ThisTimeNextDoor

by Gretchen Galway

  “Well, if my dream comes true, I’ll be staying here forever, feathering my gay love nest.”

  “I wish you all the happiness in the world,” he said, stepping around her.

  “No, no, don’t look so worried. It’s a relief, actually, that you guessed.”

  He paused, eyeing her.

  “You should know everything.” She put a hand on her chest. “In fact, you should know it all.” She sighed deeply. “I wasn’t always this way, you know.”

  He was suspicious, but since she blocked the door, he played along. “No?”

  “Well, how could I be? The operation was such a success, but you obviously saw right through it.”

  “Operation.”

  “Of course.” She slipped a hand over her hip, down her belly, between her legs, and suddenly cupped herself. “It was worth being born a man so I could father Blair’s baby, but finally, after years of denying my true nature, I can finally be the woman I was born to be.”

  His face was burning hot enough to melt butter.

  Unlike her mouth, obviously, the sarcastic vixen.

  “Very funny.” He put an arm around her waist and swiveled her out of the way. She was big, but he had an orange belt in judo. And laughing so hard made her weak. “Just for that, you can get your own duct tape.”

  “What I can’t decide is, should I have the baby call me Mom or Dad?” she asked as he jerked the door open.

  “When you’re at the hardware store, buy yourself some jumper cables,” he said.

  She followed him out onto the porch, watching him storm away. “Dinner’s at seven,” she called after him. “Tonight!”

  Chapter 4

  TO ROSE’S DEEP ANNOYANCE, BLAIR thought it was hilarious.

  “You! Gay!” she cried, clutching her stomach. “Pining over me. I love it!”

  “No, it’s me who loves you, darling,” Rose said, pouring cheap white wine into a glass. It was only six, but she wanted time to prepare a staggeringly excellent meal for His Geekiness next door. “Remind me to spit on his pasta. Since I can’t spew semen on it anymore.”

  “What’s your problem? You don’t usually have trouble laughing at yourself.”

  “Me? How does this have anything to do with me?”

  “Okay, fine,” Blair said. “The situation, then. It’s just too funny.”

  “To you, apparently.”

  Blair came around the counter to stand behind her at the stove. “Are you really bothered by this?”

  “Why should I be? He’s obviously a socially stunted recluse. He wouldn’t recognize a lesbian if he saw her go down on Ellen Degeneres on national TV.”

  Biting her lip, Blair filled a mug with water from the pitcher and stuck it in the microwave. “Socially stunted, huh?”

  “He said so himself.”

  “He didn’t seem very reclusive to me,” she said, smiling at Rose over her shoulder as she punched the buttons. “Didn’t he jump into your car when you were recharging the battery?”

  “Just to get closer to you.”

  “Well, you’d know how that feels, wouldn’t you?” Blair came over and put a hand on her shoulder. “Dreaming of me all these years.”

  Rose glared at her little hand. “Do you want this dinner or not?”

  “If you think you’re up to it, of course. It might help you work through your frustrations.”

  “I’m frustrated all right.”

  Blair laughed. “You know what I think?”

  “Yes, and you’re wrong.”

  “What?”

  Rose got out the old plastic cutting board her mother had let her have when she’d packed up the car the month before. Along with one dented pot and a nonstick frying pan that was probably carcinogenic because of all the scratches on its surface. “He’s not that cute. It has nothing to do with me being jealous.”

  Tilting her head, Blair batted her eyelashes at her. “I didn’t say anything about that. But if it crossed your mind…”

  Rose banged a bowl of white mushrooms down onto the cutting board and gave Blair a tight smile. “In fact, you’re right. It is funny. Hilarious, actually.” She grabbed a chef’s knife and a sharpening steel out of the wood block and sliced them together. The knives had been her first real purchase in California. Not necessarily a good omen, but she couldn’t survive without a decent set of knives.

  “Don’t hurt him,” Blair said. “He probably feels really bad.”

  “No wonder the guy’s single. If he assumes every woman in shorts and a tank top is gay, he’s really limiting the dating pool.”

