Page 65 of Clara Knows Best

She was certainly free with the compliments, and he didn’t hate it. “Why, thank you, little lady. Sure hope you’ll save me a two-step.”

“Oh, I will. I haven’t danced in forever! You’re a good dancer, right?”

“I can do it,” he said, locking the door behind them. “Doesn’t mean it’ll be pretty.”

“I’m sure you’ll be fine. Are you driving or am I?”

“I don’t mind driving.”

“Okay, good. I think parking’s going to be tough. Dang, I can’t believeyoudrew the platypus! That’s wild.”

He half-listened to her chatter as they got into the car, responding as needed. He’d made the mature, safe choice back there in the tiny powder room, but he wasn’t completely convinced it was the right one.

When Gijo Del Amo asked Clara to dance, Jesse had been a little relieved; it wasn’t going to be solely up to him to entertain her all evening. The enthusiasm with which she’d accepted may have been a little annoying in the face of Gijo’s Tejano good looks, but people were electric sliding to an old Tim McGraw song and she probably hadn’t wanted to miss it.

So Jesse had plopped the black cowboy hat onto her head and watched her lead her partner to the floor while he half-listened to Skip talk about real estate.

Clara sure looked cute, stomping and twirling in her fancy pink boots. The nice thing about line dancing was that the dancers didn’t touch each other or even really interact—Gijo’s hands rested innocuously on his silver belt buckle.

“Hey,” Skip interrupted his thoughts. “You’re not hearing a word of this. Why’d you ask me about my work if you don’t care?”

Jesse turned back to his old friend. “Why are you talking to me about work when you’re on a date with your wife?”

Skip punched his shoulder, sloshing Clara’s ice-cold soda over his hand. “All right, we’re gonna go get some food. Don’t worry about Gijo, man. He’s a good guy.”

“Yeah, but he’s like forty.”

“More like thirty-five,” Pearl put in.

“Who’s he trying to look like? Roy Rogers? He’s a caricature.”

“He’s a sweetheart,” she countered, laughing. “I think they look cute together.”

Jesse looked at the dancers again. Did they?

“You gotta remember that Clara’s not a kid anymore,” Skip advised, and then they left him standing there alone near the dance floor, two red Solo cups in one hand and two foil-wrappedchoripanesin his other.

“Dr. Jesse!” a voice called. “Happy Valentine’s Day! You remember Hayden.”

He nodded at his six-year-old patient. “Hey there. How’s the ear?”

“Good,” Hayden said.

“He’s doing great,” his mother assured him. “Listen, my husband Roy is working tonight but he said to invite you to his poker game.”

“He did?”

His astonishment must have shown, because she looked embarrassed and confessed, “Well, not in so many words, but hewould if he heard about you. This morning Clara and I figured out you were two years ahead of Roy at Romeo High—a year behind my brother, Ted. The poker guys are mostly firefighters—Roy is, and Ted, and Helio—”

“Heliodoro?”

“That’s him! Do you know him?”

They’d wrestled together in high school. “Wait, are you a McMann? Ted McMann’s little sister? Uh, Allie.”

She answered delightedly that he was correct, and again encouraged Jesse to join the poker night while he was in town. “They play every Friday night at eight, at the hardware store. Oops, Hayden wants to play some games. I’d better quit yapping.”

She made her indifferent son say good-bye to him and Jesse lifted the sandwiches in farewell.

---