Base Pharmacy

She sat up then threw her feet over the side of the bed and let him know she was fine. She was still smiling from ear to ear, and Wyatt noticed.

"Why are you so happy?"

"Well, I was just talking to Dan again, and he's coming over again tonight for dinner. Is that..."

She didn't 'okay' out before Wyatt went crazy. Even when he had to use his inhaler a few seconds later, Charlotte still didn't feel bad because her son was as happy as she was, and she was very, very happy.

"How about we get ready to run to the store so we can buy something to make tonight?" she suggested after Wyatt's lungs cleared.

"Okay, Mom!" he replied and headed straight to his bedroom.

Having never dated an older woman before, Dan wasn't sure what was appropriate so he went to the expert named Google and asked. To his very great surprise the first thing he found was advice to never, ever give flowers on a first date. The writer said it made the man look 'needy' and that it was a huge turnoff for any woman.

Below the article there were comments, and every woman who shared her opinion disagreed with the writer who happened to be a man.

"This guy's too 'woke' for his own good," Dan said as he made up his mind.

He picked up a bottle of chardonnay and a bouquet of tulips, a flower one of the commenters said she received—and loved—on a first date. What he hadn't thought through was carrying both of them to the front door while on crutches. So when he pulled into the driveway, he wasn't quite sure what to do.

"Oh. I got it!" he said as he got out of the car then grabbed his artificial legs.

"Dan!" Wyatt said as he flung open the front door.

"Hey, Dude!"

Dan bent over and hugged his new best friend then said, "Can you do me a huge favor?"

"Sure!"

Just as Charlotte walked up in a dress that took his breath away, Wyatt was outside serving as the delivery boy.

"You're killing me here!" Dan told her when he saw her.

"It's okay?"

"Is it okay. Are you kidding me?" he teased.

"Dan! I got everything!" Wyatt announced as he came back in.

Charlotte saw the flowers and gasped.

"They're for your mom, buddy."

"Here Mom!" Wyatt said as he handed them to her.

"Dan. They're...beautiful! Thank you. Thank you so much!"

"Oh, and this too, Mom," her son said as he held out the bottle of wine.

"Can you bring that into the kitchen for me?" she asked.

Once Wyatt was gone, Dan moved closer and smiled.

"I'm dying to kiss you."

"I'm dying to be kissed," she said with a happy smile.

"You're uh, you're wearing lipstick."

She understood it would be on Dan's lips and that Wyatt would see.

"Hold on."

She set the bouquet down, grabbed a tissue, then looked to make sure Wyatt wasn't watching.

"Okay!"

Dan kissed her softly, and just as he did, someone came out of the kitchen and saw them.

"Mom!"

Charlotte pulled back as though Dan's lips were electrified. In a way, they kind of were, but Wyatt really startled her.

"Oh. Hey...buddy."

"Do you like Dan?" he asked hopefully.

"Is that okay?" his mom asked back.

"Are you kidding? That's...awesome!"

Dan laughed, and so did his date.

"Dan. You wanna play Xbox?" Wyatt asked.

"I do, but can I maybe talk to your mom a little first?"

"Oh. Sure. Yeah, that's fine!"

"But we will play. I promise."

Wyatt zipped off to his room as Charlotte put the flowers in a vase.

"This was so nice of you, Dan."

He told her what he'd read online, and when he did, Charlotte made a face.

"No. I couldn't disagree more."

"The author is a guy."

"Ha! No wonder! He's probably a single guy," Charlotte quipped.

Dan moved closer then behind her, and when he did, he rested his crutches on the counter then put his arms around her waist.

"You look amazing."

"I can't tell you how long I debated about what to wear. I kept telling myself that a dress was...overkill...but I'm glad you like it."

"I do," he said as he nuzzled her neck. "But I like the woman in it even more."

Charlotte put her hands on the counter in front of her then arched her neck back and said, "Mmmm."

"You look good and...you smell good," Dan said as he continued kissing her neck.

"You uh, you should probably stop doing that as in...right now," Charlotte said in a husky voice.

"I will if you'll promise I can finish doing it at a later date."

"I promise," she whispered before turning around and kissing him in a way they hadn't yet kissed.

"Wow. I don't know where that came from," Dan told her as he smiled at her, "but I hope there's more where that came from."

"I have a ton of it saved up, and whenever you finish whatever you were doing to me, I promise you more of that will come out, too."

