A Roof Over Their Heads

by M. K. Stelmack

  Seeing them made Seth drop the wire. “I forgot the prizes.”

  “Got ’em,” Mel called. “Tim cards. Donated, too. Now, come on and help.”

  Seth picked up the wire. Mel was acting like an older brother. Made things seem normal between them, like a family should be.

  Seth saw a lot of family that evening. As he timed the relays, watched kids weave and dart through the course, forget where they were and double back amid calls from the sidelines, watched parents piggyback their squealing children as they stepped through tires or ducked under wires, watched the parents alone take the course, forget where they were and double back.

  He wished Matt was there.

  The boy would’ve been all smiles to see his crazy game played—and loved—by so many. Seth had planned to bring Matt and have them run the course together. Not as father and son. Just as...a man with a kid. Before Alexi had nixed any contact.

  Then again, maybe he didn’t want Matt here. A few people here knew that Lakers-on-the-Go was a front for his community service requirement. Last thing he needed was for Matt to learn that the man he wanted for a father was a criminal.

  By the time the game was finished, prizes awarded and the field taken down, it was nearly ten. Seth drove back into town with the lights on.

  “Good of Mr. Stephensson to lend us his pasture,” Mel said, swirling the last of the melted ice coffee in the take-out cup.

  “I guess,” Seth replied. “Good choice.” Mel was in charge of venue booking. That was the deal the two of them had struck when his community service sentence was served. Mel seemed to think he had to help with every bit of work, despite Seth explaining over and over that his interference cost him hours he could clock against his sentence. Then again, he was nearly done. Thirteen hours left after tonight. A thought occurred to Seth. “You’re not still thinking about buying that place?”

  Mel hitched himself in his seat. “Nope. Given up on thinking about it.”

  “Good.” Seth reached the intersection marking the town line, the brightness of his headlights diffused as he passed under the glow from the streetlights.

  “You know,” Mel began, “it’s been twenty years...”

  “Don’t tell me to get over it. I was sixteen when it happened.”

  “And I,” Mel said, his slow, easy voice going as low and hard as Seth had ever heard it, “was thirty. And let me tell you that a grown son feels the loss of a dad no less than a kid. I should know. I lost one when I was ten and then our dad.”

  Their mom and Mel had never talked about his real dad. It was a kind of unspoken pact among the entire family not to mention him, so Seth was quiet when he said, “I didn’t know your first dad died.”

  “He didn’t, but might as well have.” Mel gusted out a growly kind of sigh. “Anyway, enough. You don’t want to talk about what happened twenty years and I don’t want to talk about what happened forty years ago.”

  “Fair enough,” Seth said and waited a couple of respectful moments before asking, “What did you do at Sobeys to get Alexi so upset?”

  “Me? Nothing. I like her. And her kids, even if there’s not a right one in the bunch.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with Matt.”

  Mel twisted in his seat to look at Seth. “He’s the oddest one.”

  “What do you mean by that? He’s a good kid.”

  “They’re all good kids. But he’s got that stray-dog look about him. Never sure what he’s thinking.”

  Seth straightened in his seat. “I don’t know about that. Alexi said there’s a problem because he’s getting attached to me.”

  “Why’s that a problem?”

  Seth tended to agree but he gave Alexi’s line. “Because she’s trying to adopt him and it’ll look bad with the caseworker if it’s seen that the boy’s getting attached to someone who’s not intending to be part of his life. She needs to prove that she can give him stability.”

  “Nobody more stable than you.”

  “I’m a bachelor and the handyman and I haven’t known them for more than a month. Not to mention my record, which she knows nothing about.”

  “Still, you’d think she has more problems when it comes to stability than having you around.”

  Now they were getting somewhere. “What do you mean?”

  Mel flipped open an empty donut box and began to collect the loose sprinkles on his fingertip. “You ever wonder where she gets the money to live if she’s at home with the kids all the time?”

  Seth had, but decided it was none of his business. “Maybe she’s got life insurance. No idea.”

  “Anyway, it got me thinking after I ended up paying for the groceries today.”

  It was a good thing they’d pulled into the underground parking of their apartment because Seth lost total concentration at the wheel. “What?”

  “Her card was declined, so I paid for them. You passed our parking stall, you know.”

  Seth threw the truck into Reverse, struggling to recall what was in the two bags. “There couldn’t be more than fifty bucks’ worth.”

  “Thirty-four, twelve. To be exact,” Mel said. “She said she’d pay me back, not that I care if she does. Just worried that she can’t pay other people, is all.”

  That explained her sourness. Money problems would worry anyone. Especially if four kids depended on you. What it didn’t explain was why she didn’t tell him when she must’ve known Mel wouldn’t keep it a secret. She’d already asked him for his time, why not money? If she didn’t have anyone else, why wouldn’t she turn to him?

  “You might want to finish parking,” Mel suggested, and Seth eased forward. “Just letting you know, seeing as how you’ve taken an interest in her.”

  “Not in the way you think.”

  “You mean I got a chance, then?”

  Seth was about to tell his brother exactly how unlikely that was when he saw Mel’s grin.

  “Yep,” Mel said, “you’re interested in exactly the way I thought.”

