by Kacey Shea
With my time in lockup complete, I open a group text to Jill and Alicia while I drive home. I know it’s not safe, a bad choice with the run of luck I’ve been having, but frankly I don’t give a damn.
Me: You guys will never believe what happened to me.
Jill: Abducted by aliens?
Alicia: Switching deodorant?
Jill: Wait. You adopted a puppy?
Alicia: No, she’s more a cat lady.
These two! At the stop light I text out a quick reply.
Me: Stop it! I’m serious! I just saved a child from death and simultaneously went up in flames!
Alicia: You okay?
Jill: Is this a joke?
Me: No joke! There was a fire at Target and I used an extinguisher to save a small child from near death. And I ran into HIM.
Alicia: No!
Jill: Not fire fuckhead!
I’m almost home and glance down at the screen at each stop sign to type my responses.
Me: Yes him!
Alicia: You okay?
Jill: We should meet up and talk this out. Drinks tonight?
Alicia: Tonight yes. Drinks no. Can we go for coffee?
Me: YES!!!
Alicia: I’ll text you the address to this awesome little café near my condo. Meet at seven?
Jill: Perfect.
Alicia: If you need to talk before then call me?
Me: I will. Thanks.
I stop at home to change into some grubby clothes, throwing my damp outfit into the washer to rid it of the lingering smoke stench. I don’t bother showering even though my hair is a tangled hot mess from being drenched and then air dried. Besides, I’m just going to Kiki’s and she won’t care.
I need to find my Zen. After the near death experience and run in with Chase, I’m all out of balance. Even my hands shake as I steer the wheel and turn into her long drive.
Inhale inner peace.
Exhale bitterness, irritation, fear, and anger.
Fuck this. I just need to dig in the dirt for a few hours.
“Callie, dear! You’re late!” Kiki waves from the doorway. Her screen swings open as I slam my Jeep door shut with more than necessary force. “Whoa! Bad day?” She appraises my haggard state.
“Coffee?” I almost cry.
“Come in, come in. Tell Kiki all about it.” She pulls me inside, patting my arm as we walk through the house. I follow her to the kitchen table and plop into my usual seat. Silas meows from the window sill, most likely irritated at the disruption to his midday nap. I raise my brows at him. Try me, cat, after the day I’ve had . . . try me. He meows at my glare and hops down to scurry to the other room just as Kiki slides over a mug of java.
“I love you,” I blurt.
“The coffee, I know.” She grins.
“Yes, the coffee, but I love you, too.” I savor the first sip with a groan and let my eyes flutter closed. There’s no way in hell I would have survived the past few months without this woman. Our conversations, her care for me, and even her out of control overgrown yard have saved me from the darkest of times. Yet, after today I feel all sorts of emotional unease.
“It was him, wasn’t it?” she asks, and then nods at my sharp inhalation. “It’s not easy having to see him after everything that happened.”
I just nod. How does she always know?
“Tell me about it?” she questions, and I recount the entire ordeal—from last night’s bonfire mishap to the spark and run shopping excursion of the morning. We laugh, I cry, and Kiki listens. She gets it. She gets me.
“Will you tell me about how you met your late husband?” I finally ask. Not that I haven’t been more than a little curious over these weeks of friendship, but something about the way she is today, I wonder if she might tell me. She’s never brought it up and I want to know. I never shared with her Tiff’s cruel words the night I saw Chase and Alicia together. But they scratch at my curiosity. I just can’t see Kiki being so selfish as to steal anything, let alone someone’s husband.
She stands, grabs the coffee pot, and refills our mugs before returning to the table. She meets my gaze and nods once. “Okay.” She takes a long sip and I wait for her to continue. Her fingers trace circles over the clay of her cup and I wonder if this isn’t a story she shares often.
“I guess I’ll start at the beginning. I’ve told you how I traveled during my twenties and some of my thirties, kept the company of lovers in many languages.”
