by Mj Fields
Kat: It’s far too early to deal with you.
@rider1: Have a good one.
Kat: U2
I wake up when we pull in the driveway.
I don’t say a word when I get out of the car, walk into the house, and go straight to my room. I throw the covers down, drop my shorts, kick them and my shoes off and flop on the bed.
I grab a pillow and cover my face.
“Oh, sorry.”
I flop the pillow off of my face. “Shit. I’m upstairs.”
“Scoot,” she says and flops down beside me.
I start to sit up and she holds her hand out. “Just stay.”
I do.
Every time I am about to fall asleep either Mom’s or my phone pings.
I force myself to roll over and turn my phone off. Then hers goes off and she groans and does the same.
I wake up to my hair being twirled and snuggled up against a warm body. When I open my eyes I see boobs. Mom boobs.
I jump and she gasps. “Are you okay?”
“Of course I’m okay.” I hold my head as I stand up.
“Thank the Lord one of us is,” she groans and rolls to her side.
****
I walk out and grab two cups from my cabinet and the bottle of ibuprofen. I fill up her cup and dump two pills in my hand. I walk in my room on severely shaky legs.
“Drink this and take these,” I whisper because if I don’t my head will explode.
“Thank you Kather-” she pauses, “Kat.” She sits up and sighs, takes the cup that says, ‘I Like Peen’, and takes the pills.
I start to walk out and she says, “You can stay in here.”
“I need to start laundry,” I whisper.
“It’s done,” she says and pats the bed.
“Thanks, but I can’t lay here all day.” My words contradict my actions as I climb into my bed.
Mom smiles and then grabs her phone.
“Please don’t turn that back on.” I hold my head.
“Just looking to see if Sam or Darby called or messaged,” she says looking at the screen of her iPhone Plus.
“Did they?”
She lays back down and groans, “No.”
“Just pot right?”
“Just pot?” she asks wide eyed.
“Well, it’s not coke or meth Mom,” I defend.
“Right,” she says laying back.
“Is there more?”
She shakes her head no.
We lay there quietly, both waiting for the other to say something.
“Aside from how I feel this morning, I had a great time yesterday,” she says.
“Yeah.” I shake my head almost disbelieving what is about to come out of my mouth. “Me too.”
“Watch some TV?” she asks.
“Yeah, sounds good.”
****
We spent the whole day in bed together, Netflix and talkin. We switched between TV shows because we couldn’t agree on a movie. She likes chick flicks, I like horror. She got thirty minutes of HDTV’s Fixer Upper with Chip and Joanna Gaines, she apparently thinks I resemble Joanna, with art. When she calls my tattoos art I nearly die. I got to watch an hour of The Walking Dead, she only looked away once in a while.
When we needed a break for hydration, the bathroom, or a meal, I voiced my opinion on Darby living in Wildwood if she is having issues with drugs, and she assures me she knows what she’s doing.
“I raised you, Kat, and even though I don’t approve of everything you do, you seem to be doing fine. You own a home, have a stable...job, and although you may drink too much, you are a very responsible young woman.” She continues, “I know where I failed and I will not do it again.”
It actually warms my heart a bit.
“There is another reason for me being here,” she says looking over at me.
“To get help hooking up,” I joke. “Get offline and get out. You did fine yesterday.”
“I was drunk,” she whispers ‘drunk’ like someone may hear her. “I like the safety of being behind the keyboard.”
“It’s a joke,” I laugh.
“You’ve had two dates,” she says giving me the Mom-ster eyebrow raise.
“Let’s be honest here. I’ve had two hook-ups.”
“Hook-ups are dates,” she states.
“No, hook-ups are supposed to end between the sheets.”
She looks confused.
“When someone asks you if you want to hook-up it means sex. Netflix and chill is banging on the couch while Netflix plays in the background. Boff, smash snatch, bump fuzzies, stanky on the hang low-”
“Katherine!” she gasps and laughs.
“Horizontal bop, hit it, home run, knock boots, put your feet on my rug, pound the duck, sexy time—”
“Okay, okay, I get it,” she laughs.
“I’m not sure you get it Mom, it’s a different world.”
“I am beginning to see that.”
“Do you know what a meat thermometer is?” I ask trying to drive the point that no, she doesn’t get it, home.
“Of course I do. 135 to 140 degrees is how we eat our steak.”
“Tube steak, wankie, trouser snake, Mr. Happy, boom stick, Jimmy Johnson, bald headed yogurt slinger, love shaft, the D-”
“Okay, yes, I get it.”
“Get what?”
“A meat stick is a penis.”
“Yeah.”
She grabs her phone and hands it to me. “Here, pick one you don’t think is a sexual deviant or married, or a serial killer for goodness sake.” I take it. “Now give me yours.”
“I don’t think-”
“Kat and Carrie,” she says still holding her hand out. “Not Katherine and Mom-ster.” I feel my eyes widen. “Don’t act like it’s a shock. I know you and Darby call me that behind my back.”
“She told you that?” I’m shocked.
“There was a baby monitor under her bed until she was ten.”
“That is so damn wrong,” I say because it is, and because I am wondering what else she heard.
