Waiting on You

by Kristan Higgins

  "I--okay, I'm speechless."

  "I know. There's just no good comeback for that."

  "Is life so quiet here that this is what passes for fun?"

  "Don't sell it short. Want to watch? He's really good." She grinned, and Lucas felt a responding smile start in his chest.

  "So your dog required some, um, special treatment?" he asked.

  "No, that would take the New York Giants and a very, very brave vet. It's Mrs. Tuggles, one of Paulie's recent acquisitions. Rufus over there is my baby." She pointed, and Lucas glanced over to where a gray, cow-sized dog lay on its side as if dead.

  "Are you a good boy, Rufus?" Colleen asked.

  The dog's tail thumped twice in confirmation.

  "So these anal glands," Lucas said. "Your way of getting Paulie and Bryce together?"

  "Mmm-hmm."

  "How romantic."

  "Hey. It's working. You see, Lucas, a lot of men don't appreciate what's right in front of them, so they have to be shown. In twelve-foot neon letters. With arrows pointing to it." She paused to let that sink in, lest he miss the innuendo (whatever it was). "Also, Mrs. Tuggles was blocked and kept scooching her butt across Paulie's rug. You get the picture."

  The exam room door opened again, and there was Paulie, holding Mrs. Tuggles, a rotund little dog that looked extremely satisfied at the moment, her wide mouth grinning, tongue lolling. The dog yawned and closed her eyes.

  "Looks like she could use a cigarette," Colleen said. "Bryce, what did you do to her?"

  "I aim to please," Bryce said, drying his hands on the paper towel. "Hey, Lucas! You know Paulie, right? We went to high school with her senior year."

  "Nice to see you again," Paulie said.

  "Good to see you, too, Paulie," he said with a smile. Her face grew pink...then red...then blotchy. That was some blush.

  "Mrs. Tuggles, say hi to Lucas," Bryce said. He bent down to kiss Mrs. Tuggles's head, bringing his own head in the vicinity of Paulie's chest. Her face went into the purple zone, and the dog licked Bryce's face with exuberant gratitude and slobber. Kind of disgusting.

  "You got a minute, Bryce?" he asked when the dog was done frenching his cousin.

  "Totally. Girls, it was great seeing you both," Bryce said. "All three of you, that is." He scratched the pug on the head.

  "Oh, yes...uh, I mean, yeah. You, too," Paulie said. She cleared her throat and took a deep breath. "Colleen, thank you for coming with me." Her voice was loud and expressionless. "I was so concerned about poor Mrs. Tuggles, and it was good to have a friend." She took a shaky breath. "Bryce, you were so wonderful. Let me buy you a beer some night." Her face went nuclear.

  Lucas would bet a hundred bucks Colleen had given her those lines.

  "Sure. That'd be great," Bryce said, completely oblivious. Paulie's eyelids fluttered, and she took an unsteady step backward, looking as if she was about to faint.

  Colleen gave her a little push forward and picked up a bike helmet from one of the chairs. "See you around, boys. Paulie, I'll walk you out. Come on, Rufie!"

  The women and their animals left, and Bryce stretched his arms over his head. "I think Colleen might have a thing for me," he said.

  There was that flash of jealousy again. "I'm pretty sure that's not it," Lucas said.

  "You never know. She and I--" He glanced at Lucas as if just now remembering that Colleen had once been with Lucas. "Uh...nothing. We hit it off. As friends, you know? At the bar, just shooting the shit. Friends. You're right, there's nothing there." He cracked his knuckles. "What can I do for you, bro? You want a dog? Or a cat? My mom won't let me have one, which is probably why I work here, you know?"

  "I can't have a pet, Bryce," Lucas said. "I'm only in town for a while."

  "Right, right. Or you could move back."

  "Not gonna happen, pal."

  "Right. South Side forever."

  Lucas smiled. "I figured you could show me around, since you said you spend a lot of time here."

  "Sure! Come on back."

  Another door led to the kennels. The usual suspects--pit bull here, Rottweiler there, with a couple of older-looking dogs. Bryce had a kind word for all of them, even the snarling black mutt in the last kennel. Then on to the cat room, where there were far too many felines of varying colors and sizes.

  Bryce picked up a kitten. "Who's beautiful, huh? Who's so pretty? You are, sweetie!" The kitten batted Bryce on the nose and mewed.

  Lucas had never had a pet. He could get one, he guessed; he just wasn't home a lot. Maybe now that he was leaving Forbes, he'd get a dog who could ride in his truck to job sites and lie at his feet at night. It'd be nice to have some company.

