Bait

by M. Mabie

  When I looked at Shane to see if he took the teasing well, he was scratching the side of his nose with his middle finger. No hurt feelings there.

  We ordered every appetizer on the menu; it's how my family always ate dinner when we went out. I loved it. We talked about everything and shared. It was the only way to dine with your loved ones. I caught a few more loaded glances between my dad and Grant, but even Grant was laughing and seemed to enjoy himself.

  Only Shane teased me about my new bangs, but I didn't care. I loved them, too.

  Grant's phone rang quietly in his pocket. He looked at me apologetically, but said, “I'm sorry, Blake. It's probably the Jensens. They put in an offer and are probably calling to get an update.” It wasn't strange for him to get calls at dinner, or anytime really, and I understood that it was just part of his job.

  “Don't worry about it. Take the call.” I gave him a sincere smile and he appeared grateful as he retrieved his cell and stood to excuse himself. He walked over by the edge of the outdoor dining area, closer to the pristine view of the water.

  My dad threw his napkin at me and said, “I have an extra ticket to tomorrow's ballgame. Or are you working? Did you quit?”

  “I'm talking to them tomorrow. So, I'll let you know about the game.” I wasn't looking forward to talking to my current employer, but it had to be done. At least if it didn't go well, my dad would get me drunk at the game.

  Tuesday, June 24th, 2008

  They let me go. Let's just say it wasn't a congratulatory goodbye.

  “Well, congratulations,” my boss said shortly. Then he said, “Fuck,” and walked out.

  I left with a small plastic bag containing the few personal belongings I'd had in the break room and at my station. I told a few people goodbye and then I left. I liked that job, but the feeling of new and exciting possibilities overshadowed any disappointment I may have felt.

  I was eager to travel and excited with not being nailed down to one city, at least for now.

  When I got into my car, I called my dad. He was happy I could go to the game with him and he told me that he'd pick me up around two.

  The ballpark was bustling. We found our seats while the bleachers filled with Mariners fans. My Dad sat next to me and we had beers and hot dogs.

  “God, these are good,” I told him as I ate my ballpark frank.

  “We haven't been to a game together in a long time, sis. I'm glad you could go,” he said and bumped his shoulder with mine.

  “Me, too.”

  I loved my dad. My mother and I were close, but not like my old man and me. We were a lot alike. We shared the same sense of humor. Ours was a relationship that was easy and strong.

  “So, tell me about this new job. Are you nervous?” he asked as he washed down the last of his lunch with his beer.

  I was chewing, but with him I wouldn't be scolded for talking with my mouthful. I covered my lips with my hand and said, “Yeah. I think it's going to be really fun, you know? I love traveling and getting to work in different places sounds ideal.”

  Thinking about all of the different cities that Bridgett and Lance told me about yesterday made me think of Casey. They'd mentioned a place in Phoenix and of course their other office was located in San Francisco.

  “Good. I'm going to go get another beer. You ready for another?” he offered. I didn't have to work tomorrow, so I thought, why not?

  “Yeah, a big one. Hurry though, game’s about to start.”

  He sat on the end of the aisle, so a quick dash out and back wasn't much of a hassle.

  Still thinking about Casey, I decided I should text him. I'd said I would and that was two days ago.

  I opened up our message thread and smiled.

  Me: I got the job. Cheers!

  Then before I thought too much about it, I snapped a quick selfie with my beer and sent it.

  I watched my phone and waited, hoping that he'd reply quickly. Nothing happened and then my dad was handing me my second draught.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “You're welcome.”

  We watched the game, cheering on my dad's beloved Mariners. They had been in a bit of a slump that season, but seemed to be pulling it together that afternoon.

  “Go! Go home!” he yelled as Beltre rounded the last base and continued down the home baseline. My dad had stopped drinking, but I continued.

  I felt the vibration in my lap and looked down to see a reply from Casey.

  Casey: That's great. Where are you? Beer looks cold.

  Me: Ballgame with my Dad. It is cold.

