by M. Malone
She laughs softly. “Yeah, I’ll bet. Well, if you’re good, I even have desserts in here.” She pulls out sandwiches, small snack bags of chips and a plastic container of red velvet cake.
“You know, I’ve never been on a date where the girl planned everything. Will I get my balls back after this is all over?”
She looks up at me, and then lets out a little giggle. “Is it that threatening?”
“No, I’m just joking. Badly, obviously.” I look down the sand to where a few other couples sit on towels, similarly enjoying the unseasonably warm weather. The sky is a crystalline blue dotted with fluffy white clouds that look like floating cotton balls. I close my eyes and let the breeze coming off the water flow over me. Above me, I can hear the cry and call of the seagulls.
“I’ve never really been a beach person.”
Emma stops her fussing with the food. “Sorry, we can go if you’d rather do something else. I just thought it would be a quiet place we could talk.”
“No, this is nice. I find myself willing to make an exception for you. So, how long have you worked for Patrick?”
Her face falls slightly. “Just a few months. After my parents died, Mr. Stevens was the one who handled their estate. He’s an old family friend. I think he just feels sorry for me, really.”
“I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize.”
“No, it’s okay. I know you didn’t know.”
We sit in awkward silence for a minute before she asks, “So, what about you. What did you do before you worked as a bodyguard?”
“I was in the military. I’ve been working for Alexander Security ever since I got out.”
“What branch of the military?”
“Army.”
She looks at me expectantly when I don’t provide any additional details.
“Most of the missions I was on were classified so I can’t really talk about them.”
“Of course. I don’t need to know details. I was just wondering what you did, you know, in general?”
“Um, I was a sniper actually.”
“Oh. Really?” Her eyes go round and she takes a big bite of her sandwich.
I dig in the cooler looking for another sandwich. Anything to distract me from this painful silence. What am I supposed to say, I used to kill people? I did scary stuff that I hope you won’t ever have to know about? There’s just nothing that I can say to put her mind at ease. I’m reminded of my last girlfriend, Jenna’s, words.
You’re just too much sometimes, Tank. Too damn much to deal with.
“Oh. Well. Okay then.” Her eyes roam over the sand, the waves crashing to the shore and then to the birds flying overhead. She’s working as hard as I am to think of something to change the subject. Apparently she’s not having any more luck than I am.
Damn this is awkward.
“Don’t worry. That’s always a conversation killer. It’s not just you.”
Her eyes light up. “Good. I mean, not good that it’s a hard question to answer but good that … oh, never mind. So, tell me more about you. What’s your family like?”
A smile tugs at the corners of my lips. “That shouldn’t be a difficult question to answer either. And yet, it is. I apologize, Emma. This is the least normal date you’ve probably ever been on. To answer your question, I grew up with my younger brother, Finn. He’s like a shorter, less attractive, version of me.”
Her lips quirk up at the corners. “I’m sure. Sorry if it feels like I’m questioning you, or something. I didn’t mean to pry.”
“You weren’t. You are asking perfectly normal questions. It’s just that my life is a little too reality show for a girl like you to understand.”
“What does that mean? A girl like me?” She raises her eyebrows.
“The kind of girl who grew up with two parents and a dog. The kind of girl who wears sweater sets and thinks hell is a bad word.”
Her mouth falls open. “I have absolutely no idea what to even say to that.”
I lean over and tuck a strand of her sunny hair behind her ear. The stuff is always sticking up all over the place and for some reason, I love it. Anyone else would look like an electrocuted poodle but on her, the effect is charming.
“Don’t worry about it, buttercup. It’s not an insult. We’re just different, that’s all.”
She regards me from beneath lowered lashes, her gray eyes worried. Her teeth clamp down on her bottom lip. “What about your dad?”
“Uh, my parents divorced when I was a kid. So what did you do before you worked for Patrick?” Talking about my deadbeat dad is not the way to get this date back on track.
“I was in school. I was in my junior year when my parents died. Even though the school gave me a leave of absence to deal with everything, I couldn’t keep my focus even after I came back. My grades suffered. I had a partial scholarship but you have to maintain a certain GPA to keep it. So now I’m trying to earn enough money to go back and retake some of the classes I failed.”
“Makes sense. Is that why you started dancing at the Black Kitty?”
Her head snapped up. “Dancing? Oh god, you mean stripping? I’m not a stripper.”
The disdain in her voice is obvious. I know she doesn’t mean anything by it but after everything I’ve witnessed over the past twenty-four hours, it strikes me as incredibly ironic that most of the girls stripping at the Black Kitty are probably farther along in their college studies than she is. Most of them are dancing to pay their way through school. Or to support their kids.
“Are you okay?” Emma asks.
Part of me says to just write this whole thing off as a bust, to grab my shit and go home. But I’m so disappointed. So damn disappointed because I thought she was different. I contemplate not answering. She doesn’t get it and people like her never do. But something inside me wants her to understand.
“Those girls you look down on are just doing what they need to survive. Half of them are in college and will probably make more money than either of us when they finish.”
