by Izzy Daniels
“Speaking, may I ask who is calling?”
“My name is Brooke but I’m calling in regards to an incident involving a restaurant shooting that you were witness to. Do I have the right Paul Sherman?”
“Unfortunately, you do. You’re talking about the incident at Luca’s nearly ten years ago?” He asks me in a deep voice.
“Yes, I am. Good, it’s you,” I say with relief. “Listen, I’m very sorry to bring it up. I know it must have been a traumatic time for you, but it’s important that I ask you something related to it.” I hesitate to say anything further. I want to give him the opportunity to refuse talking about it.
“Go ahead,” he says instead. I clear my throat before continuing.
“Martha Rhodes, is it true that she was… that they.. was she shot in the head? I’m sorry to ask,” I say as carefully as I can. There’s no good way to say something so horrible.
“Why are you asking me this? Are you a reporter? A police officer?” He demands.
“No, I know it seems terribly rude, but I’m a close friend of Ms. Rhodes’ daughter and I’ve been trying to get some details straight,” I tell him.
“Wait, you know Emmaline?” He asks, his voice changing from suspicious to surprise.
“I do. Did you know her?” I ask, puzzled.
“Oh my god. Thank god. Is she okay?” He implores urgently.
“She is… how do you know her?”
“Well, Martha, was my girlfriend for nearly three years. I had come to think of Emma as my own daughter,” he explains. “I can’t believe this. Where are you?”
“We’re in Virginia,” I answer. “I vaguely remember Emma mentioning you, but I didn’t know that your relationship with her mom was that serious.”
“Virginia. So she’s with Martha’s brother then,” he murmurs to himself. “I couldn’t find anything out. Martha would never have wanted her to be there, though. I have regretted every single day since that we didn’t make it official. Martha and I had talked about getting married, but she wanted to take it slow for Emma’s sake. If we’d had time I would have married her and adopted Emma as my own. In a flash, I lost the love of my life and her daughter. To answer your question, Emma didn’t know how serious we were. She was so young and we thought we had all the time in the world.” His voice breaks and I can hear his uneven breaths through the phone.
“I’m so sorry, Mr. Sherman. I can’t even imagine how painful it must be for you,” I tell him. Tears are brimming my eyes, thinking about him witnessing the love of his life getting murdered in cold blood in front of him.
“Is Emma there with you? I’d love to speak to her, if she’s willing,” his voice is still clogged with emotion.
“No, she’s not, I’m sorry. She doesn’t actually know I was going to reach out to you,” I say, guilt pecking away at me.
“Oh, I see. How do you know her exactly? Why were you calling to confirm how Martha died?” He asks.
“Well, um, I’m her girlfriend,” I admit. “I asked because there was a discrepancy in what Emma was told and what the news articles claimed. I needed to see which one was right.”
“I see. I can tell you care for her a great deal and that makes me very happy,” he says. He takes a deep breath. “Martha lost her life instantly from the gunshot to her head. How did Emma believe she was killed?”
“Then the articles were right. Somehow, Emma came to believe that she died in agony from a bullet wound to the stomach,” I reply.
“Oh, good heavens, no,” Paul gasps in horror. “Who would have told a child that? Was it her uncle? Martha always said he was an unpleasant man. After her mother, Emma’s grandmother, disowned her for getting pregnant before marriage, she sought out her brother for some familial connection. All her attempts were unsuccessful. I hope he’s changed for the better with Emma in his life.”
“I haven’t met him and Emma doesn’t mention him much. She barely talks to me about her family at all. She keeps a lot bottled up inside of her. She feels incredibly responsible for her mother’s death,” I reveal.
“Oh my. There is so much I want to talk to her about. Do you think you could tell her we talked and that I would love to speak with her? Please? I can fly there to talk in person if she is okay with that,” he asks earnestly.
“Yes, I can tell her. She’s at work right now, but I’ll talk to her when I see her in person. She doesn’t know that I’ve called and I need to explain it to her gently,” I say. “But thank you so much for answering my questions.”
