“You said there were two things you wanted us to do,” I said.
She nodded her head like a show horse. “The other one’s not work, though, it’s just a lot of fun. Al and I are having friends over for a barbecue on Saturday afternoon, and we’d like you girls to come. Don’t need to bring anything except your appetites.”
“Dinner at your house?” Nina fingered a lock of hair near her shoulder.
“And bring a friend if you want,” Shanty said. “Or come together, there’s an option. I know it’s hard to walk into a party alone, so whatever works for you girls is good with me. Cecily, maybe your dad would like to come with you. Nina, do you have a roommate in the dorm? Anyhoo, y’all come on over Saturday. I’d love you to meet my Al. He’s a riot.”
She’d love us to meet her Al.
When I thought about going to a barbecue at Shanty’s house, I felt a leather band tighten around my lungs. This sounded worse than the Be You Challenge. It was worse than smiling at myself in the mirror. It was worse than meeting with two strangers in a coffee shop. But I was determined to manage it. One way or another.
Chapter Seventeen
Text from Shanty to Graham: FYI group is going GREAT. Thanks for hooking me up with those two sweetie pies!!
Graham: Appreciate all you do. Let me know if you need anything.
Graham had to send the text discreetly, so Cecily wouldn’t notice Shanty’s name on his phone. Somehow he didn’t feel right taking Cecily to Soccer Mom’s for lunch, even though he had taken Veda there every Wednesday for months. Cecily wasn’t Veda. Instead, they got Pizza Hut to go and took it to the park. They sat in empty bleachers next to a ball field, Graham turned halfway in his seat, and Cecily sitting backward on the bench so she could see the lake behind them. While they ate their thin-crust pepperoni, Graham noticed that the noon sun caused the natural highlights in Cecily’s hair to glow. Or maybe they weren’t natural, but they were pretty either way.
“This place is full of memories,” Cecily said, “but then again, every place in Canyon reminds me of something. Is it that way for you too?”
“Not so much, because I never really left. Even when I was at Tech, I’d come home most weekends.”
“Your parents still live here?”
“They’re in Amarillo now.”
“You see them much?”
The easy banter felt good to Graham. “A lot more than I want to, that’s for sure.”
She brushed an ant from the bench. “I’ve gotta ask what you mean by that.”
“Oh, I don’t know. Things are all right between us.” He was leaning with an elbow on the bench behind him, trying to look laid-back, one ankle resting on the opposite knee, but his foot was jittering. He laid a palm on his ankle to still the nervous tic. “It’s just that my dad called this morning to give me his biannual declaration of disappointment.”
“What’s he disappointed about?”
“Me.”
Cecily had been sitting in such a way that her shoulders bunched around her ears, and when she heard his words, her neck straightened in surprise. “But . . . why?”
Graham wondered why he had started talking about his parents—a topic he never broached with anyone. “In a nutshell . . . I’m an only child. I was supposed to grow up and fulfill all of Dad’s dreams, but frankly, I fell short.”
“You’re successful . . . you’re independent . . . you’re not on drugs . . .” Her eyes swept the sky. “What more could he want?”
“An accountant.”
“Your dad needs an accountant?”
“No. My dad is an accountant. And he thinks like an accountant, analytical and logical, and he expects me to think the same way. And want the same things.”
Her lips puckered in a tiny frown. “He doesn’t understand your job.”
“No, but Mom’s all right with it.”
“She’s not an analytical type?”
“Not hardly.” He reached for his drink. “She babysits in her home. Sort of like a home daycare, except she only works with three kids. And she dabbles with crafts on the side. Nothing professional, just a hobby, though she has sold a few things on Etsy.”
“Now you’re beginning to make sense to me.” She started rolling up her sleeves, hesitated, then continued.
“You were going to say I’m a mama’s boy, weren’t you?” he asked.
“No, I was going to say you’re a lot like your mother. There’s a difference.”
Graham wanted to ask which of her parents she favored most, but her phone rang. Besides, he thought he already knew.
