Running From Mercy

by Terra Little

  Pam finished her laps and left the pool. She padded across the slippery concrete and dropped onto the lounger beside Nikki with an exhausted sigh. “You decided to have a look, huh?” she asked as she scrubbed a towel through her hair and shook it out with her fingers.

  Nikki couldn’t help herself. “Yep, and there’s some pretty interesting speculations about you and my dad, Aunt Pam. I think you ought to just come out and tell me if what my mom suspected was true.”

  “What did your mom suspect?” Pam was careful to keep her voice even and light.

  “You and my dad were kind of hot and heavy back then. What’s up with that?”

  “What’s up with that is that your mother had a very active imagination and it looks like you do, too.” Pam stood and playfully tapped Nikki’s thigh. “I thought you were supposed to be taking comfort from having that book, not looking for clues.”

  “So there are clues to look for?” Pam was gathering up her things so Nikki starting gathering her own things. She dropped the diary in her tote and threw her towel over shoulder. She stood and pushed her feet into her flip-flops, watching Pam’s face closely.

  “Nikki, please. I told you before not to believe everything you read. And anyway, even if your dad and I did have a crush on each other back then, which I’m not saying we did, he married your mom. Mystery solved. Can we go and eat now?”

  I don’t think so, Nikki thought to herself as she followed Pam to her room. They took turns in the shower and got dressed. Pam changed into drawstring silk pants and a matching sleeveless top and pulled her wet hair into a sloppy ponytail at the nape of her neck. She was pushing earrings into her ears when Nikki emerged from the bathroom, looking freshly scrubbed and bringing the scent of lilacs with her.

  “I see you found my shower gel,” Pam chuckled and shook her head. “Your mom used to help herself to my stuff, too.”

  “You mind?” Nikki perched on the edge of the bed and slathered some of Pam’s shea butter cream on her long legs.

  “No, I don’t mind. I love you and I share with the people I love. You like that?” She nodded toward the jar Nikki held, sat down next to her and scooped cream into her palm. “Here, turn around and I’ll do your back. When did your tits get so big?”

  Nikki gasped and turned to stare at Pam over her shoulder. “Aunt Pam! I keep telling you I’m seventeen now. I’m supposed to have tits. And mine are only a little bigger than yours.”

  “Must get those from Chad’s side of the family,” Pam murmured, referring to the fact that her own breasts were a conservative 34C and Nikki’s were at least two sizes larger. She brought a mental picture of Chad’s mother to the front of her mind and nodded at what she saw. Nikki would probably have breasts like Angela Greene; plump and juicy, the way most men liked them. She smoothed the last of the cream into Nikki’s skin and gave her back a light pat. “Seems like just yesterday you had braces on your teeth and ponytails hanging down your back. God, you had the wildest, tangliest hair I’ve ever seen in my life.”

  “You know what you gotta do, don’t you, Aunt Pam?”

  “Oh no, not the comb.” Pam hopped off the bed and backed away from the comb Nikki held out to her. She darted a glance at the tangled mess on Nikki’s head and cringed, which made Nikki burst out laughing. “You’re tender-headed Nikki, and you know how you used to scream and holler when it was time to get your hair combed.”

  “At least I already shampooed it. Come on, Aunt Pam. I just need you to moisturize my scalp and then comb it out for me. Do me one of those French buns you always wear.” She saw the tortured look on Pam’s face and stuck out her bottom lip pitifully. “Pleeeeeease?”

  Nikki refrained from screaming and hollering, but still over an hour had passed when they finally walked into the dining room, ready to sit down to lunch. Chad came to pick up Nikki just as they finished the caramel cheesecake they were sharing for dessert.

  He approached the table, hands in his pockets and looking from one to the other expectantly. “If any crimes have been committed tell me now,” he said.

  “You just missed the police, Dad,” Nikki said. “And you’re late.”

  He spread his hands wide in surrender. “Some of us do work, you know. I wish I could’ve spent the day lounging around the pool like you. Where’s your stuff?”

