by Parker Ford
I grunted, took the beer over and delivered it. I took my tip and his pay and listened to him tell me a story about his wife that he’d told me every since I could remember. His wife Rose had died during childbirth. Mr. Jenkins had one daughter with her, Michelle. Michelle Jenkins had left town like her ass was on fire the moment she graduated high school. It couldn’t have been easy having the town drunk, and the town joke, as a dad. But most of us still felt sorry for him.
“She threw all my clothes out on the lawn,” he laughed, winding down. “But we made up and she got pregnant with Shelly…” and then his eyes teared up as usual and he took down half his draft in a swallow.
“I’ll get you some pretzels, Mr. Jenkins,” I said softly.
“Thank you, darlin’. You’re an angel.”
“Quite the opposite,” I said under my breath and filled a bowl with pretzels. Then I gave John my dollar tip and treated Mr. Jenkins to a beef stick. He needed something in his stomach. He looked like an animated scarecrow.
“Don’t get too attached, we’ve all tried to help him, Jen.”
“I know,” I said, waving my hand dismissively as I took the snack back. I just felt a sympathy for misfits.
I heard a familiar boisterous voice and steeled myself. Before I could turn, I heard “You must be new here, gorgeous” and then a firm tap on the ass. When I turned Carl looked startled.
“Do you always spank the help?” I asked.
“I knew it was you,” he lied. His face said he hadn’t but I listened to him talk. “I’d know that ass anywhere, Jenny,” he said, softly.
“Don’t call me Jenny and don’t lie to me, Carl.”
I glanced at John who shrugged. He couldn’t tell if Carl was lying and to be honest, neither could I. I thought he was, but was I really sure? Bottom line, Carl wasn’t going to be with me till death do us part. Was it really important in the long run?
“I wasn’t Jen. I swear.” He leaned in and kissed me, fingering the blue streak in my hair. “Sexy,” he said. “Really sexy. What time do you get off, girl?”
“Whenever you get me off,” I laughed and let it go. “Now, I’m on the clock, Carl. What can I get you?”
I got him an import on draft and he stole a kiss in the hall, touching my breast and rubbing against me for a moment. I let him and laughed when he said in my ear. “I want to come all over that blue streak in your hair.”
“I’m sure you do.”
About ten minutes before my shift ended, Gil walked in. Drunk and angry.
Chapter 8
“What the fuck did you do to your hair, Jenny?” He grabbed my arm.
I tried on a smile. “Something new. I cut it off and donated it and got a little something extra.”
“You look so different,” he said.
“Now I don’t look like Marian,” I said, feeling a bit put-off. The least he could do was say he liked it before he made me feel like shit.
“You don’t look like Marian at all,” he said. His voice was only slightly slurred, it was the shine in his eye and the cut of his jaw that told me he’d had one too many.
“Oh, please.” I took off my apron and poured myself a beer for the end of shift. John handed me my tips and then skeedaddled. He could tell that Gil was off and that meant something was wrong. Gil was a man who kept a good handle on himself and rarely if ever had too much to drink.
“You don’t,” he said, and banged his big hand on the bar. “You look like you. You’re gorgeous and you look like your own goddamn self and not your mother,” he said a bit too loud.
“Okay,” I laughed. “Thank you for that stellar endorsement of my own personal beauty. Bottom line is, I just wanted something new.”
“Blue is new,” he said and then laughed at himself. “Blue is new,” he said again, as if he were tasting the words. “And blue is you,” he said, reaching out to stroke the blue ribbon of hair that swung near my cheek.
His finger brushed my cheek and my nipples went hard like a sudden chill had overtaken me. My pussy grew moist for him just from the memory of him touching me in other places with those warm fingers. “Thanks,” I managed.
Gil caught himself, looked angry, pulled his hand back as if he’d been burned. “Beer?”
“No,” I said.
He shrugged and hit the bar once more but not very hard.
“What’s wrong?” I asked and then my brain kicked into gear and I figured it out. I bit my lip, waiting.
