by H. Mattern
She responded with her left hand, since the cigarette was still in her right. This caused her neighbor to quickly need to rotate his own extremity. “Katie. Katie Baker.” She said.
“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Katie Baker. I’m sure we’ll catch one another around.” He had a smirk on his face as he turned to walk away, as if he was hiding some secret. “Those things will kill you, ya know,” he said as he rounded the side of her house.
“I’m not a smoker.” She quickly stuttered out, but knew that it sounded completely ridiculous even as she said it, since the topic being discussed was balanced between her two fingers. Katie opened her mouth to try and begin again, to try to say all that she’d rehearsed if this chance ever presented itself yet here she was, silently sabotaging her own plan with ramblings about cigarettes. “What is wrong with me?” she muttered.
She used to say she “only smoked socially” whenever someone spotted her box hidden away on the bookshelf, yet here she was with no other person around and caught in the act.
Katie turned to the vintage blown glass ashtray her Grandfather left her when he passed away. He had been a collector of ashtrays, using them himself when he smoked. He was one of the reasons she felt compelled toward the addiction. They reminded her of her childhood visits to his house. Some remember the smell of mothballs when they think about their grandparents—Katie remembered cigarettes. Others didn’t understand it, but to Katie, tobacco brought a much-needed comfort.
She put out the white stick and sat frozen on the iron bistro chair. Chilled. In shock. Confused. She found herself fighting back tears. Not tonight. I’m not going to cry, I refuse to cry. She thought of her grandfather, and her husband, both taken away from her forever. If only they were here. The same familiar knot rose up again in her throat. The knot that no matter how hard she tried, no matter how much time had passed, Katie could never seem to swallow.
She walked back inside and went to return the box to its hiding spot, but paused. There, next to its home, was a photo of her and her husband on their honeymoon. She remembered that day: it had been full of dancing and playing under the waterfalls at the tropical beach resort. Best honeymoon ever, and you couldn’t tell in any of the photos that a life had begun to grow inside of her. She hid it really well. Katie traced her husband’s face in the photo and lingered.
“Oh, how I miss you,” she said before stepping off the chair and grounding herself again.
The energy wasn’t in her to walk up the flight of stairs that led to what used to be their bedroom. Tonight, she didn’t want to sleep alone in the king size bed—the bed they shared before the accident. It still felt so lonely, after almost two years. Katie just couldn’t sleep there right now. She grabbed a quilt off of the couch and wrapped it around her shoulders as she let herself sink into the cushions, something that had become more of a habit lately than Katie would like to admit.
CHAPTER
2
Sounds of glass collapsing and the smell of burnt rubber. The tires screamed out as metal slammed against itself. This couldn’t be happening! Blood drizzled warm down the side of her face. She felt a pain in her chest, as she looked over at her husband once the car had finally come to a halt. He sat motionless.
“Babe, babe? Oh my god! Babe, please. No. Wake up, babe. Say something. Oh god.” There was nothing. No response. It was then Katie felt the very first contraction. Everything else after that point grew dark.
Katie woke to crying down the hall. Relieved to not relive the rest of her nightmare, she stretched her shoulders back, reached her arms up over her head towards the ceiling and as usual pondered joining a morning yoga class to help stretch out her always tight limbs. One of these days, she thought to herself as she went to gather her daughter.
“Good morning, sweetie,” she said.
The little girl reached up her chubby toddler arms to her mother and clung to Katie’s neck out of the crib. This made her mornings totally worth it, and she was not a morning person. Micah was always so ready for morning cuddles as she slowly began to take in the new day. Katie walked to her daughter’s closet and chose one of the many pink cotton knit dresses for her to wear today, along with a fresh new diaper. “It’s about time you start using the big girl potty,” she said as she placed the new diaper on her daughter.
It was a brand new day, with no mistakes in it. Katie hoped this one would end better than the previous. It has to, she thought to herself. It just has to.
Katie sat Micah down at the table and handed her a pink sippy cup full of milk while she began working on breakfast.
“Oh Mea” said Micah as she pointed to the red and blue oatmeal box that sat next to the wine near the stove.
Katie’s husband used to praise her homemade oatmeal. It became part of her and Micah’s daily routine ever since he had passed away. She would rise, push start on the coffee pot and boil water. All without having to think much about it. It was easy and repetitive, and was especially needed in that first year without him. Some days Katie felt a slave to the pattern but easy and quick mornings were worth it.
Today, the coffee pot seemed to taunt her with each drip, coming much slower than usual. She begged it not to die since she didn’t want to shop for another one. Katie stood in front of it, waiting impatiently for a morning must-have.
Katie picked up her cell phone, still attempting to control her frustration with the morning coffee, and rang her friend.
“Jill, hey, it’s me.” This was also a part of her daily habit: she woke up, started breakfast, and called her one and only contact (besides her father) on the cell phone. She wasn’t sure why she even owned a cell phone, as she stood talking right in front of the vintage telephone that hung near her on the outside of the kitchen pantry. She remembered the day her dad purchased the cell phone for her and insisted that she carry it with her at all times. It was after the accident. He demanded she have it in case of any other emergencies.
