by Paige North
Then I catch a reflection of something in the mirror and frown.
Boxes. Dozens of them, all packed up in the living room. All my father’s railroad memorabilia from down in the basement, packed and ready to go.
This is why I’m home after all.
My parents are splitting up.
My mother told me the plan: She’s moving to a retirement community in Florida to live with my aunt, and he’s going to head out to Colorado to stay a few months with cousins. But it all sounded so surreal. Like I’d come back here and find out I’d made it all up in my head.
The truth crashes around me. This is really happening. They’re moving out and leaving this place, my home.
I whirl back around and realize my father is still staring out the door, as if Dax is hiding in the bushes, waiting to attack.
“Dad, we’re losing AC,” I tell him, pushing the door closed.
He nods and looks down at the book in his hands. “All right. You’re just . . . are you sure you and he weren’t . . .”
I snort. “What? Getting it on in his truck?” I laugh at the ridiculousness of it, and wrap my arm around him. My dad’s a slight man, and only getting slighter as he ages. In my pumps, I’m taller than him. “Come on, you know he’s the only mechanic around. What else was I supposed to do?”
“You could’ve—“
“I know. I could’ve called you. But what could you have done? You would’ve just had to call his garage, anyway. I just didn’t want to bother you, considering the. . .” I can’t bring myself to say those words. The divorce.
His eyes fill with storm clouds for a moment, but before I can ask him how he is, he says, “So, you’re looking sharp. How’s the job, my big shot legal eagle? Are you getting those applications ready?”
I force a smile. My dad will never be accused of having any fashion sense whatsoever, so “sharp” to him is anyone in decent shoes. And as much as I’d rather leave thoughts of my soul-crushing job behind, I can’t refuse to talk about it with my dad. Any time I get him on the phone, it’s the first thing he wants to talk about. He brags to all his friends that I’m the Smart Donahue who’s making it in the big city and going to take the legal world by storm, as if I’m soon going to be arguing cases in front of the Supreme Court or something. “Well, it’s—“
Before I can launch into my latest lie about how awesome it is, I hear my mother calling to me. Thank god. She appears in the doorway to the living room, throwing her hair into a ponytail. “Oh, hi, beautiful!” she says.
She comes up close to me, smelling comfortingly like her floral perfume I know so well, and plants a kiss on my cheek. “What’s this about your car? It wasn’t an accident, was it?”
I open my mouth to speak but my father quickly fills in: “No, Gloria. It broke down.”
She doesn’t even look at him. “Oh, no. Are you all right?” she asks, sympathetic.
Before I can answer, my father mumbles, “She got That Dax Harding to tow it. He just dropped her off.”
All sympathy on my mom’s face turns to alarm. “Dax Harding was in our driveway?”
It would sound much the same if she’d said Charles Manson was in our driveway?
I head her off before that seed in her brain can take root. “It was just a quick tow, and believe me—that was even too much for me.” It’s not a total lie, but the reason it was too much for me is exactly the opposite of what my parents would want to hear. I keep that part to myself. “Anyway, enough about my broken car. What’s for dinner?”
My father starts to say something about Dax, but luckily, I’ve managed to sway my mom off the Dax Conversation and to the thing she loves to concentrate on most: Feeding me. She holds up a hand to stop my dad from continuing the Dax topic. “Enough, Henry. She just got home and she’s hungry, can’t you see?”
She’s scowling at him. I’ve never seen her look so totally hateful at another human being before, much less my dad, who she’s always gotten along with. They hardly ever fought before. In fact, she’d always tell me the story of how they met with stars in her eyes. They were both going for their Masters in Education at Penn State and were put together as study buddies in Child Development class. They were the type of parents who still held hands and kissed and gave each other lovey-dovey looks that made me squirm.
Now, he swallows his words and bows in apology, which only makes me feel bad for him. He looks so . . . small. I shift my gaze between them, wondering if this awkward moment is going to be the first of many more this week. Suddenly, she tears her eyes from him and smiles lovingly at me, magically recovered.
