Dancing With Velvet

by Judy Nickles

  “You didn’t even know me when…”

  “Yeah, I know, but I always knew you’d be there. I remember Dad telling me how important it was to believe there was one right girl for every boy. I guess he thought Mother was the right one for him. They seemed happy enough, even if she did call the shots. For what it’s worth, I wish I’d waited for that one girl—for you.”

  He kissed her once more, then held her away from him. “Gotta go, Velvet. But I’ll be seeing you.” He touched the tip of her nose with one finger. “Count on it.”

  ****

  Kent called to let Celeste know he was back in Brownwood, a civilian again, and had a few loose ends to tie up before he could get to San Angelo. When she told Jonny, the news unleashed a torrent of questions she knew he’d been holding in. “Are you going to marry him, Mom? Is he going to live here? Can I stay, too?”

  Celeste took a deep breath. “Jonny, you’re always going to stay here. This is your home. We’re a family. A team, remember?”

  “But if you get married, maybe you’ll want babies.”

  “I hope I’ll have them, if and when I get married. You’d like a brother or sister, wouldn’t you?”

  He scowled. “Maybe.”

  “Well, it’s not going to happen tomorrow.”

  “But are you going to marry Kent?”

  She took another deep breath, then another. “We’ve talked about it, but we have some things to work out first. He’s got to go to school and be a lawyer, like he’s always wanted.”

  “He said that would take a long time. I asked him. He said six or seven years. You’ll be old then.”

  She laughed. “Not really, but you’ll be almost grown up.”

  “If you and him got married, would he be my dad? I wouldn’t mind having a dad, not if he was nice to me like Kent.”

  “You and he,” Celeste corrected.

  “Okay.”

  “Being a dad is a big responsibility.”

  “I’d be a lot of trouble, I guess, huh?”

  “I don’t mean that. You’re not any trouble at all. But it’s different with us. We’ve been together a while and worked things out. Like you said, we’re a team.”

  “Yeah, we’re a team, Mom.”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Celeste didn’t repeat the conversation to Kent when he called a few days later to say he was driving to San Angelo the next morning. “I can pick Jonny up from school, if that’s all right.”

  “He’d like that. The bell rings at three-twenty.”

  “Then I will. See you soon, Velvet.”

  “Soon.”

  ****

  Over supper, Jonny leveled a barrage of questions at Kent, this time about the new warehouse and what was in the other buildings on Oakes Street. “He doesn’t quit, does he?” Kent asked when Celeste came back from putting Jonny to bed.

  “He’s curious.”

  “He’s just plain smart. Really smart.”

  “He likes school.”

  “I did, too. Not math, though. The rules drove me crazy, when I could do it all in my head.”

  Celeste chewed her lip. “You told me that before. And Jonny said it, too, about pluses and minuses and boxes and carries.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “No, that’s what he said.”

  “You said you’d paid off the hospital bill,” Kent said, changing the subject.

  “All done, thanks to the money you gave me.”

  “I’m glad it helped.” He patted the couch. “Come over here, and turn out the lights on your way.”

  “What if Jonny gets up and wanders in here?”

  “If he’s like most nine-year-old boys, he’ll say ‘Oh, yuk,’ and run for cover.”

  “I guess I don’t know much about boys.” Celeste curled herself beside Kent.

  “You forgot one of the lamps,” he said.

  “No, I didn’t. That’s for insurance.”

  Kent nuzzled her ear. “I remember the afternoon I saw your face after your father knocked you around. For days after that, all I could think of was how to keep you safe.”

  “You found a way—the room with Mrs. Clay.”

  “I’ll be honest—I was glad he died. It meant he couldn’t ever hurt you again.”

  “I wasn’t glad. More like relieved that it was over…and a little sad that things wouldn’t ever be right between the two of us.”

  He laced their fingers together. “I’ll only be here until Christmas. That doesn’t give us much time to work things out.”

