Cookie Cutter

by Jo Richardson

  No.

  I should go somewhere.

  Maybe next time I have some time off, I’ll drive to Miami. I hear the night life there is fantastic and the food. Oh my God, the food I could eat there. Except that my license is officially expired and I’m not legally allowed to drive at all right now.

  “Crap.”

  The wind in my metaphorical sail diminishes. Not only that, but how in the hell am I getting Ally to school today? Speaking of which, I check the time and listen for my daughter. Hmmm. The tinkering around in the kitchen tells me she’s already up. I find that odd since it usually takes her four or five snooze button pushes before she’s coherent enough to say good morning to the world. I grab my robe and wrap it around me on the way to the kitchen. Pots and pans clang together and I stop at the doorway. Ally is trying to juggle some eggs in one hand while she struggles with the bread in the other.

  “What are you doing?” I lean up against the door jamb.

  “Oh hey, mom, I’m making breakfast.” She searches for something in one of the overhead cabinets.

  “Why?”

  “Just you know, wanted to do something nice for my mother.” She sings the word mother at the end. Then shoots me this ridiculously huge smile and my mom senses tingle with suspicion. I check the time again. Perhaps I overslept. A lot. Nope, it’s 6:00 alright.

  “Something happen last night? Who drove?” I was too tired for these questions last night. I was just glad she made it home alive.

  Ally laughs. “Nothing happened, mom. And Blake--”

  “Why didn’t Karen’s mom get you?”

  “Karen told her not to bother.” She shrugs, then finds what she’s looking for. Salt. “Blake was there, he has to drive right by both of our houses anyway . . .”

  “I don’t like you driving around with boys I don’t know at night, Ally.” I stride over to her and take the salt out of her hand.

  She rolls her eyes and drops an egg.

  “Ugh.” She throws her hands up into the air, frustrated. So I step in. It’s the thought that counts anyway. Right?

  “Here, let me help you.” I bend down to clean up and she gladly complies. Ally’s not used to cooking.

  The paper towel rack is empty by the time I take what I need to clean up the egg off of the floor. We kind of dance around each other until finally, the breakfast prep that she started is aligned properly on the counter and I’m heating up the frying pan. She cracks the eggs and beats them in a bowl for me while I start some toast in the toaster. Then she slides the bowl toward me.

  “Can you add that stuff you used to put in them?”

  “Old Bay?”

  “Yeah, I love that stuff.”

  I flip the cabinet open and grab the small tin I have of it. “You used to loooooove it when I put Old Bay on your everything.”

  “What?” Ally giggles hard. I haven’t heard her giggle like this around me in years. “When did I say that?”

  “All the time. Mommay, you’d say. Could you to be putting oh bay on my everything peas?”

  Ally laughs a huge, full on, can’t not laugh - laugh and now I’m laughing with her.

  “I did not say that.” she insists.

  “Oh, but you did.”

  She lets the laughter die as it gets quiet between us. I can still see her smiling from where I stand, though.

  “You were adorable.” I have to add, because she was. Still is, when she wants to be.

  Breakfast comes and goes within five minutes of the food being cooked. Ally drops her plate in the sink and hurries upstairs. I head into my room to get a shower and get ready, and before I know it, here I am once again, waiting by the car for my daughter. I set my work bag down next to me and lean up against the driver’s side door. I check my work e-mail on the old iPhone to make sure nothing urgent has come up since last night. There isn’t anything from Mark but that doesn’t mean there’s nothing urgent going on—like my need to get to work without being pulled over and consequently thrown in jail for having an expired license.

  I forget about my e-mail and glare at Meg’s house. I wonder if she’s up and if she is, is she functional? Not that I’m jealous but the woman hasn’t worked a day job ever. Meg is what you’d call “independently wealthy”, from a trust fund she was awarded at eighteen and, lucky for her, she has a team of very smart lawyers who have drawn up extremely air tight pre-nups for each of her previous three husbands.

