by Pace, Pepper
“You got three days to make something happen.” One of the men said. “Or we’re going to make it happen for you.”
Christopher’s face paled. “You guys got way too much time on your hands…”
They gave him angry looks. “We know.” And then walked away.
~***~
There was nothing much worse than 16 Marines with nothing better to do than to butt into his personal business. Christopher sat back in his armchair and drank a beer, something he seldom did. If they weren’t lying about there being a bet, then this was worse than he thought. Because it meant that they would keep pushing and pushing until they were satisfied.
He groaned. They couldn’t understand, they hadn’t been in this same position before. He knew how it worked. He squeezed the half empty bottle and tried the shut away the memory. But it replayed despite his reluctance to relive it.
Debbie Roberts lived down the street from him down in Corbin. He knew her only in passing. She had something like ten brothers and sisters and it seemed that all she did was take care of the little ones. They were always running wild and Debbie would come to their house and ask if anyone had seen this or that one.
Sometimes she would look so tired. They’d catch the school bus which was all the way down at the bottom of the hill. It took a good fifteen minutes to walk it, worse was when you had to walk up it. You actually had no choice but to be in good shape if you lived on Cobb Mountain. Debbie was certainly built nice, even for a fourteen year old.
She didn’t talk much either and kept to herself. There was no such thing as poor white trash when you lived on the mountain—everybody was poor. It wasn’t a word he learned until they moved to Covington. But Debbie’s family was poorer than poor.
One day they were walking up the hill and Debbie just sat down. They weren’t walking together, just at the same time. But when he looked back and Debbie was still sitting on the ground he went back.
“You alright?”
She didn’t move for a long time, then she squinted up at him and he remembered that she had dark brown eyes and blond eye brows and the fine blonde hairs around her face was damp with sweat. “Why should I get up? Why should I walk up the mountain, take care of my mama’s kids, do my homework, walk down this hill the next day, sit in school where people talk down on me? Why should I do that?” There wasn’t a tear in her eye and she was asking him an honest question and waiting for an honest answer.
He swallowed. “Because you ain’t never going to get off this mountain if you don’t.”
Debbie had pulled herself up and walked up that hill…with him. And every day after she waited for him at her gatepost or he waited for her and they walked down it and then later in the afternoon they walked up it once again.
Then at school she started sitting next to him during open assembly. There wasn’t much need to talk but it was nice that she sat near him. And when he thought that he was satisfied with her silent company, she changed it by asking him about his scars and she reached out and traced a finger down the long one that ran down from his forehead. He’d given her a surprised look. No one but family and doctors had ever touched his scars.
He’d explained about the cleft palate and though she didn’t seem to completely understand she was satisfied with his answer. Later that day she came knocking on his door and asked if he wanted to walk with her to the store. He did.
And the next day when she knocked on the door carrying her school books they sat on the sun porch and did their homework together. And that is how he and Debbie Roberts became friends. They didn’t talk a whole lot, it was mostly comfortable quiet.
“She likes you.” His brother Walt had said. Walt was a year older and had a girlfriend that he had been seeing since summer. “Why are you being a baby about it? She likes you, Chris! You’re like her only friend. Just ask her to be your girlfriend.”
He’d blushed beet red. He thought about her all the time, he thought about her sad eyes and her long blond hair. He thought about her skinny elbows and her beautiful legs in cut off jeans.
But did she think about him?
“Just do it.” Walt said. He gathered up his nerves and on Saturday when they walked down to the spring to bring back fresh water he’d reached out for her hand.
Debbie looked at him but didn’t pull her hand out of his. “Debbie. Do you want to be my girlfriend?”
She had given him a confused look. “I am your friend Chris.”
“No like…” He leaned in and kissed her and she’d touched her lips in surprise. Then he knew…Debbie didn’t like him like that. Debbie had never even thought of him in those terms. She made up some excuse to go back to her house. Afterwards she slowly stopped coming around after school and he stopped seeking her out.
Not long after, they had moved up to Covington Kentucky where his Dad had gotten a job at the VA hospital. Debbie didn’t even say goodbye to him. For years he wished that he had just kept his mouth shut and then he would have never lost her friendship. Even if he couldn’t have her as his girl, he at least could have had her as his friend.
Ashleigh’s friendship was about the most important thing to him right now, even though it had only been a month. She gave him something to look forward to each day. She made him laugh, she made him think. The guys could say ‘go for it.’ But he liked Ashleigh and he wasn’t willing to risk losing her friendship by making the same mistake twice.
~***~
Ashleigh was looking at her roots in her mirror. She hadn’t been to the hair salon in weeks and her nails had long since lost their overlay. She quickly pulled on jeans, but they were too loose and even with a belt they sagged. She pulled out a box of clothes that she’d packed away. She tried on three pairs before she found one that fit her snuggly. On a hunch she pulled the jeans off and looked at the tag in back.
