|
"Hold it Pete, I'll be right over. I'll be at your place in twenty minutes. I want to witness this historic occasion."
"Don't rush, Tony. The option is valid for a week. Anyway, Craig wants us to look the place over before we sign. And listen to this, Tony, it includes a clean, sheltered, crescent-shaped beach!"
"Sounds perfect, Pete. But what's the catch? There must be a catch."
"Well, there's a slight catch. If we buy it, there won't be any money left over."
"Don't worry about money, Pete. If the idea is great and the location is as outstanding as you say, the money will come in somehow. I've got my pension, and you have a well-paying job."
"Would you like to drive out with us and have a look?"
"Right now?"
"No Tony, tomorrow morning at six."
"At six! That's in the middle of the night, man! And this on a weekend! Are you crazy?"
"I thought you were..."
"I was just joking. We can leave at midnight if you want. It makes no difference... Still, I think you are nuts," he added before he hung up, "but you're wonderful, I love you my friend."
It was still dark when we picked Tony up. He wasn't ready. I half expected that. He had overslept. I went in and helped him pack.
"Now, tell me, how did you get Sylvia to go along with this scheme?" was practically the first thing he said when we were alone. "Also, tell me another thing; with a great wife like her, who goes along with that, what possessed you to be messing around with Heather?"
"Did you forget, Tony, Heather was key to the whole idea. Sylvia realized this the same way as we did."
"You mean you told your wife about Heather, too? You actually did?"
"It wasn't a matter of choice, Tony," I interrupted him. "And believe me, I'm glad that I told her. Out of it came a really close and intimate feeling for one-another that we never had before."
"And now you are going to tell me that if we did this on the political level the arms race would end immediately," Tony joked.
I nodded and grinned. "Don't worry, Tony, there is hope for us yet."
"At any rate, this crazy scheme of yours is still a hell of a lot better than sitting on our asses, spellbound and in fear, hoping for the nuclear threat to go away on its own."
"MY scheme?" I said. "I thought that was OUR idea."
"Actually we should blame it on Heather," he said. "If Heather hadn't left you that day out of sheer desperation..."
I raised my hand to stop him.
"Maybe it wasn't all because of her," said Tony.
"Sylvia believes it was. She said to me 'the world might be full of people who can't cope anymore, like Heather. They might look for a way to escape and be tempted to force matters..."
"You aren't talking about nuclear weapons sabotage," he interrupted.
"Or nuclear blackmail, or some submarine commander ordering his crew to fire, or some idiot pressing anyone of the thousands of buttons." I could come up with quite a long list. I assured him of that.
Tony looked at me surprised.
"Actually, Tony, those were Sylvia's words, not mine. Anyway, Sylvia likes the idea of living full-time by the sea. Also, this brings us close to one of the best medical facilities that I know of, in Norfolk. She still has the occasional need for medical treatment. In this sense too, she is glad that we met Heather."
Next Page
|| - page index -
|| - chapter index -
|| - Exit -
||
|
