by London Casey
I couldn’t believe the words on the tip of my tongue. I couldn’t believe my own restraint. I couldn’t believe my own fear. Yeah, fear. The one thing I refused Sadie to have. I was a hypocrite.
But in my defense, I had good reason.
Emily wasn’t just beautiful in her features… she was beautiful in her heart… and that threatened my heart.
“Okay, Emily, let’s face the facts here,” I said. “We’ve been neighbors for a little while now and we really don’t know much about each other. Yet there’s something, right? I mean, I see the way you look at me. The way you’re so involved with Sadie. Don’t give me the runaround that it’s just your job. You like Sadie. Sadie adores you. But that’s hard for me. It’s hard for me because I have to bite back on my tongue. I’ve been biting so fucking hard, Emily, that I can’t stop swallowing the blood. I want to fucking scream. I want you to know you’re not her goddamn mother and you never will be. Spitting fire and anger is easy. It comes so freely to us. The harder thing is to keep my mouth shut and wait. You want to know the story. I know you do. You won’t come out and ask it though. You’re not like most people. They look at me and either know or assume what they don’t know and then I get pity. You challenge me a little. You want to help. I want to help you, Emily. I want you to put up a fucking for sale sign and be done with it all. That’s the right thing for you to do. But you won’t. So, fine, I’ll tell you what happened.”
I rubbed my forehead. I looked down. I wanted to find the words. The real words. Not the fake story I told Sadie to help ease her tiny and kind heart.
I looked forward again.
Eyes stared back at me.
“I lost her… I should have gotten… we… blub blub…”
I stood up and turned away.
Late for work, talking to a goldfish.
That’s what I had become.
I pinched the bridge of my nose.
I hurried out of Sadie’s bedroom and out of the house, needing to get to the shop.
If I even flirted at that line with Emily things would explode. No matter what I did in my life, there were two hearts involved. The other woman’s and Sadie’s. And Sadie’s was the most important heart. And what woman could honestly say they’d want a life of being second in line? Nobody deserved that. Especially Emily.
Goddammit, when I shut my eyes I saw her. Her hair, wet, the time I knocked on the door. The way it was off to the side. Her hair, this morning, dried, a little curl to the ends, some sleep still showing.
Fuck.
I sat in the parking lot at the garage and smashed my hands over and over on the steering wheel.
I couldn’t stop.
(“What would you do?” she asked.
“What?”
“If I…”
She nods to the TV.
I hate chick flick movies. And I hate this one the most. The woman getting cancer and dying, leaving the guy to fend for himself through life. The guy so lost, raising a couple kids, meeting women, never sure how to get through the guilt. Fuck that shit. Fuck that life. Fuck this movie.
“No way, Ev,” I whisper to her. “You’re not getting away that easy.”
“Stop. I’m serious, Jake. You never know…”
“It’s midnight on a Saturday. We’re half naked under a blanket. You just made me watch this movie. And now you want to talk…”
She blinks fast, tears in her eyes.
My right hand slides down her cheek, stealing a tear. Down her shoulder. Down to her belly. Her belly is growing. So beautifully growing.
“Let’s talk,” I say.
“I don’t ever want you unhappy,” she says.
“Ev, I’m with you. I can never be unhappy with you.”
“Without me?”
“Without you, Everly, there is no life. There’s no sun to light the day. No stars to wish upon. No grass to grow and tickle the bottoms of my feet. No love. No passion. No feelings. There’s nothing.”)
I opened my eyes and I was still pounding the steering wheel inside the truck.
It was all a fucking lie.
There was life. The sun came up. The stars were out at night. There was grass. But love? Passion?
I gritted my teeth. Because Emily popped into my head at that exact moment.
“Jake, yo!” a voice screamed.
I turned and saw Paul standing there. He looked all fucked up, hungover.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he yelled.
I opened my door and slammed it into him. He flew back. Red wasn’t even the color that washed over me then.
Paul was an easy target and I hated myself as I jumped out of the truck and grabbed his shirt. Two hands, walking him backwards, his feet dragging on the ground as he called for help.
I put him on the hood of the car and lifted and slammed him down a handful of times.
“Are you drunk again?” I yelled. “You fucking show up drunk again? Huh? What the fuck is wrong with you? You out driving drunk too? You piece of fucking shit.”
I brought up my right hand, ready to attack.
I felt something grab my arm and twist. I felt like my shoulder was about to pop from its socket, and that’s just what I needed to feel. It woke me up out of my angered state.
I spun and Mickey was there, a thick wrench in his hand, lifted in the air. He put the metal wrench to my jaw and snarled his lip at me.
“In my office,” he said. “Now.”
I broke away and smacked the wrench away.
Mickey made a jump toward me and I grabbed his wrist, twisting, breaking his hold on the wrench.
“Fucking Christ,” Paul said. “Get him a fucking anxiety pill or some shit.”
“Jake!” Mickey yelled, knowing I was going to do something.
I turned back around and swung the wrench. If I had hit Paul with it, it would have killed him, no doubt. Instead, I slammed the wrench to the hood of the junker car. It made a thundering sound and left a huge dent.