She glanced at the screen and grimaced. “I should take this.” She moved to climb out of the stands, then seemed to think better of it, and settled back, almost in defeat. “Hello, Brett.”
Instantly, Graham found himself wishing Cecily’s phone battery would die.
“No, I didn’t know,” she said.
Graham took the opportunity to look at the tattoo she kept so well hidden, a tangle of barbed wire covering her thin arm. Then he realized his knees were bouncing, and he pressed his palms on his thighs to stop the movement.
“I’ll talk to him,” she said, “but I can’t make any promises. Daddy’s his own man. You know that.” She fidgeted with the seam of her jeans and slowly closed her eyes. When she opened them again, she was looking at Graham, and the eye contact sent a vibration through him. “Okay,” she said into the phone, then tapped the screen to hang up.
Graham could feel her tension from three feet away. Her posture had changed during the call, and now her muscles looked as hard as the metal bench. She sat bolt upright, one hand gripping the bleacher, the other clenching the phone so tightly that her knuckles whitened. Her feet were flat on the board beneath her, as though she might scurry away at any minute—a flight response—to escape her problems.
Graham bit his lip to hush the invasive questions that were trying to slip out.
When she finally spoke, she covered it with laughter. “You’re not the only one who has problems with their dad.”
Graham felt the problem was with Brett, not Dub, but he continued to keep his mouth shut.
“And apparently your phone number is not the only one Dad has on speed dial,” she said.
Graham hurt for her, and he found himself wanting to make her feel better and maybe make himself feel better too. He wanted to massage her tight shoulders until she relaxed, and kiss her forehead and tell her everything would be all right, that he would take care of things, and that she wasn’t alone. He wanted to do a lot of things.
“Your dad hasn’t called me this week,” he said. “If that helps at all.”
She didn’t answer, just rocked back and forth, and Graham worried that she might snap. He hadn’t seen her interact with Brett in years. As he watched her now, he realized Cecily was not only stressed from her ex-husband’s call, she was holding back a tidal wave of emotion, pushing it down inside herself in an attempt to . . . what? Hide it?
Graham felt as though he were standing by, watching as she drowned herself.
“Can I hug you?” he asked. When her eyes doubled in size, he hurriedly explained himself, his words tripping over each other. “Hugs are good medicine, you know? In fact, sometimes physical touch can do more for the soul than just about anything.”
Thoughtless, stupid words. What was he thinking? He never would have asked a client for a hug—not in a million years—but Cecily wasn’t a client. She was a friend, if they were even that much. And he had just crossed the line.
“I’m sorry I said that.” He tried to laugh away his idiocy. “That was inappropriate.”
“It probably was.” She spoke softly. “But still . . . a hug would be nice right now.”
He froze. Had he heard her right? Had she meant she wanted him to hug her? His foot slid from his knee. “Wait,” he muttered. “What?”
She laughed then, an airy release of some of her tension. Or possibly another cover-up to hide it. “It’s just a hug, Graham, and I’m o
nly your receptionist, not a client. I’m practically nobody.”
“You’re not nobody.” He looked pointedly into her eyes and imagined a gentle flurry of hope there, but then it was gone. He closed the distance between them and slid his arms around her shoulders. She felt stiff and unyielding at first, but then she softened and rested her chin on his shoulder.
“I can see how this could be beneficial.”
Her hair smelled like coconut, and Graham fought the urge to inhale deeply.
She gave his chest two short pats before she pulled away. “Dad’s not a hugger.” She giggled at the thought. “That was always Mom’s department. In fact, now that I think about it, she used to tell me she needed my hugs.”
“I call it touch therapy.”
“Of course you do.”
Her quick retort surprised him, and he chuckled. “Your mother was a smart woman, Cecily. Your dad means well too.”
Her shoulders slumped. “But I’m an adult, you know?”
“I know exactly. Believe me.”
“Does he not think I’m doing all right? I’m working, I’m going to a support group, I’m talking to the famous Dr. Harper at the park. It doesn’t get better than this.”
