by V. L. Locey
“I wanted to talk to Dixie.” His mouth tightened, and I felt bad for being so blunt. “She’s easy to talk to. Seems understanding.”
“And I don’t?”
“To be honest, no. You’ve been a dick to me since the first. And hey, I get it.” He started to argue but I rode over that shit like a steamroller. “I’m just this fuck-up who you’re straddled with for the summer. No respect, no work ethic, total Millennium mindset, egocentric, and far too impressed with his own worth. Did I leave anything out?”
“No, I think that about covers it,” he softly agreed. I snorted at the bullshit of it all. “But…” he slipped in as I pondered on leaving, “I’m here now. You’re here, and you’re obviously in distress. I’m sorry I’m not Dixie. I know she’s an amazing sort of glowing empathy angel. She’s the person everyone turns to when they’re in a bad spot because she’s just a kind soul. I’m not as good as Dixie. God knows I’m a far cry from Jim and his giving heart, but I’d like to try to reach out to you.”
“For Jim, right? I mean the only reason you do this is for him, in his memory. You don’t help us because you want to, you just do it because you promised him you would.”
He drew back as if I’d slapped him. “Maybe in the beginning that was the case. I’ve had five people come through the gardening program so far, and I’ve discovered that I like helping them.”
“Oh okay, so all the other guys were okay but it’s me who gets all the shit?” He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Hey, you wanted to talk. So, here we are, talking.”
“Yes, I know I just assumed…” His eyes opened and his hand fell to the table. “Do you believe in reincarnation?”
“Huh?” A phone rang and our server cheerfully answered it. “What the fuck does that have to do with anything?”
He waved his comment away with a calloused hand. “Nothing, just being whimsical. Do you still want to go party?”
“Maybe?” I replied, ripping a small chunk of muffin off then tossing it into my mouth. “I’m still unsure about all of this. Why are you here?”
He nodded as if he got what I was saying which would be a first. “I know there’s been some tension between us since you came out to Sunflower Acres. Most of that is on me, some on you.”
“Yeah, like ninety percent you,” I mumbled around another bite of soft, sweet muffin. I was going to have to find somewhere to skate soon, begin working all this junk food off. Preseason would be here in two months, and I had something to prove to the Mustangs front office.
“I was thinking more along a sixty-forty but fine, I’ll carry a bit more. The reasons that I’ve been so…”
“Dickish?”
One side of his mouth twitched slightly. See, the man did have a sense of humor, he just buried it under his ice armor plating.
“How about curmudgeonly?”
“Dude, I have no clue what that word even means. Did you go to some fancy garden college?” I took a sip of pretty good coffee to wash down another bite of muffin.
“Well, I went to college, sure. North Carolina State for my plant and microbiology degree, and when I graduated I bought out an old garden center, applied to Penn State Extension and took another forty hours of training to get my Master Gardening certification.”
“Damn. That’s a lot of plant studying.”
“Mm-hmm, but I love it. Where did you play college hockey?” He took a small sip of his coffee. Some of the deeper furrows on his brow were disappearing. He looked younger and hotter when his forehead was smooth and his eyes were sparkling with gardening adoration.
“Never went. I was drafted out of high school and went into the Manhattan Marauders minor league system. One season in the ECHL, one in the AHL, won two championships, and got a nod as the most valuable player while picking up a trophy for most points in the league.”
“Damn. That’s a lot of hockey playing.”
I snickered at his wit. “Sure is. Next stop the NHL if I can just work through some stuff.” I’d gotten down to the paper muffin wrapper. I folded it neatly and laid it back on the dish then wet my finger and pressed it to the tiny bits of brown sugar sprinkled all over the edge of the saucer.
“Some stuff being the urge to drink when things get tough?”
“Party. I like to party, that’s all. I’m young. I enjoy having a good time.” I sucked the sweet from the tip of my finger. Bran’s attention seemed locked on my mouth.
“Mm, I know. But your good times all seem to involve abusing alcohol and driving.” He spoke into his cup, both slim brows arching as he made his point. “Life isn’t much of a party now, is it?”
