by Robin Wells
The rest of the place was just normal stuff, except for one thing: It looked like a guy still lived here. A man’s belongings sat on one of the nightstands as well as on top of one of the dressers. Half of Katie’s closet was filled with men’s clothing, and one of the two dressers in her bedroom was filled with men’s underwear and T-shirts and jeans. Fishing stuff sat in the hall closet, along with a man’s coat and boots. And pictures of her husband—it was the same guy as in the wedding pictures, so it had to be her husband—were everywhere: in the bedroom, the living room, the kitchen, even the bathroom. It was kinda creepy. Oh, and that urn on the fireplace. If it was what Gracie thought it was, it was beyond ick.
The song was getting to the good part. “You are…,” Gracie sang. She twirled around and then stopped short. Damn—Katie was standing in the doorway, smiling at her.
Shit. She yanked out the earpieces. She didn’t want Katie to think she was thrilled to be staying with her or anything. She immediately dropped her shoulders into a slouch and eyed Katie warily. “What are you doing here?” Which was totally stupid, because Katie lived here.
Thank God Katie didn’t choose to point that out. “I brought you lunch.” Katie dropped a white paper bag on the dining table. “I don’t have a lot in the fridge, and I thought you might be hungry.”
“Oh.” Truth was, she was starving, the muffins notwithstanding. “Thanks. I guess.”
“No problem.” Katie moved into the kitchen, turned on the faucet and washed her hands, then opened a cabinet and took out two glasses. Placing them on the counter, she opened the fridge and pulled out the milk.
Gracie watched her, twirling the lock of hair above her ear. “Do you come home for lunch every day?”
“Not every day.” Katie put the milk back in the fridge and closed the door. “Did you sleep okay?”
That was a lame-ass question. The sort of thing a mom would ask. On the other hand, it probably wasn’t worth getting into a snit over. “Not too bad.”
Katie carried the glasses to the table. Gracie followed her. “So what is there to do in this podunk town?”
“Well, Zack said you might be interested in finding a part-time job.”
Gracie shrugged. She kinda liked the idea. It sounded grown up and independent. Besides, she liked staying busy, and she liked knowing what she was supposed to do. “Maybe.”
“Sunnyside Assisted-Living Villa is looking for help,” Katie said. “I’m working out there this afternoon, and I thought you might want to come with me.”
“Assisted living? You mean a place where old geezers live?”
“Well, I doubt they think of themselves that way.” Katie sat down in the same chair she’d sat in at dinner. “But yes, it’s mainly for elderly people—although they have a physical-rehab wing for people who are recovering from injuries or surgeries. My mother-in-law broke her leg and needed knee replacement surgery, and she’s staying there for a few weeks. When she gets out, she’s going to stay here with us until she’s well enough to go back home to New Orleans.”
“So it’s basically a nursing home.” The chair squeaked on the hardwood floor as Gracie pulled it out.
“Not exactly. Most of the residents are completely independent and rent small apartments.” Katie picked up the white bag. “Others need some help.”
“You said you’re working there? I thought you were a hairdresser.”
“Well, Sunnyside has its own little beauty salon. Another stylist and I take turns going out there three or four times a week. The residents are some of our most loyal clients.”
“What do you do—dye their hair blue?”
Katie grinned. “Not as blue as yours.”
Gracie smiled, then abruptly caught herself. She was not going to like Katie.
Katie pulled out two wrapped sandwiches and handed one to Gracie. “I hope you like turkey po’boys.”
Gracie took a bite. The tang of spicy mustard filled her mouth. She wanted to say something negative to cancel out grinning at Katie’s comment, but the sandwich was delicious and she didn’t want to stop eating it. She decided to dis the job. “I don’t think I want to work at a retirement home. I’m not changing anyone’s Depends.”
“Why not? It would be good practice for the baby.”
Her mouth fell open in horror. She put down the sandwich. “You’re not serious.”