  “You keep talking about working things out, Kent. I don’t really have anything to work out. I mean, this is my life, here with Jonny. I want you in my life, too, but only if you really want to be here.”

  “My dad was great, and I always thought I’d be like him.”

  “But you’re not sure.”

  Kent didn’t say anything for a few minutes. When he spoke, his voice sounded like it was coming from somewhere far away. “I had a friend in school. Well, not a friend, exactly, but we were in the same class. His stepfather beat the crap out of him on a regular basis. The police would go out and haul the guy in. He’d spend the night in jail, and then Benny’s mother would go bail him out and take him home again. The child welfare people even went out one time, but the guy ran them off with a shotgun, and they never went back.”

  “What does that have to do with you?”

  “That afternoon I saw you, after your father beat you up, Benny flashed through my mind, and I swear, I might’ve killed your father if you hadn’t pulled me off of him.”

  “I don’t believe you could’ve done something like that.”

  “Maybe not, but you were scared enough then I was going to. Anyway, Benny’s stepfather finally killed him, and then he got put away for good. Some of the neighbors ran the mother off, too.”

  “She should’ve protected her son.”

  “At the time, I thought that, too, but maybe she couldn’t.”

  “You were making a point.”

  “Just that I wonder if I’d ever hurt Jonny. Not beat him, you understand, but there are other ways to do damage to a kid. He’d know if I didn’t really accept him…love him…especially if we had kids of our own, and I want that, Velvet.”

  “I want a baby, too,” Celeste murmured. “Your baby, Kent. Someday.”

  “I did what I did to Claudia…”

  “You weren’t responsible for her death.”

  “I might’ve put her in the position of feeling desperate about having to raise a child alone.”

  “Do you think she was desperate or just determined to get you one way or the other?”

  “I don’t know. Does it matter?”

  “I think it does.”

  “I don’t want to see her every time I look at Jonny.”

  “Do you?”

  “Sometimes. I resent the hell out of her, Velvet. At the same time, I’m ashamed of what I did.”

  “Being sorry for doing something you shouldn’t have is a good thing, but one mistake doesn’t have to ruin your life.”

  “If I could believe that, I wouldn’t be worried about what I might do to Jonny.”

  “At least you’ve gotten this far thinking about it.”

  He began to kiss her. “Let’s just stop talking about it. About anything.”

  She folded her arms around his neck. “That’s a good idea.”

  ****

  Kent came for supper every night, often bringing groceries with him to help keep the pantry stocked. Afterward, he helped Jonny with his homework. Celeste thought maybe Jonny’s need for help was more a ploy on his part to get Kent’s attention. She liked Kent’s attention, too, after Johnny went to bed.

  Kent described his job like it was a favorite hunting dog. “You really like what you’re doing, don’t you?” Celeste asked one night while she mended a pair of pants for Jonny and sewed some buttons on one of Kent’s shirts.

  “I know the business inside and out. It’s a
good feeling.”

  “Being a lawyer will be a good feeling, too.”

  He got up and walked to the window, then back. “I’ve been thinking about that, Velvet.”

  “You’ve changed your mind?”

  “I don’t know if wanting to be a lawyer was just a dream I had to get me away from home, or if I really wanted to be one. Seven years would be a lot of time to waste on something I didn’t really want once I got it.”

  “Like the blue velvet dress.”

  “What?”

  “I really wanted that dress. It was going to change my life, and I worked hard to earn the money to get it. Then, when you didn’t show up for the next dance at the Roof Garden, I hung up the dress in the back of my closet and realized I hadn’t wanted the dress so much as I’d wanted what it represented.”

  “Freedom from your father?”

  “More like freedom from myself. I was in such a rut. I dreamed of a handsome prince who was going to carry me away to his castle, where we’d live happily ever after. What I decided I got was fifty dollars down the drain.”

  “So maybe I wanted to be a lawyer because I saw it as a way of setting myself free from a life I was unhappy with.”

