Kicking Eternity

by Ann Lee Miller

  Chapter 22

  Aly knocked on the outside garage door where Cal said she could find him. She told him it was an emergency—hers. She didn’t want him thinking this had to do with Raine. She did need Cal. He was her best friend.

  No answer. She could see light coming from around the door. She twisted the knob, and the door gave way. Heavy metal music pulsated from a paint-splattered boom box. Cal sat on the foot of an open sofa bed, his back to her. He faced Raine’s portrait propped against a ten-speed bike.

  She stepped around the boxes stacked on the grease-stained cement and looked at Cal. He stared blankly at the portrait. Was he high? He looked up at her when she stepped into his field of vision.

  She turned the music down. “Raine told me about the other day. I’m sorry.”

  His jaw clenched under the coarse, brown stubble. “What’s your emergency?”

  She sank down beside him on the bare, fold-out mattress. “I—I think I’m pregnant.”

  He looked at her, his expression losing some of the sullenness. “What are you going to do?” His voice was flat.

  “I don’t know.” She lay back on the mattress, blowing all the air out of her lungs. “I did the math today.” A tear slipped out of the corner of her eye.

  Cal looked down at her. Self-pity and compassion warred in his face. He dropped onto one elbow beside her. “I’m sorry, Al.” He wiped away the tear with his finger. The tenderness he scraped from somewhere deep inside made her want to cry even more.

  Cal gathered her to him with one arm and held her while she swallowed the tears in her throat.

  She let out a ragged sigh.

  “Hey, it’s not a contest. You didn’t have to come up with bigger issues than I’ve got.” Cal lay back leaving his arm around her shoulders.

  She gave him a smile that was not a smile.

  “Your love language is touch, did you ever realize that? That’s how you give and receive love. That’s why you—”

  “Say it. That’s why I sleep with guys.” She squeezed her eyes shut, but tears leaked out the corners running across the bridge of her nose and into her hair.

  Cal dropped his free arm over her, and she curled into him. “I didn’t mean to hurt you. Come on, don’t cry.”

  “All I’ve ever wanted was for someone to hold me like you’re holding me now.”

  “You haven’t had a dad since you were seven. Of course, you’re going to go looking for what you missed.”

  The truth of his words soaked into her spirit, and she cried. Silent sobs racked her body.

  When she looked up at Cal, there were tears on his cheeks—for Raine, she was sure. Somehow, that was okay. She snuggled her nose against Cal’s scratchy neck. There was no place she would rather be.

  “We could, you know…” she drew circles on his chest with her finger, “comfort each other.” Her words were muffled against the neck of Cal’s T-shirt.

  Cal didn’t say anything, didn’t move. It felt like he stopped breathing for a moment.

  “It was a dumb idea. Forget I said it.” She started to roll away.

  Cal held on. “Stay here. Let me hold you. You don’t need another guy to use you right now.”

  She relaxed against him.

  “I told Raine you and I were like siblings, but—” Cal pulled away a little so he could see her face. Skin bunched under his chin. “That’s not quite right, is it?”

  #

  Raine slid into Drew’s truck while he held the door he’d unlocked for her. Through the windshield she could see Jesse stoking the fire for the teen campfire. A residue of orange lay on the horizon.

  The glow from the dashboard bathed Drew’s cheekbones, bringing out his strong jaw. She shifted uncomfortably. This wasn’t a date. Drew had reconciled with Sam by now for all she knew. He certainly couldn’t read anything into stopping by her folks’ to pick up her mail. She shook her head slightly to dispel the pull she felt. She could have ridden her bike, but she’d been on edge about Eddie for days.

  Drew pulled into her driveway and she jumped out of the truck before he could think of coming around to open her door.

  She kissed her mother, breathing in the scent of Happy a second before Antoine galumphed across the room and nearly knocked her over with his huge paws on her shoulders.

  “Down!” She pushed him off her, but not before he slimed her cheek. “Yuck. Say hi to Drew, why don’t you?”

