~Chapter 2~
The Freedom of the Moon
(originally posted June 12, 2007)

She was beginning to feel overwhelmed and panicky.  On the pretext of getting more lemonade, she picked up an empty pitcher from the picnic table and fled into the Belden kitchen.  Bracing herself over the kitchen sink, Diana looked out the window at the happy scene outside.

Honey was seated on Brian’s lap, her arms around his neck.  They both looked like they were about to float away in happiness.  Miss Trask and Mrs. Vanderpoel were fussing around the picnic table, making sure there was plenty of food available for everybody.  Regan and Tom were amiably discussing the recent Kentucky Derby and the upcoming Indy 500, each politely pretending to be interested in the other man’s passion.  Tom’s wife Celia was fussing over old Mr. Maypenny, the Wheeler’s semi-retired gamekeeper, who was dandling her firstborn child precariously on his knee.  Trixie was talking to Spider Webster about her college of choice, SUNY Albany, and her plans for majoring in criminal justice.  Mrs. Wheeler and Mrs. Belden were already making wedding plans for their children, even though Honey and Brian had expressed their desire to wait until Brian was finished with med school.  Mr. Belden and Mr. Wheeler had wandered off through the apple orchard for a walk, talking about finances no doubt.  Birds were singing, crickets were chirping, and fireflies were just starting to appear as dusk settled on Crabapple Farm.  It was a perfect spring evening.  So why then, am I so miserable? Diana wondered.

She heard shrieks of laughter and saw Mart, blindfolded, being chased and taunted by her younger brothers and sisters and Bobby Belden in a rousing game of Blind Man’s Bluff.  She tried to smile, but it was no use.  Tears began cascading down her cheeks and her shoulders shook silently. 

“Diana?  Are you all right?”

It was Nick Roberts.  He and Diana had taken many art classes together during high school and now both of them were heading to the University of Chicago to study art there.  They had become close friends, even more so since Mart had been in Africa.  Whenever Diana had a problem, and didn’t feel like she could talk to Honey or Trixie about it, Nick was there.

When she didn’t turn to him, Nick rushed to her side and put his arms around her.  He didn’t say anything or ask her any questions.  He just let her cry on his shoulder.  Sometimes, you just needed a friend to be there, without saying anything.

*******************************************

Trixie heard the car as it turned up the driveway.  It was probably too early to be Jim, she thought, but still looked that way in anticipation.  As the vehicle approached, she saw that it was Dan Mangan’s battered old red pickup truck.  He and Tad Webster were roommates at the community college in White Plains.  The two of them climbed out of the truck and shouted hello.  Tad’s older brother immediately put him in a headlock, demanding to know where he had been and what had taken him so long to get there.  The two of them ended up in the grass wrestling while Bobby Belden and Larry and Terry Lynch shouted on encouragements.

Dan rolled his eyes and came to greet the more civilized folk at the party.  Dan was the seventh and last member to join the B.W.G.’s back in high school.  After getting in with a bad crowd while living in New York City after his parents had died, Dan had been brought to Sleepyside to live with his uncle, Bill Regan, who worked as the Wheelers’ stable foreman.  It had been rough for a time, but being a part of the B.W.G.’s really turned him around.  He had cleaned up his act and set a course for becoming a police officer like Spider Webster.

He squeezed Trixie’s arm as he passed her and gave her a quick peck on the cheek, then did the same to Honey, offering his congratulations to the happy couple.  Only Honey noticed the slight redness on his cheeks when he leaned over to kiss her.

Dan had been experiencing some very strange feelings ever since he had escorted Trixie to her senior prom.  After Jim and Trixie had broken up that winter, Trixie had firmly declared she wouldn’t attend prom.  But Honey and Di had worn her down, until she finally agreed to the plan that the three girls would go “stagette” as Honey called it.  Then the no-dating pact had suddenly fallen apart.

Di couldn’t stand that her good friend Nick Roberts wasn’t planning on going.  He wasn’t dating anyone, despite his dark good looks and chivalrous personality.  So she urged him to ask Honey.  He insisted he wasn’t interested in a relationship, but Di insisted even harder that Honey was devoted to Brian and there would be no sticky issues like that.  They would simply be friends enjoying their senior prom.

Meanwhile, unbeknownst to Di, Tad Webster was probing Honey about prom, asking all sorts of questions about what the girls were planning.  When he discovered that Diana, the prettiest girl in school, did not have a date, he screwed up his courage and asked her.  He knew she was dating Mart Belden, but Mart was in Africa and what was that saying about all being fair in love and war anyway?  Diana was too polite to refuse him, and besides, she liked Tad.  It might be fun going to prom with him.  She had no clue that he was actually hoping for more than a friendship.

