by Whitley Cox
She swallowed hard. “Yep. Fine.”
He knew her too well. He could tell she was lying. His hand on her elbow and a slight push had them moving away from the slowly filling waiting room. Adam eyed them curiously but was suddenly distracted by Mira.
They rounded the corner to the storage alcove, where she kept all her cleaning supplies and spare ballet bars.
“What’s up? You looked very lost in thought back there, and tears were welling up in your eyes. Everything okay?”
She wiped her eyes and sniffled. “I was just thinking about him.”
Her brother nodded. It was oddly comforting but at the same time something you never wished upon anyone, particularly your loved ones, but the fact that Mitch knew exactly how she felt made things a bit easier. He understood her grief. Understood her sudden mood shifts and when she could be fine one moment and then in a dark place the next. Because he was the same way. They leaned on each other. Got each other. Because they had no one else.
“He would be so proud of you, Vi, of all that you’ve accomplished. You made his dream, your dream, a reality.” He slid his hand down her arm and reached for her hand.
She wiped her eyes again with her free hand. “I just really miss him. He had the confidence that I still lack. He … ” She trailed off when a sob caught in her throat.
Her brother pulled her into a hug. His hand trailed down the back of her head. “I know. I know,” he murmured.
She let the tears fall. “What am I going to do, Mitch? How am I going to do this all by myself?”
He continued to shush her. “You don’t have to. You have me. You have Jayda. And eventually you’ll be able to hire some other teachers. Give it six months, and this place will have a waitlist of students, I promise you.”
The noise from the waiting room grew louder. Her students were waiting for her. She had a sign on the door that said 15 minutes early=On time, On time=late, Late=dead. She couldn’t be late herself. Not on the third day of being open. Pushing out of her brother’s arms, she batted her lashes and smiled, her lips dripping with tears.
Although it didn’t bother her at all, it bugged Mitch that they were practically the same height. He hated that his little sister was only four inches shorter than him. But she was born to be a dancer, all five-foot-ten of her. Long-limbed, slim and tall.
“I should get back out there,” she said, reaching for a piece of paper towel from the shelf and blotting her eyes. “Can’t be late.”
He released her, his eyes sad and glassy. He and Jean-Phillipe had always gotten along, but she could tell he wasn’t thinking about Jean-Phillipe. He was thinking about Melissa.
With her hand on the doorjamb, she paused. “What was it you asked me before?”
He stepped forward, and they made their way back out to the waiting room. “If you’d be willing to watch Jayda for me on Saturday night, once you get back from work.”
She stopped in her tracks, not caring that they were in a room full of students and their parents. “You have a date?” Was Mitch ready to move on? He didn’t seem ready. Melissa had only been gone just over a year.
He shook his head. “No, no date.”
Adam wandered over, the same curiosity as before in his blue eyes. “Hey, buddy, we still on for poker on Saturday?” He slapped Mitch on the back. “Gonna give me all your money?”
Mitch snorted and rolled his eyes. “We’ll see about that.”
Was that jealousy clawing at the back of Violet’s neck? It sure felt like it. Her brother was making friends, branching out and doing things other than pine over his dead wife. And he was doing them with Adam, of all people.
“Poker?” she asked, trying to put as much enthusiasm in her tone as she could but hating how high-pitched her voice went. Did they know she was faking it?
Mitch gave her a weird look. He knew she was faking it.
Thankfully, Adam was all smiles. “Yeah, it’s a group for single dads. We all get together on Saturday nights at a friend’s place and play poker.” He shrugged. “Kind of a place for just us guys to vent and moan and gripe and stuff.”
So men bashing their ex-wives, then?
“We don’t woman-bash though,” he quickly added, obviously seeing her none-too-pleased expression at the thought of a bunch of guys sitting around a card table badmouthing the mothers of their children. “Kid-bash a bit though.” He chuckled. “Like how they’re cockblockers and just all-around gross, wiping their noses on shit, always having sticky hands, and coughing right on your eyeballs.”
