Second Chance Girl

by Jessica Thorn

  That’s what matters to you.

  The devil that has been on my shoulder since the moment I arrived in Rocky Point whispers into my ear, saying the thing I’ve been avoiding since moving Gran into the facility. Am I here for Gran, really? Or am I here to stave off any further guilt I might feel for hightailing it out of town ten years ago, and never looking back?

  I squeeze Gran’s hand again, and this time, she looks at me. Her eyes grow wide as she takes in my face, that familiar twinkle twisting my stomach into knots. She smiles at me, reaches up with her other hand, and touches my cheek.

  “Jeannine? Is that really you?”

  The hairs on the back of my neck stand up and the sound of my mother’s name.

  Rocky Point, Massachusetts, August 2009

  Slowly, carefully, I shut the front door of the house and turn the deadbolt, holding my breath so as not to make a sound. As soon as the deadbolt lock clicks shut, the lights in the foyer flick on and I jump, whirling around and pressing my back against the door.

  Busted.

  Gran stands at the foot of the stairs, clad in a blue cotton nightgown, arms folded over her chest. She is wearing the same scowl she always gives me, except this time, there is anger burning behind her eyes. I swallow hard, knowing I’m in big trouble, but trying my best to maintain my rebellious demeanor. I scowl back.

  “What in God’s name are you doing out so late, Elizabeth?” Gran snaps, and I shrug my shoulders in place of an answer. It’s past midnight, and my curfew is 9PM. We both know I snuck out, so I don’t see the point in saying it out loud.

  Gran descends the last step and bridges the few feet between us, glaring at me. She sniffs at my clothes.

  “So what was it, you went to a party? Were you drinking? Doing drugs? Out with it,” she snaps, and I am appalled she would even think that of me.

  “No way!” I shout back, pushing past Gran and stomping toward the kitchen. “I was out with Cam, we weren’t doing anything like that.”

  In fact, Cam and I had been drinking milkshakes at the 24-hour diner in town. Afterward, we’d gone down to the harbor and watched for a comet that was supposed to be passing by. I don’t tell Gran any of it, though, I’m too upset that she would even assume I’d been doing drugs of all things. Plus, I can tell she doesn’t believe me.

  “Oh sure, of course,” she says. “Like I haven’t heard that before.”

  “It’s true!” I yell, pouring myself a glass of water.

  “Sure it is, and I’m Mother Theresa. You know what? You’re just like your mother.”

  I freeze, mid-gulp with my glass of water. I lower the glass slowly, biting back the tears stinging my eyes. Gran points a finger at me.

  “You’re exactly like her. She got into everything at your age, drinking and partying until all hours of the night, and what did that do for her? It got her pregnant, and addicted to drugs, that’s what.”

  “Please stop,” I say, my voice just barely above a whisper. “I wasn’t doing anything like that, I swear.”

  “She swore all the time she wasn’t doing it, and where is she now? On the streets somewhere getting high, maybe dead. Is that what you want?”

  “No. I’m nothing like that,” I plead, but Gran keeps on.

  “And don’t even get me started on your father. You want to end up in jail like him? Keep getting yourself into trouble.”

  “I’m nothing like either of them!” I shout, but Gran just crosses her arms again and shakes her head.

  “I can’t even look at you. Every time I do, all I see is your mother at your age,” she makes a point of looking away from me, turning her head dramatically toward the wall, and pointing toward the stairs. “Go to your room. I don’t need a constant reminder of how I failed as a mother hanging around.”

  Dropping my glass into the sink, I do as I’m told, holding back the lump in my throat until I’m behind my closed bedroom door. Only then, when she can’t see me, do I allow myself to cry.

  Chapter Five

  Elizabeth

  I LEAVE SHORTLY AFTER Cheryl arrives to keep Gran company, desperate to get out of there even though my conscience feels like it’s weighing me down. By the time I pull up to Gran’s house, I can feel that my face has become puffy and swollen from crying. When I spot the black pickup truck in the driveway, emblazoned on the side with Tate Construction, I do the best I can to wipe my face. Glancing in the rearview mirror, I can see I’ve only made it worse.