I jot down his cell phone number and we say our goodbyes. I glance at the restaurant and debate going in to talk to her now, but she’s in the middle of her dinner rush. Besides, I need to figure out a way to broach this subject with her. I back out of my parking space and head home, my thoughts falling all over each other.
...
Over the course of the next three weeks, I never worked up the nerve to tell her I spoke to Paul. No time ever seemed the right time to drop that kind of bomb on her. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving and I really can’t tell her on a holiday. I called Paul and told him that I haven’t talked her yet, but that I still mean to. He was understanding and said that he’s waited so long to hear from her and that he’s just happy to know that she’s alive and healthy.
Emma is off at nine tonight and she’s going to stay the night for the fourth time. Every morning waking up next to her has been incredible. Her sleepy eyes and tangled hair melt my heart, but I haven’t so much as uttered the word love around her. When she looks at me though, her eyes shine. And she’s been very affectionate. When we went to the movies, she snuggled her head on my shoulder the entire time. She held my hand all through a trip to the grocery store, like she didn’t want to let go. At night, when she sleeps over, she touches me like… like she loves me. Maybe I’m imagining it. Even if she doesn’t love me, what we have is better than anything I’ve ever experienced. In time she will come to see that I really do love her. I’ll just be patient until then.
I hear the knock on my door and roll my eyes. No matter how many times I tell her she can just come in, she still knocks. When I open the doors I get a whiff of Italian spices on her and it’s delicious.
“Hi,” she says as she slides her shoes off and drops her bag on the floor. She slumps into my waiting arms and I rub my hand lightly up and down her back.
“Hi, welcome home,” I tell her. “How was work?” I can’t see her face so I don’t know if she flinched when I said ‘home’ but she probably did. One day, though. One day .
“Loooong. How was your day? How did the meeting with that guy go?” She asks and releases me, heading to the kitchen to grab a bottle of water. “That guy” is middle-age George Adderson. He just opened a business near the flower shop that caters to canines, called Scrub-A-Pup.
“Great, he wants to do a pretty generic website. He had no idea what I was talking about, I’m glad Barabara recommended me to him. After that, I did laundry,” I reply. “Have you eaten?”
“That was nice of her. Yeah, I had something at the restaurant. Did you finish off the leftover chicken parm?” Emma asks.
“Yes, it was perfect, thank you. Wanna cuddle and watch a movie?”
“Absolutely. Your pick, I’m going to take a quick shower,” she says with a grin. She starts stripping on her way to the bathroom and I suddenly realize I’m feeling very, very dirty. I should probably shower again.
…
“How do you tell if it’s done?” I ask. We’re leaning down in front of the oven, looking in its tiny window. We’ve been over at Jack’s house since the buttcrack of dawn. We watched the parade and played a few card games in between getting the food ready.
“Oh, I know, I know, pick me!” Jack calls from the other side of the countertop. He’s picking at the remaining finger foods while he watches football. I eye him doubtfully and he winks at me.
“Okay, smarty pants, how?” Emma asks as she stands up. She leans on the counter with her arms crossed.
>
“Duh, the smell test,” he states. “Does it smell done? Yes? Boom, done.”
“Right, of course, the smell test. How did I never think of that?” Emma asks sarcastically. “And then I guess after I smell it, I could stick a thermometer in it. Just to double check.”
“That’s what she said,” Nicholas claims as he passes by and grabs the last mini quiche from the plate before dropping back down next to his dad on the couch. They both shout at the same time at whatever just happened in the game. Gail is pacing around the dining room talking on the phone with her sister who lives in California. Jack says it’s normal for them to talk for hours because they’re super close, they just rarely get together for holidays.
Emma takes the potatoes off the stove and drains the boiling water. She patiently teaches me how to make mashed potatoes, gravy, and stuffing. When she checks the temperature on the turkey, she announces that it’s done. We all converge at the table but before anyone begins eating we all take a turn saying what we are thankful for. Even Jack takes it seriously.
“I’m thankful for the food and joy that surrounds me,” he tells everyone.
