by Mary Calmes
Her husband was an online YouTube vlogger who made videos of himself playing games and doing other things, much in the same vein as Markiplier—though nowhere near as fun or interesting—positioning himself not with millennials, but with their parents. He was the guy who tried to help parents know something, anything, about what their kids were into. Having watched him film his first time playing Five Nights at Freddy’s, I had laughed myself silly in the background and was banned from the house on workdays.
“I would rather sit at home and rub my husband’s feet than have to take one more call about Hub!”
I was quiet as she stood there seething, arms crossed, breathing out of her nose.
“In my defense—”
She growled low in her throat.
“—he’s a very nice man.”
“But it has nothing to do with us!”
“True, but you know the home warranty company doesn’t have an office here.”
“So that gives people the right to call up here and waste my time, to yell at me about something that has nothing to do with us?”
“No.”
She flung her Thor Funko POP figurine at me, but I caught him before he hit the wall.
“You love this,” I reminded her.
“I do love that, but you need to have a ‘come to Jesus meeting’ with Hub or I’m going to shove that right up his ass!”
“Might I remind you that he does a great job for us and you thought he was pretty the first time he walked in here.”
“He’s gorgeous and tall—a bit too thin for my taste, lanky doesn’t do it for me—but yes, very nice to look at, and he’s got the voice of a phone sex operator, but Jesus H. Fucking Christ, Hage, the second he starts talking to customers, they wanna kill him!”
She gave me the whole spiel without taking a breath.
“I’ll talk to him.”
The second growl told me I was on thin ice.
Hubert “Hub” Miller was one of the guys who worked for me who handled the plumbing, heating, and furnace installations. But also, on the side, he worked for a plumbing company that handled home warranty contracts on the items he installed, and because they were not in Benson and we were… we got the calls about Hub’s less-than-fabulous personal interaction skills.
It wasn’t that he didn’t do a good job. The man was in fact so OCD that there was no way he could not do one: he was compelled to check and double-check, missing nothing. The issue was the running commentary on every little thing.
“I’ll talk to him,” I promised again.
“Good,” she said curtly, sitting back down at her desk. “He’s driving here now from a job, so you can go outside and wait for him.”
“But I have—”
“Outside,” she snarled.
I went, because Loretta was a little scary before she’d had at least three cups of coffee, and clearly, the call about Hub had taken her from her morning routine.
When I saw the familiar white Ford Super Duty truck turn into the gravel parking lot in front of our warm A-frame office, I took the steps down from the porch to meet him.
He parked the truck but remained inside with the engine running.
“You have to get out,” I called to him.
He shook his head.
“Hub.”
Wincing, he turned off the truck and came as far as the hood before he stopped and leaned on it, his big dark brown eyes fastened on me.
“Stop telling people they need to clean their houses,” I directed.
“How am I supposed to work if it’s so dusty and covered in dog hair that I can’t see what I’m doing?”
I groaned.
“What?” he asked, throwing up his hands. “And some of the spaces people put their furnaces in are ridiculous!”
“Yeah, but—”
“Something could catch on fire or blow up!”
Rangy was what the man was, tall and rangy. “So how is it going with Jenna?” I asked to change the topic.
Deep, heavy sigh. “She hates me.”
“What’d you do?”
He looked like a little lost puppy. “Apparently you’re not supposed to tell the truth when a woman asks you if a dress makes her look fat.”
“Oh God.”
“What?”
I ended up going with him to see the woman Loretta had been on the phone with, smoothed that out, and then accompanied him on his next two appointments, meeting with homebuilders, interrupting him before he blurted out anything really offensive, modeling what he could and couldn’t say, and then driving to the Crosstown Diner where Jenna Reeves worked so we could have lunch and talk to her at the same time. I got an egg salad sandwich for Loretta while I was there and stopped at Elixir on my way back and got her an iced coffee. All was better in my world after that.
I had to work late on a job that seemed like it was going to be easy but, once we were in there, was not. Hardwood floors that were supposed to be level were actually off by a half an inch from one end of the room to another and since we were putting in built-in bookcases, we had to build up and make the surface flat first.
“Hey,” I said when I got ahold of Jessie. “I’m gonna pick up the boys after school, but you might need to feed them dinner because I’m gonna have to come back, and then I’ll be stuck here for a bit.”
“Sweetie, I’ll pick them up. Just stay there and work, and that way you can hopefully get to see them before they go to bed.”
I was silent and so was she.
“Oh shit,” she breathed. “We sound like an old married couple.”
There was no way to stop smiling on my end. “I’ll get ’em and bring them to you. I promised I’d be there to pick ’em up, and besides, I wanna hear about their days.”
“Aww, Hage, what a good father you’d make.”
“I doubt grabbing them one time makes me Father of the Year.”
“Yes, but keeping your word is a very good start.”
I grunted and hung up because I really didn’t want to get into it with her. Wanting to be part of Brandon’s and Ryder’s life was probably not the smartest idea, but both were so easy to be around, and I could really get used to the hugs and the bleary faces in the morning. I just needed to figure out what I could truly do.
