Skin Deep

by J. M. Stone

  I felt heat at my back an instant before I heard Luke whisper in my ear, “Is your mom feeding my dog from a FORK at the kitchen TABLE? Oh, God. She’s feeding him egg. Is that egg? That’s egg. Oh, shit, he’s staying here tonight. Seriously, he’s not coming home with us because his egg farts are the worst!”

  I giggled, turning my head to look at him and when I did, I noticed that everyone in the family had gathered silently in the kitchen, including my niece and nephew, watching my crazy mother feed a huge yellow lab at the kitchen table like it was an everyday thing.

  The silence finally registered with my mom. Either that or she felt all of our eyes boring into her in disbelief. She looked up and glared at each of us before saying, “What? You’ve never seen a dog eat Thanksgiving dinner before? It IS a holiday, you know, and he’s part of the family now, too. I’m just sad that he can’t have the turkey, too, but its bad for dogs. Now all of you, go wash up for dinner, and Calland, you can set the dining room table. Leah, you help. Emma and Jenna, start carrying food into the dining room. Move!”

  We all sprang into action, and so the day went. You’d swear that Doug was one of Mom’s grandchildren, the way she spoiled him and doted on him as well as Hayden and Jarrod. Thanksgiving dinner with everyone crowded around the table went off with only minor hiccups, those mainly being Calland throwing the dinner rolls at everyone instead of passing the basket around, Calland refusing to let me have any mac & cheese until my mom threatened to beat him with a wooden spoon (again), and Calland teaching Hayden how to fling peas across the table at her mom with her spoon. (Sensing a pattern here?)

  After dinner and dessert was done, everything cleaned up, and the leftovers designated (I got ALL of the mac & cheese, bitches! Muahahahaha!), the guys headed into the living room to watch football, the kids took Doug out back to play, and me, my mom, and my sisters all sat in the kitchen playing double solitaire.

  We spent a few pleasant hours just enjoying everyone’s company before we started to disperse. Everyone was giving hugs and kisses and punches (that was Calland, go figure) and grabbing their designated bag of leftovers. I helped my sister and Noah get everything into their car, including a miraculously half-asleep Hayden, and headed back in to get my stuff and say bye to my mom and dad. When I got to the door, Mom was hugging Luke and Brandon and pushing them out towards me. Luke had my coat over his arm and Brandon had my bag of leftovers, but I didn’t see Doug.

  I gave her a quick hug, telling her Happy Thanksgiving and thanking her for a great dinner before I asked about Doug. “Um, Mom? We need to-”

  She pushed me toward Luke with a smile and wave, shouting, “Happy Thanksgiving! Thanks for coming and spending the day with us, come back soon, okay?”

  I shouted to be heard over her. “Mom! We need to get Doug! Remember? The dog you fed at the kitchen table?”

  “He’s fine, Emma. Bye now!” With that, she turned and shut the door in our faces.

  I turned to Luke, a bemused expression on my face and nodded as he sputtered, “Did? Did she just-? She just stole my dog!”

  I grabbed his hand and Brandon’s, pulling them towards the car as I said, “Yep. She did. We’ll come get him tomorrow. Let’s go home and watch a movie or something, okay?” We got in and Luke started backing down the drive. “Besides,” I continued, “she fed him eggs with dinner, remember?”

  Luke nodded his head as he drove away from my parents’ house and Doug, a slow grin spreading across his face and Brandon started laughing. “Oh, yes. She did, didn’t she.”

  My phone rang around one in the morning when Luke and I were snuggled up together in bed. When I answered, my mom shouted, “Emma! Come get this dog! Oh, God, he keeps farting and its stinking up the whole house! Seriously! Your poor dad is wearing a clothespin on his nose!”

  I just laughed and simply said, “Goodnight, Mom. Happy Thanksgiving!” before I hung up on her and cuddled back up to Luke.

  Chapter 17

  “Good morning, Floyd Grim’s office, how can I help you?” It was the Monday after Thanksgiving and everything was back to normal. Well, as normal as could be with the wacky people in my life.

  “Hey, sweetheart. Did you have a good Thanksgiving?”