“I’m so thankful to have all of you in my life and for being right here, right now,” I say when it’s my turn. Emma nods agreement, our hands already entwined under the table. Her lips curve up into her special smile and I get lost in her sparkling eyes.
“I’m thankful for being able to share this meal with all of my favorite people,” says Emma.
At last, we all clink our glasses together and dig in. As I watch Emma eat, I reflect on our first Thanksgiving together. My lips curve up into an admiring grin. I don’t know how she does it, but I fall just a little more in love with her every day.
Her birthday is in four days and on every one of those days she either has work or school. Except for tomorrow because I made a secret call to Joe. He was more than happy to give me a day for her. I’m going to wake her up bright and early and take her to see the Atlantic. She’s never been there so there’s no time like the present to start crossing off places from her bucket list. I even made her a road trip playlist and packed an entire duffle bag of necessities: a warm blanket, changes of clothes, combos, candy bars, and other essentials.
Once we’ve stuffed ourselves to capacity, we all pitch in to make containers of leftovers and clean up. One football game ends and another starts, drawing the attention of all four of the men and Gail. She takes a seat right on Dave’s lap and they start talking about some injured player that’s finally back in the game. Emma finds me standing behind the couch and wraps her arms around my waist from the side.
“Want to watch football or want to go home?” She asks in a whisper close to my ear. It tickles. I wonder if she called it home because it’s my home or if she’s starting to think of it as hers, too. A girl can dream . I tighten my arm around her and peck the tip of her cute nose.
“Home, most definitely.”
13
Emmaline
Some kind of feather light tapping pulls me from a very lovely slumber. One eye is smushed against a soft pillow, so I open the other bleary one a tiny bit. Brooke is stretched out and staring at me, looking happy as can be. I blink a few times and realize it’s still dark out.
“Is it morning or night?” I ask, my voice thick with sleep. “And why are you smiling like that? It’s highly alarming.”
“It’s morning and I’m smiling because you’re adorable when you sleep. Did you know you snore a little bit? It’s less snore and more cat purring, though,” she mentions thoughtfully.
“You’re adorable,” I tell her. “And no, I had no idea and I could have gone the rest of my life without knowing. Wait. Did you wake me up just to tell me I snore?” I roll over and stretch my arm across her waist.
“No, of course not. I woke you up because we have somewhere to be,” she says giddily. I search my sleepy brain for any knowledge of what she’s talking about. It comes up totally empty. I don’t have to be at work until eleven.
“Uh.. we do? Where?” I ask, now more confused. For the first time in a long time, I’ve been getting decent sleep and I’m starting to become pretty fond of it. Which means, the only place I have to be is right here, sleeping next to my incredibly beautiful girlfriend.
“It’s a surprise. A really good surprise, I promise,” she placates.
“So, you’re saying I have to get up now?” I ask lamentably. She’s up early on her day off and it’s a surprise. Hmm. Brooke loves sleep more than anyone else in the entire world. What could she be up to?
“Yes, sleepyhead, but I have coffee waiting for you,” she answers in a singsong voice.
“Oh, thank god, I love… coffee.” Holy crap , I almost said ‘you’ . She pushes herself out of bed and grabs my hands and starts pulling me off of the bed. I tug one hand away and cling to the sheets. “Noooo! I’m not ready to leave the warm, happy place. You can’t make me! Ah!” I yelp as we both hit the floor with a thud. Her warm laugh is music to my ears.
“If I tell you the surprise will you promise to behave and get dressed like a grown up?” She beseeches.
“Maybe,” I say indifferently.
“What if I tell you and give you a kiss?” She asks. I pretend to think it over before I nod judiciously.
“I accept. But don’t ruin the surprise. I’ll just take the kiss. And the coffee,” I tell her. She leans over my sprawled body on the floor and her lips kiss me sweetly. I let her pull me to a stand and lead me toward the heavenly smell. I see a big duffle bag by the door and my eyebrows shoot up. “Are we hiding a dead body? Is that the surprise?”
She laughs and shakes her head at me. She lets me enjoy the coffee before she sends me off to shower. The news that she showered without me before I woke up, fills me with sadness. I’m addicted to seeing her naked.
