“What are you trying to tell me?”

“That I’m going to take my medicine.” She kissed him again. “I love you. I hated last night after you’d gone home. I didn’t sleep. It was so lonely. Today would never come.”

“Don’t think about that. You’re the lady of the house now.”

She hugged him. “You’ll be happy, you’ll see.”

When they returned to the city they had another two weeks before he started at the Academy. She went back to her old jobs and he finished at the hospital. When his first department check came she began to look for full-time work in earnest. For a while she had bad luck and it got her down. There were jobs on assembly lines paying nearly twice as much as she was offered by offices and the department stores. One evening he found her in tears. He was helpless. What she felt was more than a desire to have a job she could be proud of. His salary would remain under fifty dollars a week for the next two years and she was sure that this was the one period in their lives when they would have the chance to get ahead. There was nothing he could do; his classes ran from nine to six and he could not even have his lunch outside. The assignments in the Department came on the basis of grades, and he didn’t want to spend the next four years in Northport or Bay Slope. These things made her feel worse. She could not help him, and after she had gone through the newspapers, there was nothing for her to do but prepare herself for the morning.

He would awaken her gently. Their lovemaking had a fulfilling harmony that impatience could be no match for. Sometimes he would awaken her again later, excited, and he would put his arms around her. If she awakened enough she would try to help, but mostly she slept too soundly. He would caress her until she pushed herself against him suddenly and tried to kiss him. Sometimes she moved to make him kiss her breasts. Once she asked if he wished there was milk in her, and when he said no, she said she did. He did not fully understand that. For her part, she could not understand his fascination with her bottom. Neither could he. But he had it, and at times he could make her jealous of herself.

She found a job: at the Port Smith Hotel, as assistant to the banquet coordinator. It was interesting work and the salary promised to pass his within a year. She would have to attend many of the dinners, working late in the evenings, but he wanted her to give it a try. Remembering the impressions she had made on him when he had met her, he thought that she could make a success of it. If it led to important contacts for her, all the better.