by Linda Opdyke
“Matty,” she said softly, bending down. “Is everything…”
The child threw himself into her arms, wrapped small arms around her neck and buried his head in her shoulder. “Can I stay with you tonight?”
Jack stood stock still, knowing for certain that the event Kelly Jo came back to change had to now be within hours of happening. How could he possibly know if any choice that he made or was about to make during this critical point in time would be the right one? What if he made the wrong choice or choices and his actions only made the catastrophic event that Kelly Jo caused that much worse?
For the first time, real fear gripped him.
Chapter Thirty One
“Of course you can,” Kelly Jo said with soft assurance. “Does he know you left?”
Matty shook his head with it still buried in Kelly Jo’s shoulder, and answered, “He’s…sleeping,” which Jack took, from the unhappy, hesitant way it was said, to mean ‘he passed out’. Matty raised his head to look at Jack. “I’m sorry, Dean. I know I promised to try to be quiet and stay out of the way.”
Jack swallowed hard, his voice temporarily lost. Seems everyone recognized him as Dean. Was this little boy apologizing to him for somehow being a problem or trouble? “You’re always welcome to be in the way, kiddo,” he joked and gently ruffled the boy’s hair. Why was this child here, what role would he play and how did it involve Jack?
Kelly Jo raised up and so did Matty, but he took Kelly Jo’s hand. Kelly Jo threw Jack an odd look then smiled at Matty and led him into the living room. “You’re never in the way, Matty, and you know we’re always happy to see you. Anytime.”
Kelly Jo sat Matty on the dark green sofa and then bent down, her hands on her knees. “It’s late, honey, have you had dinner? Are you hungry?”
“I had a bowl of cereal,” he answered, and Jack saw the lean look of someone who rarely has what most people would consider steady meals. “I can wait until breakfast,” he said politely, but Kelly Jo was already on her way to the kitchen and gestured for Jack to follow.
She grabbed bread, peanut butter and grape jelly and a small plate while Jack waited for her to speak. She instructed, “Pour a half glass of milk,” and he did. When she’d started making the sandwich she finally looked over at him. “Please don’t go down there,” she said in a softly pleading voice. “Matty let it slip the last time that his father took it out on him when you showed him sympathy and kindness. I think Charlie Bradford has been through a really tough time since his wife ran off and left him and Matty, and I think he’s insecure and jealous of your easy relationship with Matty. I think it’s best if you let me continue as the go-between with your rent. I’m not sure it’s a good idea for you to have another face-to-face with him, even if he’s sober enough this time to remember you. He’s unpredictable with Matty…sometimes he tries to act like a real father…other times…” she trailed.
Jack stood silently. So the boy lived in the downstairs apartment, and Dean, the persona that Jack had assumed, or, rather, that he’d been dropped into, in the basement apartment. He didn’t know why or how, but he was sure the unfolding events would revolve around, or at the very least, include, Matty. Was Matty supposed to die and Kelly Jo saved him? Was he supposed to live and her actions got the little boy killed instead? He frowned, lost in thought while Kelly Jo watched his face. Robert had said that Kelly Jo caused someone to die that wasn’t supposed to die, and his gut feeling was that this child’s life was on course to end tonight, and he guessed the tragedy would come from violence at his father’s hand. He fought off welling tears. How could he stand by and do nothing if he was right, if he saw that unfolding in front of him? And, he thought with growing anger, if he had been a natural part of this long ago event from the outset, why the hell hadn’t Robert told him that fact or enabled his memory of it? Instead, all the big angel had done was warn him not to help Kelly Jo and that if he was unsuccessful at stopping her, he was absolutely not to interfere when the events began. One thought he tried to block completely was that he, Jack, had actually caused this little boy’s death and that’s why Robert wouldn’t allow him to remember, in order to eliminate any possibility of Jack altering what was the fated path.
