by Katie Cross
I tilted my head back and took a deep breath. Perhaps I could gather my courage if I just sat here for a few minutes. To marshall my bravery, I slipped to the place I always went when I needed to ground myself.
Airfare: $500
Hotel: $500 for a 3-night stay.
Food: $100
Rental car: $300
Gas: $100
Extras: $200
* * *
Location: Fort Worth, Texas.
Plan: Find a social event with Anthony Dunkin and approach him there.
Operation Find My Biological Father had been underway for the last two years. Online college expenses and low wages in the Diner meant saving the requisite $2000 to make this happen took a long time. Things had been better since I moved into the Frolicking Moose. Bethany and Maverick lowered my rent and took it out of my paycheck. The remnants were just enough to pay myself.
That left a small, but heartfelt, savings. I just ignored the inevitable debt of student loans I’d have to chip away at soon.
Money wasn't the hardest part. Tracking Anthony Dunkin down was. His location was easy enough to pinpoint because his office wasn't hidden, but finding a place to pop up and say, “Hi, I'm the daughter that came as the result of what I think was a one-night stand, but my mom doesn’t talk about it, so I don’t know for sure. The daughter you have been purposefully avoiding. Just wanted to say hi!”
Then watch his reaction.
Aside from Jayson Hernandez, I'd daydreamed of nothing else more than the moment I met Anthony Dunkin and he realized exactly who I was.
My eyes flew open when a pair of knuckles rapped on my window. A wild halo of white-blonde hair peered into the driver’s side window through slitted eyes that were the exact same shade as mine.
“Why are you sitting out here?” she asked.
A little smudge of fog appeared on the window when she spoke, she stood so close to it. I let out a sigh and reached for the door handle. A bit creepy, with her pale skin, to find her looming outside.
She stepped back to let me out.
“Hey, M-mom.”
The door popped open under my hand and she tilted her head to the side. “Come on in. Gotta check my groats.”
I trailed behind her through the yard, where free-range chickens clucked and fought each other for scraps of squash littered on the ground. They scattered as Mom strode by, her thin legs taking her quickly through the tall, wild grass and up the stairs. Old flower boxes lined the old mobile home, empty and dry. She had seventeen empty flower boxes now and had snapped at me when I suggested donating some to the cemetery. From outside, the sound of a grinder filled the house, and increased in volume when she tossed open the door.
Mayhem greeted us.
Mom’s double-wide trailer had always been chaotic, but her latest idea made it almost unstable. Various food items littered every available space, whether it was bagged whole grain oats—which she called groats—or cans of cinnamon sticks waiting to be ground. Glass jars and linen sacks filled in all the nooks and crannies that food waiting to be processed didn’t. A television played somewhere in the background and the scent of incense lay heavy on the air.
Handmade baskets lined with linen filled the kitchen as she waved me past her couch and into the dining area. Bamboo sporks clustered together in fist sized bundles tied by twine. A tag, made of recycled paper, said Save the Earth with Erika.
“Just about done,” she called over the loud groan of a grain grinder. “The groats got gummy. Kinda wet. Forgot to roast and dry them out, so they’re clogging my grinder. Blasted thing takes forever. You almost can’t charge enough for ground oat flour with how long it takes.”
A giant grinder took up half her old counter space. I paused near the sink, where grain dust decorated the top of the counter. The grinder was at least as old as me. Clear, empty bags lay on the counter next to it, along with more Save the Earth with Erika tags waiting to be applied.
Although I'd struggled all the way through high school with my Mom and her strange ways, I’d long since accepted it now. The fact that she managed to single-mom her way through my childhood, put food on the table, and still love me in her strange way felt like a gift. Her eccentricity was sometimes a bit much to process, but she largely just wanted to live her life and be left alone. We would probably never be close, but now that I had adult friends, we didn't need to be.
“H-how’s b-b-business?” I asked.