  That’s right. I said three.

  She does nothing with that money. Nothing. Except go shopping. Oh, what I would do with that kind of money. Forget Miami, let’s talk Hawaii. Fuji Islands. Europe.

  “Morning,” a soft voice whispers next to my ear.

  I’m not exactly startled when Carter suddenly appears next to me like he does. More like stunned out of the day dream I somehow got lost in a moment ago. Not that I’m complaining, the bright brown eyes that are staring into mine are better than Hawaii anyway.

  “Morning,” I say through a smile I couldn’t hide if I wanted to. I know nothing’s happened between us and nothing probably ever will, but the way my belly quivers when I see him tells me something did happen, yesterday, out in front of my house. “How’s your head?”

  “Good as gold.” He smiles, and taps the side of his temple. “Thanks again for the ride home. See you got your car back.”

  “Yep.”

  “The ex?”

  “No.” I grin like I’m about to tell the ending to the world’s greatest joke. “Paul.”

  Carter’s eyes grow wide and he looks impressed. “Naked Paul.”

  “The one and only.”

  He nods. “Nice.”

  “He really is, actually.” Paul’s excitement about life in general puts me in a better mood, just thinking about it.

  “I’m not at all surprised. So, whatcha doin’? Besides waiting for Ally.”

  I let out a slight huff through my nose. I’m still annoyed with the police officer that pulled me over the other day. “Thinking.”

  “About?”

  “Whether or not I should risk driving Ally to school without a license or call us a cab.”

  He chuckles and it sounds like some Greek god somewhere has smiled down on him for Christ’s sake. Since when am I into Greek mythology?

  “Well, not that I think you’d get busted seeing how you refuse to go over the speed limit, but how about I take you in?”

  I should tell him no thanks, he’s done enough for me. Really.

  “Don’t you have work to do on the house?” I hope he doesn’t.

  “Nope.”

  I should tell him I’ll get Meg up and make her take me in. I really should.

  “That’d be great.”

  My daughter exits the house and pulls the door shut behind her. She seems pleasant enough. Still in a decent mood, but when she sees Carter and me talking, her expression turns grim. I pick up my bag and swing it over my shoulder.

  “Come on, Ally.” I start off with Carter toward his truck across the street.

  “Where are you going? The car’s right here.”

  “Carter’s taking us in.”

  “Why?”

  At least she’s walking. “My license expired.”

  “Well, can’t dad just take us in?”

  “Nnnnooo.” That is so not happening.

  Ally huffs and she puffs but doesn’t say anything else until we get to the truck and she sees it’s a front seat only type of situation. “Seriously?”

  “Oh for crying out loud, honey, just get in.”

  “She’s pretty roomy,” Carter promises. He throws a wink my way as we all scoot into the cab. I slide into the middle, letting Ally have the window since she has to get dropped off at school first. For convenience purposes only. Honest.

  “It’s so cramped in here,” Ally mumbles before she pulls her phone out to text a friend.

  Carter and I share a silent laugh between us and then we’re off. I tell him how to get to the high school. It’
s not that far away, then I try to start some conversation with my daughter and mostly she just ignores me. It’s not until we’re about halfway to school when she finally decides to speak.

  “So, Mom, there’s a party this weekend at Karen’s cousin’s house—she wants me to come with.”

  “Annnnnnd, there it is,” I say. I knew she was being too nice today.

  “What?”

  “Nothing.”

  She snorts at me. “Whatever.”

  “Anyway, no can do, not this time; you know the carnival is this weekend.”

  “Mom.”

  “Sorry.”

  “No you’re not.”

  “Okay, I’m not but you did promise you’d help and you didn’t make it to the site last weekend so—”

  “Awesome.” She throws a free hand up into the air. “I guess that means I can’t go to Paris with dance club, either.”

  “Pa-- ” What? “Yeah, no that’s never happening.” No way is she going that far away from me at her age.

