Love in Mid Air by Kim Wright

across the pool and she says that Jeff likes to fight with Elyse. He follows her around
     at every party or whatever and gets her in a fight because he likes it, and then Nancy’s voice got kind of funny and she said,
     ‘He told me he wants to climb her,’ which is a weird thing to say, and later I started thinking that must be why Nancy doesn’t
     like Elyse. Although that thing about the faux glazing was pretty mean too.”
    Kelly looks at me. “Did you know any of this?”
    He does follow me around. I’ve noticed that much. He wants to talk politics, he wants to talk religion, he wants to talk books.
    I shake my head. “That’s ridiculous.”
    “Why?” says Kelly. “He’s a minister, he’s not dead.”
    “Among about a million other reasons, Jeff is Phil’s best friend.”
    “So what? I’m not suggesting he’d ever really hit on you. We’re talking about what people think about doing, not what people
     actually do.”
    I shake my head again. “That’s not what he meant by climbing. You know how Jeff is—he just blurts stuff out and he doesn’t
     stop to think how it sounds. All he meant is he likes talking to me. Jeff’s really kind of innocent, you know? He acts tough
     and he wears that silly zip-up jacket…”
    “Oh yeah, he’s the regular James Dean of the pulpit,” Kelly says, sliding the plate of brownies toward us and refilling our
     coffee. “You’re saying that’s fake?”
    “The night Belinda was talking about, we were arguing about
The Canterbury Tales
…”
    “Come off it, Elyse, nobody goes to the swimming pool and argues about
The Canterbury Tales
.”
    “It’s just that Jeff used to be a history major all those years ago and he likes debating obscure stuff. It juices him, and
     let’s face it, nobody else around here will argue with him. You all stand back from him like, ‘Whoa, he’s the minister so
     his opinion has to matter more,’ and sure, there’s a part of him that gets off on that, but there’s another part of him…”
    “A part that wants to climb you,” Kelly says, and her mouth twitches a little.
    “A part that wants me to tell him when he’s full of shit.”
    Belinda looks up from her brownie. “Oh, I see what you’re saying. He thinks you’re smarter than Nancy.”
    The door pops open and Nancy walks back in. We’d been so preoccupied I didn’t even hear the car drive back up. “Sorry,” she
     says. “Sorry.”
    “No,” I say. “I was completely out of line.” We smile at each other.
    “It sucks,” she says. “I was halfway down the block and so pissed off that my mouth had gone dry when I started thinking that
     the kids are bathed and they’ve done their homework and Jeff got home early to keep them so, come hell or high water, I’m
     out for the night.” She throws her car keys on the counter, drops her purse on the kitchen chair. “Okay, Elyse, tell the truth.
     What did you think about the book?” Everybody laughs.
    “All right,” says Kelly, “whatever. I’m just glad you’re all staying. I thought I was going to have to drive Belinda home
     and eat a plate of cream cheese brownies all by myself. I don’t care what we read, I just want everybody to get along. Next
     month we’ll do
David Copperhead
.”
    “
Copperfield
.” I can’t seem to help myself.
    “Is it sad?” Belinda asks. “Because even though I didn’t get to the end of this one, I could tell it was going to be sad.”
    “You can’t expect everything to be some old-fashioned romance,” says Kelly, picking up the plate of brownies and walking into
     the den. “It’s supposed to be a realistic treatment of an affair.”
    “What do you mean?” Belinda asks, following her. “That things have to be sad to be realistic?”
    “What she means,” Nancy says patiently, as patient as a saint, “is that in novels women run off with their lovers. In real
     life, women stay.”

Chapter Four

    I n my dream, he seems to have the power of flight. Or at