Free Getting Warmer by Carol Snow Page B

with the strand around her neck.
    I wore my navy blue skirt that should have been taken up an inch because it hit me at mid-calf, which any women’s magazine will tell you is the most unflattering, leg-shortening length. Up until this moment, I hadn’t cared.
    We met Jonathan’s father and stepmother at the door to Clarke’s, which was located inside the intimate and ever-so-swishy Golden Palms Hotel. In Scottsdale, most good restaurants are located inside hotels, which unsettles me, as if the Phoenix Valley is just a nice place to visit and living here is a kind of extended vacation and not real life at all. Everything is geared toward visitors, as if the several million residents don’t count. Still, I was excited to be eating here; my parents, in the process of working their way through Fodor’s restaurant recommendations, had eaten here with the Gillespies, after which Mrs. Gillespie said to me, “It is so fabulous, you must get a date to take you there.” I didn’t know whether to feel insulted that Mrs. Gillespie didn’t think I could afford to pay my own way or flattered that she’d think I could find a guy willing to spend that kind of money on me. Now I found myself wondering which guy was going to pick up the tab. I couldn’t see Jonathan and his father splitting the bill.
    As immaculate as she was, Krista looked older in person than in her pictures. She was forty-three, and she looked it—but in a “lived the good life” kind of way: countless mornings spent squinting at tennis and golf balls had left lines around her eyes, while afternoons at the pool had resulted in sun spots on her face and arms. I made a mental note to throw out my 4 SPF sunscreen and stick to the thirty. Krista’s tan hands were flawless, though: long-fingered and perfectly manicured.
    As for Krista’s husband, there were many older husbands with younger wives in Scottsdale. Typically, they had full heads of silver hair, deep tans, toned physiques and self-satisfied, if slightly tired, smiles. But Jack Pomeroy looked like a man who had split his almost-seventy years between fine restaurants and expensive golf courses (where he wouldn’t dream of walking between holes). Jonathan had described his father (whose name was also Jonathan, he informed me, as if I didn’t know) as “a heart attack waiting to happen.” For some reason—the young wife, I suppose—I had taken the description as an indication of a life led too quickly and filled with too much stress. As it turned out, Jack enjoyed his surf and his turf, preferably in large portions and doused with butter. His cheeks were mottled red and littered with sun spots. His navy blazer fit so well that it must have been custom-made to cover his girth. His scalp shone red through his sparse white hair.
    Krista placed one of her delicate hands on Jack’s elbow and said to me, “Is this your first time at Clarke’s? It’s Jack’s absolute favorite place. We eat here at least once a week.”
    I said I had never had the pleasure but that my parents had recommended it. I caught myself and said quietly to Jonathan, “Though of course they haven’t been able to come for several years.”
    Jonathan’s father said, “Let’s do a quick tour of the grounds, then.” I smiled politely at him and his wife, trying not to gawk at their differences. I wondered if his previous three wives had been so attractive. What could all of those women have seen in him? And then it struck me: Jack Pomeroy was loaded.
    “The Golden Palms was originally a private residence,” Krista informed me as we walked under a Moroccan-style arch dripping with flowering vines and out onto a lawn flanked by orange and palm trees, their trunks painted white to protect them from the sun.
    “You’re probably hoping I’ll build you a house like this,” Jack said, squeezing his young wife around the shoulders.
    She threw back her head and let out a musical laugh. “Maybe something a little bigger,” she