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FROM THE HEART by By Kitty Bucholtz

Not too many Valentine’s Days ago, John and I were broke and in love. No, we weren’t in college – in fact, we’d been married about ten years already. But we were still lovey-duvvy enough to want to go out and celebrate. Since Valentine’s Day fell on a Saturday that year, John came up with a great idea: we’d go to the dollar theater for a double feature!

I love movies! Any kind of movie – action, drama, romantic comedy, you name it. So I didn’t care what was playing. We just needed two films that could be watched more or less back to back. Sounded like a lovely way to spend a Saturday.

Except that I’d forgotten one little detail. John loves movies, too – but only some movies. He loves movies with lots of action and fighting. (I was so embarrassed when he laughed out loud during the heads-being–off battle scenes when we saw Braveheart opening weekend!) The only way he’s going to see a chick flick is if it’s a guy’s dream come true (movie star chases regular guy in Notting Hill) or if there’s an actor he really likes in it (Kevin Smith in Catch and Release this past weekend – which, by the way, I’m going to consider my Valentine’s Day date this year; you’ll see why soon).

We drove to the theater and stood there reading all the show times. It wasn’t a great line-up for Valentine’s Day, but hey, it’s the dollar theater.

“Hey, we could see Aliens 3, go have lunch, then come back and see The Replacement Killers,” John exclaimed with delight. (Reading over my shoulder, he says he did not exclaim with delight. Only women exclaim with delight. Trust me, he was excited.)

So I’m standing there thinking, it’s Valentine’s Day, the day you show the one you love that they’re the number one person in your life. And I love movies.

“Sure, why not?” I said with forced delight.

Two hours later, we took a break and walked over to Burger King for lunch. (Yes, Burger King.) “What’d you think?” John asked.

What I was thinking is that Sigourney Weaver was bald and saying the f-word on the most romantic day of the year. “Not as good as Aliens,” I said.

We walked back over for the next part of our date. I have to admit, I was kind of dreading the next movie. Maybe the people will have some redeeming qualities in the end, I thought, trying to be optimistic.

Um, well, kind of.

At the end of the movie, as we walked out to our car, John said, “Happy Valentine’s Day, sweetie.”

I just looked up and him and shook my head. “What part of this day had anything to do with Valentine’s Day?” I asked with a half-laugh.

“Well,” John began. “Sigourney Weaver loves her family and friends so she protected them from aliens. And in the other movie,” he paused to think. “There was a lot of blood and blood is red, so there you go!”

I heard someone snicker behind us. John flashed his fabulous grin at me. I couldn’t help it. I caved and started to laugh as he gave me a huge hug and kissed the top of my head.

I’m sure I’ve had some pretty sad Valentine’s Days in the past, but only with people I didn’t love like I love John. The fact is, when you love someone, you can choose to enjoy anything if you’re together.

Still, with Valentine’s Day just around the corner, I took some precautions this year. I bought the Trojan Pleasure Pack today. Regardless of what movie we see or whatever else we may do, I know the day will at least end well!

Kitty Bucholtz is an OCC RWA member, a 16-year veteran of the marriage wars, and currently writing a chick lit novel about a married woman who discovers she has a super power.

What A Man Wants by Dana Diamond

“Okay boys,” my professor addressed our stadium seating Human Sexuality 101 class, “What is romance?”

Like the first kernels of Jiffy Pop, one by one the boys slowly popped out with, “Naked.” “Warm.” “Being close.” “Being together.”

“Yes! Naked, warm, and being together,” my teacher repeated, smiling because they’d played right into her hands. “Okay, now girls. What is romance to you?”

Like the boys, we were slow to warm, “Chocolate.” “Candlelight.” “Flowers.”

“Yes!” my professor exclaimed with the same orgasmic enthusiasm as Meg Ryan in When Harry Met Sally…

“You see the problem here?” she asked. “We are different. We see romance differently.”

She went on with another of her legendary funny-yet-informative lectures, but I don’t remember it. Great as she was what I remember most of her class was what I learned in that one “ding-ding-ding” moment.

Maybe because it was reinforced later that week…

See, me and my then-boyfriend/now-husband were celebrating our first Valentine’s Day. And he wanted it perfect because he knew how sentimental I was.

And though he doesn’t like Italian food, he even ordered in from a fancy Italian restaurant because that was neutral ground for a vegetarian like me and a heathen, I mean, carnivore like him.

Long story short, it didn’t go well.

That lovely Italian place he ordered from just for me? They took over two hours to get us our food. Cranky and hungry, it was all we could do to not bite each other’s heads off, much less get all lovey dovey and sentimental.

When the food and wine came, we were thinking, “Great. It can only go up from here.”

Nope.

Now, I’m not a big wine-o and I was ravenous so it took me a couple bites before it hit me that my eggplant parmesan wasn’t…right.

Did I mention I was pretty hardcore vegetarian at the time?

So I took another bite, chewing carefully. “Uh, I think this is veal parmesan.” (I might’ve dry-heaved around here.)

“Nuh-uh,” he said in total disbelief. “Here, let me try,” he speared a bite. Swallowing, his face fell.

“It’s okay. I’ll eat around it.”

He rolled his eyes, “You can’t eat around that.”

“Sure I can.”

But it was nothin’ doin’. We switched plates so I could at least pick the pasta out of his shrimp dish.

He was so bummed. “I just wanted to make this special for you.”

“But you don’t have to. What makes tonight special is us being together.”

Being together.

Hmm…where had I heard that before? Oh yeah! The Romance lecture!

“You know what would make tonight really special?” I asked.

“No,” he says, eyes on the floor, the picture of disappointment.

I took my top off.

That got his attention.

“Tonight’s special because we’re together. The other stuff doesn’t matter.”

And it didn’t.

Wait! Do you hear that?

That was our door slamming.

Let’s just say, I got my romance…and he got his.

Dana Diamond is Co-Media Director for OCC/RWA, a contributor to OCC’s e-zine A Slice Of Orange, and hard at work on her next book. For past interviews visit the Orange Blossom section of OCC’s award-winning website.