  “Mom, it’s my last summer before senior year. My last chance to do something great. My last--”

  “Wait,” Carter interjects. “Why would it be your last chance to do something great?”

  Both Ally and I stare at Carter. It’s not so much that he said something, but rather more like, we’re not quite used to anyone of the male species having any interest in anything we’re talking about. Of course when I say male species, I mean Ally’s father. He never got involved with arguments between Ally and myself. He couldn’t bear to be the bad guy. Ever.

  If Ally’s expression could talk, it would probably say something along the lines of, who are you? I mean, how dare he speak to her much less speak to her about something that she deems is none of his business. The nerve. He blows off her rude silence and shrugs. “I’m just curious.” he clarifies.

  She rolls her eyes and goes back to texting her friend. Carter refuses to be ignored.

  “Look I’m not taking sides here, I just don’t think you realize the benefits of being young. You’ve got your whole life ahead of you, and it’s a little presumptuous to say that this is your last chance at anything.”

  His voice lowers after that. “It should be your first chance at everything.”

  Carter stares straight ahead as he drives now but he peeks at his rear view mirror and shakes his head like there’s more he wants to say. I feel for him. This is my life. Every day. Trying to get her to listen only to be rejected most of the time if not all.

  “Maybe I’ll go when after I graduate then,” Ally says. “When no one can tell me what I can and cannot do.”

  This would usually be where I have to raise my voice to make a point with my daughter and I’m about to but then it hits me – she heard him. Which means, maybe she hears me too. I let the conversation end there. For now. And when we pull up to her school just under a minute later, she opens the door before we’re even stopped and slips out quickly without another word.

  After she pushes the door shut, she never looks back. When she catches up with her friends, they all look over in the direction of Carter’s truck and laugh with Ally. Then they all head off to life within the walls of high school.

  As Carter pulls away, I tell him how to get to Maximum Copy. Then I slide over to where Ally was just a few moments before and slide down into the seat. I watch the world go by and think about Ally being out there somewhere, further away than she already is. Without me. I can’t even think about it. Not after that poor girl, from the news, died last year on her spring break down in Ft. Lauderdale. And she wants to go to another country? Seriously? Alone? I push thoughts of men doing evil, unthinkable things to my daughter out my mind and replace them with something safer.

  “Did you know Paul has been all over the world?”

  “No I didn’t know that.” Carter smiles as he watches the road.

  Something I truly enjoy about him is that he lets me avoid further discussion about my teenager and engages in my new topic without another word about her.

  “He was in Nice for two weeks last month.”

  “Nice sounds . . . nice,” he puns.

  I let myself laugh even though it’s totally cheesy.

  “Where’s the last awesome place you’ve been, Iris?” he asks.

  I wish I had a better answer for him. I’m tempted to make something up but I’m not a very good liar. “Nowhere.”

  “Come on,” he jibes.

  “Honest.”

  “You’ve never been outside of Spangler?”

  I shrug. “No one ever leaves Spangler. Not by choice, anyway.”

  He gives me this look then, like I’ve just frightened him or something.

  “What?”

  He goes back to watching the road. “That doesn’t sound creepy at all.”

  Good job, Iris, you have officially scared off the only man that’s ever been worth paying attention to in recent years.

  “I’ve been to the coast.” I try to make up for my creepiness.

  “California?” He sounds optimistic.

  “No, Hilton Head.” It doesn’t sound as awesome when I say it out loud.

  “Oh. Well, that counts,” he informs me. “And sounds . . .” he hesitates, like he can’t quite find the right word. He finally ends with, “great.”

  “It is kind of great.” My voice sounds small when I say it, even to me, as I turn to stare out the window at the trees speeding by.

  If you consider going to the beach with the girls alone every day while James worked most of the time, it was kind of great. It’s quiet in the truck after that, until Carter pulls into the Maximum Copy parking lot.