“No.” I sighed then went back for more sugary crumbs because I liked the sweet and because Bran was still staring at my lips. Yes, I was now flirting with a hot man I didn’t even like that much. Did I? No, yes, kind of. I guess I kind of liked him when he wasn’t in iceberg mode. Like now when his stormy summer eyes were caressing my lips. Right now I liked him fine. And for the record, I have fucked men I’m not fond of. Cocks have a way of leading a dude around at times. “They want me to attend an AA meeting.”
“They?” he asked, his eyes snapping up from my mouth to the server when she appeared out of nowhere with a coffee pot in hand. We both got another, Bran paid for both, and then he nudged me to reply. “So they, who is they?”
“Monica or Mona. Whatever her name is who runs the IDP program.”
“Ah, and you don’t like that idea. I can tell by how fiery your eyes are.” I looked away so that he’d no be able to read me so easily. My grandfather had my eyes, or I suppose I had his. Dark brown eyes, sweet when he was happy, terrifying when he was mad. Like Chris and Dad back when Dad knew how to be mad.
“I’m not an alcoholic.”
“Did she say you were?” He ran a finger around the rim of his mug, his voice low and soft, keeping the conversation subtle and between us and not the other customers in the booth at his back.
“No, she said she thought I abused alcohol, which is total shit. I don’t abuse anything.”
“Hmm, well, maybe you should just go once or twice?” I glanced up from his finger circling the edge of his cup. His face was open, honest, and incredibly appealing. Wonder what he would do if I leaned up and kissed him? “Maybe it could help to talk to other people who are battling with the same party problem you are. We’re talking.” He pointed to me and then himself. “And you look less edgy.”
Huh. Yeah, I did feel a little less cranked up. I grunted in a ‘whatever’ kind of way.
“Give it a try. I’ve discovered that talking about things does help smooth out some ragged edges.” He smiled at me and wow. The need to put my mouth on his tripled. “Things feel calmer between us now, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, yeah, I guess so. We keep this up we’ll be bed buddies.” His eyes widened and his Adam’s apple bobbed.
“I uhm, I’m sure that wouldn’t be appropriate.”
I shuddered as the toasty feelings we’d been wrapped in began to chill a bit.
“Probably not. But I’m Nate Zinkan. I’m all about being inappropriate.”
He never said a word but pressed his lips together, coughed, and mentioned an appointment he had. Within three minutes he was peeling away from the curb in that funky old Apache truck, and I had a pretty clear idea of just where me and Bran the master gardener stood.
Somewhere between the Blue Button Café and the next day, that whole better relationship between Bran and me kind of fizzled. Since I was the same man I had been last night when we had coffee and flirted I had to assume the change was his. Okay, I flirted and Bran looked like someone had shoved a jellyfish into his boxers. Whatever. The point was Bran had gone right back to Mr. Freeze, but now he simply gave me the cold shoulder instead of the dark looks. Not sure which was worse. That went on for about four solid days as the temperature of late June began to climb. You’d think all that iciness would feel good after hours weeding, fertilizing, watering, a
nd helping confused elderly folk to their proper plots, but it didn’t. And I had no fucking clue as to what had changed.
“….sure I’m plot forty-eight?”
I shook off the heat-induced stupor and nodded my sodden head at Mr. Linkman. “Yep, I’m sure. I have a map.” It was in my back pocket, soaked with ass sweat, but it was there. We’d just looked at it ten minutes ago when I found him in plot thirty-eight trying to pinch potato bugs off of Mrs. Nun’s tater plants. She was grateful for the bug picking but not thrilled to have Mr. Linkman asking her if she wanted to ha-cha-cha whatever the hell that meant.
“This doesn’t look like my plot,” the old gent argued as I wheeled him up to his little square.
“Sure it does,” I said, locking the brake on his wheelchair then dropping into a squat beside him. “See all the corn plants. Those are all yours.” I waved a grimy and blistered hand at the green spikes of young corn.
“Are they knee high?” he asked then patted the stump that used to be his left leg. Got it blown off in World War Two he informed me hourly. “My dad always said corn has to be knee high by the Fourth of July. Is it July yet?”