What the hell did I just witness? They’ve been married for thirty years. When did things get so goddamned chilly between them?
But she’s back to my good old mom again, as we walk, arm in arm, to the kitchen. She pinches my side and says, “You’re getting skinny. And hasn’t anyone told you to be careful about wearing silk in the rain?”
I groan. Yes, she has told me that little nugget of info, at least a hundred times.
My mother heats up my stew in the microwave while I pull down earthenware bowl from the cupboard and get myself a Diet Coke. The aroma is more than heavenly, making my mouth water like a fountain. It’s also comforting. There’s a reason she thinks I’m getting skinny.
Turns out, adulting is stressful. Not only that, eating Frosted Flakes as one’s only meal for seven days straight will do that to a person.
And when my boss didn’t reimburse me when I fronted the money for one of our takeout orders, he threw my entire budget out of whack, and a quart of milk was all I could afford at the store.
Mom brings the plate of food to me, I do my best not to inhale the entire plate in record time.
My mother sits down next to me with a hot cup of tea and says, “What’s wrong with your car?”
I shrug, then say, mouth still full, “It just died. I don’t know. He’s going to call with the damage later.”
She purses her lips. “Dax?”
I nod. Oh, here it comes . . .
She takes a sip of her tea. “You should let your father take care of it.”
“Fine,” I say absently. What she’s worried about doesn’t matter.
Dax doesn’t have my new cell phone number anyway. He won’t be able to call me directly, so he’ll have to call the old house phone. When he does, he can speak to my father and relay all the information to him.
And as much as it pains me to do it, I’m intending to stay far away from him again, starting now.
Yes, Dax makes my insides turn to Jell-O, which is exactly why I have to avoid him at all costs.
She reaches over and touches my hand. “I meant it about Dax, honey. Really, you have to tread carefully when it comes to that boy.”
I roll my eyes. “I know, mom. I got it. I’m not going to see Dax again. So just stop.” Maybe it’s the chilly atmosphere, but I think that’s a new record: getting into an argument with my mom in the first fifteen minutes of being home. I yawn. “I think I’m just tired. I’m going to head upstairs and turn in early.”
The stern look on her face morphs to concern. She reaches over and tucks a stray hair behind my ear. “Okay, honey. Leave that dress in the hallway. I’ll see if anything can be done.”
I put my bowl in the dishwasher, grab my bag, and head upstairs to my bedroom. When I get there, I pause in the doorway, where I’d measured my height from the time I was able to stand. There are dozens of little scrawlings in my improving handwriting, along with my age. I sigh.
The funny thing is, when I left for college, I never worried for a second that my parents might turn my empty room into a sewing or exercise room. While other parents couldn’t wait for that chance, mine made it clear on the day I left for college that this would stay my room, period. Forever, end of story. It’s all white wicker and Laura Ashley lace in pale pink and mint green. My mother took me to a department store to pick it out when I turned eight.
It’s mine.
Even thoug
h I was just here for Christmas, somehow, the whole place looks smaller, different. I realize I’m looking at it with new eyes, the eyes of someone who knows she might not see this room ever again.
The thought of another family living here makes a knot form in my throat. This is my place. My home.
I throw my bag on the ground and collapse on the bed, staring up at the Unicorn poster over my bed.
During the one and only time Dax came into my bedroom, I was eighteen. Since my house is a ranch, he climbed in the window. I’d never had a boy in my room before that. He’d made all sorts of jokes about how my bedroom was perfectly fine for any six-year old. When I was officially so embarrassed I couldn’t even look at him, he swooped down and kissed me. My first kiss. Before that, I’d thought the smell of cigarette smoke was disgusting. One taste of him, and I became an addict. We’d only known each other three days.
Dax had that surprising way about him; he’d make you think he was heading one way and go in a completely different direction.