"Is it too early to tell you you're really 'hot'?" Dan asked as he put his arms around her waist.

"You can say it, but I'm going to need some time to be convinced you mean it," she replied, her insecurity about being so much older rearing its ugly head.

"I can do that. Guaranteed."

The way Dan looked at her made her heart skip a beat. He was SO handsome it almost scared her as she really wondered how he could possibly be interested in her. But the thought of asking him and hearing an answer she didn't want to hear was even scarier so she just smiled, kissed him again, then said, "Can you help me get dinner ready?"

He told her he could, then when he reached for his crutches she felt terrible.

"Dan. I'm so sorry. I...I got so caught up in, you know, that I forgot all about your..."

"Peg leg?"

Out of relief, Charlotte laughed again then asked to go sit down as she went to get Wyatt who was happy to help.

Wyatt wasn't quite as excited about baked chicken as he'd been about pizza even though he thought it tasted great. He even followed the conversation most of the time, and asked Dan a bunch of questions about the Marine Corps.

"Why do you have silver things on your collar but gold wings on your chest?"

"Is the guy with all the stripes higher than you?"

"How can you be higher than him when he has more stripes?"

"Do Marines make a lot of money?"

"Have you killed anyone?"

His mom politely stopped him when he asked that question and let him know that wasn't something to ever ask anyone. She did her best to explain why without making her son feel guilty, and he moved on to video games.

"So tell me about your dad's business," Wyatt asked at one point.

Charlotte spent a few minutes explaining how he started out as a driver back in the mid-1960s and paid off the truck. He got a loan and bought another and then formed an LLC.

"Now he has over three dozen vehicles and drivers plus a staff of three in the office. I do his books and billing."

"Oh. An accountant."

Charlotte laughed and told him, "Self trained. I did take a couple of classes in California, but most of what I know, my dad taught me. The woman who'd been doing the billing got married—to a Marine—and she left for Pensacola where her new husband is going to be an instructor in flight school."

"Okay. Yeah, I have quite a few friends who went there. In fact, they're all still there."

He could tell Charlotte wanted to ask him a question, but she only told him it could wait as she turned things around and asked him to explain what 'ANGLICO' did. She pronounced it 'angle-ko', but Dan didn't laugh. He just pronounced it correctly as he began talking.

He started with the role of naval gunfire back when the Navy had battleships and the need to precisely control where the huge shells landed to avoid killing friendly troops while decimating the enemy. Charlotte was doing her best to follow along, but there was just too much to explain in too short a time. Even the basic job description was a confusing mess.

"ANGLICO provides commanders a liaison to control fires in support of joint, allied, and coalition forces," he said before stopping.

"We talk on the radio," Dan said as a simple way to sum it all up.

"I...I feel so..."

"Mom! You're not supposed to say that word!" Wyatt told her, knowing she was about to say 'stupid'.

"Good thing you remembered then, huh?" she told him with a smile.

"Your mom is very smart," Dan told him.

He looked at Charlotte then added, "And very beautiful."

"I know," Wyatt said with a slightly embarrassed look as he smiled at his very pretty mother.

"Ah! Both of you are so nice!"

"That's 'cuz we love you!" Wyatt told her.

Charlotte's eyes got wide as she looked over at Dan who was smiling as he put his hands up.

"Hey. What he said."

Dan pointed at Wyatt who thought he was in trouble.

"No. I was agreeing with you," Dan told him.

"Oh. Okay. Mom? Can I have dessert?" the happy boy asked, and that caused both of the adults laugh which made Wyatt cross his arms to indicate he didn't like being laughed at, even though he was having a great time. He could also tell no one was being mean, and he was enjoying being the center of attention.

"I suppose you could have have a couple of Oreos with some milk," his mom said.

"Can I have five?"

"How about three?"

"Four?" Wyatt asked knowing he'd win.

"Okay. Four," his mom said as she looked at Dan for support.

"He's thin as a rail," Dan told her as though he had no choice but to tell the truth.

Wyatt was already into the bag and getting his ration of cookies while his mom gave Dan a 'thanks a lot' look before smiling at him.

When Wyatt sat back down with the cookies and milk his mom said, "If you're going to slurp them, how about slurping them in your room?"

Wyatt had that same sheepish look on his face when Dan came to his rescue again.

"What other way is there to eat Oreos?"

