table and poured coffee into the mugs, watching him reach for his before she said, "Be careful. It's hot."

"Thanks, Mom," he said, and she winced. "I'm kidding," he said hastily. "Dumb joke."

"Probably not." Nina put the pot back on the wanner and sank into her seat. "I'm practically old enough to be your mother."

"Not unless you had a lot more fun in kindergarten than I did," he said, and Nina said, "I'm forty. Two days ago, as a matter of fact."

Alex nodded wisely. "It's those years that end in zero that kill you. Twenty-nine was nothing like this."

"Thirty-nine sucked, too," Nina said. "I got divorced."

Alex winced. "Sorry."

Nina shook her head. "No, it's fine now. I have my own place, and I can do anything I want, and I love it. Last night after you left, Fred and I stayed up and watched The Great Escape until one-thirty. You can't do that when you're married. I missed out on a lot of great movies because Guy didn't like it when I stayed up late. I love being single."

Alex blinked. "I watched it, too. Steve McQueen and the catcher's mitt. You like old movies?"

Nina nodded. "And James Garner. James Garner is great in that movie." Then she frowned at him. "Now back to your problem. From the wisdom of my advanced years, I can tell you that waiting too long to start a career is a mistake."

Alex sipped his coffee. "You just starting one now?"

"Going back to one I abandoned sixteen years ago," Nina said. "I got very lucky and found a job in publishing after my divorce, but if I'd stayed at it, people would be working for me instead of me working for them. It took me six months to advance from secretary to assistant editor. One of the editors who has seniority over me is your age. It's hard."

Alex shrugged and sipped again. "Why do you care? Age is irrelevant."

"Tell me that when you're forty." Nina put her mug down. "Come on, let's work on your future. You said you liked science courses in school."

"I said I took science courses in school. I didn't say I liked them." He took another sip. "This is excellent coffee. What kind is it?"

"Don't try to change the subject. What do you like?"

"People. Excitement. Noise. Color."

"Maybe we can get you in with the circus," Nina said acidly. "Concentrate here. I'm trying to fix your life."

"You and my whole family. Why don't we leave my life alone? I like my life.'' Alex drained his coffee mug and then stared into it. "You know, this isn't supposed to work, but I do feel better. Must be the caffeine."

"How are you supporting yourself now?" Nina asked, hoping for a direction to steer him in.

"I'm a doctor." Alex pushed his empty mug toward her. "Could I have another cup, please?"

Nina blinked at him. "You're a what?"

"A doctor. Never mind, I'll get it." Alex got up and stepped over Fred to fill his mug from the pot before he gestured it in her direction. "You want more?"

"No." She didn't want more coffee, she wanted to kill him. He'd known what she'd been thinking and had just played along to amuse himself. Turgid as a Russian novelist. How juvenile of him. Well, he was young, but not that damn young. "Very funny. I want to know why the hell your family isn't happy with a thirty-year-old doctor."

"Because I work in the ER." Alex sat down again. "I like the ER. I have a very short attention span and there's always something going on there to keep me interested. Plus, I get to save lives, which makes me feel good."

Nina nodded and thought about strangling him. "And your family wants you to be what? A lawyer?"

"God, no." Alex looked horrified. "That's my uncle Robert. We do not mention his name." He grew thoughtful for a moment. "Although we do turn to him in times of malpractice suits."

He was being deliberately obtuse, which was his right since she was prying into things that were none of her business. She should just butt out. "I don't get this," she told him. "Explain it or you get no more coffee."

"My mother wants me to be a neurosurgeon," Alex said.

"Why?"

"Because she's a neurosurgeon and I am her only child." Alex sipped his coffee. "This stuff is great. I'm feeling human again."

Nina scowled at him. "I thought you said you had a brother and sister.''

"I do. She's an oncologist and he's a gynecologist." Alex stopped. "Oh, you mean, how am I an only child? They're half-sibs. Dad got married three times. We're all only children. It's a real bond."

Nina put her chin in her hand, fascinated. "And your father wants you to be what?"

"A cardiologist, since Stella and Max let him down." Alex drained his coffee mug. "I'm feeling a lot better. Have you got anything to eat?"

Nina stood and got a package of Oreos from the cupboard. Fred perked up and moved nearer to Alex's hand. "Why did they let him down?"

