“Apparently, Sue Ellen went down to the dock yesterday and let Joe have it big time. She said he couldn’t take care of his family.” He said it in a low voice so that others couldn’t hear.
“Yeah, well, there’s not a lot I can do about it, is there?” I tried to get up from my seat at the bar, but Birdie placed his hand over mine, forcing me to stay put.
“Listen, I know you and Joe aren’t on the best of terms, but he does care about you, you know. With the economy the way it is, I keep hearing rumors that he might be having money troubles. It’d be good if he had some support.”
“I’ve gotta go.” I yanked my hand out from under his and fled to the safety of the kitchen. I wanted to yell or cry, and right then the yelling part was close to winning. It was bad enough that I had to live in the same community as Joe, knowing full well everyone was aware he’d dumped me off on my grandmother Penny to raise, but like hell was I bailing him out.
I placed my forehead on the cool metallic surface of the countertop, taking deep breaths. It wouldn’t help anyone, least of all me, if I got upset at work. With a slow shove, I pushed myself away from the counter before rearranging my shirt and patting my bangs back into place, then walked over to my cubbyhole and grabbed my bag. I didn’t even bother to finish off my final stragglers, but passed them over to Haylee, who looked at me quizzically as I went out the door. It was unlike me to leave before collecting my tips, but I couldn’t stay in Paddy’s a second longer. Tonight, I just needed out.
I was tempted to take the longer path back to my trailer, but I was too tired for any strenuous exercise. Plus, thoughts of Joe were still swirling around in my head, and what I really needed was a distraction. Feeling worn out and hungry, I veered right outside Paddy’s and headed around the corner to Chu’s Chinese Takeaway. In my world, Chinese food fixed everything. When I opened the door of the takeaway, the smell of fragrant noodles and smoky soy sauce soothed me—right up until Amanda came around the corner looking harried and irritable.
This couldn’t be good.
Amanda Chu was one of our gang. Although she was three years younger than me and Haylee and almost six years younger than Birdie, her family had been on Tybee since the fifties. David Chu, her dad, owned lots of prime real estate on the island, including the takeout restaurant. Like me, Amanda grew up without a mother, so we had that in common, but I’d lucked out with being raised by Penny. Mr. Chu, on the other hand, was a nightmare. He could be a difficult man to live with even on good days, and he was as old-school as it got, expecting Amanda to act like a good, proper Chinese girl. Well, Amanda thought otherwise.
“How’s it going?” I asked, leaning on the counter, my head propped on my elbow.
“That man is an odious ogre and an ass!” she fumed. Amanda’s mouth settled into a frown as she stomped toward the counter. She had a knife in one hand and a spatula in the other. Before I could react, she threw the knife toward the butcher block and it landed tip-down in the wood with a thunk, the same sound an arrow made as it hit a target.
“Amanda!”
“If he thinks I’m going to marry some complete stranger, he’s got another thing coming. Hello? Are we in Communist China? I don’t think so!” She slammed the spatula onto the counter.
“Not that again.” I sighed.
It wasn’t the first time Mr. Chu and Amanda had had a fight over arranged marriage. The first time had been when Amanda was thirteen. Haylee and me had been horrified at the thought, and we still were. The hope was that Mr. Chu would eventually give up on the idea. Of course, he hadn’t.
“Amanda, I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine.” I didn’t know what else to say.
“No, you can’t, and you never have to deal with this crap. What am I going to do?” she whined, her eyes starting to tear up.
“We’ll figure it out.” I reached across the counter and rubbed her shoulder for reassurance. “Maybe someone can talk some sense into him.”
She sniffled and ran the back of her hand across her forehead before lifting her eyes to me and adding the briefest of smiles. “I have something to tell you. Promise you won’t tell Haylee or Birdie, okay?” she said.
“Amanda, look, I’m not–”
“Promise me!”
“Fine. I promise. Whatever you want.” Keeping secrets wasn’t my strong suit.
She looked behind her before leaning in toward me. “I’ve met someone.”
“You what?” I exclaimed.
