She eyes me curiously. “Passionate?”
I shrug. “I don’t know how else to put it.”
“Was he…big?”
I snicker. “Yes.”
“Good with his hands?”
“God yes.”
“And his mouth?”
I blush, stupidly; my fingers have, somehow, drifted up to brush my lips as if to relive where his had been, and I immediately snatch them away and tangle them on my lap. “Well, he’s an amazing kisser, I’ll tell you that much.”
“Did he kiss both sets of lips?”
“Cora!” I say, whacking her across the arm. “Nasty!”
“It’s not nasty, it’s hot, and you know you like it. You told me Daniel did it once and you really enjoyed it but you never got him to do it again, and you were always pissed about that.”
“Yeah, and if he had, I’d have been more likely to…you know…to him. But he didn’t, so I didn’t.”
“Because he was a selfish asshole.”
“That too.”
“What about this guy—what was his name? Jamie?”
“Yeah, Jamie. And no, he wasn’t selfish, not at all. And no, we didn’t do…that. Either direction. We just…it was…it happened so fast, you know? Not that it happened fast…I mean, once we got to his house and started kissing, that was it. There was no stopping it.”
“Wow.”
“We woke up in the middle of the night…or maybe closer to dawn, I don’t know what time it was. And we did it again.”
“Sober?” Cora asks, eyebrows lifted.
“Yeah. Or, mostly. We were both kind of half asleep, but it was…in a way, it was almost hotter than the first time.”
“That’s a little weird, to be honest.”
“What is? That it was better the second time?”
“No, that there was a second time way after the fact. Most of the one-night stands I’ve ever had, and there have been…a few…it was like, you have sex half drunk and you keep at it until the buzz wears off, and then one of you leaves, or you pass out and one of you sneaks out. You don’t wake up halfway through the night, sober, and have, like, intimate sex. That’s weird.” She shrugs. “But more power to you, if it worked for you.”
“It was amazing.” I frown. “But now that you call it into question, it was kind of…intimate.”
“Which is why I’m saying you should’ve stuck around. Maybe it could’ve become something. God knows you need someone to help you get over Daniel’s stupid ass.”
I sigh. “I’m as over him as I can get. We haven’t heard from him in over a year, and the last time we did hear from him it was a generic birthday card for Aiden with a twenty-dollar bill inside, and he’d signed it ‘Dan.’” I shake my head. “He never went by Dan, it was always Daniel. And who signs a birthday card for their own child with their first name?” Cora’s eyes narrow, and I realize I’m getting worked up. “I’m over him. As in, I’m over our relationship. I’m not in love with him, I don’t miss him, and I hope I never see him again, but that is just for myself. I’m mad for Aiden, and that’s different. Aiden deserves a father. Our personal problems shouldn’t mean Aiden doesn’t have his dad. I’ve never said a bad thing to Aiden about Daniel and I never will, and if Daniel comes back and indicates he wants to be a part of Aiden’s life, I’d let him. I’d have an anxiety stomachache the entire time, but I’d do it for Aiden.”
Cora’s smile is gentle. “I know, babe. I know you would.” She sighs, and then smiles more brightly. “I’m glad you had last night, at least, though.”
I laugh. “Me too.”
“So. What are we doing today?”
“Back-to-school shopping,” I tell her, glad and sort of sad at the same time to be moving on from the topic of Jamie and our one, magical night together. “Aiden still needs a new pair of gym shoes, a few more folders, and like, eight million glue sticks.”
“So…we’re making the drive out to Walmart, then?”
I sigh. “As much as I don’t want to, yeah.”
She shrugs. “Fine by me. I want to browse their book section anyway. My little library is a bit sparse.”
“Didn’t you spend something like a hundred dollars on books for your classroom library last year?”
She rolls her eyes. “Don’t get me started. Kids borrow them and don’t return them.”
“So make a sign-out system. Like, hold their grade hostage until they give the book back.”