Graham knew Dub was transferring some of his own pain to his daughter. “I guess both our fathers are alike in that they want the best for us.”
“I suppose.” She said it grudgingly, then pulled a pizza crust out of the box. “Ducks?”
“Actually, they’re geese.” Graham grabbed two crusts and tossed the empty box in a trash barrel, then followed Cecily to the bank of the lake, where a group of geese paid close attention to them but kept their distance.
“At least Brett wasn’t horrible this time,” she said.
“Is he usually?”
“Only every now and then, but I never know which Brett I’ll get.” She glanced toward Graham, seeming to make a decision about what she would say next. How much she would say. “Sometimes I have weird, crazy dreams about him. Not quite nightmares, but strange.” She tore off a small piece of bread and tossed it to the closest goose.
Since she was making light of it, Graham did too. “I love crazy dreams. Tell me.”
“Well, there’s not much to tell. Sometimes Brett will be stuck high in a tower. It might be the Empire State Building, or a ride at an amusement park, or just a really tall tree, and then the tower or tree explodes or disappears and he’s standing in front of me with an ax. Or sometimes it’s a rose or a box of tissues or a hamburger. Crazy stuff. And he always tries to give me whatever he’s holding, but I never take it from him. And then he gives me a kiss on the cheek, and I wake up.” She lowered her head. “See? Isn’t that weird?”
She tossed a hunk of pizza crust into the lake where three geese began squawking and fighting over it.
“Oh, I don’t know. I once had a dream I was a giant pigeon and I got stuck in my car.” He took a quick look at her. “Okay, actually, I dream that one fairly often.”
“Is it the car you drive now? The little truck?”
“It’s never my own vehicle. Sometimes it’s a sports car. Sometimes it’s a bus. One time it was an orange-and-yellow plastic Little Tykes coupe.”
“I have a visual image now that I’m never going to be able to get out of my head. Were you a gray pigeon or a white one, or what?”
“Enough already.” She was so easy to talk to. “Don’t forget, I can fire you at any time.”
“Don’t forget, I can quit.” She smiled, but it faded as though the sun went behind the clouds. “So do your dreams mean anything? Do mine? And why do I keep having them?”
“Well . . . it’s probably because Brett is on your mind—not that you’re deliberately thinking about him—but your subconscious is working things out.” The geese lagged behind them.
“You’re saying I’m still hung up on him.” Impatience nipped at the edge of her voice.
“Not at all. You don’t seem hung up on him to me, but you’ve been through a lot, and your brain and your emotions are scrambling to catch up. And while you sleep, they’re working on things so you don’t have to figure it all out by yourself in the daytime.”
She stopped walking. “That makes sense, but what does the tall tower mean?”
“Actually, I don’t put much stock into dream interpretation. To me, it’s just a jumble of things bouncing around in your head.”
“Like a bunch of puzzle pieces dumped on a card table.”
He smiled at her perfect analogy. “Just like that.”
“So you don’t think it means anything?”
“I think it could mean something, and because of that, dreams can be useful in helping you make sense of your problems, but I look at it from another perspective. Instead of trying to figure out what the dream means, I simply acknowledge it, store it in my memory, and let my subconscious work on it. Then later, when I’m actually thinking about my real life, a little piece of a dream may help me make sense of it all.”
She frowned. “So instead of figuring out what the dream means, you use the dream to figure out what your life means.”
“Yes. Because dreams are funny. The thing I dream about could be a mirror image of what needs to happen in my life, or it could be the opposite of what needs to happen, and if I go trying to analyze it, I’m likely to end up even more confused.”
Cecily motioned toward the walking trail, then pulled her phone out of her pocket to check the time. “We’re okay still.”