When Honey and Di discovered that they both now had dates, while Trixie was “stagette” all by herself, they panicked.  That would never do.  Trixie would never go to prom now.  So the two girls had put their heads together, given Dan a call, and begged him to ask Trixie to prom.  Dan hadn’t even gone to his own senior prom.  He was definitely a jeans and t-shirt kind of guy and getting all gussied up in a tuxedo to go dancing wasn’t his idea of a good time.  But the girls had played the “all for one and one for all” card, insisting that his fellow Bob-White needed him, and he had grudgingly allowed them to twist his arm.  He surprised them all, and even himself, by having a really great time.  Nick Roberts told him he looked like James Bond in his tux, and that was enough to make Dan feel like a tough guy again.  “You can take the boy out of the city...” he had mused.

But beyond the fun of being with his friends, Dan was now looking at Trixie in a new way.  She had worn a strapless sapphire blue gown to prom that took his breath away.  Her blond curly hair, which she had let grow almost to her shoulders, had been pinned up on top of her head in a way that made her look very grown-up.  Dan had brought her the requisite corsage and then blushed furiously as he attempted to pin it to her gown without sticking her.  And each time he had had the opportunity to slow dance with her that night, he could feel his heart beating madly and his palms sweating. 

But it wasn’t that long ago that Trixie and Jim had broken up.  Dan didn’t want to be her “transitional man”.  So he had played it cool, hoping for more, but not pushing himself on her.  Kissing her cheek just now had come to him instinctively and he had been embarrassed by it, trying to cover by treating Honey the same way, even though he had not been a “kisser” prior to this.  He hoped nobody noticed.

He hurried to the table to see if Mart had left anything for the latecomers.  But Mrs. Belden had made plenty, and guests had brought extras and there were still a lot of goodies to be had.  He fixed himself a plate and situated himself on the grass near Trixie’s feet, asking her about the graduation ceremony, how Mart and Brian had come to be at home, what he had missed so far that evening, what Brian and Honey were planning, where Diana was, if Jim was planning to be there.  He slipped that part about Jim in there casually, but carefully watched Trixie for her reaction.

“I called him earlier.  He had to wrap up things with the construction crew at the school, but he said he’d be here,” Trixie said.

Dan couldn’t get a read on her, but she didn’t seem inclined to continue the topic, so he changed the subject.  “What are you planning on doing this summer before you go to school?  Look for another mystery?”

That brought a smile to her face.  “Yes, I’ll be trying to solve the mystery of the homeless freshman.  Honey is going to NYU, so now I’ve got to either find myself a new roommate or a cheaper place to live. It’s too late to get into the dorms now, and anyway, I was kind of liking the idea of having my own place.  Too bad I’ve lost my roommate who sews and cooks though.” 

Dan opened his mouth to make a wisecrack about her culinary skills, when a pair of headlights cut through the dusk as a car came up the driveway.  It was Jim’s little blue Toyota hatchback.  Dan was chagrined to see Trixie jump from her seat and go quickly to greet him.  Honey beat her to it though, throwing her arms around her adoptive brother as he picked her up and spun her around. 

“Congratulations, sis!  And you too, Brian!”  He shook Brian’s hand and gave his future brother-in-law a hearty hug.  He smiled at Trixie, but it was brief and stiff and he quickly hurried off to the crowd gathered in the yard.

Dan could see that Trixie looked hurt.  He wanted to run to her, but thought that might be too obvious.  Instead, he went over to say hello to Jim, trying not to shoot daggers at him with his eyes.  What was up with him anyway?  Breaking up was one thing.  Treating Trixie like this was quite another.  Maybe he should pop Jim in the nose, just to give him a wake-up call.

“Dan?  When did you get here?”  It was Diana, coming out of the house with a pitcher of lemonade.  Her eyes were a little red-rimmed, but she had a smile on her face that reached all the way to her eyes.  Nick had helped her freshen up so that she looked normal again.  He was close behind her, a large platter heaped with cookies in his hands.  “Mangan, Dan Mangan,” he said somberly, and Dan punched him lightly in the arm with a grin on his face.  Tad rushed over eagerly and took the pitcher from Diana and carried it over to the picnic table.  Dan followed, laughing under his breath, his irritation at Jim forgotten in the light-hearted atmosphere.

*******************************************

As darkness fell on Crabapple Farm, guests began to leave one by one.  Others stayed to help clean up and moved the party into the house, where a raucous game of Apples To Apples got under way in the family room.  Trixie was the last one to leave the kitchen after cleaning up, but instead of joining the others, she slipped out onto the porch for some fresh air.  She was staring up at the full moon when she heard the screen door open and shut softly. 