“She used to walk in her sleep and have nightmares,” she shrugs. “I won’t apologize for trying to keep my child safe.”
I don’t say anything because I feel that she’s being sincere. I also sure as hell, don’t want to discuss what else was said.
“The other reason I came,” she says redirecting the conversation to where we had veered off track. “Your trust fund.”
“My what?”
“When your father passed we had life insurance. I was very careful with the money for the year it was just you and I. When Sam and I married, we put half of it in a trust fund for you. There is quite a substantial amount in there.”
“Is that how you bought the house on the beach?” I ask because my mother had no money of her own. Sam worked outside of the home. He worked full time as an accountant and a few hours a week at the Catholic school helping with curriculum development.
She nods. “Sam was not happy with me.”
“It’s not Sam’s money,” I say.
She nods. “I know.”
She looks away and there is sadness in her eyes that I rarely see.
“Hey Mom?”
She turns back and smiles. “Yes?”
“Who’s that smile brought to us by?”
“Confusion?” she giggles.
“What does Sam say about Darby’s pot issue?” She doesn’t answer. “Mom?”
“I told him it was mine.”
“Come again?” She rolls her eyes. “Did you just say you told him it was yours?”
“He was so angry, the look on his face when he walked out of the bedroom,” she pauses and shakes her head. “I never wanted her to see him look at her that way, so I-”
“Are you kidding me?” I gasp.
She shakes her head no.
“You have to tell him the truth,” I almost yell at her.
“No.”
“Mom, be serious.”
“I n
ever want any man to look at his daughter the way he looked at me. That’s not something you get over.”
“Why would he even believe it was yours?”
“I found it, and put it in my dresser drawer.”
“Why was he in your dresser drawer?”
She looks away.
“Come on, you found a laundry basket full of plastic peens, if that’s what he was going for—”
She laughed. “He would have died.” She laughs harder. “Oh my good Lord, he would have died.”
“Shitty sex life?” I can’t help but ask, I mean that would explain some of her issues.
“Katherine,” she scolds.
“Kat,” I correct.
“He’s not your father, that’s for sure.”
“Okay, that may be TMI.”
“Your father was the love of my life. Every girl in the neighborhood wanted to be his and all he wanted was me.”
“But he got shit faced every day?”
“He stopped for drinks more than he should have, that’s for sure. That day, it was much longer than usual.”
“Why?”
She shrugs. “I’ll never know and Kat, I know he loved us, so it wasn’t us.”
“I never said it was.” I look down.
“But I’m sure you thought maybe he needed a break from me. Maybe I drove him as crazy as I do you. Heck, maybe you’re right.”
“Like you said, we’ll never know. But Mom, I know he loved you.”
“God, so do I.”
The sadness in her voice is almost contagious.
“And Sam?”
She shrugs. “Sam, your Dad, and I grew up near each other. I was the only reason they were friends. Sam’s love isn’t the same. Sam’s love comes with, strings.”
“He left the priesthood for you.”
“He said he only became a priest because of me. He told me that two days after we buried your father.”
****
That night I lay in bed with a new found clarity into why Carrie, Mom, Mom-ster was the way she was.
Men, who needs them? They fuck everything up.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Tattoo Tuesday
Juggling three cups of Dunkin’ in my hands, I unlock the door to the shop and kick it closed it behind me. That’s the problem with sleeping past ten in the morning, I just couldn’t sleep anymore and now, I’m here two hours before opening. Normally when I open on Tuesdays, I was the last person to walk out on Saturday. I know shit’s in place.
Wednesdays, depending on how swamped they were, were usually a much different story. Men just don’t take care of things like women do.
I walk down the narrow corridor to the break room and open the door to put the lunch Mom insisted on making in the refrigerator. When I close it and turn around I nearly jump out of my skin.
“Joe.” I cover my chest thinking my heart may bang out of it. “You scared the shit out of me.”
“I’m sorry dear,” she smiles. “I was hoping to be here early to have some things set up before talking to you.”
“Everything okay?”
She turns and waves her hand for me to follow her.
Josephina Steel is a couple years older than my mother but to me she appears less… motherly. Even in the days before she and her sons inherited an ass load of money, Josephina Steel was always put together beautifully.
We sit down at the reception desk and she pulls an envelope towards her.
“My sons, their wives, and my fiancé love this place.”
I nod.
“We love this place and it will always be part of us.”
“Of course.”
“There is a problem.”
“Okay.”
“We don’t believe we put in enough time here to call it ours, but we are not willing to sell it because we are selfish asses and want to be able to come,” she pauses, “home whenever we have the itch.”
I nod, because I already know this.
“But, we don’t want to profit from it anymore. We would like for it to be yours.”
“Mine?” I look at her like she’s nuts.
“You’ve been here the longest,” she says with a smile.
“Ricco has been here almost as long.” I almost snap at her. She smiles and sits back. “It’s a lot of responsibility. I don’t like responsibility.”
“Ricco will be here,” she says calmly.
“I don’t think he will.” I’m dead serious.
“We’ve spoke to him. He came to dinner Sunday night, him and Natalia.”
“Baby Momma number?” I joke.
