Maple Sundaes & CIder Donuts

by Olivia Gaines

  “You are evading. You are intentionally evading my questions about you and Rick. He hated you enough to try and kill me! He didn’t try to kill you but me,” she said, looking at him as if he’d sprouted a horn in the middle of his forehead. “Start talking, damn it!”

  “Leta, there is nothing to tell,” Evan said. “Rick has always rubbed me the wrong way, and with the fear I saw in Ellie’s eyes, I knew he’d done something or tried to do something to her, but she couldn’t tell me and she never told anyone else. If she did, it never got out. Aunt Evelyn has never been quite right in the head after all the drugs and years of abuse from Uncle Taylor. The answers you want I truly don’t have.”

  “And you completely shut down, hiding behind a desk and passing out stickers for boats and license plates,” she countered. “This craziness has impacted and stunted your growth as well. Don’t you see that? The moment you started to laugh, your co-workers thought you were having a stroke since they’ve never heard that sound come from your mouth. Not normal. This is not normal at all.”

  Evan’s eyes grew wide. “You allowed a woman with glowing green eyes to rub baby making oil all over your belly and you want to talk to me about normal? None of this shit is fucking normal, but you were my chance to shove it all at them. Our chance to not let them win, isn’t that what you told me? I’m sick of them winning. I want to be happy. I deserve you. I deserve this.”

  “You’re right, we do deserve it, but there needs to be a cleansing of your spirit,” she told Evan, rubbing her hand across his shoulders. “Evan, what is in the garage?”

  His bottom lip trembled. She’d hit home, finally breaking through the years of muck that he’d hidden under to keep from seeing the dirt under his nails. Water formed in his eyes and he looked up to keep the tears from falling. He never mentioned the garage to anyone, not his father, and definitely not his mother.

  “I don’t know. I never went in. My father told me to never go inside. And I didn’t,” Evan said his eyes tearing. “Rick stayed with us a while, after Uncle Taylor beat him pretty bad, but he never spoke of any of it and neither did I.”

  Leta’s eyes teared as well. Between the emotional damage of his mother’s depression, Rick’s unbalanced childhood and being surrounded by sadness, she began to understand Evan keeping to himself. The protective barrier formed around him kept him safe from harm.

  “After Rick went back home, he and Aunt Evelyn started going to church. Uncle Taylor started getting sicker and sicker, and he died one Sunday morning. It was an Easter morning. The same morning Rick and Evelyn were being baptized. I’ll never forget it,” he said, wiping away a wayward tear. “I returned to New York to finish college, then grad school, and came home one summer, and the Town Clerk cut herself and they gave me the job. Fifteen years later and I’m still here.”

  “You’ve never dated anyone in this town in fifteen years? I’m trying to wrap my brain around so much of this,” Leta said.

  “I never dated anyone in this town, but I did date as far away as Manchester. The women in this town have a darkness surrounding their spirits and it’s heavy, like my mother’s depression,” he confessed. “I didn’t want the women in this town to know me. It may be stupid on my part. I wanted to break the cycle and be a different kind of man.”

  “I can respect that,” Leta said, moving closer, nearly sitting in his lap. “Are there any other surprises I need to know about or secrets you want to share?”

  His cheeks burned crimson when he looked at her, and the sheepish look on his face encouraged Leta to find out what he was hiding. His nose scrunched up a bit when he looked at his wife out the corner of his eye. He’d bared his soul so one more secret wasn’t going to hurt.

  “I like it when the tip of the tongue is inserted into the head of my pee hole,” Evan said, stretching his eyes wide.

  “Jesus hold my hand!” Leta said, scowling at him.

  “Aww man, please tell me you don’t think that’s too weird because it truly flips me the hell on and turns me into this ramrodding sex machine,” he said, waggling his brows.

  “The tip of the tongue, huh?”

  He nodded his head up and down while providing a cheese-eating grin. Evan reached for his belt buckle hoping to prove his point watching her face to see if she would make him stop. Leta didn’t. She gave her husband what he asked for and she wasn’t disappointed in the least.

