Full of Grace

by Misty Provencher

  Sher covers her mouth, burping softly into her fingers.

  “Just two orders of fries, please,” I tell the woman. “And a pole dance.”

  Sher gapes, but the woman doesn’t miss a beat. She slings her checkered cleaning rag over her shoulder.

  “Ena’s home feedin’ the kids. If you really want it, I can call her, but I gotta warn you, Ena’s pretty high and mighty. She ain’t gonna run over here for twenty percent of the bill if you’re only getting fries.”

  “Would forty bucks do it?”

  Thoughtful, the woman drops her chin in a nod. “Think so.”

  “About how long before she comes back?”

  “Another ten minutes, at least. Maybe twenty if she’s feeding Donny peas. That kid hates peas. She’s gotta trick him into eating ‘em.”

  “Sexier by the second,” Sher murmurs under her breath.

  “We’ll wait,” I say.

  “Then I’ll get your fries.”

  After the bartender leaves, Sher leans across the table, taking extra care not to touch the top or the sides.

  “A lap dance? I never said I wanted a lap dance!”

  “It’s not a lap dance, it’s a pole dance. You said you wanted to learn how to pole dance,” I correct her. “And since I don’t see a whole lot of pregnant pole dancers, I expect the doctor might be against it.”

  “As well as the audience,” Sher adds.

  “I figured I’d get you the next best thing. A lesson.”

  “A lesson,” Sher deadpans, “from Ena, who can’t make it because her kid who won’t eat his peas.”

  “Sure.” I grin at her.

  But Ena, wherever she was, blows into the bar in wobbling, worn stilettos before our fries even arrive. The forty bucks must’ve inspired her to let Donny pass on the peas today.

  Instead of being a lithe, young stripper, Ena is a thick, shot-putting kind of woman that looks to be running hard at her late thirties. She’s got calves like metal torpedoes, bleach-blond hair extensions, and an outfit lifted from the set of Xena, Warrior Princess. The last abrupt thing about Ena is that she appears to spend as much time tanning as it takes to dry out asphalt. She’s highlighted that fact with body glitter.

  “You want a dance?” Ena asks, stopping at our table with her skeptical eyebrow lifted high in the air.

  “Please,” I say.

  “It is forty,” she says. She wipes a fingernail-claw over her lips. I think it is meant to be suggestive. Unfortunately, all it suggests to me is that I get my money out faster, so she’ll leave the table. I hand her two twenties.

  “You are a nice man,” Ena purrs, and Sher clears her throat.

  “The dance is for me,” she says. Ena glances at Sher with a sourpuss frown.

  “You?”

  “Yes, me. And I want lots of booty shakin’ for that forty bucks,” Sher adds, her arms wrapped around her own waist. She’s still not willing to touch anything, not even her dirty water glass. Ena’s frown dips a little deeper. I guess that swinging for the other team lies far beyond the margins of her stripping-comfort-zone.

  “Of course,” she finally says. She struts away, which is a gruesome sight to witness from the back.

  At the base of the stage, Ena kicks a control panel on the floor and some colored spotlights swirl to life on the square platform of a stage. The silver stripper pole glistens in the center. I catch too much of Ena’s loose back end, billowing from the edges of her pleather panties, as she flips on the sound system. There is a screech that makes us cover our ears seconds before the music kicks on. Ena clambers onto the stage.

  Bad Company’s Can’t Get Enough blasts out of the front speakers and Ena begins a slow grind on the pole. There’s no foreplay, no build up. She just gets right to it. Sher grimaces at me from across the table.

  What follows is a tormented version of a strip tease that has Sher and I both wincing. Ena throws herself at the pole the way men throw fish at the market. She slaps against it, drops as if she’s broken her neck, and then crawls across the stage, reaching at the shadows. Then she flings herself back against the pole again, repeating the sequence. For a split second, Ena almost convinces me she’s sexy, as she wraps her legs around the pole. Sher cranks her arm in the air and hoots the stripper on, but unfortunately, Ena has no upper body strength, so, both times she attempts the upside-down twirls, she slides off and lands in a bottoms-up, pleather puddle on the stage floor. With enough repeat performances, the bar might have to consider changing its name from Hole in the Wall to Hole in the Floor.

