by J. P. Grider
A short bald man holding a clasp envelope stood outside. “Noah Richard Mack,” the bald man requested.
“Oh. Sure.”
“I’m Noah.” Noah walked up behind Lorraine.
“I’m here to deliver this. I need you to sign here.”
Noah signed the sheet on the clipboard, and the man wished him luck. He then opened the envelope and pulled out the papers inside.
“What the—” Noah heard Lorraine until he didn’t.
Suddenly, all that Noah heard was the screaming in his head. Fucking Margaret. That mother—
CHAPTER TWENTY
Lorraine stood, hand on brass door knob, gaping at the opened envelope in Noah’s hand. Messenger now gone, Noah looked at the document one last time before he tore it to shreds and left. Lorraine fell to her knees, scrambling to pick up the pieces, when she heard the engine of Noah’s motorcycle. Sitting back on her heels, she pieced together what she could.
Margaret Rose Pearson, plaintiff vs. Noah Richard Mack, defendant. Summons to appear in court. Complaint for custody of Norah Allison Mack.
Lorraine read words she didn’t understand, and when she said, “Oh dear,” out loud, Norah was standing behind her, reading the summons over her stepsister’s shoulder.
“No. No. I’m not going with her,” she cried. “No. You promised.”
Lorraine shook her head. “No. We won’t let that happen.” She stood up and held Norah’s hands. “That’s why Noah’s here. That’s why he came home to us. It’s all gonna be okay.”
“Then why’d he take off like that? It doesn’t look like he thinks it’s gonna be okay.” Norah sobbed.
“Well, I guess he didn’t expect to jump any hurdles, that’s all. Really, Norah. We won’t let you leave.” Lorraine squeezed Norah’s hands.
Norah’s crying now causing a scatter of red blotches on her face, she buried her head in Lorraine’s neck. “You promise?”
“I promise.” Lorraine hoped she could make good that promise.
Dishes rattled in the dining room. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” Carter said bitterly, slamming away from the table and tearing up the back stairs.
Without saying another word, the girls picked up what was left of Easter dinner and washed and dried the dishes. It was a letdown to say the least. Lorraine’s rice pie, uneaten on the counter, the stainless steel bowl and beaters futilely sitting in the freezer waiting to beat fresh cream, her hope for a life returning to barely normal—shattered again.
***
She was bringing the garbage to the curb when Noah rolled in. “Hey,” he said when he removed his helmet.
“Hey,” she responded, wiping her untied hair from her face.
His helmet still in hand, he stammered. “Yeah, uh, look, Rain, I’m uh, I’m sorry I walked out like that. I, um—” Damn. Why was it so hard right now to talk to her? “Anyway, I’m sorry,” he repeated.
Again, she brushed the hair from her face, releasing the scent of coconut through the air. An ironic scent for the end of March. “I get it. I’m worried too.” Lorraine smiled. “We’ll fight her. You’re Norah’s immediate family, there’s no way your aunt can get custody.”
“If you haven’t noticed, I’m not really guardian material.”
“I think you’re perfect,” she said just above a whisper, her small smile lighting up the night. “I mean, you’re perfect as her brother, to be her guardian, and to take care of us, I mean her, and—”
“Rain?” he interrupted.
“Yeah?”
“Is there any dessert left?”
“Yeah. The whole pie.”
“I can go for some. I’m just going to change into sweats. I’ll be right in.”
Lorraine nodded, and he followed her around the back of the house. Before she went inside, Noah stopped her. “You wanna bring it by me?” The words were out before he’d even given them a second thought.
“You’re apartment?”
He nodded, wondering if he should just have dessert in the main kitchen. His emotions were all over the place, and being alone with Lorraine for any amount of time tonight was probably not a good idea. But before he could say so, she’d said, “Be right there,” and closed the back door.
He went in, changed into his sweats, and flipped on the television. Grease Live was on channel five. He kept it on; it wasn’t like he’d be able to concentrate on TV anyway. Not with Rain in his presence.