  The ramrodding sex machine had to dial it down a few notches since the recipient of all that energy had been bounced upside down in a vehicle earlier in the day. However, she wasn’t afraid of a bit more jostling. As far as Evan Eaton was concerned, life with Leta was going to be grand.

  She still needed to talk to him about her business idea, but it could wait. There was plenty of time to discuss the puzzle pieces that continued to come together.

  AT HALF PAST THE HOUR of eight, the television screens flashed with breaking news on a developing story. Claudia Tackett was sitting in the Charlotte Airport, waiting for a connecting flight when the news flashed a story of a Pastor in Meredith, New Hampshire arrested for an orgy with local teenagers over the age of 18. Blue eyes watched the screen as she identified the man she’d met in Mexico last year and had seen again last week when she was in Cabo with Kevin. Rick Goodson, Evan Eaton’s cousin.

  “Well, crap,” Claudia said, watching the story unfold. The news reported that the vehicle he had used to try and kill his cousin’s wife, Leta Eaton, had been recovered from an old family barn loaded with crystal meth. The reporter talked to the camera, confirming the older model Chevy had paint chips on it from Ms. Eaton’s vehicle where Pastor Goodson had attempted to run her off the road earlier in the day. “Holy fuck!”

  Claudia was on her feet pacing the floor. Leta had gone to New Hampshire to marry Evan. That’s why she wasn’t answering my calls. The man who paid Claudia to pretend to want to marry Evan and leave him high and dry had been his cousin. All of the trickery done to get the land that Evan lived on.

  He had tried to kill Leta.

  Had she been married to Evan, that madman would have tried to kill her.

  “New Hampshire isn’t for me,” Claudia said, picking up her bag and heading to the counter to change her ticket to return to Atlanta. “I’ve had a change of plans. I’m going home to Atlanta.”

  Leta could have that life. If she no longer wanted to talk to her, good riddance. It still pissed her off the way Leta had handled the matter and didn’t have the common courtesy to speak with her woman to woman, but at least no one had tried to run her off a cliff. As far as Claudia was concerned, she’d dodged a bullet and would leave the sleeping dog on the cold front porch in New Hampshire.

  “Serves her right,” Claudia said, putting her ticket on the counter. “They deserve each other.”

  Chapter Seventeen – Mellowness

  Trevor Feldman was everything that Leta had hated about the dating scene in Atlanta. Her brother was tall, dark, handsome, well-educated, and gainfully employed. He was the trifecta in a race he didn’t bother to register in as a runner yet he was winning. Women flocked to him even when his ‘I have a big dick’ monitor wasn’t flashing. It also didn’t help that he exuded confidence which easily read as he had money. Trevor was sugar to a mound of ants. Leta hated more than anything that he knew it and could pick and choose who, where, and how he spent his time, but as a woman, she didn’t have the same option.

  All morning, she’d been in a foul mood. The tow truck company pulled the rental from the lake and delivered it to the house right at seven in the morning. This was also the same time Evan came inside from his morning row, thinking he would get a second row on the soft cotton sheets with his wife, but that too was halted at the arrival of Leta’s Pod and her personal vehicle. To add insult to impending piles of injury, she received a text from Claudia which simply read, “Fuck you and Evan.”

  Her phone rang, and it was her brother Trevor, who gleefully informed her that he would be arriving two hours earlier th
an expected in Manchester and couldn’t wait to see her.

  Evan asked, “Honey, everything alright?”

  Leta showed him the message from Claudia, which made him laugh. She pointed at the POD, her car and the crunched up rental, and in a hearty exhalation of breath informed her husband, “My brother is landing in an hour, so I have to go to Manchester to pick him up.”

  “What do you want me to do or how can I help?”

  “Kiss me and tell me I’m pretty,” she said, poking out her bottom lip.

  Per his wife’s request, he pulled her into his arms, squeezing gently and kissing her on the mouth, deepening the connection and letting go. He exhaled breath that could have used a bit of mouthwash and said, “Damn, I’m pretty.”

  “I can’t with you this morning,” she told him, playfully swatting at him with a dishtowel.

