HeartStrings

by Savannah Kade

  Driving home, he talked to them, told them they'd been good at the vet. At least the vet had said so, despite the fact that they gnawed on her hand, licked her face and tried to bite her chin. She was gentle but firm when one pawed at her and left scratches.

  He had her card and was told he could see any of the vets at the clinic, but if he wanted to, he could make an appointment for them with her. He wanted that, wanted them to see the same doctor over and over, to lessen the chance that anything might get missed.

  Dr. Naman was young, beautiful and intelligent. She might even have been hitting on him, but he hadn't cared. He'd pocketed her card then put it on the fridge with tape since he couldn't find a magnet.

  He walked his puppies. Played with them. Fed them measured bowls of food. Walked them again, then put them in their crate and tried to leave them in the corner of the living room.

  They let up tiny attempts at howls, mad at being left despite the fact that they had each other. He lasted fifteen minutes.

  They lasted longer.

  Craig let them out, toggled the crate through the bedroom door and set them up in the corner of his bedroom. He was proud that he had his time down to five minutes to get them both into the crate at the same time.

  He crawled into bed again.

  They howled again.

  With a weak laugh, he pulled his pillow from the bed, grabbed his soft, fuzzy comforter and curled up on the carpet next to them.

  Finally, they were quiet. Coming over to the side of the crate close to him, one stuck a paw through the metal wire and rested it on his arm, as though touching him reassured the puppy that Craig wasn't going anywhere.

  He reminded himself the dogs had been abandoned on the side of the road, watched their siblings and mother die, spent several weeks in the shelter and went unadopted. Despite their cuteness, they had bad blood. Pit and Rottweiler was unwanted.

  Craig sighed wearily to himself. He hadn't meant to understand Shay.

  He'd been trying to forget her—thinking a dog would take up his time, need his attention, and pull him out of his funk. It was supposed to help him get over her. She'd made a sound decision about what she could and couldn't do. He understood that he didn't fit into her life.

  She'd chosen her kids over him. Shay had to.

  Despite the fact that he'd intended the dogs to help distance himself from her memory, it brought her back to the forefront. The switch had flipped. The harnesses, the right food, the constant vigilance, it was all part of his 'parenthood.' Somehow, in no time at all, he loved them.

  He wasn't sure he'd ever loved anyone or anything before. Maybe the comforter—he'd wished for one as a kid. As an adult, it was one of the first things he'd bought when he had a place of his own. He didn't think he'd ever really loved a human being.

  But this was so easy, it had snuck past him.

  He broke. There on the floor, his comforter under and around him, he started crying. First tears fell that he couldn't get under control, then the silent defeat turned to great sobs. Unable to stop himself, he tried not to look at the puppies, but felt another paw reach out as though to comfort him. Though he fought to stay silent, Craig couldn't tamp down the pain that wracked his chest and clamped his lungs.

  He'd never cried as an adult. He hadn't cried since he was sixteen. He'd cried his first night on the street, just a little. He'd cried his first night off the street, a lot. It had been scarier and worse than his first night on his own. But he'd never cried again.

  Not until now.

  Not until he understood how easy it was to love something small that needed him. And not until he saw that—despite how easy it was—no one had ever done that for him.

  Chapter 15

  "What are you reading, Honey?" Shay looked down at Owen. To say he was 'sitting' in the chair was a misnomer. He was sprawled sideways across the one recliner they had. It didn't recline anymore, but that didn't stop him from reclining in it.

  "It's about a dog."

  Thank God, better than what he was reading last time! Shay sighed to herself and looked at the clock.

  Saturdays and Sundays were rough. Often one boy or the other had something with his father. Weekends like this one—with no father visits—were both easier and harder. The boys were far enough different in age that finding a single activity for both was a difficult task.

  Though the sky was bright and the sun out, the weather forecast wasn't good, and she decided to take a chance.