Cora just sighs and waves a hand. “I could, and I threaten to do just that every year, but the kids who don’t return the books are the ones that probably don’t have any books of their own at home, and I just sort of conveniently forget. Every kid deserves to have books at home.”
“You’re too good for your own good.”
She widens her eyes and whispers conspiratorially. “DON’T LET MY SECRET OUT!”
I just roll my eyes, laughing. “It’s not a secret to anyone who knows you, Cora.”
“I do have a certain reputation around town, Elyse.”
“That’s just a holdover from high school.”
“I did sleep with Ellen Baldwin’s husband senior year.”
I snicker. “That was the talk of the town for years. I still can’t believe you went through with it.”
“He was a DILF! Or, not a dad, just a hot older guy.” She shrugs. “Ellen and Cooper were basically divorced by then anyway. It’s not like they were happily married. They weren’t even living together—and hadn’t been for almost a year. So I like to think I slept with Ellen Baldwin’s ex-husband, except for a minor technicality.”
I just laugh. “Yeah, minor technicalities like actual signed divorce papers. No big deal.”
“She was just mad because Cooper told everyone I gave better head than she did.”
“CORA KATHERINE PEARSON!”
She grins salaciously. “Which is true. I do give amazing head.”
“CORA!”
She rolls her eyes at me. “Oh stop being such a prude, Elyse. Sex is normal. Everyone has sex.” She frowns. “Except for Pa Chantry, I think.”
I laugh. “Actually, I heard from Margie Nelson that Pa Chantry and Dot Wannamaker get it on. In his barn. A lot.”
Cora shakes her hands, making gagging sounds. “Oh my god, oh my god, eeew. Why would you tell me that?”
I laugh harder. “Because sex is normal, and everyone has sex.”
She glares at me. “Exactly! So why are you such a prude about me discussing my exceptional fellatio skills?”
I just sigh and shake my head. “Because I’m just more conservative about it than you, I guess.”
“Which is because you’ve basically only ever had boring married people sex with boring Daniel Thomas. You never really got a chance to be wild and do crazy stuff. I know that much for a fact, because you told me that you and Daniel almost never had sex in any position except missionary.”
I sigh again. “Can we not go back into my erstwhile sex life with my ex-husband? Please?”
“Fine. Which positions did you and Jamie do it in?”
I bite my lip, grinning. “Missionary, the first time. The second time, on our sides facing each other.”
She frowns at me. “Super weird, Elyse. You and Jamie had sex, sober, half-asleep, on your sides facing each other?”
I frown back. “Yeah, why? It was incredible.”
“That’s the most intimate and personal way you could possibly have sex, Elyse, you do realize that, right?”
I shrug. “I mean, I guess. It just happened. I woke up, he was, ahem, right there, if you know what I mean. And I just…I needed him, and it just happened.”
She’s still frowning, shaking her head. “I’m telling you, Elyse—that’s not normal. You should have left him your number. Or better yet, had breakfast with him.”
I just shake my head back at her. “No. I told you—I can’t afford to get involved with anyone right now. Aiden and I have things worked out. We’re good. I’m good.
”
Cora sighs. “Whatever. You’re a big girl; you can make your own decisions. But just let it be known for the record that I think there could have been something better than a one-night stand in it for you.”
“Duly noted. The committee will take your comments under advisement.” I glance at my phone. “Time to get Aiden from my parents’ and go to Walmart.”
“Are we getting more Legos?” Cora asks.
I laugh. “You know he’ll beg, and you know I’ll give in.”
“Yay! We need a new set.”
“You guys built the last one in, like, an hour!”
Cora loves building Lego sets with Aiden—it’s part of their thing. She just grins at me. “It was too easy. We need a challenge.”
“Yeah, I know. He’s been wheedling me for a Technic set for months.”
“OOH! YES! I’ve wanted to do one of those for years!”
I shake my head at her. “Then you can pay for it. Those sets are crazy expensive.”
“Deal.”