Mitch snickered. “Jayda’s done that to me at least half a dozen times. I always wind up with a cold.”
“Better than pinkeye,” Adam said with a grimace. “One guy’s little dude wouldn’t stop sticking his hands down his pants. Then he’d touch his dad’s glasses or poke around his dad’s face. Guy wound up getting pinkeye.”
“Remind me to wear gloves if I ever meet this kid,” Mitch said.
Violet shook her head with a laugh. Her heart already felt lighter than it did a few moments ago. “I can watch Jayda for you, no problem.”
Adam’s face lit up.
Mitch pecked his sister on the head. “Thanks.” He lifted his camera bag up off the floor where it was next to Jayda. “I brought my camera if you want me to start taking some pictures for the website?”
Violet nodded. “Yes, please.” She eyed the children in the waiting area. They all seemed to be dressed, ready and eager to move. She clapped her hands three times. “All right, boys and girls, let’s head into the studio.” Excited children in leather slippers loped across the floor, some of them giggling, others very serious and quiet. She flashed all the parents a big smile before turning around and heading toward the studio.
She was almost at the door when a very masculine scent surrounded her. He didn’t have to touch her for her to feel his warmth and know he was close behind her.
“Violet?”
It was Adam.
Swallowing, she turned her head but not her body. “Yes?”
“You have a piece of toilet paper stuck to the bottom of your slipper.”
Ah shit.
He crouched down and motioned for her to lift her foot up. She lifted her leg, and although as a professional dancer, she should easily be able to stand on one foot for days if needed, her hand shot out to his shoulder for balance. “I also wanted to tell you that you look really nice today.”
Her cheeks were on fire. “Thanks.”
Was it the makeup she’d decided to wear? Probably not. After all the crying she’d just done, her makeup probably looked like a train wreck. She probably looked like a train wreck.
He stood back up, all grins. “No problem. And hey, thanks for watching Jayda so Mitch can come to poker.”
Her smile was tight.
Frustration filled her. Mitch was spending time with Adam, and that made her feel things. Frustrated things. Things she shouldn’t be feeling after having just cried her eyes out over her dead boyfriend.
With a curt nod, she turned away from him and headed into the dance studio, making sure to close the door behind her.
4
Violet curled her feet under her on the couch and pulled the knitted blanket over her lap. She had recorded Dancing with the Stars earlier in the week and only just now had a chance to watch it.
She turned on the television and took a sip of her wine. She was exhausted. Every night over the past week, she’d been at the studio until nearly ten o’clock. So come Saturday, she was dead on her feet. Mitch was out at his poker night and Jayda was finally in bed, so with the house to herself, she was going to take advantage of the quiet. She needed one night to unwind. She needed one night to veg on the couch, empty her brain and let the wine take her to a happy place.
She was halfway through the show when she heard the front door open and then close. Keys jangled and shoes were kicked off, followed by a heavy sigh.
She paused the show.
Mitch turned the
corner.
“So, are we millionaires?” she asked.
He sat down on the other end of the couch. “Nope. Not even close. Lost fifty bucks.”
Violet groaned. “Did Adam fleece you?”
He shook his head. “No. Seems like it isn’t just Vegas where the house always wins. Liam cleaned us all out.”
She yawned and stretched, pointing her toes in her big, puffy ballet shoe slippers. “Is that a recurring thing? Any suspicion he’s cheating?”
Mitch laughed before leaning over to the table, grabbing her wineglass and taking a healthy sip, all to the death stare of his baby sister. “I’m heading out of town next week for a few days. I need you to watch Jayda. Have a shoot in Portland.”
She took her wineglass from him and drained it before he could pilfer any more. It was her favorite wine, one she’d saved until after the grand opening, and this was the second to last glass. He’d been drinking beer all night so wouldn’t even be able to appreciate the wine. The jerk.