Sighing, I strip off my still-damp dress, leave it in the hallway for my mom to deal with, and riffle around in my bag for a new pair of clean underwear I already know I didn’t pack. Sighing, I peel off my wet undies and get into my comfy boxers and tank. I snuggle down into my familiar bed and start to charge my phone, already predicting and dreading what I’m going to see when I open my work email, because heaven forbid I don’t look at it for an hour.
I feel sicker and sicker as I scroll through each unread message. I’d had my out-of-office assistant on, of course, but obviously, no one pays attention to those. There are at least a dozen emails from Fowler. The looks he gave me when I asked for an advance of my vacation time in order to settle things back home could have frozen the Caribbean.
I’d only been at the job three months, but the news of my parents’ divorce was not just catastrophic. It was so unexpected, it practically took the breath out of me. I walked around in a daze the first 24 hours after my mother’s phone call, trying to process it.
I told Fowler I’d keep checking my emails, and it’s obvious the douchebag was testing to make sure I was telling the truth. I type in a text to him: Sorry. Just got in. My car broke down and my phone lost its charge.
I stare at the words. Any excuse seems insufficient. Well, for Fowler, anyway. He’s short with a Napoleon complex, so he’s fond of marching around the office spitting out phrases like, “I don’t need excuses, I need action.”
So it doesn’t matter if I’m lying dead in a ditch somewhere, the victim of a horrific car accident. I wasn’t at his beck and call, and therefore, I have failed him.
And the sad thing is, he’s not the only one with attitude in the firm. In fact, I think they have a “douchebag requirement” in order to become an attorney there. I haven’t met a partner that doesn’t look at me like I’m a piece of gum stuck to his shoe. And so yes, while the original plan was to take a year off while deciding what law schools I wanted to apply to, right now, my answer is: None of them.
But I’m going to do it anyway. Anything else would break my father’s heart.
As I’m imagining the major heart attack my dad would have if I ever told him what I really feel, my phone begins to ring. It’s a number I don’t recognize, with a 570 area code, the area code for Northwestern Pennsylvania. I think of letting it ring through, like I always do with unknown phone numbers, but in the last second, I decide to pick it up. “Hello?”
“Hi, Katydid.”
All the air whooshes out of my lungs. His low drawl reaches into my chest and pulls at my heart like he has it on a string. I straighten like a pin on top of my lace comforter. “Dax?” I’m breathless. I swallow. Calm, Katherine, calm. “How did you get this number?”
“You gave it to me.”
“What? No, I didn’t.”
He lets out a sigh and says, very condescendingly, “You gave it to the Auto Club, who in turn, gave it to me.”
“Ohhhh. Right.” I’d been getting worried that not only had he become hotter than hell in the past four years, he’d also developed magical telepathic powers. “Can you stop calling me that? I’m Katherine, now.”
“Katherine?” He says it like it’s a name he’s never heard before. “What, do all the hoity-toity types in Boston get off on all those extra syllables?”
I wrinkle my nose, annoyed. “Katydid has just as many.” He seems to take it as a personal affront that I want to go and make something of myself instead of being stuck in Friesville forever. “So did you fix my car?” I say, trying to sound stronger and more in control of myself than I actually feel.
“Hold your horses, there, Katherine,” he says with a laugh. “Damn, girl. I’ve had your car in my possession for less than two hours.”
“Well, I seem to remember that everyone in town raves about how good you are.”
“True. But I like to go slow, and take my time,” he says, and I can’t help but think of the double meaning behind his words. My pulse increases by a factor of twenty. “Plus I haven’t quite had everyone in town,” he continues, his voice getting deeper. “You want to test me out and see for yourself?”
I’m blushing now and I feel a stirring in my lower belly. Actually, even lower than that if I’m honest with myself. I throw my comforter off and stare at my painted toes. I am so not letting him do this to me. “Look. Can you fix it, or not?”
“Of course I can. But it isn’t just a matter of cleaning up the clogged oil pumps. The engine’s blown.”
I cringe. “That doesn’t sound good.”