THE SMILES on the boys’ faces when it was my turn at the front of the line made my whole day. They ran for the truck, scrambled up, got belted in, and then we were off. I heard all about the hamster in Ryder’s class and how he’d found out he’d been more places in the world than Mrs. Dupree.
“It’s ’cause we used to travel with Dad,” he explained, his expression so very serious, his furrowed brows reminding me so much of his father.
“You’re so lucky,” I assured him.
He nodded in agreement.
“Everyone in my class wants to come to see your treehouse,” Brandon informed me.
“Ah, well, maybe you can have a birthday party there or something.”
He thought that was a marvelous idea.
I took them for pasta at Buon Cibo, and Jessie met us there. I explained to the boys about me having to go back to work and that Jessie was going to take them home.
“Not to our house, right?” Ryder wanted to be sure. “To your house.”
I glanced at Jessie and she nodded.
“Yeah, okay,” I agreed. “One more night in the sunroom.”
They both seemed very content and I worried about that, but I covered it by picking chicken out of Brandon’s fettucine alfredo. Apparently the sauce made it slimy.
After dinner, I went back to the job site. I needed to work. When I worked, I was able to put everything out of my mind. Getting home that night in time to say good night to the boys but too late for Mitch’s call was a blessing as well. I really didn’t want to talk to him about me leaving after I’d spent two days parenting his kids. I had no idea how to begin having that conversation.
“Why do you look guilty?” Jessie asked as I leaned on the c
ounter in the kitchen, drinking a large glass of ice water.
“I don’t look guilty,” I snapped. “You look dumb.”
She looked down at her Doctor Who fuzzy pajamas and then back up at me. “Don’t deflect your shit onto me and the Time Lord. You’re the one acting shifty.”
“I am not.”
She crossed her arms and tipped her head sideways, regarding me coolly.
“Fine. I agreed to go to LA tomorrow and see Ash.”
She nodded slowly.
“And for whatever stupid reason, I feel like maybe Mitch would be pissed.”
“Well, yeah, he’s gonna lose his frickin’ mind.”
“No, I don’t think so, because me and Mitch, we just decided to take a step, right?”
“I’m sure he thinks it’s more than that.”
“Maybe, but also, I wouldn’t want Mitch to think that I’m not taking what we agreed to as a commitment, because it is.”
“So what is it you want?”
“That’s easy. I want to figure out how to convince Mitch that it’s okay that I go see Ash since I’ve told him that we’re just gonna be friends now.”
“And you’re worried that if you go, that Mitch might get upset and call everything off between you guys.”
“I am.”
“Because he did it once, what would stop him from doing it a second time.”
“Exactly.”
She glowered at me. “Oh, come on, Hage, you know that’s bullshit. You know he’s never ending anything with you ever again.”
“Do I?”
“Well, yes, dear, you do. The two cute kids asleep in your sunroom says he trusts you with the most precious things in his life and therefore, he wants you to be part of said life.”
But that had been true once before. He promised me his whole life once before. He had said nothing would change once before.
I had seventeen years that spoke to Mitch Thayer saying one thing and doing another.
What guarantee did I have that he wouldn’t change his mind? The dread was sitting like a thousand-pound weight on my heart.
“Hagen, do you honestly think that when Mitch comes home tomorrow that he won’t expect to see you?”
“But maybe that’s the point, right? He shouldn’t.”
“Oh, I see. You’re running on purpose.”
Even though I’d told Ash I wouldn’t be sleeping with him, it didn’t mean Mitch and I had decided anything more than he could see or confessed we both wanted to slip beneath the sheets. I was now firmly—at least on my end—friends with Ash, but Mitch and I were basically still in limbo, in a holding pattern until he got back. “No,” I objected, hoping she didn’t hear the uncertainty in my voice. “That’s not it.”
“How long were you thinking about that answer?”
I glared at her.
“Don’t get mad at me because you’re floundering.”
“I’m not floun—”
“Are you in love with this Ash guy, then?”
“He’s not some—have you seen Blood Tracks?”
“Of course, I love that show.”
I waited.
“Oh shitballs. Are you kidding me? Ashford Lennox is the Ash you’re talking about?”
I grunted as I drained the rest of my water.
“Well, hell, I’d go to LA too.”
“You’re not helping.”
“That man is gorgeous.”
I groaned and walked over to the couch and flopped down. She followed after a moment, curling up beside me like a languorous cat, all graceful feline movement.
“Do you not love Mitch anymore?”
What was I supposed to tell her? That I’d never stopped loving him, or that I wasn’t sure if he felt the same, or worse, that even if he did love me, how was I supposed to ever believe him? “How could I?”
“No residual feelings?”
“Of course,” I confessed to her. “It’s all residual, right? There’s nothing new, just what used to be, and we’re both running on that.”
“So with a bit of fanning, it could be a wildfire all over again.”
“Or not,” I said sadly. “You have to wonder, are we trying to resuscitate something that died a long time ago?”
