by Emilia Finn
I don’t want it either, but my job as Max’s mother makes it my responsibility to take.
“He’ll have the same as me. In fact, we’ll share.”
“Got it.” Nixon flashes a grin that makes my throat dry and my skin bump, then he lopes away and goes to taunt the women behind the counter.
My eyes remain on his back, his narrow waist, his oversized pants. The fact he wears them implies he’s already run toward a fire today, no?
“Oh my god,” Arlo sets the soccer ball and my diary on the bench seat at her side. “You like him!”
Stunned, my eyes whip to hers. “What?
“You like Nixon!” she hisses. “You’re shy and bumbling and sweaty and there are all sorts of sex pheromones floating in the air. You like him!” She grins. “It’s so obvious.”
“I should hope not.” I cross my legs and lift my shoulders. Snobbery and aloofness always help when intimidated. “And you’re being inappropriate in front of my son.”
“You totally like him.” She ignores my reprimand and instead digs in deeper. “He’s sweet, you know? Always a total gentleman. He cooks, and showers at least once a day.”
“You sound intimately aware of such details.”
She rolls her eyes. “Now who’s being inappropriate? I’m just a child, Ms. Mazzi. Virtuous and pure of heart.”
“Ve bene. Pure, my butt.”
“Offensive,” she snickers. “You’re lucky I’m sure of myself. Oh, Max?”
Arlo sees something I don’t, an expression, perhaps, since she’s facing him. But by the time I look, Max pops to his feet and stands on the bench.
“Bathroom?” she asks. “Sure thing, kiddo.” Arlo reaches out and takes him when he opens his arms, so I remain in place, ignored, unneeded, and then, alone. “We’ll be back in a sec.”
Then off they go.
“Chocolate ice cream in a cup.” Nixon’s voice makes me jump, but he makes no comment when I startle. He does nothing as the other two race away, except drop two cups of chocolate gelato down in front of me, then two more cups on his side, one for Arlo, and one for him.
He stops at the side of the table for a second, glancing around, then brings his gaze to me. I look down, avoiding his eyes, so I can’t be certain he’s studying me. But I feel the heat of his gaze. I feel his penetrating stare.
“We’re two down. I swear I was only gone for a second.”
“Bathroom,” I mutter in response. “Max had to go.”
“Oh, okay. Cool.” Nixon drops down in the booth opposite me and folds his neck so he can catch my gaze. “Wanna talk about it?”
“Talk about what?” I snag my spoon and dig it into the ice cream. “I have nothing to discuss.”
He scoffs. “I think you have a million things to discuss, and I want to listen to them all. You intrigue the shit out of me, Idalia. I don’t know you, and we’ve said barely ten words in total. But I have an endless number of questions zinging around in my head.”
He wants the gossip. The latest on the single mom who moved to town.
“Your curiosity is unappealing.”
“Of course it is, because it would be best if I didn’t notice you at all.” He digs his spoon into his dessert and brings a little to his lips. “You were more verbose when you were parading as waitstaff.”
“Parading?” Finally, I allow my eyes to meet his. “I was not parading. I was working.”
“Regardless, being the help was easier for you than being the boss. You enjoyed having that shield up, and when you had it, you felt freer to speak out against me and Beck hounding the kitchen staff for food.”
“Seems you still enjoy hounding people in general.” I look around the parlor. Then to our booth, my dessert, my companion. “Somehow I’m sitting here with you right now, and that smug grin of yours.”
“I have a smug grin?” He brings a hand up and covers his twitching lips. “I had no clue.”
“And you can’t lie,” I add. “Your jaw flexes when you tell a lie.”
“Guess you caught me,” he lowers his hand but keeps that damn grin. “Wanna exchange questions and answers? I know you’re curious too.”
“I’m not curious at all.” I’m so effing curious. “Honestly, I’m so busy that I can barely sit still right now. So once my son is finished in the restroo—”
“Great segue. Let’s start with Max.”
My temper flares. “Let’s not.”
