From A Woman Like Annie:

“I.  WANT.  HIM.”

Clarice made her dazed declaration with Glenn Hall still framed in the rear-view mirror of Annie’s Tahoe.

Annie accelerated, and a cloud of dust kicked up behind them on the gravel driveway.  “Clarice,” she said in her best you-know-better voice.

“I know.  I’m not supposed to like him.”

“I didn’t say that,” Annie objected.  “It’s just that a lot is riding on whether or not he changes his mind.”

“Agreed.  Point being?”

“Point being that needs to be our focus.”

“You afraid that steering wheel’s going somewhere?”

“What?” Annie looked down at her own white-knuckled grip, immediately loosened it.  “I guess I feel a lot of pressure on this, Clarice.  It’s important.”

“Well, I know that.  But what harm can come from me showing a little interest in him?”

“I don’t know.  Just that maybe it’s not a good time to distract him.”

“There are distractions, and there are distractions.”

It was pointless to argue.  Annie knew her sister well enough to recognize immediate infatuation when it struck.

Clarice popped on a pair of black Armani sunglasses, slid down in her seat and blew out a sigh.  “Sorry I was zero help in there.  But mercy, I have never in my life seen a man that good looking.”

“You think?” Annie shot some deliberate neutrality into her response.  Clarice hardly needed encouragement.

“Think?  You’re kidding, right?” Disbelief reverberated through the Tahoe’s interior.  “Annie, surely J. D. didn’t do that much damage to your eligible man antennae.”

“Mine’s on temporary hiatus in the hall closet.”

Clarice laughed.  “At least you can joke about it now.”

“They call that progress in therapy circles.”

“Well, it is, actually.  For a long time, I couldn’t bring myself to say his name because it hurt too much to see the pain on your face.”

The mood in the Tahoe had gone suddenly somber.  Annie heard the love in her sister’s voice and was grateful for it.  Clarice, had indeed, seen her on the down side of disillusion.  Not a pretty sight.  “I have a feeling J. D. and Jack Corbin have a lot in common.”

Clarice’s perfectly arched eyebrows shot toward the roof.  “How so?”

“Self-interest being their number one priority.”

“Well, I won’t deny it where J. D. is concerned.  But isn’t it jumping the gun to hang that sign in Jack Corbin’s window just yet?”

Annie kept her gaze on the road, maneuvered around a brown bag in the middle of her lane that had fallen off the A&E Seed truck in front of them.  Guilt needled at her.  Maybe it was a tad unfair.  She was going on surface impressions, after all.  Hadn’t she been the one defending him to Clarice just a couple of hours ago?  And now she was ready to put him in the same box with J. D. and toss the key in Lake Heron.  “I just wish he would give the company a chance to get on its feet.  That’s all.”

“Maybe he will.  Party’s not over yet.  And even though I talked a big game before going over there this morning, I wimped.  But I’ve got all the googly-eyed stuff out of the way now, so maybe I’ll actually be able to string together a few coherent sentences at the picnic.”

Annie smiled.

“You aren’t interested in him, are you?” Clarice asked, failing to hide her worry.

“Oh, Clarice, of course not,” Annie said.  As sisters, they’d had this conversation numerous times in their lives.  And Annie always said the same thing because if Clarice really wanted the guy, she didn’t stand a chance, anyway.  Not that she was interested in Jack Corbin.  Or any other man at the moment.  “I know you’ll find this hard to believe, but I am very, no, extremely, happy with things the way they are in my life.  I’ve finally proved to myself I don’t need a man to be complete.”

Clarice shot her a look of exaggerated appall over the rim of her sunglasses.  “Heresy.”

“No, if I ever start looking again, it’ll be the flip side of J. D.  The kind of man who drives a nice ordinary Buick or Chevrolet.  A man with roots.  Feet on the ground.  Steady.  Dependable.”

“Boorrring!”

Annie laughed.  “Boring can have its selling points.”

“Not if you’re talking about men.  You’ve got to be willing to get burned a time or two to ferret out a good one.”

“Then they ought to come with warning labels.”

Clarice laughed now.  “Oh, Annie, most of the time they do, we just choose to ignore them.”

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