by Blair Grey
Leila rolled her eyes, but she barely managed to suppress her grin. “I’m not making any promises,” she said. “I’m not agreeing to another date or another repeat of what happened after our date on Saturday. I’m just saying that if you want to come and talk to me, that’s where you can find me. But you’d better not get in the way. I’ll be working there.”
She paused. “And stop coming here to visit me at work. The other nurses are starting to talk.”
I laughed and gave her a mocking salute. “As you wish, darling,” I told her. “I’ll see you on Friday at the fairgrounds, no later than ten.”
“Fine,” Leila said. She made a shooing motion with her hands. “Now get out of here so I can get back to work. Your friend is probably waiting for you.”
I grinned and headed out the door.
18
Leila
Thursday
My thoughts and emotions were in a chaotic whirl with the week I was having, and I was glad to have a day off on Thursday to finally process everything that had happened since Saturday. Between sleeping with Marcus to the artificial insemination consultation to seeing Marcus again at the hospital, I didn’t know how I was feeling. I needed to talk to Rachel.
She got a sitter for Gavin so that we could have a girl’s day. I had begged off going out for drinks with her, even though that was what I had promised, and she let it be. Probably, she thought I didn’t need to go looking for a man because I had just been on a date last Saturday night. Knowing her, she was probably already planning the wedding.
“Hey!” Rachel said excitedly as she met me outside our favorite lunch spot. She gave me a huge hug. “Come on; I want to hear everything,” she said, linking my arms as she led me inside.
I rolled my eyes, but I was grinning. No matter how old we got, no matter how much our lives diverged, she was always my best friend, and I appreciated that more than I could tell her.
“So come on, tell me about the date,” Rachel said as soon as we sat down at our usual table. “I thought you were going to call me as soon as it was over. And you’ve been cryptic all week. It’s been killing me.”
I laughed and shook my head. “I just needed time to process it, that’s all,” I told her. “I wasn’t trying to hide anything from you.”
“Oh my god, you slept with him,” Rachel said, gaping at me with her mouth wide open.
“Is it that obvious?” I asked, grimacing.
“Well, I can’t think why else you would need to take your time processing it.” She shook her head. “Oh wow, Leila. That’s huge for you. You must really like him.”
“He’s a nice guy,” I said, shrugging nonchalantly. “But I don’t think I’m going to keep dating him.”
Rachel groaned. “Why not?”
“He’s just not the right guy for me.”
“Why not? What’s wrong with this one? And if it’s something stupid, I’m going to steal your phone and call him up myself to set you up on another date.”
“He just… reminds me of my father, that’s all,” I said, staring down at my plate.
When I looked up, Rachel was making a face, but I could tell she wasn’t going to push things. I thought about telling her that Marcus had come into the hospital again, that I was giving him another chance. That I was going to let him prove that he wasn’t just like my father.
But in the end, I decided to keep that to myself. The last thing I wanted was to get her hopes up about this relationship working out. I didn’t want to put any pressure on things, not when I was already having my doubts.
“Anyway, I had my insemination consultation, too, remember?” I said, pulling out the folder that Sandra had given me. “It was actually pretty exciting. I think I might really go through with it.”
Rachel sighed, and I could tell she still wasn’t on board with the idea of it. But she flipped open the envelope and started looking at the sample donor profile. “This is, like, super detailed,” she said in surprise.
“Yeah, the consultant joked about it, said wouldn’t it be nice to have a folder like that before you ever started dating someone?”
Rachel snorted and shook her head. “Don’t you feel like it’s kind of creepy, though?”
I shrugged. “It’s not like I’ve stalked the guy to get all of this information. He willingly gave it.” I paused. “I’ve been on their website, browsing through the database. I’m not officially signed up for it yet or anything, and even if I decide that I really want to do that, there are some medical tests they need to do to me first to make sure I’m healthy and everything. But it was cool to look through the profiles. There are some pretty amazing catches in there. Now, I just have to decide what kind of kid I want. Other than one who’s just like Gavin.”
Rachel grinned. “He really wanted to see his Auntie Leila today, by the way. But he’s hanging out with his friend Brian from school, so he’s pretty happy about that, too.”
I laughed. “I’ll try to swing by for dinner again sometime soon,” I promised. “It’s staying light pretty late now; he and I can play some Frisbee before bed or something. You know, really wear him out.”
“He’d love that, I’m sure,” Rachel said.
“I definitely want a kid who’s sporty, but I think that’s more nurture than nature,” I mused.
“You could have a musician’s baby,” Rachel said. She snickered. “You’d be almost like a groupie then.”
I giggled. “Yeah, but with my utter lack of musical talent, the kid would still probably turn out average at best.”
“True,” Rachel said. She shook her head. “I still don’t think this is the best way to go,” she admitted. “I mean, you know that I’ll support you, no matter what you decide to do. But I really think it would be better if you found yourself a good man. Someone that you could count on.”
She paused and then sighed. “Take it from me; trying to raise a child on your own for even part of the time is difficult.”