“Sounds good.” Graham threw the remainder of his crust into a trash barrel, and they settled into a slow pace, side by side, heading toward the playground. They wouldn’t be working off any pizza calories at this pace, but he didn’t care. Cecily seemed lost in her thoughts, and he was fine with that. He had his own thoughts that needed pondering. Like, what on earth was he doing? Cecily probably viewed their lunch date as nothing more than an impromptu counseling session, but his mind wasn’t buying it, and he knew that in the future he’d have to keep his thoughts and actions in check.
“My dad wants to know what happened between Brett and me.” She blurted out the words as though saying them faster would dull the sharp edges. “It’s like he needs to know I’m justified in getting a divorce.”
They walked twenty paces before Graham answered. “I suppose that’s understandable. After all, you’re his—”
“I’m his little girl, I know, and I’ll tell him everything—when I’m ready—but until then I just wish he would leave me alone. And definitely leave Brett alone.”
Graham knew her irritation wasn’t meant for him, and he sort of felt sorry for Dub, should Cecily ever unleash it on him. “If you never feel like telling him, that’s all right, you know.”
“I owe him an explanation.”
“No, you don’t.”
She nodded. “Okay, but I do want to explain eventually. Just so he’ll know it wasn’t—” Her hand went to her mouth, and she didn’t finish the sentence.
“It wasn’t your fault.” He finished it for her, willing her to believe it, hoping it was true.
“Brett was . . . Brett hurt me.”
“Physically?”
“No.” She peered in the direction of his truck.
Graham didn’t change the pace she had set, but he veered away from the path and started walking to the parking lot. She followed him. “You don’t owe me an explanation either.”
“I suppose I should pour out my heart to Shanty Espinosa, right? Have you ever been on her website?”
“I looked over it one day. She’s got a lot going on, and big-name bloggers are over there too.”
“Goes to show you never can tell.”
“Speaking of Shanty,” he said. “She invited me to a barbecue picnic out at her house on Saturday, and she mentioned that you were coming. I checked with Nina to make sure it wouldn’t bother her for me to be there, but I wanted to ask you as well, even though you’re not actually a client.” He pulled at his earlobe. “Just seems
appropriate somehow.”
“Honestly, I had been a little worried about that party. Having you there might actually help settle my nerves. Do you think we could ride together?”
Graham tripped over a rock and caught himself. “Sure, if that will make it less awkward for you.”
“It’s the walking-into-a-room-full-of-strangers part.”
“I hate that too.” Okay, so he would take her to Shanty’s barbecue, but after that, he would keep a safe distance.
They were standing in front of his truck now, and she turned toward him. “Thank you for letting me rattle on about my silly dreams and whatnot.” She looked up at him, but the sun blinded her and made her squint.
Graham took a half step to the left so his shadow would shield her eyes, wishing he could shield her from all of life’s troubles. Wishing she would trust him to do it. Wishing he could hug her again. “That’s what I’m here for, Cecily,” he said. “To help you.”
He just hoped he could help instead of hurt her.
Chapter Eighteen
Group text from Shanty to Cecily and Nina: What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us. (Ralph Waldo Emerson said that)
Nina: thats cool thanks
Cecily: What is it with RWE?
Shanty had suggested I bring Dad to her backyard barbecue, and while I knew she meant well, the thought of going with my dad reminded me of kindergarten when I refused to walk into class without him by my side. The party gave me the same nervous jitters, mainly because I had no idea who would be there, other than Shanty and Nina. And Graham. Maybe I shouldn’t have asked to ride with him, but it seemed all right somehow. Neutral.
As I hiked from our back deck down into the canyon, I worried, not about the barbecue, but about Shanty’s Be You Challenge. It had fallen onto the floor of my car with a jumble of Midnight Oil cups, and it had stayed there until I fished it out, deciding I’d ignored the assignment long enough. It had been four or five days—depending on how you counted it—but knowing I’d see Shanty the next day gave me an urgency to at least begin the task.
I sat on a natural ledge in the canyon wall, letting my feet dangle over the side. A spiral notebook lay open on my lap, and Shanty’s list perched on the rocky ground next to me, the corner tucked beneath my thigh to keep it from drifting away. I frowned down at the first challenge.
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