Can't Help Falling in Love (5 page)

    
“Not to mention that he has you looking like a tea kettle about to boil. He
sounds dreamy. Who is he, Pat Boone’s brother? Frank Sinatra’s cousin?
Rock
Hudson
’s twin?”

    
Karen’s luggage suddenly appeared before them on the conveyor belt. Allison
wanted to leave before she blurted out more. “When I know more, I’ll give you
the entire low-down. My next meeting with him is tomorrow afternoon. Maybe we
can plan to talk about it afterward at dinner? I’ll go pull my car up.” 

    
Before Karen could reply, Allison was out the glass doors on her way to the
parking lots.

    
Within a few minutes, she had steered her car curbside, and they stowed Karen’s
luggage in the trunk. They drove away from the airport and were soon out on the
main highway heading toward town.

    
“I’m a little tense about delving back into my job,” Karen confessed. “Just
being away for a week gave me a whole fresh perspective. It’s not that I’m
tired of the old routine; I love teaching photography, but it’s just that I’m
at a point in my life where I need to refresh some things.”

    
Allison fully understood. “Breaking off an engagement can make you want to go
in a new direction, and it’s not unusual for that feeling to spill over to
other areas of your life.”

    
Karen frowned.
“Like driving this old highway.
We’ve
been down this old road so many times I’m surprised
there’s
not tire tracks
leading straight to our apartment!”

    
“I can tell you’re feeling a growing annoyance with the status quo,” Allison
said, hoping that if she showed extreme sensitivity to Karen’s plight, her
sister might not be too irritable when they returned to their apartment. “Maybe
some music will help.” She flipped on the radio. No sooner had she turned up
the volume than her jaw dropped. She exclaimed, “That’s him!”

    
Karen’s head shot up and she glanced toward the sidewalk whizzing past them.
“Where?”

    
Allison glanced at her watch.
“On the radio!
It’s
ten o’clock
. That’s my new client! He said his new
song might be playing tonight!”

    
She turned up the volume a little more so they could both hear the record
clearly.  His up-tempo pop rendition of an old country song presented an
entrancing, toe-tapping break from the conventional music popularized by Teresa
Brewer, Nat Cole, and Tony Bennett.

    
“My goodness!”
Karen finally cried out. “Be still my
heart! That boy can sing!”

    
Allison nodded. “Yes, and he’s as charming in person as he sounds. The big
challenge he brought to me is how in the world we can capture that excitement
in a photo or a press release. He’s different from the others, and he needs
something new, fresh, and different in his pictures. Who do we know who’s
talented with a camera and lights that might be able to capture his special
appeal like no one else has?”

    
Karen and Allison exchanged weighty glances.

    
Karen instantly caught her sister’s drift. “I’d love the job, Allison!” She
sank back and let the music play havoc with her imagination. “He sounds
familiar to me, somehow. Isn’t it funny how some songs take you back to another
time and place? For some reason, he makes me think of high school, but I can’t
place the voice. I’m sure I’ve never heard this band before.” Suddenly, she
gasped and sat bolt upright with an astonished expression. “Allison, he sounds just
like . . . .”

    
Allison was surprised by her sister’s abruptness. She took her eyes off the
road and looked searchingly at Karen. “He sounds just like
who
?”

    
“Oh, it’s so silly. For a second, when he said the word ‘goodbye,’ I thought he
sounded just like a boy I used to know. Oh well. No matter. A new challenge is
just the charge I need to prod me out of my doldrums!”

  
The next morning at
five o’clock
, Allison heard her sister’s alarm clock
go off. This was far too early to get up, by Allison’s standards. She did not
generally rise until
eight o’clock
. One of the advantages of being
self-employed was that she rarely scheduled an appointment before nine-thirty.
Karen, on the other hand, had a stimulating job teaching photography at the
Memphis College of Art. She had to arrive early enough to prepare materials for
her
eight
o’clock
class.

    
After Allison finally got up and dressed, she meandered into the kitchen. She
was debating whether or not to have breakfast when she encountered the mess
Karen had left behind in the sink—a bowl partially filled with pancake batter,
a skillet on the stove filled with bacon grease, an orange juice glass, and
coffee cup.
No wonder Karen has trouble with
her weight!
Allison silently carped.
I
don’t feel like eating anything anyway, so I’ll just skip breakfast and leave
the dishes for her to clean up this afternoon.  It’ll be best to head
directly for the committee meeting at ten. No doubt, they’ll have coffee and
danish
there.

    
She looked forward to attending industry meetings, especially when they were
held at the Museum of Art in Overton Park, a 342-acre public park in Midtown
Memphis that featured the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, the Memphis Zoo, a
nine-hole golf course as well as the Memphis College of Art, Rainbow Lake,
Veterans Plaza, Greensward, and the Old Forest Arboretum. She could easily
spend a lively morning or afternoon just strolling around the complex before
attending a meeting, but not today. She was determined to stay focused on the
business at hand, to concentrate on the issues to be discussed, and to brush
from her mind her constant reflections about the young singer haunting her every
thought. She was scheduled to meet with him later in the day, and if the
previous encounter gave any indication, she fully expected to be bowled over by
him again. This time, she vowed to skip the coffee and jelly donuts, and remain
calm.

    
Allison sped down the freeway and veered onto the exit ramp that led her to the
bustling downtown area. She chose a parking lot two blocks away, where rates
were somewhat less expensive. She accepted a ticket from the attendant, and
then hiked to the complex.     