  Oh, well.

  Cameron exits his truck as I slide out of my car, adjusting the blue baseball cap on top of his head. He walks around to me, hands jammed into the pockets of his faded jeans, and stops with a few feet between us.

  “Hi,” I say, not really able to muster much more.

  “I just wanted to stop by and make sure everything worked out alright with the roof,” he says, skipping the pleasantries. He appears to look straight through me, which is fine with me since I look like I just spent a few hours in a small room slicing onions.

  “Oh,” I say, grinding my toe into the ground. “Yeah, thanks. They said it probably needs replacing.”

  “I know,” he says, “Don’t worry though, we’ll take care of it for you. Have to order some materials, but should get them in a few days, a week at most. The tarp should hold you over until then.”

  “A few days to a week?” I rub my forehead and inhale a sharp breath. “Okay, not a problem.”

  “Got plans or something?” he asks, and I chuckle.

  “Just, you know, work,” I reply. “It’s fine, though, I’ll let them know I need some time off.”

  Cameron narrows his eyes at me.

  “Are you alright?”

  “Fine,” I say, but we both know I don’t mean it.

  “Helen?” he asks, and I nod my head. Cam is no stranger to the many facets my mine and Gran’s relationship, so not much more context is needed.

  “I think I forgot for a moment that she can’t stand the sight of me.”

  We stand in a tense, awkward silence for a few moments, and I want to kick myself for saying anything. I sound pathetic. Pity party, party of one.

  To my surprise, Cam doesn’t flee screaming from my pitiful self. Instead, he gives me a sympathetic smile.

  “I’m sure it’s tough, but you’re doing the right thing,” he says, his voice softening. “If I was in your shoes, I’d be making the same decision.”

  His words stun me, and I stand there with my mouth half open, wanting to say something to the contrary but not finding the words. I want to tell him to stop, to tell me how much of a terrible person I am. Why is he defending me? After everything I put him through when we were kids, shouldn’t he be angry at me?

  “You don’t have to be nice to me,” I say, the best I can do. He knits his brows together.

  “What are you talking about?” he asks.

  “You don’t have to be nice,” I repeat. “You of all people are allowed to tell me what a shit person I am for leaving and never looking back. For coming back after ten damn years for the sole purpose of putting my only relative into a nursing home so I don’t have to deal with it.”

  He takes a step closer to me, and I instinctively take a step back.

  “Elizabeth, your grandmother is sick. Nobody blames you for what you’re doing.”

  “I blame me,” I say, cursing myself for the tears welling up, threatening to spill over. I hate how vulnerable I’m allowing myself to be around him.

  “Well, you’ve always been hardest on yourself.”

  I let his words sink in, taking a deep breath to try and collect myself. Once I manage to corral my emotions, I stand up a little straighter.

  “Thank you,” I say. “And thank you for coming to check on the roof.”

  “Sure,” he says. “Do you mind if I take a look at the ceiling inside again? I just want to see how it looks now that it’s dry.”

  “Oh, of course,” I say. “Come on in.”

  He follows me into the house
, heading upstairs to look at the ceiling while I sit down at the kitchen table, in front of a box of Gran’s important personal documents. Cheryl suggested I contact Gran’s lawyer to discuss her will and wishes, a conversation I am so not looking forward to, and I need to locate the most recent copy of her will. I’m still staring at the box, lid still on and everything, when Cam returns downstairs.

  “Well, we’re definitely going to need to do some work on that ceiling. I hate to say it, but it’s rotting through.”

  Great. I squeeze my eyes tightly shut, praying that I don’t lose it. “Will that take long to fix?”

  “Hard to say.” Cam sits down at the kitchen table next to me, removing his baseball cap and running a hand through his hair. “We’ll need to replace the exterior roof first, to prevent any further damage. Once that’s done, we’ll have to evaluate the extent of the rot on the inside and the make any necessary repairs. Could take anywhere from a few extra days, to a few weeks, depending on the damage.”

