Holding a Hero

by Layne, Lyssa

  “We’re here this morning to settle the matter of Joss Kelley versus Travis Buratta regarding the custody of Wyatt Leroux. Generally, I exclude children from formal hearings, but as it’s my understanding that neither of the children present are the child in question, I’ll allow them to stay today. Please make other arrangements for future hearings, Mr. Buratta.”

  Travis barely acknowledged he was being spoken to. His lawyer, however nodded repeatedly, clearly eager to stay in the judge’s good graces.

  “Alright. Counsel, are we ready to proceed with today’s hearing?” His eyes were still on Travis’s attorneys.

  “Yes, your honor.”

  Next, Judge Parrish addressed us. “And you, counsel?”

  Diane agreed. “Yes, your honor. We’re ready.”

  And so it began.

  Two hours of opening arguments. Both sides declaring without a doubt that they were the more suitable parent. The last time I’d been here, I’d understood it. It had made sense to me that I would have to fight to keep him. That I had to make a case for myself as a parent. Today, it felt absurd to hear Diane argue on my behalf, stating a list of reasons why I was the right parent for my son when the only reason that really should have mattered was that he was in fact my son. I was his mother. Who had given these people the right to question the most basic truth of my heart?

  By the time court adjourned, we had earned ourselves another date the following Wednesday. Seven more days of hell, anticipating what Travis would have in store for us next. The next session would include testimony from witnesses of our choosing.

  “We’re going to need to go over our list of people we want to bring in for questioning on your behalf. Probably be best if you come by the office first thing tomorrow morning so we can get started on it.” Diane was back to pacing in the lobby. She had another case coming up shortly.

  “Yeah, I can do that. What time?”

  She scrolled over the screen of her phone, checking her schedule. “How’s eight? I’ve got an opening all the way through lunch. We’ll need it.”

  I didn’t have to check my availability. I would be doing nothing except this until it was over. “I’ll be there.”

  Diane quickly added my name to the first open slot in her calendar, then peeked up at Derek. “What about you Mr. Tice? Will you be joining us as well?”

  I was about to explain to her that it really wasn’t Derek’s problem and that he had some much neglected work to catch up on when I heard him. “Absolutely. Expect to see me at every meeting from here on out.”

  She seemed more than satisfied. “Excellent. Well, then, I’ll see you two first thing tomorrow.” Diane gave a backwards wave as she hurried off to meet her next clients.

  “I guess that means we’re free to go.” Derek gestured for me to walk ahead.

  “Free might be a bit of a stretch. How far is Travis?” I grumbled as I started moving toward the tall front doors. The anxiety was lurching back and forth in my stomach with each step I took, just thinking about the son of a bitch and how he had become like the fucking Jack in a box of my life. Always lurking quietly, letting you think he was gone and never coming back and then – POP went the mother fucking weasel.

  Then, I felt Derek’s hand on the small of my back as he came up beside me and all of my worries vanished into thin air. “Saw Travis walk out about five minutes ago. I imagine he’s still out in the parking lot though. If not there, then hiding somewhere near the exit so he can catch us coming out.”

  I could see him smirking out of the corner of my eye. “What is it exactly about having a stalker you find so funny?”

  “Just been busy thinking of ways to fuck with him. Our friendly neighborhood psychopath is in for a surprise today.”

  Intrigued, I pressed on for some details. “What kind of surprise?”

  He winked. “You’ll see.”

  Then, before I could argue, I felt a light pressure on my back from his hand, urging me to turn right, away from the exit.

  “This way.” He nodded at the elevators along the wall.

  Once inside, he pressed number 7, the highest number available.

  “Where are we going?” As far as I knew, there was nothing that far up that concerned either one of us.

  “The roof.” His refusal to be a little bit more forthcoming was quickly raising my usual unstable sanity to lunatic status.

  “Listen, I’m not up for any crazy SEAL shit, okay? There will be no launching myself off of rooftops attached to some hang glider. Got it?”

  He chuckled.