  Drew came in the door after her. “Hey.”

  Antoine skittered across the wood floor and hid behind Dad’s recliner.

  “You big sissy.” Drew laughed.

  “Stopping by for my mail.” She bent over and pressed her cheek to Dad’s forehead—doing the expected.

  She grabbed her stack of envelopes off the hall table, half listening to her father talking to Drew. Florida Christian College Alumni Newsletter, two credit card offers, bingo! She held up the envelope from the mission organization.

  “What have you got there, Raine?” Dad peered at her over the reading glasses perched on the end of his nose. The newspaper rattled in his lap.

  If there was any way around it, she wouldn’t tell him. “Teaching contract for Africa.”

  Dad sat forward, causing the footrest to thump down against the chair as his feet hit the floor. “Don’t sign it.”

  She bit on the inside of her cheek to keep from yelling. “I’m twenty-two. I’ve already given my verbal agreement. And I don’t need your permission.” She kept her gaze from Drew. She didn’t want reminded of their discussion.

  “That’s true, legally speaking. But I am still your authority spiritually.”

  “You want to control me.”

  “I want to keep you safe. Your well-being is my responsibility before God. If you were married—that would be different.”

  She blew a puff of air through her lips. “I’ve got someone who wants to marry me.”

  Mom and Dad both looked at Drew.

  For a fraction of a second Drew registered shock, before the familiar tease pulled across his face like a window shade. “Rainey, I—”

  “Not Drew.” She waved away whatever it was Drew was going to say. “I should go ahead and marry the guy—no matter how unsuited he is for mission work.” And I don’t love him! “Would you be happy then?”

  Her father shook his head, and she saw how white the stripe down his part had gotten. “Of course, I don’t want you to marry someone solely as a means to get to Africa. But I can’t give my blessing for you to go as a single woman.”

  She was still boiling inside, but her father seemed almost sad. Sad and granite.

  “We have to get back.” She hugged her mother, one last breath of Happy, and walked out the door. She fumed in the truck for another five minutes till Drew ambled out the front door.

  “What took you so long?”

  Drew smirked. “Trust me, you don’t want to know.”

  She threw her arms up. “I wish I were a guy—”

  “I don’t.” Drew eased the truck into the intersection and accelerated.

  She ignored him. “Dad wants everyone to know he’s still king of his mountain.”

  Drew pulled into a space at Old Fort Park. “Out!”

  “You’re kicking me out?” Her mouth dropped open.

  “You’re going to walk around the park until you get the anger out of your system. Then, we’re going to talk.”

  “About?”

  He leaned across her and opened the door. She felt the pressure of his arm against her. “Marriage.”

  #

  Cal startled awake. It took a moment for him to realize where he was. He stared at the bare bulb overhead while his mind cleared. Cody’s garage. He felt a weight on his arm and saw Aly curled into him in sleep. He hadn’t gotten loaded and— No. They were both fully clothed. He relaxed.

  He looked at her pale lashes resting on her cheek, her honey rose lips slightly parted in sleep. It was the face he’d fallen in love with at seventeen, the face he’d
painted at eighteen. And now she offered herself to him. Ironic because he had fallen in love with Raine—beautiful, impossible-to-please Raine who served a beautiful, impossible-to-please God.

  Aly had made him forget his misery for a few minutes. What if she was pregnant? She was still two years from her career. Career meant a lot to Aly. He supposed it was because she anticipated having to support herself indefinitely. Her mother had been thrown into that life. Aly wanted to be prepared.

  He smiled, thinking about Aly’s offer. He almost got the feeling lately Aly cared for him. Too late. He thought about the passionate jealousy he’d felt toward every one of her boyfriends. Not Gar. Aly barely liked Gar. The guy was an idiot, not worth getting worked up over. And he could be the father of Aly’s child.

  He still loved Aly on some level, but it was hard to say how. First love, maybe. The cord stretched both ways between them. He thought of the five years of his doodles that papered Aly’s room. He’d never known.

