Sweet Secrets

by Rhonda Sheree

  My cell phone vibrates in my back pocket.

  “Callia, it’s Viv, how are you?”

  “Tired. I’m packing up my old house so we can sell it and I’m beat.” I look at my watch. It’s after five.

  “Would you like some help?”

  “Thanks, but I think I’m done for the day. Besides, you’ve got your hands full over there.”

  “True. But I also have help over here. I employ a college kid in the summer who’s majoring in hospitality. And although he’s nice to look at, I’m bored.”

  I head downstairs, then lock up the attic. “I’ll be back here tomorrow if you want to swing by.”

  “Yeah, I’d love to get away from here, even if it’s only for a couple hours.”

  I give her the address. Then Viv says, “Have you given any more thought to the business?”

  “Viv, I don’t really have a business.”

  “You don’t have to have a brick and mortar place. I just thought, in your spare time, if you could bake some things up and bring them over, I’d love to pay you for them. There’s something about freshly baked cupcakes.”

  “What about the bakery over on MLK?”

  “Their stuff is serviceable—I do go over there sometimes. But their baked goods don’t keep well. I bought some of their muffins one evening to serve the next morning and they were rocks. Your leftovers are still moist. And I like your variety of flavors. Like the red velvet cheesecake. Where in heaven did you get that recipe?”

  “I modified a recipe I had found.”

  “It was sinful.”

  “I aim to please,” I say. I shut the front door of the house and my eyes linger on that lockbox. My childhood home is being sold. A ping of unexpected anguish twists my gut. Dad is gone. Carmen and I are no closer than we’ve ever been. And some day, Mom will be gone, too. The migratory life of the military has me accustomed to change, but this…this is harder than any reassignment I’ve ever taken. This is my life and it’s changing too fast.

  “Don’t let me pressure you into doing anything you don’t want to do,” Viv is saying when I tune back into the conversation. “I got the idea when Mrs. Roth asked about buying some. But maybe baking all the time would be a bore. For me, it’s a disaster.”

  “Honestly, I have been thinking about having a side business.” I say this as though I have a main business.

  “Really?”

  “Yeah.” I think about Grayson’s offer. I may not sleep with the devil, but perhaps I can do business with him.

  “Tomorrow, we’ll talk about it. And we need to get Mrs. Roth her three-dozen cupcakes. What time should I be there?”

  “I’ll get here at nine but you don’t have—”

  “I’ll be there at nine,” Viv says after taking down my address. “Someone’s just walked in. I better go see who it is. See you tomorrow,” she says and hangs up.

  Chapter 33

  The first thing I plan to do is shower when I get back to the house. I feel as though I look like my old bicycle I found in the attic: aged with rust. When I enter the atrium, Mom comes running up to me from the kitchen.

  “Carmen.”

  “Callia,” I correct her.

  “Oh, you know what I mean. You’ve got to see the apartment I picked out. When can you go over to Arbor Bridges with me?”

  “You picked out a place already? I thought I was going to help you find an apartment.”

  “I wanted to look for a place today, so Grayson took me.” Mom steps away from me and looks at me from ponytail to sneakers. “Where’ve you been?” She looks at me as if I’m the one wearing a glittery tank top and hot pink capris and not her. Now that I think about it, this is a rather muted outfit for Mom. She’s ditched the Martha and the Vandellas hair for her own curly ’ ‘do.

  “Your hair is cute.”

  She pats it proudly. “Your sister did it for me this morning. Trimmed it and everything.” She sniffs. “One of us needs a shower.”

  “I was over at the house, packing up.”

  “And what about last week? Where were you?”

  “Huh?” I ask. “You know where I was. I was at work.”

  “Grayson went by the house yesterday to get our mail. I didn’t have a chance to look at it until this morning.” She hands me a folded envelope she’s pulled from her capris. It’s a letter from Lexis Educational Institute.

  “You opened my letter?” I ask.

