The Fourth Man Ch. 02

"Ah, a "little something"; is that a dig," he joked.

"Ken," she said faking anger and punching him in the arm. "You know better than that."

"Well my little something is getting bigger just thinking about it."

"Oooh," she cooed, "You're not kidding," she said sliding her hand down and into his pants. "What do say we go upstairs and put your, "big something" to good use."

Ken hit the off button on the TV remote, took his wife by the hand, and led the way.

The next morning Jen got up extra early and had toast and fresh coffee waiting as Ken prepared for his trip.

"All packed?" she asked escorting him to the door.

"Yup, I've got everything I need. I'll be back late Sunday night. I think our plane gets into O'Hare around eight-thirty. By the time I get my bags and get out of there it'll probably be almost ten by the time I get home."

Jen forced a smile. "You have a good time," she told him while helping with the buttons on his coat.

"I will," he said with a smile.

Everything was fine but again she just couldn't leave well-enough alone and her anxiety resurfaced. "Just don't have too good of a time. You be good, buster; remember who you're coming home to," she said almost as if she was forewarning him.

As soon as she said it, she wished she hadn't. The smile quickly left Ken's face. She could look right into his soul through his eyes and see the anger and disappointment. His goodbye kiss didn't exactly inspire passion. He walked out the door without saying another word and she watched nervously as Ken put his luggage and clubs into the back of his car. Jen could see daylight breaking over the horizon as he took off heading for the airport.

***

"Hey, there he is," Ken heard a familiar female voice say as he approached the departure gate, "The hero of the hour."

Ken looked over and saw Tara already sitting next to Jack. She jumped up and gave him a friendly kiss on the cheek. "I'm so excited, I've never been to Hilton Head before; have you?"

"Never," responded Ken.

"I was there once," volunteered Jack, "but that was many years ago."

The three sat and talked until they were called to board. Since the plane was only half full they were all able to sit together. Tara got dibs on the window seat. About midway through the flight Tara remembered something she wanted to ask her two friends.

"Hey guys, you know where I can get a good deal on a new cellphone?"

Jack and Ken looked at one another and laughed.

Ken looked back at Tara. "You're kidding, right? You do know we both work in telecommunications, right? What's wrong with the phone you've got?"

"The damn disconnect button keeps sticking on me. The other day I tried calling a girlfriend of mine. When her phone went to voicemail I tried to hang up but the fricken thing wouldn't work. I kept hitting the stupid button but it wouldn't disconnect. The voicemail just kept going on and on. I finally just stuck the damn thing back in my purse. I have no idea how long it stayed connected. It's happened three or four more times since then too."

"Well don't worry, when we get back to Chicago we'll set you up with new phone at a fraction of what it would cost you in a store," Ken told her.

Tara smiled, "Thanks, guys. I knew I could count on you."

The rest of the flight was filled with small talk, mostly about golf. When they landed Ken went over, got the rental car that was reserved by his employer, picked Tara and Jack up at arrivals, and was soon headed toward their hotel.

The weather was a balmy sixty-eight degrees, a lot different than the thirty-something degrees they left back in Chicago. They checked in, one room for Jack and Ken, and another for Tara and her sister, Laura. They had about two hours before Ken and Tara had to go back to the airport to pick up the remaining member of their foursome, so they all met in the restaurant for breakfast.

"When is our first tee-off?" Tara asked.

"One- thirteen," Ken responded. "I hope Laura's plane isn't late," he added, "it's going to be tight as it is."

They called when they got back to the room and was happy to hear Laura's flight was right on time. As soon as Ken saw her walking in from the loading gate he knew who she was. Laura was most undoubtedly Tara's sister. They both screamed like little girls when they saw one another. Tara held out her arms as they approached each other. As her sister got closer, Laura dropped her overnight bag at her feet in preparation for their embrace. Such a display of sisterly love had collected several chuckling on-lookers.

After finally breaking their clinch, Tara turned to see Ken standing behind her.

"Laura, this is Ken, the guy I was telling you about. Ken, this is my sister, Laura."

"I'm not sure what she told you," he said with an easy smile and an outstretched hand, "but don't believe a word of it."

"Oh, so you're not Tiger Woods, Arnold Palmer, and Jack Nickolas all rolled into one," she said smiling back.

"Not hardly," he chuckled.

"Well it's good to meet you anyway, Ken. This is the only luggage I have but we'll have to go to baggage claim to get my clubs."

When Laura pointed out her golf bag sliding down the carousel, Ken grabbed them, hoisted her clubs over his shoulder, and they were off for three days of frolicking on lush, green fairways.

"I told you he was good," Tara told her sister as they all sat down to order a beer and count up the scores.

"Yeah, you weren't kidding. What'd you shoot, Ken?"

"Ah, an eighty-four," he said modestly. "You didn't do too bad yourself; you shot a ninety-three, not bad at all. Tara, you and Jack tied with a ninety one. Laura, you shoot a lot like your sister."

"That figures," interjected Tara. "We both learned from the same guy."

"I thought you learned from your ex?" Jack inquired.

"I did, we both did," responded Tara.