  “That’s it? You’re just going to laugh at me?”

  His brow cocked upward and I could see him biting the inside of his lip while he decided how to answer me.

  “Alright then. How’s this?” Even as he said the words he stepped toward me until my back was against the wall. I felt the hiss of his ‘s’ on my lips as his mouth came down on them hard. Between the sensation of moving upward in the elevator and the general sense of hazy dizziness that overcame me every time Derek kissed me, I was in some sort of new state of delicious delirium.

  I was only just getting lost in this sweet torture when the ride came to a stop. He nipped my bottom lip and said in a deep whisper, “So, ready to leap yet?”

  In that moment, I was fully prepared to say yes regardless of whether he was referring to the roof or our relationship, if only it meant we could continue riding the elevator a little while longer.

  Derek however, unfortunately had no intention of staying on any longer, which he demonstrated quite clearly by taking my hand and leading me out into the hall.

  “Now what?” I couldn’t tell where we’d ended up, but it definitely wasn’t the roof.

  “Now we take the stairs.” Still holding onto me, he led the way.

  When we reached the top, we were faced with yet another door. The instant he opened it, a thunderous roaring drowned out the entire world. I thought an airplane was crash landing right on top of us. I wasn’t far off. It was a helicopter. And it had already landed quite safely on the roof.

  “Holy shit,” I breathed. I could have shouted it, Derek still wouldn’t have heard me.

  Knowing any argument I made at that point would literally land on deaf ears, I closed my eyes and let my feet take me wherever Derek directed them to. When I opened them again, I was being shoved inside the surprisingly large cabin of the chopper.

  Next thing I knew, the doors had closed and we were taking off. Thankfully it was much quieter inside than it had been on that roof.

  “What. Just. Happened?” My arms were gesturing wildly in the air.

  Derek just sat back, a satisfied grin on his face. “I was tired of always being followed. Figured Travis would have a hell of a time getting that shitty Civic of his airborne.”

  “Are you insane? Who gets picked up from court in a helicopter?” It was a pretty damn fancy one at that. Not like a rescue or military chopper you see on TV. This thing had style. Leather seats and everything.

  “You do. Joss, meet my buddy, Carson. Our pilot.”

  Carson turned back halfway to give me a friendly wave before returning his attention to flying the chopper. Meanwhile, I wasn’t sure what the appropriate response was to any of this, so I simply waved back, mouth hanging open like an idiot.

  Derek took advantage of my current state of dumbstruck and silent. “Carson and I met when we were both overseas. He got out a couple of years before me though. Landed this sweet job flying around corporate bigwigs.”

  “That explains his fancy ride,” I mumbled. It didn’t really explain shit else. “So, what’s going to happen to my Bronco? You got some former tank driver you met out on a secret mission coming to pick up?” I was joking. Or, at least I sincerely I hoped I was.

  “Not a tank driver, no. Bobby’s sending Mattie to get it and bring it back to the Flying Monk. I’ve gotta head over there later anyway and grab a few of my tools I left behind.”

  My mouth opened to tell him th
at Mattie got a DUI three months ago and didn’t currently have a driver’s license, but it seemed like a sort of trivial bit of information all things considered, so I just closed it again and said nothing.

  “Check out the view.” Derek pointed past me, out the window beside my head. We were just flying over downtown. It really was pretty spectacular looking at it from way up here. At ground level all I ever saw anymore was the annoying amount of traffic that seemed to spread out between the buildings, not leaving much room to enjoy anything else.

  Aside from a phenomenal window seat, traveling by helicopter came with another perk. Travel time was cut down tremendously. Next thing I knew, we were hovering over my neighbor’s pasture. Thankfully, he’d recently moved his cattle to another lot and was resting this field for the time being, making landing a lot easier.

  When we walked into the house, Deb looked, surprised to see us.

  “Where the hell did you two come from? I didn’t hear your truck pull up.”

  “Did you hear the massive helicopter landing in Farmer Tom’s field next door?”