He continued to prattle on. “School starts at eight thirty, then pickup at two thirty.”
“I do have a business to run. I can’t just be running all over town to chauffeur your child around, you know? I was able to help out with that before the studio opened, but now I have classes to teach.”
Mitch rolled his eyes. “You don’t start teaching until nine in the morning.”
“And her school is a good twenty minutes or more from my studio! And then I teach a ten o’clock special needs class and an eleven o’clock mom and toddler class and a one-thirty preschool class. I won’t be able to make it to her school for a two-thirty pickup and then make it back here for the three-thirty beginner class.” She shook her head and stood up, wandering into the kitchen to pour herself the rest of the wine. “You have to either hire a babysitter or something, or start rescheduling your gigs around my work schedule.”
“So move your one-thirty class to one o’clock. Problem solved.”
She growled at him. “No, not problem solved. I’m not rearranging my class schedules to accommodate you. That’s rearranging over a dozen other people’s schedules. Those parents have paid for a one-thirty class. They expect a one-thirty class.”
He rolled his eyes, a stupid beer-buzzed grin on his face.
This was Mitch’s MO. He never understood when he was inconveniencing others, when he was putting them out. Before Jean-Phillipe and Melissa had passed away, Mitch had just flown into New York one weekend without any notice and expected Violet to drop everything and show him around town. Expected her and Jean-Phillipe to put her brother up in their small studio apartment. It didn’t matter that she and Jean-Phillipe had a performance every night or practice every day. It didn’t matter that they slept on their Murphy bed in the living room. Mitch just expected them to accommodate him, play tour guide and host.
She loved her brother, but he could be an obtuse ass sometimes.
“Well, the money is too good to pass the gig up. So you’ll just have to figure it out,” he said, reaching for her wineglass again.
She dodged his hand. “This is mine. Get your own.”
“You’re being a child.”
“And you’re being an inconsiderate douche.”
“What about Kathleen? Can she go get Jayda from school?” He wasn’t backing down. He just expected everyone to bend over backward to make his life easier. Her sister-in-law had been a saint to put up with her brother’s bullshit for as long as she had.
“I’m not asking my receptionist to go and pick up your kid from school. That is not in her job description.” If she asked Kathleen to go get Jayda, the woman wouldn’t hesitate. But that wasn’t the point. The point was that if they did this once for Mitch, he’d expect it again and again and again.
“Well, I’m not sending an Uber.”
“I never asked you to.”
They squared off on the couch, neither of them willing to concede.
His eyes softened, and his face split into a big, Cheshire cat-like grin. Oh, here we go. He was going to play the charm card. “Come on, sis. You know how hard it’s been since Melissa passed. I’m used to doing this child-rearing thing as part of a team. I thought we were a team?”
“If this wine wasn’t so good, I’d chuck it in your face. You do not get to play the dead wife card with me. We are part of a team. And I’ve done a hell of a lot more for you since we bought this house together than you have for me.”
His smile fell. He knew she was right.
“We need to sit down and have a discussion about how things are going to go now that I have the studio. I won’t be able to help out with Jayda like I did before. I have a job, just like you. I can still watch her in the evenings like I did tonight, but I can’t be on pickup and drop-off duty for school like I used to be. Things need to change.”
He didn’t say anything. Instead, he whipped out his phone and started hitting the touch screen hard, his face in a determined scowl.
She simply watched him. He was up to something. But what?
A minute or so passed. She sipped her wine. God, it was good. South Africa knew how to make a good mourvedre. She held the liquid on her tongue and shut her eyes. Jean-Phillipe had introduced her to good wine. It was one of the few things they splurged on. Good wine and good cheese were the two vices they allowed themselves, and only on Sundays after their weekend performances. Discipline was key, but so was living and enjoying how you lived. And if you couldn’t enjoy a bottle or two of fine wine and some decadent French cheese on Sunday, then why live at all?
That reminded her, she still had a piece of brie in the fridge.