She knocked twice and walked in, her hands holding a tray filled with stuff.
“Whoa, hey.” He got up and took the tray. Setting it down on the coffee table, he spotted the lying down bottle of blackberry brandy. He picked it up. “You didn’t go through your mother’s stash yet?”
She sat down and cut the rice pie. “Last one.”
Noah chuckled.
Lorraine placed a slice on each plate, Noah poured the brandy. She handed Noah a plate, he handed her a glass. Sitting crossed-leg against the arm of the couch, she placed her brandy between her legs and kept the plate in her hands. Noah couldn’t tear his eyes away from her face. It overwhelmed him so much he couldn’t speak.
“You don’t like it?” she asked, eyeing his untouched plate, her eyebrows raised as she waited for an answer.
Forcing himself to look away, he looked at his pie and said, “Don’t know. What is it?”
She laughed. “Rice pie. I had heavy cream to whip, but, well, things didn’t quite go as planned.”
That brought Noah back to earth. “No. It didn’t.” He took a bite of the pie and moaned. “Mmmm. Good,” he mumbled with a full mouth.
“Woulda been better with the whipped cream.”
Noah finished his slice, Lorraine finished her brandy. Neither spoke. Noah wondered if she was as nervous as he was. As she poured herself another couple of ounces, Noah took her barely eaten pie from her and took a bite. “Did you always drink so much, or is this a recent thing?” he asked with another mouthful of pie.
Lorraine looked into her glass. “I don’t drink a lot.”
But the way she said it, Noah didn’t think she really believed it herself.
“I don’t,” she said again.
Noah took another bite of pie.
“Noah. I don’t.”
“Who are you trying to convince, Lorraine?” He put a slice of pie on the fork and extended it toward Lorraine. “Eat.”
Her lips parted, her tongue darted out, and when her mouth wrapped around the fork, Noah wanted to forgo the pie and replace it with his tongue. He wanted to taste her full lips, suck on her mouth, and inhale her breath.
But he wouldn’t.
He couldn’t.
Lorraine cupped her hand beneath her chin when he slid the fork from her mouth. With his thumb, he wiped a stray crumb from the corner of her lip. As he sucked in a breath, she closed her eyes.
She felt it too.
Damn.
This could get messy.
When he offered her another bite, she accepted again, only this time, she’d sucked in her breath when she took the bite. When he slid the fork from her mouth, she chased the pie down with her brandy.
He set the fork on the plate, the plate on the table. “I don’t think you should drink anymore tonight,” he said with little conviction.
“Why not?” she asked, her eyes half-closed and unintentionally seductive.
“Because...you may do something you’ll regret.”
She smiled and teased, “What makes you think I’d regret it?”
Oh, this had the potential to get very, very messy.
He tossed back his own shot of brandy and set the glass down, then he took the drink from her hand and set it next to his. In no subtle move, Noah slid to her side of the couch and braced her neck in his hand. “Maybe because it’s fucked up.”
She swallowed hard and licked her lips.
It turned Noah on.
Tracing her ear with his thumb, he focused his eyes on her lips. Pink. Moist. Heart-shaped.
>
They faced each other, their knees touching, their faces only inches from each other.
“How come this feels like a deja-vu?” she asked.
He stretched his thumb to meet her lips. “Because we’ve been here already,” he responded, even though he knew her question was rhetorical.
She closed her eyes and leaned into his hand. “Isn’t this supposed to be wrong?”
Her eyes remained closed while he contemplated the answer. His heart pounded, his breathing raced, and his sweatpants were suddenly tight. Was it wrong? It didn’t feel wrong. It felt absolutely right.
It felt especially right when her hand landed on his thigh. He watched her small fingers, painted black, tickle his leg with her light touches. Her tiny tips, sparking an electrical surge straight to his groin. Noah moaned.