  That weird raspy voiced creepy guy was calling me again! “Can I help you, sir?” I asked, hesitantly. Although I had told him about the weird hang up calls and the other calls Creepy had made to the office, Floyd wasn’t in the office with me at that moment. He was down in Domestic Relations Court on a custody case that was scheduled for a half-day trial, which meant he wouldn’t be back in the office until around noon, unless they settled early. Given the case that it was, I had no hopes of that happening.

  “Just wanted to check on my beautiful girl and to wish her a Happy Thanksgiving. Did you get the rose I left for you last Wednesday?”

  Oh. My. God. He had been to my work? That was him? I tried to keep my voice calm as I asked again, “Sir, is there something I can help you with?”

  “Don’t ignore me, Emma. I asked you a question. Did you get my rose?” His voice began to rise, still retaining its raspy quality, and becoming even more creepy, if that was possible.

  “Um, I’m not sure what you are talking about, sir. Now, if-”

  “NO! You lie, Emma. You lie and you got my rose because I saw you get it. I saw the way you smiled when you held it up to your nose and smelled it. It smelled beautiful, just like you. Why did you lie to me, Emma? Why?” His voice was plaintive, almost whiny now.

  I took a deep breath, panicking as his words began to sink in. He’d seen me pick up the rose? He was watching me? Oh, shit… “Sir, if there’s nothing I can help you with or you aren’t calling for an appointment, I must insist that you not call here anymore.” I couldn’t mask the shakiness of my voice, and I prayed that he wouldn’t pick up on it, wouldn’t know how much he was affecting me.

  I replaced the phone onto its cradle, trying to make myself believe that the man wasn’t shrieking in rage when I’d done so. The phone rang again immediately after I lifted my hand from it and I jumped, jerking my hand back and letting out a shriek. I didn’t want to answer it, but I had no choice.

  “Hel-hello? Floyd Grim’s office?” I stuttered into the phone.

  “Emma?”

  Allie’s voice rang through the line and I shuddered in relief. “Allie! Oh, thank God!”

  “What’s going on, sweetie? What happened?” she asked, her voice rising with concern.

  I explained quickly about the phone call I’d just received and she hung up as soon as I was done, telling me she’d be at the office in minute before she clicked off the phone. When she got there (she must have broken land speed records getting there) I was still shaken. I picked up the phone at her urging and called the police to make a report. They weren’t very helpful, the officer on duty only reluctantly taking a report down to have on file and gave me the report number quickly before hanging up on me.

  I turned to Allie, shaking my head in disbelief and rage.

  “What’s wrong now? They took the report, right?” she asked.

  “Yeah, but he didn’t want to. He just kept telling me that there’s really nothing that they can do because he didn’t threaten me and hasn’t caused me harm in any way. I explained that he’d been calling repeatedly, but he said the same thing basically. I have no number that shows up on the Caller ID to prove that all the hang ups were him and blah blah blah…grr!” I threw my hands up.

  Allie stayed with me, saying that she had had her mom go take over at her store so she could be there with me. When Floyd came in the office, looking tired but satisfied (he won his case), I filled him in. He was concerned and told me that he’d be getting me some sort of recording device for my phone system.

  The next morning, he’d left a box sitting on my desk and I hooked everything up, impressed by the gadget that allowed me to record my phone conversations by pressing a little button on the little box that I attached to the hands free/headset outl
et on the phone. It made me feel a little more secure having that option, but I didn’t get any more calls for the rest of the week.

  On Friday night, I had Luke swing me by my house to check on it. I’d finally moved out everything that I wanted and told Leah that she could live there as long as she had the utilities switched over into her name and made the mortgage payments on time. She’d been pretty good about it so far, and for being such a ditz, she really was responsible.

  I grabbed the few pieces of mail that hadn’t been forwarded to Luke’s house and we headed home. I thumbed through the mail, most of it junk, as Luke drove us home. One of the envelopes was plain white with my name typed on it, no address, and no return address. I felt a chill skitter down my spine as I turned it over in my hands a couple times before I took a deep breath and opened it. My breath whooshed out on a sigh of relief when I pulled out a brightly colored piece of paper with birthday party information printed on it for an old friend of mine and Allie’s son’s third birthday.