  "Aaron?" She called toward the back of the small house. She was pretty sure the youngest was playing with his click-blocks in the bedroom. She'd seen him back there just five minutes ago. But to a three-year-old, five minutes was more than enough time to get into serious trouble. Luckily, he came out when called and Shay managed to get Owen's attention away from his book.

  "Look what I got!" She held up a printed ticket to the local indoor bounce house and grinned.

  Both boys lit up like little firecrackers and yelled. Her heart warmed at seeing even Owen have more than just a mellow reaction, and for something physical. He was so subdued normally that she wondered if she should become concerned.

  As excited as they were, they were easy to herd through the many steps to get ready. The money she'd spent on the ticket was a discount, but she hated spending when there was a park for free down the street, a community pool for cheap in the summer, and so on. But the kids needed variety, both in where they went and who they saw. She’d hoarded the ticket for the right day, and was glad that today seemed like a good one.

  Both boys had slept well the night before, the day wasn't gloomy enough to drive everyone inside and overcrowd the place, and she hoped it would be a good visit. They went to the bathroom in order, Aaron insisting he didn't need help and Shay watching and monitoring as she 'not helped.' They put on shoes with little fuss, ate a quick snack as she packed more for the car—she wouldn't spend on the expensive pizza slices and sugar water drinks they sold at the place.

  Then they were in the car and off.

  Other parents plugged in laptops and hooked into the Wi-Fi. Shay was too afraid to unplug hers from her home system. One day a reboot was going to crash her dinosaur, she knew. Besides, though Owen could go off on his own in the enclosed space, Aaron still needed someone watching him pretty much the whole time.

  Once through the door and past the ticket counter, her boys shoved their shoes in cubbies, not noticing that their shoes were older and more beat up than the others they were next to. They didn't notice that only a few of the parents had presented discount tickets at check-in. Shay wondered how long it would be before Owen started seeing the differences.

  Luckily, it wasn't today. He was off like a shot, lost in the crowd of kids and inflatables. Shay told herself not to worry; he was a smart kid and well street-trained. Aaron grabbed her hand and pulled her to watch him climb a bubble climbing wall.

  Though she grinned and responded to his every question and his every "watch me," her mind wandered.

  Brian was an idiot. Her ex had told her with great joy that he'd given Aaron Benadryl and he'd slept like a charm. When asked—with great alarm on Shay's part—why Aaron needed medication, Brian had proudly said, "So he'd go to sleep!"

  "That's great, sweetie!" She smiled up at her son. He seemed to have no lingering effects from being doped. She told Brian he couldn't do that, then she'd looked up all possible side effects and lasting damage online and found there wasn't much. It was nearly impossible to even have an allergic reaction to the stuff. But while Brian agreed not to do it again, she didn't trust him to remember or even to keep his word if he did. She knew Brian and current girlfriend Debbie smoked a lot of weed, too.

  Aaron grabbed her hand and pulled her to the other side of the large room, still bouncing despite the fact that he was no longer on an air cushion. Her son tugged her past several large slides and she looked up to see Owen, helping a little girl climb the rope rigging to the top.

  "You can do it, honey." A
voice told her, and Shay's attention was unexpectedly jerked to the man at the bottom of the steep slope. Her breath caught.

  Craig.

  She knew the blond hair, the broad shoulders, narrow waist. The twist in her heart. But then he turned as their two kids reached the top and she got a glimpse of his profile.

  Not Craig. Of course not. Craig didn't have kids, didn't want kids, didn't even particularly like them. He didn't even live in the area.

  The problem was that it wasn't the first time she'd seen him. Once, she'd almost approached a man in the grocery store, thinking Craig had come back and simply hadn't called her yet. The boys hadn't been with her; it had seemed so easy and so obvious.

  She'd come up behind him and even said his name. When the man turned, confused, he so obviously wasn't Craig that she'd become embarrassed and turned beet red. She'd even stammered, "I'm so sorry, I thought you were someone I know."