“Answer me, please,” Kelly Jo insisted, snapping Jack back to reality. “Why did you say what you did and make Matty think that he’s in the way up here? He was telling you that he did what he promised you, that he tries to be quiet and avoid any argument with his father whenever he can. I could tell by how his face dropped that he was crushed. He adores you.”
“I…I…I’m sorry,” he said, taking the plate with the finished sandwich from her. “I didn’t mean it that way…”
Kelly Jo’s smile was soft. “I know you didn’t, and I don’t think you’ll have too much trouble soothing his bruised feelings. It’s just that he hears so many bad things downstairs and this apartment has become the only safe haven for him, especially when he needs to hide out for a little while.”
They went to the living room and stood in front of the little boy who had curled up and fallen fast asleep on the sofa.
“Matty,” Kelly Jo called quietly, but Jack stopped her.
“Let him sleep. Poor kid looked exhausted and if he’s hungry enough he’ll wake up and he can eat then.” He sighed and took the plate and milk back to the kitchen. After putting the glass in the refrigerator he returned to the living room and found Kelly Jo seated on the floor by one of the long windows, her elbows propped on the window seat, staring out into the night.
He glanced over at the sleeping child then sat beside Kelly Jo, ignoring the wing chair in favor of the floor. “I wish we could help,” he began, hoping she would say something, anything that would help him untangle what was happening to all of them.
Kelly Jo took a long breath, then expelled it. Her, “I think we did enough last time,” was tinged with sarcasm. She didn’t elaborate and Jack hoped whatever ‘they’ did last time didn’t result in anything severe aimed at Matty, but he suspected it did. Gloom settled on his mood.
Without warning Kelly Jo threw herself into Jack’s arms, her voice choked up as she lay her face on his chest. “What am I going to do if Charlie comes up here again, Dean? How do I stop him this time if you’re not here?”
Stunned, Jack pulled her close and lowered his head to rest on the top of hers, breathing in her unexpected sweetness even as her ponytail tickled his nose. “We’ll figure something out,” he assured her with much more conviction that he felt.
Stop him…from doing what? To whom?
Chapter Thirty Two
“And I am here right now,” Jack said with quiet force and his arms tightened around the softness of her body, something that felt so good and so natural it almost made him uneasy, as he wondered again if Robert had blocked out his memory of a life as Dean. A happy, love filled life with Kelly Jo was an unbidden thought. “Nothing is going to happen to anyone.” Except a sick feeling had landed dead in the bottom of his gut, for he knew that the soothing, assuring words he’d just spoken were an outright lie. A lie he would give anything to convert to truth.
Kelly Jo pulled back to search his eyes. “I know he has the right to come up here and take Matty anytime he wants, Dean. He’s done it so many times already and that scares me to death. When you’re not here I can’t stop him…I don’t have the easy, persuasive way with words that you do or an imposing physical presence. He’s so…unpredictable.” The strong passion of her desire to protect the little boy darkened her sky blue eyes. “If only Charlie would try to make them a real family again, before it’s too late. I can only imagine how heartbreaking it is to have your wife walk out on you, for a small child to be abandoned by his mother, but…”
“You can’t control other people’s actions,” he reminded her. “Or guarantee their behavior, or make them do what you want, when you want…”
Her sudden giggle cut him off.
He eyed her. “I said something funny?”
&nb
sp; “No, I just remembered that you still owe me an explanation.”
“Oh.”
She sat up and moved to where she sat cross-legged directly in front of him. After a glance to reassure herself that Matty remained sound asleep curled up on the couch, she directed to Jack, “As much as I don’t want to hear this, I can’t wait to hear it.”
“Sure,” he said slowly, then said, “Tell me exactly what you remember and I’ll pick it up from there.” Please let me be as creative with inventive storytelling as she is with her crazy con jobs, he thought wildly, but his face remained placid.
She frowned. “I already told you. I don’t remember anything after I met you downtown for dinner and a walk in the park.”
“Well,” he began, evaluating the possible scenarios that raced through his mind. Then he smiled. “You’re right,” he said with an impish grin. “It was payback for that awful Cafe poetry reading episode.”