“It’s not. Not to mention that the transmission’s on its last legs.”
“So, you won’t have it fixed by tomorrow?”
He laughs. “I’m good, but I’m not that good.”
“So what are my options?” I ask desperately.
“With me, or your car?”
“Screw you,” I groan.
“If you can afford it, get a new car, Katydid. One that’ll keep you safe in that big ol’ city you call home now.”
“I don’t want a new car,” I tell him, gritting my teeth to the harsh reality that I can’t afford a new car. “I want to fix that one. Isn’t there something you can do?”
“Anything I do’ll be more expensive than the car’s worth.”
That was not what I needed to hear right now. “Can’t you do a band-aid? Something cheap that will keep it running so I can use it now and then?”
He pauses. I figure it’s a long shot, so I’m surprised when he says, “Could be.”
I exhale, just as I hear something thump downstairs. A door slams closed. Then I hear my mother, voice high and screeching. I can only make out parts of what she’s saying: If you hadn’t . . . Then my father’s voice, calm but strained: I can only . . .
They’re arguing. The two people who never said a cross word to each other, ever.
Two seconds later, I hear the door to the basement slam shut, footsteps slamming down the staircase, and the whirring of the treadmill starting up. My dad always ran down there after a hard day teaching, and some nights, he’d run for miles and miles and not come back up until I’d been asleep for hours. A second later, I hear my mom climbing the stairs. She knocks on my door and comes inside, holding the dress she’s going to work her miracles on. “I’m going to turn in, dear. I’m tired.”
I drop the phone to my chest, covering the display as if she might be able to tell it’s Dax I’m talking to, and look at the alarm clock at my bedside. It’s only eight-thirty. “Okay.”
She closes the door, leaving me to wonder if this could get any weirder. My mom was the night owl, and now she’s going to bed early. They’re arguing so much that I don’t think they can be in the same room together. What the hell happened here? This feels like a war zone. Or worse than that, The Twilight Zone.
“Kate—Fuck. Katherine?” Dax says.
I’m holding the phone in a sweaty death-grip. I’d spent a long time dreaming about moving to the city, thinking
how glamorous it would be. In a few weeks, my house will be gone, and I won’t have any reason to set foot in Friesville again. Boston might as well be my real home, because once my parents sell this place, I won’t have one. “I’m sorry. What?” I ask, my forehead sweaty from the sudden anxiety that’s gripped me.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah. My parents were just arguing.”
He laughs. “Your parents? I didn’t think those two did that.”
“Nobody’s relationship is perfect, I guess,” I mutter. “It’s . . . things are a little strained around here, to say the least.”
“Yeah? What’s up?”
I don’t speak. I can’t tell him this. If I tell him this, and it’ll just make me tell him more, and more, and more, knocking down every wall between us. It’ll be like the domino effect, the floodgates will open and then all of my quickly weakening resolve will be gone and it won’t ever come back.
But at the same time, as much as I want to keep him away, right now I can’t think of any other person I’d rather talk to than him.
“You want to get out of there? I’ll pick you up,” he offers, as if he read my mind.
I suck in a breath. No. I can’t. I won’t. I do that, and it’s all over. My mouth opens, but instead of the definitive NO my head is telling me to say, “And go where?” comes out.
“Wherever.” When I don’t answer, he says, “I’ll bring you to the shop and go over the options for your car, okay?”
That sounds harmless. But nothing with Dax has ever been harmless. There’s a reason my parents said I should stay away . . . and not only that, I said I should stay away.
If only I could remember what that reason was.
I listen for a few moments to my father’s feet pounding steadily on the treadmill downstairs. I think of Dax as he’d looked when he came to tow my car, lifting the hood of my VW, tattooed arms flexing, the way he’d smiled that devilish smile at me through a jawline coated with rich dark stubble.
Despite having nothing in common, there was something we always had an abundance of: Chemistry. I used to think of us as two magnets with opposite charge—impossible to keep apart.