by L. C. Morgan
I shrugged her off. “I don’t know. I’m just not.”
Taking advantage of her proximity, I snatched my pen back to finish grading papers. She snatched it right back once it hit the paper, this time chucking it across the room. I glared at the little red dot before glaring at the floor where the pen had landed. When I turned my glare on her, she smirked, raising a brow as if to ask what I was going to do about it.
“Real nice, Alyssa. Let’s just teach the kids it’s okay to steal and throw other people’s property. I’m sure the parents will really appreciate that.”
“Learn to chillax, Teach.” Alyssa rolled her eyes then looked out over the class, gesturing toward the children. “They’re not even paying attention.”
Grabbing another red pen from my red pen cup, I looked back down at my papers. I was quicker this time, pulling the pen out of reach before she could snatch and trash it again.
“Okay, fine.” After sliding off the desk, Alyssa stood and straightened her skirt. “Be that way. But you better be in a better mood by tomorrow because the three of us are hanging out and we’re all going to have fun, whether you like it or not.”
I watched her walk away out of the corner of my eye, letting out a breath when she shut the door behind her. I had a lot of things I had to get done before the conferences on Tuesday. Things that needed my full attention. Things that were going to cause dinner to be late tonight. I was already stressing enough over what I was going to cook. I didn’t need anything else slowing me down.
To be honest, I didn’t really want to talk about what was bothering me, seeing as Alyssa had already told me what she thought—that I should jump on that ship and kindly sail it all the way to port “O” or shut the hell up about it for good. I’d never sailed anything in my life. It was kind of hard to be excited when the thought made me feel as nervous as it did.
I got less accomplished than I hoped to during arts and crafts hour. Little Bobby got a ball of something stuck up his nose, and when he couldn’t blow it out I had to call for backup before personally escorting him to the school nurse. During snack time, more than the usual amount of milk was spilled, which I had to clean up. A fight broke out between Molly and Jada that I had to break up, so nobody got to play with the doll. Then finally, at the end of the day, when everybody was set to go home, Kaylee’s foster father forgot it was his day to pick her up and I had to console her while we waited for her foster mother. By the time we got her out of my arms and settled in the car it was going on five o’clock. I still had a handful of conference points to plan. The end seemed like it was nowhere in sight. But once seven thirty rolled around, I was done—whether I really was or not. And I packed up my stuff and headed out, stopping at a burger joint on my way home.
Coll’s truck was sitting in the driveway when I got there. I pulled up behind it and parked, contemplating if I should knock or not. The lights were off. All except for the security light that clicked on once I got out of the car. The last thing I wanted to do was wake him after a long trip out to sea. It was hard work. He was probably tired. So I knocked lightly a couple times before leaving the bag on his porch and jumping back in my car to head over to my house.
I was wide awake by the time I walked through the door. Once changed into something more comfortable, I pulled out a roll of cookie dough, nearly eating half while I baked the other, my mind going in all different directions. I really needed to go for a run, but there were probably bears and I was never going to finish those conference plans if I didn’t work on them. Amber was coming in less than twelve hours and would no doubt demand all of my undivided attention. She was going to be so bored here. I could just hear it. Fish? Hailey, really? Fish? Just kill me now.
The oven dinged, and I set the cookies on the counter, letting them cool before stacking every last one onto a plate. I didn’t need any and Amber wouldn’t touch them. I always did envy her willpower. If only I had a shred of it.
After pulling on my boots, I walked the cookies over to set them on the porch right beside the bag.
Both the bag and plate were still sitting on his porch when I woke and looked out the window the next morning. Both still there when I left for the airport. I stopped by and knocked for good measure, but was met with nothing, nada, before I was back in my car, settling in for a nice, long trip.
My drive to Seattle topped out at four hours twenty minutes. Google Maps said right under four. But between a bathroom break and how hard the rain had started coming down it tacked on a good forty minutes to the trip.
Not that it mattered. Amber’s plane was delayed an additional two hours because of the weather. I ended up walking around the terminal to help work out the kinks until I got a text that she had landed and was on her way to baggage claim. I heard her squeal before I saw her head bopping up and down in the crowd.
“Oh, wow. Look at you. You cut your hair.”
I went to play with the blunt end and she swatted my hand away.
“Don’t touch it. Don’t look at it. Don’t talk about it,” she warned. “Angie says I have to wait until it grows out at least three inches before she can glue in the extensions. And that’s if I want to look as busted as Britney on her first attempt at a comeback.” Holding her forehead, she bit her lip to keep from crying. “I don’t know what I’m going to do ‘til then. What do I do? Do I embrace it? Do I buy a wig? What do I do? Tell me. What?” She pulled me closer to better see the look of desperation in her eyes.
“Well.” Patting her hand, I took another look at her hair.
“I said don’t look at it!”
Her outburst caused a few people to stop and stare. I grabbed her hand and pulled her away from the middle of the floor and being the center of attention. Her and that hair.