“I don’t think so.”
“But you don’t know.”
“True,” she agreed, “I can’t say for certain, but I do know he wants you back in his life,” she said, curling a long piece of hair around my ear. “He told me.”
“Yeah, well, that’s all well and good, but if I don’t trust him, that ain’t gonna work.”
“Why wouldn’t you trust him?”
I shot her a look.
“But we talked about that.”
“Doesn’t mean I’m not scared to death.”
“You doubt him.” It was a statement.
“Hell, yeah, I doubt him.”
“But he put down roots here, Hage. His kids are here, he bought a house here, he moved his business here… these things don’t tell you anything?”
They did and didn’t, but not enough for me to blow off Ash. “The truth is, I doubt where I stand.”
“Why?”
“Why? Because a million years ago I thought I was joining him in Florida,” I explained, meeting her gaze. “That was always the plan, until it wasn’t.”
I still remembered the phone call. I’d been so excited even though Mitch had cancelled his trip out to see my graduation. I was packing to go and checking to find out when he’d be there with the U-Haul truck to move me, and kept missing him. But finally, he picked up at one in the morning.
The hello was sleepy and was my name when he said it.
“Hey,” I sighed, feeling my love for him light me up from the inside out. “Why haven’t you been picking up?”
“I’m sorry. I’ve just been so busy.”
Too busy for me? But I only said, “Sure.”
“It’s been crazy around here,” he said defensively. “I’m sorry I don’t have time to call like I used to. This isn’t high school anymore, Hage.”
“I know.”
“If you did, you wouldn’t be pushing.”
“Who’s pushing? I’m just calling to see when you’re coming since you missed my graduation and I was expecting you then.”
“Shit, I told you I was sorry. Why ya gotta beat a dead horse?”
He hadn’t actually ever said he was sorry. He had, in fact, simply called and said he couldn’t be there. “What’s the matter with you?”
“Nothing.”
It was a lie; I knew it and felt it as I flushed with cold from the ice in his voice. “Just tell me what’s going on.”
He didn’t answer.
“Please, Mitch.”
He coughed softly. “I’m kinda busy right now, so let’s talk sometime this weekend, okay?”
“No,” I was firm. “Tell me what you have to say now.”
“I don’t think I—”
“You know how my mother always says that when you have to tell the truth and you don’t wanna, that it’s like eating frogs?”
“Yeah, I’ve heard her say that a million times.”
“She says you eat the biggest one first and you’ll never be sorry.”
It sounded like he choked on the other end.
“Eat the frog, Mitch.”
He cleared his throat. “Okay, so, I think maybe it’d be better if you waited and came in the fall, not right now over the summer.”
This was why he’d been dragging his feet on getting an apartment, all his excuses, from not having time to go look to having spent what he was going to use as a deposit on something else just as needed. All of that was him backpedaling.
“I mean—” He coughed again, choking on the frog. “—you can still come if you want, but not until around October or so. I think that’d be best.”
My turn to be quiet.
“Does that sound good?”
It was hard to speak around the lump in my thr
oat, but I swallowed until I could, not worried that I couldn’t see through the tears.
“Or maybe even in the spring, huh? You can get a job there until then. Your folks’ll be happy to have you a little longer.”
“Sure,” I managed to get out, but just barely.
“I was thinking, too, that with us being so far apart, maybe we should see other people just until you get here. I’m sure it’s been just as hard on you as it has for me, with the whole being faithful thing.”
He’d been thinking about it all for a long time, I could tell. I knew him.
“How would that be?”
“Great,” I agreed. “That’d be perfect.”
He coughed again. “Maybe we just don’t make plans for a bit.”
“Okay.”
“And we’ll only be broken up until you come out, and then we’ll get right back together.”
I would be his safety net. He could do whatever he wanted in the interim, and once I got there, if ever, he got me back, and everything would be just how it had always been. He got the cake, got to eat it, and got to share it with whoever caught his eye.
“Hagen?”
“You have a nice life, Mitch,” I told him. “I hope you get everything you want.”
“Thanks,” he said, and I could tell he was distracted before he chuckled over something. “Sorry, me and some of the guys are watching a movie.”
“I’ll let you go,” I said hoarsely. “Bye.”
“Oh hey,” he drawled, stopping me like this was just another conversation, not the end of the dream I’d been holding on to for dear life. “My Dad’ll be by to pick up Gordo from you. They’re coming to visit and they’re gonna bring him to me.”
Of course he had to have his dog. It was like a knife in the heart.
That was the last I’d heard from him.
With my heart in splinters, I joined the Army and was through boot camp and stationed overseas on my first tour by October. I’d thought about him then, as I did often, wondering if he even gave me a thought.
“Hagen?”
“Sorry,” I apologized to Jessie, “my mind drifted.”
“I know what you were thinking about, and I know remembering what he did is hard, but Hagen, he’s not the same person. He’s not a boy anymore, I swear it.”
“I was so distraught, I joined the Army to get out of here,” I reminded her.