“Keep your voice down!” she hissed. For extra emphasis, she rolled her eyes at me.
“Are you nuts?” Mr. Chu would go ballistic if he found out.
“Look, you can’t tell anyone, okay? I just needed to share it with someone.” She said it as if she regretted telling me.
“What? Don’t I get any details? Do I know him?” I prodded and pushed, but she’d clammed up.
“I don’t want to jinx it. I’m sorry, I know that’s lame, but seriously, that’s all I can say.” She crossed her arms, and the message was clear.
I sighed again. “That’s all right. The less I know, the less trouble I can get in.”
“That’s my girl. Good attitude.” She grinned at me inanely.
“All right. Can I get some food now, Miss I’m-all-secretive?” It was my turn to roll my eyes.
As if to bribe me, Amanda not only made my order, but she also gave me a big helping of her famous dumplings and didn’t charge me a dime. I was an easy target when it came to Chinese food.
Strolling home while munching on some fried wontons from the bottom of the bag, I wondered how life had gotten so weird so quickly. A strange guy had showed up at the bar, Amanda had gotten herself an illicit boyfriend, and Joe was cropping back up in my life.
What’s next? I thought.
2
The next day I didn’t roll out of bed until sometime after lunch. With the morning gone and most of my chores seeming like too much hassle, I headed out back to my studio. As I flicked on the lights, a fluorescent glow bounced off the shiny counter that held my paints and brushes. I looked around the confines of my untidy yet perfectly sized studio. If only I could stop thinking about Joe.
I had successfully cut him out of most of my life. To be honest, it hadn’t been hard. When my mother, Ellie, had killed herself right after I was born, he had fled town. It wasn’t until I turned six that he finally showed back up on Tybee, but by then the damage was done. My grandmother Penny would never forgive him for running away, never mind coming back a half dozen years later with a pregnant wife in tow. He was a stranger to me—whether by his choice or his new wife’s didn’t matter. He had hardly acknowledged my existence back then; he’d been too busy with his new family.
And now I was grown and Penny was gone and my father was suddenly hovering like an annoying fly. Frustrated, I stood in the doorway for a moment, inhaling the fumes of turpentine, latex, and glue. It wasn’t an overpowering smell, and the familiarity of it made me feel better. I glanced around at the unfinished canvases that were stacked in the corner and sighed. Here I was thinking about Joe when I had bigger problems. I had started over a half dozen paintings and abandoned them. The canvases just stared back at me.
Walking toward my easel, I dragged my stool along with me. The metallic seat felt cold, but I ignored that and sat down anyway. I pulled my iPod out of my pocket and scrolled through it until a piece of music appeared that was calming yet had enough tempo that I could find my rhythm. The first bars of the tune kicked in, and I tried to focus on an image that would translate to the canvas. I wasn’t in the zone yet, but I allowed the wave of paint to build like the crescendo in the music. Caught up, I didn’t hear him.
It wasn’t until a shadow crept onto my canvas that reality broke through my concentration, and then it was like having ice water thrown in my face. I pulled out my earbuds and kept painting.
Crap. Joe.
“Hi, kiddo. How you doin’?”
&nbs
p; I toyed with the idea of ignoring him completely. “What do you want?” I asked him finally, my voice flat.
“Hey, is that any way to treat your old man?”
I wasn’t good at dealing with Joe. He made me feel like a schizophrenic—a scared six-year-old and a very angry twenty-four-year old trapped in the same body.
“I’m kinda busy right now. What’s up?” I tried to rein in the ugliness.
“I haven’t really gotten a chance to talk to you lately, and I wanted to make sure you’re okay.”
“I’m fine.” But he probably wasn’t, I reminded myself. On the money front, that was.
“And you?” I asked, not really caring what the response was.
“Yeah, well, things are okay. With the recession, everyone’s getting hit. It’s hard, but we’re seeing it through. If Sue Ellen would just lay off a bit, everything would be grand.” Joe moved from the doorway and sat down on a barstool on the other side of the table. He propped his tan, hairy arms on my work bench.