  By the time the song ends, neither Sher nor I have touched our fries or drinks, and Ena is sweating off her stage glitter with her mouth hanging open.

  “Is that enough of a lesson for you?” I ask as Ena trips off the stage.

  “Yes, I’ve definitely had enough.” Sher giggles.

  “Then let’s get out of here. You’ve succeeded, Sher.”

  “Succeeded?”

  “You’ve achieved some wild living in the last couple weeks. Horses, tattoos, stripping, and beach-sex with some guy you hardly know. Are you ready to be a mom yet?” I say. She smiles.

  “That guy on the beach, he wasn’t really a stranger. I think I know him pretty well,” she says.

  “Well, you had your shot,” I say. “There aren’t going to be any more strangers getting with you.”

  She tips her head to one side, eyes wide, as if she’s seriously contemplating it.

  “No?” she asks. I furrow my brow.

  “Nope.”

  Sher plants a hand on the table, leaning across to kiss me.

  ***

  We decide the safest place to hide from any other Ena-ites, is the cabin. We sit around talking about music and movies and books we had to read in high school.

  We sit close on the couch and gnaw through bits of stuff instead of actually eating dinner. Croissants, first. Then roast beef slices that shimmer iridescent purple and blue on top, like gasoline puddles. Chips. Sher refuses the pop.

  “Caffeine.” Her finger wags like a metronome. Then she yawns. “Not good for babies.”

  I decide to finally go ahead and ask what I want to know. “You’ve decided against going to the clinic, for sure? We don’t have to talk about that anymore?”

  “The abortion clinic?” She sits up, moving an inch away from me so she can look me in the face. Her heat dissolves and my first impulse is to drag her back.

  “I thought that maybe that’s what you were talking about on the phone. I just heard you talking and I was wondering.”

  “You know, you’re super nosey,” she says, but she giggles and snuggles up against me again. “If you were a super hero, you’d be Captain Eavesdropper.”

  “I just think you should know by now, that you can talk to me. You can trust me.”

  “I do,” she says, but it’s not very convincing, because she still doesn’t tell me what she was talking about. I give her a few seconds to say something, but she just lies against me quietly.

  “So, are you going to tell me?” I finally ask, as gently as I can.

  “I was just talking to Hale,” she whines. “That’s it.”

  “Then you’re not planning on going to the clinic.”

  She groans. “Nooo already. I’m not.”

  “Good,” I say. That’s what I wanted to hear. Satisfied, I switch subjects. “Want to go to bed?”

  “Only if it’s to sleep,” she says. “I can’t keep my eyes open.”

  We go up to bed and she wasn’t kidding. She’s out the second her head hits the pillow. I lay there, alternating between staring at tree branches through the skylight, and staring down at Sher from the mirrored tiles surrounding the ceiling window. She’s curled like a little shrimp beside me.

  I don’t know why the question pops back up, but suddenly the phone call she made starts to loop in my head again and without her awake to assure me otherwise, I can’t let it go. I wonder if she is telling me the truth after all, and if she is, th
en I wonder where she is planning on going when we get home?

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  IT’S MISERABLE THINKING ABOUT LEAVING the cabin tomorrow morning, especially because whatever Sher is planning is still hanging over my head and she hasn’t offered another word about it. She doesn’t appreciate revisiting the subject either. I take a run at it, she blows up, and I give it a rest so she’ll settle down before I take another shot at it. My strategy is simply to wear her down, but no matter how I try to crack that nut, with humor, with hints, and finally with threats to call Hale, Sher doesn’t budge. She finally tells me to leave it alone, in no uncertain terms, and back it up by not speaking to me for three hours. I fold when she won’t even let me kiss her.