“Yes, you’ve told me all of those stories.” My lips pull into a wide grin.
“I guess I have. Well, something they don’t tell you about adventure, about living the nomad life, is that eventually the appeal, the allure—it starts to wear off. Each country starts to look just like the others, and the men . . . while beautiful and charming, they’re all looking for that one thing. A one-night stand, a connection, a release . . . and I grew tired of it all. It was time to come home.
“My parents, all too happy to finally have their daughter home, bought me this place.”
“I thought you bought this place with your husband.”
“Do you want to hear the story or not, dear?”
“Sorry, please continue.”
“I was so excited to have a place of my own, to put down roots, and I loved the neighborhood instantly. But you can imagine how well I was received by the Susie Homemakers of the block.” She rolls her eyes. “You can’t tell it now, but I was quite the looker in my day, full figure and a tendency to mow my lawn in nothing by my bathing suit top and shorts.” She pauses to laugh her throaty chuckle. I join in, picturing a younger version of Kiki doing such.
“Well, I wasn’t the biggest hit with the housewives. But the husbands? They loved me. Offered to help with anything, but I didn’t need the drama. I’m an independent woman, after all. That was, until my water heater nearly exploded. I had been here six months and the damn thing shook the house. I thought it was an earthquake at first, and then noticed the smoke.”
“What did you do?”
“Used the neighbor’s phone to call the fire boys over. That’s when I met him. My Phil.”
I sigh. I can’t help it. It’s so romantic. And despite that I hate Chase, I still remember a time I loved firemen. “Was it instant love? Did he ask you out on the spot?”
“Hell no! He was married.”
My stomach drops. “Oh, Kiki . . .”
“Now don’t you ‘Oh, Kiki’ me until I finish the whole story. It’s not like that. Though it’s what everyone assumed. But I digress. I met Phil and the other fire boys, and they put out the fire quickly before it caused much damage. I was thankful to them, offered them coffee, and we conversed a few minutes. It was nice. I was a little lonely, sure, but once I learned Phil was married, he was out of my head.”
“So, what happened next?”
“The next week, Phil stopped by to make sure the repairs had been made. That I was doing okay. He was concerned, genuinely, and we shared a cup of coffee again. No funny business, just talked about life. He and his wife had a little one at home and they also lived in the neighborhood. He loved them dearly. That was the start of a real friendship. He stopped in, oh, maybe once a week to check on me.
“He could always make me laugh, you know. That’s so important to any relationship. Life is tough, and if you can’t stop to find the humor of the situation, things will bring you down. Anyway, this went on you see, for years, and I’ll admit, I fell in love with the man. But I would never make a move. He was married.
“I guess it was about four years after we met when he came over to fix a leaky pipe in the laundry room. It was August, hot as hell, and I don’t know, maybe it was just the right time, but squeezed together in that small space something charged in the air, changed between us, and he kissed me. Chaste. Sweet. And in a way no man had ever kissed me before.” She touches her fingers to her lips.
“What did you do?” I whisper and lean forward over the table.
“I slapped him!”
/> “What?”
“He was married,” she explains.
“But you loved him!”
“He wasn’t mine.” She glances out the window and I wonder what she sees. I imagine it’s more than just the burnt orange and red leaves that fall from the branches of the large oak. “He came over the next day. Refused to apologize. Proclaimed his love. Things had been bad between him and Sharon for years. He was in love with me. Said he was going to leave her. But we got in a big fight. I didn’t want to be the other woman, we hadn’t even slept together, but somehow I already was. I was angry, ashamed and scared things would never work between us anyway. I ended things. Everything. Our friendship. I couldn’t do it, wouldn’t be the cause for breaking up a marriage.
“We didn’t talk or see each other for months. I threw myself into my work. Creating. Painting. Writing. It helped with the pain. But when I ran into his wife, Sharon, at the market and she was noticeably pregnant, I lost my mind a little. I never intended to have him, but just knowing he had another child on the way, it solidified that I’d be alone, without my epic love, for the rest of time.” At that she stands and refills her cup.