We tidy up the house, and then get in my secondhand, eight-year-old Ford Focus to pick up Aiden. We spend a few minutes with my parents, chatting, and then start the drive to Walmart. It’s easy to get wrapped up in the comfortable, familiar patter between Cora and Aiden. It’s easier yet to get caught up in back-to-school shopping, getting my office at the high school ready, going over files from last year, and making notes to check in with this student or that one, helping the other counselors finalize schedules, and work out scheduling conflicts, and attending staff meetings.
Jamie slips slowly from my mind over the week that precedes the start of the school year. I let myself think about that night sometimes when I’m alone, and if I need a little…stress relief, but that’s a dangerously slippery slope, and I start to avoid even that. Best to just let the past be in the past—focus on Aiden, on the new school year, and on my students.
By the time the first day of school rolls around, I’ve all but put Jamie out of my mind.
And that’s for the best.
6
“AIDEN!” I shout, for the seventh time in five minutes. “LET’S GO!”
Of course, my son chooses today, the first day of school, to be the slowest, pokiest, slowpoke on the planet. Usually, he’s up and at ’em by six thirty or seven regardless of what time he went to bed, but today? Oh no. Today, he slept in. And I, not wanting to wake him until necessary, let him sleep. Figuring we’d make up the time by hustling a little bit. Only, he’s foiling those plans by doing everything as slowly as possible. He ate his eggs at a sloth’s pace. Hung around over his toast for ten minutes. Took another five minutes to drink his juice; all the while, I’m running around like a chicken with my head cut off, trying to get myself ready, get all his stuff ready, and eat my own breakfast while scurrying this way and that, forgetting things.
And then—AND THEN…as we’re heading out the door, already running five minutes behind schedule, he says he has to go to the bathroom.
And stays in there for FIVE MINUTES.
“Aiden Daniel Thomas, what in the world are you doing in there?”
“I’m poopin’, Mama. I’m almost done.”
I facepalm myself. “Now? You had to go now?”
“When you gotta go, you gotta go. That’s what Papa always says.”
“Yeah, and buddy, we have GOT to go! You are going to be late for school!”
“So? It’s the first day. It’s not like we’re gonna actually do anything important.”
“That’s not the point. You can’t be late the first day of third grade.”
“Okay, okay, keep your pants on. I’m coming.”
I hear him wash his hands, flush the toilet, and then he comes out, still wrestling with the zipper, which is stuck at the bottom.
I glare at him when he stops messing with the zipper and glances up at me. “Do not tell your mother to keep her pants on, Aiden. It’s disrespectful.” I sigh. “Let me guess, Papa says that to Grandma?”
He shrugs, not willing to rat out his Papa. “I plead the second.”
I laugh. “You mean, you plead the fifth. The second amendment is gun rights, buddy.”
“Oh. Whatever,” he says, still trying to get the zipper to work. “The fifth, then.”
“And that just means you’re not willing to say anything which might incriminate you. It’s basically admitting guilt.”
He sighs and gestures in frustration at his zipper. “Can you help, please? It’s stuck.”
I fix his zipper and then hand him his backpack, which is stuffed to overflowing with the mind-boggling amount of folders, glue sticks, crayons, Kleenex, more glue sticks, colored pencils, markers, more glue sticks, a pencil box, a binder, packets of colored construction paper, and did I mention glue sticks?
“Are you finally ready, now?” I ask him.
“Yep.”
“Are you sure? You’re not missing something? Like, say, oh…I don’t know, your shoes?”
He glances down and wiggles his toes, which are clad in socks, but not shoes. “Oh. Oops.”
I hand him his shoes. “Put them on in the car, champ. We have to go. You’re going to miss the first bell at this rate.”
“Okay, Mama.”
I ruffle his hair as we leave the house. “Good thing you’re cute, Aiden.”
He just gives me a saucy grin as he climbs into his booster and buckles up. “Grandma always says I’m gonna end up catching me a world of trouble with this grin of mine.”
I sigh. “And they encourage it.”
“Yep, they do.”
“Okay,” I say, preparing to back out. “You have your shoes?”
“Yep.”
“And you’re putting them on and tying them tightly?”
“Yep.”