  But she didn't know him. And why was she so flustered? She'd given up being embarrassed about anything long ago. She owned her mistakes and stupidity. She'd had to tell the women's shelter, then her lawyer, then everyone in the mediator's office exactly what Jason had done to her. She'd used up her shame a long, long time ago.

  But it didn't seem to matter, she'd been so embarrassed that she thought she'd seen him, and now she did it again. He wasn't here. He wasn't coming back. Maybe that was why she was embarrassed—because she somehow truly believed it would all be different. She was upset that she mistakenly hoped he would come back and sweep her off her feet.

  It was upsetting to know that in her heart she'd wanted it. Even just a little. Even knowing what that kind of thing brought. It was shameful wanting something that wasn't right for her kids.

  Turning her thoughts back to the boys, back to her real life, Shay helped Aaron climb yet another house-sized blow-up toy. He came down the slide ass over teakettle, but seemed to think it was fun enough to do it again. Shay wasn't going to tell him he wasn't doing it right.

  Wanting to milk the day-pass for all they could, she stayed until the boys said they were ready to leave. Exhausted, they could barely get their shoes on. She was as tired as they were, and she hadn't even jumped on anything.

  Hauling them inside once they were home involved waking them up from the backseat. It made her think again about Brian giving Aaron Benadryl, and made her wonder if it wasn't time to dig into that account.

  The boys ate their dinners and headed off to bed, ready for school the next day. Shay sprawled on the couch. Her body was sluggish, but her mind ran disturbingly fast. So much for getting extra work finished this evening.

  Each time she finished a project early, she could ask for the next one. She could sock away more money. But tonight she was afraid she'd mess up her stitches, match fronts and backs of fabric badly, and cost herself time. Those kinds of errors made her slower rather than faster and made it not worth even trying to work when she saw she wasn't in the right frame of mind.

  Instead, she lay there, her brain thinking about Brian, about Owen, and the book she'd managed to put away before sprawling there.

  Cujo.

  It's about a dog, Mom.

  She should have known. He was still reading Stephen King.

  Staring at his bookshelf, she thought about his rejection of all the books she'd tried to get him interested in. Goosebumps. Treehouse of Horrors. There were so many that were for his age, and Owen wanted nothing to do with them. She'd found The Amityville Horror tucked under his pillow a few weeks ago.

  Maybe it was time to meet him halfway. Maybe he could read adult books, but she could steer him toward dragons and elves and such. She'd try to hit the library tomorrow morning when she could talk to the librarian and explain her problem.

  Her eyelids drifted closed and she thought of several sets of parents she'd seen at the bounce house. It would be nice to have someone to bounce ideas off. Someone who helped instead of hurt. Shay knew it existed. Somewhere.

  Craig's words flitted through her head. What if I don't turn into an asshole?

  That shouldn't be romantic, but to her, it was. Other people had long, good, solid marriages. Why couldn't she? Why couldn't she learn to pick the right kind of guy? She wasn't doomed!

  Then again, maybe she was. Brian had gotten horribly upset just from seeing Craig's car. Had he seen the man, he'd have known he could never measure up.

  She'd neatly sewn herself into a pocket.

  If she found anything for herself, her very happiness would trigger both Brian and Jason to take it out on her. To take it out on her boys. Until Aaron turned eighteen, or until she got the men to relinquish their parental rights, it would not be an option. Her own doing, she knew it.

  Shay took a moment to be grateful that Zoe hadn't followed in their mother's footsteps anywhere near as well as she herself had. Zoe was twenty-four and still had never been pregnant. That was such a big family victory that Shay almost cried at the futility of it all.

  She'd considered bribing the men to sign away their rights. Brian would do it for cheap. He had no concept of money. And she had the money saved up to buy his agreement. More than once she'd thought about just trading cash for rights. But if a decent lawyer ever got a hold of Brian, the fight would be on, and her money would be gone.

  Jason would squeeze her for everything before he signed anything. Then he'd find a lawyer right away and sue her for trying it. Shay didn't doubt any of this.