“I don’t know if this is a good idea.” She breathed out the words, and he was unsure whether she was talking to him or to herself.
“It’s probably not,” he said honestly, though he wasn’t really up for the truth right now. He wanted to shut everything out and just have a taste of this beautiful nymph sitting in front of him.
Her fingers continued to graze his thigh as they worked slowly up his leg. With his one hand lingering just below her neck, his other hand stroked the top of hers, not discouraging her fingers from their journey. But the next words out of his mouth might have. “Are you a virgin, Lorraine?”
As he suspected, her hand came to an abrupt stop.
“What?”
“Are you a virgin?”
She removed her hand from his leg completely and said, “Well, I don’t think that’s any of your business.”
“Can I make it my business?” he asked, reaching again for her hand.
She let him hold it. “No.”
He held her hand with one hand, while tracing the spot behind her knee with his other. She uncrossed her legs and let them drape across the couch. “It’s important.”
“How is my virginity or lack of it important to you?”
Now Noah was getting nervous. “No, I didn’t mean that it was important to me the way you think I meant it, I, just, I don’t want to take advantage of you if—”
Again, she pulled her hand from him. “You shouldn’t take advantage of me regardless.” She stood from the couch and headed for the door.
Noah jumped up quickly and spun her around. “I said it wrong, Lorraine. I swear. I wouldn’t take advantage of you. Never. I just, I wasn’t sure if you knew what you were doing, being you were drinking and, shit, I don’t know what I meant, but I wasn’t trying to take advantage of you. Either way. I just thought, y’know, if it was your first time, that maybe we should, you should not do it when you were drunk. That’s all. Really, I’m babbling now, but I didn’t mean it the way it came out. I promise.”
She looked down at the floor, but she didn’t make a move to leave.
“Rain. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.”
Lorraine nodded and looked at him. “It’s not your business.”
“I know that. I do.”
“We probably shouldn’t be doing this anyway. I mean, we have two kids to worry about and, you know, if things got weird between us then, we could mess up everything. Right?”
Was she asking him? Because he was still into shutting out reality and pulling her into his arms. But that would be taking advantage of a situation, and not two seconds ago, he’d promised he wouldn’t. “Right,” he forced himself to say.
She nodded, and just when he thought she’d turn and leave his apartment, she stepped closer and pressed her hands to his chest. “I don’t want to be alone tonight.”
He covered her hands in his. “Oh.” Now what the hell was he supposed to do?
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Noah took Lorraine’s hands and hung them around his shoulders and then wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her in so that her heart beat against his lower chest. She looked up at him and pressed her lips to his, initiating their first kiss.
Why did she always have to be so forward?
He asked if she was still a virgin.
If he only knew.
Lorraine was trying so hard to forget her past, but old habits had a habit of resurfacing during stressful times. And there was no more stressful time than having to raise a family at eighteen years old because there was no one else to do it. So, she submitted to her urges and kissed the heck out of Noah.
When he pulled back, asking if she was really sure, she kissed him hard and pushed him back onto his couch, where she proceeded to drive him down into the cushion so she could straddle him. “Whoa,” he said, surprised. “You’re strong for a pixie.”
“I don’t wanna be alone tonight. Tomorrow, we can forget this ever happened. Okay?”
He nodded, and Lorraine noticed his body was extremely willing to keep her company tonight. But she noticed his eyes were saying something completely different.
“What?” she asked, confused. “What’s the matter?”
He shook his head and covered her mouth with his. “Nothing at all,” he said before twirling his tongue around hers.
Their mouths were still connected when Noah lifted her up, she still straddling him, and carried her to his bed. When he lay her down, he took over and started undressing her, beginning with lifting her tiny pink t-shirt over her head and continuing with lowering her flannel pajama pants off her legs.
Boy, she wished she’d worn fancy underwear under her pjs. Or any underwear at all, for that matter.
“Holy shit, you are beautiful. Like a real-life fairy.”
Lorraine’s stomach tingled at his words.