“Hi.  Mind if I join you?”

“Of course not,” Trixie smiled.

Dan moved over to stand next to her.  She was leaning on the porch railing staring up at the moon and the stars.  His hand was very close to hers and he had an impulse to hold it, to hold her.  Gripping the porch railing tightly in order to restrain himself, he stared up into the night sky instead.  He was trying to remember a story his mother used to tell him when he felt Trixie’s touch.  She had put her hand over his and was gently tracing her thumb down the back of his hand and wrist.  Pleasantly surprised, he turned to look at her, but she was still staring pensively up at the moon.  Smiling, he turned his hand palm up and interlaced his fingers with hers, then whispered softly, “What is it you want, Trixie? You want the moon? Just say the word and I'll throw a lasso around it and pull it down for you.”

Trixie smiled and turned to look at him.  “Stealing lines from movies are we, Dan Mangan?  Or should I call you George Bailey?”

“I was kind of getting used to James Bond, personally.”

“Well, you don’t look very 007 at the moment,” Trixie snickered.

Dan looked down.  His worn jeans were dirty from a game of touch football earlier that evening.  His black t-shirt was wrinkled and equally soiled.  And what was that?  A spot of mustard?  Crap!  This was his favorite shirt, too.  Not to mention the fact that he’d been walking around all night with a splotch of yellow on his shirt and no one had told him.  Though it did explain that moment earlier in the evening when he had thought he heard Honey call his name, only to turn around and discover Mart and Tad laughing like hyenas while they covered her mouth.  He’d get them for that.  He ran his free hand through his disheveled hair and grinned sheepishly.  “I’m undercover.”

He had not failed to notice that Trixie’s hand was still in his.  He gulped.  This must be what a squirrel feels like on a telephone wire, he thought.  Do I confidently race ahead and enjoy the thrill?  Or will one wrong step send me hurtling to the ground?  Great, now I’m comparing myself to a rodent.  Dan leaned in a little closer to her, testing the waters.  She tilted her head upward and caught his eye.  She didn’t say anything, but she swallowed hard and her lips parted slightly.  Dan leaned in closer.  Abruptly, the screen door creaked open and Tad was hollering,  “You ready to go, Dan-O?”

Trixie hurriedly pulled her hand from Dan’s and backed off a few steps.  Dan quietly fumed for a moment over the bad timing his roommate consistently displayed, before he turned nonchalantly to him, “Why don’t you take my truck and drive Di home, Tad?  Then you can come back and get me.”  He figured Tad would leap at that chance and he was right.  He held out his hand with a lopsided grin on his face and Dan tossed him the keys to his truck.  Tad bounced back into the house looking for the lovely lady Diana.

Trixie smiled, “You’re stirring up all kinds of trouble there, 007.”

Dan shrugged and grinned.  “All’s fair,” he said.  That thought sobered him momentarily.  He thought about how Jim had slighted Trixie earlier that evening.  If Jim wanted to throw away a chance to be with a girl as great as Trixie, that was his loss.  They had broken up months ago.  All was fair.  He waited impatiently until Tad brought Di out of the house.  He watched as they got into his truck and pulled away, and as the headlights faded from view and darkness settled around the house again, Dan put his hand around Trixie’s waist, pulled her to him and kissed her.  It was gentle and brief, not very Bondesque, but Dan thought it was just about perfect.  Trixie must have too, he guessed, because she sighed softly and smiled up at him, her blue eyes sparkling in the moon’s glow.

“There’s no rush,” he whispered to her.  “I just wanted you to know I’ll be here...waiting.”

*******************************************

For the next week, Trixie was so busy it was impossible to spend too much time thinking about that night, or that kiss.  After the graduation party at the Lynches, the three girls had gone together on a weeklong trip to Chicago.  The families, who had grown as close as their children had over the years, had made an agreement whereby the Wheelers sent Jim and Brian on a trip for their graduation present, the Beldens and Bill Regan had sent Mart and Dan when they graduated, and now the Lynches sent the girls for their graduation gift.

None of the girls had ever been to Chicago before and they made the most of.  They went to a Cubs game at historic Wrigley Field.  They all agreed it was great fun enjoying a baseball game without the boys hanging over their shoulders spouting their uniquely male sports knowledge to the “helpless females”.  They spent a day at the Art Institute of Chicago, where Diana breathlessly dragged them from exhibit to exhibit in complete rapture.  They spent an afternoon at Arlington Race Course watching the beautiful Thoroughbreds race.  Diana hadn’t been able to join them on their trip to Saratoga, and Honey and Trixie reveled in the chance to teach her all they had learned on that trip.  They visited the Sears Tower, Navy Pier, the Chicago History Museum, and Jackson Park, where the 1893 World’s Fair had been held.  And of course, they visited the university where Diana would be taking up residence that fall.