  My cell alerted me to an incoming picture message. I tapped it to download what he'd sent. It was Casey holding up a bottle of water, an awesome view of the Golden Gate Bridge behind him.

  Casey: Cheers. No beer with me right now or I'd have one with you. I'm with my sisters.

  Me: Where are you?

  Casey: Bike ride.

  Me: No helmet? Couldn't find one big enough to cover that hair?

  Casey: ha ha You ride?

  Me: No. I was terrible at riding bikes when we were kids. Haven't been on one since I was little.

  Casey: You never forget how. Like blow jobs.

  I shouted, “Ahhh!” after reading the message and laughed really hard.

  My dad noticed and asked, “What's so funny? Let me see?” When he leaned over my shoulder to look, I flipped it face-down and placed my hand on it.

  “No.”

  “Well, well. Okay. I won't look.” He chuckled. “I'm old. I get it.” He played hurt.

  “No, it's not that. It's just…you won't think it was funny, is all.”

  “Is that Grant? I'll get it out of him later.” He popped his collar. “I'm still pretty cool, you know.”

  I had a great buzz and my dad really was cool, but I was confident he didn't want to see a text to his little girl referencing oral sex.

  I didn't want him to mention it to Grant though. He wouldn't know what my crazy dad was talking about. I actually hadn't heard anything out of Grant that day.

  “It's not Grant. It's just a friend.”

  His face looked curiously at me. “A friend?”

  “Yeah, you should know about those. You're so cool, remember?” I said playfully and knocked into him.

  “A guy friend?” he asked diverting his eyes back to the game and taking a drink from his lemonade.

  I'd never lied to my dad. I didn’t think any of us ever had. Sure, with mom we'd bend the truth, but Shane, Reggie and I could always talk to our father. He wasn't a judging man. He had a vastly open mind when it came to most things. When we were teenagers, he’d spoken candidly about his own life experiences, both good ones and not so good ones. I think it made us feel like we could tell him the truth about anything.

  “Yeah. It's a guy friend.”

  “Hmm. Good guy?” he asked still not meeting my eyes. Pretending to watch the game, he leaned back into his seat to hear me as best as he could with Mariners’ fans whooping and hollering around us.

  “I don't really know. I don't know him that well. We met at Micah's graduation. Well, the night before.”

  He thought for a while, quietly.

  I couldn't resist looking back at my phone. It had buzzed twice while I was talking to Dad.

  Casey: Hey. Where'd ya go?

  Casey: Are you trying to remember bike riding or blow jobs? Send another picture.

  I quickly thumbed back.

  Me: I'm with my dad. No blow job texts. No more pictures for you.

  Me: I'll text you later. Have a fun ride.

  I pocketed my phone and decided that the combination of beer, my dad, and Casey were not good. The three were a little difficult to manage at once. I settled for beer and Dad at the moment. Casey later.

  “So what's—” my dad paused, waiting for me to fill in the blank with Casey's name.

  “My friend.” He cocked his head at me and gave me a cut-the-shit look. “All right, Casey. His name is Casey.”

&
nbsp; “Casey. So what's this Casey-friend like?”

  I puckered my lips off to one side in contemplation. I didn't know a lot of things about him, just the basics.

  “He's a twin. Micah's boyfriend Cory's twin actually. It's weird. Their identical, but they don't look that much alike.”

  He didn't understand what I was saying.

  “They look different. They have different styles and hair. He has crazy hair. It's all over the place. Big curls. Messy.” I considered showing him the picture. Then, decided what the hell.

  I fished my phone back out and tapped the picture from the text so that only the picture could be viewed.

  “See?”

  My dad studied it and then smiled. “That's some hair.”

  I took my phone back, taking a minute to look at the picture of him smiling brightly. His bicep was flexed holding the water slightly above his head. He was wearing a sleeveless T-shirt and the lime green aviator sunglasses he'd bought when I was with him. He was hot.

  “He's fun to talk to,” I said shrugging as I leaned over toward my dad and returned my phone to my pocket.

  “What does he do for a living?” What a dad question to ask.

