by Karen Baney
At his raised eyebrow, she explained. “That’s Marcy, my roommate. She’s been trying to get me to date since the beginning of the year. I guess you could say that I’m her latest mission. The problem is that I don’t want to date. I’m quite happy with my life the way it is. See, I think it was Marcy you spoke to last night. How long did the two of you talk anyway?”
“Two hours.” His crestfallen expression as he looked from Marcy’s picture to Niki and back again left her feeling some measure of sympathy for him.
Taking her phone back from him, she got an idea. Why hadn’t she thought of this sooner? He would be perfect for Marcy. Dropping her phone in her purse she looked for something to write on. She never had any paper, but always kept a pen in her purse. The irony struck her as funny, bringing a smile to her lips. Pulling one of her business cards from her stash, she crossed out her information on the front. Turning it over, she jotted down “Marcy Jacobs” and Marcy’s cell phone underneath.
“Here, give her call. Don’t hold this disaster against her. She’s really a sweet gal with a good heart.”
The waitress stopped by and Niki asked for a box for her food. She would take it home and eat it, putting poor Chad out of his misery.
Pulling her wallet from her purse, she took out a twenty dollar bill and laid it on the table. “This should cover my meal,” she said, standing with her box of food in one hand and purse in the other.
“I’m serious. Give Marcy a call. I won’t be offended and I think you might find that she is more your type.”
Chad blinked at her, jaw slack. She was pretty sure this was not how he expected the date to go.
Stepping back from the table, she slung her purse onto her shoulder so she could shake his hand. “It was nice to meet you, Chad. Who knows, maybe I’ll see ya around?”
He shook her hand still mute.
Niki turned on her heel and left. As she got in her car, she felt a tiny bit of remorse. She could have been nice like Marcy asked. But, if she was nice, and made a connection with someone—well that could eventually lead to affection or maybe even love—and Niki Turner was completely over loving anyone in this life. It only ended in heart-wrenching pain when they were ripped away. No, she did the right thing.
Turning up a side street, she hated the emotions that bubbled to the surface. Doug’s words rolled through her mind as she meandered through side streets covering the short distance to her home.
Doug—shy, quiet Doug—was on a date. He told her she needed to find someone. This from the guy who thought he’d never find a date, much less a long-term relationship. Towards the end of the Hamilton project he even acted like he was resigned to being single forever. What changed?
And now he suggested she make the same change.
But she couldn’t. It hurt too much.
As she turned the last corner onto her street, she punched the garage door opener button and waited impatiently for the door to rise. She pulled into the right side of the garage and shut off the engine. Sitting there for just a second, she shoved all those confusing thoughts and emotions deep inside. She prepared for the conflict waiting on the other side of that door. Marcy would not expect her home so soon.
Exiting her car, she retrieved her meal, purse, laptop case, and flip-flops. Balancing the stack carefully, she unlatched the door to the house, pushing it open with her toe. Dropping everything but the flip-flops on the kitchen counter, she turned and reached around the door to press the button to close the garage.
When she turned back towards the kitchen, a very angry Marcy greeted her, complete with both hands propped on her hips, blue eyes flaming. Niki side-stepped her and walked into the kitchen, pulling a spoon from the silverware drawer. She assembled the rest of her fajitas, waiting patiently for Marcy to strike.
“What did you do?” Marcy asked as Niki bit into her dinner.
Through the mouthful of food, she replied, “Nuthin.”
Chapter 2
“Nothing?” Marcy’s volume edged higher. “Nothing! I send you on a date with a perfectly nice guy and before you even pull in the driveway I have a voicemail from him saying he would like to talk to me. What is wrong with you?”
Niki smiled. Good for you, Carl. Oops. Chad.
Swallowing her food, she said, “Nothing is wrong with me. And there’s nothing wrong with Chad either—well, except that he’s an accountant. What were you thinking in setting me up with him?”
Marcy dropped her hands to her side with an exasperated sigh. “I was thinking of your happiness. My mistake.”
“Well, I was thinking of yours when I gave him your number. Did you really talk to him for two hours?”
“Yes. And he was very nice.”
“And I think he’d be perfect for you. That’s why I gave him your number.”
Marcy leaned forward on the bar height side of the kitchen island. Silently, she stared at Niki, her expression turning serious.
Niki swallowed. The fajita turned to lead in her stomach. Here it comes.
“When are you going to let go and move on?”
No. She would not talk about this. Not now. Not even with her best friend. “I have moved on.”
“No, you haven’t. You isolate yourself. You throw yourself into your work. You make up rules to keep people at arm’s length. All of it screams that you have not let go.”
She frowned and her hand shook. Marcy knew this was a touchy subject for her. Why was she pressing so hard? And why now?
“Enlighten me, Marcy. What am I not letting go of?”
“Jack. Your parents.”
Three simple words. The three that had the power to break down all of the defenses she had carefully crafted into an impenetrable wall.
Niki slowly set the spoon on the counter. She placed both of her hands flat against the cold granite. She looked at Marcy. Concern wrinkled her friend’s brow. She wasn’t trying to be spiteful or pick a fight.
