Toad in the Hole

by Paisley Ray

  “Maybe I should be asking that question,” he countered.

  Water ran in the sink, and when they returned her neck looked reddish, but the slithery snake was still intact. She caught me staring at it and prodded me with the spatula.” You were supposed to be here a day and a half ago.”

  “My car broke down.”

  “Excuses are like assholes; everyone’s got one,” her voice lowered to a murmur. “I should have known. You do this every year.”

  “Do what?”

  With calculated precision, she squinted her black eyes at me. “You avoid all the work of moving in.”

  My voice pitched, “I do not. Not on purpose.”

  Placing himself between Francine and the stovetop, Roger stepped in. His head grazed the ceiling of the pint-sized kitchen and he hunched his shoulder to peer into the pan. “Now ladies, don’t be accusing.”

  “Are you taking her side?” Francine asked.

  “Francie, something from this griddle is smelling mighty fine.”

  She manhandled the spatula, and watched the crispy brown that formed on the edges of what I assumed were pancakes. “There isn’t room in here for all of us. You two sit your bottoms down,” she ordered as she adjusted the heat on the electric stovetop.

  Everything was ready at the kitchen counter. The red snap-top on the maple syrup was open and a knife stood erect in the center of a tub of butter. Roger tucked a napkin in the neck of the burlap blanket he wore and wrapped each of his fists around a utensil. “So the Galaxie broke down? Is she fixed?”

  “Why didn’t you call and tell us?” Francine snapped as she stacked the grill cakes on a plate.

  “Has anyone set up the phone service yet?” Duh. I would’ve called if there was somewhere to call.

  Biting her lip, she re-focused on the food.

  I considered storming off, that is, if pancakes weren’t my all-time favorite food. Besides, junior year had just begun and I didn’t want to start it with a fight.

  “I ended up phoning Dad to let him know I’d been delayed. He spoke to the mechanic at the repair shop so I wouldn’t get completely ripped off. Even said he’d send me the money to help cover the cost, but I don’t plan on holding him to that.”

  “Art restoration business still slow?” Francine asked.

  I shrugged. “His business has picked up.” Which was a good thing since his butt-busting aerobic-instructor girlfriend of two years ate into his pockets with the social calendar she subjected him to.

  After tightening her tasseled bathrobe belt and tucking some escaped hair under her shower cap, Francine set the platter in front of us. I noticed Roger’s pie hole maneuver a series of exercises and contortions as a warm up. Both he and Francine took food as seriously as religion, and he was focused on quieting the grumble in his stomach. Sliding a fork down half the stack to serve me, I stopped him.

  “Just one,” I said.

  The two contorted their faces at me concerned-like.

  “Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure they’re great.”

  “These are no ordinary pancakes. You’ll change your mind, ” Roger said.

  They were golden around the edges, and seemed denser than the ones at IHOP. I could’ve vacuumed most of the stack, but my jeans from last year were snug.

  Francine’s boyfriend had perfected fueling her ego. It was his way of placing a protective shield around himself. I knew his gig. He conveyed a simple, easy-going persona, but underneath he was one smart dude.

  “To start with,” I said.

  “Suit yourself, but these johnny cakes aren’t going to be around for long.”

  And it began. The southernisms that always confused me were pitched like fastballs. I slathered soft butter on my lonely cake and poured a puddle of syrup out of the Mrs. Butterworth bottle. “Johnny Cakes? Francine. Who? What are you talking about?”

  The downstairs bedroom door lock clicked. Within seconds a pair of lightly freckled, lanky arms hugged me from behind, draping a curtain of red hair over my shoulders. Releasing me, the chronic hugger dangled her nimble fingers onto my plate and tore a corner of my johnny cake. After popping the bite behind her glossy lips, Sheila Sinclair made a show of sucking the leftover drops of syrup off her fingers. “Rachael,” she purred. “Good of you to show. What wanker kept you from your own party?”

  I didn’t immediately turn to face her. For the life of me, I never thought I’d be living under the same roof with my bar brawling nemesis. But her daddy owned the house and she collected the too-good-to-be-true rent. My back would be covered by my best buds, which she mistakenly assumed included her. “For the record, no man keeps me. And what party? No one told me about a party.”

