by Dale Mayer
At that, Joe burst out laughing. “You could have fooled me,” he said. “The bastards could have covered the thing with the medical insurance, but they wouldn’t. The surgery itself is covered but not the equipment he needs at the other end. And you can’t do one without the other, so it’s off until we can raise the money.”
“Must be tough having to go back to work after you’ve retired.”
“It is, and it sucks too. It’s not just tough. My bones like to stay abed at nighttime, not chasing strangers driving up all those roads.”
“Strangers?”
“Yeah, there’s been traffic up and down that damn place. You’d think they’d let us security guards get a decent nap, but, no, of course not.”
“Strangers? Can’t be too many of those around here.”
“Well, you are one of them, now that I think about it,” he said.
Eton immediately introduced himself and explained where they were staying.
“Ah, yeah, we often get people from that Airbnb stuff,” he said. “It’s all garbage.”
“Well, it looks like a good source of income for people who need it,” he said.
“Maybe, maybe the people don’t just need it, they want it,” he said. “I’ve come to understand that needs and wants are very different things at this point in my life.”
“I’m sorry. That’s a hard lesson to learn, isn’t it?”
“Well, I learned it,” he said. “I just didn’t expect to have to do it again.”
Eton pulled some cash from his wallet and handed over four hundred dollars and said, “Put this toward the expenses,” he said. “Let’s get that boy on the road to recovery.” With that, he picked up his coffee, smiled at Joe, and said, “I hope you have a better day.”
Joe nodded, as he accepted the money, clearly flustered. “Thank you. I don’t know what to say. Thank you.”
“Not an issue,” Eton said, as he took his leave. He decided that maybe, instead of continuing to ask around, he’d drive a little farther into another town and start looking for answers there. One thing was for sure; he needed a new source now. He didn’t want to cause any alarms locally. He wasn’t ready to stop checking things out though.
As he walked back to his car, Joe called out to him. Eton turned back and looked at him. He couldn’t hear the old man, so he walked back, saying, “I’m sorry. I couldn’t hear you. What did you say?”
“I was just saying thank you again,” he said. “Getting a little closer every day, and maybe, pretty soon, I’ll leave that bloody security job.”
“The condos are almost done anyway, aren’t they?” he asked. “Surely they don’t need the security guards for much longer?”
“Maybe not,” he said. “I don’t much like being up there. People are walking around in the dark, where they shouldn’t be.”
“Did you tell the bosses that?”
“I did, but they won’t do anything about it,” he said.
“Well, if you think there is any danger, it’s sure not worth risking your life for,” Eton said in all seriousness. “Surely they are at the lock-up stage by now. And then, if someone breaks in up there, it’s an insurance matter.”
The security guard looked at him for a long moment and nodded. “Maybe I’ll have a talk with them.”
“Are you there all night?” Eton asked.
Joe shook his head. “Midnight to six.”
Eton managed a completely honest grimace on his face. “Not my ideal time to work,” he said. “Especially outside.”
“That’s exactly the problem,” he said. “My old body isn’t meant to do that anymore.”
“Well, I mean, if you need the money, then it’s certainly understood,” he said, “but, if you can make your way without doing those hours, it will be better for you.”
“Isn’t that the truth? Still, I’ll have to think about it.”
“But, if you think you’re in any danger, you can call the police, right?”
He shrugged and said, “Well, I won’t.” He shook his head. “It would take hours for them to get there, especially at that time of night.”
At that, Eton stopped, then walked over, and, pulling a little notepad out of his pocket, he jotted down his cell phone number. “You can always call me, while we’re here anyway,” he said. “I’ve got special ops and militarily background,” he said, “and I could get there pretty quickly. Don’t put your life in danger.”
There must have been enough sincerity in his voice for the other man to believe him because he took the note and nodded. “I sure don’t want to quit, if I don’t have to,” he said.
“Good enough,” he said. “Just give me a call, if you run into any trouble up there. I don’t mind at all.”
“Maybe you’re the trouble,” Joe said, only half joking.
“And because you don’t know me, I understand that,” he said, “but a lot of people will vouch for me.”
“What are you doing around here?”
“Hunting,” he said, with half a smile and a glance over his shoulder. “Looking for some of those guys you don’t ever want to meet in the dark.”
At that, Joe looked at him, his gaze sharp.
Eton, breaking his long-standing rule of not talking about his job, nodded. “I’m serious,” he said. “If you think even for a minute that anything is going on up there, just let me know, and I’ll come running.”
“I don’t want to get killed over this.”
“Exactly,” Eton said in a quiet voice. “Remember your priorities too. That boy needs his grandpa. It’s not worth getting killed over.”
“Damn it. I figured it was nothing,” he said, staring off in the distance, “but then, last night, a couple of them were around.”
“A couple what?”
“A couple guys,” he said, “and that made me aware that something else was happening up there.”
“Do you think it’s the staff from the jobsite?”
“No,” he said, “I don’t think it’s like that at all. He’s always talking to somebody.”