“I can’t say I’ve had a great deal of time in his presence, but I’ve noticed he doesn’t speak. Wanna elaborate on that?”
“Mind your business.”
“I mean no harm, ya know?” Nixon leans closer, only to reach out when I let my gaze drill into the table. He places a finger beneath my chin and tilts my head up. “I’m a decent guy, I won’t hurt you. I’m just curious, the same way I was curious about Arlo losing her mother.”
My heart stumbles. “Wait. Arlo’s mother is dead?”
He shrugs, slow and smooth. “It’s a shame you haven’t taken the time to get to know your staff. She takes a lot of your ice queen act whenever you think she’s not toeing the line with Max, but she’s actually really cool. She’s abrasive, but she also tutors high school kids when she’s not working. Did you know that?” He scoops another spoon into his mouth. “She paints in her spare time, and I’d bet a dollar that she’s already handed a paintbrush to your kid. She’s loud, but she’s intuitive and smart, and if I noticed that Max doesn’t speak, then I’m sure she did too. I bet she figures art is an exceptional way of expressing oneself without speaking.”
“So my nanny is amazing.” I stare out the parlor windows and hate how his words make me feel guilty. “You make it sound like a bad thing.”
He scoffs. “I didn’t say that. I’m just saying, she’s awesome, and since you have her, you could probably relax a little. Max is in safe hands.”
“Great.” I bring my gaze back to his. “Why do you fight fires for a living?”
Surprised by my question, Nixon raises his brows high. “Well… I…”
Before he can answer, I push on. “There are a zillion other, safer jobs, but you choose to fight something that can’t be beat.”
“Can’t be beat?” he balks. “I beg to differ, Miss Italy. I beat them down every single day. All fire is, is oxygen and heat. Claws and a nasty attitude. Kill her oxygen, kill the fire. Easy-peasy.”
“Easy.” She rolls her eyes. “Fire kills people. Every single day. Serving burgers is much safer.”
“Is it?” he challenges. “Didn’t you see that thing on the news the other morning? Armed robbery at the drive-thru in the city. A fire has never once held a gun to my face.”
“You trivialize the danger,” I snarl. “Have you no care for your family as they wait for you to come home again?”
“Some would say my family and I have an unhealthy codependence,” he counters. “I’m on the phone to them a dozen times a day. They know I’m safe.”
“And if you die on the job?” I push. “You’re lying if you say the thought hasn’t crossed your mind.”
“Of course it’s crossed my mind!” His temper is fraying. “I’m not stupid. But nor am I impulsive or unskilled. I’m careful, Idalia. I’m good at my job. My team has my back, just as I have theirs. And I haven’t been hurt yet.”
“Yet.” I send my eyes skyward and cross myself. “Way to tempt the universe. Idiota.”
Laughing, unfazed by my upset, he only goes back to eating. “I know what that word means. You think yours is the only bilingual tongue around here? You think Italian and Portuguese are nothing alike?”
My eyes snap to his, curious and mad at the same time. “Portuguese?”
“Well, I sure as shit didn’t get my dark hair and tan from my mother’s Irish roots. And as I’m one of five boys, the youngest of them all, it would be foolish to think I didn’t learn and become fluent in the cusswords.” He brings another spoonful of ice cream to his lips and makes a show of sliding his t
ongue over the frozen dessert. “Português is the language of romance.”
“And you seem awfully comfortable spouting off what you do. Womanizer, perhaps?”
“Perhaps.” He shrugs and releases my eyes so I can find reprieve in studying the street outside. “Or, like I said… interested. Wanna talk about Max’s inability to speak yet?”
“No.”
I hate that my eyes burn and itch. There’s no true reason to be upset; nothing new has happened. Nevertheless, the emotion I’ve spent two years pushing deep under my son’s needs and my want for the Oriane to be a success bubbles and threatens to spill over.
I’ve made it a rule to get on with my life, to not dwell, to remain strong for my son, but for some reason, while I sit in an ice cream parlor and struggle to keep my lips shut, my rules seem to be all for naught.
