Playing by the Rules: A Novel Read Online Free Page A

sentences, and this had made him quiet lately, soquiet that he hadn’t been himself. One woman he wouldn’t know if she dropped out of the sky and landed at his feet; the other he knew all too well, and he was aware that she was beginning to think there was something not right between them. Even though he had been distant lately, the last thing he wanted was to send Louise the wrong message. Tomorrow he decided he would tell her what was on his mind, so she wouldn’t think he was losing interest, or worse, seeing another woman. Tomorrow he’d tell her about the search for his mother and how he felt it was important to uncover the truth before he could ask for her hand in marriage so they could start their own family. Despite the fact he had only been dating Louise seriously for the past six weeks, he had known all along that she was the one for him. And now that he was on a serious, life-changing mission, he hoped the love of his life would understand. Certain the ad that he’d placed in today’s Lemon City Chronicle would generate responses from the public about his birth mother, Medford was optimistic he’d get results fairly soon.
    The wool turtleneck sweater he was wearing irritated his skin, making him itch. He slid his finger alongside his neck to scratch and realized he was rubbing his kidney-bean-shaped birthmark. It was the only place on his body that was a souvenir from his birth. It also happened to be the same spot on his body that was sensitive to Louise’s touch. He always saw the irony in his birthmark, which he considered to be the one thing the two most important women in his life had in common because it was the point of intersection, like lines on a road map, the place where they connected, but would never meet.
    In contrast to uncovering the mystery of his mother, Medford didn’t feel the same passion to find his biological father. As Clement’s adopted son ever since he could remember, there was no mistaking the man who’d saved his life and raised him like his own. Medford doubted his birth father could have done a betterjob than Clement. It was finding his mother that became a priority and the older he got, the more he was being consumed by curiosity. It haunted him to have no knowledge about the woman who had abandoned him forty-four years ago on Clement’s porch. With every passing day, it became more and more an obsession.
    Medford glanced at Clement. There was a thin white cloud swirling around his derby hat from the cherry pipe tobacco he was smoking. Clement had as many hats in his closet as a millinery, or at least as many hats as some women have shoes. His everyday hat was a porkpie, but he had an assortment of other headwear that included Panama hats, buckets, and fedoras. The way Medford saw it, Clement wasn’t deliberately stylish. He was as bald as a rock on top of his head, with hair that clung like moss to the sides, giving his hairline a horseshoe kind of shape. The hats he wore were intended to cover his vanity and as Clement would be the first to say, his “head-toppings” also made him more appealing to the ladies, like sprinkles across a scoop of ice cream.
    Taking a puff off his pipe, savoring the smell of his cherry tobacco, Clement blew smoke out of the crack of the opened window.
    “I been noticing that you and that gal been seein’ a lot of each other lately,” he said, clenching his pipe between his teeth. “Seem like she’s been enjoyin’ herself being with you too.” He waited for his son to add on to the conversation, but Medford continued driving as if he were alone in the car. “I know you been waitin’ a long time for her to come ‘round, had your eye on her since she was young…how old’s she now? Twenty-six or so? If you ask me, that’s just ripe for marryin’.”
    “Yes,” agreed Medford, wincing at the age difference between him and Louise. “But please don’t make me sound like I’m robbing the cradle.”
    “I don’t mean it like