  She made a face. “Obviously. Pretty damn hard to miss – ohhhh.”

  “Yeeaah.” I gave her a patronizing pat on the shoulder, because in our family we didn’t just let stupid slide, and then went on to find Wyatt. “Monkey man! Guess what mommy did!”

  He poked his head out of his room and came to meet me in the living room for a big hug.

  “You wented high in the sky with a rocket?” His big brown eyes were wide and I couldn’t help but wonder what he’d seen on TV that morning after Tom and Jerry ended.

  “Close. Derek took me for a ride in a helicopter.”

  “Whoa.” I loved how for a four-year-old, a chopper ride could be even cooler than taking off into outer space. Distance and probability played no role in his realm of functioning. It was great.

  My aunt and Derek had joined us in the living room.

  “So, you two have any lunch on that helicopter ride of yours?”

  I laughed, thinking about the luxurious interior. “Surprisingly no, there was no food in flight. No peanuts, no nothin’. Seriously, who do I talk to about that?”

  Derek shook his head, the right corner of his lips lifted, making his eyes crinkle in the most adorable way. “I’ll be sure to mention something to Carson about snacks next time I see him. Meanwhile, who do I talk to about getting some chicken fajitas? Is it Wednesday or what?”

  Aunt Deb actually blushed a little. It was the cutest thing ever and it made me think I needed to spend a little more time gushing over the food she made for us day in and day out. Over the years I’d become complacent about it, but I didn’t want her to think that I didn’t appreciate everything she did for us.

  After lunch, Derek went to take care of a job he’d been putting off for two weeks while I ventured into my workshop to work on his bedroom furniture. I’d made quite a bit of progress on it already, working here and there in between other projects. Now that he was my husband I could hardly charge him for it, so that had kind of bumped him down on my to-do list. Not that I’d told him that. Didn’t really matter anyway. At this point, who knew when he’d get to sleep in his own bedroom again?

  Derek still wasn’t back by dinner or when I put Wyatt to bed, something I tried not to be bothered by, but which clearly had an effect on my son, who had already grown accustomed to their nightly routine of sharing a banana before bed and then making up a bedtime rap before he and I disappeared in his room for a book and cuddle before he finally went to sleep.

  Wyatt wasn’t the only one working Derek into his daily habits, something I became eerily aware of when I had a slice of Aunt Deb’s key lime pie and he wasn’t around to eat the dry graham cracker crust I always left behind. And then again when I went to water the garden after sunset and he wasn’t sitting on the porch steps with Hattie, keeping me company. I didn’t like it. Not the fact that he wasn’t there, nor the part where I wanted him to be. I didn’t like any of it. Not. At. All.

  By the time he finally showed up at the house again, I was sitting curled up on the sofa watching re-runs of Who’s The Boss and wondering how Tony and Angela maintained their friendship all those years without crossing over the line when they were so clearly nuts for one another. Sure, in the end they wound up together, but why wait? What had kept them both from jumping in heart first, head second? Especially when things seemed to work so…perfectly.

  I was stuffing the fourth chocolate chip cookie down my throat when Derek walked in. I had a moment of reality and fiction clashing, and subsequently another where I realized just how absurd it had been to spend such an overabundance of thoughts on a relationship that wasn’t even real. Of course it didn’t take a genius to figure out why I’d spent an hour and a half obsessing about Tony and Angela. It was simply preferable over having to analyze my own situation.

  “Hey, sorry I’m so late. Let me just jump in the shower and we can head out.”

  He came by and kissed the top of my head on the way to the kitchen. I heard the fridge door open and close and a minute later he was back guzzling from a water bottle.

  “Head out where? The only place I’m headed is my bed.” I would have thought the sweats and wife beater I was wearing were a clear indicator of my plans.

  “We have to go pick up your truck. Did you forget?” He was leaning against the wall casually, water bottle now lowered down below his waist and resting against his thigh. Don’t ask me why this was the part I was choosing to focus on. Probably for the same reason I was still trying to decide if Tony and Angela had been right not to get involved until the final season.