Charlotte's jaw dropped in an exaggerated manner as she shook her head in mostly mock disbelief.

"What can I say? I'm all boy, too."

Charlotte started to say something, but Dan held up a finger.

"Don't you dare say a word about the 'boy' part, okay?"

She had no intention of saying anything like that, but she understood what he meant immediately and said, "Who, me?"

"What are you guys talking about?" Wyatt asked as he pulled an Oreo out of the milk then slurped it until the cookie collapsed in his mouth.

"Someone's insecurities," his mother replied.

"What does that mean?" Wyatt asked.

"It means your mom doesn't know how beautiful she is," Dan said to Wyatt as he looked his mom.

The boy was already soaking another black and white cookie and didn't really care. When he slurped it, his mother cringed but Dan laughed. When he did, Wyatt laughed, too, exposing a mouth full of soggy cookie that was also stuck to his teeth.

Charlotte gave Dan another, "What am I supposed to do?" look when he said, "Hey. All boy, right?"

For the first time in years she really thought about what it would be like to have a man in her life who loved her son and who could serve as a role model. She'd thought it about in some generic sense many times, but she hadn't ever really imagined what it might look like day to day or in any specific circumstance until right then.

But as she saw Dan, who was male in every sense of the word, and her son, who was growing up so fast, she understood that they would share a bond she never could. Having been the only adult in Wyatt's life all day, every day since her late husband left for Afghanistan, she felt a pang of jealousy at having to share him. But the pang was replaced by her awareness that boys needed men to guide them and to bond with. That meant doing guy things like sports and being aggressive and maybe even slurping their food or even, as much as she hated to admit it...farting and belching.

All those thoughts ran through her mind in the space of a few seconds, and in the end, it made her smile.

"So do I have to go to my room?" Wyatt asked after swallowing the rest of cookie #2.

"No. I don't mind a little slurping," she told him, grateful to have such a good, decent boy as her son, and for having Dan there with her, too.

Once the table was clear, the dishwasher loaded and running, and Wyatt's black teeth turned pearly white again, he wanted to play video games again.

"How about something similar but not involving Xbox?" Dan suggested.

"Like what?" Wyatt wanted to know.

"If you'll go get my iPad, maybe we can all do something together."

"Okay!"

Dan asked Charlotte to sit on his left and Wyatt to sit on his right as he opened the game he'd let Wyatt play at the base pharmacy.

"Let's see if we can figure out the clues together," Dan suggested.

Wyatt was ready and willing, but Charlotte said, "I'm terrible at this kind of thing."

"Have you ever tried it?" Dan asked as he turned to look at her.

When their eyes met from just inches away, Charlotte got a warm bath of emotion that spread over her entire body.

"No. I can't say I have, but if I can stay right here, I'd be happy to try," she told him quietly as she ran the fingers of her hand along his forearm.

"I'd like that," Dan replied just as quietly. He formed a kiss with his lips, and when he did, Charlotte smiled then laid her head on his shoulder and waited for him to explain what to do.

"Oh! I see it!" Wyatt said before his mom could even tell what was going on.

He found a key to open a box, and when Dan clicked on it, the box opened.

"That's amazing!" his mom said as she looked around Dan.

"It's easy, Mom! You try."

Charlotte stared at the screen but couldn't see what to do next.

"How about we look over here?" Dan suggested as he touched the screen which moved them closer to a corner.

"How about this silver thing?" she asked as she pointed to it.

Dan clicked on it and when he did, it rose up and she could see a hole in it.

"Oh! If we get this little stick thingy over here, I bet it'll go in that hole!" she said as she started getting excited.

It fit, and Wyatt said, "Way to go, Mom!"

"Thank you, honey!"

Dan looked at her then said, "Yeah. Way to go...Mom."

She slid her arm through his and held it tight as they continued playing. At one point she put her left arm on top of Dan's forearm and ran it along it as they played. Wyatt never noticed, but Dan did, and he needed to adjust the iPad to conceal a...growing problem...just underneath it.

Nine o'clock came so quickly that all three of them were surprised as the grownups said goodnight to Wyatt.

When Charlotte came out of her son's bedroom to sit with Dan, she snuggled up even closer than she had while playing The Room.

"I realized something tonight," she told him.

"What's that?" Dan quietly asked.

"I said I wanted to go really slow, but I..."

She looked up at him then said, "I don't feel that way anymore."

"Yeah?" a surprised and happy Dan Knight replied.