  Shaking my head at myself, I tossed all the mail into my purse and reached over to grab Luke’s hand. When we got home, Brandon and Allie were sitting on the couch with Doug laying at their feet and Jackson was in the kitchen making microwave popcorn.

  I grinned at Jackson before trotting over and giving him a hug. “Hey! When did you get back? Did you have a good Thanksgiving?” I asked him.

  Luke walked over and did the one-armed-macho-man-hug thing with Jackson while he replied to my questions. “I got in about an hour ago and yeah, it was okay. Not as fun as yours sounded, though!”

  I grinned at him and we spent the rest of the evening trading stories and watching movies. I curled up with Luke in the oversized armchair and Allie sat between Brandon and Jackson. I could have sworn there was a few times that I saw Allie slap hands away from her. I’m not sure whose hands they were, but judging by the red creeping over Allie’s cheeks, she wasn’t totally against them touching her.

  I looked at the clock, surprised to see that it was almost two in the morning, stretched and climbed off of Luke. He stared up at me, asking if I was ready for bed. I nodded and we said our goodnights before heading up the stairs. I turned to look at Allie and winked, then waggled my brows at her. She glared at me, well, tried to anyway, but her lips twitched and she winked back.

  We got up early the next morning and I went over to Jenna’s house for a while since Luke had a couple things to do at the stop. When I got there, Noah and Jarrod had gone out for a “men’s day” and Hayden was begging Jenna to have a “grill’s day” and let her give her a makeover. Seeing the potential for mega laughs at my sister’s expense, I joined in with Hayden’s cajoling and we cracked Jenna in about five minutes.

  We headed upstairs to Jenna’s en suite and plopped her down at the stool in front of her vanity. I played assistant to Hayden, handing her items, but I drew the line at the curling iron. No way was I getting blamed for burn marks across the forehead! Hayden used her little hands to basically tie Jenna’s hair in knots all over her head, and then proceeded to make Jenna look like a whorish clown with makeup. She ended up with hot pink lipstick (who even uses that these days anyway?) surrounding her entire mouth, including her lips and teeth, lime green eyeshadow (Jenna and I seriously needed to talk about her makeup bag) smeared across her eyelids and high into her eyebrows, and red stripes of blush decorating her cheeks.

  Hayden picked up Jenna’s eyeliner and pointed it toward her mother’s face. Jenna squeezed her eyes shut, bravely allowing her to attempt to put it on. I snickered behind my hand, earning me a glare from Jenna, when Hayden colored over her mom’s eyes, then her forehead, like she was using a crayon.

  She stood back with a flourish and nodded at her mom like she was an artist acknowledging her latest masterpiece. I grabbed my cell phone out of my pocket and snapped a few quick pics, trying not to laugh out loud at Jenna’s face when she looked in the mirror. I had to leave the room when Jenna struggled to tell Hayden that she made her mommy look very pretty but it was too fancy to wear around the house. She finally got the okay to wash her face off and Hayden and I went downstairs while Jenna cleaned herself up.

  “Aun’ Emmy?” Hayden piped up in her little voice.

  “Yeah, baby doll?” I asked her, giving her a quick squeeze as she cuddled into my side on the couch.

  “Whas’ a gorgamsm?”

  “A what?” I asked her, not understanding what she said.

  “A gorgamsm. I heared Mommy talkin’ bout it on the ‘pone. Whas’ is it?”

  “Um, I’m not sure, honey. What did Mommy say about it on the phone?” I asked, kinda scared about the answer I would get.

  “Hers said it was sumfing that my Daddy gived her an’ it was ‘mazin’ an’ made her toes curled up. If I have a gorgamsm will my toes curled up, too?”

  I choked, completely at a loss as to what to tell her, but thankfully Jenna came down the stairs then. I quickly jumped up and told Hayden that she should ask her mother about that one before I kissed her cheek, patted Jenna’s arm as I ran past, and bolted out the door.

  I headed downtown to Skin Deep, intending to surprise Luke. He was supposed to call me when he was done and on his way back home and I would meet him there, but I figured, what the hell? Maybe we could leave together if he got done before Brandon and I would just let him use my car to get home in.