Size 16.
She gasped and nearly choked. Size 16?! She’d lost three dress sizes! How long has it been since she first stepped into the gym? Three months. She couldn’t wait to tell Christopher! Things were happening faster because of him. She had to do something nice for him!
She paced while she thought about what she could do to show her appreciation. She would invite him to lunch with her, Lance in Kendra. He was her friend and she wanted her other friends to know just how cool Christopher was.
Ashleigh ran to her closet and began ripping down her clothes. They were getting packed up. She forgot all about going to the hair salon and about getting her nails done. She didn’t even want to buy new clothes. No, Ashleigh wanted to dig out her OLD clothes! The ones that she hoped to one day fit into again. Now ‘one day’ had arrived!
~***~
“Christopher, guess what?”
He looked up from where he had adjusted the mats. “What?”
“I’m down three dress sizes!”
He smiled crookedly at her, his eyes twinkling. “Now do you believe me? I told you you were getting smaller.”
She clapped her hands and jumped up and down. “I believe you. I believe you Christopher! Now are you going to help me celebrate, or what?”
He paused. “Celebrate?” His smile faltered.
“I want you to meet my two best friends. We go out for lunch together at least once a week. Will you go with us?”
“With…your friends?”
“Yes.”
“I’m not much of a people person.”
She swallowed. “Because…of your scars?”
He nodded.
She inhaled and decided to plow forward. “Those aren’t just from your cleft palate, is it?” She held her breath hoping that her question hadn’t embarrassed him.
He reached up and touched his upper lip. “I have a bilateral cleft. It’s a lot tougher to correct surgically. But I also had some problems with the way my skull came together…or didn’t. They tried to fix that…badly. I look like Frankenstein’s monster.” He smiled slightly.
“Can…cosmetic surgery help?”
“
Yes.”
“Why-?”
“How much good is that going to do, honestly? I’ll never be an Adonis. And I’m a jarhead. The time it would take for me to get surgery just so that I’ll still be ugly seems hardly worth it.”
He turned away and sat down and proceeded to go through his stretching. She’d upset him and it crushed her. It made her sound as if she thought he should get surgery and that’s not what she had meant at all. After nearly six weeks of knowing this man his scars were just an after-thought to her anymore. Most times she forgot about them…or they seemed so much a part of the kind man that she knew that they were no longer ugly to her. It was just Christopher’s face.
She sat down opposite him.
“Christopher. I apologize.” She thought about the way it always made her feel when people with good intentions told her that she needed to lose weight in order to be truly pretty. “I didn’t mean to insinuate that you should change anything about yourself. You are a wonderful man just the way you are.”
He met her eyes. His brow knit and he steeled his resolve. Maybe…maybe it wasn’t like Debbie Roberts.
“Christopher, please come to lunch with us. Will you say yes?”
He warmed and then slowly nodded. “Yes.”
She smiled in relief and then leaned forward and gave him a quick hug. Christopher’s hands came up to lightly touch her back. “I realize it’s hard for you to meet people. But you don’t have to be nervous about meeting my friends. They are good people. And I…took the liberty of explaining about your scars. So you see, you don’t have to worry. You don’t have to be lonely, Christopher. You got me, okay?”
Something in his body relaxed, a bit of the wall he had constructed around himself began to crumble. He nodded.
“You gotta meet my friend Kendra! She is freaking awesome. She is the matchmaker of the gods. So I’m going to give you fair warning, she will probably try to find you a girlfriend. Let her work her magic on you. I know blind dates are hard. I hate ‘em too. But believe me when I tell you that if she tells you she’ll find you a love interest she will do it.”
Christopher’s soul sank to his feet. He looked at Ashleigh and tried to hide the pain in his heart. “So if she’s such a good matchmaker why didn’t she find you a match?” He knew that she was single, knew that she’d just broken up with the guy named DeAngelo.
She looked down at her hands. “I guess…” Then she looked at Christopher. “I guess because I’m still in love with my ex.” His eyes became guarded and he cleared his throat as he built the wall back up around his feelings.
“We better get started with the workout.”
She smiled again. “Right.”
~***~
The look on The Beasts face left no doubt to his mood as he stalked towards the locker room. No one met his eyes but he wasn’t fooled! He was pissed that this part of his life was broadcast for their enjoyment. Now maybe they would understand and leave him the hell alone!
He pushed the door of the locker room open and it almost tore from the hinges. He stalked to his locker and the guys present glanced at him; all conversation stopped. He stripped out of his clothes and walked nude into the showers. His massive toned body rippled with unspent adrenalin. He scrubbed his body and hair and then silently re-dressed in fatigues.