“You are no longer a stay-at-home mom,” he’d told her, pushing for her to carry this device with her at all times because she could no longer rely solely on a landline.
Katie could hear Jill already beginning to giggle. “So, what happened last night? Did you end up killing that neighbor of yours?”
Katie gave a snort and an angry “ha!” as she went on to explain the events that occurred the night before, in detail. That’s the way she communicated. Re-living each and every little thing. It was a blessing and a curse. The details are not only relived in her mind but also they play as if on rewind in her dreams. They haunted her more often than they blessed.
“I think it’s quite romantic that he caught you out smoking. You probably came off as a badass,” Jill said.
“What!? I’m not a smoker. Why does everyone keep insisting on calling me one? I only smoke when I have the need.”
“Oh, totally, me too. Katie, is that really what you’re going to focus on here? What about the fact that the cute neighbor came over and talked to you, purposefully?”
Katie scooped some of the oatmeal into a bowl in order to let it cool down for her daughter and replied, “You are nuts. He came over because his dumb dog roamed off. Who names their dog ‘Montag’ anyway? Why not give a dog a normal name like ‘Chocolate’, ‘Buster’, or ‘Rascal’?”
Jill snickered. “Hey, I gotta run, but I’ll see you at work, and then you can fill me in on all the other details.”
“Whatever.”
Katie hung up and handed the oatmeal to Micah and said, “Don’t forget to blow on it, sweetheart, it’s a little hot.” The little girl looked up, smiled with those gorgeous blue eyes she inherited from her daddy and immediately began digging into her breakfast.
“Let’s hurry; Mommy is going to be late for work.”
Katie grabbed her briefcase, which was currently stuffed to the brim with lesson pl
ans, a few diapers, and school crafts. This made it unable for her to properly fasten the lid closed. Bag over one shoulder, she scooped up Micah and placed her on the opposite hip. Katie locked and closed the front door as she quickly waddled to the SUV.
Katie couldn’t help but glance quickly across the drive, all the motorcycles were gone except one, the green one. The one that Katie saw pull in and out more often than any others. This must be his, Katie thought.
“Idiot.”
Just as the word was out, she noticed the bike was being mounted by someone whom Katie assumed was the neighbor himself. She couldn’t remember what he had said his name was, so she rolled the options around in her mind: Caleb, Matt, Brad, Will . . . ? It just wouldn’t come.
“Why do I care anyway?” she said out loud as she buckled her daughter in the car seat.
Katie drove around the circle drive shared by the neighbor and noticed he waited at the bottom of his driveway. She pressed on the brake petal and the screeching wail was back. With blushing cheeks, Katie motioned for him to go ahead out in front of her but he didn’t listen. Stubbornly, he shook his head, which currently sported a helmet with dice graffiti on the side. Katie couldn’t make out his eyes behind the iridium shield but the rider motioned for her to go ahead with his hand, as if saying, “Ladies first.”
“Ugh,” this kindness irritated her even more: Him, trying to be polite, trying to be chivalrous. As if. The thoughts running through Katie’s head only added to the frustration of last night’s situation.
She pulled her SUV impatiently through and up the gravel drive. At least she wouldn’t have to see or talk to him all day. Usually Fridays thrilled Katie since it meant she had the weekend off, but she wasn’t looking forward to her time off now that the neighbor had gotten friendly all of the sudden.
The drive to her and her daughter’s preschool was silent, just what she needed to relax and become centered. This countryside was so peaceful: Alabama the beautiful. It made sense that her husband would choose to move them here. It really was a gorgeous state.
Katie remembered hating him for it in the beginning. Phil Campbell, Alabama was his home, where he grew up—not hers. She was scared to death of the country. She never could understand the attraction to it, the slang voices and horrific music. She was often angry with him at first for taking her, the city girl, away from her father, her only family member, and moving her to the middle of nowhere. She didn’t understand it then, but she knew she loved him.
“You can’t help whom you love,” her father used to say. And she had fallen in love with a country boy.
Katie was only fourteen when she’d first met him, it was her first year in high school and he was a year older. As the new kid in school and with a bad boy look to him, he seemed very mysterious. All the girls wanted to be his, yet she was the lucky one because he chose her. She still couldn’t recall why.
It didn’t take long for the two of them to become inseparable. He was her best friend. They were on track for the fairytale romance you only hear about in the movies until the pink stick gave them a positive sign just before graduation. They hadn’t planned on having children that early, they hadn’t planned on getting married that early, but they did. This meant art school for Katie had to be put on hold for a few years in order to raise a baby.
Those nine months were the happiest of Katie’s life. Even though she wasn’t excited about having a baby instead of going to college, and even when her husband accepted the job in Alabama just after her high school graduation. It didn’t matter to Katie, she was still so happy. She knew that having their own little house and their own little family would make everything perfect and make up for the lack of schooling. And it had, for a while.