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Can I talk about it, then?” Nixon finishes his ice cream, pushes the cup to the side, then he grabs Arlo’s and starts scooping into her sherbet. “I’ve heard a little about your story. House fire, you lost everything, and now you’re here. Abby makes it no secret that you’re business-savvy and tolerate no fools.”
“And yet, here you sit.” I bring my eyes back to his. “Something doesn’t add up.”
“Burn,” he snickers. “So, Max has… selective mutism? Or has he never talked at all?”
“That would be my business. And I’ve asked you to mind your own.”
Frustrated, Nixon stops and drops his spoon into the ice cream cup. “Fucking ice queen.”
Surprised by his outburst, I bring my gaze back to his.
“It’s okay to have friends, you know? It’s okay to spread the load just a little bit. And it’s absolutely not necessary to shit on the people who want to know you, all because you’re terrified of losing an inch of control in your disgustingly structured life.”
“No, Mr. Rosa. What is unnecessary is a man I do not know thinking his attention should flatter a woman, all because he likes what he sees. What is unnecessary is the stress I know you would bring into my life. What is unnecessary is you asking personal questions, and when I ask you to stop, you impose and try to make me feel guilty for not wanting to share.”
I push up to stand and run my hands over my skirt to smooth the material. “I came here for peace, Mr. Rosa. Not for a strange man to think he’s entitled to something he’s not.”
I step out of the booth and come around behind his bench seat. Green eyes follow my every step, my every movement, then they darken when I lean into his space and snatch up my diary and Max’s ball.
“If you see me in the street,” I conclude, “feel free to tip your chin. I might even nod back in hello.”
I snatch Max’s ice cream, since he’ll be disappointed to miss out, then I push across the parlor in search of my conspicuously missing son and nanny.
I peek around the corner, then into the restrooms, only to find each toilet cubicle empty, every door open.
I have just a single second to panic, to wonder where they are, but when I turn back to the mirror, I find a message in lipstick.
“Outside. Relax.”
It’s not signed; there is no proof at all that Arlo wrote this, but there isn’t a doubt in my mind. So I push back into the parlor and pretend I can’t see Nixon staring as I walk.
I snag my sunglasses from the top of my head and slide them back over my eyes. Then I only reinforce that ice queen act as I storm out of the parlor without a backward glance.
I don’t mean to be this way. I don’t want to be this person. But the idea of letting anyone in, let alone a firefighter, makes my stomach swirl in painful directions.
It’s best this way. Even if there’s a large part of me that wants to go back inside and sit down with the handsome stranger.
I’m a mom now, and moms don’t always get what they want.
I wander the sidewalk for only a minute before I catch sight of Arlo and Max experimenting with a gumball machine outside the general store.
I storm in their direction, mad at Nixon. Mad at myself. Mad at the whole damn world.
“You’re so into him,” Arlo taunts the moment I’m close enough. “We walked out of that bathroom and crossed the ice cream parlor, and you didn’t even notice.”
I lean around my son and press a kiss to his sweaty cheek. Then I pass the melted ice cream, though I know he’ll get more on his face and clothes than he’ll get in his mouth. “Here, Max.”
“I see you ignoring me.”
“We’ll head home in a minute, bello. Wash up, make some lunch, and have a rest. Then Mommy has some work to do.”
“You’re defensive because you feel vulnerable,” Arlo pushes. “It’s okay to show your vulnerabilities sometimes. Especially to the right people. We’ll take care of them, ya know?”
“I didn’t know your mom died.” I bring a hand up and begin biting my thumb, a nervous habit I thought I kicked eons ago. “I never asked, and because I never asked, I had no clue I was being insensitive.” I meet my friend’s gaze. “I’m sorry.”
She smiles. It’s soft, elegant, appreciative. “It stinks when people we love die. It especially stinks if we feel cheated by their death. Like maybe we still had business with them, but our chance has been taken away. Your chance was stolen from you. And my chance… I gave it away, uncaring that our time was precious and ending. That’s my regret to bear. It’s my trauma to work through. I’m not mad that you couldn’t read my mind.”