  “I left it in Aunt Pam’s room. If you’d let me drive we wouldn’t have these kinds of issues. You know that, right?” She gave him the evil eye as she pushed her chair back and stood up slowly.

  “Maybe after I forget about those three tickets you got, I’ll give you back your keys.”

  “That’s not fair.”

  “That’s fair as hell, especially since Harper just made it his business to inform me that you and Kelly were out past two o’clock in the morning last Saturday. You want to talk about that?”

  “Old Man Harper has the biggest mouth in town,” Nikki complained dramatically.

  “Yes, he does,” Pam agreed quietly and looked away when Chad grimaced in her direction.

  “I just want you to know that I’m feeling really mistreated right now.”

  “Duly noted. Go get your stuff.” Chad stepped back and pointed a finger toward the staircase, eyebrows raised. Pam remained silent, handing Nikki her room key as she passed.

  “She’s a spoiled brat.” He dropped into the chair Nikki had vacated, picked up her water glass, and downed the rest of it in one gulp. He locked eyes with Pam over the rim of the glass. “It’s a damn shame she has me wrapped around her finger and she knows it.” He set the glass down and folded his hands on the table.

  “She’s a good kid,” Pam said, but her next thought wrinkled her forehead prettily. “She’s also nosy as hell, too. That damn diary could bring up a lot of questions that I don’t have answers for. She’s circling around like a vulture as we speak.”

  “I was thinking the same thing. I thought about sneaking in her room and making it disappear, but I’m sure she’d notice it was gone.”

  “She asked me if we dated and I couldn’t think of anything to say, except that it was ancient history and that Paris probably embellished a little bit.”

  He grinned and shook his head. “That sounds like the same thing I told her when she approached me, which undoubtedly makes us both look guilty as hell.”

  “And here I thought we were being so careful back then. Keeping secrets and sneaking around, and all the time Paris knew?”

  “From what I understand she suspected,” Chad clarified. “After we were married the conversation came up and I got around to admitting that you and I were lovers for much longer than she knew, but I had no idea she’d write it down in that damn diary of hers.”

  “Oh, for the . . .” Pam lifted a hand and let it drop back to the table disgustedly. “Thanks a lot, Chad. That was a really smart thing to do. And why were you discussing my business with Paris, anyway?”

  “It was my business too, remember?” He leaned across the table slightly. “Plus, it helped explain why things were the way they were between Paris and me. How was I supposed to know she’d write the shit down? And what is this obsession women have with keeping diaries any damn way?”

  “For your information, Moira gave us those diaries when we were twelve,” Pam hissed. They didn’t make journals like them anymore. They were heavy, hard bound and covered with floral printed cloth, both of them at least five hundred pages thick. The pages were lined with midnight blue ink, the lines set close together for elegantly tiny entries, and the edges of the pages rimmed in gold. She and Paris’s arms had been sore after lugging them all the way back to the home after Moira had surprised them with the books. She’d probably be seventy years old before a replacement was necessary. The cloth had since taken somewhat of a beating, but she had just recently reached the halfway point in her own 8X10 diary. Even journaling daily, Paris couldn’t have been that much further along.

  “And?”

  “And nothing, I’m just saying. You shouldn’t h
ave said anything to Paris about us. What if she wrote that down, too?”

  “So what if she did? Look, forget about the diary for a minute.” Chad sat back and ran a hand around the nape of his neck. “Nate called the other night.”

  “I thought he was still in the Middle East somewhere?”

  “He is, but he’s ready to come home.”

  Happiness about Nate returning to the States safe and sound had a smile turning up the corners of Pam’s mouth. Then, just as quickly, she was frowning. “She could ask Nate about us.”

  Chad dismissed the possibility with a flap of his hand. “Don’t even go there. He won’t tell her shit. She’s too damn nosy for her own good, though.”

  She reached across the table and laid a hand on top of his. “Does he know about Paris?”

