The Feminine Touch

by V. J. Chambers

  So, when Tabitha called him that night, he was very, very drunk, and he wasn’t the fun kind of drunk. He’d been drinking whiskey out of the bottle alone while he cried. Yeah, he wasn’t proud of it, but he’d been sobbing his eyes out.

  The phone rang, and he was sitting on the floor in his living room, tears running down his face and dripping off his chin, while he contemplated stopping his podcast to keep his job.

  He saw it was Tabitha, and he picked up.

  “Hey,” he said.

  “Hi,” she said.

  “I’ve been having the worst day.”

  “Me too,” she said.

  “I think I lost my job today.”

  “What?” she said.

  He launched into all of it, telling her what had happened, telling her that he couldn’t quit the podcast, that it was his dream and his passion and his lifeblood, and that if he quit that, it would kill something inside him, and that no job was worth that. “I’ll just… I don’t know, go work at a gas station or something.”

  “A gas station?” said Tabitha.

  “Yeah, why not? It’s not like teaching pays a lot anyway. And it’s not like I’ve got a family to support or something. I don’t need the benefits. I haven’t used my insurance once since I got the job.”

  She was quiet.

  “You think I’m being crazy?”

  “I didn’t say that. It’s only… what if you did have a family? Someday, in the future?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “That would have to be really far in the future, because there’s no way I’m ready for anything like that right now.”

  “Yeah,” she said, and her voice cracked. “Look, I have to go.”

  “Oh, no, don’t go. I’m sorry. I’ve been yammering on about me, but you said you had a bad day. What happened? Tell me.”

  “No, never mind. I don’t really…” She took a shuddering breath. “I was only calling to say that I don’t think we should talk anymore.”

  This hurt him. He felt it like a stab just under his ribs. “What?”

  “Yeah. Uh, because it’s long distance, and we can’t ever find time to see each other, and it just doesn’t make any sense to try to torture ourselves, right?”

  “No,” he said. “No, not right. I don’t think that at all. I like you, Tabitha, and an hour away is not that far. We’ve had bad luck trying to get together, but I’m quitting my job, and my schedule is going to clear up—”

  “Stop.” She sniffled. “Just don’t call me, okay?”

  “Okay,” he said, feeling confused. But he’d been raised that a guy who does anything against a girl’s express wishes is a jerk.

  So, he didn’t call her again.

  He felt hurt about all of it for years. Sometimes he’d think of her, and he’d wonder why she’d suddenly decided she hated him. Was it something he’d said? Sometimes, especially after Cold Case Files took off, he wondered if she was jealous of him for having a dream that he could pursue, even though it was scary.

  But then two months ago, she called him again, and he felt like an ass for thinking that.

  When he’d picked up the phone, he’d thought it was going to be another tip for the podcast, because that was the bulk of the calls he got lately. He had his cell phone up on the Internet for people to get in touch with him, and it meant he tended to mostly get calls from strangers.

  He picked up the phone. “This is Nash Steven Wilt,” he said, using his full name, since that’s how he introduced himself on the podcast. “What can I do for you?”

  “Um, hi, Nash. You might not remember me, but this is Tabitha Walker?”

  “Tabitha!” He recognized her voice. “Holy shit. Hey. How are you?” He was getting pleasant flashes of memory of the way it had felt to cup her bare breasts, of the shape of her hips when she was bent over. Not that he could act on any of those things again, because at the time, things were incredibly serious with Madigan, and he wouldn’t dream of being unfaithful to her.

  “Um, I’m good,” she said. “I tried to call your old number a few months back, but, um, it was out of service.”

  “Yeah, I had to change numbers,” he said. “So, you looked me up through the podcast?”

  “I did. It’s awesome that this is going so well for you,” she said. “It makes me feel like I made the right decision after all. So, you’re doing well now?”

  “I’m doing all right.” He was confused. “What decision are you talking about?”