  “Hey Iris?” Carter says as he stops in front of the entrance.

  I look over at him and wait for him to poke fun but he doesn’t.

  “Have a good day,” he says.

  I grin. It feels like this is an old hat between us even though I barely know him. Kind of.

  “Thanks.”

  I get out of the car and grab my purse.

  “I mean that by the way,” I say. “And please don’t worry about later, I’ll figure something out.”

  I swing my bag over my shoulder and shut the door to his truck. I wave but he waits for me to go in. I walk a little slower than normal and look back over and over again to see if he’s left yet he’s still there. My cheeks burn from the smile that’s plastered across my face. His protectiveness is cute. Finally, I head into the office.

  “Iris.”

  And my mood is shot. Just like that.

  “Hey, good morning,” my boss says too loud for this time of day. And now, He’s too close but he’s not crossing the line exactly. I’m debating saying something when he reaches around me to open the door. He’s still trying to make up for being an ass, I suppose.

  “Hey, Iris. Listen,” he says.

  I stop and he stops but he’s still holding the door open.

  “I’m gonna need you to stay later tonight – Mac wants the numbers in presentation format by tomorrow and I have to catch a flight out to go over them with him, personally, so . . .”

  No. Flipping. Way.

  “Mark, I have the carnival tomorrow. I can’t just---”

  “Babe.” Carter? Only it can’t be Carter. But it is Carter. And why would he be calling someone babe?

  It’s him alright – and he’s jogging to catch up with me. There’s no one else around but the security people sitting at their booth inside so, he must be talking to me. Unless he’s talking to Mark. As he approaches, with locked eyes on me and me alone, he’s certainly not talking to Mark.

  “Hey,” he says to my boss with a nod of some sort.

  “Carter? I don’t ---”

  “You left this in the truck.” He turns to me and murmurs through that boyish grin of his, holding out a stick of Burt’s Beeswax Chapstick and I might be lost in those beautiful brown eyes of his, but I’m very confused as well.

  “Must have fallen out of your purse when you grabbed
it. And I know how you like to keep those luscious lips of yours soft.” He cups my face with his hand, unexpectedly. His fingers curl through my hair and around my neck.

  Rather than flinch away, I fall completely prey to his voice and those words and I let myself lean into his hand, then I close my eyes as his thumb sweeps across my lips. It’s been forever and a day since someone touched me like this and even though I understand now, what he’s doing, that this is all just show for Mark so he’ll leave me alone, I pretend that it’s not.

  “Plus, I didn’t get to say goodbye properly,” he tells me, softly.

  I open my eyes. His eyes dart from my mouth to my eyes with something I don’t recognize behind them and in an instant, his lips are on mine.

  He’s kissing me.

  He is kissing me.

  And it’s not like Mark at all. Thank God – or James even. It’s passionate and urgent but not sloppy or over the top, it’s like the first hill of a roller coaster; heart pumping, stomach flipping takes my breath away. It’s everything I imagined happening yesterday, when nothing happened at all. He holds me like he’s telling me something. A secret maybe. A deep, dark secret.

  When Carter lets go of me, I can’t move. My lungs feel heavy and my palms are sweating. I’m sure my face is beat red right now and my blood is pumping like I’ve just run a marathon. My fingers touch my lips, where his just were. Carter doesn’t look like he’s going to apologize for what he’s done. I don’t want him to, either. He offers Mark his hand.

  “Carter Blackwood, by the way.”

  “Nice to um, meet you Carter, I’m Iris’s um . . .” He chokes on his words. “Boss. I take it, you two are . . .” he asks, hesitantly, as though he’s unsure. Like that kiss could leave anyone questioning what’s going on between us.

  “Sure are,” Carter says. “You keep an eye on her for me will ya, Mark?” He eyes him carefully and then adds, “I’d hate for anyone to try and take her from me.” He cracks his neck to the left, then right. “Just sayin.’”