  Well. He'd wait to get back to Chicago. There were plenty of animals waiting to be adopted in the city, he was sure.

  "You ever think about becoming a vet tech, Bryce?" he asked. "You're really good with animals."

  "Thanks! But not really, no. You need school for that."

  "So? You could do it part-time, I bet."

  "Well, whatever. Even so, the shelter can't afford to pay anyone. We're all volunteers, and Dr. Metcalf comes in when we need real stuff done."

  "Could you work for Dr. Metcalf?"

  Bryce shrugged. "He has this hot chick who works for him. She volunteers here, too. We hooked up once or twice." He scratched his head. "Maybe I should give her a call. I'm thinking about having kids."

  Wow. "Yeah, you'd be a great dad," he said (and hoped). "But you need a job first. And possibly a place of your own, so you don't have to raise a kid in your mother's basement."

  "True enough. You wanna get a beer? I think O'Rourke's is open."

  "It's eleven-thirty, Bryce."

  "Yeah, so they're definitely open. Oh, I get it. You don't want to see Colleen."

  Lucas gave his cousin a look. "I have no problem seeing Colleen."

  "Okay."

  "I don't."

  "Must bring up memories, though, right? Because you two were pretty hot and heavy."

  "That was a long time ago. Anyway, about you getting a job, Bryce--"

  "Shit! I forgot. I'm supposed to have lunch with my mom. I gotta run." Just then, the front door opened, and a very pretty woman came in. "Hey, Ange! Right on time."

  "Hi, Bryce," she purred, sparing Lucas a glance (and giving him a gratifying double take). "Your brother?"

  "Cousin. Lucas, this is Angie...Angie, uh..."

  "Beekman."

  "Right! Ange, I gotta fly, but listen. You wanna grab a drink sometime?"

  Lucas couldn't help feeling a flicker of sympathy for Paulie.

  "Sure," she said with a coy smile. "See you around, boys."

  Lucas scrubbed a hand through his hair as Bryce tore out of the parking lot a few seconds later, going too fast, as usual.

  *

  WHEN LUCAS WAS fifteen, his cousin saved his life.

  "Remember when I saved you?" Bryce would say from time to time. And Lucas would have to say of course he remembered, and yes, it sure was lucky Bryce had been there, and absolutely, they were as close as brothers, and yep, they did look alike, since they both looked like their fathers--and Dan and Joe could've passed for twins.

  It wasn't that Lucas disliked Bryce. No one did. Bryce Campbell, the adored only child of Lucas's aunt and uncle, was unendingly cheerful, up for anything and had an intense case of hero worship. He kept a respectful distance from Lucas's sister, Stephanie, who was six years older and called him only "kid." But he stuck to Lucas like a tick.

  About three times a year, Joe, Didi and Bryce would visit them (they, in return, were never invited to the wealthy suburb to the north of Chicago where Bryce and his family lived). And every time, Bryce would be glued to Lucas's side, wide-eyed with wonder at anything Lucas had or did--his tiny bedroom on the third floor of the two-family house they lived in, his second-hand bike, the stunts he could do on it. Lucas was a White Sox fan, obviously, being from the South Side; Bryce traded in his Cubs shirt to match Lucas's, which
nearly got him stoned by his peers. Lucas would clear the crowded table after dinner because he was the kind of kid who did chores; Bryce decided that nothing was more fun and exotic than washing dishes by hand. And the thing was, he meant it.

  Bryce couldn't get over the fact that Lucas was not only allowed to have a knife, but was allowed to use it as well, and viewed whittling as damn near miraculous. He peppered Lucas with questions about his late mother, who'd died of ALS when Lucas was six. Did he miss her? What had it been like to have a Puerto Rican mother? Did they ever see her ghost? It never occurred to Bryce that the subject might be a sensitive one.

  Lucas liked his cousin. But Bryce could be tiring, like a puppy who just wanted to bring you a stick. At first, it's really cute. Aw, hey, a stick! Go get it, boy! But by the tenth time, when the puppy's enthusiasm hasn't been touched but yours is getting tired, you wish the dog would take a nap. By the twentieth time he brings you the stick, your arm aches. And by the fiftieth, you really wondered what you were thinking when you decided to get a dog.

