Hot Mess

by Anne Conley

  Second, educate yourself. I guarantee you there are things about the health condition that you don't know, and your loved one will get enough people telling them what to do based on false preconceptions without you adding to the hubbub. Check out my Frequently Asked and Resources pages. It won't hurt you any to be educated. That way, when your loved one needs help, you can actually have an educated opinion.

  Third, don't force your attentions on them, unless they seem to be a danger to themselves. Getting the news is a shock, and lots of people spend some time grieving for the life they think they've lost. You need to let them go through those stages on their own. Then they will be in a better place. This goes back to the first item, be supportive, not destructive.

  Above all…

  "Mom!" Sophia shouted, scaring the life out of Rachel, who had been in the middle of the blog post she'd been putting off all day.

  "Honey, you don't have to shout at me. I'm sitting right here. What?" She had to smile at her daughter's excitement. Sophia was bouncing on the balls of her feet with wide eyes and flushed cheeks.

  Taking a deep breath, the nine-year old tried to contain her excitement. "We have a new neighbor! And she lives across the street. Can she come over to play? Please?"

  "Are her parents home?" Rachel tried to meet the parents of each child that Sophia played with.

  "Her dad is, but he's taking a nap. He works tonight. Can she come over to play? Please?"

  "Of course. As long as her dad knows where to find her when he wakes up." So many parents had jobs at the prisons system near here, and they worked strange shifts. Rachel considered herself lucky to have a decent job from home.

  Sophia squealed in delight, before turning to run outside and bring in her new playmate. Rachel could hear two girls pound down the hallway to Sophia's room and slam the door.

  Chuckling to herself, she returned to her blog, eager to finish so she could start dinner. She had been busy with a client online most of the day and hadn't gotten to the blog post yet. Her advertisers stipulated that she blog a certain number of times a week, and Rachel was behind.

  Thirty minutes later, she sighed with satisfaction and closed the lid of her laptop for the day. She could hear giggling come from behind Sophia's door, so she walked down the hall to meet the new girl.

  She opened the door to find Sophia, with her long, brown braids, chattering with excitement, and a lovely looking waif of a girl, with wide blue eyes and blond hair cut into a short pageboy style.

  Rachel flashed a welcoming smile. "Hello, I'm Sophie's mother Rachel Fairchild. What's your name, sweetie?" She wasn't a stickler for being called Ms. Fairchild, but some parents were, so she gave the child her whole name in case her parents insisted she be formal.

  The little girl's eyes widened even further, turning down at the edges, and Rachel could see something alarmingly adult in them, a sadness that tugged at Rachel's heart. She felt an urge to hug the child, but sensed that wouldn't be welcome, so she extended her hand instead.

  "Amanda Owens, ma'am." The little girl accepted Rachel's extended hand, solemnly.

  "Will you stay for dinner? I'm fixing to start lasagna." Rachel said hopefully. If her dad was still sleeping, who knew when or what Amanda would eat.

  "Okay," the girl replied.

  "What have y'all gotten into?" Rachel noticed her jewelry scattered all over the bedroom floor. She didn't mind. None of it was fancy, and she let Sophia play in the box all the time. "You guys will pick it up when you’re finished, right?"

  "Yes, ma'am," the girls replied, dutifully.

  "Good. I'm going to go start dinner." She shut the door, and went to the kitchen, wondering about Amanda Owens and glad that Sophie had found her. Sophia, like Rachel, felt a calling to help people in pain. She had cried during the Hunchback of Notre Dame, because poor Quasi didn't get the girl in the end. Rachel felt disappointment, as well, but it didn’t affect her nearly as much as Sophia. The child had cried foul to everybody who would listen in the video store when they'd returned the movie.

  Rachel browned the hamburger meat, chopped garlic, and made the sauce, before she assembled the lasagna and put it into the oven. She was pulling salad stuff out of the fridge, when a frantic banging on her front door interrupted her.

  She had to suck in a hard breath when she opened the door to the most beautiful man she had seen in a long time. Tall, broad shoulders, huge biceps stretching his sweater tautly across his shoulders, muscled thighs that made his worn jeans fit snugly, familiar brown boots. It was the cocky guy from school, and he was standing here, on her porch, looking so…worried?