  “Well, I’m actually calling to tell you something.” She let out a whoosh of air. “Uh, at the time that I decided to keep it from you, I thought it was the right thing to do, but I’ve regretted it since, because I think it’s something that you probably would want to know, and so, I figured that I should probably… uh…” She laughed. “Sorry, I’m just not sure where to start.”

  He laughed too, but he felt nervous. “Yeah, I’m a little confused.”

  “Well, do you remember the last time we talked?”

  “Sure. You told me never to call you again.”

  “Only because I didn’t want to mess things up even worse for you. I mean, you were at rock bottom right then, and you were about to make a huge leap, to quit your job, and if I had told you back then, it would have changed everything for you.”

  “Told me what?”

  “I, um, I called you that night to tell you I was pregnant.”

  His chest tightened.

  “You have a daughter, Nash.”

  Now his heart was beating really fast and his shirt felt tight. He gripped the phone, feeling suddenly as though he’d been caught in a whistling wind that was threatening to whirl him away. “What?”

  “Her name is Ariel. She’s four years old.”

  “You named her after that mermaid?”

  “It’s a family name.”

  He looked around for somewhere to sit down and found his couch. He sat down. Heavily. He didn’t say anything. He didn’t know what to say.

  “Do you want to meet her?”

  He was quiet, struggling to breathe. “Yeah,” he finally said, and he was stunned to realize that he was actually desperate to see the little girl. He hadn’t known she existed, but as the knowledge of her washed over him, so did a wave of fierce love. He didn’t know where it came from. He’d never really felt an emotion like that for another being before. Maybe the closest was his dog, Biggs, who’d gotten cancer and had to be put to sleep when he was in high school. And maybe it was crappy to equate the love of a dog with the love for a child, but he didn’t even know her yet, and he already loved her that much, so it was actually a good thing. At least he thought it was.

  And once he met Ariel, he was head over heels. The love was more intense than anything he’d ever felt.

  He wished Tabitha would let him see Ariel more often, would let him call more often. But he took what he could get.

  The phone rang on his bed, startling him out of his reverie. He picked it up. “Hello?”

  “Daddy?” said Ariel’s voice on the other end of the phone.

  “Hey there.” He grinned. “How was your bath?”

  “It was fun,” said Ariel. “I like baths.”

  “Yeah? Well, they’re pretty great.”

  “I’m wearing my pajamas now. My pink princess ones. They’re not my favorite pajamas, because my red ones are my favorite pajamas, but they’re my second favorite.”

  “Oh, well, that’s pretty awesome.”

  “No, they might be my third favorite. Maybe my blue ones are my second favorite.”

  He chuckled. This sort of inane chatter was pretty great, if you asked him. “Personally, I like blue.”

  “You do?” she said. “Maybe my blue ones are my first favorite now.”

  “Sounds good.”

  “I’m getting ready for bed now.”

  “I know. I always call you before bed.” Nash figured this was Tabitha’s way of controlling the length of the conversation or something.

 
“I’m going to go to sleep, and dream a lot, and then I’m going to wake up, and it’ll be morning.”

  “That is generally the way it works.” He had a huge grin on his face, and he only grinned like this for Ariel.

  “Then I have to eat breakfast.”

  “Yes, it’s always good to have breakfast in the morning.”

  “As long as it’s not oatmeal.”

  “What?” he said. “You don’t like oatmeal?”

  “Ew.”

  “I think oatmeal is delicious.”

  “You do?”

  “Yeah, you should give it another try.”

  “I don’t know.” She seemed a bit worried about this. A pause. “Mommy says I have to hang up now.”

  “Already?” he said.

  “I want to talk more too.”

  “Put me on with your mom, huh?”

  “Okay.”

  A pause and then Tabitha was back on the line. “I can’t talk, Nash. I have to put her to sleep.”

  “Let me call her tomorrow,” he said.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t know about two days in a row. She’ll think you’re going to call every night.”