Trixie came home to find several emails from her brothers and Dan, wanting to hear all about the trip.  She started typing up a reply and soon realized that even though she was out of high school at last, she had somehow once again been stuck with a “What I Did Last Summer” essay.  The irony made her laugh as she attached a few photos from Chicago to the email.  Before hitting ”send”, she hesitated then added Jim’s email address as well.  He hadn’t emailed and asked her about the trip, but damned if she was going to let him off that easy.  The Bob-Whites were friends, and he would just have to get over his problems, whatever they were.

Just minutes after the email had been shot into cyberspace the phone rang.  She heard 11-year-old Bobby galloping through the house, loudly announcing his intention to answer it.  After a minute she heard him hollering, “Trixie!  It’s for you!”

She picked up the extension in her room, “Hello?”

“Hi, Trixie.  It’s Dan.”

”I just sent you an email like two minutes ago.  Please don’t tell me you’ve already read it and want to discuss my grammar and punctuation errors.”

Dan laughed, “Nope.  I don’t even have my computer set up here, yet.”

“Here?  Where’s here?”

“I just got a small apartment in a boarding house here in Albany.”

Before the girls had gone to Chicago, Dan had asked Trixie how she would feel if he transferred to SUNY Albany that fall.  Trixie was delighted.  Moving away from home was scary enough, but when Honey decided to go to NYU instead of Albany, Trixie started having minor anxiety attacks every time she thought about living alone for the first time two hours from home.  Just having Dan close by, in whatever kind of relationship they ended up with, would bring Trixie peace.  And exploring that relationship was going to make being away from home that much more exciting.

“And Trixie?  Mrs. Howard – she’s the landlady – told me that the room across the hall from mine was going to be available at the beginning of August.  It’s a lot smaller than mine, just a studio really, but I think you’ll really like it.”

As Dan gave her the lowdown on the building, the neighborhood, and the cost of rent and what it would include, Trixie couldn’t help feeling a tingle of excitement.  It was the same feeling she got whenever she had gotten started on the trail of a new mystery.  There was no mystery here, but the thrill of something new and unknown could be just as exciting, Trixie thought with a grin.

“I’ve got to work tonight, but do you want to come up and see the place this weekend?  You could sleep on my couch,” Dan suggested.

“You’ve got a job already?” Trixie asked.  “Where?  Doing what?”

“Nothing glamorous, Trix.  I’ll be in classes during the day, so I was just looking for something for the nights and weekends to help pay the bills.  I’m bussing tables at a restaurant called The Chop House.”  Dan could hear muffled laughter on the other end of the phone.  ”What’s so funny?”

Trixie couldn’t help it. She burst out laughing.  “The Chop House?  You spent all of high school chopping wood for Mr. Maypenny and now you’re working at a place called The Chop House?”

Dan tried to act disgruntled, but it was no use.  He started laughing so hard that tears began running down his face and he started choking.  He had to put the phone down until he could stop coughing and regain control, but he could still hear Trixie laughing on the other end.  When Dan’s uncle had brought him to Sleepyside, Dan had lived with Mr. Maypenny, the Wheeler’s gamekeeper.  The Wheeler game preserve was several hundred acres large and Mr. Maypenny was getting on in years.  This created a lot of work for Dan.  He didn’t mind.  He was grateful for the chance to earn his keep and say thank you for all that his uncle and Mr. Maypenny and the Wheelers had done for him.  But the work often kept him from joining in on the trips his fellow Bob-Whites had been privileged to go on.  He frequently joked with them that he had to stay behind and “chop down some more trees for firewood”.  You’d have thought the whole Eastern seaboard was still heated by woodstoves.

Once he was able to speak again, Dan picked the phone back up.  “So, do you want to come up and look at the room or not, smart alec?”

Trixie stifled a giggle, “I do.  Let me see if Moms will let me use her car and then I’ll call you back, okay?”

“Okay.  Like I said, I have to work tonight, but then not again until Sunday evening.  So...maybe I could take you out to dinner and a movie Saturday night?”

Trixie was glad Dan was not there to see her face slowly turning pink.  She had thought about Dan almost the whole flight back from Chicago.  She thought about their friendship.  She thought about senior prom.  She thought about that kiss and how, as quick as it was, it had made her toes tingle.  She was still upset about Jim’s attitude toward her, and she didn’t want to be dating Dan on the rebound.  But what could dinner and a movie hurt?  “Sure, that sounds great.  But let me spring for the movie, okay?”