  Aly stirred, and he felt his body responding. He had to get out of this bed. Now. He eased away from her and her eyes popped open. He glanced at the digital clock on his phone.

  “It’s late. Let’s go to the Quick Stop and get you a pregnancy test.”

  Aly moaned. “Let me wake up first, before you throw life at me.” She sat up and stretched. Her collarbones peeked from the neck of her baggy T-shirt. She’d always had great bones. His artist’s eye scanned the cluttered garage. He catalogued every detail about Aly who had fallen back on the bed to finish waking up. He clicked a picture with the camera in his phone.

  He’d have to paint her in the morning before the shading floated away, the sleepy look in her eyes. And he wouldn’t smoke until the painting was done. He never painted well high or loaded. He’d ask Aly to pose for him, but she’d get the wrong idea. He needed something besides Raine to think about, a reason to stay sober for a couple of days.

  At the convenience store, he stood in front of the selection of sunflower seeds and flavored corn nuts not bothering to pretend interest. They guy behind the counter had sold Aly a home pregnancy test and handed her the key to the restroom on a foot-long replica of the State of Florida. No secrets here. He got tired of waiting and went out to sit on the curb under the hum of the white neon tubes.

  Aly burst out the front doors with the State of Florida in one hand and something that looked like a plastic thermometer in the other. “It’s blue, it’s blue!” She danced around.

  He stood up, laughing at her. She threw her arms around him, planting a loud kiss on his cheek and released him. She danced on the curb, down on the oil-polished cement, up on the sidewalk. “No mini-Gar! No borderline-I.Q.ed toddler who walks around in love with his belly button!”

  Aly’s glee was infectious. Tomorrow he’d paint.

  #

  Drew speed-walked Rainey around the square block of Old Fort Park for the third time, and he hadn’t let her talk yet. Banyan trees crowded out the night sky, but streetlights warmed the sandy path.

  He knew, deep down, she wanted to make the right decision about Africa, the one God wanted her to make. She couldn’t do that when she was mad. Maybe he should let her work it out on her own. But they had talked and prayed about this so many times. And they were together at her folks when she finally blew.

  Rainey puffed her breath into her bangs. “Real funny, that crack about marriage. As if—”

  “As if you should consider waiting till you’re married to go to Africa?

  “Not you, too.”

  “Your dad’s only concerned about your safety.”

  “You might as well say I have to stay here because no man wants to go to Africa, at least not with me. If no one stepped up to the plate at college, where am I going to find a man who wants to be a missionary to Africa—put an ad on Craig’s List?”

  “Your folks wanted to know why you keep bringing me by the house instead of the guy who wants to marry you.”

  “They actually said that?”

  He flattened his lips and nodded.

  “What did you say?”

  “That we’re friends.” He looked over at her. “I’d marry you and go to Africa if it weren’t for—” Cal.

  “Sam. And you don’t love me like that. And you haven’t dreamed of Africa your whole life.”

  “What if I did?”

  She stopped and looked at him. “Dream of Africa your whole life?”

  “Love you.”

  She started walking again, her sandals scraping against the shelly dirt. “Okay, this conversation is getting weird.”

  “Answer the question.”

  She stood on the sandy path and stared at him for a heartbeat, an invisible current zinging back and forth between them. “We’d go to Africa.”

  “Do you think—” you could love me? Or did she just want to go to Africa that badly? “Never mind.” He didn’t want to know. There was no point in getting neck deep into the hypothetical. “What are you going to do?”

  “Sign this contract.” She pulled the envelope out of her back pocket.

  “But—”

  She ripped the end off the envelope. A single typewritten sheet—not a contract—slid into her hand.

  Her eyes moved back and forth across the page under the street light. She sunk down onto a nearby bench and handed him the letter. When the organization got her teaching application they realized there had been a huge misunderstanding. They needed a teacher with special education certification, something Rainey didn’t have. The director felt terrible about it and would circulate Rainey’s resume among the other agencies on the continent.