He ran his hands up her legs and stopped where they met, stroking her with his thumb. “I like the bare look,” he said softly, referring to her lack of hair, thanks to her recent Brazilian wax.
She closed her eyes as he continued to circle his thumb over her while his other hand traveled languidly up towards her breasts. He brought his lips back to hers and didn’t remove them until he reached into his nightstand and pulled out a condom. Which made Lorraine wonder who exactly he’d been sleeping with since he’d come back from Duke. But the thought immediately left her when he slowly, very carefully, entered her. He thought she was a virgin. She hoped to God he wasn’t disappointed.
As he took his time with her, she held back her urges until he fell into a steady rhythm. Then she met his pace, thrust for thrust, until he collapsed on top of her, both of them fully sated.
The high she was feeling was soon going to come crashing down when Noah took off his condom—there’d be no blood.
But when he did take it off and toss it in the wastebasket, he just lay back down beside her and held her close. He didn’t care. He didn’t care. Relieved, Lorraine smiled, turned on her side, and let Noah spoon her the rest of the night. He woke her once, but only to say, “Shhh, Lorraine, it’s a dream. It’s only a dream.” She’d wiped her tears, tucked in tight to his side, and fell back to sleep.
Because she didn’t have her phone with her, there was no alarm to wake her for her five AM Monday Body-Sculpting class. She flew out of bed and looked for Noah’s phone. Four fifty-three. Shoot, she had seven minutes to get to the gym. She left Noah without word, went into the main house to change, and scrammed out of the house three minutes later. Four minutes to get there. Hopefully, she’d make it.
***
Noah awoke alone in his bed.
He was surprised to learn he was disappointed by that fact.
Everything he’d imagined making love to Rainy would feel like paled in comparison to the reality of it. She was soft, she had a tender touch, and she tasted as sweet as she looked. And being inside her was like nothing he’d ever experienced. It was like walking around in the dark all his life and then suddenly, without intimation, he’d found his way home.
He only hoped Lorraine felt the same way.
After lying in bed reliving the whole beautiful night in his head, he
forced himself out of bed, showered and brushed his teeth, and looked for a note from Rain. But there wasn’t one. So, he went into the main house, where not a creature was stirring. Where the hell was everybody? He made his way upstairs and gently pushed open Lorraine’s bedroom door. Her bed was still made, but the pajamas she had on last night were strewn at the bottom of her bed. “Rain?” he whispered, making his way further into her room to check her bathroom. Empty.
He left her room and found his way to Norah’s room. “Norah,” he said just loud enough to wake her, but not loud enough to startle her. “Norah,” he said again, nudging her.
“What?” she grumbled.
“Why aren’t you up yet? The bus comes in half an hour.”
“Because it’s Spring Break, No. Now leave me alone.” She ducked beneath her pillow and went back to sleep.
Spring Break. So where the hell was—then it hit him. She was working. Normally, by the time he’d made it over to the house to see the kids off for school, Lorraine would be back, so it slipped his mind that she had morning classes.
As he was walking out of her house, he caught the back of her walking into his.
“Hey, that’s breaking and entering,” he teased.
“Noah.” She turned, her cheeks red. “I thought you’d still be sleeping.”
“Bed was cold.”
She blushed deeper. “I got you a coffee. I thought we could talk.”
He took the coffee she handed him and shut his apartment door. “Sure. Let’s talk.” When he sat on the couch, he noticed Lorraine pulling out a seat at the kitchen table. “Okay,” he said, getting up and then sitting with her. He looked at her fidgeting with the teabag string hanging out the side of her cup. “So, talk.”
She nodded, keeping her eyes on her tea. “Right.”
Noah waited, the pang in his chest that he felt last night when she’d said, “Tomorrow we can forget this ever happened,” was back.
“Look,” she said to her cup, “I’m sorry I came on so strong last night. I probably shouldn't have initiated it. Sometimes, I get carried away. I’m sorry.”