After three attempts to carry the duffle bag on her own, she finally relents and lets me help her carry it down two flights of stairs and all the way to her jeep. We’re both breathless by the time we shove it into the jeep, where it barely fits. I watch Brooke review her mental list on her fingers, she excels at being prepared for anything. I’ve always hated surprises, but Brooke seems to love them. To be fair, I haven’t hated any of hers. All of hers have been perfect. She gets me. We both climb into our seats and she reaches into her center console and hands me two CDs labeled Our First Road Trip 1 and Our First Road Trip 2.
“Put the first one in when we get on the highway,” Brooke tells me.
“The highway? B, where are we going? I have work in a few hours, remember?” I ask, concerned that she legitimately forgot.
“No, you don’t,” she claims. “And you can’t have a genuine road trip if you don’t hit the highway.”
“What do you mean, ‘no I don’t’? Yes I do, at eleven,” I tell her matter-of-factly.
“What I mean is that, no, you really don’t,” Brooke says with a grin. “I talked to Joe and you have the day off, with pay.”
“Really? When? How? Why?” I ask her rapid-fire.
“You’re so full of questions today,” she says in feigned exasperation. “He said to consider it a birthday present. Please, relax. You’re the DJ today.” That just adds to all of my unanswered questions. I try to piece everything together. She got me off work, we’re getting on the highway, and evidently it’s a road trip so long it requires CDs.
“Okay, okay. I give. Where are you taking me?” I say a few minutes later. I’ve come up with blanks so far. Her eyes meet mine and she grins.
“We’re going to the beach,” she answers me cheerfully.
“What!? Are you serious?” I whoop with excitement.
“Yes!”
“We’re going to the beach? We’re going to the beach! Yay!” I shout joyously. “Road trip!” I lean over and kiss her, repeatedly all over her face. I’ve always wanted to see the beach. She just laughs and I release her face.
“You’re so cute. Alright. Let’s do this,” she says and starts t
he engine.
“You are the best,” I tell her sincerely. I buckle my seatbelt and grab the CDs again. “Okay, I’m ready to jockey your discs.” She holds up her fist and I bump it with mine. As she backs out of her spot, I study her profile. She is really the most thoughtful person I have ever met. I can’t even believe she’s my girlfriend. She makes me feel like the luckiest person in the world.
Over the next three hours, we listen to music, chat, and stop for breakfast at a diner. It’s mostly a gigglefest because we’re both hyper. We’re amped to spend the day together, at the beach. She tells me funny stories about her brother and a few about her mom. Her stories make me laugh but also get me thinking. It sounds like she misses them, or misses what they used to have. I think she should reach out to them, just to see how they are, but she says she isn’t ready. It seems to me that Brooke carries around some hurt from the way they shut her out of their lives. As if it was easy to forget the seventeen years they spent being her family.
I want to make up for all that time she spent alone, feeling abandoned and unwanted. I want to remind her as often as I can that she’s wonderful. Of course, she never expresses those feelings, but it’s there, in the words she doesn’t say. She’s been so tough since then. Not letting anything close enough to hurt her like that. Maybe she believes that by being upfront about who she is, people can’t just unexpectedly desert her like her family did. Each moment we spend together, that sad part of her brightens just a tiny bit. It’s inspiring to watch. If she can overcome her past, perhaps I can, too.
When we arrive, we eagerly hop out of the car and stretch. It’s an absolutely beautiful day, cool and breezy, but sunny. I can faintly smell salt in the air as I take in the people milling about. Brooke slips her camera strap over her neck, meets me on my side of the car, and takes my hand into hers.
“Ready?” She asks, her pretty eyes shining.
“Yes!” I bounce on my toes in anticipation.
When I finally catch sight of the sand and the dark blue ocean, I gasp. It’s so big . Bigger than anything I’ve ever seen. I squish Brooke into the biggest hug before taking off down the sand. I watch as the water laps the sand and I lean down to feel it with my hand. It’s freezing. Brooke laughs hysterically and keeps repeating my yelp of surprise. I have to threaten to throw her in before she agrees stop doing it.