  “Let me do that. Let me talk to her every night. Come on, Tabitha, it’s like five minutes twice a week. I miss her.”

  “You just met her.”

  “She’s my daughter.”

  Tabitha sighed. “I have to go.”

  “Okay, if I can’t call tomorrow, can I call the day after?”

  Another sigh. “Fine. Sure. I guess so.”

  “Thank you.”

  She hung up.

  Nash hung up too, pleased that he’d be able to talk to Ariel soon. Then he sighed too. He wished it wasn’t so difficult for Tabitha to let him in.

  * * *

  The next morning, Zoe Johnson was in the lobby of his hotel. He saw her when he was ducking in to the breakfast room to grab a continental danish and some coffee.

  She saw him too, and she stood up and waved.

  Her hair wasn’t in pigtails today, but she still looked incredibly young to Nash. Maybe he was just old. He was getting to the point where girls in their early twenties looked like kids to him. He waved back and then he turned to find the danishes.

  She’d said she was twenty-three. That made her eight years younger than him. Man, she was a kid.

  He scrutinized the selection, and picked up a cheese danish. He put it on a napkin and turned around, looking for the coffee.

  Zoe was right behind him. “Hey,” she said.

  He startled. “Geez.”

  She cringed. “Sorry.”

  “You clean here too?” he said.

  “No,” she said. “No, I work for Many Maids, and we only do houses. And that’s just a part-time job to help pay for school and stuff. I’m not actually, like a maid.” She cringed again. “Not that there’s anything wrong with being a maid. Because there’s not.”

  Nash yawned. He didn’t mean to, but it was early, and he wasn’t quite awake. He hadn’t even showered yet. The plan had been to come down for continental breakfast and then go back to the room to shower. He covered his mouth. “Uh, sorry.”

  “No, I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m ambushing you again, aren’t I?”

  “I just haven’t had my coffee yet…”

  “Right,” she said. “Well, why don’t you sit down, and I’ll get you coffee.” She pointed to one of the tables on the other side of the room from the buffet.

  He surveyed her. “Uh, I don’t need you to wait on me or anything. It’s flattering that you’re a fan and all, but I—”

  “I’m doing it to butter you up,” she said. “I want to ask you a favor.”

  What? Seriously? The balls on this girl… He shook his head. “Uh…”

  “I’m going to get you coffee.” She pointed. “Go sit down.”

  Feeling as though he’d been run over by a truck, he made his way over to a table and plopped down. He tore off a piece of his danish and popped it in his mouth.

  He chewed.

  Zoe came back over with a styrofoam cup of coffee and a handful of creamer and sugars. “I didn’t know how you liked it.”

  He picked through the creamers, some of which were flavored. “Get me another hazelnut,” he said. He picked up the rest and held them out to her. “You can take the rest of these back.”

  “Okay,” she said, taking the creamers and scurrying off.

  Zoe came back with not one but two hazelnut creamers.

  He emptied both of them into his coffee, along with the other one. Then he put four packets of sugar in. He stirred.

  “You like sweet coffee,” said Zoe.

  “Yup,” said Nash. “What’s this favor?”

  “So, you know how you said you didn’t need an intern—”

  “No.” He shook his head at her.

  “Please?” she said. “I already know everything about the show. You wouldn’t have to teach me anything. And I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll get you coffee every day if you want. I’ll get your dry cleaning, walk your dog—”

  “Listen the podcast does okay, and I support myself with it, plus pay for the insane amount of travel it requires, but I don’t really have a lot of extra money lying around to pay an intern.”

  “You don’t have to pay me.”

  He raised his eyebrows.

  “Seriously,” she said. “Most of the internships out there are unpaid. So, that’s normal. Unpaid internships are what being in college is all about.”

  “So, when you get out of college, what do you want to do?”

  “I want to have a successful podcast like you,” she said.

  “You think that’s going to pay off your student loans?”

  “Well, I know it’s not going to happen right away. I’ll get another job. It’ll be fine. Right now, I do my own podcast, and I go to school, and I clean houses.”