  “Maybe I can put in an order and you can tonight?”

  “Hopefully with Trevor’s help, I can get a lot of this rearranged and ready for your parents’ arrival on Saturday. If we can move into the new bedroom, your parents can take that one. Trevor can go in the guest room down the hall,” she said, looking around. I have a queen bed that can go in the new bedroom, just in case, so there’s that. Hey, how do you feel about this couch going on the front porch?”

  “I thought maybe you’d want some Adirondacks.”

  “Those would work better around the fire pit. If I see a few on my way back, I will grab some,” she said.

  “Do you need any money?”

  Leta smiled. Outside of her father or her brother, she’d never dated a man who asked the question. Either they handed her a few bills to cover what was needed, but to actually ask, to see if she needed any was refreshing. “No, I have a few bucks in the bank.”

  “Okay, I’m going to work half a day today and half a day tomorrow and be here by the time you and Trevor, is that right, get back.”

  “Trevor. I think you two will get on well,” she proposed, hoping her words would ring true.

  “Get a move on, Mrs. Eaton. I don’t want you speeding trying to make up lost minutes,” Evan said, passing the purse and keys to her. “Text me when you get there and text me when you’re heading back, or better yet, call me so I can hear your voice. Your car has hands free talking, right?”

  “It does, Husband. You’re so sweet,” she replied as he pushed her out the door. She waved at him as she climbed inside her own personal vehicle, happy to be behind the wheel, half eaten French fries, and wasted sweet tea in the cup holder which had started to grow mold from the high sugar content. “There is nothing like having your own.”

  Leta set off down the hill, going slower as she came upon the intersection where she was broadsided yesterday while horns honked behind her. It was a reflexive action, but she didn’t plan to take any chances. She drove down the hill, connecting with Daniel Webster Highway and driving out of town towards Manchester. An hour later, she arrived at the airport to find her brother waiting outside, leaning against a pole, dressed as if he’d stepped out of GQ Magazine, and women fluttering around him as if his penis held the elixir of life.

  “Good grief, can you be left alone for five minutes?” she asked, rolling down the window. Three women scattered to the wind and the fourth one still wanted to take her shot and slipped a business card to Trevor. The woman even dared to offer Leta a smile as she walked away. “Please tell me she knew I was your sister?”

  “I didn’t say anything to her one way or another. I just walked out the door and stopped to check my messages and the time. Plus, you’re late,” he said, opening the back door and slipping his carry-on luggage onto the backseat. “Hey, Big Head.”

  “Hello, Big Brother,” she said. “How was the flight?”

  “White as hell. How is the husband?”

  “White as hell, but adorable and I love him,” she replied, laughing.

  “Can’t wait to meet him, but more importantly, I can’t wait to hear how, why, what the fuck you were thinking, and have you heard from Claudia, Mom is going to kill you, and Daddy is going to punch your pink husband in the throat,” Trevor said in one big whoosh of air.

  “Trevor, did you come to gloat?”

  “No, I came to take photos to post on social media,” he said, looking out the window. “You know what this reminds me of...Minnesota.”

  “No, downtown Minnesota is greyish. Everything feels grey from being under snow for so many months per year. There is color and life here. Lots and lots of life,” Leta corrected.

  “And this is to be your life. I’m curious and looking for a change myself. I can ski, I like to fish, this may be a way of life for me,” Trevor said.

  “How do you know I want you to follow me here? I came to get away from my life. You are just like Mom. I mean I love you both dearly, but my God, you both treat me as if you have to be present in my every move to make sure I don’t screw up my life,” Leta said, putting on the blinker and merging into the traffic.

  “Can’t I miss my sister and want to be present for the birth of my nephew, niece, or a blonde haired, high yellow child you plan to have? Forgive me for wanting to be a part of your life, Sis,” Trevor said.

  She sighed, making a left out of the airport and driving to the interstate. If she pushed it, they could be in Meredith in forty-five minutes. Maybe stop at Mabel’s for lunch and swing by the Town Clerk’s office if she pushed it.