  I take a different tactic. I do everything I can think of, to make the rest of the weekend enjoyable for both of us and sway her in the right direction, if she needs swaying. I’m sure it’s working when Sher loosens up again. Eating whenever we feel like it and making love all day long can’t be beat. Sometimes we even do both at once. I find out that Sher loves mint ice cream, she especially when my mouth is numb with it and I put my lips everywhere I can think to kiss her.

  On the way back from the cabin, we’re both quiet in the car and that’s when my mind starts going in the same tired circles again. The one difference between what I asked myself on the way up and what I ask myself on the way home is that now I’ve spent the weekend with Sher. I don’t think she was lying when she said she wouldn’t sneak off to the clinic. But I’m not 100% positive. I don’t think whatever she told Hale about is going to turn out bad for me. But I’m not 100% positive. By the time I pull the car into my apartment parking lot, the only thing I am 100% positive of is that returning to work tomorrow morning is going to be about as enjoyable as a week of back-to-back funerals.

  Sher doesn’t seem bothered by any of it. Her phone’s been silent since the call with Hale, but I am contemplating my first moment alone, so I can call Oscar and get his ear to the ground. The opportunity happens as soon as we unpack the car.

  Sher dumps her bag down in the living room and says, “Do you mind if I get a nap? I don’t know why I’m so exhausted all the time, but I can’t keep my eyes open anymore.”

  “Go,” I tell her. “I’ll get whatever’s left in the car.”

  She stumbles off to my bed and the second I’m jogging down the steps to my car, I’m dialing O.C. For the first time in history, Oscar doesn’t pick up. The call goes to his voice mail twice. I dial Hale’s number. She picks up on the third ring.

  “Hello?” she says, but her voice is small on the other end.

  “Hey Hale, you guys okay?” I say.

  “Yes, why?”

  “Oscar didn’t pick up. Something wrong with his phone?”

  “Oh, uh, I took it away from him,” she says. There’s something off. Her tone is strained, jittery. “I took it away…because he’s been working too much.”

  “Well, I’m not work, so can I talk to him for a minute?”

  “Oh, uh, he’s not here.”

  “Where is he? You sure you’re okay?”

  “We’re fine, Landon,” she says and now her tone is absolutely believable. “He’s in the shower.”

  “Oh, okay,” I say. It’s four in the afternoon, so I really doubt Oscar’s in the shower, except…maybe I interrupted them. “Can you just have him call me when he gets a second?”

  “Sure, but I don’t know if he’ll call you back today. He’s really tired, Landon. And we’re supposed to meet some of his clients for dinner. He’s been super busy. That’s why I took his phone.”

  Hale’s excuses scamper all over the place and she finally ends them with a nervous, high-string giggle that is so much like Sher’s, I zoom back to the last time Sher giggled like that. On the beach, when she’s on top of me. I must’ve interrupted them.

  “Alright, well, sorry to bother you. Just have him call me when he can,” I say.

  “It might not be for a couple of days,” Hale says quickly.

  “A couple of days? How long of a shower does he need?” I joke. Hale giggles again.

  “A couple days worth,” Hale says and I get off the phone, so they can go back to doing whatever it is that they’re planning on doing for the next couple of days. Maybe Hale’s decided to jump on the pregnancy train with her bestie after all.

  ***

  I get up for work the next morning. Kind of.

  Sher’s still asleep, so I creep around in the dark trying not to wake her, even though all I want to do is climb back into bed beside her. She woke up in the middle of the night, and when she didn’t come right back to bed, I got up to see if she was okay. I found her in the kitchen, eating mint ice cream from the gallon we’d bought. I joined her, until my mouth went numb and then we stayed up for another hour, while I defrosted my mouth against her skin.

  And I’m paying for our midnight shenanigans this morning.

  I get on my work clothes like a death sentence, eat my breakfast like it’s my last, and drive to work on auto pilot. It seems like I haven’t been to work in months, even though it’s only been a couple weeks. And it feels like I’ve been away from Sher for years and it’s only been a couple hours. So much has changed.