  It was always something of a relief to see Bryce get reluctantly bundled off into the car with his parents. "My God, that woman is evil," Dad would say of his brother's wife, tousling Lucas's hair. Though it was clear Aunt Didi barely tolerated her husband's family, she never let them visit without her, even if she did brush off a chair before sitting on it. "But your cousin, he's a pretty great kid, isn't he?"

  And Lucas would agree that yes, Bryce was really nice. Which he was.

  Joe Campbell was the brother who'd made good; Dan never made it out of the careworn neighborhood where they'd grown up. Joe got into college, which was near-miraculous from the sound of it, whereas Dan became a mechanic, married the girl next door and moved into an apartment around the corner from where the brothers grew up.

  It was clear that Joe viewed their childhood as far more idyllic than Lucas's dad did. Even when he was little, Lucas understood that, felt his father's edge when Uncle Joe would wax poetic about riding their bikes in the empty lot or leaving pennies out on the rail for the train to flatten. After all, Joe and his family got to leave at the end of the day.

  When Steph was nineteen, she moved in with her boyfriend and had a baby girl. Another thing Bryce couldn't get over--how cool was it that Lucas was an uncle! How he wished he had a sister, too, so he could be an uncle! "Bryce, angel, a baby's not always a good thing," Aunt Didi said.

  "This baby is," Lucas said, giving his aunt a dirty look. Mercedes was cute and smelled nice, most of the time, and Steph was a good mom.

  Didi didn't blink. "Well, we'll see how things turn out, won't we?" she murmured. "Not all of us are thrilled that our tax dollars pay for Stephanie's lifestyle." And though he wasn't 100 percent sure what she meant by that, Lucas knew that it was a put-down just the same.

  Visits from Joe and Bryce and Didi were rare, he didn't have to think about it much. Would it be nice to take a vacation in Turks and Caicos, wherever that was? Probably. Would it be fun to have a flat-screen TV in your room? Sure. But Lucas wouldn't trade places, that was for sure. Home always seemed a little nicer after those visits. Careworn instead of shabby, washed in the light of relief that they had each other, at least.

  Until Dad was arrested.

  Things Lucas Didn't Know About His Father:

  He'd been arrested at age eighteen for grand theft auto (a Camaro left with the keys in it, so really, who could resist? Certainly not an eighteen-year-old American male from the wrong side of the tracks).

  He'd been arrested at age twenty-one for breaking and entering and vandalism (Mrs. Ortega's place, where he and his buddy sat in the living room, watched Cinemax, drinking her schnapps).

  He was $95,700 in debt, thanks to Mom's medical care during her unsuccessful battle with ALS.

  He was a drug dealer.

  Lucas was fifteen at the time of the bust. The cops showed up, flashed a warrant and searched the house while Lucas made frantic phone calls to the garage. It was too late; the police found several small bags of crystal meth in a shoe box in the back of Dad's closet.

  Seemed like Dad had become a minor dealer in an organization run by one of his old high school friends. It was the only way he'd found to stop the creditors from taking the house after Mom died; he already worked eighty hours a week at the garage. Because of Dan's "criminal past," the judge sentenced him to sixteen years.

  "I'm sorry, son," Dan said to Lucas as the bailiff handcuffed him. Lucas hugged his father and tried not to cry. His father, who looked a decade older than he had that morning, didn't need to see that. Besides, they'd appeal, the public defender said. This wasn't forever.

  Lucas wanted to stay with his sister, but Steph had tearfully turned him down. She and Rich lived in a tiny apartment, and she was pregnant again, this time with twins. Though Lucas swore he'd help, he could sleep on the couch, Mercedes loved him, he could babysit and everything, Steph said he'd be better off with Uncle Joe.

  Joe and Bryce showed up as Lucas was packing. "This is so great!" Bryce exclaimed. "You can live with us now! We'll be like brothers!"

  Lucas barely refrained from punching him. It wasn't great. His father was in jail, and even if he'd be getting out soon--please, God--this was far from great.

  Being without a choice in the matter, he went, moving from the South Side, the run-down but tight-knit blue-collar neighborhood he'd lived all his life to a development made up of streets with saccharine names: Shadow Creek Lane, West Wind Way, Shane's Glen Circle.

  Didi showed him his room, the smallest room in the house, jammed full with an unused treadmill (which Didi insisted stay in the room, rather than be moved to the basement), a broken computer from the early nineties and a twin bed under the eaves. Bryce had been hoping they'd bunk in together, but no. There was another unused bedroom, but Didi said it was for company.

  It was horribly different.