“Weird,” Eton said, staring out, but it certainly lined up. “Like I said, don’t put yourself in a position where you could be in danger.”
“I think that’s what they expect of me though.”
“Are they paying you enough for that?”
The old man shook his head.
“You have already reported the problem to management, right?”
Joe nodded.
“Tell them that, as long as all this shit is going on up there, with strangers walking around in the dark, you want nothing to do with it.”
“I’ll see,” he said.
It was obvious the old man was thinking about his grandson and what needed to happen with him. Eton had done what he could at least. “Call me. Anytime at all,” he said, and, with that, he walked away. He could only do so much, before it didn’t make a bit of a difference anymore, and people were better off making their own decisions. He hoped he’d made the right one in telling Joe. And he especially hoped Joe made the right decision and called him if anything went south. Very little room for recovery when people went down the wrong pathway. Sometimes you get no room to recover, and things go straight downhill very quickly. That’s not what Eton wanted for Joe.
Chapter 6
By the end of the day, Sammy was tired and worn out. They’d had nothing but problems at work. Several designs needed to be dealt with, and her dad was having a difficult day. He’d gone to have a nap at two, and, by four, he still hadn’t gotten up. Worried, she’d gone into his room to find him completely disoriented, sitting on the side of the bed. She tapped him, and he got up and followed her into the kitchen to have a cup of coffee. When he finally got his thoughts back together again, he looked up at her with sad eyes and said, “It’s getting worse, isn’t it?”
She’d frozen, then reached over, gave him a hug, and said, “It doesn’t matter, Dad. You have enough to worry about. Don’t worry about that too.”
Now the two of them had returned to the office upstairs. He sat beside her, staring at the diagrams, not necessarily helping but not hurting either. And she enjoyed having him here. “You do good work,” he muttered, as he watched her.
“I learned from the best,” she said, with a smile.
He chuckled. “I don’t know about that,” he said. “This getting old sucks.”
She didn’t say anything because there wasn’t anything she could say. It might suck, but she suspected it didn’t suck this much for everybody. But then maybe that was just her naive idea about aging. “We’ll get through it together,” she promised.
He reached over again to pat her hand, then picked up a pencil and went to work. She watched him carefully for a few minutes, without letting him see, then realized that he really was there and was doing a great job; so she settled back to continue on her own work. By the end of the day, he said, “I’m not even hungry.”
“Well, you shouldn’t be too tired,” she said. “You had a good nap this afternoon.”
“But I am,” he said. “Maybe I’ll just go lie down.”
She watched in worry as he got up and headed to his bedroom again.
“What about you?” he asked, stopping at the doorway. “Will you stop and eat?”
She hadn’t been planning on it, but, as he’d asked a direct question, she shrugged and said, “Maybe.”
“No maybe about it,” he said. “You need food.”
“Well, if you don’t, I don’t,” she said in exasperation.
He just glared at her.
She shrugged. “It takes two.”
“If I eat, will you eat?”
“Deal,” she said and hid a smile. He just glared at her. She looked at him gently and added, “We have to do what we have to do.”
“Fine,” he said. And he walked back over to where she sat. “Can we eat sooner?” he asked hopefully.
“We can,” she said. “Any particular wishes?” When he named one of her pasta specialties that he’d loved forever, she smiled. “It’ll take a little bit of time to make though,” she said.
Immediately he changed his mind, and she shook her head. “I don’t mind the work,” she said, “but you have to stay awake.”
“I will,” he said. “I’ll even come help.”
So together they put away their architectural drawings and went down to the kitchen. As she started working on what was essentially homemade pasta, but a much easier version just dropped into boiling water in little pieces, she wondered that she hadn’t heard from Annie.
Almost as if he were listening to her thoughts, her father asked, “What about Annie?”
“Good question,” she said. “I was just thinking about her. But there doesn’t appear to be any calls from her.” She checked her cell phone again and shrugged.
“Good. No news is good news,” he said.
“I hope so,” she said. “It does make me a little worried though.”
“I’m sure she’s fine,” he said casually. He was getting the boiling water ready, putting the salt in it. “How is that dough coming along?”
“It’s doing great,” she said, giving the spongy batter a hard stir.
He looked over and smiled. “You always were a good hand with that dish.”
“Because we love it so much, I have lots of practice making this one,” she said brightly. She leaned over, gave him a kiss on the cheek. “Anything for the special man in my life.” Immediately she realized she shouldn’t have brought that up because he frowned at her, and the scolding began.
“You need to have a partner, a man who would be there for you.”
“Well, if and when I find one,” she said, chuckling, “I’ll be sure to let you know.”
“It’s not that funny,” he said. “Being alone sucks.”
“I know,” she said. “You fill the gap though, so there’s been no void in my life for a very long time.”
“That’s not good either,” he said, with a shake of his head.
She chuckled and said, “Are you chopping and frying that bacon, so we’ll have layers here or what?”
With that, he completely devoted himself to the next project, and, after they had the dish in the oven, completely slathered with sweet cheese, he looked at her and said, “That smells so good.”