  “He's a brewer. He works for Bay Brewing Company. He actually just got promoted or something and he's doing sales for them. I think he's worked there a long time.” I tried to remember more of our conversation from the night at HLS, when he told me I was drinking his beer, but I wasn't paying close enough attention to what he was telling me. I was too busy watching his lips move and imagining what they’d feel like flush against my…well, everything.

  The sun started to make its way to the opposite side of the field and I had to pull my sunglasses down from my hair and wear them.

  Finally my dad said, “I always wanted to brew my own beer.” He smiled. He didn't push or pry, but I could see so many unasked questions in his expression. “Sounds like a cool guy.”

  “Very cool,” I said before I thought better of it.

  His head snapped to me and I gave a terrible fake impression of a smile.

  “Not cooler than me, though.”

  “No. Of course. You're the coolest man I know.”

  “Good. You're the coolest girl I know.”

  My faux-smile transformed into the real thing. I swelled with pride. “You think I'm cool?” I laughed and leaned forward to grab the beer I'd set on the cement between my feet.

  He winked. “As far as women go, yeah. You're cool.”

  “Cooler than Mom?”

  A mischievous smile crept across his face. He adored my mom, but I was his baby girl. This was a true test.

  “Let's just say you have more cool than her on account of your genetics. It's only logical that you're doubly cool because of your parents. I guess that makes you lucky, too.” My dad, so witty.

  He leaned over and gave me a kiss in my hair and said, “Be good, Blake.”

  He said it at the right time for it to imply he didn't want me trying to throw my mom under the bus, but I know he meant be a good girl and not a cheater or I'd lose my cool card.

  Oh. Wait. I already had. In that moment I felt like telling him everything. The whole story, but I didn't have the nerve. The feeling like I'd lied to my dad for the first time burdened me.

  It was the friends terminology that made it false, deep down I realized that we weren't just friends.

  Sunday, June 29, 2008

  THERE WAS NO FUCKING way we were going to be just friends.

  Number one, my dick didn't get hard when I text my friends. Number two, my dick didn't get hard when I simply thought about texts with my friends. Number three, I rarely asked my friends for naked pictures. Especially when they were in a relationship.

  Me: Just one?

  Honeybee: You're out of your goddamned mind!

  Me: LOL You're right.

  Me: If you're going to send one, then you might as well send two. What was I thinking? I'm a silly man.

  Honeybee: I'm not sending you a picture of my underwear drawer.

  Me: Prude. I bet it's so organized. You're a freak aren't you?

  Honeybee: If preferring perfect rows for my G-string, satin thongs makes me a freak then...

  Okay. Our texts had escalated.

  She was so funny. Seriously, the weirdest person I'd ever had the pleasure of meeting, but I couldn't get enough. She ate mustard on her tacos. She didn't like her look. Her term was geek-chic. She couldn't sleep with socks on. Actually, she'd prefer to never wear them. She never remembered to charge her damn phone. She had both terrible and also a generous amount of self-esteem, it just depended on the subject. On the flip side, she was more competitive than any man I'd ever met and was convinced that she could beat anyone at anything. She was a walking, talking contradiction.

  Me: That wasn't fair. We were texting about your tidiness. Don't change the subject. Your brain is always in the gutter.

  Me: Am I gonna have to block you?

  Oh, and she wound up like a clock. She was stubborn and her temper was fascinating. The strangest things got her feathers ruffled.

  We were texting about ketchup and she swore and pulled the “I'm a trained fucking chef card” when she argued that it had to be refrigerated. I think she almost blocked me for real when I made her send me a picture of where it said that it needed to be refrigerated after opening. She couldn't and she was pissed about it. I had to remind her that I didn't invent ketchup and that she needed to contact them. In reality, some ketchup said it and some didn't.

  But she would back down eventually. That was my favorite part.

  Honeybee: I have to go to sleep. I'm going into the office tomorrow. It's my first day. I want to be coherent. I'm not staying up late texting with you again tonight. Don't you sleep?