  “It was addressed to Mrs. Cole. They’re an educational institute, yet they addressed the letter to a Mrs. instead of a Miss. And why they didn’t use your first name is beyond me.”

  I pull the letter out of the envelope and read it. I fold it back up and place it back in the envelope.

  Mom crosses her arms and shifts her weight to one leg. Damn. Even though she has to look up to meet my eyes, I feel like a nine-year-old in her presence. She shoots me the same look from when I gave her a phony report card in the eighth grade. I could’ve gotten away with it too had I not been greedy and given myself all As.

  “Callia Lynne Cole. Why are they sending you a letter stating you are no longer a viable candidate for the position and they have selected another applicant for the job?”

  “I’m not sure. This must be a mix-up. I’ll talk to them tomorrow.”

  “You were fired,” she says.

  “No.”

  “You quit then,” she says.

  “Not, no—” I stammer. “Mom, why are you asking me these questions? I’m really hurt that I couldn’t take you to see those apartments.”

  “Is that a library book in your hand? Is that where you were going all last week?”

  A million little lies go through my head and I immediately disregard each as sounding as ridiculous as the other. Fessing up is about my only option.

  “Mom.” As a child, the disappointed look on her face did more damage to me than my father’s belt ever could. If more parents knew the heartbreak their eyes alone could cause there would be little need for spankings. I sink down on a step and Mom comes and sits beside me.

  “So you’re unemployed, so what?” She nudges my leg with her own. “So you don’t have a boyfriend, so what?” I look over at her. “So you’ve put on a few pounds since you’ve been back, so what?”

  “Mom!”

  “Too much?”

  “Yeah, too much.”

  She holds my hand and we giggle at her silliness, but I’m still in a funky mood about my deception. I’m in a funky mood about a lot of things.

  “Mom, have I turned out to be a huge disappointment to you?”

  “Now why would you ask me a silly question like that?”

  “I was doing okay in the military, you know? But I got bored and wanted something more out of life. I wanted stability and normalcy and I wanted to feel like there was concrete beneath my feet instead of shifting sand. Maybe I even wanted a guy who wasn’t an overbearing alpha male that I could believe in. Someone I could believe who wouldn’t abandon me. Does that make any sense?”

  “Perfect sense,” she says. “Change is good. But stability is nice, too. Your dad and I had a pretty good, stable life together.” She gets quiet as if lost in a memory of him. “He was such a dreamer, too. Always talking about the things he’d buy me once he made a million dollars.”

  “That sounds like Dad.”

  “He also had another side to him. Your father was selfish with his affection. Sure, he loved me. But he wasn’t very physical. Sometimes a woman needs a man who knows how to show his love. Who knows how to take his hands and—”

  “I get it, Mom,” I say, certain that I don’t want to continue down this line of conversation. “What about secrets?”

  Mom takes her hand away from mine. “What about them?”

  “Do you think it’s okay for a man to keep a secret from you?”

  “Depends on how much that secret affects your life. Not everything unknown is worth knowing. Sometimes you’re better off being in the dark.”

  Not m
e. That might work for her, but not me.

  “Callia, You’re not a disappointment to me. And neither is Carmen, for that matter. Both of you girls follow your heart, and when you’re not freeloading, you’re completely independent and I love that.”

  “Mom! I’m not freeloading.”

  She nods. “A little bit.”

  “Okay, fine. A little bit, but that’s because someone broke into the house.”

  “And you’re not financially prepared to go out and get yourself a place of your own,” she says.

  “Exactly.”

  “Callia,” she says. “Get yourself a job, your own business. Something. But do it fast. I didn’t raise my girls to be dependent on a man, even if I had to be.”

  “You should tell that to Carmen,” I grumble.

  “Carmen is a survivalist and she’s getting by in this world the best she can. And what she knows—although God knows she didn’t learn it from me—is to take what doesn’t belong to her, squeeze it until it’s dry, and then move on. Someday, when those looks are gone, she’s going to realize that she needs to find something else to depend on. Until then, she’s doing what she knows how to do. I love both you girls, but I also see you both for who you really are.”