  “He does now. That’s why he called, said he’d just gotten the message. I called his publicist right after it happened, but apparently he’s been out of contact for a while. You know he would’ve been here otherwise. He took it pretty hard.” Nate had cried for ten minutes straight, and all Chad could do was hold the phone helplessly and listen to his friend’s grief. “He was shocked when I told him you were still here.”

  “Well if he wants to see me, he’d better hurry home. I guess Nikki told you about the tour I’ve got coming up next month?” Pam took her hand back and lifted her water glass to her lips.

  “She mentioned it, but I was waiting for you to bring it up.”

  “I would’ve . . . eventually.”

  He looked up and saw Nikki coming down the stairs. “There are some things I need to discuss with you, Pam. Can you come by the house tonight?”

  “Can’t. I have an appointment with Miss Verna in a few hours and then I’m going to see Moira.”

  “What about later?”

  “I told David I’d meet him for dinner. What is this about, Chad? Is it something to do with Nikki?”

  “I don’t want to get into it right now, not with Nikki around.”

  Nikki approached Pam from behind and surprised her with a smacking kiss on the cheek. She smiled at her niece and leaned sideways for another kiss on the lips. “Thanks for today, Aunt Pam. I had fun,” Nikki said.

  Pam nodded that she was welcome. “Did you take the cream you like?”

  “You mind?”

  “Of course not, you little thief. I’ll see you soon.” She looked up at Chad, who was now standing over the table and sighed. “I guess I’m coming to the house.”

  Dear Diary,

  Aunt Pam said that my mom embellished things in her diary, but I have proof positive that she didn’t. I did a horrible thing today. When I went to Aunt Pam’s room to get my bag I looked in her diary. I thought with her being older, she’d have a really sophisticated hiding place for her diary, but she didn’t. I stood there, looking around her room, wondering where I would hide my diary if I was her and then I found it at the bottom of her suitcase under the bed.

  I didn’t get too deep into it, just flipped through the pages near the front. I just wanted to see if Aunt Pam had written anything about my dad. And if so, what? So I could compare stories and know the truth for once and for all. I know the truth now, all right.

  My dad was Aunt Pam’s first and she was his. How crazy is that? Some really screwed up shit must’ve been going on back then. Had to be and that’s why everybody’s so secretive when I ask about stuff now. One thing I know for sure, I’m not asking my dad or Aunt Pam about what I read. They’d know I was snooping big time then. But I’m going to start paying closer attention to what’s going on around me from now on.

  This is like a mystery or something. Now I have even more questions than I started out with. I feel a little sick to my stomach, thinking about Aunt Pam and my dad being together like that. God, I wish I could go back in time and be a fly on the wall.

  Nikki

  Scalp still tingling from Miss Verna’s magic fingers, Pam pushed through the restaurant door and spotted David sitting in a booth near the back of the room. She sent him a short wave of acknowledgment and then let herself be waylaid by the hostess and two wait staff. She’d been talking all day and a few more minutes wouldn’t make too much of a difference. She signed her autograph across the bottom of a menu and helped select the spot on the wall where it would hang, then went to join David.

  “Sorry I’m late.” She slid into the booth and smiled across the table at him. “It got a little crazy in the beauty shop and then again in the A&P.”

  “Crowds of adoring fans?” Miles wanted to know. He lifted a hand to signal the waiter, a little irritated at having been kept waiting for twenty minutes.

  “Not exactly the kind you’re thinking about. More like crowds of old folks, anxious to remind me of all my dirty deeds and laugh about them. Seems like I was public enemy number one back then, but now the shit is just plain hilarious. What are you having?” She picked up a menu and perused the selections.

  “I thought I’d have the enchilada platter. Have you decided what you’re having?” She told him and he gave their orders to the waiter. Then he sat back and studied her intently. “Your hair looks nice.”

  “Thanks. I swear Miss Verna has voodoo in her hands. I almost fell asleep over the bowl.”

  “So she’s not part of the reason you stayed away so long then?”

  Pam caught his eyes and held them. “I never said she was. How was your trip to New York?”

  “How did you know that’s where I was?”