“Your mother called,” he said.
“I forgot to leave you a note,” I said. “I was supposed to warn you and I--”
He put his hand over mine. “Not your fault, not your problem.”
I took another sip of my beer, decided I didn’t want it and dumped the rest in the bar sink. Carl was laughing with a bunch of band members in the corner and looking at the female bass players tits. I shook my head and sighed. “But I should have remembered. I was so pissed at her and then I got the hair cut and my brain is fried. I’m totally stupid right now, Gil I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” He patted my hand again and sighed.
“So why are you upset? Because she wants some stuff sent? Not to be disloyal, daddio,” I laughed, “But I think you’re better off without her.”
“I’m not upset because she wants some stuff,” he said.
“Then why?”
He leaned in and I moved forward to hear his whispered words. “I’m upset because I’m not upset.”
“Oh,” I breathed, my body responding in an entirely inappropriate way. I chose to ignore it.
“And I’ve had too much to drink,” he confided.
I smiled then, a smile that touched not just my face but my heart, too. “You don’t say.”
“I do say.”
“How about if I make sure you get home okay? I’m off now,” I said.
“You are a gem, Jenny. You are the best almost daughter in the world.”
“Thanks,” I said and clocked out. I told Carl to party on and that I’d see him later and off I went, making sure my almost dad got back to my almost home.
“Do you feel weird about me being here?” Gil asked as we walked. The streetlights lit half his handsome face but threw the other half in shadows.
“Of course not. Why would I?”
“Because I’m not your dad and I’m in the house your mom was in before I met her.”
I shrugged. When he lit a cigarette I drew a deep breath and held it, relishing the rich fiery smell. He offered me one and I shook my head. “Nope. No to the cigarette and no to the question. I do not feel weird. She left, not you.”
“True,” he said and kicked a soda can before sighing, stooping and picking it up. Gil stuck it in his back pocket.
“Why are you upset that you aren’t upset?” I asked, feeling oddly shy but hugely curious.
“Shouldn’t I be upset?”
“I guess. It would make sense, but only if you were happy. Were you happy?”
He turned to me, so fast he threw me off kilter and I stumbled. The beer was wearing off and he reached out a hand, fast and sure, and steadied me. “I thought I was. But now I wonder if I just assumed I was instead of actually feeling it.”
“Then it’s a good thing she left,” I said softly and turned, continuing so fast that he took three running steps to catch up.
“I’m sorry if that sounds like something an asshole would feel,” he mumbled.
“The only asshole in this is the one who ran off,” I said and then snorted. “That sounds kind of gross.”
At home he pulled his key from his jean pocket and let us in. “Beer?”
“You sure?” I said and smiled. I hit the small light in the living room. Something about the dark was comforting. I wasn’t ready for real light, so the small lamp’s glow was more than enough.
“I’m fine. I wasn’t, but now I am. You calm me,” he said and then frowned and moved away from me.
I saw my chance and I walked in the kitchen behind
him. When he shut the fridge door, I put my hand on is arm. “Can we talk about it?” I asked.
“What? Your mother?”
I shook my head, popped the caps off the beers with a small souvenir opener screwed to the wall by the back door. A reminder of vacations past. Of youth and absurd souvenir stores and family vacation.
“Not my mother,” I said. “Last night.”
“No.” His jaw went tight and he moved from me.
I grabbed his arm and said, “Please, Gil.”
“Nothing happened.”
“But it did,” I said in a rush. “It did and it was great and I can’t shake it or the thought of it or that fact that…” Here was where emotion surged up in my throat and I had a hard time.
His dark eyes were unreadable in the dim light. “That?”
“I want more,” I said, pushing the words out. Something I really had not admitted to myself and I was admitting it to him aloud.
“No.” He walked out of the room and that was that.
But I’ve never been that person. I could never take a no and leave it be. I had to poke it with a stick. I had to go one step further. I hurried after him and found him in his room kicking off his work boots. “Gil--”
“I said no. I don’t even want to talk about it. There’s nothing to talk about.”