She looks at me funny. “Natalia is his daughter.”
“Huh,” I shrug.
“You’ve never met her?”
“No.”
“He’s never brought her in?” She acts shocked which confuses me. This is work, not romper room. “It doesn’t matter,” she waves her hand through the air.
“Joe, people like you. You like people. Me being an owner, not such a good idea.”
She laughs. “Kat, you have referrals and repeat customers the same as Ricco and the boys do. I’m sure with a smile you’d have the men lined up down the street.”
“That’s the point, I don’t care to smile. Hell, I don’t like men, or women for that matter. I am not a businesswoman. I’m an artist. Being an artist means it’s okay that I’m moody and pissed off half the time.”
“It also means you’re passionate about what you do and Kat, you’re talented.”
“Hell, I won’t argue that, but the whole business owner thing, that’s not a good idea,” I sigh.
“Ricco is going through some things,” she says looking at me as if trying to figure out if I know what she’s talking about.
“He has a dick problem, a baby momma problem. I know, he gets served court papers all the time.” She tilts her head and looks confused. “Shit you didn’t know?”
She doesn’t answer the question. “When that is all said and done, he will be partner in the business and we’ll sign off. For now, it’s you and me.” She looks at her watch and stands up. “The notary will be here in thirty minutes, just sign and we’re all set.”
Before I have a chance to formulate a fuck no, in a way the woman I respect deserves one formulated, a little less fuck and a more stern no, she is walking out the front door.
“What the fuck just happened?” I say to… no one.
****
It’s been one hell of a day. Tattoo Tuesday, every motherfucker out there was coming in for ink, but nothing exciting. Words, feelings, phrases, blah.
The day I am forced to sign some stupid paper that literally made me feel like I was being tied down and not in a hot way, in a way that made me… responsible. It also happened to be the day I couldn’t be creative, that Ricco called Zack to tell him he’d be late, and that for some reason I wasn’t able to use getting messages from pervs to distract me in that way either.
Today sucked big hairy balls.
The phone rings at five o’clock and it’s Mom. “Hello.”
“Hello, Mace is here and we are going to meet you for Taco Tuesday.” She sounds excited, but fuck if I’m not annoyed. Did she say Mace? Did she use my nickname for one of my best friends and am I really so juvenile to be annoyed by this?
Maybe…
No, I wouldn’t be annoyed, that’s a feeling and feelings are nonsense. Mom is a woman. She is a woman that had shitty sex for years, Mom-ster or not, I am on her side.
“Kat?”
And she’s calling me Kat.
“Yeah, okay.”
“See you then?”
“Hey, are you driving or is she?”
“Why?” she asks.
“Just ask her if she took a 420 break.”
I hear Mom cover the phone receiver to speak to Macey, she sounds like Charlie Brown’s teacher. I hear Macey’s mumble, but can’t make out anything except she seems annoyed. Oh well. Macey likes to partake once in a while, I’m n
ot one to judge, but well… I judge.
“She told me to say, you’re a dick, and no she didn’t.”
“Tell her she’s a twat and I’ll see you both soon.”
“I love you, Katherine.”
“I love you too Mom-ster,” I say because I am annoyed that she’ll be pissed if I don’t return the sentiment. I throw in the Mom-ster because I need to annoy her for, well, annoying me.
I toss my phone on the reception desk, close my eyes and lean back.
It’s quiet, I have no one scheduled. I could leave but Ricco is running late. He never runs late.
I sit up and look at my phone, he hasn’t texted, or called the shop.
“Kat, we got this, go ahead.” I look over my shoulder at Zack.
I should tell him to suck my dick, that I’m his boss and now I actually have an excuse to tell him to mind his damn business, but do I? No. Why? It’s easier to ignore him.
I lean forward and look at my phone. I hit the Match Up app and click on daily matches.
@TallhotPro pops up first
He’s six foot tall, dark hair and eyes and has some ink. Well, four stars down his arm, that’s a start.
His About Me says:
I’m a triple threat. You better be cute, hot, and ready for a man whose hot, cut, and able. You aren’t, you’re out.
I see an option to send him a message, so I do.
You aren’t that cute, you have shitty ass ink that could easily be found in a Crackerjack box, and why the fuck is it her job to be ready? Don’t answer. I just wanted you to know you’re a dick.
Next is @joco69.
He’s five foot eleven, bald, blue eyes, and a nose that looks like it’s been hit a few times.
A message pops up.
@joco69: I see you checked me out. How about a number.
Kat: No fucking way.
@joco69: lol why not, you’re beautiful.
Kat: Because you’re not.
@joco69: Not beautiful, but handsome and hung.
Kat: Don’t care.
I x him out and click on my messages.
@rider1: Hope you’re having a great day.
@rider1: Must be busy.
@rider1: Who the hell have you pissed off babe? LMFAO, look at the messages under your pics.
I click on my profile picture. I notice five more pictures of me are posted.
I’m gonna kill Macey. I scroll down, and I’m gonna kill Steph. Bitches put those pictures up.
When I get to the last one it’s me at five years old in a fucking tutu, and now I’m gonna kill my mother.