“Deal.  I think there’s a new James Bond film out.  That’s gotta be better than some chick flick.”

Trixie giggled again as Dan’s tough guy persona flashed.  She wondered who he thought he was fooling.  “That sounds perfect.  And you don’t even have to wear a tux.”

“Fantastic!”  Dan fairly shouted.

They said their good-byes and Trixie raced down to the kitchen to find her mother to see if she could procure the family sedan for the weekend outing. 

*******************************************

Trixie left at the crack of dawn on Saturday morning.  She wanted to be able to spend the whole day in Albany.  She and Dan explored the campus when she arrived, eating breakfast at a little diner called Bombers that was popular with students and locals alike.  They were served up huge cheesy omelets loaded with fixings, heaping portions of steaming home fries, and several slices of crisp bacon for each plate.  A platter of flaky homemade buttermilk biscuits occupied the center of the table, with a variety of jams and butters to choose from.  They both agreed Mart would probably return from Africa on the first plane available if he knew such a place existed.

The room at the boarding house was just right and Trixie told Mrs. Howard she would take it.  It would give her the perfect blend of privacy and hominess that she was looking for.  And more importantly, it fit her budget.  Although her parents were paying for Trixie’s tuition, she didn’t want them carrying the full burden of her college experience.  Though Trixie often felt like a poor little church mouse compared to the Wheelers and Lynches, her family was more than well off financially and she didn’t qualify for many government loans.  Establishing her independence from her parents would help her to qualify for that assistance on her own.

Trixie insisted on taking Dan shopping to furnish his apartment, which she declared was shockingly bare.  Dan had a few sticks of furniture, a TV, his computer, and not much else.  Dan trusted Trixie not to let his room get too “girly”, so he agreed to purchase a few things she picked out for him – some picture frames, a throw and some pillows for his secondhand couch, a couple of framed prints for the walls, a few minor knickknacks, and a coffee table they found at a local thrift store.

They grabbed some sandwiches at a local deli on the way back and spent the afternoon just talking.  Dan reflected on how enjoyable that was.  He loved the camaraderie of the tight-knit B.W.G. group, but it rarely allowed for any one-on-one time with any individual member.  He and Mart were close friends since they were in the same grade through high school, but most of the time, where there was one B.W.G., there were bound to be at least two or three others. 

Dan had carefully thought about where to take Trixie to dinner, trying to find a balance between romantic and friendly.  He had settled on a little family-owned place called Fireside Pizzeria.  Pizza was always a nice casual meal, yet the restaurant also had drippy candles on the tables and a large fireplace in the center of the dining area, which lent it a certain intimate ambiance.

After dinner they went to see the latest James Bond film.  They both enjoyed it, and Dan was glad Trixie wasn’t the kind of girl to insist on a weepy romantic comedy.  But as they came out of the theater, at the same time as one of those movies let out, he noticed how many women were clutching their dates’ arms, leaning on their shoulders, dabbing their eyes and sighing happily because Kate discovered her heart could go on even without Leo.  There might be something to these chick flicks after all, he thought.  Discussing how James Bond saved the world by wiping out a bunch of bad guys with a machine gun wasn’t exactly a touchy-feely conversation.

On the other hand, the walk back to Mrs. Howard’s was very conducive to romance.  The moon was a pale sliver in the sky, there was a soft June breeze drifting through the trees, and occasionally they could hear a nightingale singing its lullaby to the world.  Dan reached down and lightly grabbed Trixie’s hand.  She didn’t object, but squeezed his hand in return.

“So...what do you think?”  Dan asked.

“About what?”

“About anything.  Mrs. Howard, the movie, the pizza, my decorating skills.”

Trixie chuckled, “I think we’d better skip that last topic.  You probably won’t appreciate my opinion.”

“I’m interested in anything you say, Trixie.  In everything you say.”  They stopped on a corner to wait for the light to change.  Nobody was around.  Dan put his hands on Trixie’s waist and looked down into her eyes. “I don’t know where this is going, Trixie, or where it’s going to end up.  But I know where I want it to end up.”  He didn’t say anything else, and he didn’t make any moves.  He wanted to know if she felt the same way, or if she was simply going with the flow because she felt lonely.

Trixie stood on her toes and put her arms around Dan’s neck.  Her voice was barely above a whisper, “I don’t know where it’s going to end up either, but if you’re there, that’s good enough for me.”  She touched her lips to Dan’s and the two of them were soon caught up in a passionate embrace under the watchful glow of the moon.