“You have your backpack?”
“The thing weighs at least a billion pounds, so I don’t think I could forget it.”
“Yeah, well, once you give Mrs. Crenshaw your supplies, it’ll be empty again except for a folder or two.”
I glance at him in the rearview mirror as we head for the school complex—a large plot a few miles north of downtown Clayton; the complex houses the adjoined middle and high school, the elementary school, the New Oxford Public Library, and the county police station, along with the various athletic fields.
“And do you have your positive attitude and eagerness to learn?”
He rolls his eyes at me. “Yes, Mama.”
“Don’t you roll your eyes at me, young man—I’ll pick ’em up and roll them right back at you.”
He just snorts. “That’s dumb.”
“Mom jokes, kiddo. Get used to them.”
We pull up to the elementary school as the last of the drop-off line of cars pulls through. I pull to a stop at the front of the line, put the car in park, and get out. Aiden is already out and jogging for the door, backpack bouncing heavily.
“Um, excuse me, mister!” I call out. “Hugs and kisses and first-day photos!”
He stops, hangs his head, turns around with an elaborate show of drama, and drags his feet back to me. “I’m gonna be late, Mama!”
“And whose fault is that?”
“Yours?” he says, grinning, eyes twinkling mischievously.
I laugh, kneeling down and hauling him in for a tight hug, giving him a truly embarrassing number of kisses, until he squirms and writhes away.
“Okay, pose for the first day of third-grade photo!”
“Mom!” he huffs. “There’s no time for photos! The bell’s gonna ring!”
“There’s always time for photos.”
He poses, giving me a cheesy grin and two thumbs-up, and I snap several photos.
“Okay, now flash me a three on both hands like gang signs,” I tell him.
He rolls his eyes. “I don’t know what gang signs are, but they sound stupid.”
I laugh. “You’re probably right, but it’ll be funny. Just hold up three on both hands and look tough.”
>
He does the pose as requested, and then comes over. “Can I see?”
I show him the photos, and he picks the ones he likes best—which is our deal whenever I want to post photos of him on social media: he gets input on which photo, and veto power if he really hates it.
I smack him on the butt. “Now go! I love you! Have a great first day, okay?”
“You too! Love you, Mama!” He jumps up, gives me a kiss on the cheek, and then runs inside.
I clap my hands over my heart as he slips inside, struggling with the door, stopping halfway through to wave at me before vanishing. “Stop growing up so fast, Aiden,” I whisper to myself.
I brush away a lone tear—first day of kindergarten, I sobbed like a baby; first day of first grade, I cried enough that I had to reapply my makeup in the car before I went in to work; first day of second grade, I cried, but not enough that I had to redo makeup. Third grade? Only one lonely little tear. It still feels like I’m sending a piece of my heart into that building, though.
I summon my breath and my courage, and head back to my car. There are a few other stragglers dropping their kids off late, and the busses are trundling away from the bus drop-off line, diesel engines grunting and rumbling. I hear the bell ring as I slide in behind the wheel, buckle up, and put the car in park…
I get about two feet when I happen to glance in the rearview mirror, and see Aiden’s Star-Lord lunchbox on the back seat.
“Crap.” I let out another few unladylike words my mother would scold me for using, and then brake to a stop and throw the car in park again. I’m going to be late myself, now—I have an 8:15 appointment with Jen Hurley, and it’s currently eight thirteen, and I still have to get over to the high school, park, get to my office…yeah, I’m going to be late.
“Darn it, Aiden.” I lean to the back seat, snag the lunch box, and throw my door open.
I leave my car running and the door open as I jog toward the front door of the school—at the same time, I’m whipping off a text message to Liz, the main office secretary, letting her know I’ll be a few minutes late for my appointment with Jen. I glance up briefly as I reach the doors, then back down at my phone, finishing the message as I yank the door open. I hit “send” and launch myself through the door, intent on jogging to the office as fast as I can in my navy-blue knee-length skirt and red wedge heels.
Pregnant in Pennsylvania Page 6