I let the wrench go.
I looked at Paul.
“Sorry,” he said. “It’s the booze talking, Jake. Sorry.”
“My office,” Mickey yelled. “And, Paul? Call for a ride. Go get cleaned up. And I don’t mean your fucking shirt.”
I walked away and kicked myself into Mickey’s office. I didn’t take a seat, even when he came in.
He walked behind his desk, sat down, and opened the top drawer. He took out a small bottle of scotch and a prescription pill bottle.
“What the fuck?” I asked.
“One or the other,” he said. “Or both.”
“Mick…”
He slapped the bottle over. “I went through that shit for a long time. Until I woke up next to some woman I didn’t know. I spent the rest of the day crying at my wife’s grave, begging her for forgiveness. I still don’t know if she forgave me. Then came this shit” - Mick smacked the pill bottle over. “They help me calm down when everything gets fucking fast.”
I faced his desk.
The old man was getting vulnerable near me.
My fingers twitched at the sight of the pill bottle. I didn’t want to take that path, not with Sadie. I didn’t want to hide in a bathroom with my demons and swallow white pills to make them shut the fuck up for four hours at a time.
“Or you can try this,” Mickey said.
He opened the drawer again.
I thought for a second he was going to take out a gun.
Instead, it was a picture of Sadie.
Mickey’s favorite picture of her. From last summer as she stood against a burning sunset, holding a chocolate ice cream cone. Her face smothered in chocolate, her hair stuck to her face because of the ice cream. But she had this look on her face… this look of a warrior about to do battle.
I finally sat down.
I rubbed my jaw.
“Sorry about Paul,” I said.
“You were freaking out, weren’t you?” Mickey asked as he sat down and put the booze and pills away
, but not the picture of Sadie.
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“You know why, Mick.”
“Because of your neighbor, not Everly.”
“What did I tell you about saying her name, Mick?”
“Beat me up if you want, Jake. I won’t stop saying her name. I miss her too. She made the best damn cookies I’d ever had. She held my hand through my wife’s funeral. You don’t think a day goes by that I don’t think of Everly? Huh? What planet do you live on, Jake? I felt like I lost a daughter that day. I looked at you and I had no words for you. Jesus Christ, Jake, I spent nights researching the make and model of her car, wondering if I had fucked something on it. But, no, it was just… it was just the way life goes.”
Mickey grabbed a tissue. His greasy hands dabbing the tissue to his eyes.
“What do I do, Mick? I can’t drag my neighbor into this anymore than she already is.”
“You can’t fight what hearts want. They’re like magnets sometimes. They just pull and pull and pull until the right one hits.”
“There’s been nobody since…”
“I get it,” Mickey said. “So you need to figure this out, Jake.”
“Meaning what?”
“Meaning set a boundary or take her out on a date.”
“Mick…”
“No,” he said. He slammed his hand on the table. “I’ve busted your balls about dating before. No matter what, at the very least, you need some company. Okay? You have to make sure you’re taken care of.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Go get fucking laid!” Mickey growled. “Christ, Jake. Go out with someone. Have a few drinks. Go to her place. Do what you need to do.”
“And you’re going to watch my daughter?”
“Whatever you need help with.”
“And what about my neighbor?”
“Same for her too,” Mickey said. “You want to sleep with her? Go for it. You don’t want to? Then don’t. What do you want from me, Jake?”
I stood up. “You just got done saying…” - Everly - “she was like a daughter to you. And you’re encouraging me to…”
“It’s not easy to figure out, Jake. I know that. I didn’t say it was. But you can’t sit around for the rest of your life. Beating up the steering wheel of your truck. Beating up Paul.”
I rubbed my jaw. “I owe him an apology. And a new shirt.”
“Don’t worry about him,” Mickey said. “Do something, Jake. You always take charge, no matter what. You’ve been an amazing father to Sadie. You always will be. I know that. But sometimes… turn that switch off in your brain. And just… just fuck someone.”
I laughed.
Mickey laughed.
It was all we could do to keep from crying.
I remembered Everly standing there, holding Mickey’s hand as Mickey cried at his wife’s funeral. And I remembered Mickey holding my arm so damn tight at Everly’s funeral. I wasn’t sure who was holding who up…
Then or now.
Chapter Nineteen
The Not So Date, Date
(Jake)
I stood in the hallway, the only guy there. Miss Anderson had the kids lined up in the hallway, each holding their favorite zoo animal. The boys all had tigers, lions, snakes, the normal deadly stuff that boys were into. The girls chose horses, pandas, a few had kittens. And there was Sadie, smack dab in the middle. Holding a cutout of a unicorn. Granted, it was the same horse shaped cutout as the others, but Sadie’s had a paper towel tube attached to its head.
A freaking unicorn.
I smiled and nodded, watching as Emily gave a quick speech on their adventures to the zoo in the classroom. The books they read. The information they learned.
It was cool when the center did stuff like this.
Miss Anderson then announced that everyone was free to go. The kids hurried into a crazy shuffle, darting into the room to get their stuff and get back out to their parents.