Katie grinned. “You’re right. I’m not.” She unwrapped her sandwich. “Actually, I think they’re looking for someone to help the recreation director. You could come with me and find out.”
Gracie started to say no, just on principle, but the truth was, she didn’t want to just stay here all day. “Why not? Anything beats hanging around this shrine to your dearly departed.”
A flicker of hurt shot across Katie’s face. Aw, hell. Treating Katie badly didn’t feel nearly as good as she’d thought it would.
Katie gave one of those I’m-gonna-smile-even-though-I-feel-bad smiles that her mom used to give her when Gracie turned nasty. “I made an appointment for you to see an obstetrician next week.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Her name’s Dr. Greene. She’s really nice. I hope you’ll like her.”
Gracie liked the idea that the doctor was a woman. The old dude she’d seen before had been awful. “Does she do ultrasounds?”
Katie nodded. “She has a machine in her office.”
Gracie was dying to see her baby. Maybe if she saw it, it would seem real. As it was, it was hard to believe she wasn’t just getting fatter and fatter. “So do you think she’ll do an ultrasound?”
“I can’t say for sure, but I’d imagine so.”
Annette had just swung her leg out of the bed when Dave appeared in the doorway. For a moment, the room seemed to spin. Probably the pain meds, she told herself, clutching her pajama shirt across her chest. “What are you doing here? I told you not to come back.”
“I needed to see you.”
“Well, I don’t need to see you.”
“Methink the lady doth protest too much.”
Arrogant SOB! How dare he presume to tell her what she needed or wanted? “That was always the problem with you,” she spat out. “You never listened to me.”
“I didn’t?”
“No. You just heard what you wanted to hear.”
“Gee.” He rubbed the top of his head. “I’m sorry.”
The remark was as uncharacteristic as it was unexpected. Annette narrowed her eyes, looking for signs of sarcasm, but didn’t find any. Dave always had excuses and explanations and long reasons to justify why he was right and she was wrong. This must be a new tactic, part of a new, clever campaign to get back in her good graces. Well, it wasn’t going to work. “It’s too late for sorry.”
He sank down in the faux-leather recliner and somberly nodded his head. “I understand why you feel that way. I was a total ass, and I want to make it up to you.”
“Then go away, and stay away.”
His mouth curved into a winsome smile. “I don’t think you really mean that.”
Annette straightened her spine. “Why on earth would you think that?”
“Because you’re all stiff and prickly and angry-looking—the same way you used to get when you gave me the old silent treatment.” He grinned. “Remember the time you didn’t speak to me for four whole days?”
“It was five.”
“Yeah. I had to sleep on the couch, and the springs dug into my back like knives. What had I done that ticked you off so much, anyway?”
“You don’t remember?”
“No.”
That figured. He never remembered the things he did that made her angry, and Annette could never forget. “You used the money I’d saved for a new washer and dryer for a new set of golf clubs, and you didn’t even discuss it with me.”
“Oh, yeah.” He had the nerve to grin.
“It wasn’t funny,” Annette said. “It’s still not. It was as if I was a junior member of the marriage, and
you had all the power.”
“I would have sworn it was the other way around,” Dave muttered.
Annette wasn’t sure she’d heard him correctly. “What?”
“Nothing.”
“No. You said something, and I want to know what it was.”
Dave sighed. “You always had these lists of chores and jobs—mow the lawn, repair the window, pick up toothpaste.”
“I needed help! I was doing all the work in the marriage—all the cleaning, all the cooking, all the grocery shopping and errands—not to mention everything involved in raising our son. And I was holding down a job at the same time!”
“I know, I know.” He settled into the chair beside the bed. “But it seemed like there was never any time for fun.”
“And that was all my fault?” She put her hand on her chest.
“No.” He ran a hand down his jaw and shifted his weight in the chair. “No, it wasn’t. Look—I’m sorry. I didn’t come here to argue with you or to blame you for anything, Annette. I take full responsibility for screwing things up. I was a jerk.”