“Uh-oh,” I said, reaching out and putting a hand over hers. “Are you and Victor having problems?”
“We’re not having problems, per se,” Rachel sighed. “But I haven’t seen him in weeks now, and he called last night to tell me that they’ve added another couple cities onto this round of expos. So it’s going to be even longer until he gets back.”
“Um, did you tell him that’s totally unfair?” I asked, raising an eyebrow at her. “I’m all for being supportive of your spouse, but he’s been gone forever now, and at some point, he has to come home and take up his share of the burden.”
“But he is taking up his share of the burden,” Rachel protested. “I’m not working; his salary is what’s supporting Gavin and me at the moment.”
“Honey, if you wanted that, you could have him paying child support while you found yourself someone who really appreciated you,” I said, rolling my eyes. I loved Victor, and I thought the two of them were great together. I always had. But sometimes, Victor was such a dude, and Rachel just let him get away with it, even when it was breaking her heart.
I got that she wanted to be supportive of him. I understood that he was working and that she didn’t feel like she could argue with that. But she had to put her foot down at some point. Victor, like most guys, could sometimes get so caught up in what was right in front of his eyes. She had to remind him that there was more to the world, and to his life, than that.
She sighed. “I just don’t know how to talk to him about it,” she said. “I want to make it clear that I support him, and obviously I know that he’s not doing this because he doesn’t want to be back here with us. I understand what’s going on. I just miss him.” She wrinkled her nose. “But I don’t want to sound like one of those girls, you know. I don’t want to be too clingy.”
I laughed. “He’s your husband,” I reminded her. “I think he’s given you the lifelong right to be clingy.”
She grinned. “There is that,” she agreed.
“If you really don’t want to do it
over Skype, wait until he gets back home after this trip and then talk to him about it,” I suggested. I waggled my eyebrows at her. “Then you can really show him just how much you appreciate having him spend a little time at home.”
Rachel shook her head, but she was giggling. Then, she gave me another of her serious looks. “How is it that you always give me such great relationship advice even though you never take any of it yourself?”
I sighed and looked away from her. “You know why I don’t do relationships,” I told her. “I’m too busy for that stuff. And I hardly ever meet guys who even might be worthwhile.”
“Uhn-uhn,” Rachel said. She pointed a finger at me. “I think you’ve been lying to me all these years. It’s not that you don’t have the time or that your standards are too high. It’s what you said about this guy Marcus, isn’t it? He reminds you too much of your father. Every guy reminds you too much of your father.”
“Marcus more than most,” I muttered, even though I knew that wasn’t helping my case.
“Oh, Leila,” Rachel said sadly. “Let me give you a little advice. Not every guy is going to be like your father. I know things were rough for you, growing up. And I know you’re glad that you don’t have anything to do with that guy anymore. I’m glad for you; he’s an ass. But not every man that you date is going to be like your father. Especially not with you as a wife. You’re smart, and you’re sexy, and you’re driven, and I bet whoever you finally allow to be your lucky man is going to get on his knees and worship you.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’m not interested in that,” I said, but I could feel the blush spread over my cheeks as I thought back to Saturday night, with Marcus on the ground in front of me, eating me out as I leaned against the arm of the couch.
Rachel quirked an eyebrow at me, but I shook my head. Some details were better left out, especially since it had been her shoes I was wearing and nothing else.
“I know not every man is going to be my father,” I sighed. “But that doesn’t mean that I’m interested in sorting through to find the ones who are going to be good guys. I’d rather just skip that whole part and start a family on my own. I know I can raise a child by myself. It’ll be hard, sure. But I can do it.”
“I never said you couldn’t,” Rachel said, but I could tell that she was still feeling sorry for me.
“Come on, let’s stop talking about this,” I said, grabbing the folder off the table and shoving it into my bag. “Today’s supposed to be fun.”
Rachel put her hand over mine, squeezing lightly. “I support you no matter what,” she repeated.
I stared at her for a long moment, but I could tell she was serious. All of this was just her way of looking out for me; I knew that. I smiled back at her. “I know that,” I said quietly. “Thanks.”
19
Marcus
Friday
On Friday morning, I got to the fairgrounds slightly early. I wasn’t entirely sure what sort of equipment Leila needed help with, or even what sort of fundraiser this was. But I was eager to get into her good graces by helping out. Not to mention the fact that it was nice to have something to do with my day. Even though I had plenty of side projects, it was weird not having anything to do for Red Eyes. I’d been finding weird gaps in my schedule over the course of the week.
I got out of my car, surprised to see that there were plenty of people already milling around the fairgrounds. I grabbed a flier off one of the tables and saw that the fundraiser was for children with cancer.
It wasn’t much of a surprise when I thought about it. I could imagine Leila totally devoting herself to that cause, based on what I knew about her. But at the same time, I was surprised that she had asked me to come help out there.
“Aren’t you afraid I’m going to scare all the children away?” I asked, grinning at her when I finally managed to track her down.
Leila rolled her eyes. “Honestly, in my experience, kids are light-years ahead of the adults I know in terms of these things,” she told me.