  Seth could explain a hundred different ways how wrong Mel’s thinking was but when something got stuck in his head, there was no way to budge it.

  When Mel got out, Seth kept the truck idling. “I’ll be back later.”

  Mel’s grin was still plastered in place. “Tell Alexi not to worry, that you’ll figure something out.” He closed the truck door before Seth could answer. Not that one was forthcoming.

  Seth first parked at his bank and withdrew his maximum daily limit. Only when he pulled the thick stack of twenties from the ATM, a stack with real weight, did he see he’d become an idiot for Alexi.

  * * *

  ALEXI MEANT TO bring in the laundry she’d draped along the deck railing. She meant to set up her sewing equipment downstairs to make it appear as if her business was operational. She meant to bake banana bread to offer the caseworker the next day. She meant to unpack the bakeware so she could actually bake the banana bread.

  But when all sound had muted to only the soft breathing of four sleeping children, to the hum of the new fridge and creak and whirr of the old rotating fan, and to the murmur of friends around a neighbor’s fire pit, Alexi could not move.

  Hot and tired to her core, she slumped down against the side of the kitchen island facing the back door. The fan, as it swiveled, cuffed her damp face with gentle, warm air.

  She should have a shower and go to bed.

  Yeah, right. She’d lie there and wonder how to feed and house her kids.

  She opened her phone to Richard’s picture. He smiled at her as always. He didn’t frown, cross his arms, point at her bruises, question her, rescue her child, buy her a coffee, tell her she was a good mother, fix her home or ask her to tell him what was wrong after taking one look at her when she’d come back from the grocery store, his voice low and his face creased with worry. She’d wanted to unbur
den herself on Seth so badly her chest had hurt.

  “Richard,” she began and stopped. For the first time in a year, she had nothing to tell him.

  Nothing more to feel. This was nothing other than the picture of a dead man she loved.

  She felt pain as acute as when he’d first died. She was losing him again, this time her need for him as her daily sustenance. If she could no longer draw solace from him, then who?

  Yes, she had the kids but their love existed on a different plane. It wasn’t that solid, intimate pact of two people taking on the world together.

  A little like what she and Seth had, working together to give Matt a home. Except she was using him, something she sensed people had done all his life, and who wouldn’t? He was the generous type who deserved more than she could give him, which right now was absolutely nothing.

  She should’ve pursued an income more seriously the past year. Instead she’d pocketed the cash pooled by Richard’s coworkers at the oil company. They’d been hugely generous. Almost Richard’s yearly salary in cold hard cash. But there’d been a funeral to pay for. Van repairs. Rent, food, the usuals. No life insurance, and no income other than the few hundred dollars here and there from Little Wonders.

  Besides, where would the kids have gone if she’d been working? She couldn’t put Callie in day care. It would’ve destroyed her already fragile emotional state. Not to mention Bryn and his rigid routines. Or Matt and his tendency to bolt. Amy might’ve been okay but only if placed with the other kids, and how likely would that have been?

  A quiet knock on the back door jerked her to attention, but before she could react, in walked Seth. He wore the same cargo pants as before, a green T-shirt and a blue baseball cap with the Lakers baseball logo. And he wore sneakers. She’d never seen him in anything other than his work boots. They made him more energized, more...alive. If that was possible, because whatever else Seth was, he was very much alive with eyes on her, for her.

  She scrambled to her feet and then to her utter shame, she ran to him and he, as no small part of her knew he would, opened his arms and drew her in.

  To be caught in his arms was a beautiful trap. He held her tight against his warmth, one arm around her waist matching their hips together, another across her back. She tucked her head against his neck and clung to him, and he let her, for how long she couldn’t tell.

  After a time, she began to order herself to step back, to break the hold. But it was like coming out of a deep sleep in the early morning.

  It was Seth who loosened his hold and said softly against her hair, “Mel told me what happened.”

  She lifted her head from the warm bank of his shoulder. “I never meant for any of this to happen.”

  His hold tightened. “We never do.”

  Her throat thickened with tears. She swallowed. For what she had to say next, it was only right that she break free of his arms but she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Instead she braced herself against his chest and whispered, “I understand the position this puts you in. And I understand how you are totally justified in doing something about it, what with the caseworker coming tomorrow—”

  Seth’s arms dropped away from her. She hadn’t realized how much of her weight he was bearing until his withdrawal caused her to stumble forward a step, nearly falling against him again.

  “Why do you think I should do something about it?” His voice was harsh, suspicious. She floundered about her tired mind, searching for the key point he seemed to think she knew.

  “Because of Matt...you like him...you wouldn’t want him in a place where he wasn’t taken care of...so you’d do something about it.”

  He shoved his hands in his front pockets and nodded slowly. “You read me right. You know, on the way here, I was thinking how stupid coming over was, but then I opened the door and...you came to me. It felt great. You and me and no other reason.”

  Alexi caught her breath. Exactly what she’d lost with Richard. She looked at Richard on her phone.

  Seth snorted. “Yeah. Him. Why else would I be here except to do the job he no longer can?”