"I can't explain it, but I...I have this...feeling."

"What kind of feeling?" Dan asked as he used the back of his fingers to gently touch her cheek.

"I...I feel like...like I can trust you."

"You can," Dan assured her.

"When I was a little girl I used to believe in love at first sight. But as I got older I became more practical and felt like I needed to know someone for at least six months before I could have any, you know, romantic feelings for them."

"And?"

"Well, maybe it's just my emotions or not having had a man in my life for so long, but..."

"Uh-huh?"

"Please don't laugh, okay?" Charlotte asked in a way that said she was feeling vulnerable.

"I won't."

"I feel like meeting you was...I don't know. Maybe...destiny? Or fate?"

"I called home and talked to my dad, who's the smartest man on earth, and I told him I'd met a woman who pretty much turned my whole world upside down. He wanted to know how long I'd known her, and when I told him, he laughed."

"Oh," Charlotte said, feel deflated and foolish.

"No. He didn't think it was a bad thing. He laughed because that's how he felt about my mom the first time he met her."

"Oh," Charlotte replied in a completely different tone of voice, now feeling much better and even hopeful.

"He told me, 'I just knew. I don't know how I knew, I only knew that I did'."

"And?"

"Well, they went out a couple of times, and my dad said he told her he thought he was already falling in love with her."

"What did your mom say to that?"

Dan laughed then answered her question.

"She said, 'Gee, what took you so long'?"

Charlotte gasped, sat up, then asked, "Did she really say that?"

Dan smiled then said, "Well, I uh, I wasn't actually there, but my dad swears it's the truth."

"But your parents aren't like us, right? In terms of age?"

"My dad is three years older than my mom, so no. But don't you think that when you know, you just know?"

Dan was staring into her eyes, and Charlotte had this crushing sense of needing to tell him she loved him. She didn't because her rational mind won out, but it was all she could do not to speak those three little words. Rather than say them she only told Dan she agreed.

Dan turned his hand around and placed it on her cheek then quietly said, "And...I just know."

Charlotte's eyes were darting with his so fast it would have been humorous had the mood not been so serious.

"I do, too, Dan," she whispered before raising up to press her lips against his.

They kissed for several minutes, and Charlotte knew they had to stop, because in spite of her 'knowing' she knew she wasn't ready to sleep with him yet. Dan also knew that, and he was the one who suggested they stop while they still could.

They talked until midnight, neither of them moving as Charlotte nestled in close, Dan's arm around her, feeling like she was safer and happier than she'd ever been.

"You have to work tomorrow, don't you?" he said when Charlotte mentioned it was already twelve o'clock.

"I do."

"You need to get some sleep."

"Hey! Are you saying that because I'm so old?" she teased as she looked up at him.

Dan laughed then kissed her and ignored her question.

"No. However...I do know, though," he told her.

Charlotte smiled then told him she was very happy that he did before reminding him that she did, too. She then walked him to the front door where he thanked her for dinner and another wonderful time, and she told him the pleasure was all hers.

"Charlotte?" he said as he held her just before saying goodnight.

"Yes?"

"I'd like to see you as often as you'll let me."

She smiled then said, "I'll let you as often as you like."

"Yeah?"

"Uh-huh. Anytime."

"Promise?"

"Cross my heart."

Dan looked at her for several seconds then said, "I love you, Charlotte."

Had they not talked about love at first sight or Dan's father and mother, she'd have recoiled in fear. But that talk, which really began because of her comments, had set the stage for those very unexpected words.

"I love you, too, Dan," she whispered back as he pulled her close and kissed her one more time.

"See you tomorrow?"

"Yes. Please."

When Dan walked out, Charlotte stood there with her back against the door as her body trembled and her mind swirled with emotions that came crashing down on her all at once. There were too many to number, but out of all of them the one that stood out the most was a feeling of gratitude.

She had no idea whom to thank, or if anyone was even to be thanked. Perhaps it was nothing more than fate itself. Maybe it was that she was so ready, willing, and able to fall in love again that made this happen, but had Dan not felt the same way, she knew she wouldn't be feeling anything even close to this.

And yet she was, and as she heard his car pull away, tears of joy welled up in her eyes as she realized she was once again in love. The man she loved made no sense 'on paper', but love wasn't an equation. It was a thing of the heart, and Charlotte's was telling her this was as real as anything she'd ever experienced.