Free Message from Nam by Danielle Steel Page B

Paxton.
    “My Mom and I are … well, pretty different.…” She didn’t want to say more, not yet, and there was no point. And it sounded too awful to say she had always thought her mother didn’t love her.
    “Is that what the Peace Corps is all about? To get away from her?”
    “No.” Paxton smiled. “But Berkeley was.” She was very honest with him, they both were. They were just that kind of people.
    “I’m glad,” he said to her, as his lips brushed hers and they lay close to each other on the floor, propped up on their elbows.
    “So am I,” she whispered back, and then he took her in his arms and they lay there and kissed for a long time, until suddenly Gabby opened the bedroom door and looked down at them with considerable interest.
    “You guys going to bed separately or together tonight, or are you just gonna lie here and neck? It’s all the same to me, I just wonder if I should wait up for Pax, or go to sleep now.” Peter groaned and Paxton laughed as she rolled away from him, her hair tangled, her cheeks pink from their kissing.
    “Has anyone told you lately what a rude pain in the ass you are, Gabrielle?” He knew how desperately she hated the name and he loved to use it to annoy her. “Christ, it’s just my luck to fall for my sister’s roommate.” He stood up then, and held out a hand to Paxton. “I guess you’d better get some sleep, babe. If the mouthpiece here will let you. I don’t know how you stand it.”
    “I just fall asleep when I’m tired.”
    “And she probably keeps talking.” All three of them laughed because it was true and he kissed Paxton goodnight and left. And when he was gone, Gabby pressed her.
    “Is it serious, Pax?”
    “Don’t be silly. We’ve only known each other for six weeks, and we’ve got our whole lives ahead of us. He’s got three years of law school, I’ve got four years of undergraduate work to do. What could be serious?” But in her heart, she knew it was, and didn’t want to admit it yet to herself or Gabby.
    “You don’t know my brother. I’ve never seen him look like this. He really cares about you. I think he’s in love with you.” And then with an earnest, investigative stare, “Has he told you he loves you?”
    “For heaven’s sake … of course not.…” But he didn’t have to. Paxton knew it. Gabby was right. And Paxton had never felt like this either. It was just rotten luck that it had happened so fast, and so early. For the moment, finding the man of her dreams was the last thing Paxton wanted.
    “Shit. Isn’t this just my luck,” Gabby complained as they got into bed. “I want to find a husband and you don’t, and what happens, you’ve got Peter drooling over you and looking like he wants to get engaged, and who have I got? No one. Some jerk with frizzy hair to his waist who wants to go to Tibet with me next summer as long as I’ll pay for his airfare. Some people have all the luck.”
    “Karma.” Paxton grinned as she lay in the dark, listening to Gabby.
    “Who’s he? Isn’t he that guy at the free-speech table on Bancroft?”
    “No, it’s that thing Dawn is always talking about. Karma. Fate. Kismet.”
    “They must be sleeping pills. Christ, did you hear her getting sick yesterday? I think she’s dying.”
    “Maybe she’s pregnant,” Paxton whispered hesitantly.
    “When does she have time to get pregnant? She’s always sleeping.” And with that, they both laughed and turned over and went to sleep. For once, Gabby had nothing left to say and she had to go to her contemporary music class in the morning. And she had a lot to do after that. It was the day before Halloween, and she wanted to work on her costume. She was going to be a gold lame pumpkin.
    It was also the day the Viet Cong attacked the Bien Hoa airbase, fifteen miles north of Saigon, the first major U.S. military installation to be hit.
    Five American men were killed, and seventy-six were wounded. And Johnson did not order an attack in