Rest & Trust

by Susan Fanetti

  And God, the mess she’d made of herself. She didn’t know why she’d broken a habit of years—a rule she’d held sacred—and marked herself in a way so much harder to hide. Not impossible, but not easy during an inland SoCal summer. Breaking that habit, that rule, felt like a bottoming-out of some kind.

  And it gave Sadie hope. Maybe that was her next meltdown, like the day she’d lost it at work and ended up in rehab. Maybe cutting her arms so badly was the same, the moment when she had nowhere to go but up, away from the need.

  Fix one reckless behavior at a time. Okay, then. She wasn’t ready to give up her box yet, but she could envision a day when she might. Maybe she wouldn’t even need it when the baby came.

  That would be cool.

  ~oOo~

  Sherlock got quiet and cross whenever he saw his family. This was the third time he’d brought Sadie to the little house hidden behind the enormous manzanita hedges, and he always got quiet, his brows always drew together.

  He’d told her that his family was ‘shit,’ and he hadn’t been enthusiastic about her meeting them, especially after meeting her father had gone so poorly.

  Sadie’s dad had been obviously appalled at Sherlock’s mere appearance. He’d tried to be a gentleman and cover, but the damage had been done. Afterward, he’d called her to provide a list—she thought he’d literally made a list; it had sounded like he was reading to her—of all the reasons she could do better. His age. The piercings and tattoos. Even his name. Hell, even his truck, as in, ‘I’d never have expected you to be interested in someone who would drive a pickup truck.’

  Her father still didn’t know that he was a biker, much less one of the Horde. Or that she was pregnant. That was a list for another day.

  Her family was ‘shit,’ too. She loved her father, but nothing about them had really been functional since she was nine.

  As much as he didn’t like to go home, Sherlock also obviously loved his mom. And Sadie liked her. Patty Holmes was a sweet, sad woman. For whatever reason, though, Sadie had had a more middle-class picture in her head than the reality proved to be. She’d been almost as shocked by Sherlock’s family as her father had been shocked by the man himself.

  The neighborhood was tattered around the edges—lots of yards with more weeds than grass, or more dirt than weeds, with broken toys left where they’d been dropped. Cars on blocks in driveways. The Holmes house was nicer, though. Not a better house, just better cared for. Sadie knew Sherlock was responsible for that.

  Patty herself spent most of her life inside, usually sitting in her recliner in front of the television. She was a really big woman, with a lot of health issues, and when she got up and moved around, she looked miserably uncomfortable. None of that mattered, of course, in terms of how good a person she was, but Sadie couldn’t help picking up a little of Sherlock’s depressed vibe. As friendly as Patty was, and as welcoming and pleased that her ‘baby boy’ had found love—and how awesome it was that he’d never brought a woman home before!—this wasn’t a happy house, and Patty wasn’t a happy woman.

  Sadie suspected that no small part of the gloom was due to Sherlock’s older brother, Thomas. She stopped short of blaming him for it—she was too experienced in addiction to assign blame to a man so obviously lost in the world—but Thomas was the opposite of high-functioning. The man could barely sit still for the duration of a meal; he could barely maintain his side of the most casual conversation. And he looked half-decomposed already.

  Meth addiction was notorious for the ravages it wrought on the human body, and Thomas had been addicted for a very long time. When Sadie first laid eyes on him, she’d almost cried. Even in rehab, she’d never seen anyone so far gone. But then, her father had sent her to a swanky rehab center in the mountains. Meth wasn’t really the drug of the well-heeled.

  Thomas was why Sherlock and Sadie were here today. They were ostensibly here to borrow some gardening tools, and that was true; Sadie wanted flowers in Sherlock’s—their—boring back yard, and he only had a mower and a hedge-trimmer. But they had another reason for coming today, too.

  Sadie was nervous. She’d never done anything like this before.

  Sherlock still hadn’t moved. They were in his truck; he wouldn’t let her ride on his bike while she was pregnant. He was staring at the GMC logo in the middle of the steering wheel.

  She reached out and put her hand on his arm. “Are we going in?”

  “Yeah. You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.”

  “I know. I want to. Maybe it’ll help. I want to try.”

  With a sigh and a nod, Sherlock got out of the truck, and Sadie followed suit, jumping off the running board to the ground with a little hop.

  He was waiting for her at the front fender. As he took her hand, he said, “I wish—”

  She cut him off. “You’re not lifting me out of your monster truck until I’m at waddle weight. I’m not jostling the little peanut in my gut by jumping a foot down. There’s a limit, Sherlock. I’m a disaster, not an invalid.”

  Laughing, he kissed her cheek. “You love me like this.”

  She grinned and pushed him away. “Do not. Shut up.”

  ~oOo~

  They talked to Patty first and told her what they’d arranged. Sherlock didn’t want to surprise or upset her. When Patty agreed, then Sadie went, alone, back to Thomas’s room.