  I say good morning to the people I always do, and once I’m in my office, I look at the files on my desk and have a hard time prying my mind off Sher to focus on what needs my attention. I drink three cups of coffee, catch up with some of my co-workers and assure everyone I didn’t die, since none of them have ever seen me miss work before. But the longer the day drags on, the worse it gets. I sit in my chair doing little more than tapping the end of my pen against the desk top. My mind wanders to what Sher is going to do today. If it is whatever she was discussing with Hale.

  I write a note to the baby in Sher’s stomach.

  Dear Baby,

  I don’t know you, but I think of you all the time. Let me tell you what I know about your mother. She has a giggle that will make you laugh and will drive you insane. She’s got an amazing sense of humor. Ask her about the monkey tattoo on her thigh someday. Ask her how she got a dance lesson from a scary Warrior Princess.

  I have fallen in love with her and…

  My pen gets stuck. I don’t know if I should write that. Maybe I’m jumping the gun. I’m totally attracted and I might even go so far as to say I’m completely intrigued, but love is a big order. It’s only been a few weeks.

  I revise the note, leaving out the mushy part, and print it. I stick it in my briefcase with a sigh.

  I call O.C., but it goes directly to voice mail. I leave him a message, “Hey buddy, it’s Land. Just wanted to talk with you real quick. Give me a call back when you get this.”

  He doesn’t.

  I go back to the stack of work on my desk. I make ridiculous errors, spill my fifth cup of coffee all over my desk, and finally give up and call Sher.

  “Yello,” she answers on the first ring. The entire office drains away and I smile into the phone.

  “How are you doing, Mama?”

  There’s a pause on her end, but then she picks right up.

  “After that weekend? What do you think? I’m glad you had to go to work. The hobbit needs some time to hibernate.”

  I cross the room and close my office door. “Sore?”

  “Ya think?” she giggles. I smile. I did that. I sit back down, swinging my chair from side to side with my foot on the edge of an open desk drawer. I have to ease into this next question carefully.

  “So what are your plans today?”

  “Looks like a judge show on TV right now. But who knows? Maybe later I’ll catch a rerun of the circus…that talk show where they always end up beating each other.”

  “No soap operas?”

  “Detest,” she answers simply. The conversation idles and I’m desperate to keep her talking, partly so I know where she is and mostly so I don’t have to hang up and concentrate on anything else.

  “Where do you want
to go out for dinner tonight?” I ask.

  “Out?” she says.

  “Where else would we get dinner?”

  She giggles. “In the stove. Seriously, Landon. I don’t understand why you even own a kitchen table.”

  “Me either.”

  “Well, now you’ve got a…” she pauses, searching for a word. She finally finds one. “A woman to support. You can’t go spending all your money on dinner out when I can make it at home for a quarter of the price.”

  “You really are cheap, aren’t you?” I laugh.

  “I’m not a fool with money, that’s for sure,” she says with her own giggle. “Get back to work. Make bacon. I have things to do.”

  I pause my chair in mid-swing. I try not to sound like an accusing bastard when I ask, “Like what?”

  But Sher just bubbles a beautiful string of giggles into the phone.

  “I already told you! I have a whole day of TV ahead of me and you’re putting me behind. Go do important things!”

  ***

  Sher’s a liar. She was not watching TV all day. It’s even obvious as I walk up the steps to my place. The smell wafting from my apartment is like a red carpet to a starving man. A neighbor I never talk to comments on it as she passes me on the stairs.

  “Somebody’s cooking something really good,” she says.

  “Sure are,” I nod. I can’t help but smile. The smell of something incredibly delicious gets stronger as I slide my key in the lock. I open the door and the amazing scent of dinner pounds me in the taste buds. I swallow down the drool as I drop my keys on the coffee table.

  It’s not just dinner that’s kept Sher busy. My entire place is sparkling. I follow the vacuum lines that branch off into the bedroom. My dust has been replaced with clean shelves. The bed is made. I leave my briefcase beside my closet and tuck away the new baby note in the closet file. I emerge from the bedroom and notice a bucket and mop leaning against the wall outside the bathroom.

  Sher’s no where to be found. There’s something bubbling in a familiar pot on the stove and there is browned garlic bread on top of the stove. There are cookies heaped on a plate.