As Katie neared the preschool entrance she ran through the list of things she wanted to get done today. There was so much to do that, as usual, she began to feel a bit overwhelmed. Lists were supposed to be helpful but lately they felt suffocating. What’s the point of them if not much gets checked off other than work and keeping Micah alive?
Katie took a deep breath and decided to smile—she was determined that today would be different than yesterday. Today was going to be a marvelous day, with lots of surprises in store. She wondered if believing this would actually make it come true. One could only hope.
Katie drove around to the back of the school where most of the staff parked their vehicles and found her normal designated spot. Most of the teachers had already arrived. She even spotted Jill’s little silver Volkswagen bug with the bright yellow flower showing through the windshield.
“Oh boy,” she said and sighed.
After she dropped Micah off at the classroom for one-and-two-year-olds, she walked to her own room. These rare moments of quiet solitude, before all the children arrived in her class and set things in motion was one of Katie’s favorite parts of the day. It was almost zen-like to sit and meditate before the kids came running in.
Today, her solitude was interrupted, as she had expected, by her friend. She saw Jill down the hall heading her way. Katie quickly attempted to sneak away from her without being noticed and bolted into her classroom. Her mission failed.
Jill spotted her and came running into the room after her. She closed the door, and with a giddy school-girl grin began pleading, “Tell me everything!” She grabbed Katie’s arm and sat her down in one of the child size chairs, smirking as she waited.
“Just like I said this morning, there’s nothing to tell. I can’t stand the man. The way he thinks he looks all hot on that motorcycle of his.”
“Ha,” Jill said, “you know he totally does. You never talk about men and now, all of the sudden you can’t get him out of your head? You are totally in denial.”
Kate rolled her eyes. “Whatever. He continues to invite all the bikers, in the whole state it seems, to come hang out and be hooligans at his house until all hours of the night. It all drives me insane. Can’t stand it. Is that what you wanted to hear?”
“Yep,” Jill said, still grinning as if she just proved her point. “You speak with such passion, I love it. It will only be a matter of time, girl. He has you wrapped around his finger and you don’t even know it.”
“Stop trying to play matchmaker, you really have no idea what you’re talking about. Seriously. I hate the guy.” Katie said as she stood and tried to wiggle the plastic chair off of her backside, which was wedged in and wouldn’t budge.
“Hey, I’m basically your big sister, it’s my job to look out for you and tease you a bit along the way . . . Katie and Biker Dude, sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G.”
Katie leaned forward to push Jill backwards off the tiny chair she was also sitting in.
“So you’re telling me you don’t find him hot? The bad boy motorcycle look doesn’t turn you on? Aren’t you a fan of the hooligans?”
“Jill, you have literally lost your marbles,” Katie muttered. At that moment one of her students walked in with his mother. “Good Morning,” Katie said as cheerily as she could manage and helped the little boy to his place on the rug that they use for circle time.
“We are done talking about this,” Katie whispered to Jill and proceeded to wait for her other students.
The day passed in regular fashion. Not much drama, thank god. All the children were cooperative, even the few that enjoyed challenging their teacher. Katie was glad the kids took her mind off of all her other attention-seeking problems.
Finally, it was time to pick up Micah and head home. What a day, a good one, but way too long as usual. Tonight, I WILL get that bath, she thought to herself. Katie gathered her things and walked to the front door to turn off the lights and head home. She paused. The reflection that stared back at her from the mirror on the back of the door caught her attention.
“Wow, I’m not a teenager anymore,” she said as she looked at the face
staring back, touching the space between her eyes she was convinced sported little wrinkles. Jill always laughed at her and said that they must be invisible wrinkles, but Katie could see them. Clear as day. There, right in the middle of her forehead, the lines mocked her.
Her hair that once would have been considered a lighter shade of blonde now appeared to have a darker hue to it. She wondered if it would still be thought of as dirty blonde or if some would even argue and say she was now officially a brunette. She remembered her bright wispy yellow curls that she had as a child and wondered whether or not Micah would keep her blonde ringlets or if they’d disappear just as Katie’s had done. She thought of her husband and his dark hair, she remembered being so surprised and even a little sad that their daughter was born looking so much like her.
Micah did get his eyes, though. No doubt about that. Those bright blue eyes. Katie used to say his eyes were made from ocean matter. They were so bright, unlike hers, which were hazel, or, according to the DMV lady who told her point blank, “Lady . . . your eyes are brown.” People like putting their noses into other people’s business. I just don’t get it, she thought, what’s the big deal about saying my eyes are hazel.
I wonder what color eyes the motorcycle guy has . . . Katie caught herself mid-question. What in the world? It must be something I ate that’s making me all reflective and day dreamy. I do feel a bit out of it, now that I think about it. Katie reached for the door handle and walked out of the classroom. Must be the weather.
On her way out of her classroom there was a bustle of teachers in the hallway; they all seemed to be hyped up about something. “What’s going on?” Katie asked.
“Have you heard about the storm headed this way?” One of the teachers asked. “They say it’s looking real bad.”