“So what’s up then?” I asked, immediately sorry that I had.
Joe launched into a one-man diatribe about Sue Ellen being unreasonable and that he was trying his best to provide for her and the kids, yet the longer they were together, the more demanding she got. I tried to keep my anger in check, but when he started to backpedal and ramble on about how maybe Sue Ellen was just misunderstood and that she’d had a hard life just like him, I lost it.
“You must be kidding me.” My voice was thunderous. I stopped painting. “You and Sue Ellen are victims now? Give me a break!”
“Listen, it hasn’t been easy, Poe. I have a right to be happy, too, you know,” he whined.
“How dare you come here and complain to me about your life! Who the hell do you think you are? I’ll tell you who you aren’t—you aren’t my dad. You never have been!” I was yelling now; the anger was overtaking me.
“I can’t take back those things. That was the past. All that matters is now,” he said, his eyes teary.
I placed my hands on the table and took a deep breath, still clutching a paintbrush awkwardly in one hand. The hurt clamped around my heart and damn near choked the life out of it. I was almost surprised by the freshness of the pain. It never dulled. It stayed raw and ragged no matter how many times we had this argument.
“So when are you going to have me over for dinner?” I asked.
My calm question shocked him.
“What?”
“I said, when are you going to have me over for dinner with the family?” I asked again, already knowing what his answer would be.
“Well, you know how Sue Ellen is…” he began.
“When are you going to have me over for dinner, Joe?” I asked again, the pitch of my voice getting higher.
“Come on, Poe, there’s no reason to be like this.”
“Say it!” I yelled at him.
“Listen, it’s not like that.”
“Say it! Don’t be a coward.” The lid was off my anger.
“I can’t,” he whimpered, his hand covering his eyes as he let out a sob. His words were worthless.
“Get out.”
“Please, Poe.”
“Get the hell out!” I raised my voice, slamming my paintbrush down on the counter. Paint went everywhere, but I didn’t care.
“Okay,” he said, his shoulders sagging. He turned and trudged out of the studio. If I’d had compassion, I would’ve run after him, but I didn’t. Anger was all I had for him these days.
***
Contemplating what had just happened with Joe, I wiped my hands on a spare rag and then wiped the unshed tears from my eyes. I had the edge of a headache coming on, and my shoulders thrummed and throbbed with the inevitable stress. To make matters worse, I was running late now. I tramped back to the trailer to take a shower.
When I got out, they were already there.
“What time do you call this?” Haylee’s words were the first to greet my ears.
“Yeah, no, kidding, what happened to you?” chimed in Amanda.
“Joe,” I mumbled, pushing my damp hair out of my face.
“Ah.” Haylee walked through the kitchen, giving me the knowing eye.
“Yeah, but not something I want to talk about now.” I didn’t say any more.
“Forget your dad,” interrupted Amanda, whining. “What about mine?” She followed Haylee. “What the hell am I going to do about this arranged marriage mess?”
“Oh, hell no. He ain’t talking that shit again, is he?” Haylee exclaimed. She looked like she’d been slapped with a fish.
“Uh, yes, he is very much talking that shit again!” exclaimed Amanda, who couldn’t quite pull off the swearing.
I knew better than to enter that conversation, so I tuned them out and walked back to my bedroom. As tempted as I was to bail out tonight, I couldn’t disappoint Birdie. Sighing, I turned back to my closet.
Being a jeans and T-shirt sort of girl had its disadvantages at times like these. I didn’t go out very often, so my array of skirts and cute girlie clothes was severely lacking. After searching through my closet for something decent to wear, I finally opted for an old ratty jean skirt and a simple black tank top with a matching sweater. I was tempted to try wearing my only pair of heeled boots, but I knew that could end in disaster with a dance floor full of sweat and beer. Doc Martens and a pair of tights would have to do.
I was just finishing off applying some mascara and trying to push thoughts of Joe out of my head when the discussion in the other room caught my attention. Grabbing my turquoise pendant off my dresser, I hurried back into the living room.