    
Ascending the stairs, she considered the people she would likely encounter:
Core
people, undoubtedly
, she surmised.
The
same people always come to these things. Now and then, a self-motivated
newcomer shows up, but it would be nice to see new members.
Just
once, I’d like to leave one of these meetings feeling stimulated to the point
of bursting!

    
Today’s meeting had been conveniently arranged. A conference room had been
booked so attendees could easily walk to the nearby luncheon at the end of the meeting.
Eight people were already deeply involved in a heated discussion when Allison
entered. She looked at her watch and only then realized that she was
twenty-five minutes late. 

    
She hung up her coat, and as unobtrusively as possible, poured herself a cup of
coffee. She ignored the picked over
danish
,
then joined the others. Several people smiled or nodded as she slipped into a
seat.

    
No sooner had the lively in-progress discussion concluded than a long-winded
discourse on the Effective Use of Color on Paper Bag Advertising began. The
dull subject soon left her numb because Blake, a balding, heavy-set advertising
executive, merely droned on and on in a dreary monotone about the pros and cons
of using red, blue, or yellow ink, and his speech was entirely devoid of any
kind of audio visuals. Allison’s thoughts quickly drifted to the young music
sensation she had met. She had been so close to him that they could have been
lovers at a drive-in movie. She was almost convinced that she had seen a sparkle
of love light in his eyes, and that vision kept preoccupying her thoughts. When
she tried to shake him off and study the printed program to discern if a more
interesting speaker and topic would soon appear, she only saw him smiling back
at her from the program. She clamped her hand down over his face so hard that
the move embarrassingly jiggled everyone’s water glasses. She finally resorted
to tallying the thread count in her napkin, but even that task failed to take
her mind off him!

    
She was deep in thought about what kind of portraits Karen might be able to
take of him when she suddenly heard the moderator say, “Meeting adjourned!”

    
Before she could stand up, Blake maneuvered into the empty chair opposite her
and cooed, “Allison, you should have come earlier. You missed all the latest
gossip! Walk with me over to the luncheon—you
are
going
to it, I hope—and I’ll fill you in!”

    
Normally, she would have had nothing to do with Blake. Not only was she
repulsed by his chunky build, shiny face, and protruding nose hairs, but his
busybody approach left her more than annoyed. She looked at her watch.
I’ll
have to kill some time before the luncheon, and Blake can sometimes steer me
toward new prospects if I can stand to endure his trite chit chat,
so she smiled and replied, “Of course.
Let’s walk over there together.” Little did he know that she already planned to
think only about her upcoming appointment with a man who was so exciting that
he made all other men seem transparent. Blake would no doubt interpret her
unusually serene and happy disposition as a sign that she was enjoying his
company. Under the circumstances of having to tolerate Blake, her fantasies
were finally a welcome diversion. 

    
Blake waddled down the hall beside her, chuckling. He could not wait until they
were out of earshot of the others to spill the beans about some news he had
heard before the program meeting. “Oh, Allison,” he beamed, “you know how
competitive this business is. Even large agencies can loose well-established
accounts. I’ve got to point someone out to you—someone who might have her eye
on your client list and be thinking about stealing some of your business!”

    
As they entered the large hall, the place was buzzing with cocktail
conversations, but his stingingly tart remark left her feeling uneasy. Blake
took her coat.

    
“Thank you, Blake. What’s this about stealing my clients?”

    
“I’ll hang your coat up,” he said. “See if you can find a strategic set of
seats for us. I’ll tell you after we sit.”

    
Allison feigned confusion. “Oh Blake, I’m so sorry, but we should sit at our
assigned tables.” She walked away into the crowd, not really wanting to hear
his gossip. Blake stood there disappointed that they would not be sitting
together, but mostly puzzled that she had not been more interested in his hot
scoop.

    
The hall was set up with a long podium at the front of the room that was lined
with the keynote speaker, club officers, and prominent guests. Lavish green
draperies had been drawn open to enable sunshine to fill the room. The day was
so beautiful that Allison longed to be outside, but she dutifully found her
seat. To her joy, she could sit between her friends, Jeff Unger and Marshall
Wells. 

    
As she gracefully maneuvered her knees beneath the yards of hanging table
cloth, she playfully announced, “Why don’t we abandon the meeting and go for a
long walk?”

    
Jeff and Marshall laughed. They were media salesmen, working together for a
company that sold space in national publications. They were always glib about
their business, and Allison shared a positive-minded outlook with them. 

    
The meal was typical for that kind of group affair. One had a choice of fruit
salad or chicken. Allison chose the fruit salad, and she devoured the chunks ravenously.

    
“This is the first thing I’ve eaten all day!” she said.

    
“Slow down, girl!”
Marshall
affectionately teased. “You can have
some of mine if there’s not enough there.”

    
Allison grinned sheepishly. “I
have
been inhaling this, haven’t I?”

    
She dabbed her napkin at her lips, and suddenly noticed a dark-haired woman
sitting at the next table who was staring at her. When their eyes met, the
other woman did not avert her gaze. Allison felt somewhat unnerved and could not
help but wonder if her hearty appetite and vigorous chewing had been offensive
to the woman. She brushed her off, turned back to her friends, and asked, “Any
new prospects on the horizon?”

    
Marshall
began telling her about a new chain
store, but Allison could only half listen. She nonchalantly glanced back at the
dark-haired woman who was still intently staring at her.

    
When
Marshall
took a bite, Allison interjected in a
whisper, “Please don’t look at her too obviously, but I’d like to know who that
woman is—the pretty one with the shoulder length dark hair and coal-gray eyes
at the next table.”