"Stella's mom died of cancer, so Stell fixated on that. Max, on the other hand, chose for aesthetic reasons."

"Gynecology is aesthetic?"

Alex broke open the package and took a cookie. Fred moaned a little and leaned on his leg, so Alex gave the cookie to him and took another for himself. Fred spit the cookie out, looked at it, licked it, nudged it with his nose, licked it again and then picked it up with his teeth and trotted off to the living room.

Alex watched him and then turned back to Nina. "Gourmet dog. Where was I? Oh, yeah, aesthetic gynecology. Well, as Max pointed out to me just an hour ago, why spend your life looking into the chest cavities of eighty-year-olds when you can look into-"

Nina shut her eyes and leaned back against the cupboard. "I don't want to hear this."

"-the eyes of women who are listening to your every word?"

Nina laughed and then tried to glare at him. "You set me up."

Alex grinned at her and nodded. "Just like Max set me up. I laughed, too. You'd like Max. He's old, almost thirty-six."

"Up yours," Nina said politely.

"And Stell is a little older than you. Forty-two, I think. You'd like Stell, too." Alex's eyes met hers, and she felt her heart thump funny for a moment. Stop that, she told her heart.

"Next time they do this," he told her, "you come along to protect me.''

I'm not going anywhere with you, sonny, she told him silently, but she wanted to know more, so she said, "And then there's your stepmother. Max's mother, right? What does she want you to be? A dermatologist?"

"No, that would be my cousin Tom." Alex crunched the last of another Oreo. "They'd disinherit me if I did that. I'm supposed to do something invasive not topical. Max's mom is a thoracic surgeon, but she doesn't care what I do as long as I pick a specialty."

"What's wrong with the ER?"

"No status, no fame, no glory." Alex picked up his third Oreo. "Do you have any milk?"

"Skim," Nina said and went to the refrigerator, shoving back the Crock-Pot on the top of the fridge that had inched its way forward as she opened the door.

"Why do you do that?" Alex asked.

Nina slammed the refrigerator door and turned. "Push the Crock-Pot? The top of the fridge is the only place I have to keep it, but the vibration from the motor makes it move forward." She squinted back at it. "I should find a better place, but the cupboards are full."

"It's going to fall on you," Alex said. "Move it."

Nina scowled at him. Just what she needed: an infant doctor giving her orders. "It's fine. Do you want this milk or not?"

Fred had returned by now and sat down with a thump by Alex, his butt hitting the ground like a sack of lumpy lead. He wiped his nose on Alex's pants.

Alex didn't seem to mind.

"Don't beg, Fred," Nina said. "Alex will think you've had no upbringing."

Alex fed him another cookie, and Fred went through the drop, lick, nudge routine again before he picked it up and trotted back to the couch. Alex turned to Nina. "Skim milk. How healthy of you." He got up and rinsed out his coffee mug before he held it out to her. "Thank you very much, I'll take some."

Nina poured his milk. "So what are you going to do?"

Alex collapsed into his chair. "I'm going to stay in the ER and just wait them out. They're busy people. Eventually they'll go back to their own lives. Except for Max, but he doesn't give a damn what I do. He's just trying to make sure I don't go for something so high-pressured that I become Dad."

Nina put the milk down on the table. "And that would be bad."

"That would be terrible. My father is a great doctor but a mediocre human being. The only way I'll ever have a real discussion with him is if I develop a heart murmur.'' Alex crunched into another cookie. "Do you know who raised me? Max's mom, Melanie. My mom left for a residency in Denver, and Dad was too busy, so Melanie just absorbed me into the family with Max and Stella. And Stella wasn't hers, either."

Nina conjured up a motherly thoracic surgeon, surrounded by three adoring children. It was a weird picture. "She must be a wonderful woman."

"Not really. Just efficient and responsible." That sounded awful. Poor Alex.

Alex straightened a little, and Nina realized her distress nust have shown in her face. "Hey, don't knock it," he told her. "When you're a kid, that's pretty good, especially if your own parents aren't around much." He shook his head, remembering. "One day we were all together, must have been a holiday, and I disagreed with something Melanie said, and Dad said, 'Do what your mother tells you' and Melanie just looked at him and said, 'I'm not his mother.' And Dad said, 'What?' And Melanie said, 'He's Mice's son.' My dad didn't even remember." Alex slouched back in his chair. "Thank God for Melanie. I'd never have made it to adulthood alive and sane." He stopped in the middle of his Oreo, a cautious look on his face, and put his hand on his stomach.