  “I can’t answer that for you, Kent. You have to decide. But whatever decision you make, I want you to be happy.”

  ****

  Celeste knew the question was inevitable; still, when it came, she felt unprepared. “Mom, what is Kent’s whole name?”

  Taking refuge behind the open refrigerator door, she said, “Here, pour the milk.”

  Jonny did and handed it back to her.

  “What is Kent’s whole name?”

  “He’ll be here in a little bit. Why don’t you ask him?”

  “Okay. But it said Goddard on his uniform. Like me.”

  “I see.”

  “Yeah.”

  He’s so reasonable. I don’t know what I’d do if he weren’t.

  “Is Kent going to the ranch with us when we go for Thanksgiving?”

  “He’ll go home to be with his family in Brownwood.”

  “I thought we were sort of like family.”

  “He has a mother and a brother, you know that.”

  “I wonder if he knows my grammy.”

  Celeste forced herself to breathe. How do you explain to a nine-year-old boy that he’s not even supposed to be here? “Go turn on the lamps in the living room. It’s getting dark. Do you have homework?”

  “Spelling words.”

  “We’ll get on them right after supper.”

  She meant to warn Kent, when he came in through the kitchen door with a bag of groceries, but Jonny heard him and came running. “Hi, Kent.”

  “Hi, yourself. How many licks did you get in school today?”

  “Aw, I never get licks.”

  Kent set the paper bag on the cabinet. “I got a few.”

  “You didn’t neither.”

  “Did, too. I brought a snake to school when I was in the fourth grade. Or maybe it was the fifth. Whatever, I slipped it in the teacher’s desk, and when she opened the drawer, she hollered so loud the principal came running. I got three good licks with his wooden paddle. More when I got home.”

  “What kind of snake? I saw a green garden snake in the backyard.”

  Celeste bent down to get eye-to-eye with him. “Don’t you even think about doing something like that.”

  “Bet it was funny,” Jonny said, going off into a fit of giggles.

  Celeste smacked Kent’s arm. “Thanks for giving him ideas.”

  Kent laughed. “He’s not going to take a snake to school, Velvet. Relax.”

  “I wouldn’t be too sure about that.”

  She held her breath through the hash made from Sunday’s leftover roast, waiting for Jonny to spring his questions on Kent. When it didn’t happen by the time she served chocolate pudding for dessert, she relaxed a little. More to get them out of the kitchen and away from her hearing in case Jonny remembered what he wanted to know, she sent them to the parlor and told Jonny to get his spelling book so Kent could call out the words.

  While she washed, rinsed, and dried the dishes in slow motion, she wondered if she could find other chores to keep her in the kitchen. You’re being ridiculous. You’ve got to face it sooner or later. So does Kent. He’s a grown man, and if he can’t answer Jonny’s questions honestly…but how? What can he say that Jonny will understand? Finally, with no excuse to stay, she ventured out.

  Jonny looked up as she came in. “His whole name is just like mine,” he said, as if he’d only posed the question to her seconds ago. “Jonathan Kent Goddard.”

  “I see.”

  “I bet you knew that.” Celeste tried to discern a note of accusation in his tone, but she couldn’t.

  “I guess I did.” She glanced at Kent’s face, composed, without expression.

  “And he knows my grammy. He knew my first mom, too.”

  “I see.”

  Her knees too weak to hold her any longer, she sank down on the couch.

  “Yeah, he knew her a long time ago before I was born.”

  Celeste’s eyes pleaded with Kent to say something, but he sat in stony silence.

  “He said she said he was my dad.” Jonny fiddled with the loosened cover on his speller. “That’s why I have the same name.”

  “Right.”

  “He said it’s okay if I have his same name.” Jonny’s eyes darted around the room, into the corners, back to his speller, and up to the ceiling. “He said it was okay,” he repeated like he was reassuring himself.

  “Do you know all your spelling words?” Celeste asked in an attempt to stop the endless one-sided discourse.