I shake my head but before I can say anything else my phone vibrates in my pocket. I pull it out. Normally I wouldn’t take a phone call in the middle of a date, even one as spectacularly bad as this one but when I see my mom’s name on the screen, I answer immediately.
“Hey, Mom. Is everything okay?”
“Hi baby. Yes, I’m fine. I just can’t find my pills. I think I remember you setting them all out for me in that nifty little pill case. The one with the days of the week on it, right?”
“Yeah, I left it right on the kitchen island so you’ll see it every morning.”
“That’s what I thought but it’s not there.”
I sit up on my knees and start placing things back in the cooler. Emma watches me and then starts packing up the items she took out.
“I’ll come find it for you, Mom.”
“Don’t be silly. There’s no need for you to drive out here just for that. I’m sure it’ll turn up. I probably just moved it while I was cleaning off the counter and now I don’t remember where I set it down. You know I do that sometimes.”
It’s been happening more and more lately. She’s forgetting things and doing things that don’t make sense. It worries me. What if she forgets she’s already taken her medicine and then takes it again? She could overdose herself without even realizing it.
“I’m in Virginia Beach anyway. I’ll be there in a minute.”
After I hang up with my mom, I turn to Emma. “My mom can’t find her medication. She does this sometimes. Misplaces things. I need to get over there. I’m sorry to bail on you.”
She follows me, her legs working double time on the sand to keep up with my long strides. “It’s no problem. I think it’s nice that you’re so devoted to your mom.”
“Well, she did whatever she had to do to keep us all together when we were growing up. We didn’t have a lot of money but she never let us down. Now it’s our turn to take care of her.”
When we reach the par
king lot, I wait while she fumbles with the keys on her chain to find the right one. She opens the trunk so I can place the cooler inside.
“Sorry I have to cut things short.” Even though things weren’t going well, I still feel bad about running out on her. I’ve been hitting on her for weeks and now the first time she says yes, I ditch her after less than an hour.
“No, I understand completely. I hope your mom is okay.” Emma closes the trunk and then unlocks the front door of the car. I wait while she slides behind the wheel.
“Thanks. I’m sure she’s fine. I just want to check on her.”
She turns the key and her engine strains to turn over. It sounds like it’s pleading for help.
“Ugh, I hate this stupid car.” She tries it again and a cloud of smoke erupts from beneath the hood. Emma gets out of the car and waves her hand in front of her face. “Maybe I shouldn’t have said that. Now I’ve pissed her off.”
I glance at my cell phone again. There’s no way I have time to get beneath the hood and figure out what’s wrong. But I also can’t just leave her here alone. I could take her home and come back for her car later but that would be going completely out of the way. And my mom didn’t sound good.
“Come on.”
She leans in and grabs her bag from the passenger seat of her car. “I’m so sorry. You don’t have to stay. I’ll call Ivy. Or maybe Sasha can pick me up.”
“What if they can’t come right away?”
She places a hand over her eyes shielding them from the midday sun. “It’s a beautiful day. I’ll just hang out until they can get here.”
I don’t even have to think about it. Every instinct I have revolts at the idea of leaving her somewhere alone without a guaranteed way to get home. Normally I wouldn’t take a girl home to meet my mom this soon. Or ever. But in this case, it really doesn’t matter. We tried and it didn’t work out. I’m not the only one feeling the awkward vibes so there’s no way she wants to see me again either.
“Yeah, no. You’re coming with me buttercup.”
She wrinkles her nose at the nickname but follows me as I walk over to my bike.
“I really wish I hadn’t worn a skirt now.”
My lips curl up as I look at her slender legs peeking from beneath the billowy layers of her skirt. “I don’t mind.”
Her annoyed response is drowned out by the roar of the engine as I start the bike. She climbs on behind me and wraps her arms around my waist. “Where are we going anyway?”
I flip the visor down on my helmet before I answer. “I’m taking you home with me.”
We walk up to the doorway of my mom’s house and I hit the bell. Despite it being after lunchtime the curtains in the front are still drawn. After several minutes, I glance back at Emma. She’s looking around curiously but doesn’t seem impatient.
“It takes a little longer for her to get to the door these days. The chemo hits her pretty hard.”
I’m not sure why I’m explaining anything to Emma. I chuckle a little under my breath. Men really do think with their dicks. Despite her snide comments on the beach, there’s a part of me that’s still hanging on to the idea of her. That date proved without a shadow of a doubt that my fascination with her is completely chemical. So I shouldn’t care at all what she thinks about anything and I definitely shouldn’t be sharing intimate details with her.
The door finally opens. Mom is wearing her oversized nightshirt and a pair of sweatpants. They hang off her. I make a mental note to buy her smaller sizes until she gains back some of the weight she’s lost.
“Tank. I told you not to come. But since you’re here, you can fix the television for me. Who is this?” Her eyes stop on Emma and she glances at me.
“Mom this is my friend, Emma. Emma, this is my mom, Claire Marshall.”
“Sorry, I know I must look a mess.” Mom pats the bandanna tied over her thinning hair self-consciously.
I should have anticipated this. But I’m a guy and we don’t think about this kind of stuff. We don’t worry about how our hair looks or what we’re wearing. But I would never do anything to embarrass my mom.