"Well, the sane's still up for grabs," Nina said. "All those Oreos on top of milk, scotch, whiskey, brandy, and beer can't be a good idea. And you call yourself a doctor."

Alex thought about it for a moment and finished the cookie. "I think it was the milk that was the bad idea. But you need milk with Oreos." He tried to look stern. "It's probably because it's skim milk. Whole milk would have coated my stomach."

Nina tried to look stern back at him. "How old did you say you were? Ten?"

"Very funny." He reached for another Oreo and she moved the package away. "Hey!"

"You've had enough. You're going to get sick."

He frowned at her. "You must be one mean mother."

"Nope," Nina said. "No kids."

Alex sat back. "Did I just put my foot in it?"

"Nope," Nina said again. "Never wanted any. I'm just not the maternal type."

"Now that's interesting." Alex leaned forward again and snagged another cookie while she was off guard. "I never want any, either. Neither does Stella. Max says he gets enough babies delivering them. I've always figured it was our lousy childhoods since we all lost parents. What's your excuse?"

"I'm the oldest of six kids," Nina said. "I already raised five brothers and sisters. I'm done."

Alex raised his eyebrows. "No mom?"

"I have a mother," Nina said, not wanting to discuss it. "She's not interested in children. She gave birth, and then we took it from there.''

Alex nodded sympathetically. "Career woman."

"No." Nina took an Oreo from the package, rattling the plastic and alerting Fred, who came to sit beside her. She blinked down at him, surprised by his enthusiasm, and fed him a cookie, and then watched him trot to the couch before she looked back over at Alex. "Not a career woman. Society woman. We had money, we just didn't have parents."

"So you went to college and became an editor?" Alex shook his head. "That doesn't make sense. You're either supposed to become your mother or her opposite."

"I thought that was marry your father or his opposite."

"Same difference. So you became your mother's opposite?"

"No." Nina put down her cookie as the realization dawned. "No, I became my mother. I married a lawyer and did the society thing and became a law-firm wife. My God, I did become my mother." She blinked at Alex. "No wonder the divorce felt so good. That life was hers. Now I'm living mine." She leaned back in her chair. "Boy, does this explain a lot of things." She picked up her Oreo and bit into it, feeling even more liberated than she had before.

"What kind of things?" Alex asked.

Nina stopped in midcookie. "Why do you want to know?"

"Well, I just spilled my family secrets to you," Alex said reasonably. "It's payback time."

"I didn't hear any secrets."

"Okay." Alex nodded at her, the picture of reason. "My father is alcoholic. He doesn't drink before seeing patients but we're keeping an eye on him, anyway. My stepmother kicked an amphetamine addiction a couple of years ago and now is grossly overweight. We worry about her heart. My mother is manic-depressive, and I thank God every day for lithium. My sister has been married three times, all to cardiac surgeons, but refuses to see anything significant in the fact. She is now engaged, at forty-two, to her fourth cardiac man. My brother is chronically single because he lives for the thrill of the chase and finds stability boring, which I have told him is only an overreaction to our tense childhood." Alex shrugged. "Other than that, we don't have secrets. We're just your standard family of obsessive-compulsive yuppie doctors."

Nina tilted her head at him. "And what's your secret?"

Alex stirred in his chair. "I don't have any secrets. My life is an open book."

"Bull." Nina got up to rinse out her cup. "You're so defensive you won't talk about yourself. You tell all about your family but you won't say what you want." She turned back to him. "So what do you want, Alex Moore? If you could have anything you wanted, right now, what would it be?"

He sat very still on the chair, his eyes on hers, and she stopped breathing for a moment, sure she saw heat in his eyes, that he wanted her, but that was so ridiculous she shook her head to clear the thought. Then he relaxed. "I want Oreos," he said very seriously. "And I want to be able to come back here and talk when I'm not drunk."

"Sure," Nina said and pushed the package toward him. "Help yourself. Anytime." His eyes met hers again, and she blushed and added, "To the Oreos."

"Right," Alex said. "That's what I thought you meant."