  His hair stuck up wildly, and his penetrating blue eyes held lines of anxiety.

  "Can I help you?" She asked, as mildly as she could with her heart pounding in her chest.

  "I'm new in the neighborhood, and I seem to have lost my daughter. I fell asleep, I've been trying to get used to a new schedule for work…Have you seen a little girl, nine years old, with short blond hair? She's wearing…" He ran his hand through his hair, as if trying to remember what his daughter was wearing. Rachel stopped him.

  Rachel empathized with the man's plight, nobody liked losing their child, no matter how short-lived the loss may be. "Amanda is here. I have a daughter, too. They're playing. I'm sorry, she didn't tell you where she was?"

  His shoulders sagged in relief, and his eyes relaxed. A shuddering sigh escaped him, and Rachel felt his stress level decline. She had been watching this man for a week, while she waited to pick up Sophia, and he had always exuded confidence, self-assuredness, cockiness. She smiled slightly as she remembered him showing off his spectacular butt last Monday. But this man in front of her now was none of those things. He was a frightened dad.

  He held out a hand to her. "I'm sorry. I'm Sam. We just moved in across the street."

  "Sure. Uh, I'm Rachel Fairchild." As she grasped his huge, warm hand in hers, a slight tingle of electricity coursed up to her shoulder, leaving her arm momentarily limp. She looked down at their hands, then back up at Sam's face, noticing his eyes had widened, and a smirk lit up his face. She realized that her hand was clutching his, as if unwilling to let go.

  Looking at his smirk again, she blushed, understanding the cocky man had returned now that his daughter was safe. And she was still holding his hand. Dammit.

  Releasing him and wiping her hand absently on her sweats, "Um, come inside for a minute?" She opened the door wider to let him follow her in. He squeezed his impressive frame inside her tiny entryway and whistled.

  "Nice place. Don't see many craftmans in this part of the world."

  Rachel blushed with pride. "Yeah. There's only three in Serendipity. We're lucky to have it."

  "I'll say. It's fantastic."

  Smiling at his exuberance, "Well, it's not huge or anything, but it's ours."

  "Cool." His gaze had wandered over the room, with its warm wooden details and colorful accents that Rachel and Sophie had added, finally resting on Rachel's face. She could feel the blood crawl up her neck, an uncomfortable heat under his scrutiny.

  "Um…" His eyes were unbelievably blue, like a tropical ocean. They were deep and clear, and she could see herself drowning in them. Focus Rach. "I was just fixing supper. You and your wife are welcome to stay? It's lasagna. I already invited Amanda. I didn't know you would be missing her. She said it would be okay, but if it's not, then that's okay, too." Way to stay focused, dork.

  A smile crinkled the edges of his eyes, but didn't make it to his mouth, which was disappointing. "No. No wife. But I'll go ahead and take her home. My first night of work is tonight. It's the nanny's first watch, and she just got there. Thanks for keeping an eye on her, though. Amanda wasn't supposed to go anywhere, but she's been…having a little trouble." He shrugged and stuck his hands in his pockets, which pulled them a little tighter across his thighs, and Rachel had to pull her eyes up.

  "Oh, okay. I'll just go get her." Turning to hide her disappointment, she went to Sophia's ro
om to get Amanda. "Sweetie? Your dad's here. Y'all pick up all that stuff, okay?" The girls complied, and Rachel went back into the entryway to ogle Sam some more.

  "So, how long have you lived here?" Sam's voice was rich and murky. It was liquid sex, dripping over her body, coating her with desire. He looked like he could be heading to the beach, if only the weather was forty degrees warmer and there was a beach within two hundred miles.

  "We've only lived in this house about three years, but we've lived in Serendipity most of Sophie's life." She prayed he wouldn't ask about her life before that. It wasn't something she was comfortable talking about with people the first time she met them. Some people never knew anything about her life Before Serendipity, or BS, as she referred to it.

  "Is it just you two?" Good God, the man looked interested! Rachel was stunned by the way his eyes roamed over her sweatsuit-clad body, lavender fuzzy house shoes, frizzy ponytail, and no make-up face. She shifted, uncomfortably.