  Alexi shook her head. He wasn’t making any sense. Then he pulled a wad of cash out of his pocket and tossed it on the island, the green twenties splaying across the surface. She stared at the cash, at him.

  “Are you giving me money?” She had to state the obvious because it was so incredible.

  “Yes, I am. Isn’t that what you wanted me to do?” He’d shoved his hands back into his pockets where she could see they were balled into fists.

  She fisted her own hands into her tangled hair. “No, it isn’t. I didn’t want you to do anything. I’d only hoped that if Mel told you, you’d think it was none of your business and let it go.”

  “You think I’d ignore the fact you can’t pay for food?”

  “No, no, no! I didn’t think you would. I thought you’d tell the caseworker because you wouldn’t want Matt to live with me because I couldn’t provide for him. I was hoping you wouldn’t, that you wouldn’t care. But—” she gestured at the fan of twenties “—of course, you do. I didn’t think you’d show it this way,” she finished weakly.

  It was his turn to look confused. “So you think that I’d turn you in, force Matt to lose the home he chose because you’d run into money troubles?”

  How had she not seen it his way? “All I’m saying is that I could understand why you would.”

  “Then you don’t understand me at all, Alexi.”

  He was at the door before she stopped him. She reached for his hand but it was with the hand that held the phone, so only her last two fingers could touch his. “Wait, Seth, wait. Let me explain.”

  He waited but she couldn’t find the right words, like when she talked to Richard. She had a million for Seth, all in the wrong order. “I’m sorry. I don’t understand. I don’t understand how anyone can give so much, and expect so little in exchange.”

  There was the slightest hesitation, and then he took her hand in his and raised the phone so that the glowing image of Richard was beside his face.

  “How about in exchange,” he said softly, his expression both tender and challenging, “you set down this phone and kiss me?”

  * * *

  SETH BRACED FOR Alexi’s reaction. She set the phone on the kitchen table, screen down. She came to him, not in a rush like when he’d opened the door, but slowly. Her glorious blue eyes, dark in the shadowed room, were pinned to his, and she settled in front of him. He banded his arms around her. She cupped his face in her hands and brought his lips to hers. A peck only, she retreated, the swell of her lower lip all that touched his mouth, and then she returned, her kiss deepening.

  He kissed her long and thoroughly. When continuing meant taking it to a level he was pretty sure she’d no intention of going, he pulled away and then dived back to her kiss-swollen lips for another taste. He eased away and returned twice more before he could stop. Not wanting to break contact completely, he wrapped his hands around hers.

  Her gaze dipped to his chest. “Thanks,” she whispered.

  Now was not the time to tell her how much he detested her constant gratitude but he was curious. “Why thank me?”

  “Because I can’t help feeling that once again you’ve given me something.”

  He chose to believe she meant the kiss and not the money. “I think we both came out winners,” he said.

  Her gaze slanted toward the phone and his hands squeezed involuntarily on hers. She said quickly, “I’ve had a hard time letting go.”

  He could almost hear her searching for the right words to tell him what they’d just shared was going nowhere.

  “No deadline on missing someone,” he said, all the while wanting to wing the phone against the wall just to wipe the smile off good old Richard’s face.

  “Yes and...only... I want you to know...”

 
; He didn’t want her to stumble on trying to find a nice way to end what had barely started. He stepped out of her touch, let his hands drop from her and pulled open the door.

  “How about we don’t say anything more this evening so there’s nothing more we’ll need to fix?”

  She raised her hand as if to stop him again, then froze. Her shoulders slumped. “Okay.”

  It was just as he’d been afraid of. A dead man still had her heart.

  CHAPTER TEN

  MARLENE THE CASEWORKER rolled in like a tank. A tank encased in sweatpants and a paisley peasant top. She mounted the stairs and from that vantage point, surveyed the kitchen, living room and down the hall to the bedrooms. She let loose a long, low whistle and then advanced in green high-top sneakers toward the bedrooms.

  Alexi hurried after her, Callie cinched to her leg, all Alexi’s prepared explanations scattering as she tried to keep pace. Marlene poked her head into the room Amy and Bryn shared and then turned right.

  “This is his. Matt’s, that is,” Alexi babbled as Marlene took in the bed and chest of drawers minus the bottom drawer which Alexi remembered belatedly was being used for Callie’s stuffies. “That’s new carpeting. Laid yesterday so things are still in a bit of uphea—”

  Alexi broke off as Marlene opened a closet door, the bifold sticking in the track, so she gave it a sharp pull and out popped the entire door.

  Alexi couldn’t suppress a groan.

  “Not my fault,” Marlene said. “Bifold doors are the devil’s work.”

  A woman after Seth’s heart. Not that she was thinking of Seth or his heart or any of his body parts, for that matter. Marlene bowled past Alexi back up the hallway and then pounded down the stairs to the basement. Alexi trotted behind, as quickly as she could with Callie. Thankfully the other three were in the backyard.

  Marlene powered around the basement, no doubt recording every little horror. The bank of unopened boxes. The scraps of pipes and boards from the renos. The bathroom with the missing toilet. Looping electrical wires from which dangled Amy’s skipping rope tied into a noose. What had the kids been up to?