  Heated water in hand, Blair joined her at the counter, dunking her tea bag up and down. “I think it was the way you jumped the car. All that confidence with the cables. Very macho.”

  “Exactly,” Rose said. “He’s probably never met a woman without a father or brother to rely on for that sort of thing. You should have seen him tinkering with our thermostat, assuming it was just needing batteries. As if we were too stupid to check that first.”

  “I was,” Blair said.

  “Yeah, well, you straight chicks are too afraid of getting your hands dirty.”

  Smiling, Blair sipped her tea. “There you go. I knew you could laugh at this.”

  “At first I thought it was hilarious. In fact, I told him I was the male-to-female transsexual biological father of your unborn child.”

  Blair laughed loudly. “I wish,” she said, giving Rose a squeeze before pulling out her phone.

  Her smile fell.

  “I wish you could give up on him,” Rose said softly, slicing the ends off the mushroom stems.

  After a long period of silence, Rose stopped chopping to glance at Blair. She’d turned the same cadaverous gray as the mushrooms.

  “He’s here,” Blair said numbly. “Just landed in San Francisco.”

  Rose felt the breath catch in her chest, her throat tighten. “Who?”

  Blair stared at her phone. “Sorry. He says he’s sorry.”

  Oh, God.

  “He’s coming. Right now,” Blair said.

  Rose looked down at the cutting board. She’d planned on a tarragon cream sauce, heavy on the cream. “I wonder if the prick’s still a vegan.”

  Blair leaned against the counter. “Oh. I feel sick.”

  This wasn’t an abstract threat coming from a pregnant person. Rose wiped her hands and herded her out of the kitchen. “Deep breaths. I’ll get you a cool washcloth.”

  Blair stumbled, eyes wild. “I haven’t shaved in a week.”

  “Please. If he wants a landscaped woman, he needs to give the crew notice.” Flicking the light on, Rose nudged her into the bathroom, grabbed a clean cloth off the shelf.

  “I’m going to puke.” With a surprising burst of energy, Blair shoved Rose out of the bathroom and slammed the door.

  “Save some for Mr. Sperm’s shoes,” Rose called out. “A homecoming present.”

  Blair’s voice was high, panicked, confused. “How can he do this to me?”

  Then the retching started. Powerless, Rose leaned against the door, hands bunched into fists, and plotted.

  If John thought he was going to waltz into the house like he owned it (which he didn’t, damn it, that was his aunt) and have Blair smile and fawn over him as if she hadn’t been crying alone every night, he’d be too dead to have another think coming.

  “Well, at least you’ll be hungry for dinner,” Rose said when the vomiting finally stopped.

  The door creaked open. Wiping her hair off her forehead, Blair leaned into the doorframe. “Now I’m all sweaty.”

  “Tell him you were having hot sex with the neighbor,” Rose said. “No, don’t worry. I’ll tell him.”

  “He just landed. If traffic’s light he could be here in an hour. Or less.” She rubbed her eyes. “My God, I have to shower. I’m ripe as a banana.”

  “It’s past time he sniffed a real woman. The man needs to face up to reality.”

  “I can’t risk it,” Blair
said. “I can’t do this by myself. I just can’t.”

  “First of all, better to know now what he can handle than later, when you’re really dependent on him. And second, you can handle it. Whatever it is, you can. You’re tougher than you think. Don’t let him get away with being horrible just because you think you need him so much.”

  “I do need him. The baby needs a father. How can I ever afford college tuition by myself? Have you seen the annual growth rate of educational expenses?”

  “While I’m sure your kid is a genius, even he or she won’t be going to college in the next two hours.” Rose pushed her back into the bathroom. “Go ahead, take your shower. It’ll make you feel better. I’ll see if I can come up with a vegan alternative to the cream sauce.”

  “Oh, dinner. Rose, I’m so sorry, but I don’t think I can do it.”

  Rose started to protest but thought better of it. Blair was right. As much as she hated to admit it, she couldn’t mediate this one. “Maybe tomorrow, then,” she said.

  Blair peeked her head out, managed a weak smile. “You’re the best.”