She looked away, swallowing hard as she blinked rapidly to hold the tears at bay. She didn’t want to have this conversation. Not now. Not ever.
“Look, I don’t mean to hurt you. But, you really need to move on. Stop hurting yourself with this tough act. You can’t go through life pretending like you don’t need anyone. You do.”
Niki’s head snapped back. No matter how truthful Marcy’s words were, she had no right to say these things.
“What do you know! You have perfect parents, an older brother you adore, and more friends than I can count on one hand. You have never known the loss of everyone close to you. Talk to me when you’ve felt some pain.” The acid of Niki’s own words surprised her.
Marcy looked down, tracing the lighter pattern in the granite countertop with her index finger. “You know, I have felt pain. Just not in the same way as you. When Jack was killed in Afghanistan and you got the news, I hurt with you. I saw how much you loved your brother. I walked by your side for years as you grieved for him and your parents.
“And I’ve sat by for the last four years thinking that surely you would move on. You graduated from college. Started your career. The next natural step is to want to find love, to marry a handsome man, and settle down.
“But, Niki, you’re stuck. It’s been eight years since Jack died. Twelve since your parents died. It’s time to move on.”
Marcy reached out and rested her hand on Niki’s forearm. She wanted to pull away, but something in the honesty of the gesture held her steady. Tears rolled down her face and she let Marcy pull her into an embrace.
Then, with sudden determination, Niki backed away.
“I can’t. I just can’t.” Leaving her unfinished dinner behind, she ran to the sanctuary of her room.
Niki rolled over, bringing her hand down hard on the loud offending buzz of her alarm clock. Five in the morning. Monday morning after a long, restless weekend. She spent far too much time thinking about what both Doug and Marcy said about her. The worst part about today, she thought, as she dropped her feet to the flo
or, was that she could not even find solace in her work. She was between client assignments.
She padded down the hall to the kitchen, thankful for the life-saving aroma of freshly brewed coffee. She quickly prepared the strong brew the way she liked it—a little bit of coffee with a lot of caramel flavored creamer. Taking a few sips, she felt the fog of sleep start to lift. After a few more sips, she was ready to start her morning routine.
Forty-five minutes later, a showered, dressed, and primped Niki poured a travel mug full of coffee. Taking it, along with her purse and laptop case, she headed off to work. Normally, she liked the long commute. She kept loud music with a heavy beat blaring as background noise as she thought through whatever challenging problem she needed to solve for her client. Unfortunately, with no clients this week, the only thoughts rolling around her mind were the ones spilling over from the weekend.
In a few weeks, she would turn twenty-six. Like Marcy said, normal people started thinking about more permanent relationships at this stage of life. But, nothing about Niki’s life was normal.
As a teenager, she hated Dad’s job. He was an important salesman for a high tech company. Every few years they would assign him a new territory and the family would be uprooted and moved to some new part of the country. She would have to start at a new school. At least she had Jack. He watched out for her at the new school, often helping her make her first friend.
But the move to Arizona was different. Jack entered basic training in the Air Force just before Dad found out he was being transferred. At fourteen, she dreaded the thought of moving again, especially without Jack. She threw herself into her studies this time around instead of trying to make any friends. She did good—even getting straight A’s—until…
Until November, when a drunk driver crossed over the center median of the freeway and hit her parents’ car, killing them instantly. They were on their way home from a company party in Scottsdale. They had just merged into traffic on the freeway headed back to their home in Chandler when the accident occurred. The drunk driver walked away from the scene but none of the passengers from the other two vehicles survived. In an instant, Niki became an orphan.
Jack finished basic training and had just settled on base in Ramstein, Germany. He took the first flight to Arizona as soon as Niki called. She stayed with a neighbor, a friend of her mother’s, until Jack got there. Then he took care of everything—the funeral, the will, the house. Thankfully, Mom and Dad updated their will a few months earlier to make Jack her guardian. Who knows where she would have ended up if they hadn’t.
He took her to Germany. He enrolled her in the high school on the military base and he applied for enlisted quarters so they would have some sort of home to live in. The first few weeks, they lived in the base hotel, since the Air Force was short on housing and they could not live in Jack’s dorm room. For three months they lived in temporary housing until they were finally granted permanent housing.
The next three years of her life seemed relatively normal, other than she was living and going to school on an Air Force base in a foreign country. She met Marcy within weeks of arriving in Ramstein and the two became fast friends, though Niki admitted she was not much of a friend the first few months as she struggled with her grief.
Jack became both parent and brother, often clumsily navigating the new role thrust upon him. He was the one who taught her how to drive. He was the one who scared off the boys who might have asked to date her—not that any had. He was the one who talked about using some of the life insurance money to pay for her college education. He suggested going back to Arizona since he had kept their parent’s home.
Life was normal—until September 11, 2001. Every American’s life changed that day, including hers. Within weeks of the attacks, Jack deployed to Afghanistan, leaving Niki with Marcy’s family. She was only supposed to live with them until the war was over or until she graduated in May and headed back to Arizona with Marcy for college.