  Me: You don't have to text. I told you. Send me pictures.

  Me: Or call.

  I'd asked her to call me almost every night, but she never would. She said that friends didn't talk in bed. I had to, of course, remind her of the friendly things we'd already done in a bed and that talking on the telephone was a much lesser offense.

  She got mad. Went radio silent. Then text me the next day that her phone had died. It was quite predictable.

  Honeybee: Goodnight, Casey.

  Me: It was. Anything else?

  The incoming picture was of her underwear drawer. It wasn't exactly as neat as I'd thought, and there weren't as many satin, G-string thongs as she’d said, but I did see one pair I'd like to see more of in person. Or in a perfect world, they would be lying next to a bed she was naked in.

  I quickly went to my dresser and snapped a picture of mine and sent it. Turnabout was fair play. At least that was a courtesy I hoped to implement. You send me one. I'll send you one. Sure, at the moment, it was underwear drawers, but I'd hoped it wouldn't be long before it was a lot more personal.

  Honeybee: A man who likes variety.

  Me: Maybe, I just haven't found the right underwear yet. I like to keep my options open. Thank you very much.

  Me: Go to bed.

  Honeybee: Ok. Bossy.

  I wouldn’t want to admit how much time we’d spend sending messages and random, nonsensical things. But it was a lot. It started to feel like a new hobby.

  I'd been home for a week, and I spent some time with Cory and our sisters. It'd been nice. Mom was on me about that damn shed, but then Marc needed me at work, so I'd put some hours in on the floor in the brewery. It was nothing to complain about. I'd much rather make beer than paint a shed any day.

  Blake and I had texted every day, sometimes all day. She was really excited about her new job and the opportunity to travel. I knew she had a trip coming up, but I didn't know where.

  I was leaving in a few days, too. Unfortunately, I didn't get to take our friend Troy with me since it wasn't a trade show situation, which he sometimes came along for to help with. It was much more fun when he came. Instead, Aly was coming along. Her dad, Marc, wanted her to get a feel for talking
to customers, or at least potential ones. He wanted her to listen to the questions I asked and how I answered theirs.

  I'm not arrogant, but I'm smart and I work hard. Plus, I know everything there is to know about her company. It was no wonder Aly's dad wanted her to know how and what I did. I think deep down he wanted her to be out there doing it, too. In the past few months since I'd been out on the road we'd got a lot more attention and that had meant dollars for her and her old man. I guessed me, too.

  I wasn't looking forward to being on the road with Aly. She was a cool girl and all, but she didn’t do it for me. She felt differently, but I knew how to be professional. I hoped she did, too.

  Tuesday, July 1st, 2008

  Aly and I flew from San Francisco to Austin that week. They loved our beer, but the distributor was lax. He might call, then again he might not. They liked our product, our packaging and our business model. All good things. They didn't like it when Aly said no thank you to her own beer because she was full after lunch. And when they told us they'd call she asked, “When?”

  Aly wasn't cut out for sales. She didn't have that easy-going, everybody's friend thing that sales people needed. She was more of a numbers girl.

  These are our gross sales for the year. This is our turnaround on orders. These are the awards we've won for excellent brewing. And how many cases would you like monthly?

  But she tried.

  She was quiet on our flight that day to Chicago. I let her think about it. When she was ready, she would ask. If she didn't, then I'd simply tell Marc he needed to hire another sales person. When we touched down at O'Hare and we were allowed to turn our devices back on, I was stoked to see an influx of texts from Blake.

  Honeybee: What was that band you were talking about the other day?

  Honeybee: Oh, never mind. I'll scroll up.

  Honeybee: They're pretty good. You said they're from San Francisco?

  Honeybee: Mayday Maggie. I like that band name. What are you doing?

  Honeybee: Are you ignoring me? Is this about the steak? I said I'd eat it rare, but only if I cooked it.

  Honeybee: I wish you'd text me back.

  I couldn't contain my smile. In fact, the damn thing stayed with me all the way off the plane, through baggage claim and out the doors into a cab.