She flipped the grinder off. “Fine. Still trying to get the lease on the old lot where they had that pizza place, remember? Some developer wanted to make it a spa.” She scoffed. “Spa. What a waste. Do you know what lotion bottles do to our environment? Anyway, it’s about time Pineville sees a store with holistic support and resources, if you ask me.”
I nodded and leaned against one wall, my arms folded across my chest. Despite her holistic approach to the world, Mom’s house looked like a pack-rat’s nest. Clogged with miscellaneous old glass bottles and dust. When I had asked her about county and state laws around processing food, she’d rolled her eyes and said, “My bleach bottle and I take care of any problems anyone needs to worry about, thank you very much.” I eyed a tottering pile of old newspapers she hadn’t taken to recycling yet and thought I heard a squeak.
Mom pushed a lock of hair out of her pale eyes. At fifty-something, she still had a young face, with wrinkles that added character and an intensity in her eyes that felt familiar. Her eyes appeared owlish behind massive, wire-rimmed glasses without which she was almost blind. Beads jangled from where they hung around her neck, scalloping a bright turquoise tank top that dipped well below her collarbone. Today, she wore a pair of old coveralls and slippers made from leather. Normally, she had wispy skirts in various shades of tie-dye.
She studied me. “And you? Thought I heard there was some trouble at the coffee shop.”
“F-fine. I—”
“Of course, no information has been released.” She rolled her eyes. “Allegedly, the woman was under the influence of some drug. Mark my words, Dagny. They’re going to blame mushrooms again and it’s not the mushroom’s fault!”
“I—”
“The woman needs to see a better herbalist if she’s turning to mushrooms to relax. Marijuana can do a lot these days, you know.”
“Mom—”
“Of course, inhaling marijuana is far more unpleasant. Mushrooms, on the other hand . . .”
My mouth opened again, but I closed it again. Why fight it? I let her words run through the background of my mind and kept a very loose track on whatever tangent she’d launched herself into now. Why waste the precious words? Mom didn’t actually need or want me to respond. She just wanted to talk. Like a child who self soothed through chattering to herself. Less than a minute later, she’d worn the subject out.
“Anyway.” Mom popped a hand on her hip and lifted her eyebrows. “Any news from you?”
“Ah . . . n-not really. I may have found a place in J-jackson C-c-city that will take my pallet furniture, but I haven’t c-confirmed with them.”
She frowned. “Why not?”
“I’m b-b-busy.”
Frightened, I thought. Mom would pounce on that in a second if I admitted it, however.
“Better get on it,” Mom muttered, but turned to pull something off a cupboard above her when the grinder made a screeching sound. “The universe doesn’t just give those opportunities away, you know. Gotta take them when they come.”
So many replies surfaced to the tip of my tongue, but I stuffed them back down. The universe and I, as Mom saw it, had things to talk about.
“What are you scared of, anyway?” she asked as she riffled through a cardboard box. “Can’t be that scary, talking to some local businesses to sell your furniture. We like to support each other, you know. We’re in this together.”
She said we as if she were a vetted business. As if she’d ever worked cooperatively with anyone in her life. Some of her friends bought food or earth-bas
ed goods out of her house when she offered a discount, but Mom had never operated above board. Who was she friends with that ran a company?
“I-it’s not,” I said in an attempt to sound confident. “I-I-I just th-think—”
“I know.” She waved an impatient hand. “I know. You don’t want them to reject you or judge you based on your stutter, but you need to get over it already.”
My nostrils flared as I sucked in a sharp breath. That wasn’t what I was going to say, but Mom was forever speaking ahead of me. It’s how it had always been and the reason my stutter was so much worse at her house. Her quick get over it sent a frisson of frustration through me.
A familiar tension crept up my body, like a fist holding onto my vocal cords. I could feel it tightening, tightening, tightening. Even the muscles in my face and jaw felt the grip. Once this happened, I rarely got my words back, no matter how desperately I tried.
“What can you t-t-tell me about my b-b-biological f-father?”
My firm tone gave me a surge of pride despite the words falling over themselves. By now, I’d normally retreated to uncertain grunts and one-word answers. Several words in a row and a sentence started without a stutter in front of Mom was almost a new record.