Dave never apologized. That had always been one of their problems. Hearing him apologize now, when it was too late to make any difference, made her heart throb as badly as her leg.
She turned her head away from him. “Well, I have nothing further to say to you.”
“I think you do.”
Anger gathered in her chest like steam. “What part of the words ‘I have nothing to say to you’ don’t you understand?”
“It’s not the words; it’s just—well, I know you. After you’d do one of those silent treatments, you’d let loose a torrent and really let me have it.”
“It never made any difference. You always twisted things around and made it seem like I was the one to blame.”
“I got mad at you because you were mad at me.”
“Exactly. You acted as if I never had a right to be mad!”
“Yeah.” He wagged his head in agreement. “I didn’t want to be wrong.”
His willingness to admit it left her speechless. She realized her jaw had fallen open, and abruptly closed it.
“Anyway,” he continued. “I think you have things you need to get off your chest, and if I go, you’ll never get to do that.”
“I repeat: I have nothing to say to you.”
“Okay.” He nodded amiably. “Then I’ll say it for you: I’m a prick. I’m a worthless bastard. I’m shallow and selfish and ungrateful, and I never fully appreciated you or let you know you were loved. I was a lousy husband.”
“You were a pretty crappy father, too.”
The guilt on his face made her heart squeeze. Oh, God—she wished she’d kept her mouth shut.
His gaze dropped to his lap and he blew out a sigh. “You’re right. Not a day goes by that I don’t wish I could do it over. If I could, I’d make every one of Paul’s softball games. I’d take him fishing and camping and I’d play catch in the backyard.” He looked up at her, his eyes full of pain. “I’d be home every night for dinner.”
She hadn’t meant to talk to him, but now she couldn’t seem to stop. “You spent more time playing golf and drinking with your buddies than you did at home.”
He’d called it networking. He used to say that the insurance business was built on relationships, and in order to get and keep business, he needed to court his clients. That might have been true to some extent, but it had gotten out of control. Way out of control.
He nodded. “Yeah, I did. And I turned into an alcoholic along the way.”
“That’s no excuse.” It irritated the hell out of her, how they called alcoholism a disease. Oh, she knew that at some point it became an addiction, a thing beyond an addict’s control, but before it reached that point, Dave had had a choice.
“It’s not an excuse,” Dave said. “It’s just a fact. I take total responsibility for my actions. I’m working the steps, Annette, and one of the steps is to make amends to everyone I’ve hurt.”
“Well, you can’t make them to me.”
“I think I can. I think I can help you vent some of that anger you’ve been hauling around.”
“What if I don’t want to?”
“Why wouldn’t you?”
Because being angry keeps me from feeling anything else for you. The thought was as unwelcome as the pain in her knee, and just as sharp. At least her knee would get better.
“Get out of here, Dave.”
“Okay. But I’ll be back.” He rose from the chair and grinned. “So start making a list of ways to rip my head off.”
“It’s not your head I want to rip off.”
He shot her a roguish grin—the same one that had made her heart flutter back in 1974, when she’d looked up at a sorority party and seen him across the room. It still had the same effect on her. Electricity sparked through the air, and despite it all, she found herself grinning back.
A knock sounded on the door, then it slowly opened to reveal Katie. “Annette?”
Thank God for the interruption! What was wrong with her, sitting there grinning at Dave like some kind of mindless jack-o’-lantern? “Katie! So nice to see you. Come in, dear.”
The door widened, and Katie walked in. A pale, sullen-lipped girl with dyed black-and-blue hair skulked in behind her.
Katie smiled. “Dave! I didn’t know you were here.”
“He was just leaving,” Annette said.
The girl looked at him with interest. “Hey—you’re the dude from the bookstore.”
“Yeah. Nice to see you again, Gracie.”
“Are you feelin’ okay?”
“Sure, sure. I’m right as rain.” Dave turned to Annette. “Annette, this is Katie’s daughter.”
The girl scowled. “Don’t call me that. Saying I’m her daughter implies she’s my mom, and a real mom doesn’t give her baby away.”