  Stationed at the stove, Francine manipulated the iron skillet with her wrist to evenly grease the pan, then waited a moment before she ladled puddles of sunflower-colored batter. “That’s because it was a surprise.”

  Roger and I turned toward Sheila, and we both noticed her clingy, low V-neck t-shirt that left nothing to the imagination. Braless and perky, her prized torpedoes were on display. What the hell was I thinking, agreeing to live with this crazy-ass chutzpah that reveled in testing her roommates’ boyfriends loyalties?

  “Why would you throw me a party?”

  Sheila slinked into the kitchen and leaned her skinny backside against the sink. Pulling her shoulders back, she gave Francine, Roger, and me an eyeful. “Honestly Rachael, you’re so modest.” At least one of us was. Unlike Roger, I kept my focus above Sheila’s neck.

  Francine stepped an arm’s length out from the stove. Her Rubenesque figure and perfectly angled, oven-mitted hands on hips blocked Roger’s frontal view of Sheila. She spoke without moving. “For winning the scholarship we threw you a ‘dress like your favorite masterpiece’ surprise shindig.”

  “You did?” I said looking from Sheila to Francine. Francine met my wide-eyed astonishment with a blank stare, and Sheila plastered an angelic smile on her shiny lips. Now the mis-arranged chairs, the dark stain on the mauve carpet, the ashtray filled with butts, and the body tucked under a throw with a back cushion covering its face made sense. “Is that Katie Lee or Jet on the sofa?”

  Sheila’s eyes brimmed with delight while Francine contorted the patch of skin between her eyebrows heavenward.

  “That there,” Francine said, “was uninvited and will be on its way as soon as it enters consciousness.”

  Intrigued, I feigned pretend nonchalance. “Where is Katie Lee?”

  “Over at Dufus’ place.”

  My nose crinkled. I had a vivid memory of Xanadu Apartments that still stung. I’d been out of the country for a good part of the summer, and wasn’t up-to-speed on the whirling dramas that hurdled in and out of Katie Lee’s life.

  So she and Hugh were still a thing.

  I wouldn’t have predicted that those two would’ve lasted—not that I overly cared, except that Hugh’s roommate, Clay Sorenson, was my ex-fiasco. Our thing should’ve been promising, but ended with an unexpected bang—the kind that lands you in the hospital. If Hugh was still living with Clay, that meant that our circles overlapped and there was the potential for a run-in with someone I’d worked hard to put in The Forget File. Shaking the past out of my head I moseyed closer to the sofa. “Jet?”

  A soda can tab snapped and Sheila poured herself a Pepsi. “Upstairs sleeping.”

  If the body on the sofa wasn’t either of my missing roommates and it wasn’t Hugh or Roger then it had to be someone left over from my party. Someone I knew. I’d had a long, romanceless summer, and a flurry of magnetic energy sparked from my heart to my thighs. Had the girls arranged for Stone Rogers, my on-again off-again to drive in from South Carolina for this soirée? End of last year, we’d left things dangling, but I wouldn’t have been disappointed to see him now.

  At the corner of the breakfast bar, Roger used his finger to collect the last of the syrup on his plate while Francine hummed. Sheila didn’t bother to hide watching me as she giggled.
<
br />   “Do I know this someone?”

  Francine fixed a plate for herself. “Unfortunately.”

  That bristly response meant it wasn’t Stone. He was the only guy interest I had who she tolerated. Panic seized me. There was a southern badass who passed in and out of my life. He’d been a man on the run whom I’d slept with, once. Like chocolate covered sprinkled donuts, he shredded my sensibilities cockeyed with his sweet-talking, testosterone-infused, tussled charm, and I somehow hadn’t managed to say no. After our last encounter, I’d sworn to never willingly step foot near him again. Frantically, I assessed the dimensions of the lump under the throw.

  Back in the kitchen, Francine made a clatter, and Sheila and Roger were talking about basketball season and whether or not Roger was going to be a starter. I raised a hand. “Please tell me that you two did not invite.”

  They ignored me.

  “Francine, when you said Johnny Cakes was looking for me, was that Bayou code for Bubba Jackson?”

  “If that fool comes a-knocking, he won’t be leaving in the same shape he arrived.”