“Okay, sorry. Jeez. Let’s just grab your bags and get out of here. We’ll buy a bag of Doritos on the way. You’ll drink a Mountain Dew. One with real sugar from the sweet cane of Mexico. I’ll have a diet because calories. And when we get back, we’ll get you good and drunk and we’ll talk about anything you want. Anything at all.” Anything to get her mind off the hair.
“Okay. It’s the purple ones.” Amber grabbed a purple suitcase, then another. She passed me a third before throwing a duffel over her shoulder.
I grabbed the hard case she let get away before turning to her and asking, “Just how many bags did you pack?”
“This is it.”
“Five? Really, Amber? You packed five bags?” Just how long did she think she was staying?
“Uh, yeah. One for my lights. One for my heavies. One for my shoes, my hair products.” She briefly pouted. “And another for my makeup.” She pointed to the hard case in my hand. “Why? Don’t you have an extra bag for your makeup?”
I gave her a look. “My makeup, yeah.”
“Well then, you get it.” Taking off toward the entrance, she yelled over her shoulder, “Let’s go. My patience is running thin and I’m more than ready for that Mexican Mountain Dew you promised me.”
The drive back home seemed to last even longer than the drive to pick up Amber. While she filled me in on everything Chicago, I nodded and gasped at all the right moments. My steering wheel was covered in Dorito cheese before we even reached Clallam. I considered licking it off until Amber encouraged me not to. Though it was more like threatened if I did. I sad-faced a little when she took out a wet wipe and rubbed it down at a red light instead.
It had stopped raining by the time we hit up the liquor store and got something more fulfilling to eat. I considered getting Coll something but thought better of it. I wasn’t ready to go down that road with Amber just yet.
My heart skipped a beat when I pulled into the driveway and saw his truck, like it knew I was hiding something from my best friend. The bag and plate of cookies were gone from the porch.
“What are you smiling about?” Amber asked.
“Nothing.” I looked straight ahead as I pulled up to park.
I ignored the fact that I coul
d feel her eyes on me and climbed out to grab some of her bags. She followed close behind, complaining about mud holes along the way.
“So your landlord owns both these properties, huh?” The look on her face told me everything she was thinking before she said it. “Do the people over there look as busted as the house they live in?”
“Person.”
“What?”
“There’s just one person who lives there.”
“Oh.”
“And, no. They don’t look as busted as the house.”
After setting two glasses on the counter, Amber grabbed the wine bottle out of my hands. “Well he might not be busted, but someone sure is.” Popping the cork, she poured us both a drink.
“What? You don’t know what you’re talking about. Besides, who said it was a he?”
She handed me a glass filled to the rim. “You didn’t have to tell me. I can see it.”
“See what?”
“The smile in your eyes.”
Taking a sip of what tasted like toilet water, I successfully deflected. “Enough about me. What’s up with you?” I pointed to the one thing she didn’t want to talk about. The hair.
She sucked down her full glass then poured another. “I think Trevor might like boys.” Taking another big sip, she filled her glass again.
“That’s why you cut your hair? To—”
“To seem more attractive to him. Yeah.” She took off for the living room and I followed. We both plopped down on the couch. “Anyway, it was a big mistake because, well, my hair.” She pointed out the obvious before continuing. “And it didn’t work. He still wants nothing to do with me. I’m beyond stupid.”
“You’re not stupid,” I assured her, and she let me pat her head. “You just did a stupid thing.” It was surprisingly soft.
Pouting her lip, she set her glass down on the table and then laid her head in my lap. “Remind me again why we’re friends.”
Setting my own glass down, I continued to pet her like a dog. “Because our mothers met in prenatal Pilates and they wouldn’t have it any other way.”
She snorted a laugh. “Right. Why else would I be friends with such an insensitive bitch like you?”
What started as a crappy night turned into a spectacular bash-your-exes evening. We laughed. We cried. We cringed when we remembered Zach with the hairy back.
“Eww! Oh my God, Mike and the toes! I forgot all about the toes!”
I didn’t see how she could. Maybe because it was my toes he sucked on and not hers. My toes. Not hers. Vomiting in my mouth a little, I shivered.
By the bottom of the second bottle, I kissed Amber goodnight and headed to bed, looking out the window as I passed by.
Low and behold, there was my neighbor. All six foot something of him, rocking in his rocking chair. When he waved, I waved then slowly closed the blinds. I started for the bedroom before changing my mind and turning around to head outside instead.
I gave myself an internal pep talk as he rocked back and forth, looking as cool as the late night air. I didn’t even think he noticed me at first.
“Evenin’,” he greeted, finally looking over when I walked up.
“Hey.” I pointed to his porch. “Mind if I sit?”
He nodded once. “By all means.”
He continued to rock while I took a seat, leaning back against the post to face him.
“So to what do I owe the pleasure? You had enough of your company over there?”
“How did you know I had company?”
“I saw two shadows and nobody’s left yet. Your boyfriend visiting or something?”
I snorted a laugh.
Poor flat-chested Amber and her haircut. At least she got what she was going for.
“Hardly. That’s my friend Amber from home,” I explained.
He slowly nodded his head. “Home. And where’s that exactly?”
“Chicago.”
He hummed. “Chicago’s a long ways away from here.”