I should have just dropped Emma off, gas mileage be damned.
“Sorry Mom for just dropping in on you with company. But I wanted to make sure that you were okay.”
I don’t say it out loud but she hadn’t sounded too good on the phone. The lines around her eyes are more pronounced and she looks tired. Really tired. It’s a scary thing to see her looking like this. It reminds me of why I’ve made the decisions I’ve made recently. It’s all for her. She deserves everything Finn and I can give her.
“Come on in.”
We walk past her and into the house. It’s dark with the curtains drawn.
“Let me just change my clothes. And try to do something with this hair. It’s so hard to wash my hair in the shower now. I get dizzy sometimes.”
“I used to wash my sister’s hair in the sink when we were younger,” Emma comments.
“In the sink? That’s a good idea.” Mom pats the bandanna on her hair again.
“Do you want me to help?” Emma takes off her jacket and then rolls up her sleeves. “I was usually helping her strip out a bad dye job so a simple wash should be easy.”
Mom looks shocked but then smiles at her. “Would you? I’d love it.”
They walk toward the kitchen and I follow behind. “Do you guys need any help?”
Emma scrunches her nose up at me. “No boys allowed.”
“I’ll just go grab my shampoo and a towel.” Mom leaves the kitchen, seeming more cheerful than I’ve seen her in weeks.
Emma curls a hand around my forearm. “Don’t worry. She’ll be sitting the whole time with her head over the sink. This way she doesn’t have to worry about slipping in the shower. It’ll be fine.”
My mom keeps canned sodas in the back of the fridge for me so I pull out a cola and take it back to the living room. I flip on the television but keep the volume low in case they need me. The soft murmur of their voices and the occasional burst of laughter filter in from the kitchen but otherwise it’s silent. It’s a good silence. A peaceful silence. We haven’t had much of that lately.
No matter what happened before on our date, Emma has given me the most unexpected gift. She’s taken my mom’s mind off the chemo and brought it back to the land of the living. She’s smiling and laughing again just like she used to. There’s nothing in the world that could mean more to me.
As Emma is cleaning up, my mom comes and sits on the couch next to me, rubbing her hair absently with the fluffy blue towel around her neck.
“I’d forgotten what it’s like to just laugh and gossip about nothing. We put so much focus on treatments and therapies and we overlook the simplest joys. Laughter. This was a really nice day.”
She glances over at me. There’s a silly little smile on her face, one I haven’t seen before.
“What?”
“Nothing. Just that I like her.”
“It’s not a big deal, Mom. She’s just someone I’m helping out. A friend of a friend.”
“Still, I like her.” She watches me with her knowing eyes. “It’s okay to like someone, Tank. Not everyone leaves. I know your father left. And now I’m … I’m leaving you.” Her voice breaks a little and I’m not sure I can listen to this.
“Mom,” I warn, not wanting to hear anything else she has to say. Not if it’s going to be talk about her leaving us.
“I’m just saying, it’s okay to like someone.”
“Okay, I’m not talking about girls with you. That’s not happening. And you aren’t going anywhere. I’ve got the money for your surgery.”
Her hands fly to her mouth. “How could you have gotten that much money so fast?”
“I told you I’ve been working really hard and I just had to figure a few things out. Finn and I worked it out. We’ve got it covered now. I don’t want you to worry about anything.”
“You’re keeping something from me. I k
now it. Just tell me that you didn’t do anything illegal.”
“Mama.” The word takes me by surprise even as it leaves my mouth. I haven’t called her that since I was a kid. “I told you, you don’t have to worry. It’s nothing like that. It’s just Finn and I moving some money around. Okay?”
She doesn’t speak but her shoulders sag a little as she sits back. “Good. Okay. I just worry about you, Tank. I worry about you most of all.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
EMMA
“You don’t have to clean that up dear. I can do it.” Claire appears in the doorway of the kitchen. She still has a blue towel around her neck but her hair looks almost dry, the light brown strands curling at the ends.
“I’m almost done. See?”
As I sponge up the puddles of water around the sink, I sneak glances at her. She looks so young to have a son Tank’s age and she’s a lot of fun. We spent a pleasurable hour while I was washing and conditioning her hair talking about my college classes and all the things she regrets doing during her college years. It shouldn’t have taken that long really but I wasn’t in any hurry and Claire didn’t seem to be either.
She’d asked all kinds of questions. I think she’s wondering what my relationship is to Tank.
“All done.” I wring out the sponge and place it back on the counter. I already gathered up the loose hair in the sink and put the caps back on the shampoo and conditioner bottles. “I kind of wish we had time to do manicures and pedicures, too.”
I try to remember the last time I had this much fun. It’s been a long time since Ivy and I have done anything together. Everything these days is about money and our lack of it. She’s always with Jon lately and I’ve been working around the clock. There’s not a lot of time for laughter. I hadn’t realized until now just how much I’ve missed it.
“I do, too. Visitors are few and far between these days. I tell you what, cancer lets you know who your real friends are. Mainly it’s my boys.” Claire presses another section of hair between the folds of the towel, blotting out the excess water. “They come out every few days to check on me and they call everyday. So I can’t complain.”