  She knocked on the door. When he answered and saw her, he smiled. If he could kick the meth, he really, really needed dental work. First thing.

  “Hi, Sadie Bug!” People loved to give her nicknames. Like, everyone—all the men she knew, anyway. Even ‘Sadie’ was a nickname. She didn’t understand it, but it rarely bothered her.

  “Hi, Thomas. You mind a visitor?”

  He looked surprised, and a little worried. “Tim around?”

  “Yeah. He’s out talking to your mom.”

  “He’s okay with you hanging out with me?”

  “Sure. Why wouldn’t he be?”

  Thomas shrugged. “I don’t know.” He looked down the hall. “I’m not his favorite person. I’m just surprised he’d trust me with you.”

  “Are you thinking about doing anything untrustworthy?” She smiled and made it a joke.

  “No, ma’am. Well, sure, then. Come on in.”

  He opened the door all the way and ushered her in with a grand bow and sweep of his hand. “Sorry about the mess.”

  Yes, indeed. Ugh. So unbelievably gross. Sherlock was nowhere near this disgusting.

  “No problem. Sherlock’s a slob, too.”

  He knocked a mountain of garbage off an old armchair. Sadie didn’t feel like she could decline his invitation to sit, but she perched just on the very edge, with as little of her ass on the seat as she could manage without falling on the even grosser floor.

  “So! What brings you to my neck of the woods? Are you doin’ okay?”

  “Yeah, I’m good. How about you?”

  “Good, good. I’m good, too.” He nodded. “Real good, yeah. It’s good you’re good. Tim’s good?”

  “Yeah, great.” Fuck a duck, this was the worst. “Thomas. I actually wanted to talk to you about something.”

  His dopey grin faltered and then fell back into place. “Okay. Shoot.”

  Sadie took a deep breath, letting the air fill and expand her chest. After she let it out, she said, “I’m an addict. Heroin and Oxy.”

  His face closed down like he’d dropped a security door over it. “That so?”

  She nodded. “Yeah. I was hooked for almost ten years, since I was fourteen. About a year and a half ago, I had this crazy meltdown at my job, and my father put me in rehab. I was at the Bright Future Recovery Center, up in Big Bear. You know it?”

  Slowly, he shook his head. The atmosphere in the room had chilled perceptibly.

  “It’s cool. Like a resort. I was in for three months. I’ve been out over a year. I’ve been clean since the day I lost it at work.”

  “That’s good f
or you, then. You got a point?”

  “Thomas, are you happy?”

  He stared at her, not blinking. Finally, he said, “Sadie, you’re my baby brother’s girl. I’ve met you...”—he looked suddenly lost, like he had no idea how often he’d met her or how well he knew her—“not many times. I’m old enough to be your daddy. Why do you think you get to ask me that?”

  She didn’t know if she was doing anything right here. Maybe she was making things worse. She was trying to talk to him the way they’d stressed in rehab: open and kind. Honest and clear. “Because I love Sherlock, and he loves you.”

  Thomas laughed bitterly at that. Since she’d been sitting in this rank, filthy room, his perception had sharpened noticeably. Whatever he was feeling had cleared his head somewhat. “You really don’t know what you’re talking about, Sadie Bug. So just get to your point and get it over with.”

  “Sherlock’s worked it out so you can go to Bright Future. There’s a private room reserved for you right now. It’s a great place, Thomas. So pretty, right on the lake. And the people are…not lame.”

  Thomas shook his head. “Nah, I don’t think so. Tim’s tried that a few times. Moms, too. Rehab’s not for me. I can’t have all those people in my grill.”

  Sadie nodded and let it drop. She didn’t feel like she had the standing to try to strong-arm him, and she didn’t know what else to say. “Okay. I just wanted to let you know that it was arranged.”

  She stood and went to the door. As she took hold of the doorknob, Thomas said, “Sadie,” and she turned around and waited to hear what he wanted to say.

  “Why’d he send you to talk to me?”

  “He didn’t. I asked if I could.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know for sure. I guess…I guess it’s because I know what it’s like not to be able to let anybody know. If that makes sense. Anyway, sorry I pissed you off.”

  He shook his head. “We’re cool.”

  She left his room feeling like she’d done every bit of that completely wrong. When she went back out to the living room, Sherlock and his mom both turned to her, wearing the same expression of curiosity and guarded hope.

  She shook her head. “I’m sorry. I did it wrong.”

  Sherlock stood and came to her. “No. You couldn’t have. Trying at all was right. Thank you.”

  Over in her chair, Patty sighed. “Maybe this is just the way it’s supposed to be. Maybe this is God’s plan for Thomas.”

  Sherlock tensed. “Moms, come on.”

  “No, Tim. You keep trying to fix him, and you love him less every time you can’t. He’s not your failure. He’s your brother, and he took care of you. Love your brother and forget the rest. Maybe that’s what needs fixing.”