“What do you mean?”
“They’re not going to take one look at your tattoos and decide you’re an arrogant ass,” she said, and I couldn’t help laughing.
“You mean they’re not going to have the same first impression of me as you did?” I asked. “What a shame.”
Leila grinned over at me and handed me a box. “I need you to take that over to the blue tent on the far side of the field. Get it all set up, and then I need you to man that booth for a little while. Take their money, hand them their raffle tickets, and point them in the direction of the rides and things. People should start getting here in about half an hour, so you’ll need to have it all ready to go by then. Can you do that?”
“Uh, sure,” I said, even though I really wasn’t. “I thought you were going to have me helping out with equipment, though. Like, setting things up.”
“Yeah, I was, but Manny, the guy who was supposed to be at the admissions tent, called in sick this morning,” Leila said impatiently. “If you don’t think you can do it, I can try to find someone else, but I’m just about at wits’ end at the moment.”
“No problem,” I said quickly, heading off in search of the blue tent that she had referenced. The last thing I wanted was for her to get the wrong idea and think that I didn’t want to help her out. But putting me on the admissions booth didn’t sound like a very good idea to me. I was serious when I asked Leila if she was worried that people weren’t going to want to see me there. I wasn’t exactly the kind of guy people generally wanted around their children.
In fact, I was more the kind of guy where if people saw me coming down the street toward them and their children, they would cross the street to the other sidewalk, giving me a wide berth. But I didn’t want her to panic or to tell me to just get out of there if I couldn’t handle it.
If this was what she wanted me to do, if this was the only way I could have a chance at talking to her again, I was going to do it.
The morning was incredibly awkward, right from the first people to arrive.
“Hi,” the mom said, giving me a suspicious look. “Is this the carnival that the hospital is putting on?” she asked, checking the fliers like she might possibly in the wrong place.
“Yes, it is,” I said, doing my best to be pleasant, even though I wanted to grind my teeth.
“I see,” she said. “I was under the impression that it was being run by the people who work at the hospital.”
“What makes you think that I don’t?” I asked, fighting the urge to fold my arms across my chest in a way that would really show off my tattoos.
She frowned at me. “We’ll take four raffle tickets and six of the ride tickets,” she said, counting out her cash. She looked like she didn’t want to hand it to me, but I held the tickets.
Finally, one of her kids spoke up. “Is that a pirate tattoo?” he asked, pointing at the ship that ran down one of my forearms. “That’s so neat! Did you get it because of Pirates of the Caribbean?”
I gritted my teeth at that comment, but I decided to let it slide. “Yeah, of course,” I said, hoping I didn’t sound sarcastic.
“Man, I want to get one of those someday,” the kid said. He was probably only seven or so, not that I was really around kids often enough to judge, but his mom didn’t look pleased. She thrust her money at me, grabbed her kid’s hand, and headed into the carnival.
“Kill me now,” I muttered under my breath.
But the next set of people had arrived at my table.
“Do you work at the hospital?” one of the kids, a bored-looking punk/Goth-princess of a teenager, asked. “Can you be my doctor next time I’m in there? You look way cooler than Dr. Brown.”
“What can you expect, with a name like Dr. Brown,” I muttered, unable to help myself. I looked up at her parents, who looked less than impressed. Jesus, I was getting shot down left and right here. Hadn’t anyone ever seen a big guy with tattoos before? Maybe I was security; did they ever think of th
at?
I was starting to get peeved, but the more pissed off I got, the harder it was to hang on to those feelings of anger. Instead, I just felt deeply uncomfortable.
The truth was, I had never really spent much time around kids. When would I? I didn’t have any family, didn’t have friends who had kids. I didn’t volunteer at the hospital normally. I just never came into contact with anyone under the age of, oh, twenty-one? There was no reason for me to.
Not that I had anything against them, I decided as the morning wore on. Most of the kids, at least other than the few who were frightened of me and hid behind their parents’ legs, were pretty cool. I liked that they spoke their minds. It was their parents who were the nightmares.
“How are things going over here?” Leila asked a little after one, when things were starting to finally calm down. She sounded breathless, and her hair was sticking to her sweaty forehead. But she still somehow looked good. It was the first time I had really gotten a good look at her that day. That morning, I’d been too preoccupied with trying to find her, and the next thing I’d known, she was shoving a box of tickets and booklets and other miscellaneous things into my arms.
She wasn’t in her scrubs today. Nor was she in a nice dress. No, she was wearing jean shorts and a plain red T-shirt, along with red canvas sneakers. She looked cute and bubbly and energetic, which I assumed was what she was going for.
I shook my head, realizing that I’d been staring. “Things are good,” I said. “Brought in quite a bit of cash, and it’s starting to die down now.”
“Great,” Leila said. “Has anyone brought you lunch yet?”
“Nope,” I said. Now that she mentioned it, I was getting pretty hungry. Another thing I hadn’t noticed since I’d been so caught up in doing what she wanted.
“I’ll get someone on that,” she said. “Sorry, things got a little crazy.”