  The news is like a sucker punch to the gut. I can’t see how I would be able to take multiple weeks off work without risking my job altogether, but the uncertainty surrounding gran’s condition doesn’t leave me many options.

  “I’ll figure it out and let you know,” I say, my throat suddenly dry. I stand up from the table abruptly and root around in the cabinets for a glass. “Water?” I ask Cam, the panic evident in my voice.

  “No, thank you.”

  Breathe, I tell myself, feeling a panic attack brewing. Finally finding a glass, I turn on the faucet and freeze when a loud banging noise echoes throughout the house.

  “What the...”

  It sounds like someone is banging pots and pans together from inside the wall. The floor shakes a little every time the sound reverberates, and no water comes out of the faucet.

  Cam jumps up from his chair.

  “Turn it off!” he shouts, and I do as I’m told, setting the glass down and slowly backing away from the sink.

  “What was that?” I ask, and I can hear Cam gulp audibly.

  “Whatever it was, it’s probably not good,” he says, pulling out his cell phone. “I have a friend who’s a plumber, I’ll have him come over and take a look.”

  I nod, officially out of words to verbalize how badly I want to wake up from the nightmare I’m currently living in. Cam must be able to sense that I’m on the verge of a meltdown because he doesn’t say anything, just clears his throat and looks at the floor.

  “There is no way I’m going to be able to sell this house,” I groan, massaging my temples and inhaling a deep breath.

  “You’re planning to sell it?” Cam asks, and something in his voice has the hair on the back of my neck standing at attention.

  “Well, yeah eventually,” I say. “Gran is going to be in the nursing home pretty permanently, and my life is back in New York, so...”

  I let my voice trail off, feeling like I’ve inadvertently ripped open an old wound. Cameron’s eyes are dark, and I can’t quite read what’s behind them. His mouth drawn into a tight line, he jams his hands in his pockets once again.

  “Right, that makes sense,” he says. “I don’t know, I just thought you might be in town for a while.”

  His deep blue gaze locks onto mine, and goosebumps explode over my skin, sending a long-forgotten chill down my spine. It’s the way he’s looking at me, the tension in his jaw and the rigidness of his stance while his eyes are screaming to me, that causes my heart to practically gallop out of my chest. I feel my lips part slightly, my body both wanting to move and not daring to at the same time, for fear that the electricity around us might strike me down at any moment.

  He rakes his eyes over me, taking his time as they move from my face down my body and back up, hesitating a moment before looking back into my eyes. I feel like I want to explode into a million pieces, and my brain is on fire, dying to know what he’s thinking. My cheeks burn as I wonder, does he like what he sees? Or does he think he dodged a bullet all those years ago? My breath hitches in my throat when I realize that I really, desperately hope it’s not the latter.

  “I... um....” The words stumble out of my mouth, and Cameron smirks.

  “I should be going,” he says, grabbing his baseball cap off the table and returning it to his head. “I’ll send someone out to take a look at that sink. Let me know what you decide about the roof.” I nod, and trail behind him as he heads to the front door. He opens it, but turns to me before he leaves. “If you still wanted to catch up sometime, let me know. You know where to find me.”

  Before I can pick my jaw up off the floor, he is out the door and in his truck, backing out of the driveway. A smile tugs at the corner of my mouth, one thought crossing my mind:

  I guess I know what he was thinking.

  Chapter Six

  Cameron

  MOST PEOPLE DESPISE Mondays, but for most of my adult life, I’ve enjoyed them. Monday mornings always feel like a fresh start. A clean slate. Most days I wake up with the sun, so I always make it a point to take a few minutes first thing on Monday morning, sip my coffee, and soak in the beauty of a new day, a fresh start.