  She struggled with the decision to start suing Brian for custody. The Benadryl concerned her. But as always, if she started with Brian she would have to finish. Would there be enough money left to take on Jason?

  Could she sacrifice one boy to save the other? If she didn't, would she lose them both?

  Then she did cry. She lay there on the couch, with silent tears rolling down her face. She cried because there were no good answers. No safe paths. And she cried because she wanted something that wasn't good for her boys. She dreamed of Craig at night. She thought she saw him when she was out and about. No matter how much she told herself it was fine and she'd get over it, it was only getting worse.

  Shay woke up on the couch the next morning, and barely got the boys to school on time. She headed straight to the public library where the librarian set her up with some guaranteed attention-holding books that didn't involve rabid dogs tearing their families limb from limb or—God Forbid—fathers burying their dead sons in a pet cemetery.

  She headed home, armed with a full bag of books for each boy. She sewed like a madwoman and turned in two projects ahead of time.

  When the weekend came again, she had each kid ready on time, and entertained until his father showed up late. Both men. She sighed. But once again threw herself into her work.

  Sunday morning, a knock startled her from the lace she was hemming onto the bottom of another stage outfit for another country star.

  "Open the door, Shay!" The pounding came again.

  She recognized that voice. Brian. Was he returning Aaron early again? And if not, then where was her son?

  As she peeked out the window, she saw her toddler over his father's shoulder, unflinching despite the shouts. "I'm coming!" She hollered back as she headed to the door.

  Brian thought she jumped for him. Never. Always for her son. But never again for him.

  She barely had the door open before he was pushing Aaron into her arms, only Aaron didn't come. Didn't hold out his arms. He just draped like a sack of lead and she nearly dropped him.

  "What's wrong with him?" She almost yelled it. Still the boy didn't react at all.

  "He's asleep." Brian brushed it off. "I got another gig. I gotta go." He was already down the steps.

  "Aaron?" She tried to wake him, but nothing happened. He wasn't this deep a sleeper. "Aaron!"

  In her panic, Shay slapped at his face but got no response.

  Brian looked back at her. "He's fine. Just asleep." His voice was mocking as if to say How could she be so stupid as to worry?

>   Normally, if something was wrong, Brian would say so. He'd make up some song and dance about how he knew she'd want to be there for the boy, blah blah blah. This was nothing like that.

  Suddenly Shay realized that in her panic, she'd been slow.

  Brian was at his car door when she yelled out to him, "You gave him Benadryl again, didn't you?"

  The ass had the nerve to shrug.

  "You said you wouldn't!" She was furious. He lied and didn't even care.

  "You weren't supposed to know." Brian shrugged again. "He would have been awake before he got here if I hadn't caught this gig. Don't worry about it. It's fine. You're being hysterical."

  Then he opened his car door and climbed inside. Shay could see Debbie, filing her nails or some crap, in the passenger seat, while Shay stood in her doorway, holding her limp son, his overnight bag left carelessly at her feet.

  The two sons of bitches drove away while she stood in her open doorway staring. As she turned to take her son inside, she held him close. That's when she smelled it.

  They'd been smoking again.

  Chapter 16

  Shay drove Aaron to the doctor despite the cost. Sure, she'd scrimped and saved, but this was what it was for. She honestly wasn't as concerned as she might be about her son not waking up. She'd given him the same medication before—for legitimate reasons—and he'd been out cold then, too.

  No, this was for documentation. She wanted the doctor to say that her son had been returned un-rousable. Shay needed a medical record stating that a professional smelled weed on her son. Luckily, she'd told this doctor all about her issues with the fathers and the doctor was ready. She was opening the clinic on a Sunday, to get Aaron in fast, before the meds wore off, before the smell faded from his clothes.

  When she met Shay at the door, the doctor led her and her sack-of-cement son into the back room to wait a moment. Shay was surprised to see the physician return with a uniformed police officer.