  “You’ve got a podcast?”

  “Yeah,” she said.

  “What is it?”

  “It’s like, um, about comic books?”

  “What?”

  “It’s not related to yours, per se, but that doesn’t matter, because I like your podcast, and I listen to it all the time, and the techniques I can learn about interviewing from you will help me in any field. And besides, I’ve never met another person who does podcasts, and—”

  “What’s your podcast called?” He whipped out his phone, ready to look it up.

  “Um, it’s called Girl on Comics.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “What? Holy shit, you’re kidding me.” Girl on Comics was consistently ranked in the top twenty of podcasts on iTunes. Cold Case Files had only broken into the top twenty a handful of times. “Your podcast kicks my podcast’s ass. I should probably be interning from you.”

  She waved that away. “Your podcast is serious. It’s respected. It’s about actual stuff. Mine is all about going to conventions and talking to people who write comic books. I mean, it’s just… I’ve hit the ceiling, right? There’s nowhere else to go. Not everyone is interested in comic books. But almost everyone is interested in true crime. So, if I want to actually make a go of this—”

  “You still have student loans?” he said. “I mean, I don’t listen to your podcast, but I assume you’re selling ad space, and that you’ve got a list of Patreon donors that’s—”

  “Currently, all my profits are going to pay down some credit card debt that I incurred when I was young and stupid. Not that it’s really any of your business.”

  He took a drink of his coffee. “Now you’re old and wise, I guess?”

  “Definitely,” she said. “Look, maybe we can help each other. I did this incentive program with my subscribers that grew my donations a lot. I could tell you what I did?”

  He leaned back in his chair. “Okay.”

  “Quid pro quo, Clarice.” She folded her arms over her chest. “I need this internship. I can’t graduate if I don’t have an internship. Pl
ease?”

  He sighed. “This is insane. But okay, whatever. I guess I would like to pick your brain on how you manage this stuff.”

  She beamed. “So, I can be your intern?”

  “It still seems really backwards, but yeah.” He eyed her. “You still going to get my coffee, walk my dog, get my dry cleaning?”

  She laughed. “You bet. It’s going to be great. You’ll see.”

  Nash laughed too. He held up his coffee cup. “Well, thanks for this.”

  “Anytime.”

  Nash hoped this was going to work out.

  THE PAST

  By all rights, Nash shouldn’t have even gotten an invite to Pike’s party that Friday night. But it had happened because of Siobhan. They’d been in study hall, and Pike had come over, talking the party up again.

  Siobhan had looked over at Nash and said, “You going?”

  “Uh…” said Nash.

  “You want him to go?” said Pike.

  “I’ll come if he does,” said Siobhan to Nash.

  “He’s coming,” said Pike to Nash.

  And that was that. Nash was going to a party. A real high school party, like the ones on movies and TV shows. Maybe he was just an awkward teenager, but he was never really sure where movies and TVs were getting this shit. Teenagers couldn’t procure kegs. Their parents didn’t just leave them alone for the weekend on a routine basis. And even if they did, Nash was pretty sure that loud parties like the ones portrayed on those shows would only resort in the neighbors calling the police.

  But now, he was going to Pike’s place, so maybe he would see it all. Maybe it was just like The O.C. Of course, on The O.C. everyone was rich…

  Whatever. Not the point. He was going to a high school party and Siobhan was going to be there. She had wanted him to be there.

  But when he got to Pike’s house, it wasn’t much like the movies. The house was a double-wide that had been built onto various times, giving it a sort of Frankenstein-like look of various types of siding and even some exposed plywood.

  When Nash arrived, Pike let him in the front door. No one else was there. Nash guessed that being fashionably late was actually a thing. Who knew?

  Pike introduced him to his dad, who had long hair in a ponytail and a straggly beard.

  “Nash, huh?” said his dad. “Like Crosby, Stills, and Nash?”