  "Um, yeah. Me and Sophie. How about you? Is it just the two of you guys over there?" She motioned past him in a vague gesture toward the general direction of his house.

  "Yup." He grinned widely at her now, and the flash of his even, white teeth took her breath away. He rocked back on his heels, hands still in his pockets, flashing those pearly whites at her, and she grasped the fact that she was staring. And he was watching her stare. And liking it. "What is there to do around here, for fun?"

  Highly uncomfortable with his gaze, she managed to mutter, "I don't really do anything fun. I wouldn't know." He barked out a laugh at her, sending warm floaty bubbles down to her toes. Something about the rumble coming from his chest, made her smile in spite of herself.

  "I doubt that. You look like a lot of fun to me." The smile still in his voice made a hot flame of desire flicker to life in her belly.

  Thankfully, the girls chose that moment to come barreling down the hallway, shrieks and giggles preceding them. Sam's face underwent a transformation when he heard Amanda laughing, a look of unexplained relief shadowed his handsome features as she launched herself into his legs.

  "Hey there, Punkin. Did you have fun?"

  "Yeah, Daddy. I did."

  Looking at the other little girl, Sam held out his hand. "You must be Sophie. Thanks for inviting Amanda over to play. I hope you guys can do it again real soon." He looked up at Rachel. "Real soon."

  Effortlessly, he swung Amanda over his shoulder like a sack of flour and turned to carry her home, amid her shrieking giggles and squeals. Rachel quelled her disappointment at his departure, even though it was probably for the best.

  That man was trouble.

  At the dinner table, Rachel asked Sophia the question that she'd been unwilling to ask Sam. She was dying of curiosity, yet she knew that Sam probably wouldn't want to answer her nosy questions, and he'd probably get enough prying from other community members.

  "Did Amanda say where her mom was?" Rachel asked diplomatically.

  Sophia's eyes grew round and watery, in her ten-year old empathy. "Her mom's dead, like mine. I mean my dad. Only, her mom just died a couple of months ago." She blinked, as if blinking back tears, and Rachel was once again taken with her daughter's ability to feel so deeply for others. A surge of love gripped her, and she reached out for Sophia's hand.

  Rachel blinked at her daughter's inadvertent slip of the tongue. She faced her own mortality every single day, a couple of times, when she took her medication. They didn't talk about it much, not anymore. It had become a fact of life, and with her daughter, as long as it wasn't a major conversation topic, Sophia didn't dwell on it. But Rachel had taken precautions to make sure her daughter would be cared for when she was gone, and she did her best to take care of herself now, in an effort to prolong her life, and its quality.

  "Then it's a wonderful thing that she's met you. You can be her friend and help her through her sad times." Rachel wasn't going to address the dead dad topic. She had told Sophia that story years ago, the only lie she'd ever told her daughter. Someday she would tell her the truth, but today was not that day.

  Sophia nodded, solemn. "I like her. She's nice. And she likes my toys."

  Squeezing the child's hand, before turning back to dinner, Rachel said, "Well, it's nice of you to share so willingly. She's welcome back anytime, Sophie."

  "Cool." Her braids bobbed, as she bent over her plate to eat.

  "I don't suppose you finished your homework before she came over, did you?"

  Sophia shook her head. "Nope, but I don't have that much tonight. Just one worksheet in math. It's easy."

  "Well, after you finish your dinner, you can work on it, while I get everything cleaned up in here. Okay?"

  "'Kay." Sophia gobbled up the rest of her lasagna, as if she actually wanted to do math worksheets and kissed her mom on the cheek before running to her room to work on it.

  Rachel loaded the dishwasher, wiped down the countertops with antibacterial wipes, and looked around the kitchen. Everything was spotless and germ-free, just the way she liked it. She was compulsive about keeping germs out of her house, and as much as she had improved in her compulsion, she was still a stickler for antibacterial stuff. She had the wipes, the hand sanitizer, and she used Lysol on every surface in her house at least once a week. It made her feel better.