“…So he’s just sittin’ there by himself. I reckoned he’d gone into a coma or something. Definitely not my thing, but when he turned and looked at me, I felt like he was lookin’ right through me. Well, that was kinda hot.” Haylee had changed into a cute tie-dyed hippie dress.
“Was he wearing a wedding band?” asked Amanda.
“Who are you talking about?” I had interrupted their tête à tête.
“Oh, you know who we’re talkin’ about. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have rushed in here so quick.” Haylee threw a wink my way.
My face felt hot, and I couldn’t look Haylee straight in the eye. “Well, I was just, well, you know.” My face was getting hotter and hotter. Sweat moistened my armpits.
“Come on, now, you can’t have a thing for him! You’ve only seen the man once,” Haylee exclaimed.
“I know.” I looked down at my Docs, not wanting to see the criticism on Haylee’s face. She came over and gave me a big hug, draping her skinny arm over my shoulder.
“You know I love you, but sometimes…you’re insane, girl.” Haylee’s hug had set off a cascade of tears that I’d tried to hold in since Joe’s departure. “Aw, don’t cry,” coaxed Haylee, wrapping me in another fierce hug. “It’ll be okay.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, my words disappearing into her shoulder. “I’m just tired, that’s all.” And alone, I thought to myself.
But it was like Haylee had read my mind.
“I’m here. You got Amanda and Birdie, too.” Haylee squeezed me tightly.
“Seriously, listen to Haylee. For once, she’s making sense,” said Amanda.
“Hey, now…” began Haylee.
“God, I’m giving you a compliment, you crazy cow,” retorted Amanda.
“I’m fine.” Dismissing the negative thought from my mind, I turned to Amanda. “How do I look?” I forced a small smile and pushed my bangs out of my eyes.
“Presentable,” Amanda replied. “Very goth with that smudged liner.”
I grimaced.
“You look fine.” Haylee rubbed my arm for reassurance. “Come on, let’s go.”
Amanda went out the door toward her car—she always had to drive separately when we went out in case Mr. Chu called her home—and Haylee walked to mine. I grabbed my ke
ys and bag and headed out the door, too.
I was as ready as I was gonna get.
***
Spanx wouldn’t necessarily be my first choice for a bar name, but somehow it seemed apt for the general clientele it attracted, an odd mix of bikers, leather boys, industrial kids, debutantes, and art students. It was located smack-dab in the middle of the gentrified historic district, only a few blocks from an old Southern restaurant owned by a famous food celebrity. As you can imagine, a lot of picture-taking moments occurred when the tourists caught a glimpse of the locals.
When we arrived outside the club, the dinner crowd was pretty much gone. Maurice, who went by the name “Champ,” was standing at the door. At six feet and 230 pounds, Champ wasn’t someone people messed with unless they were tourists or complete morons.
“Aren’t ya’ll pretty tonight.” Champ’s southern drawl was unmistakable. “But the doors ain’t open yet, ladies. I can’t let ya’ll in.”
I was surprised and a little irritated. It wasn’t the first time we’d been here—the Overlords played Spanx all the time. “Come on,” I said. “You know we’re not gonna be trouble.”
“I knows, Poe, but I ain’t—”
“It’s okay. They can come in,” said a familiar voice from behind Champ.
Birdie.
I rushed toward him, my arms outstretched for a hug. Birdie opened his arms wide and snatched me up in a strong embrace. He smelled of patchouli, soap detergent, and hair wax as he gave me a quick kiss on my hairline before undoing his arms, clasping my hands, and stepping back to look at me.
“Loving the look, Poe. It’s nice to see you in a skirt for a change.” He grinned.
“Yeah, yeah, but thank you for the compliment, anyhow.” I swung our joined hands from side to side. Suddenly, Birdie pulled me in and spun me around like a ballerina. I laughed, my heart feeling lighter. He gave me another small, devilish grin before Haylee cut in.
“Ugh, get a room already, ya’ll. Don’t just stand there in the way!”
Haylee’s comment caught me off guard…Birdie, too. The smile disappeared from his face.
Watcher (The Shining Ones Book 1) Page 2