  “Yep.” Jonny got up. “I’m gonna go take a bath now.”

  “Without being told?” Celeste asked, trying to sound humorous and failing.

  “Yep.”

  Celeste thought his shoulders drooped a little as he left. “What did you tell him?” she asked, turning on Kent.

  “As much of the truth as I thought he could handle, but not as much as I know myself. I answered his questions, all right? Just like you said you do. No more than he wanted to know, and no less.”

  Celeste closed her eyes. “I’m not criticizing you, Kent. He was asking me about it before you came. I didn’t have a chance to warn you.”

  “That wouldn’t have made it any easier.” Kent leaned forward in the chair, elbows on his knees. “He also wanted to know if we were going to get married. I said he’d have to ask you, and he said he already did.”

  “He asked me if he’d have to leave if we got married, and I had a baby.”

  “Poor kid.”

  “I told him we were a family, the two of us.”

  “You may be the only one who could make something like that happen.”

  “Anybody…”

  “No, not anybody, Velvet. You’re special. You took a little boy nobody ever cared for before and made him a pretty savvy kid who knows where he belongs.”

  “He told me once that his grandmother called him a…a bastard.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “And he knew what it meant.”

  Kent winced. “Velvet, if I tried to be his father and failed, it would be the worst thing I ever did.”

  “Are you sure you’d fail?”

  He didn’t answer her question, saying instead, “In my case, maybe, just maybe, you took a little boy pretending to be a man and made a real man out of him. But as for trying to be Jonny’s father and failing, the problem is, I’m not sure I wouldn’t.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Jonny never brought up the subject again, not with Celeste, nor with Kent who kept coming for dinner every night and picking them up for church on Sundays. On a Saturday early in December, Kent suggested he and Jonny spend the morning downtown while Celeste worked. “He said we’re gonna see Santa, but I told him I know Santa isn’t real,” Jonny whispered on the way to the car.

  “Remember I told you that Santa Claus
is the spirit of Christmas—the giving part.”

  “Right, like the wise men gave all that stuff to the baby Jesus.”

  “Yes.”

  Kent and Jonny were waiting in front of the store when Celeste got off at noon. “We’ve been Christmas shopping,” Jonny announced, “but I’m not gonna tell you what we got.”

  “I’ll tie your ears to your toes if you do,” Kent said.

  Jonny grabbed his ears and grinned.

  They went across the street for lunch. “Remember we ate here the second time I ever saw you?” Kent asked.

  “I couldn’t believe I let you pick me up.”

  “I didn’t pick you up. I picked you out.”

  “You couldn’t have. I was the only girl staring in the window of Cox-Rushing-Greer.”

  “She was looking at a dress,” Kent said to Jonny. “A beautiful blue velvet dress she wanted more than anything in the world.”

  “Did she get it?”

  “She got it. We went dancing.”

  “Why do grownups like to dance?”

  Kent winked. “You’ll know in a few years.” He turned back to Celeste. “Actually, we went by the St. Angelus and found out there’s a dance tonight. And it’s cold enough to wear the velvet dress.”

  “Mrs. Aikman is out of town.”

  Kent shook his head. “I ran into your friend Veda while Jonny and I were waiting for you. She said she’d be more than happy to come over tonight.”

  “But she always goes to the dances at the Roof Garden.”

  “Not this one.”

  “She was just being nice.”

  “She said she’d come.”

  ****

  “I haven’t worn this dress in years,” Celeste said as Kent opened the door of the car. “I’m surprised it still fits.”

  “It looks a little loose to me.”

  “Not really.”

  “Too loose is better than being too tight, isn’t it?” He closed the door and went around to the other side. “You’re gorgeous, Velvet. More beautiful than ever, and that’s going some.”

  They didn’t talk in the elevator that whisked them to the top floor. Kent paid their admission fee but didn’t move to help her with her coat. “Leave it on and come outside with me.”