“I knew it!” she cried softly.
He raised his hand. “Not what you think and not nearly as bad you’re thinking, though you did have payback coming, big time.” He held the gaze of those blue eyes steady, trying to keep laughter from his own eyes. Due to her complete loss of memory Kelly Jo had no idea exactly how much payback she had coming and what absolute pleasure it would give Jack to provide it, but this particular payback would only be made-up and only as extensive as his imagination allowed him to go.
“Do you remember what happened in the park?”
Her look was wary but she admitted to a guarded, “No.”
Cool, Jack thought. Maybe I can pull this off after all.
“I know you remember that we had dinner first at that new place, Fogerty’s or something like that, on the other side of the park.”
She shook her head.
“Oh, wow,” he told her quietly, delighted that she hadn’t immediately informed him there was no such place. “You really did blank everything out.”
Irritated, she asked, “What about the restaurant?”
“I’ve never seen champagne effect anyone so quickly,” he said with a straight face.
Her eyes narrowed with suspicion. “I don’t remember drinking champagne.”
He sighed. “I’m not surprised. You downed nearly a whole bottle.”
She drew back in surprise. “And exactly why would I do that?”
“Celebration.”
“Of?”
“Your promotion at work.”
Her head jerked back and she glared at him, then jumped to her feet, the faint shine of tears clouding her eyes. “You’ve shown me a lot of sides of yourself, Dean, but mean was never one of them and I’d never have believed this of you. Did you think because it’s been a week since I got fired that I’m okay with you making fun of it?”
He sat stock still while she walked to the sofa to check on Matty, at a total loss for words for his indescribable, and in her opinion, despicable, error in judgment. He wasn’t even comforted that her con artist skills far outshone those of his pitiful creative storytelling. Letting her know she was a much better liar than him was something that normally might make him smug. He unquestionably was not feeling smug, in any way, shape or form. The hint of tears in her eyes because of his words shamed him.
Faint, lyrical sounds reached his ears and when he turned he realized she was seated next to the still curled up, still sleeping Matty, gently pushing his hair from his face and singing softly to him. Kelly Jo’s voice held him spellbound and, fascinated, he couldn’t look away from her, even as she sang two more short songs and a lullaby. Not because of an incredibly beautiful, pure sound that she made, one capable of holding captive any audience and bringing a thunderous ovation from an entire auditorium.
Because it was the most God-awful thing he’d ever heard.
Coming from Kelly Jo. The girl whose voice had wowed everyone, including him, and resulted in her walking away with, and giving to Wiley, the two hundred dollar contest prize.
He was absolutely flabbergasted. Hands down, it was the worst out-of-tune, tone deaf singing he’d ever heard, start to finish, note for note. What the hell was going on?
Jack jumped when the wall telephone rang. It was a sound he wasn’t real familiar with, since, until very recently, he’d been living in the golden age of cell phones.
Exasperated, Kelly Jo hissed, “Answer that before it wakes Matty up!”
Dutifully, Jack hurried to the kitchen and grabbed the avocado green phone from its cradle, hoping it wasn’t someone calling for him, someone he’d have a hard time explaining to them that he not only didn’t know who they were, he also didn’t care. He had other, much more important things to worry about.
“Hello,” he said into the mouthpiece, fully prepared to launch into an ‘I’m busy I’ll call you back’ speech.
“Meet me out front,” Robert said curtly. “NOW.”
Chapter Thirty Three
Jack put the phone back into the receiver, his mind racing. Was it all about to come down, was it happening now and Robert had ordered Jack outside so that he couldn’t interfere with fate and its dark intent? His heart sank, wondering if a drunken Charlie Whitman was about to come upstairs looking for Matty and all hell was about to break loose. There was no way Jack was leaving Kelly Jo and Matty here alone, without his protection.
“Who was it?” Kelly Jo asked. “Why did you hang up?”