I dropped to my knees and looked up at him. He kept his head down but I dipped my own, looking up into his eyes, forcing him to look at me. “Gil, you make me feel safe. You make me feel sane. You make me feel something that no one else can. Not my mother, not Carl. Not all the other yahoos I’ve dated or the ones I’ve fucked.”
“Jenny--” he started, sounding pained.
“I want you again.”
“No.”
“I want you all the way. Not just your fingers in my cunt,” I said, mostly for shock value I admit. I wanted him to hear me even if it was because of coarse language or brusque words.
“Jen!”
“I do. Please, listen to me, Gil,” I said and put my hands on his thighs. I stroked the soft denim that had been worn into submission for so long.
“Stop,” he said.
I shook my head, tears pricking my eyes. I pushed my hands higher on this thighs listening to the whispery sound my skin made on his jeans. “Let me,” I said to him, head bowed.
He put his hand on my head, on my new clipped hair and my fancy blue streak. He tilted my head back and leaned down so he was bent over. Eye to eye he said, “Go to bed, Jennifer.”
I shook my head and kissed him. He pulled back for a moment and I chased him with my mouth, kissing him again. The sound he made half broke my heart, but not enough that I stopped. He kissed me back, his mouth sweet and hot and hoppy from the beer.
I tugged at his buckle, his button fly, his boxers. I took his cock in hand and dipped my head and licked the tip of him until he stopped his soft protests.
I sucked him deep and he said, “God, Jenny, fuck. I’m your father.”
“Almost,” I said. “But not quite. And nothing that is almost ever counts. Not in love or war or marbles.” I licked down his cock until he moved under me like a wave. His finger tugged the short strands of hair that kissed my jaw and he thrust up under me, moving so that his cock slammed deeper into my mouth. I pressed his legs flat and immobile with my upper body so I could control how far down I went, how deeply I would take him. I stole his power and thusly his guilt.
“Jenny, you can stop. You can stop now and we’ll pretend. We’ll pretend we never did this. We never crossed this line. We never strayed from what’s right.” Each word was a breath he blew out. Each one accented by a jittery thrust of his trim hips and the warm silky slide of his flesh over my lips. Each utterance was accented by the sight of his fist clenching my mother’s fancy bedding and the groan that he gave when I cupped his balls, set me on edge. I wanted to make him come. I wanted to taste the salty flood of him in my mouth.
“No,” I said. “No. I don’t want to stop.”
And I didn’t want to and I didn’t stop. I sucked him harder and he barked out words I couldn’t understand and then he was coming, a warm rush of his orgasm on my tongue, trailing down my throat, stickying my mouth with warm wet whiteness. I rested my forehead to his pubic bone, my new fancy fringe tacky with his fluids.
“Come up here,” he said and I climbed to him. He kissed my mouth which shocked me. It was something Carl would never do. Gil kissed me deeply curled me to him and I dozed off. I could feel his heartbeat steady and true against my shoulder and his soft breath on my face.
I awoke a bit later to a fireman’s carry. Gil carried me over his shoulder up the steps, the stairs creaking under our weight, the world swaying with each step he took. He didn’t know I was awake and he laid me on the bed, yanked off my jeans as gently as possible. He left my tee on and my panties. He kissed my forehead and my nose. And almost like an afterthought, he kissed my mouth. A tender kiss that made my heart twist up sideways in my chest.
“I’m sorry, Jen. I never should have let you. But god, I don’t think I’ll shake the reminder that you did. Or the smell of you. Or the feel.” He brushed my hair off my forehead and I sighed deeply like I was asleep.
I wanted to reach up and touch him. I wanted to kiss him and ask him to come to bed with me. I wanted to open my thighs and beg him to take me. But the back door slammed and Carl was home and before I could decide what I would actually do versus what I wanted to do, Gil had left the room and crept back downstairs.