  “Moira mentioned it.” She noticed the look on his face. “Was it a secret?”

  “Why should it be? What else did Moira say?”

  The waiter returned with their drinks and she took a sip of wine before responding. “Nothing much, just that you were in New York on business. We spent the rest of the day looking through old photos and drinking tea. You’re the spitting image of your father, by the way.”

  “If you’d seen him just before he died you wouldn’t think that’s a compliment,” Miles said offhandedly. “You looked at pictures of Moira’s dead relatives?”

  “Grandmothers, grandfathers, parents, the whole bit. I wonder why Moira never had any kids.”

  “For one thing, she never stayed married long enough to make any.”

  A shocked laugh escaped Pam’s mouth before she could stop it. She shook her head at him and tsk-tsked as the waiter arranged their plates in front of them. After he moved away she said, “That wasn’t nice, David. She was married to the last one for quite a while, I think. I remember that he was there sometimes when I visited Moira. He was nice enough.” She picked up her knife and fork and cut into her steak.

  “Do you ever think about your birth parents, Pam?” The question caught her off guard, just as he’d intended and she stared at him wide-eyed as she chewed slowly.

  “Where did that come from?”

  “I’m just curious. Most adopted people go looking for their birth parents at some point in their lives. I wondered if you ever had.” He remembered his beer and swallowed a mouthful, completely at ease with the direction of the conversation.

  “We weren’t adopted, remember?”

  “The principle’s still the same.”

  She shook her head and speared a broccoli floret. “No, it’s not. I had and have no desire to look for people who dumped me in a children’s home and left me there all those years. No one ever came looking for us, so why would I go looking for them?”

  “Simple curiosity? Maybe to rub it in a little?”

  “I wasn’t curious and, that I know of, neither was Paris. But of course, we can’t ask her now, can we?”

  “You never wondered where your green eyes came from or who gave you your hair? The color of your skin?” He bit into his enchilada and watched her face suffuse with red heat.

  “No, I didn’t. Where is all this coming from, David?”

  “I told you, I’m just curious.”

  “Well don’t be. Do I give you the third degree about your life? I’ve
never once asked where you live or what you do, have I? I don’t even know if you have a wife and kids at home or a criminal history as long as my arm, for that matter.”

  “Ask me whatever you want to know.”

  Her silverware clattered to her plate and a frustrated groan filled the space between them. “That’s just the thing, David. I don’t care. I came back to this dreary little town to bury my sister and to make peace with her death. Then I met you and you seemed harmless enough, so I figured, what’s the problem with a couple of meals and some easy conversation? But you keep poking at me and asking questions that are really none of your business, which is starting to be suspect. Now if you want a few tidbits of juicy gossip to sell to the tabloids for some quick cash, just say so and I might oblige you. I mean, hey, we’ve all got bills to pay and you might have a sick kid at home or something. But if you’re just one of those people who didn’t learn in kindergarten when to back off, then I’m telling you right now, back off.”

  “I’ve upset you,” Miles said unnecessarily. He knew damn well that he had upset her. “I didn’t mean to do that.”

  “I don’t know if I believe that.” She pushed her half-eaten food away and reached for her wine.

  “You can’t blame me for being curious, Pam. Hell, you said yourself that you hate this town, but you never say why.”

  “Leave it alone, David.”

  “Why? What are you afraid I’ll find out if I don’t?”

  “I’m not afraid of you finding out anything.” She snatched her purse from the seat and slung it over her shoulder. I have to get out of here, she thought with something like panic rolling around in her gut. She slid along the seat until she was free to stand, then looked down at him. “I’m not afraid of you at all, and I don’t owe you any explanations for the way I live my life.”

  “Pam, please sit down. I’m sorry if I’ve offended you. I guess I forgot my manners for a minute. Let’s—”

  She cut him off with a trembling hand. “No, let’s not. Come to think of it, I don’t think you should contact me again, David. It was nice meeting you and thanks for everything, but seeing each other again doesn’t seem like such a good idea right now. This isn’t really working for me.”