“Kiki, this story sucks. Please tell me that’s not the end.”
“No, dear, that wouldn’t be much of a love story, now would it. More?” She nods to my cup and I push it forward, refraining from rolling my eyes. It’s as if she’s forgotten who I am. Always yes to coffee.
“Well, it turns out Sharon had been pretty miserable as well. They were young when they married, and the stress of the job, time, me, and everything brought to light how much they weren’t meant for each other. She was six months pregnant with their daughter when Phil caught her in bed with his best friend.”
“Oh, my God! Kiki, that’s horrible!”
“Yes, Phil was livid. He drove straight here. It was the first time we’d spoken in five months and he showed up at my door, angrier than I’d ever seen a man before. You see, he wasn’t mad Sharon cheated, but because of all the years he wasted with her. In love with me and denying himself a full, loving, honest relationship because of his obligation to someone who never valued him anyway.”
“So, what happened?” My heart hammers in my throat. I can taste the pain, the betrayal, but also the hope. I need to know Kiki got her happy ever after.
“They divorced, and as soon as it was finalized he married me. But you see, everyone already saw me as the other woman, and people believe what they want no matter the facts. He took a lot of grief, was passed up on promotions . . .
“I always suspected the child wasn’t his, at least the youngest, but my Phil was a good man, even after being treated so poorly. He supported them financially. He felt it the right thing to do. But their mother fed the children horrible lies, and they didn’t have much of a relationship with their father. Besides, she remarried right away—the best friend, actually—and they had a new dad.
“It tore me up, because as strong as he was, and as much as he and I were in love, I know he missed out. He would have been an incredible father had Sharon let him be involved in their lives. He never complained, though. Never displaced any resentment or bitterness toward me. Even on the day he passed on, we were more in love than the day we met.”
“You got your epic love.”
“I surely did.”
We sit in silence, the afternoon sun shining brightly through the big window, and finish our drinks.
“And you’ll have yours,” Kiki adds warmly.
“What’s that?”
“An epic love. Surely it’s coming for you, my sweet Callie, dear. You just don’t see it yet.” I want to laugh at her words but her tone, it catches the sound right from my throat and I want to believe her. She nods. “Now, when will you get started on painting the shed?” She raises her brows and tilts her head toward the door. I do laugh this time, a deep and solid guffaw from the pit of my belly.
God, I love this woman.
I love working from home.
No rush hour. No mileage on the car, money wasted on gas, travel time. And really, who needs to dress, put on makeup, and blow dry her hair every day? It’s all precious time that adds up. But I’m starting to wonder if it’s creating some bad habits.
For example, I can’t remember if I brushed my teeth today. And I know I never tamed my curls. An open cereal box lies on its side and I grab a handful of the sugar coated oats with my left hand to pop in my mouth. With my right I upload to our client’s server the web design my boss just approved.
It’s eleven in the morning on a Thursday and this is pretty much my life. I’ll work on projects my boss sends me until it gets dark. Then I’ll make dinner. Order out if I want to treat myself. Spend the rest of the evening streaming reruns of Friends. Fall asleep and do it over again. It’s a good life. It shouldn’t feel lacking. Maybe a little sad, okay. But why does it feel so incomplete? I refuse to ponder the question long enough to answer.
The only variation of the week happens on Saturdays and Sundays when I actually shower and put on a bra to work on Kiki Callahan’s yard. And thank God for that, otherwise I’m not sure I’d remember to shower once a week. I’m pathetic.
Ping.
I scan the new email from Jim. A thank you for the stellar job on my execution of design for our client. An assignment for branding on a new client. I click on the attachment and read up. I love this aspect of my job. The ability to create. The challenge to meet and exceed expectations. If the research is done correctly, I almost always exceed.