Katie’s face flamed with misery. Annette exchanged a look with Dave. Dave had said that the girl had an attitude, and he hadn’t been kidding.
“Then we need to come up with a better way to describe your relationship.” Dave stroked his chin thoughtfully. “We could call Katie ‘the woman who gave you life,’ I suppose.”
Gracie rolled her eyes.
“No? Well, maybe we could call you ‘the DNA product she chose not to abort.’ ”
Gracie’s scowl deepened. Annette suppressed the urge to chuckle.
“I can tell you don’t much care for those,” Dave said. “I don’t, either. Come to think of it, ‘mother’ and ‘daughter’ is a whole lot simpler. And there are all kinds of mother–daughter relationships. Why, Annette and Katie have one, and they’re only related by marriage.” He patted Katie’s shoulder, smiled at Gracie, and winked at Annette. “See you all later.”
As the door closed behind Dave, Annette turned her attention to the teenage girl. “So, Gracie—it’s nice to meet you.”
The girl chomped on a wad of gum and ignored the pleasantry. “What’s wrong with your leg?”
“I fell down some stairs. I broke my leg in three places, and I had to have my knee completely replaced.”
“Replaced with what—plastic or something?”
Annette nodded. “I think it’s a combination of plastic, ceramic, and metal.”
“Awesome. How did they get your real knee out? Did they saw your leg off or something?”
“Gracie, I don’t think…,” Katie began.
“It’s okay,” Annette told Katie. During her years as a high school teacher, Annette had gotten used to the bluntness of teenage curiosity. She smiled at Gracie. “They didn’t cut it all the way off, but they did use an electric saw.”
“Cool. Guess you’re gonna have a pretty gruesome scar, huh?”
“Not too bad.”
“Can I see?”
“It’s all wrapped up right now. But they’re taking the bandages off tomorrow. You’re welcome to come back.”
“If I get a job here, maybe I will. I like looking at scars.”
Katie looked horrified—which was probably just what Gracie intended. Annette decided to put a positive spin on the remark. “Sounds like you might be interested in a career in medicine.”
Gracie shrugged. “I’ve always thought it must be awesome to cut people open and take out parts and replace them and crap.”
“It’s an amazing skill,” Annette agreed. “I can’t imagine having the confidence to do it.”
“You’d have to be pretty ballsy, all right.” She glanced disdainfully at Katie. “It’s sure cooler than being a hairdresser.”
Annette caught the pained look that flashed across Katie’s face. “I’ve always thought that styling hair is an art form,” Annette said. “A very special one, since it uses human canvases.”
“Yeah, right.” Gracie rolled her eyes.
Annette decided it would probably be best to just change the subject. “So, Gracie—I understand you’re expecting.”
“Yeah.” Her eyes were guarded. Her hand went to her stomach. Annette noticed that she didn’t have that eager glow most pregnant women got when talking about their child.
“Do you know if it’s a boy or a girl?” Annette asked.
The girl shook her head.
“She’s got an appointment to see Dr. Greene next week,” Katie volunteered.
“Oh, you’re going to love her,” Annette said.
“We’re hoping she’ll be able to tell us the sex of the baby,” Katie said.
“Tell me.” Gracie’s chin shot up. “It’s none of your business.”
Katie shot Annette an apologetic smile. My, my, my. The girl was a real piece of work.
The door squeaked open and a white-haired woman who looked like Santa’s wife stepped into the room, closely followed by a tall, thin man. Annette grinned. “Dorothy! And Harold. Come in, come in!”
The elderly couple bustled in and gave Annette loud smacks on the cheek. “You’re looking chipper,” Dorothy said. She turned to Katie and gave her a hug. “And you’re looking beautiful, as usual.” Katie hugged both elderly people.
“And this darling girl must be your daughter!” Before Gracie had time to protest, Dorothy had gathered her to her ample bosom.
“I’m not…,” Gracie started.