"Now wait a minute, I know Tony's a pretty good teacher but he's not worth flying from Atlanta to Chicago for a lesson."

The two ladies chuckled. "No, I lived in Chicago my whole life," Laura said. "Until last year we lived only a few blocks from each other. The next best thing to having a professional golfer as a husband is having him as a brother-in-law...free lessons. Until..."

She stopped in mid-sentence realizing that they were talking about her sister's ex-husband. She remembered the pain Tara had gone through during the divorce.

"Oh, I'm sorry," she said reaching over and taking her sister's hand. "I didn't mean..."

"It's okay," interrupted Tara. "I've learned to live without him." She looked at Jack and Ken. "Since the divorce I pretty much forbid anyone from talking about him when I was around. You see as our relationship slowly sunk in the west, he had a new one springing up in the east. I got sick one day at work and went home early; I walked right in on them."

"Damn, what a shock. What'd you do?" Jack asked.

"I divorced him, silly."

"Well, yeah but I mean..."

Ken saw that Jack was about to put his foot in his mouth and headed him off. "Damn, that had to be rough, Tara."

She just shrugged her shoulders. "It was. I was infatuated when I first met him. He was exciting and so full of piss and vinegar. He was going to join the tour and go head to head with the greats. Unfortunately, after three tries he couldn't get past Q-school. It really took it out of him when he finally accepted the teaching position at Seven Winds. He seemed to lose interest in everything...including me."

"I'm sorry," ken sympathized again.

"Me too," echoed Jack.

"Well, it was a long time ago."

It was obvious Tara didn't want to talk anymore about her divorce so Ken directed the conversation back to Laura. "So what made you move to Atlanta?"

"I work for Guy's and Doll's, clothing chain. I was a store manager for our down town Chicago store out there. Last year I got an offer to work as a regional manager, the only hitch was that I'd be headquartered in Atlanta."

"What about your husband?" Jack asked. "What'd he do, just pack up and quit his job?"

"My husband works as a time management consultant. He goes around to large corporations and shows them how they can improve their bottom line by streamlining things. He works from the house when he's home but he travels a lot so it doesn't make much difference to him where we live."

"Tara tells us you have kids," interjected Jack.

"Ah yes," she answered reaching for her purse, "they are the light of my life." Laura pulled out her wallet and flipped to the section holding some glassine protected pictures. Visibly beaming with pride, she presented her children one by one in living color.

"You have a beautiful family," Jack told her while reaching for his own wallet. "Here's my brood," he joked.

Tara was next, then both ladies looked at Ken. Jack knew the story and tried to divert the conversation away from its present subject and back to golf so his buddy wouldn't have to go into some painful memories but Laura didn't catch on.

"What about you, Ken...kids?"

He thought about just shaking his head no and moving on but like Tara's divorce, it was a long time ago and it no longer hurt so badly. "No, my wife, Jennifer got pregnant just after our second anniversary but she miscarried after seven months. She went into a deep depression for about a year afterward. We both went to grief counseling and eventually learned to live with it but Jen won't try again. She's been on birth control ever since."

Both women were stunned. "Oh Ken, I'm so sorry," they said, almost in unison.

"Thanks," he replied. "You never really get over something like that, you just learn to live with it." Suddenly his voice perked up as he reached for his wallet. "I do have a picture of my wife, though."

'Oh she's beautiful," commented Tara as she took the picture for a closer look.

"Can I see?" asked Laura.

Tara passed the picture on. Only Tara noticed the change in her sister's facial expression. Ever since they were kids, Laura's mouth would draw tight when she was under stress. It was very subtle but Tara could always spot it.

"Yes," Laura said quickly handing the photo back to Ken, "she's very pretty."

The next morning they all met for breakfast before their morning tee-off. They had one round scheduled for seven-twenty in the morning and another for two-twelve in the afternoon. The following day was Sunday. They had one round in the late morning then they had to check out and catch their plane back to snowy Chicago...except for Laura, of course, who would be returning to her husband and kids in Atlanta.

Ever since Friday afternoon, while they were all talking about their families, Tara had notice her sister's reserved mood. She asked her about it that night but Laura insisted she was just tired from the trip then playing a round of golf so soon after getting off the plane.

Tara accepted her explanation then but it was a new day, and after a full night's sleep she was still acting strange. Tara was determined to get to the bottom of her sister's puzzling behavior but knew she wouldn't get a chance to talk to her again until later in the evening; they had a full day in front of them.

***

About the same time Ken and crew were getting ready for their second round of golf for the day, Jen's phone was ringing back in Chicago. She wiped her eyes with a tissue and tried to sound normal as she answered. "Hello."

"Hey, girlfriend," greeted a cheery Marge. "So, did you figure out what movie you want to see tonight?"

"Oh, Marge, I'm sorry, I haven't even looked."

It was soon obvious that the attempt to disguise her anguish was in vain. "Jen, are you crying?"

"Marge, I...I can't help it. Ken and I...he hasn't even called to tell me he got there safely," she sobbed. "I...I think I'm losing him, Marge. Oh God, what have I done..."

"Losing him...Jen, what the hell... what do you mean, what have you done? What's happened?"

Continued...