Halfway through the document I lean back in the chair and stretch my legs. I inhale and that’s when I catch the faint acrid odor of something burning. I sniff the air a few times. Yep. Definitely something. Maybe a neighbor? But who starts a bonfire mid-week and mid-morning. I stand and glance out the window off the kitchen table.
Oh shit!
Thick black smoke billows from the south corner of my house. Fire! Maybe it’s contained outside? My eyes dart around the room and when I look up I notice it’s a little hazy in here. Fuck! My house is on fire! I snap my laptop shut and grab my purse as I run outside.
Maybe it’s all those years of elementary school fire drills, but I don’t poke around to try and find the fire’s source. I just get out and toss my belongings in my Jeep. Cell in hand, I know what I have to do. God, I don’t want to call them.
I hate firemen.
I can’t stand their cocky as hell, arrogant, self-absorbed, oh-look-at-me I-can climb-ladders-and-play-with-my-hose Goddamn attitudes. As if putting your life on the line and saving people on a daily basis gives you the right to do whatever the hell you want?
Which is why I’m standing outside my home, clad in a pair of sweatpants and worn college T-shirt, debating whether I need to make this call. I really don’t want to make the call, but it seems the universe has other plans. Thick black smoke plumes from the back of my house.
Fuck!
I punch the dreaded numbers.
“Nine-one-one. What’s your emergency?”
“My house is on fire,” I say and rattle off the address.
“Ma’am, is anyone else inside the building? Any pets?”
“No, it’s just me.” Thanks for the reminder.
“We have a truck on the way, just hang tight. We’ll have firefighters on the scene in five minutes,” the operator replies, and I groan at the thought.
Shit. I look like shit. Because I work from home I didn’t feel the need to brush my hair, or teeth, or wear makeup, or get dressed today. I’m not even wearing a bra! Oh, hell no. I look down and yes, my nipples are clearly visible through the thin white fabric. The cool morning breeze has them fully erect. Awesome. A bang and clatter of wood pulls my gaze back to the house where flames lick through the rooftop.
“Shit!” I curse out loud.
“Ma’am, is everything okay?”
“No. It’s really not.” I need a bra. A sweatshirt would do. My bedroom is at the front of the house. If I run, I can be in and
out in less than two minutes. I stomp up the short cement drive.
“Do you know which unit is on its way?”
“Uh . . .” There’s a brief silence and then her voice comes back on the line. “Looks like Station Ten, ma’am.” Fuck! Of course it is. Why wouldn’t it be? Fuck my life.
“I have to go back in the house. I’ll just be a second. I left something important inside.” I huff into the receiver and jog the rest of the way, then stop when I reach the door.
What? Giving the girls full support is important.
“Ma’am, do not go into the structure. I promise, the crew is on its way.” That’s what I’m afraid of. I pull open the door and the acrid scent of smoke fills my nostrils. I choke and cough as the sensation burns my throat. Dry heat stings my eyes and I squint to relieve the pain.
I consider not going any further but I spot my dresser through the open bedroom doorway. It’s taunting me. A mere fifteen feet and my rack, along with my pride, will surely thank me. There’re no flames here. It’s not even that hot in the room. The shrill sounds of the approaching safety vehicle spur my steps forward.
“I have to,” I rasp into the phone line.
“Ma’am.” Her voice is angry now, demanding. “Do not. I repeat. Do not go into the home.”
“Too late.”
The sirens gain volume and I set my phone atop my dresser, slipping my arms out of my shirt and through the straps of my bra. Cups in place I sigh in relief and reach behind to clasp the hook in place.
Boom!
The force of an explosion throws me backward. I try to catch myself but my foot snags the corner of my dresser and I feel my body going down.
Bang. The side of my head collides with the bed frame and my body crumples to the ground. My temple pulses and my view goes a little fuzzy. A haze of darkness blankets my mind.