Every kid except mine.
I waited and waited but Sadie never appeared again.
I crept toward the door and peeked into the room.
She was sitting at her desk.
I snuck into the room and pssst’ed her.
She looked at me.
Tears in her little eyes.
“Hey, what’s wrong?” I asked.
“Unicorns aren’t real, Daddy,” she said. “And I chose a unicorn. I should have just done a horse like the other girls.”
“Why?”
“The boys made fun of me.”
“Boys are jerks, Sadie.”
“You’re a boy.”
“I’m a jerk,” I said with a grin.
“Daddy…”
“Do you believe in unicorns?” I asked her.
“Yes,” Sadie said.
“That’s all that matters. You trust in what you believe. Nothing else matters.”
“Okay.”
“Plus, those horses were boring. Your unicorn looks amazing. We have to hang it up at home. So why don’t we get to Lisa’s so I can finish my work and then we’ll hang it up tonight, okay?”
“Okay,” Sadie said.
She finally stood and walked with me from the classroom.
“So how was your date with Bobby?” I heard a voice ask.
I looked over and saw Miss Anderson and Emily in the storage room putting supplies away.
So I stood there.
“It wasn’t a date,” Emily said.
“Well, to me it was. He said it went well.”
“It lasted all of five minutes. I walked away.”
“Why?”
“Julie, I’m not… I don’t know what I’m not, okay?”
“You shouldn’t be worried about seeing someone,” Miss Anderson said.
I nodded.
Emily had a date?
All that touchy flirty shit with me? What was that?
“Daddy, can we go?” Sadie said.
Emily looked at me, eyes wide. “Jake?”
“Just leaving,” I said without looking back.
I was being a jerk - a boy - but that was fine. I had things to do. I wasn’t going to stand around and hear about Emily fucking dating someone.
I took Sadie to the babysitter’s and went back to the garage.
I worked aimlessly, my mind scattered in a million places.
Finally, I threw a towel to the table and let out a sigh.
“What’s got you, Jake?” Mickey asked, a cigarette bouncing between his lips.
“Thinking about shit,” I said. “That thing about dating. What you said.”
“You’re a smart guy, you can figure it out,” Mickey said.
“Hey, if you need a date,” Paul said, appearing from nowhere, “my girlfriend’s one friend is single. She’s pretty. You might like her. Here, look at her picture.”
In seconds, Paul had a picture of a woman pulled up. He shoved his phone in my face.
Was that dating these days? Everything just so instant? People were so exposed.
It was hard to imagine what it was like before…
(I’m going to talk to her. Christ. If I don’t talk to her, it’ll be the biggest mistake of my life.
My mind is racing like my heart.
I bail on my buddies as they talk about how to lower an engine into a car. I didn’t give a fuck about engines, cars, anything in that moment.
She was a dream.
She opened the door and the wind blew her hair back.
Jeans, a black t-shirt, nothing written on it, everything mixed up in this wild beauty that stole my attention before I could get a hold of myself.
The way she stood at the counter and ran her hand through her hair, moving it to one side. Her right leg slightly bent.
I drop my slice of pizza and walk right to her. I have no clue what the fuck to say or do. Somewhere inside me I see myself just grabbing and kissing her. She’d probably smack me, call the cops, and I’d get put in jail.
Worth it.
I walk to the counter and lean against it.
Two pizza boxes are placed in front of her.
I watch as she touches her pocket and a look of terror spreads across her face.
The guy gives her the total and she stands frozen.
“You forgot your money, didn’t you?” I whisper.
Those would forever be the first words from me to her.
She looks at me. Her mouth opens, ready to spew fire. But she says nothing. Her eyes goes wide. There’s a flicker in her eyes.
Holy fucking shit. This is happening.
That spark…
“I forgot my money,” she says. “I was in a hurry. Helping a friend move.”
I reach into my back pocket. I take out the cash that’s meant for engine parts. I’ll take hell from my boss, Mickey, later about it.
“No way,” she says.
She touches my wrist.
My heart explodes.
“Make it up to me,” I whisper. “I’ll need to see you again. So you could pay me back. Right?”
She smiles.
Fuck, what a smile.
“Right,” she says.
It all feels too easy. Like it’s meant to be.
Fuck that.
It is meant to be.
I’m going to see her again.
I’m going to get that first kiss. And many other firsts…)
“What do you think?” Paul asked. “She’s pretty, right? She’s a nice person. Has her own apartment. Works at a hair salon. Doesn’t have any drama baggage with her. I mean…”
I gave Paul the phone back.
I thought about it for a second.
“Okay,” I said. “Set things up… I’ll go out on a date with her.”
Chapter Twenty
Monitor, Restraint
(Emily)
I felt like all I had been doing was writing. Just throwing words to paper without much of it making sense. It was a rinse and repeat kind of feeling where I’d just write for a few hours, send it to Alison, and wait for her suggestions. The crazy part was that she felt I had something going. She really did. To me, it was just garbage. To her, it was the raw openness of my heart she was hoping I’d be willing to give to her.