“It will be in two days, Mr. Linkman, and your corn is totally knee high.” I stood and went to stand beside the raised bed. The tips of the pointed leaves reached my hip. “They’re hip high but they’re really dry. Let me go get the hose and we’ll water them well.”
“I’ll wait here.”
I smiled down at the bald man, patted his frail shoulder, and went to find the hose. Mrs. Dudley had it and was reluctant to share. Lips coated in bright orange lipstick puckered she did, eventually, shove the hose into my chest.
“Make sure you bring it back. My zucchini are wilting,” she shouted after me. I waved the end of the hose in reply. All the plants were wilting. We’d gone weeks without rain and the heat indexes were climbing daily. Today was a brutal one, high temps and humidity through the roof. I’d been here since ten a.m. and had moved past soggy underwear stage by noon.
“Here we go.” I smiled down at the napping vet after weaving and unknotting the hose as I snaked it back to this side of the garden. Mr. Linkman slept on. I gently pushed him back toward the hedgerow and the shade trees then watered the crap out of his corn, picked some weeds from around the base of the corn stalks, and returned the hose to Mrs. Dudley and her limp zucchini.
Mr. Linkman was still asleep when I got back, drooling onto his old gray T-shirt. I shook him gently and he snorted awake.
“Hey, dude.” I smiled down at him. “The bus will be here in ten minutes. You want me to help you through the gate?”
“Is the corn knee high?”
“Yep, all the way up to here.” I tapped my hip with my hand. He grinned a toothless grin and we made our way through the gate. It was a nice wide gate, totally spacious enough for a wheelchair, but a few of the really elderly gardeners had trouble navigating it anyway.
“Did I ever tell you how I lost my leg?” he shouted over his shoulder as I wheeled him down the cement wheelchair path past the greenhouses and mounds of mulch and compost.
“Fighting Nazis,” I replied. Sweat ran into my eye as the sun beat down on us. I reached into the small bag Mr. Linkman always carried on the handle of his chair and took out an old portable umbrella. Once we were at the driveway, I popped it open and stood there, holding a Snoopy umbrella over his bald head as he told me the story of the land mine he’d stepped on. Ten minutes later, the senior citizen transport bus pulled up. I was baked like a freaking potato. We got Mr. Linkman up the ramp and into the coolness of the bus.
“I won’t be here next week. I’m going to my daughter’s for a cookout. Water my corn, Sergeant.”
“Sir, yes, sir,” I replied before leaping off the bus to help several other gardeners get on. One old gal pinched my bottom and winked. My cheeks were already crimson from the sun so any blushing that took place was never felt. Once the bus rolled off I moseyed back to the community garden and cleaned up, rolling up the hose, turning the water off, patrolling the aisles for forgotten tools or purses or wallets. Old people forgot shit all the time. Two days ago, Mr. Forde forgot his shoes. Like, really? I snickered at the thought of some barefooted old dude as my phone buzzed. I’d muted the ringtone but left the vibrate on. Who knew what would happen with my father at any given time so the phone was a must.
Whispering a prayer that it wasn’t bad news about Dad, I was relieved to see it was a text from Spank, or Tim Spankowski, my left winger. We’d grown super close over the past season and had been texting back and forth as much as possible. He was back home in Minnesota with his new fiancée, enjoying the summer, having tons of sex with his woman, and glowing in the glory of being a champ. And here I was irradiated with sunburn and scraping composted cow shit out from under my fingernails every night. Man my life choices rocked. Pfft.
I found a fat oak tree and leaned back against it, touching base with Spank, enjoying the hot breeze on my toasty face. Someone calling my name from the gate tore me from a really funny story about our goalie, Ron, that Spank was relaying.
“Fuck,” I sighed when Bran came marching up to me, all stiff-legged and sour-faced. I thought about trying to hide my phone but he’d seen it in my hand, so I sent a fast TTYL to Spank and lifted my chin to take the ass chewing about to commence.
“Give me your phone.” He held out a hand that might have been dirtier than mine.
“No, fuck you. This isn’t junior high school. You can’t take my shit. I’ll turn it off.”