  He looked back at Rainey.

  Tears streamed down her face. “I’m going to Africa. I’ll find a way.” There was steel in her voice.

  #

  Raine walked quickly away from Drew’s truck. The hair on the back of her neck stood up as she walked through the dark patch between the parking lot and the Canteen. She was getting paranoid like Eddie. No, she was paranoid of Eddie. With good reason. She sped up. Ah, out in the bright lights of the athletic field.

  Drew had asked, what if he loved her—not that he did love her. Just what if. What kind of question was that?

  What if he kissed her because he wanted to—not only to comfort her? What if Drew loved her and not Sam? She filled her lungs with pine-scented air, trying to imagine. He’d take her in his arms and tease her about her biceps. When she laughed, he’d kiss her—finishing the kiss she’d barely tasted last time, the kiss she wanted so badly her subconscious dreamed about wanting it. He’d say he loved her feet so much he’d follow them to Africa. Right.

  Drew was always out of reach—first in junior high, then when the smorgasbord of goodies showed up on his birthday. And did he forget the little detail of Sam—whom he’d loved all of his adult life? Why did he bring up the possibility of loving her?

  She’d go to Africa for one more reason. To get away from Drew and his passive aggressive weirdness. She could be free of Eddie and Drew—and Dad, for that matter. Men in general. Note to self: check out convents and Catholic missions in Africa.

  She pulled open the screen door to her cabin. And she’d as much as said she’d jump at the chance to marry Drew. She might as well have baked him snicker doodles on his birthday. He was going to think she was another one of those women hunting him down for a husband.

  Tomorrow, she’d comb the internet for all the mission agencies operating in Africa, polish her résumé one more time, write a cover letter, buy stamps and envelopes.

  #

  Drew leaned his forehead on the steering wheel. Him and his big mouth. Now, he was going to pray. Better late than never. He’d been out of line saying so much to Rainey. But why had Rainey said she’d go to Africa with him if he loved her? Was Africa more important to her than Cal?

  Lord, it’s time—past time—to lay my life out on the table. Do what You want with it. How could he not check things out with Sam? Tomorrow he’d call.

&nbs
p; #

  Cal and Aly sat in his car watching the waves roll in the moonlight. He stuck the plastic spoon in the almost-empty pint of Chunky Monkey and passed it to her. “You know, Al, we’re both pretty screwed up, but we’re good for each other.” He looked at her across the tattered bench seat. “Why is that?”

  Aly shrugged. “But you’re right.” She shifted around to face him. “The combo of thinking I was preggers, your pegging I need touch, and….” she looked at the Ben and Jerry’s carton in her hands, “your turning me down….” She lifted her eyes to Cal. “I’m done with sex—until I get married, if I do.”

  Let her think he had her best interests at heart instead of his own.

  She set the empty carton on the dash. “Thanks—for everything.”

  He couldn’t stand the admiration radiating from her eyes. He didn’t deserve her respect. “I’m a virgin. The only reason I didn’t say yes was because I didn’t want to look stupid.” He rubbed his temples. “I’m unemployed with no education. This evening while you were with me I got an idea to paint that will keep me sober for three days. That’s who I am.” His tone was harsh. But if he was going to start being honest with people, he had to start somewhere. “I can’t live up to everyone’s expectations. I’m done trying. I’m who I am.”

  Aly laid her hand on the three-day’s growth on his cheek. Her eyes were serious, boring into his. “I love you, John Calvin Koomer.”

  For now he wasn’t going to freak over how Aly meant that statement. He’d shown her his worst, and she still loved him. He let the wonder fill his gut. “Thanks, Al.”

  #

  Raine wiggled her fingers around in her ears. She wouldn’t be surprised if she had hearing loss after the gymkhana. The children were at last sitting quietly in cabin clumps around the gym waiting for Drew to dismiss them. She could almost feel the vibration in the weathered wood floor from the afternoon’s competitions.