Living with the Jacobs family was awesome. She and Marcy grew closer—practically sisters. Rick and Brenda, Marcy’s parents, modeled a happy relationship. Unlike her own parents, Rick and Brenda loved each other deeply. The idea of being unfaithful never crossed their minds. Out of their love flowed a love for their children, Kyle and Marcy, and then to Niki as a sort of adopted daughter.
Thankfully, Kyle, Marcy’s older brother, already left for college. He was a junior when Niki and Marcy were freshmen. And he terrorized Niki. At every turn he teased her. He and his buddies used to drive by her home and play pranks on her, causing tension between her and Jack. Jack didn’t know how to handle a bunch of teenage guys picking on his sister, so he often turned his frustration on her. She didn’t blame him. He had more responsibility than any man his age. She never blamed Jack.
For her eighteenth birthday in April 2002, Jack got to video chat with her from his remote location in Afghanistan. He teased her—calling her “Nickels,” the pet name that came from an old family tale. Apparently when she was a toddler, she was trying to say that something was “Nicole’s” but it came out sounding more like “Nickels.” So, the nickname stuck. Through the years, while her parents and her friends used her preferred nickname of “Niki,” Jack found ways to bring up the pet name—like on the video chat. He teased her about being legal, a real adult now. Then he ended by saying he found something he had always been looking for and he found it in Afghanistan. He promised to tell her more later. She remembered being so happy for the chance to see him. He looked good and different somehow.
The happy homey bubble exploded into a million fragmented pieces two weeks later when two uniformed men showed up at the Jacobses door. They asked for Niki—well, more specifically, they asked for Miss Nicole Turner. No one called her that. Then they told her the worst news of her life. Jack was dead. Killed in action by an IED someplace in the Afghanistan desert.
Chapter 3
A horn honked, jarring Niki from the memory. She looked around to see if she offended someone. Seeing nothing, she scanned the highway signs for her exit. Only two more to go.
With a shaky hand, she pushed her hair back from her face, noticing the light moisture on her cheek. She fumbled in the console between the two front seats for a napkin and dabbed her face dry. What floodgate opened in her heart? She could not even get to work without crying this morning.
She exited the freeway and drove the few blocks to Elite Software’s headquarters. Finding a parking space, she stopped her car. Before getting out, she looked at herself in the vanity mirror. No major damage. Thankful for waterproof mascara, she gathered her things and entered the office.
“Morning, Niki,” Brian called as she walked past his office.
She mumbled something in response, eager to find an empty desk to claim for the week. She hoped she would be off “the bench” by the end of the week. With her current state of mind, she doubted if she would last the day, much less the week with next to nothing to work on. She never understood why Brian required them to put in a full day at the office when they were between assignments.
Quirky Brian, owner of Elite Software. He insisted on doing things his way. Besides being the CEO, he doubled as a salesman. His staff at Elite Software consisted of four project managers, four business analysts, twenty-five software engineers, and three quality analysts. Oh, and an administrative assistant who doubled as HR. Not too bad for an independently owned consulting firm.
Brian started the place back in 1998. He survived the “dot com” crash, mostly because his major clients were Department of Defense suppliers and contractors. His years working intelligence in the military left him with many contacts in the DoD. He maintained his top secret clearance and hand selected staff who also qualified for top secret clearance. Over the years, the firm branched out beyond DoD clients, but they still provided nearly two thirds of the revenue for Elite.
“Hey, Nik,” Doug said tossing his stuff in the cube next to hers. “How was your date?”
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��Stop calling me that.” She stood to see over the cube wall. “How was your date?”
Doug’s lips spread from ear to ear. He sat down and unpacked his laptop. “Fantastic. We went out on Saturday night, too. And I’m seeing her again on Wednesday.”
“Slow down there, ace,” Niki said in her best cowboy movie voice. “You don’t want to scare her off.”
“Naw, it’s not like that. She’s great. And I think she likes me.”
“I’d say so, especially if you’re meeting her again mid-week.”
Doug keyed in his password and waited for his laptop to connect. With a few impatient clicks of his mouse, he blurted out, “The wireless here sucks.”
Brian’s voice filtered down from his office. “I heard that.”
“Did you have to pick a cube so close to you-know-who?” Doug whispered to her.
“Sure. It makes him feel good when he can keep an eye on us.”
Doug rolled his eyes.
“Besides, I’m still mad at you for Friday.” Niki forced her lower lip forward in a pout as she crossed her arms.
“Come on. Be fair. You can’t keep calling your friends to bail you out of every date your roommate sends you on. Either you tell her to stop, or you try making it through a date on your own.”
Niki was disappointed with Doug’s response. Mostly she just meant to tease him. Instead, she got another lecture leaning towards the its-time-you-grow-up-and-settle-down vein. Annoyed, she dropped to her chair away from his view.
An hour later, her head bobbed, jerking her attention back to her screen. Studying for certification tests, one of the typical duties on the bench, was as exciting as watching mold grow. She despised it. She checked the clock on her computer. It read 9:30. She had only been here for two and a half hours! This was going to be a long week.
Standing, she walked down the hall to the water fountain just to get up and move around. Taking a big swig, she nearly choked as Jake flew into the office, knocking the door back against the wall.