Mom paled. The linen bag she’d been preparing to shovel ground groats into fell onto the counter.
“What?” she breathed.
“M-m-my b-biological f-father. What h-h-happened to him? W-where is he? When d-d-did you last talk to h-him?
Although I already knew the answer to most of these questions, I still felt compelled to ask. Her pasty expression didn’t improve. She reached back with one hand and propped it on the counter.
“Why are you asking about him?”
A thousand reasons, I thought. I’ve always asked them, but never out loud.
“D-don’t know,” I whispered.
Which was, in fact, a lie.
I knew exactly why I was asking, but the truth wouldn’t cross my lips that way. For most of my life, the questions about my biological father had surfaced and prevaricated around the edges of my mind like a ghost. Regret that I’d asked followed when I saw the firming up of her expression. She wouldn’t reveal anything. Short of being drunk, I’d never get this information out of her.
Why did I ask? Did I want to set her on edge? Punish her? I couldn’t tell. I just knew the words came out because they’d been sitting there so long.
The last person I’d tell my grand plan to was Mom. The last person that would ever know my plan was Mom. Eventually, I’d never have to ask her anything about him again. I’d know it myself.
She let out a long breath. “I don’t know,” she said, and pressed her colorless lips together. They’d hardened, impossibly straight, and without an inch of give. I dropped my gaze, cowed by the fury hiding behind her surprise. Likely, the only reason I wasn’t getting an earful of words was because of shock.
Which meant it was time to make a gracious escape.
“G-g-gotta go, Mom. My f-f-riend is bringing some p-p-pallets over tonight.”
“Yeah, okay.” Her shoulders slumped with relief, although there was annoyance there, too. I didn’t stop to analyze why, or for what purpose. At least I’d get out of here without being screamed at again.
“H-have a g-good night. L-love you.”
She waved me toward the door, and I went willingly. “Love you, too. Thanks for stopping by. Need to figure out this stupid grinder, anyway. How am I supposed to compete with Healthy Foods Market if I can’t even make quality oat flour, for goodness sake? Like pebbles, it is!”
Her half-crazed mumblings followed me to the door and out. Once it shut with a firm thud, I let out my first full breath since I pulled onto the property. By the time I made it to my car, some of the dense clouds from my mind had cleared. The ones with my father lingering in them remained. Questions about my biological father required moxie I didn’t know I had.
If there was one thing Mom didn’t talk about, it was Anthony Dunkin.
Oil rigs. The current legislation. Overuse and dependence on plastic. LGBTQ rights. She would willingly cover it all and then some with anyone that asked—or didn’t ask. Mom had words on words on words, and she never stuttered over them. Never hesitated.
So why did I want to prod her with the remark about my biological father? I’d never really asked before. Not since I was a little girl.
I started the car, rolled the windows down, and drove back to the Frolicking Moose with the wind whipping through my hair. A sense of relief flooding my veins with every mile that separated us. I’d visited Mom this month and wouldn’t need to see her for another four to six weeks. At least I had that.
Sometimes, even that seemed far too soon.
A firm rap on the door to my loft came later that evening.
I trotted down the spiral stairs with a paintbrush in my hand and my hair pulled away from my face by a bandana. An old pair of coveralls that I’d swiped from my old neighbor, Rick, kept me from getting stains all over my clothes. Mom always swore by coveralls, and I reluctantly agreed. They were genius. Still, I reeked like stain and had sawdust on my hands.
A burly figure that waited on my porch had me skidding to a stop a few steps before the door.
Jayson Hernandez stood there, two pallets in his hands. He wore jeans with the knees worn, his usual work boots, and a white t-shirt that stretched too perfectly over his wide shoulders.
My heart cracked like an iceberg, then slid into the depths of my stomach. Two seconds passed before I comprehended him standing there. Jayson? Rick said he’d send the pallets over with . . .
. . . a capable person.