  Rose went back into the kitchen and decided she should let Mark off the hook. Too bad; she’d looked forward to making him squirm.

  Not having his phone number, she slipped on her shoes and walked over to knock on the door.

  A woman answered. “Oh, thank God. I thought you might be those curb painters coming back,” she said, holding out her hand. “I keep meaning to come over and introduce myself. Trixie Johnson.”

  A smiling, tall woman, Mark’s mother looked like a throwback hippie to Rose’s eastern eyes: naturally gray hair cut short, tie-dyed T-shirt, baggy jeans and Birkenstocks. Her sandals, however, sported a floral purple pattern and were not held together with duct tape. Nevertheless, compared to Rose’s preppy mother, who ironed her pajamas and wouldn’t step out of the bathroom in the morning without her makeup on, Trixie seemed very au naturel. In a nice way. Relaxed, friendly, low-maintenance.

  Rose shook her hand. “Rose Devlin.”

  “Trouble with your car again?” Trixie asked.

  “Oh, no. Nothing like that. I just needed to talk to Mark. It’s kind of embarrassing. You see, we invited him to dinner but…” Rose stopped herself, not sure how much she should say. Blair liked her privacy, and Trixie, though she appeared very sweet, didn’t look like the type to embrace polite ignorance. Her eyes were bright and sharp, scanning Rose’s body like somebody eager to help. “Blair has had a sudden change of plans. I wanted to ask Mark might be able to join us another night. Is he here?”

  Glancing behind her, Trixie reached into her pocket, took out a tube of pink lip balm, popped off the cap. “What a shame.” She slid the balm along her upper lip. “I hope she’s feeling all right? I always felt the first trimester was the hardest.”

  “She’s hanging in there. Thanks.” Rose glanced across the driveway, wondering how many minutes they had until John got there. The nerve of him. Just showing up. Not even bothering to call before he got on the plane. “Will you tell Mark how sorry we are? We’d love to have him over another night. And you, too, of course, Mrs. Johnson. Listen to me, my mother would kill me for my bad manners. Will you join us for dinner another night? Both of you?”

  Trixie smiled. “That’s very sweet of you. Yes, of course. If you promise to come over here first. Any time. And you don’t need to come as a set—if your friend isn’t up to it, don’t let that stop you. I can see you’re the social type, probably going stir crazy all alone in that empty old house up here in the hills with nobody to talk to.”

  Rose suspected Trixie knew a lot about that. “I’d like that. Well, thank you. Tell Mark I’m sorry about tonight.”

  With a wave and a smile, Trixie nodded and shut the door so quickly Rose flinched. Trixie’s warmth was sincere, but Rose got the feeling she was missing something.

  Like that Trixie was trying to get rid of her.

  Ah, well, who knew. Maybe she was in the middle of a TV show or something. Turning her attention back to her friend, Rose returned to her house.

  * * *

  Mark came downstairs at 6:55 p.m. wearing a pair of tailored pants he’d acquired just that afternoon. Wondering where his mother had disappeared to, he found some scissors in the kitchen junk drawer and cut off the tags.

  There was no sticker down the rear leg to remove—a step he’d forgotten, to his lasting embarrassment, on his first day teaching eighth grade algebra in Wisconsin years earlier.

  This pair was a lot nicer than those had been. No stickers. They even reached all the way to the ground. At twenty-two, he’d been clueless. Now he wasn’t any more fashionable, but he had the sense to go to Nordstrom’s, where an older dude in a purple shirt had been very happy to protect him from his own tasteless default settings.

  After a long afternoon, Mark had driven home from Walnut Creek with two pairs of perfectly tailored pants, three pairs of designer jeans, five polo shirts in assorted colors, five button-down casual shirts that cost more than a year’s rent on his first apartment and, yes, one pair of new Birkenstocks.

  He’d also stopped at the hardware store for new duct tape, whether Rose wanted it or not. As a housewarming present.

  “Mom?” He walked through the house to the back porch where she kept the dogs. There were only a few Chihuahuas living with them these days, unlike a month earlier when the herd had grown to alarming proportions. Finally admitting she’d overextended herself as a rescue operation, Trixie had found homes and other shelters, though parting with all of them had been too much of a loss to endure.