  “Then who was looking for me?”

  “Your FBI boyfriend.” Francine began snapping her finger. “What does he call himself?”

  “Storm,” Sheila said.

  “That’s the one. Left a box for you.”

  “Agent Cauldwell is not my boyfriend.”

  “Good to know,” Sheila’s voice trailed off.

  “Why’d you call him Johnny Cakes?”

  “He’s so smug. Cute, but he knows it. Besides, that’s what I’m cooking and the name fits him.”

  “Who’s crashed on the sofa?”

  “See for yourself,” Francine said.

  Pinching at its corner piping, I lifted the cushion that covered the slumbering head. A manly arm I didn’t recognize gripped it in place. Beneath the throw laid a worn pair of Levi’s with one blown knee and a black vintage, Junior Johnson, 182 wins, Nascar Hall of Fame t-shirt. I heard the mystery man under the pillow yawn as he rubbed the back of his hand over his eyes.

  My eyes forgot how to blink.

  “Well lookie here. The party girl decided to show up after all.”

  My mouth was only capable of sucking wind.

  He winked. “Been awhile, hasn’t it, Raz? Hear you’ve been stirrin’ up plenty of trouble.”

  “Nash Wilson, what the hell?”

  Climbing off the sofa to stretch, he moaned, “Aww, Raz.” After shaking the cobwebs out of his skull he wrapped me in a bear hug and planted a quick smooch on my cheek. He whispered in my ear, “I’ve missed you too, darlin’.”

  NOTE TO SELF

  Don’t have a love interest on campus. Maybe for the best with Sheila Sinclair’s torpedoes on the loose for viewing.

  Nash Wilson, Katie Lee’s trouble-prone, jail-sentence-waiting-to-happen ex is in the house—what does he want?!

  CHAPTER 2

  I Ain’t Not Never in My Life

  The North Carolina heat sizzled off the asphalt where Katie Lee parked her four-door Olds, Big Blue. Besides her car having air-conditioning—mine didn’t—hers was a sturdier, more reliable vehicle. The Galaxie’s engine now clunked and pinged when I drove it in anything above seventy-two degrees. It didn’t go unnoticed that this happened since the Ford had been ‘fixed,’ in West Virginia by mountain mechanics—Go figure.

  I’d been back to North Carolina for less than a week and already had acquired a reddish glow from bicep to fingertip—thighs to ankles. Not very alluring. Another thing I was going to have to fix.

  Tuesdays and Thursdays, Katie Lee and I had compatible class schedules so we carpooled and only had to feed one meter on the campus lot. It was the first week of classes and finally, I had some alone time with her to ask the nagging question. “Please explain how Nash knows where we live.”

  Nash Wilson, Katie Lee’s cheating ex-boyfriend was not someone easily forgotten. His presence stirred a vivid memory of all the criminal trouble he caused my freshman year. He was the type of person who coaxed an involuntary breath of relief when you knew he’d moved out of the state. Katie Lee didn’t immediately answer. Beneath tortoise shell cat-eye sunglasses and a spaghetti strap baby-blue cotton sundress, she moved across the parking lot without a hint of perspiration or tan line in sight. Her style befitted her self-assuredness. We were similar build, her hair shoulder length, mine draped a few inches longer. Maybe I’d have to borrow of few of her things and see if I could pull off a look as well as she did.

  “Rachael, I stay friendly with my exes.”

  “Since when?”

  She opened her wallet and I noticed a tattered photo of her and Nash tucked in with her dollars. Katie Lee peered at me over the top of her sunglasses. “Since always.”

  We moved onto a sidewalk, fed the parking meter, and made our way toward Campus Drive. I was headed to the Arts and Humanities building while Katie Lee had enough time to grab a sweet tea before her lecture. “Are you telling me that you don’t hold any grudges or ill will toward Nash for cheating on you, writing his own prescriptions on your daddy’s medical pad, and for getting you, and by default me, tangled with Bubba Jackson, Billy and Jack Ray, and the whole southern art ring forgery debacle?”

  “That was ages ago.”

  “Nash is trouble and you know it.”

  “You’re being overly sensitive. The past is the past. It’s not healthy to hold grudges. You’ll get wrinkles.”