The old man had a meddling hand, because I was certain he had nothing in his schedule to prevent him bringing the pallet wood himself. No, he’d wrangled Jayson into this on purpose, and I’d have words—actual words—with the old guy. While dreaming of my revenge, I cleared my throat. With a muttered curse, I forced a smile and pulled the door open. Jayson responded in kind, looking a little less certain now that I’d gawped at him like a cavewoman.
“Hey.” He nodded toward the two pallets. “I have ten more of these that have your name on them. Is that . . . is that right?”
With a nod, I opened the door wider.
“Th-that is c-correct.”
Silent questions filled his beautiful, velvet eyes, but he kept them there and yanked a work glove back on his right hand.
“Lead the way,” he said.
I peered around his more-than-capable shoulders. Behind him was a clunky old work truck likely from his family farm. Or maybe that’s what he drove. I wasn’t used to seeing him outside his cruiser. Pallets were strapped down in the back.
“I c-can grab some others—”
“Nah. I’ll get them later.”
To avoid the problem of finding my brain and forcing it to figure out words yet again, I nodded and gestured him up the stairs. While he stepped ahead of me, despite the awkward navigation of pallets on a spiral staircase, I used all my willpower not to study his jean-clad backside.
The universe sure tested me.
He stopped just inside my loft and set the pallets off to the side. A bit of a mess greeted us upstairs, although I prided myself on my usually clean living space. Cans of stain and turpentine, half-broken crates, splintered wood, nails, and hammers littered the floor of over half the loft. Aside from a bed that Serafina had left behind, I didn’t keep much in here. Something about open space made me feel like I could breathe better. Functionality was so much better than . . . stuff.
Or maybe I just didn’t want to live like Mom.
“What have you got going on up here?” he asked with a nod to the pile of debris. In the midst of it was a new piece of furniture that I’d attempted to sketch out on an old chalkboard secured to the wall. Various shades of chalk colored the surface, each assigned a different purpose. No one had ever seen my workspace before, except Mom.
“I-I create furniture from p-
pallet wood.” I waved to the half-spawned creation in the middle of the room that hadn’t quite come together the way I wanted it to. “I needed to m-make some extra money in high school to b-b-buy a car, but I didn’t have many options. S-s-so I found some old pallets and st-started to . . . make stuff. I still d-do it now for a . . . p-project I have.”
Even me saying the words high school made my heart flutter. Did he even know we went to school together? The mountain school world wasn’t that big, but we were grades apart. If he did remember, then what did he recall about me? I shuddered to think.
Jayson advanced into the room and circled my little wreckage of creativity. Heat crawled up my cheeks at the thought of him judging my work, but I kept my chin tilted back. Showing it to Jayson was good practice. If I wanted store owners in Jackson City to sell my woodwork, wouldn’t they also inspect and judge?
No, it would be different.
He stood up to better inspect a particularly flaky piece of wood. Somehow, it felt more intimate and scary with Jayson running his finger along the edges. Like he peered into my soul as if it were a crystal ball.
“That is so cool,” he said.
“W-what?”
“This is awesome.” He grinned and gestured around us. His gaze fell onto the far wall, where Bethany had helped me stage a few of my finished works so I could take photos to send to the businesses that I wanted to sell them. “They are awesome.”
“It’s . . .”
Sort of desperate, I thought. The pallet furniture was a means to make money to meet my biological father. A man that, for all intents and purposes, didn’t want me to exist. The fact that I wanted to force him to acknowledge me was desperate enough. Scrapping together furniture out of pallets? Seemed a step farther.
“Inventive,” he finished for me, and said it firmly. I didn’t have the courage, or ability, to correct him or try to change his mind.
The need for funds hadn’t diminished over the years, which is why I continued to play with pallet wood design today, although I was in a far better financial position than I’d ever been before. Maverick and Bethany paid a generous salary for a barista, and I felt certain they cut the rent down on the loft when I applied. Why they’d be so kind to someone they hardly knew and were not obligated to help, I had no idea. Nor did I question it, because being a barista gave me the space to try out the pallet furniture.