Making sure to take her wineglass with her, she swallowed, opened her eyes and got up from the couch to go and find some cheese. God help him if Mitch had eaten it. She’d put a Post-it note with an angry face on it and everything.
Her brother was still busy on his phone when she returned to the couch, wine and cheese in hand. “Rescheduling your shoot?” she asked.
His brows were pinched in concentration. “Nope.”
She bit into the creamy brie, once again closing her eyes. She spoke between chews. “Well, I can’t go get her from school.”
“And I don’t need you to.”
She opened her eyes. “If you texted Kathleen, I will rip out your throat.”
He rolled his eyes again. “Always with the death threats. I didn’t. Adam agreed to pick Jayda up from school. Turns out he lives like three blocks from her elementary school, and Mira’s preschool is only two blocks from Jayda’s school. He’ll be in the neighborhood already. He also has a spare booster seat, so we’re golden.”
“So he just agreed to swing by the studio and drop her off, or is he taking her back to his house and I have to go pick her up from there?” The idea of seeing Adam outside of his daughter’s dance class made wine-tipsy butterflies take hazardous flight in her belly. She bit into her hunk of cheese to calm them down.
“I’ll be gone Tuesday morning to Wednesday night. He said he can pick her up from school and bring her to dance on Tuesday. She can stay at the studio with you and just play or hang out and read, watch the iPad or whatever until you head home, and then he said he can do whatever is needed on Wednesday too. I’ll ask her teacher if you can drop her off a bit early at school. That way you can make it to work for your first class. Shouldn’t be a problem. I’ve done it before.”
“You’re asking a lot of your new friend.”
“He offered. Says this is what the single dad club is all about. Helping each other out when we have nobody else. If he needs me to watch Mira sometime, I will.”
Finally, her hackles began to deflate. “I’m glad you’re finding friends, other men you can lean on.”
“Well, I can’t lean on my sister, so … ”
She tossed a pillow at him. “You’re a dink.”
“Watch your wine.”
She glared at him. “You’ll miss my birthday.”
He paused, his face ta
king on a very serious expression. Then it clicked. “Shit. It’s Tuesday.” He ran his hand through his hair, real remorse finally on his face. “I forgot. I’m sorry.” He leaned forward and touched her pajama-pant-clad knee. “We’ll do something really special on Thursday, okay?”
She made a dismissive face. She wasn’t much into birthdays anyway. Even if it was the big three-oh, her heart wasn’t into the celebration.
“We could go see Mom on Thursday,” he offered. “Take a cake, you, me and Jayda.”
“Have you been to see her recently?”
He nodded. “She’s doing okay, not great. Misses dad.”
Violet’s throat grew tight. “We all do.”
The Benson family had been dealt a really rough hand over the past year and a half. Not only did Mitch lose Melissa, and Violet lose Jean-Phillipe, but six months ago, they lost their father, too.
Mitch and Violet’s parents had their children later in life, so their father was in his early seventies, but he’d been a smoker for over fifty years and refused to give it up, no matter how much they all pleaded with him. He had emphysema, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or COPD, and was on an oxygen tank a lot of the time. Their mother, who was only in her sixties and fit as a fiddle, doted on her husband hand and foot because she loved him. Because they were each other’s soul mates, or so she said.
So when he passed, her health began to deteriorate and she became a recluse. She often said, in her darker moments, that she didn’t want to live without Bert but stayed alive for the children, for Jayda, and that they’d all experienced enough loss with their own spouses that she wouldn’t take her own life and do that to them. But they could tell how sad she was, how much she missed their father.
“I’m sorry for being such a douche,” Mitch said, his eyes a touch watery and his jaw tight. “Sometimes I forget that other people have jobs and lives too. Sometimes I forget that I’m not the only one grieving. We’ve all lost a lot over the past year. We’re all struggling to pick up the pieces, and I promise to start helping you pick up more of your pieces, just like you’ve helped me pick up mine.”