I nodded back. “That it is.”
“So what brought you all the way out here? No teaching jobs in the city? Seems hard to believe.”
“Yeah well, they pretty much all wanted someone with experience. So, I came here to get it.” I shrugged. “This is me getting it.”
We sat in silence listening to the bay for a moment.
“You fixin’ to go back after?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. Depends on how this year goes, I guess. If there’s anything here worth staying for.”
“You mean besides the view?”
I smiled out over the cliff. “It is a pretty good view.”
“That it is.”
I turned my smile on him and he smiled back, both of us amused by his teasing.
“Well, I think I’m gonna get going.”
“All right.”
Standing, I dusted off my pants. “This was nice. We should do it again.”
“Anytime,” he said, and I descended the stairs, turning slightly to wish him a goodnight. With a nod, he gave me a lazy salute and started to rock back and forth in his chair again.
I could still hear him rocking when I lay down on my bed, going over and over our conversation in my head. I fell asleep with a smile on my face.
Chapter Six
I woke the next morning to the sound of my own squeaky screen door slamming shut.
Rolling out of bed, I pulled a sweater on over my tank and poked my head out my bedroom door.
I waited and listened, only emerging when a muted banging came from the kitchen. I found Amber holding a bowl of pancake batter, a pair of huge sunglasses on her face, and a mess of pans at her feet.
“Morning, sunshine! How’d you sleep?”
I jumped with the volume of her voice. “Why are you being so loud?”
She ignored me, bending to pick up a pan before kicking the others out of her way.
“So, who was at the door?” I asked, sitting down at the table.
Whisking away, Amber smiled down at the batter. “Your neighbor.”
She turned away to flick water on the pan and make sure it was hot enough, leaving me to wonder what they could have talked about.
“And?”
“And what?” She played dumb.
“What did he want?”
“You know, it’s funny.”
Sighing, I laid my head in my hands. “What’s funny?”
“Oh, just the fact that I was drunk, but I wasn’t so drunk that I wouldn’t remember you telling me that boy out there was the hottest thing this side of the planet.” Pouring a dollop of batter onto the pan, she shook her head and sighed. “Seriously, Hailey. That brown hair and those brown eyes … I can just imagine what your kids would look like.”
I snorted. “Please.”
“Please yourself.” Covering her mouth, she snickered. “Don’t pretend like you haven’t thought about it.”
“I haven’t. You of all people know how I feel about kids.”
Flipping the pancake, she nodded. “Anybody else’s but your own. I know. But still.” After tossing a pancake on a plate, she handed it to me. “You have to admit they’d be pretty.”
I rubbed the bridge of my nose. “So, what did he want? What did he say?”
“Not much. He just introduced himself as your neighbor. Said thanks for the cookies and cold burger.” She eyed me from over her shoulder. “Then he handed me that plate over there and he was on his way.” She turned off the stove then sat down opposite me. “Oh, and he invited us to the bar tonight.”
“What?”
“The bar. He invited us.”
“Which bar?”
She shrugged. “He didn’t tell me the name. He just said we’d know it ‘cause it was the only one in town.” Leaning across the table, she stole a piece of my pancake. “So you wanna go?”
“Why didn’t you make your own pancake? Aren’t you eating?”
She shook her head. “I don’t eat breakfast. So we’re going, right?”
“Well, if you don’t eat breakfast then why are you eating mine?”
“Hailey, focus.” She snapped her fingers in my face. “Are we going to the damn bar or are we not?”
“We are not.”
“What? Why?” She drew it out, bouncing in her seat dramatically like a little kid.
I stabbed another piece of pancake with my fork and pointed it at her. “Just so I could hear you whine like that.”
Her glare threw daggers at me, and I tried to stab her hand when it attempted to invade my plate again.
“I’ll make you another pancake.”
“I don’t need another pancake. I don’t even need this one.” I thought back on all those Doritos I’d readily consumed.
Huffing, she fell back in her seat. “Well then, what? What do you want? Name it.”
“Your pink sweater.”
“The crocheted one that hangs off the shoulder?”
“That’s the one.”
“Okay. But just to wear to the bar, right?”
I shook my head. “No. To keep forever.”
Amber briefly thought about it. “Okay, deal.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah. Seriously. You need to get out of this house. And it’ll give me a chance to try and work with this tragedy.” Amber patted down the spoiler sticking out of the back of her head, but it just popped right back up again.
“Hey, I get out of the house.”
Amber gave me a look.
“What? I do. Alyssa and I hang out on the porch all the time.” As if she had heard me, there was a knock on the door. “Speak of the devil and she shall appear.”
“How do you know it’s her?”
“Her signature knock.” It was as obnoxious as a woodpecker on crack.
I let Amber answer the door and introduce herself. As predicted, they hit it off immediately.
“So, you’ve already met the orally-fixated neighbor, huh? Did she tell you about what he did to her finger?”
While Alyssa filled Amber in, I cleaned up the kitchen, every so often eyeing the crumpled up bag of Doritos. I desperately wanted to stick my head in it and hide from those two. I was also still starving. All that one lousy pancake did was make me hungrier.