  “My truck? Shit, it’s still at the Monk, huh?! Don’t you think it’d be better to wait until tomorrow to get it? I don’t know how I feel about leaving Wyatt and Aunt Deb here alone at night. Especially after the way we pranked Travis today. What if we pissed him off and he shows up here after we leave to try something?”

  Derek finished his water and went to toss the empty bottle into the recycling bin. “Got it covered. I made a couple of calls. Turns out some guys I used to serve with are in town on leave right now. They’re headed over here to sit on the place. Deb and Wyatt won’t even know they’re there.”

  I climbed up from the sofa, not really following what he was saying. “You’re calling in military back up to deal with Travis?”

  He laughed. “I guess you could put it that way.”

  I shook my head. “That’s crazy, Derek. I’m sure they have better things to do than come and sit outside of my house for a few hours. We can’t ask them to do that.”

  Derek reached out for the waistband of my pants with both hands and gently brought me closer to him. “Listen to me, these guys are like my family. This is what we do for one another. They would be offended if they found out I was in trouble and didn’t call them. Okay? Now come on and get dressed. You need a night out of this house.”

  He cupped the side of my face with his hand and kissed my cheek, his soft stubble brushing against my chin in a familiar way. I inhaled deeply while he stood so close to me. Derek always smelled of sawdust and fresh air. He wore cologne as well, but it was a secondary scent that merely complimented the others. I sort of loved that about breathing him in, like it gave me some sort of secret insight into his day even if I hadn’t been a part of it.

  “Alright. I’ll go put on something more suitable to wear,” I finally conceded. And I did.

  Ten minutes later we were sitting in his pickup and on our way out to my brother’s pub. We’d passed a black Suburban in my driveway, which Derek had indicated as being his former Navy playmates. I couldn’t help but feel as though I’d unknowingly been enrolled in some sort of secret club of arms where all you’d ever need to do was shoot up a flare and the troops would come running. I kinda liked it.

  For a long time, we just sat there in silence, both of us apparently busy sorting through our own troubling thoughts. Or, in my case, thoughts as trite as Tony and Angela’s un
conventional set up and whether or not they’d been onto something.

  “You ever watch Who’s the Boss?” The moment I heard myself say it out loud I wanted to be cloaked in my own shame and hidden out of sight.

  “Are you kidding? I loved that show.”

  Surprised, I leaned to the side to get a better look at his expression. “You did?”

  “Absolutely. Come on. Alyssa Milano? Every guy I knew was watching that show!”

  I pressed my lips together tightly in spite of every effort to seem unfazed by the news of his childhood crush. In reality, I was brimming with jealousy. And then more shame.

  “Wasn’t she a bit old for you?” I asked snidely and in spite of myself.

  “Of course. That was the best part.” His enthusiasm was quickly starting to be annoying, but since I’d already opened the door, there was no point in not walking through it, even if I had to step over Alyssa Milano to do it.

  “So, where did you stand on the whole Tony and Angela thing? Did you feel like it dragged on for too long, them not being a couple? Or did you think they were always better off the way they were?”

  Derek turned his head toward me at the stop light to answer. “Not sure. They weren’t really the reason I was watching, you know?” Then the light changed and he went back to facing the road.

  “So you didn’t feel like it was about time when they finally got together? You didn’t experience any sort of excitement over their long awaited happily ever after?”

  “Wasn’t much of a happy ever after. They broke up in the final episode.”

  WHAT?! How had I never seen that? I spent the rest of the drive stewing in silence. Partially because that one little revelation had somehow ruined the entire show for me, but more importantly because it suddenly seemed perfectly clear what I needed to do. If Tony and Angela hadn’t been able to hack it as a couple when they had everything going for them, there really was no hope for us. And yeah. Basing major life decisions on sitcoms from the eighties isn’t always the brightest idea, but desperate times called for desperate measures. That, and I was running scared and at a point where any reason to speed up and not look back was a welcome one.