  Going into her room, her jewelry box was on her bed where the girls had finished playing with it this afternoon. Idly opening it, she saw that they had just thrown everything in, willy-nilly, with absolutely no organization to it whatsoever. She didn't really mind. It just made it difficult to find stuff when she actually had a notion to wear jewelry. So she sat on the edge of her bed to sort out the box.

  After untangling the necklaces, matching the earrings back up, and sorting through the bracelets, she was putting the rings back in the slots on the edge of the box, when she noticed one missing. It wasn't a particularly fine piece, none of it was, but it had belonged to her grandmother. It had been her Mothers' ring. She had five children, and the ring had birthstones for all five kids: a garnet, a sapphire, two topazes, and a pearl. Truthfully, Rachel didn’t believe any of the stones were real, and she knew the ring itself was only made of silver, but that didn’t make it any less sentimental. Her grandma's second husband had given her the ring after they married, and he took on all five of her children as his own. It was a statement of faith in their life together. And her grandma had given her the ring before she died. It didn't fit her, so she didn't wear it much, because she was too afraid to lose it.

  She went to Sophia's room and knocked on the door. "Sophie?" Opening the door, she saw her daughter laying across her bed, math worksheet in front of her, pencil in her mouth, headphones in her ear, obviously listening to some garbage that Rachel didn't like to hear out loud in her house.

  Tapping her on the shoulder, Rachel got her attention. "Sophie? Were you guys playing with Meemaw's ring?"

  She nodded. "Amanda was wearing it, but we put everything back. I promise." Sophia's eyes were wide, and pleading.

  "Of course you did. It's not in the box now though. The ring must be in here somewhere. Will you help me look for it?"

  Nodding, the little girl slid off the bed to help Rachel look for the ring.

  Sophia was a neat child. In Rachel's house she had to be. She had been raised to put everything in its place when she was finished, and on the weekends she had an active role in the weekly disinfecting. So she knew that picking up regularly was easier than doing it all on Saturday before she could play or watch movies.

  They searched the floor of her room thoroughly, as well as the bed and shelves and toy box. When it seemed that the ring was nowhere to be found, Rachel stood, sighing heavily.

  "Well, maybe Amanda accidentally took it home with her. It might have somehow slipped into her pocket. I'll go over and ask her father. You finish your math and get in the tub. I'll be right back."

  Rachel didn't really believe that the girl had accidentally taken it home. She knew ho
w little girls could be with shiny things. A couple of years ago, Sophia had "borrowed" a crystal baby Jesus from a manger scene in a shop downtown, and Rachel had marched her back to return it as soon as she'd found out. Girls will be girls.

  She wasn't looking forward to asking her handsome neighbor about it, though. If his wife had died in the last couple of months, then he wouldn't want to deal with this, she was sure.

  Chapter 3

  From the point of ignition, fire begins to grow. Starting out as a spark or a small flame, other combustibles heat up, liberate flammable gases, and ignite, spreading the chain reaction to other flammables and resulting in an increase in size. -- From Firefighter's Handbook, Essentials of Firefighting and Emergency Response

  Sam pulled two frozen pizzas out of the fridge and preheated the oven.

  "I can do that. You go get ready for work. I know the drill." Brenda came up behind him and rested a hand on his shoulder. He shrugged her off gently, feeling a little unsure about the whole situation. She seemed to be working out okay, but her constant touchy feeliness was probably going to get on his nerves after awhile. And the denim skirt she was wearing tonight showed off an awful lot of leg. He was aware that she was probably hitting on him. He was used to that, but he wasn't interested.

  Brenda had spent last night at the house, sleeping on the futon in the living room, to get used to the routine. Sam didn't really see the necessity in it, although he had offered. It was just the night time, surely she didn't need to get into the routine of sleeping. It had been a little disconcerting to wake up to find her in the kitchen in her plain, albeit short pajamas.

  He couldn't wait to start work tonight, so he didn't have to spend the night in the same house with her again. He didn't think she was dangerous, or he wouldn't let her stay with Amanda, but she made him feel uncomfortable. She was just trying too hard to make him like her. And he didn't like her in that way. He needed to get a bed for the guest room, so she wouldn't be sleeping in his living room. The futon couldn't be that comfortable, and he didn't want to walk in on her when he came home.