  This intrigues me and I’m curious to know what judgment Mom’s arrived at about me.

  “Who am I?” I ask.

  Mom smiles and puts her finger beneath my chin. “I can’t wait for you to find out.”

  “Ah! You tricked me, old woman.”

  Mom gets up. “So I did. Get showered and we’ll have dinner.”

  “There’s something I wanted to ask you,” I say. “If I wanted to stay over at the house, do you have a problem with it?”

  “Do you feel comfortable over there after what happened?” I nod. “Then suit yourself. But don’t get too comfortable. We’ve already had potential buyers stop by to look at the place.”

  “Okay,” I say, deciding on the spot that I should expand my job search to include temp jobs. “What’s happening with those boys?”

  “Lillian, who lives across the street from us, told me one of the boys was shipped out of state to go live with his dad and the other is in some kind of boot camp for troubled teens. The matter is done, as far as I’m concerned.”

  That makes me feel a whole lot better about staying over there for good.

  “I’ve already started packing up some stuff over there today. You’ll need to go over and decide what we should toss.”

  “Toss the romance books,” she said. “I don’t need them anymore.”

  “You don’t want your books anymore?”

  “I might have a romance of my own brewing,” Mom says, glowing. “I don’t need to read about any fictional accounts. Besides, those writers are cranking new books out faster than I can read them.”

  I take a step down the stairs. “New romance? Really?”

  “Yes,” Mom says and starts to walk back to the kitchen. “While you and your sister are busy fighting over the same man, your mother happened to find one of her own.”

  My jaw drops. The woman knows everything.

  “Callia,” Mom says, stopping me on my way upstairs. “Stay over at the house if you want, but remember that love’s not always cupcakes and kisses.”

  Nor is it secrets and lies, I want to say to her, but I don’t.

  “Thanks, Mom” is all I manage before heading upstairs to pack my things and go.

  Chapter 34

  Before I pack, shower, or do anything else this evening, I’m going to have a chat with Grayson. I need him to put my mind at ease. I want him to tell me that I’m being silly, overreacting, and the only thing that happened in that cabana was him telling an oversexed nymph to play her games with someone else.

  I need to hear him tell me that.

  His office door is shut. I place my ear to the door and hear murmuring. I lean in closer for a better listen.

  “I’ve let you walk out my life for the last time. If you walk out on me now, it’ll be your last time.” Pause. I hold my breath, waiting to hear Carmen’s voice but all I hear is Grayson’s. “We can’t recapture what we had last winter. We shouldn’t have even tried.”

  My breath catches. He must be on the phone. And he’s talking about a fling they had last winter. And now he’s leaving her? Or is she leaving him? I can’t fully grasp the specifics, but I understand enough to know what a fool I’ve been. They were living mere miles from one another while I was busy traveling the world. Of course they tried to rekindle what they had. And here I come, tripping into their love scene, thinking that maybe Grayson and I could have a chance at love. My hands are fisted so tightly my nails dig deep grooves in my palm.

  Without straining, I hear him typing. They must’ve hung up. Grayson pecks away at his computer as though his fingers are on fire and the only way to cool them off is to extinguish the white background of his screen with words. Is this his angry typing? The nerve of him to be angry.

  I bite my bottom lip and pace in circles outside his door. I should be happy that he told her what he did. But I’m not. I feel used. Carmen’s my sister and Grayson doesn’t seem to be able to figure out which one of us he truly wants. Well, I’ll make the decision easy for him.

  I swing open the door and Grayson rolls back in his swivel chair from fright.

  “What the hell?” he says.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about your relationship with her?”

  “With who, Carmen?”

  “Stupid looks good on you.”