“Twenty minutes,” she said. “That’s all we need, twenty minutes.”
He nodded. “I’ll set the table.”
He worked on that, as she cleaned up the dishes from preparing the dish. It’s not that it had to be a big mess, but somehow she always ended up with one. She didn’t understand that. Her mother could cook up a storm, and the kitchen always looked great. In Sammy’s case, the dish looked great too, but, by the time she was done cooking, a huge mess awaited her in the kitchen. She cleaned up, and, by the time she was done, the table was set, and now the cheese had melted, and the casserole was thoroughly heated. Her father opened a bottle of wine, and she brought out dinner. He was seated at the table, and, just as she was about to join him, her phone rang. She looked at it and frowned.
“You going to answer that?” her father asked, as he picked up the great big serving spoon and served himself a hefty scoop.
She smiled at the amount. That was a lot of food for somebody who supposedly wasn’t hungry. “I will,” she said. “I just don’t know the number.”
He peered over and said, “Oh, Private Caller, huh? A secret admirer?”
“I doubt it,” she said, and, when she went to answer it, nobody was there. She shrugged and said, “Must have been a wrong number.”
“Oh, he’ll call back,” her father said, with a wink. She smiled, and, when the phone did ring again, she planned to ignore it, until she saw Annie’s name. She answered it and put it on Speakerphone. “Hello, Annie. I’m here with Dad, having dinner. How are you?”
“I’m okay,” she said, but her voice was shaky.
“Something else happen?”
“Well, I was followed home from town today,” she said. “At least I think so. I’m starting to feel paranoid.”
“Well, sometimes it’s for a good reason,” she said. “We don’t want you to make light of something that’s important.”
“That’s not helping me much,” she said.
“No, it probably isn’t, and I’m sorry. I’m not sure what to say,” she said. “What kind of a vehicle was it?”
“It was a truck, like my ex’s.”
“But did you recognize him?”
“No,” she said. “I didn’t. That’s the thing. It was just a big truck. Anybody could have had been driving it.”
“Well, lots of people do have them,” she said. “We can’t go looking for boogeymen where there aren’t any.”
“But what if there are, and I didn’t see it coming?” she cried out.
“Are you home now?”
“Yes, my vehicle was taken by the garage, and new tires put on. They sent a courtesy car to pick me up when it was ready.”
“That was nice,” she said. “And now you are home again with good tires, right?”
“Yes, all good, except for the cost,” she said. “That was not cheap. It pisses me off. I don’t have that kind of money.”
“Not many people do,” she said, “so there’s lots of things to consider.”
“I know. Anyway I just thought I’d let you know I was home.” With that, her friend hung up.
Frowning, she looked at her father and shrugged. “You heard as much as I did, but I don’t know what to make of it.”
“Sounds like that husband of hers is getting to be a headache.”
“Possibly,” she said, “but we don’t know that for sure.”
“The trouble with this scenario,” her father said, “is you won’t know anything until it’s too damn late.”
She winced at that and said, “Well, let’s hope not.”
Whe
n her phone rang again, she looked at it and said, “It’s a Private Caller again.”
“Well, answer it,” he urged.
She glared at him. “The first call was nobody.”
“Doesn’t mean this one is,” he said. “You have to break out of your shell sometimes.”
“I’ve broken out of my shell,” she protested. He just rolled his eyes at her. She glared at him but answered the phone anyway. “Hello?”
“Sammy?”
The man’s voice made her sit up straight. “Yes. Is this Eton?”
“It is,” he said. “I just wanted to invite you out for coffee.”
She stared at her father, who by now almost danced in place. “How did you get my number?” she asked.
“It’s pretty easy to get from a directory. Remember the business I’m in?”
“I don’t think I want to,” she said. “It’s a little creepy.”
“Well, I figured it would be a long cold day before you’d give your number to me,” he said, chuckling. “Remember? I’m harmless.”
“Said the spider to the fly,” she finished quickly.
At that, her father gasped in outrage and shook his head at her.
“Coffee could be nice,” she said cautiously, “but why do I feel like there’s an ulterior motive involved?” Again her father stared at her in shock. He reached over and spanked her lightly on her arm. “Fine,” she said.
“Coffee at a little café in town, how is that?”
“When?” she asked, staring down at her dinner.
“Half an hour? How does that work for you?”
She thought about it, but her father was busy nodding his head. He leaned forward into the phone and said, “Perfect. She’ll be there.”
She gasped and quickly hung up the phone. “Seriously, Dad? Did you just do that?”
“You know I did,” he said. “That poor guy could wait in the rain until he died from a chill before you’d have answered.”
“I was getting around to it,” she said defensively. “I try to think before I speak, you know?”
“Well, now you don’t have to,” he replied. She just rolled her eyes him. He motioned at her dinner. “You better eat up because you’re just going for coffee. You might get a dessert down there, if they’ve been baking and didn’t sell out.” He frowned at her, thinking about that. “I haven’t had anything from there in a long time.”