“I don’t have to read minds, Arlo. All I had to do was ask.”
“But you didn’t. Because you’re afraid that if you ask questions, we’ll ask our own, and we’ll push for an answer, since we answered yours.”
And there it is.
It seems one of us can read minds.
“It’s easier to choose silence,” I rasp out.
Grief envelops me like a hug from hell. The things that remain unsaid between me and my husband weigh me down. The plans we had, the events we’d planned, those we’d RSVPed to, but never got to attend. We had a lifetime planned for the three of us, but in the middle of the night, with no warning, no mercy, that was stolen from us.
“I’m sorry for always snapping at you,” I tell her instead.
She scoffs. “I never let you make me sad. I know who you are beneath that defense mechanism. I know you’re still surviving. Barely. And considering that’s where I was a year or so ago—alive but barely surviving—I can be chill about allowing you space. Doesn’t mean I’m not gonna call you out on your palla, though.”
“Palla?” Drawn back to the now, to this street, to the gumball machine Max tries to steal from, I release that hug I never asked for, and smirk. “Palla means ball.” I hold the black and white soccer ball between us. “Did you think it meant something else?”
She only shrugs. “I’m trying to learn a new language. I store these words away each time you use them. What’s the word for ‘shit’?”
I burst out laughing and let my hands fall. “Merda works. But don’t teach Max. It’s a bad word.”
She grins. “But admit it, if he speaks again, no matter what he says, it would be cool.”
“Yeah.” I take Max’s hat off and run my fingers through his hair. “It would be cool.”
Nixon
She’s a little prickly
I push through my front door after another long day at work. A day shift, rather than a full twenty-four-hour rotation. Despite that, fewer hours doesn’t always mean less work. Sometimes, my station can have ten callouts in a single shift, and today… today was one of those days.
That’s not to imply our small town is burning to the ground. It’s just there’s always some stupid little fucker doing something he shouldn’t. Lighting fires, climbing shit they shouldn’t, getting stuck places they never should have been. I get called out to all sorts of jobs, and nine times out of ten, my paramedic brother is on the same scene, to save the same idiots that are hurting t
hemselves.
Now that he’s practically married, Mitch has mellowed out and become totally chill with the world. Where a year ago, he was tightly strung and in need of convincing that the world isn’t out to hurt those he loves, now he’s hooked up with the Arlo replica—but Nadia is a few years older, and despite how impossible it sounds, she’s louder and more abrasive than Arlo.
Poor Mitch.
Making my way through my living room and past my long, leather couch, I step out of my boots and leave them sitting where they fall. My clothes reek of smoke, my face carries soot and the remnants of the very thing a certain European someone grilled me on recently.
If Idalia saw me now, arriving home in this condition, it would surely reinforce what she thinks she already knows about my job. She hates my breed—dirty, busy, and dangerous—and though it doesn’t take a genius to understand why—no doubt, Max’s father is a firefighter, and he left her with a bitter taste in her mouth—that doesn’t mean I’m inclined to tiptoe around her condemnation.
Well… that’s what I tell myself, anyway. But if that were true, then why the fuck am I even noticing the smell of smoke on my clothes today, when I’ve never given it a second thought in the past?
“Fuck knows.”
Annoyed with myself, I make my way into the hall, stripping as I go. I’m tempted to leave my shirt on the floor, something to deal with tomorrow, but I don’t. I ball it in my hands instead and toss it into the hamper the moment I step into the bathroom.
Stopping in front of my massive bathroom vanity—double sinks, double mirrors, and hidden storage beneath—I stare at my reflection and frown at the soot on my cheekbone. I’m two shades darker than my natural skin tone. And when a glistening cut catches my eye, I let my gaze wander down to the deep gash on the side of my ribs. It’s no big deal, really. Not even enough to warrant a trip to the ER.
A residential fire over on Martin Road ended with an old-as-hell homestead falling apart. Rafters were falling, windows were spraying, and I just so happened to catch a rocketing pair of kitchen shears when the whole place imploded and pushed my team back.