  It was a childish insult. Especially considering Grayson looks as good as I’ve ever seen him. His jawline is darkened by a five o’clock shadow that makes him look ruggedly dangerous. His square jaw clenches, his cold eyes smolder behind his spectacles, and ever so slowly, he bites his bottom lip so hard I feel my nipples harden in response.

  “Stop with the insults.” My body reacts strangely to his anger. My breasts are flushed with pumping blood and my heart pounds.

  “Or what?” I ask. “You’ll sleep with my sister? You’ll try to rekindle what you two had last winter?”

  Grayson removes his glasses and cocks his head. “Last winter? She told you we had something going on last winter?”

  Uh-oh. It wasn’t Carmen. He was on the phone with someone else. And that feels like a bigger betrayal.

  “Why’d you even get things started with me, Grayson, if you knew you were still in love with someone else?”

  “I’m not in love with someone else.”

  Was that a roundabout way of saying he loves me? I shake my head and try to stay on topic.

  He stands and walks toward me. I step back and raise my hand.

  “No, please.”

  “Callia, she and I didn’t have a thing last winter. Or any other time.”

  I look him squarely in the eye. “I was standing at the door just now. I heard you on the phone.”

  Grayson’s face eases as this new piece of information sinks in. “Oh that. That was nothing. I, it was, I was on the phone with my editor going over some stuff.”

  More lies. Jeez, has he always been this way? How had I not noticed his habitual lying before? Then again, maybe I’m not much better. Maybe we were born for each other.

  “Your editor? Grayson, you wrote a memoir and a nonfiction book on business. Why would you expect me to believe you were telling your editor about walking out the door? Unless you’re sleeping with your editor. Is that it?”

  “I’m not sleeping with Donald.”

  “Just for once, tell me the truth. What happened in that cabana?”

  Grayson’s face turns emotionless again. He goes back to his desk, collapses in his seat, and clasps his hands.

  “I’m sorry, Callia. I won’t talk about it.”

  “You won’t?”

  “No.”

  I feel abandoned, standing there in front of him, while he gives me an earnest look. This isn’t the conversation I’d planned on and I feel adrift at sea. I walk t
o the chair in front of his desk and sit.

  “Why are you doing this to me?” I ask.

  I swear I see moisture in his eyes. Grayson gets up, moves to his window, and shoves his hands in his pocket. He can’t stand to be near me or to look at me.

  “The last thing I ever wanted to do was hurt you,” he whispers. I can barely hear him with his back to me. The room is a morgue of silence. Then Grayson cuts it wide open. “This isn’t going to work.”

  “Okay,” I say, having come to the same conclusion.

  Grayson must have misheard me, because he says, “This. You, me. It isn’t going to work. It’s true that you can never go home. And we can’t rekindle what we had, because really, what did we have?” He turns to me. I’ve never seen him look this way, so angry. “We were two misfits in school who found a kindred spirit in one another. But we’re nothing alike, you and me. I’m decisive, headstrong, ambitious. You’re none of those things. And to top it all off, you don’t respect boundaries. I don’t think I was asking much from you to let it alone. You couldn’t. And that’s made me come to some very tough realizations.” Grayson takes long strides back to his desk and reopens his laptop. He studies the screen as though I’m already gone. “You’re welcome to stay here as long as your mother is here, but when she’s gone, I’d like you to go as well.” He is ice. “I think that would be best for everyone.”

  I swallow hard and stand. “You think I don’t have any ambition just because I’m confused about my career right now? You use the fact that I’m afraid of failure to insinuate that I’m lazy? You have no idea what you’re talking about.” My anger is white-hot and I want to slice his gut with words as cleanly as he’s just sliced mine. “And you’re spineless. That’s why you have your stupid secrets in the first place. Because you can’t bear to bring them to the light of day and suffer the consequences. Don’t you dare judge me, Grayson Lane. You might feel like you’ve finally turned into the big man on campus, but until you learn how to be honest with yourself and the people around you, you’ll always be a spineless little boy.” I head to the door. “Oh, and I’m leaving right now. I look forward to never seeing your face again.”