He jammed his dirty clothes into his bag and then pulled his cap low over his head and went to the security room. Roddy looked up quickly from the report he was running.
“Hey, Beast,” He said politely.
Christopher looked at him. “I want to punch something.”
Roddy looked away quickly. “I’ll leave you alone then…”
~***~
When Christopher got home, he walked right past Maggie who purred and followed at his feet. He sighed and then bent down and rubbed her ears gently.
“Sorry, Mags. I’m not mad at you.” She leaned into his fingers in contentment. “Did you miss me, girl?” He stood and placed his things neatly in the closet, popped in a John Coltrane disc and then checked his messages. His mother had called.
“Son, this is Mom.” He smiled, as if he couldn’t tell. “I hate to tell you this over the phone but Aunt Lonnie passed away today. It was quiet and she wasn’t in any pain. Uncle Ray was there and the kids.” Christopher blew out a deep breath and sank down into one of the dining room chairs.
“The funeral is going to be Saturday down on the mountain. The funeral is going to be at the white church at two. We goin’ to meet up at Aunt Lonnie and Uncle Ray’s house early…before. They want you to be a pall bearer.” His mother sighed again. Aunt Lonnie wasn’t his mother’s aunt, she was his mother’s sister. He knew that she was holding it together for everyone else because that is what Mom always did. Aunt Lonnie was her oldest sister and she always said that she was more like a mother than a sister.
Christopher listened to the rest of the message and then quickly dialed his mother. His throat felt tight and his eyes stung with unshed tears. Aunt Lonnie had put evil smelling salves on his scars and had rubbed them in order to break up the keloids. His memories of her were mixed in with images of surgeries, soothing hands against his skin and her deeply accented voice telling them all stories about her and Mama’s childhood.
He wiped his eyes and cleared his voice when she answered on the first ring. “Are you alright, Mom?” They talked for nearly half an hour and Christopher promised that he would be over to the house bright and early Saturday morning so that they could drive down together. He hung up feeling anguished and useless.
~***~
Ashleigh’s phone rang and it was a testament to the passage of time that she was surprised to hear DeAngelo’s voice on the other end. Her heart dropped a little. She had been feeling so good, thinking about lunch with her friend’s and her weight loss and now he had to call and stir up feelings that she wanted to forget about.
“Hi Ash, Baby.”
She exhaled and looked around, tension evident on her face. “What do you want?”
“I’d like to come over and talk to you.”
She was already shaking her head. “No-”
“Ash, I left Shaunda.”
“What?” Her heart literally stopped beating in her chest.
“I left her. Baby, I can’t stop thinking about you. When I saw you in the hospital—it killed me. I realized that I’m not prepared to lose you.” Her mouth went completely dry and her legs began to shake. “Baby…I love you so much and I miss you and I’ll do anything to fix this. I want to see you.”
“Okay.” Her voice cracked.
“I’m on my way.” He hung up the phone and she sat staring into space. And then she remembered, he was on his way over now! Ashleigh leaped up and hurried into her room for something to wear that would show all her new curves. After changing into jeans and a t-shirt that hugged her boobs and flatter belly she agonized over her hair with her dark roots. God, she’d let herself go!
She was touching up her makeup when the doorbell rang and her heart began racing. Yet she walked to the door calmly and opened it. God…there he was. He was so damn beautiful. His chocolate eyes blinked as they scanned her new smaller body.
“Jesus…Ashleigh…you lost…” She beamed and opened the door for him to enter. He leaned in and kissed her cheek. “You look incredible.” She shivered at the contact of his soft lips. The look in his eyes at this very moment was worth every sore muscle, every hunger pang, every drop of sweat. It was the look of desire and she didn’t think she’d ever see it again.
“So. You and Shaunda are no more.”
“I moved out yesterday.” His hands crept to her hips and then began to glide over her butt. He grinned lasciviously. “I miss this.” He said as he cupped her buttocks.
Ashleigh’s brow creased and she pushed his hands away, offended at his familiarity. “Uh uh.” She said. “You don’t got it like that anymore. You can’t just walk in here like you still got this. I didn’t say that I was going to take you back, De
Angelo!”
He nodded and took a step back. “I’m sorry. You’re right. Tell me what I need to do.” She crossed her hands across her chest and turned away from him, still feeling faintly disgusted at the way he had just touched her.
She turned and looked at the fine man that stood before her; had dropped her for another woman without a warning or a second thought, and now has left his wife of less than five months.
He was such a loser.
She didn’t love him. If she was foolish enough to take a man like him back, he would just do the same thing over and over. And she would deserve it. Shaunda now knew what it felt like to be her.
She looked down with a bitter smile. It didn’t bring her any joy. They were just two women that had loved the wrong man.