  There was a pool in the back, serviced by Juan the pool boy; he and Lucas would speak in Spanish together, which irritated Didi and filled Bryce with still more admiration. The lawn was mown by a landscaping company. They had a cleaning lady. Didi drove a Mercedes and shopped at high-end retail stores and, according to a receipt Lucas found, spent one hundred and fifty dollars on her hair every five weeks.

  Lucas remembered his father asking Joe for money five or six years before. He'd been lingering in the bathroom, needing a break from Bryce's constant questions, and was washing his hands with much more care than usual.

  "I hate to ask," Dad said. "And I wouldn't, except...well, the hospital hired a bill collector. I'm working as much as I can, but..."

  "No, no, I understand," Joe said. "Um, I'll ask Didi."

  A few nights later, Uncle Joe had called, and Dad's answers got shorter and shorter. "I understand. Of course not. Don't worry about it. Thanks anyway. No. Sure. Yep." He hung up the phone, sighed, such a weary, hopeless sound that Lucas must've looked stricken, because the next minute, Dad smiled. "Want ice cream for dessert?" he asked, and they both pretended things were okay.

  A few months after that phone call, Didi and Joe took Bryce on a Disney cruise around the Mediterranean.

  For the first few weeks he was living with them, Lucas kept his clothes in his backpack because he knew he wouldn't be there long. His father's sentence had been sixteen years, but come on. That was for rapists and murderers. Not for a mechanic who was trying to pay off his dead wife's medical expenses and support a family. Surely Dad's lawyer would get that straightened out.

  But as the days turned into weeks, and the first month came around, Joe gently explained that it looked like it might be longer than Lucas hoped. He might as well make himself at home, right?

  When it came time for back-to-school shopping, Didi bought Bryce's clothes from Hollister, and Lucas's from Kmart. Point taken. Joe bought him a new baseball glove for his birthday, the first never-been-used glove he'd ever had, despite playing for a couple of years already, and five minutes after he opened the package, Didi's
tight lips and hissing whispers managed to convince Joe that Lucas didn't need a new glove. But Bryce did. Lucas could have Bryce's old glove.

  And so it went. It was Didi's job that afforded the big house and tricked-out car in the garage ("Isn't it cool that your niece and our car have the same name?" Bryce said once). Didi was vice president of something, whereas Joe worked from home, and somewhat sporadically.

  But despite his uncle's assurances that they were thrilled to have him, despite Bryce's adoration, Lucas had never felt so alone. He missed Stephanie, who was kind of a screwup, sure, but who was also funny and who let him have ice cream every night the year after Mom died, when Dad worked nights. He missed his niece, who smiled and drooled on him and babbled at him. Her first word had been Wookus and everything.

  Being half-Puerto Rican was not a big deal in his old neighborhood, but here in the suburbs, he was the only nonwhite, as far as he could tell. He missed people knowing who he was--Dan's son, Steph's brother, widely regarded as a good kid. He missed his room with the poster of Yoda on one wall, one of Michael Jordan on the other.

  Here at Didi's, the walls were bare. His bedspread was blue, the sheets new and stiff, the bed tightly made, unlike the nest of soft old blankets on his bunk bed back home. Didi asked him to throw out his battered feather pillow, saying she'd bought him a new pillow, and his probably had any manner of microscopic life growing in it. He obeyed.

  If it had just been Joe and Bryce, it would've been easier. But Didi was constantly irritable when he was around, no matter how hard he tried to be polite. The fact that he needed a haircut or new shoes seemed like a personal insult, and she'd get a look on her face as if she'd just smelled a rotting corpse. When she had to introduce him, she always called him "Joe's nephew"--never our nephew. Never Bryce's cousin, even. One night, he overheard Didi describing his parents as "Southie trash," and he had to go for a long run to burn off the hatred.

  Bryce was tiring, too, in a completely different way. Everything Lucas did still fascinated him, from the fact that he flossed his teeth every night (Dad had warned him about that--they couldn't afford a dentist, so Lucas had been instructed to take damn good care of his teeth) to the fact that he knew how to cook a meal.

  He tried to stay out of the way. Kept his head down, showered at night after the rest of them had gone to bed because Didi made comments about the hot water running out. He never asked for seconds and always made sure his room was neat. He worked to catch up in school and wrote to his father and Steph, because a cell phone wasn't one of the items given to him. But he emailed from the library every day, sitting at the third computer in the second row. He also sent handwritten letters to Dad because Dad had said in one of their weekly phone calls (which Didi resented) that getting mail was really great. And he sure would love it if Lucas could visit.