“Wrong number,” he said lightly, and thought, I know I’m going to be screwed as far as Robert and his hammer of doom but I’m not going outside.
“NOW”, the James Earl Jones sounding voice commanded directly in his ear.
Kelly Jo was looking at him funny and Matty’s breathing seemed as though stopped. Then Jack realized that they were both unmoving, frozen in time and place. He whirled, looking for Robert, but he remained alone.
“NOW” reverberated around him and then hung in the air like the word had solidity.
With no choice, he nodded.
The room restarted, returned to normal movement and Kelly Jo asked, “What’s wrong, Dean? You look funny.”
His smile was forced, but he kept his tone light. “I…I just need a little air. I’ll be right back. Yell if you need me, okay?”
She smiled and as Jack left the apartment he heard her singing once again to Matty. It had not been his imagination. Her voice was the most God-awful thing he’d ever heard. He couldn’t stop the paranoia building about his own voice, couldn’t help himself. He stopped on the landing just long enough to see if his own singing had taken the same sharp left turn that hers had taken. In a low voice he sang the first few bars of his song, the one that had been playing on the radio right before Kelly Jo decided that his place was as her sidekick in Never Never Land.
His knees almost buckled with relief. Thank God! He didn’t sound anything like her. His voice was exactly as it was before. Now feeling sheepish and just a little bit vain, he glanced around to make sure no one had witnessed or listened. All clear. He hurried out the front door and down the concrete porch steps, looking to the side and into the shadows for Robert.
The night air had changed. The moon was now behind clouds and not even a stray beam of pale light broke through the thick gathering billows. Traffic noises flowing along the front of the house had blocked out the low rumbles of thunder that promised a coming deluge, but so far no lightning threatened.
Jack blew out a breath, wondering if he should call out to Robert or simply wait for the angry angel to pounce. He didn’t have to wait long.
He jumped at the stern “What do you think you’re doing?” that came from behind him, from the shadows of a huge evergreen.
“Do you have to sneak up on me like that?” Jack demanded, peering into the dark areas around the swaying pine tree.
Robert stepped away from the evergreen that had concealed him.
To Jack’s surprise, Robert still wore the biker gear, though minus the hat. He cocked his head and looked the question at Robert.
“I like it,” Robert said flatly. “Case closed and no opinions welcomed or tolerated.”
Jack raised both hands in a sign of peace and said, “Hey, we all have our…”
“Don’t play games with me, Jack, and it would be wise not to act patronizing or cute or anything else that might offend me. I asked you what you think you’re doing.”
“Yeah,” Jack cried in exasperation. “And as soon as you tell me what the hell is going on here maybe I’ll know what the hell I think I’m doing and I can share it with you.”
“You’re not funny.”
“Maybe not, but I’m sure getting pissed. Are you really going to stand around with your thumb up…and allow that little boy to die?”
Robert cocked his head at Jack, a thoughtful expression only fleetingly masking his very evident annoyance. “It’s not my decision who lives and whose time has ended.”
Jack fought the combination of fury and misery that ripped through him. Had Robert just confirmed Jack’s fear for Matty? “Whose time has ended?” he echoed. “This is how you describe the life of a little boy? A little boy who won’t see the sun rise tomorrow or sit in school and wish he’d played hooky and gone fishing instead?” His heart broke at the thought of how Matty lived in perpetual sadness, but even more at the thought of his never getting the chance to experience the ups, down, good, bad and ugly of growing out of childhood, through the pains and pangs of adolescence and then into adulthood. Fatherhood.
Robert frowned. “I read your thoughts, Jack. And they make me wonder if all this is simply transferring your own grief at losing life so young, at the dawn of a promising career.”
“No,” Jack said flatly. “It’s about Matty. And I intend to help Kelly Jo change the course of what’s supposed to happen tonight.”
Robert’s voice was quiet but Jack noticed the wind roared a little louder when he spoke. “It’s also not Kelly Jo’s choice who lives and whose time has ended. I wouldn’t be so quick to rush in to help her without all the facts.”
