"I also said I was hoping we could go together next week."
"Yes, but that doesn't answer the question."
"Do you realize," asked Jesse when they were out on the street, "that you and I will be sort of partners?"
"Yes," she answered calmly.
A soft breeze brushed Kathy's hair and refreshed her forehead. She inhaled. Jesse noticed she looked a little pale. He remembered how Mrs. Sloan had described her: sensitive, fragile, too honest for her own good.
"Are you feeling well?" he asked.
"I have a slight headache."
He tenderly lifted her chin with two fingers.
"Not so slight, I think."
"It's getting worse by the minute," she admitted.
"This is what we'll do. We will walk back to your house and you'll be free from me for the rest of the day. I'll call you again tomorrow and we will decide what to do. All right?"
She agreed. Twenty minutes later she was lying on the sofa after taking an aspirin and commenting the encounter with her parents, who, like her, didn't know what to think of the matter.
Her sisters had come to visit while she was out, but they couldn't wait for her to come back. They would see her some other day.