  I parked the car and headed inside. There was a young couple waiting in the lobby and I smiled at them as I walked past the counter and headed toward Luke’s studio. I froze in the open doorway as I surveyed the scene before me.

  A colorfully tattooed and artfully pierced woman was leaning into Luke’s chest, her arms wrapped around his neck, and Luke’s hands were on her hips. She was a couple inches taller than me, her arms sleeved in bright colors, her eyebrow, lip, and nose pierced, and she was built like a wet dream. (Well, what I imagined would make a man have a wet dream…what? Its better than a brick shithouse!) She had long black hair, deep brown eyes, and she was gorgeous, exotic looking, and putting her lips on Luke!

  My stomach flipped and my heart thudded painfully in my chest as I spun on my heel and raced for the front of the shop. I ran into Brandon as he was coming out from behind the counter and he grabbed my shoulders, frantically asking me what was wrong. I hadn’t realized I was crying until he asked me why I was, but I didn’t answer.

  I wrenched myself away from him, running flat out for the door as I heard Luke shout my name behind me. I threw myself into my car and tore out of the lot, trying to force myself to not look back, but I didn’t listen. I saw Luke run out into the street behind me in my rearview mirror, watching as he threw his arms up in the air and then hung his head before I jerked my eyes away from the mirror to try to concentrate on the road.

  My cell phone began to ring in my purse on the seat beside me and I ignored it. Without realizing it, I found myself in the parking lot of Allie’s shop. I wiped the tears away as best I could and walked inside.

  I waved and shook my head at the girl ringing someone out at the counter when she stared at me in concern, opening her mouth to say something. I found Allie in her office going through some boxes that someone had apparently brought in as a donation. She looked up at me in surprise, a smile beginning and quickly fading from her face as she took in my appearance.

  I’m not a pretty crier, never have been. Women in movies cry pretty, their faces don’t get red, their noses don’t run…why can’t it be like that in real life? When I cry, my eyes swell and become bloodshot and demon red, my face turns splotchy, and my nose runs like a faucet. I can’t hide it when I’ve been upset.

  Without a word, Allie dropped what she was holding in her hands, walked over to me, and enfolded me in her arms, rocking me slightly from side to side. I buried my face in her shoulder, letting the tears fall uncontrollably for a few minutes before they subsided into hiccupping little sobs.

  She pulled back from me, wiping my tears away with her thumbs before asking, “Wh
at happened, sugarbear? Tell Auntie Allie…”

  I gave her the short version of the story and without a beat she went out front and shut her store down for the day. I followed her to her house, still blinking away the tears, and ignoring my phone that had been ringing nonstop.

  Allie and I sat curled up on the couch together with huge portions of our special sundaes in our hands. She shook her head at me as if trying to understand and began asking questions again.

  “So you walked in and saw her kiss Luke?”

  I nodded pathetically, taking a big bite of ice cream and wine cooler even though I felt like getting sick. “She had her arms all around his neck and everything and his hands were on her hips.”

  “Emma, maybe it wasn’t what it looked like?” she said hesitantly.

  I shook my head and glared at her. “No, it was exactly what it looked like! I trusted him, Allie! I let him get under my skin after I even told him I didn’t think it was a good idea. I…I told him I loved him, Allie. He told me that he was different, that he wanted me, that I was his. But I’m stupid. I knew better! I knew that I’d end up getting hurt. He’s just like Douche Bag Brad!”

  “What did he say when you told him you loved him?” Allie asked me.

  “He said, ‘I know’, that ass! I opened myself up and that’s all he said! Cryptic caveman douche bag asshole…” I muttered.

  I sat my bowl down on her coffee table, leaving the remains of my ice cream to melt. I leaned back and closed my eyes, opening them again immediately when all I saw was Luke and that bitch standing together. I glanced at my phone, wondering if I should turn it on again, but deciding that I wasn’t going to. If my family needed me, they would know exactly how to find me.

  Allie patted my hand and got up to take our bowls into the kitchen. I heard her phone ring and heard her answer it, speaking softly to someone on the other line. I pushed myself up off the couch to go to the bathroom to blow my nose and wipe my face, but I froze when I passed the kitchen.