Page 16 of The Space Between

Either way, she's going to have to reckon with the fallout of using her life as fodder for this story, and on the off-chance that Bill ever finds out what she's writing, she's going to need to come up with a damn good excuse for putting their lives on display.

The next day, Jo receives a manila envelope in her mailbox. She slides the flap open and pulls out a letter from the publishers ofTrue Romancemagazine asking her to commit to finishing the story of Winston and Maxine with installments that will run monthly. Along with the request on company letterhead is another, unsealed envelope. Jo pulls out a letter--it's fan mail. Her very first piece of fan mail, addressed to Josephine White, which is both her pen name and her maiden name.

Mrs. White--

Your stories have been thrilling me these last couple of months! The romance between Maxine and Winston is tangible, and how exciting it must be for her to be married to an astronaut--I can't even imagine!

Please keep writing this wonderful story, and I do hope that at some point I'll find a book in my library by Mrs. Josephine White!

Sincerely,

Mrs. Ingrid Nelson

Wichita, Kansas

Jo reads it and re-reads it, doing a little dance as she does and savoring the moment. It's not every day that a person gets actual fan mail, and it's a feeling she never wants to forget.

Jo takes it back to her bedroom and tucks the letter into an empty shoe box at the top of her closet, pushing the box back into place gently and then letting her hand linger on it.

Ten dollars per story might not be anything worth writing home about, but getting a letter from a fan? That’s priceless.

CHAPTER 6

Bill

Bill,who rarely smokes cigars, is standing at the round barbecue grill on his back patio in a pair of plaid shorts and a white t-shirt with a fat brown cigar wedged between his lips. He’s wearing aviator sunglasses and flip-flops.

“Hey, champ,” Bill says to Jimmy. “Can you grab me the bag of charcoal briquettes from the garage, please?”

Jimmy puts down the catcher’s mitt that he’s been oiling, leaving it on a chair by the pool to run the errand for his dad.

“Everyone should be here around six,” Jo says, coming through the sliding patio door in a halter top that ties behind her neck. She’s wearing shorts as well, but they’re knee length and look more like culottes. “I told Frankie to bring cold pasta salad, Barbie is bringing dessert, Carrie is bringing a veggie platter, and Jude?—“

“Is bringing the booze?” Bill jokes, taking the cigar from between his lips and smirking.

“William Booker!” Jo hisses, swatting him on the arm.

Bill has heard all about Jo’s concerns for Jude and her drinking, and while he doesn’t think it’s funny that she fell into her swimming pool and ended up in the hospital after drinkingtoo much one day, he has been known to make light of pretty much anything in a moment when it’s just the two of them.

“Okay, okay,” Bill acquiesces. “Tell me what she’s really bringing.”

Jo pouts. “No. Now you have to wait and see.”

At this, Bill laughs and jams the cigar back into his mouth. He nods and closes the lid of the barbecue.

“What time did you tell Jeanie to come by?” Jo asks. She, too, is wearing sunglasses, and this allows them both to talk without being able to see one another’s eyes. “And is she bringing something?”

“Don’t you ladies always bring something to a potluck?” Bill asks, sitting in a pool chair and stretching his legs out as he turns his face to the late afternoon sun. He crosses his feet at the ankles. It’s the Fourth of July, Bill’s favorite holiday, and he’s not going to let anything ruffle his feathers today.

“Generally,” Jo says with a frown that creases her smooth forehead like the faintest fold in a piece of otherwise perfect tissue paper. “But I want to make sure that we don’t have too much of one thing and not enough of another.”

Bill puffs on his cigar. “Well, the stores are closed, so I guess we’ll have to make do, won’t we?”

Jo unfurls a red-and-white checkered tablecloth on top of one of the wooden table-and-bench combos that sit on the lawn. “I suppose so,” Jo says tersely.

Bill is watching her from behind his dark sunglasses. His wife is a bit of a mystery sometimes, but then, aren’t all women? It’s been a few months since Jo met Jeanie at Frankie Maxwell’s house, and he was certain she’d all but forgotten about inviting Jeanie for dinner when, out of the blue, she’d told Bill to ask Jeanie over for cheeseburgers and fireworks. She’d even remembered that Jeanie has a roommate and had extended the invite to her as well.

“Where do you want them, Dad?” Jimmy asks, hauling a heavy bag of briquettes.

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