Chapter 9
Carl took a shower before he climbed into bed. I tried to lay there and wait for him awake. I wanted to know why a man would come home after two a.m. and take a shower. But I kept drifting in and out. When he came into the room and dropped his clothes, I smelled a sweet puff of some feminine scent, but not enough to rouse myself to comment.
Carl climbed into bed with me and curled himself to me. But when he touched me tentatively between the legs, I rolled away, mumbling like I was dreaming. Soon enough I was.
* * * *
I woke late again and Carl was gone. No note, no nothing, just missing money from my wallet. Probably for lunch or so he would say. I took a lazy shower, part of me oddly, insanely sad to feel my hair go from tacky to smooth as the remnants of my encounter with Gil went down the drain.
The coffee pot had a sticky note on it that said: DRINK ME. I grinned. Gil and I had left notes like that for each other when I was young.
COMPLETE ME on homework, EAT ME on birthday cake, CLIMB INTO ME at bed time, USE ME! stuck on the shower door after my softball games. I poured a cup of coffee and listened to the sounds of Gil in his workroom. Subtle bangs and swishes since he had the garage door open, the constant lazy drone of the radio. Some morning shock jock going on and on about something or another.
I put a piece of bread in the toaster and waited for it to magically turn it to toast. Extra butter, more coffee, I wondered out into the work room, nibbling my toast and wondering how I should bring up last night. Or if I should at all.
By the door was a box full of stuff and on the concrete floor next to it, some packing tape, a permanent marker and an address label. Marian’s stuff. “Good morning?” I called.
“Good morning to you, Sleeping Beauty,” Gil said from the loft. I looked up and he winked at me, giving me a little wave. “I’ll be right there.”
He came down the steps that were more ladder than staircase and dropped a photo album in the box. “Mom?” I asked.
“Who else?” He grinned at me and stooped to seal the box.
“Hold up,” I said, curious. I grabbed the photo album and flipped through. My Grandma Irene, my other grandmother Jill. Me with no front teeth. Me pigtails. Me and Gil at he beach with me clutching a big red raft. Me and Gil at the state fair. Me and Gil making oversized pancakes the size of dinner plates. “Hunh.”
“What?”
I flipped some more. “What do you see?”
“Pictures,” he said.
<
br /> “Well, thank you, captain obvious.”
He laughed, smacked my butt in a good natured way but something in me suddenly bloomed to life. I ignored it.
“What I mean is, what do you notice about those pictures?” I flipped a bit faster and he shook his head at me.
“You’ve got me, Jen. You’re too sharp for me. What should I notice?”
“That most of them are me and you. Me and you, Gil. Me and you and another person. Me and you on vacation, at ceremonies, with animals. Where is she?” I said softly, but there was venom in my voice. “Where is my goddamn, motherfucking mother!” I ground out the words.
He took the book from me gently and said “Behind the camera. That is all.”
“Every time? Every. Single. Time?”
He frowned. “Yes, mostly. I guess” he sighed, clearly at a loss for what to say.
“Fuck, she wasn’t with us even when she was with us,” I sighed and dropped the book into the box.” I dropped to my knees pushing and shoving at the box until it closed. Then I wrapped it crazily in packing tape and then banged it against the garage a few times for good measure.
Gil put his hand on my head as I knelt there breathing hard. “Better?”
“Maybe if I back over it with your truck,” I said.
He laughed and helped me up.
“None of that. We’ll ship it off and then I have to go to Levenstein to file the papers for divorce.”
“Good for you,” I said my throat tight. “You should. You sure I can’t back over that thing with the truck?”
“I’m sure. Look grab a seat, kiddo. We need to talk.”
My heartbeat tripled its rate and I hoisted myself onto the work bench, swinging my legs like a kid. I figured this would be the us talk. So it shocked me when he said “Carl was fucking around on you last night.”
I blinked at him and oddly felt the urge to remind him of what we had done last night and technically hadn’t I cheated on Carl? “I see,” I said.
“And I want you to boot his ass. John said he was messing around right there in the bar in front of everyone with Tammy from the band. He didn’t even have the decency to do it in private.”