  “I’m sorry, Trevor. I would be happy to have you about, but my Lord, it has been nice to make decisions and not have Mom over my shoulder second guessing me. Or to have Claudia breathing down my neck about my life choices or making comparisons to how screwed up my life is, while she’s screwing everything that has a seven-figure income,” Leta said. “For once, I feel free.”

  “Have you heard from Claudia?”

  “Look at my phone. Password is your birthday. She sent me a message,” Leta said, entering the interstate and getting to cruising speed.

  “Wow, that is harsh,” he replied, looking at the message. “So, you finally spoke to her about your marriage, I take it.”

  “Nope, haven’t talked to her, and honestly, I don’t need to explain myself to Claudia, you, or our parents. Evan is my husband. Moreover, he is a good guy. He wants to be married, but more importantly, he wants to be married to me and to start a family. There are no hidden agendas. No string of late-night text messages. He goes to work, and he comes home to his wife,” she said with a fierce pride.

  “And...you’ve been married a week, so take a seat, Sis. All of this is new and fun and exciting to the pink man with a new brown toy, but when he is placed in a situation with his very brown children against a man he’s known all his life calling them a nigger, then we can talk about your life with him,” Trevor said. “No, I’m not trying to rain on your parade, but this is no different than when you organized the block yard sale. It was exciting until the day of and the work which came after. Leta, there is always work after the newness wears off.”

  “Well, I might be pregnant already, so there is no backing out now,” she said, looking over at her brother.

  “You do go full throttle when you start to mash the gas pedal. I can give you that, but someone who shares your blood and looks like you has to be nearby to let that fucker know, you aren’t alone in this world, as well as his boys and any other yahoos around that want to sneak in the back door when they know he’s gone hunting,” Trevor said. “Men are...territorial. They will come and piss on your porch and let your woman smell it for days, then show up when your man leaves to check and see if you want what they have to offer.”

  “Oh my God, who are you and where is my brother?” Leta said, glancing at him from the side of her eye.

  “Leta, I work with these kinds of men. I wear the brand on my chest bearing the mark of a frat with a few brothers who are these kinds of men. There will be three men that will walk through your front door, come back and assault you, and dare you to tell your man,” Trevor said. “I’m s
ingle for a reason. There are a lot of damaged women out there carrying the burden of another wolf pissing on the doorstep and them failing to tell their man when it happened. The relationships fall apart, and the women are never the same. I need to be close to ensure these men know you have a brother and don’t fuck with my sister.”

  “You’d be willing to move to New Hampshire to live by me, in this cold, to protect me?” she asked, feeling emotions overwhelming her.

  “I would move an entire mountain if it blocked the sun from shining on your porch, but let me meet this man of yours and we can go from there,” Trevor said, looking out the window. “It is pretty here. The colors are vibrant. It has a calming energy.”

  “Wait until you see the lake,” she said, smiling and feeling the emotions rattle about in her chest. It never occurred to her that other men were watching and would want to make a move, let alone to pee on her porch, literally or figuratively. Maybe she didn’t understand men, and her brother had come to make sure the man she’d married understood.

  It was old fashioned and protective, and she loved Trevor for it.

  MABEL WAS NO DIFFERENT from any of the other women when she met Trevor. His wide-mouthed toothy white grin, perfectly groomed hair, and mustache drew the older woman to him. She added extra food to his plate and found a reason on several occasions to touch Trevor, who fawned over the woman like he planned to come back and ask her on a date.

  Trevor in turn left a fifty for Mabel as a tip. She waved at them as they walked down the street to the Town Hall where Leta walked into a flurry of activity. People called her name and passed out hugs, and Magda reached for her, grabbing her by the arm.

  “Evan’s in his office,” Magda said, turning to Trevor. “Hmm, look at God work his magic. Wow, you are all kinds of bless my soul, and I am married, but I’m going to sin with my eyes and repent in my heart later.”

  “Magda, turn it down a notch. This is my brother Trevor. Trevor, Magda, Evan’s assistant,” Leta said, as Trevor shook hands with the woman, who appeared to lose her footing when her hand touched Trevor’s.