  “Hold grudges? I prefer to think of my attitude toward your Nash as a defensive safeguard.”

  Katie Lee stopped near the entrance of the Arts and Humanities building and pushed her hair back with her sunglasses. Over the summer she’d added blonde highlights to her brunette locks, which gave her girl-next-door look some va voom. “Do you think I have bad taste in boyfriends?”

  “No.” YES. “Not all of them. I mean Hugh seems decent-ish.”

  Her lips tightened and I backpedaled, fast.

  “It’s just Nash. He’s got a bad track record.”

  “Ah, Rach,” she began, but we were interrupted by a curt voice that came out of a bleached blonde in a formfitting, pencil-straight skirt and matching gray blazer.

  “Ms. O’Brien.”

  “P… Professor Schleck.”

  “I trust you had a productive summer.”

  “Oh, um yeah.”

  Offering her hand, Katie Lee introduced herself. “Katie Lee Brown. I’m Rachael’s roommate. Third year in a row.”

  Schleck held a stack of boxes with photocopies from Kinko’s. Feigning strain under the tree she’d killed, she tilted her head. “What stamina.”

  Katie Lee took the liberty of removing the top box, forcing me to follow her lead. As I removed the bulk of paper from the professor’s hands, some catalogues fell to the floor. I quickly reached down and retrieved the professor’s fall issue of Fancy Cat magazine. I would never have pegged her as the pet type and figured it was junk mail. I made a mental note to scold Katie Lee for being ‘useful’ to the most ornery teacher on campus. I was just thankful that I didn’t have any of her classes this semester.

  The professor’s dishwater gray eyes that loitered somewhere between blue and light brown, blinked as we walked indoors. “Summer in England, wasn’t it?”

  “Toured London and the countryside with my grandmother for most of the summer.”

  We followed the professor up the entrance steps. “I trust you took in The National Gallery, The Tate, and The Guildhall.”

  “Plenty of history came my way,” I said as we turned a corner.

  Jamming my foot in the hallway entrance door, I felt an arctic blast of air-conditioning slap my face.

  “Y’all, I best be headed to class,” Katie Lee said, piling the box of paper she held into my arms.

  “You have a half hour,” I said as I transmitted another message telepathically. Don’t leave me alone with stick-up-her-ass Schleckster.

  “Just enough time to skirt across campus and visit the little
girls room before lecture. Nice meeting you, Professor,” she said.

  I couldn’t blame her really. I’d rather hang out in a lavatory than spend time with Professor Silvia Schleck.

  “Ms. O’Brien, heavy course schedule this semester?”

  “Halfway through my degree. I’ve completed almost all my core requirements so I can take some of the advanced-level Art History classes this year.”

  Without anywhere to escape, now that my arms were full of the professor’s papers, I dutifully followed her toward her office.

  “You must be pleased that you were awarded the scholarship.”

  “Totally psyched. Thanks for all the mentoring you provided with the internship and all last year.”

  Under heavily shadowed, dark smoky lids, her eyes watched me while the edges of her frosted lipstick, the color of Sheila’s carpet, betrayed no emotion.

  Turning a corner, I mostly listened to the clack of the professor’s spiky four-inch heels against linoleum and the chatter of passing students. Unlocking her office door, she hesitated. I didn’t know what she was thinking. It wasn’t like I wanted a sit-down chat. I planned a fast drop-off before high-tailing my behind out of her sight. When she finally opened the door, I was taken aback. “You’ve redecorated.”

  “It was getting tired in here so I spruced things up a bit.”

  Schleck’s office was smaller than my freshman year dorm room with only one tiny, oddly-shaped window in the back corner. Last year when I’d interned, mostly checking student papers’ facts and dates, she had a mishmash of nice but knockoff antique furniture and rugs. She’d acquired an authentic eighteenth-century French Provincial walnut desk. Its intricately engraved legs were something, but not as impressive as the Persian rug I stood on: rich in reds, with a medallion design. Spruced things up? This was a complete revamp. Although outside of my expertise, my Grandma Geneva had a couple of similar rugs around her house, and this one oozed quality. I gravitated toward a cluster of framed etchings on the far wall. “Wow, Professor, did you get a promotion?”