  This Monday, though, just started off wrong. I felt distracted, on edge, like things had been thrown slightly off balance. I knew why, of course. I’d gone ahead and opened Pandora’s box, and let Lizzie get back under my skin. My plan had been to stay away, but the minute I saw her in her driveway Sunday night, her eyes puffy and swollen, her cheeks still wet from fresh tears, I couldn’t help myself. I felt an instinctual, almost animalistic need to protect her, to make her okay. I’d known right away the issue was Helen. The issue was always Helen. I felt awful telling her how long the roof would take to fix, and I couldn’t anticipate the plumbing breaking, but as the issues piled up and I could see the stress wearing her down, I didn’t know what else to do. I just knew I needed to make it better. And the best way I could think to do that was to offer to be there for her. I had put the ball in her court, though. I didn’t want to come off too strong, but I also wanted to see how she’d react, if she’d reach out.

  I’d gone to work like a zombie on Monday morning, drifting through the day like a dinghy out in rough, open seas, letting the waves and the current take me wherever they saw fit. I went with the flow, half of me in the present and half of me stuck inside my own head, on thought playing over and over again:

  Is she going to call me?

  It’s pathetic, I know. But as much as I hate to admit it, my mom’s and Eddie’s words had started to get under my skin. All that bullshit about a second chance, about the universe tossing it right in my lap, had made me actually start to wonder if that were true. The problem, though, is that Lizzie isn’t planning to stick around. She’s fixing up her grandmother’s house, listing it for sale, and then getting the hell out of Rocky Point and going back to her life in New York City. She’d told me as much. What am I supposed to do, convince her to leave her entire life behind and come back to Rocky Point for good? Not likely. And if I put my heart on the line again, and she leaves, again? Would I be able to come back from that? I’m not sure.

  When I still haven’t heard from her on Wednesday, I’m in a right foul mood. My employees are avoiding me, communicating everything through Hank, one of my Foremen, and ducking out of my way whenever they see me. I don’t blame them; I’ve snapped at some pretty trivial shit the last few days. I snapped at Eddie Dearing, too, when he told me a shipment of supplies I ordered from him was running late. I know it’s a risk I take ordering only from small local businesses, but damn if wasn’t pissed to have to push back the timetable on a couple of projects, including Lizzie’s grandmother’s house.

  Considering that the delayed timeframe I gave Lizzie was already too long for her liking, I seriously doubt she’s going to appreciate that we might be looking at tacking on an additional week. After moping around my office for a few hours avoiding having to deliver the news, I suck it up, get in my truck, and drive over to Helen’s house, hop
ing that I can put my hurt pride aside for a while and keep the conversation strictly business.

  Not likely.

  When I pull up to Helen’s house, I notice that the shiny black Lexus that Lizzie had been driving is nowhere to be found. Instead, there’s a little silver SUV in the driveway, the hatch open in the back to reveal a trunk full of stacked boxes labeled by room. I park my truck next to the SUV, watching as an older, portly woman in pink scrubs ambles out of Helen’s front door, her plump arms wrapped around two more large boxes.

  I hop out of the truck and jog up to her, relieving her of the boxes and earning a grateful smile.

  “Why thank you, dear! That’s truly kind of you,” the woman says, opening one of the SUV’s doors so I can slide the boxes into the back seat. “I’m married, though, so I hope you don’t have any ulterior motives.”

  I laugh, gripping the back of my neck.

  “Actually, I’m looking for Elizabeth Quinn,” I say, shaking the woman’s hand. “I’m Cameron Tate. My company, Tate Construction, is working on the roof.”

  “Ah, well,” the woman says, looking me up and down. I shift on my feet, uncomfortable. “A girl can dream. I’m Cheryl, Ms. Helen’s personal caregiver.”

  “Nice to meet you.”

  She closes the doors and the hatch on the trunk, then turns to face me.

  “I’m sorry, but Elizabeth isn’t here,” she explains, shrugging her shoulders and smiling sympathetically. “She went back to New York on Sunday evening. Is there a message I can give her?”

  It takes a second for Cheryl’s words to sink in. I grind my back teeth together, the tension in my jaw sending a twinge of pain up my cheek. “She left on Sunday? Did she say when she’d be back?” I ask, the words coming out as more of a growl then I intended. Cheryl knits her brows together.

  “No,” she says, her confusion obvious. “I’m not sure when she’ll back, but I can pass along a message if you’d like. Is something the matter with the roof?”