“Did we not discuss phone usage during work hours?” He jabbed his hand at me. I slid my phone into my front pocket and straightened up. We were both about the same height, give or take an inch, but I had him in weight and attitude. While the man was hard and toned from manual labor, I was a professional athlete. Granted, I’d not been hitting the gym real hard of late, but I was still a professional athlete. I could take him.
“Yeah, but everyone’s gone, and Spank texted about Ron who’s taking up scuba diving which, if you knew our goalie, is hilarious because he kind of already looks like a fish.” I gave him a winning smile. He continued to look at me as if I were an aphid infestation. “Come on, Bran, there’s like twenty minutes left until I clock out,” I cajoled, hoping to avoid having this get nasty.
“Look, Nathan, I really don’t care about fish-faced goalies or what Skank—”
“Spank. His name is Spank like if you don’t straighten up I’m going to spank your sweet ass?” His hand fell to his side as his eyes flared. Damn those eyes were spellbinding. A man really could get lost in them. And the dark lashes that framed them? Shit yes. Tired and gross and dirty as I was my dick started to lengthen as the naughty suggestion hung there between us.
“Stop doing that.” I cocked an eyebrow at the weak timbre of his voice. Had I hit the deeply hidden ‘Turn Me On’ button he had buried somewhere in all that ice? I hoped so.
“Stop doing what?” I enquired with as much innocence as I could muster. Wasn’t much, to be honest. I’d lost all my innocence years and years ago.
“That. Stop doing that. Looking at me like that and saying sexually suggestive things. It’s wildly inappropriate.”
“Yeah, probably, but you like it. I can tell.” And I could. His nostrils were flared, his pupils wide. The impulse to pin him to the nearest tree and lick into his fine mouth had me taking a step. I ran into the hand he’d been demanding my phone with. It settled right in the middle of my chest. Big and strong, he solidly held me at bay.
“You’re way off base,” he said but his clipped speech didn’t convince me. I knew the signs. He wanted me and that scared the holy fuck out of him for some reason.
“Am I?” He shoved and I stumbled back a step, smiling in mild surprise.
“You are. Now give me your phone.”
“Nope, sorry, no can do, boss man. My father’s health is bad. I need it near me in case he takes a bad turn.”
He studied me openly for a long,
long moment. “You know I can call my uncle to verify that, right?”
“Go for it, dude. I’ll be out front loading those plants into the truck so you can deliver them to the Mandrakes before we close. Or are we not doing that before I go home anymore?”
“You’re so much like him at times I just…” The man’s eyes flashed in pain and confusion and then he stalked off leaving me gaping at his firm ass as my mind did a few twirls trying to readjust itself to this weird dimension I was caught in.
“Okay,” I said to a fat bumblebee checking out the sweat on my arm. He flew off for greener pastures, like the patch of pink flowers in plot seventeen. “Yep. Fine. I’m drunk obviously. One day he’s nice, the next he’s obnoxious.”
Ten minutes later, I was standing by greenhouse two, the one with a billion and six flats of flowers, fanning myself with my Stallions ballcap, waiting for the big boss man to join me. I had no clue what impatiens looked like and didn’t want to load forty flats of them into the back of the Apache only to have to take them out when Bran showed up and yelled at me for loading marigolds instead.
He appeared from behind the pile of composted cow shit which sat to my left, steaming and stinking. Not really. It didn’t stink, not like cow shit or rotting food. It had an earthy smell but saying it stank just made tired me feel better.
“Finally,” I mumbled when he stepped up beside me. “Did you call your uncle?”
“No, I’m giving you the benefit of the doubt. Is there a reason you didn’t start loading the flowers for the Mandrake order?” A small brown bird flitted down to the roof of the truck, looked at us, and then flew off.
“Not sure what kind of flower is what.”
“Really? You’ve been here for how long and you don’t know what impatiens look like?”
In all honesty, I’m not sure why I reacted the way I did after his comment. I’d taken much worse derogatory cracks from tons of people, my brother included, without grabbing a handful of warm composted cow manure and whipping it at the back of someone’s skull.