  When Mark had returned from Wisconsin, he’d planned on getting his own place within a month or two. But she was so happy to have him around. He’d lived thousands of miles away for over a decade—why not keep her company for a while? It wouldn’t kill him. He might even learn how to cook.

  Seeing the porch was empty, Mark concluded she’d taken the three remaining animals out for another walk.

  Hopefully, Liam and Bev would have kids right away, give her something to do, bodies to hug. Maybe that’s why she’d been willing to part with so many of her dogs, hoping babies weren’t too far off. He wouldn’t be surprised if she converted the dog porch into a playroom and then invited Liam and Bev over for dinner to prompt them to visualize a day care center.

  Dinner. It was 6:59. Breathing onto his palm one last time, Mark squared his shoulders and headed out the front door, duct tape slipped over the neck of a bottle of Shiraz. He felt good. The clothes made a difference, he realized, indulging in a grin as he tapped on Rose and Blair’s front door.

  The wait was longer than he expected, and after a long minute he heard the women arguing with each other inside.

  Maybe they were still getting dressed. That reminded him of Rose’s slinky robe from that morning.

  He tapped again. “I can come back later,” he called out.

  The door flew open. Rose frowned at him. “Mark?”

  He glanced at his wrist, forgetting he never wore a watch anymore. “You said seven, right?”

  “But I told your mom we… there was a problem about tonight.” Then her gaze raked him head to toe and she flushed a remarkable shade of pink. Almost like a highlighter pen. “Oh, Mark. Look at you. I’m so sorry.”

  Her long, tight sweater was pink, too. Even the belt cinched tightly around her waist, under her… pink… breasts.

  Not the hair, though. That was pale gold.

  Blair appeared at her side. “Mark? Oh, Mark.” She let out a deep breath. “Nice to see you.”

  He took a step back. He hadn’t even noticed she was there. Not wanting his sweaty palms to drop the wine, he thrust it at her. “But not expected. I’m sorry my mom and I screwed up. I’ll go. No problem.”

  “No, don’t,” Blair said quickly, reaching forward to clasp his arm. “We invited you.”

  “Actually, it was Rose, and it’s obviously a bad time, and really, it’s no problem.” He tried to take another step ba
ck, but he was paralyzed by the feel of Blair’s fingers wrapped around his bicep. Should he flex? Do a little muscle demo?

  “It’s a perfect time, actually,” Blair said, dragging him inside. He did his best to flex and follow at the same time without stumbling.

  “John will be here any minute.” Rose caught Mark’s alarmed glance and nodded. “Just called from the airport.”

  A righteous anger flooded through him. “Really. With no warning?”

  “None,” Rose said.

  They shared a look of barely contained condemnation.

  “Which is why you have to stay.” Blair kicked the door shut and tugged him into the living room. “Rose has made this fantastic meal and there won’t be anyone here to eat it.”

  “You won’t let him eat your food?” Mark asked Rose.

  Her lips pursed. “He’s a vegan.”

  “And I’m not feeling well,” Blair said, resting a hand on her stomach, looking down. “And we’ll probably go out.”

  Rose took the bottle of wine from her. “She only got sick when she heard John had landed in San Francisco.” She plucked off the roll of duct tape and offered Mark a small smile. “Thanks. I never did make it to the hardware store.”

  “I’ll go downstairs and put it on if you like.”

  Rose frowned at him for a moment, glanced at Blair. “That’s nice of you, really, but—it wouldn’t be fair.” Her look sharpened. “To you.”

  Mark knew what she was saying, that with John in the picture, there was no reason for Mark to be. “Sure. I understand.” He moved toward the door. “I’ll go. This is obviously a bad time.”

  “No, don’t go,” Blair said. “Please. I’ll bring you a glass of wine.” She went into the kitchen.

  Rose put a hand on his arm. “She’s right, Mark. Have a seat.” She fluffed a pillow on the couch, stared until he sat down. “I hope you like cheese,” she added.

  “I like cheese.”

  “Pasta?”