  ~oOo~

  They didn’t stay long after that; the mood was not very social, even after Sherlock told his mom that they were expecting a baby. Patty was pleased and said all the right things, but she kept giving Sadie and Sherlock melancholy looks, too.

  So Sherlock loaded the truck bed with the gardening tools Sadie needed, and they got into the truck and prepared to head home.

  As the truck engine roared to life, movement at the corner of Sadie’s eye caught her attention. “Sherlock, wait.” She tapped the window glass with her finger, indicating Thomas, who was loping toward them.

  Sherlock killed the engine and lowered the windows. Thomas, winded, came up to Sadie’s side and leaned in. His breath was foul, but Sadie made sure not to react to it.

  Thomas eyed his brother. “Rehab doesn’t work for me. Good money after bad, remember?”

  Sadie turned to Sherlock, who nodded calmly. “I remember.”

  “So why again?”

  “You took care of me. Now I want to take care of you. We’re having a baby in the spring. I’d like him to know his uncle.”

  “Or her,” Sadie interjected.

  “Or her.”

  The brothers faced each other silently for a long time. Then Thomas turned to Sadie. “I guess you brought propaganda with you? Brochure or somethin’?”

  She opened the glove box and handed him a brochure. He stood at the side of the truck and thumbed through it. When he’d gone through to the last page, he closed it and returned his attention to his brother. “When would I have to go?”

  “They’ll hold the bed through the weekend. Tomorrow night.”

  “I’ll call you.” With that, Thomas turned and walked back to the house, rolling the brochure into a tube as he went.

  Sadie turned to her man, who shrugged and said, “Probably nothing.” He started the truck.

  “He’s thinking about it, though. That’s not nothing.”

  “I guess it’s not.”

  ~oOo~

  Thomas called the next morning, and Sherlock picked him up before noon and drove him up to Big Bear.

  Sadie stayed home; she felt awkward about nosing in like she had, even if she had made a positive difference, and she knew what it was like to be left at a place like that. That was an intimate, scary goodbye, and she didn’t belong in Thomas’s.

  Anyway, she had gardening tools now, and bulbs to plant. So she’d spent the afternoon doing just that. It was a good day. She felt happy.

  Being pregnant was a breeze, so far. No morning sickness at all. She got tired and needed an afternoon nap, but hey—she wasn’t working, so no problem there. She’d decided not to add finding a job to her list of new things. Making a home and a baby were enough right now, and Sherlock was perfectly content with that.

  She didn’t need to work; Sherlock was kind of loaded. Being an outlaw biker apparently paid really well.

  Some pretty intense stuff was going on with the Horde, that was clear. Sherlock had sent her to Bart and Riley’s a couple of times, and all the other women and the kids had been there. He’d left unexpectedly and come home in a dark mood a few times, too.

  Whatever it was, it didn’t get in her way much, and he told her it was just something they had to ride out. So, okay.

  She’d stopped running—all the Horde stuff, getting shipped off to Bart and Riley’s unexpectedly or suddenly having a guard on her, made it difficult to keep up a routine, and Sherlock had had a snit about her running while she was pregnant, even though it was perfectly safe.

  She kept herself occupied by being a total Fifties wifey type. She kept the house and did the shopping and planned a garden. The pantry and closets were now aggressively organized. She’d already designed and redesigned and then designed again a nursery for the totally unused and empty third bedroom. Ezra came over, and she practiced mommying. She went to lunch or just hung out with the other Horde women.

  She was that chick. And she liked it.

  She also gamed and dabbled in writing hacking code—though Sherlock had lost his enthusiasm for teaching her.

  She felt happy. Really happy.

  When Sherlock pulled the truck down to the end of the driveway, Sadie, sitting on the ground placing red tulip bulbs in the neat arrangement of holes she’d made, stopped and turned, waiting.

  He was smiling as he got out and came to her.

  “How’d it go?”

  “We’ll see. But he’s there. That’s a start.” He crouched down and kissed her. “Mmm. Dirt.”

  She giggled and wiped her gloved hand across her mouth. “Sorry.”

  “You made more dirt,” he laughed, and brushed his fingers over her face. She closed her eyes and savored the feel of his hands on her.

  He turned and picked up the package of bulbs. “Pretty. You have a thing for tulips, don’t you?”

  Sadie took the package from him and reached in for another bulb. “Red tulips were my mother’s favorite flower. I don’t remember her very much. Just a couple of things, like snapshots. I remember her laugh. I remember when she’d get the Beemer out and put the top down on the weekends, and she’d put a headscarf around my head and a pair of her sunglasses on my face, and we’d go out and be Grace Kelly and Audrey Hepburn. And
I remember red tulips.”

  She studied the photograph on the bag, showing the variety of tulip she was planting. When Sherlock went a while without saying anything, she looked up. He was staring at her, his eyes burning.

  “So I guess they’re my favorite flower, too,” she added, feeling shy.

  “I love you, little outlaw.”

  ~oOo~