“Oh!”
Seamus blushed a little, although not because he’d accidentally come out to Michael, more that he’d fallen for the teasing. Even so, he didn’t feel comfortable calling Chancey with Michael in the house; he imagined Chancey was having the same issue with Dee being around all the time, because hadn’t they gone and got themselves all worked up in a matter of minutes?
Back in high school, there had been a really creepy boy called Finn, or Flynn, or something along those lines, Seamus couldn’t recall much beyond the acne and the bow legs, neither of which was the quality that made him creepy as hell. Oh no, that was down to the invitation from whatever-his-name-was to join a ‘wanking circle’. Seamus couldn’t say no quickly enough, horrified by the thought of doing that in front of the other boys, who saw it as ‘a bit of a laugh’ and even competed to see who could shoot furthest.
To Seamus, it was a private, intimate experience that he couldn’t imagine sharing with someone he didn’t have feelings for. Doing it with Chancey, even over Skype, had felt special, and he could hardly wait to do it again, but circumstances wouldn’t permit it.
Yes, he was jonesing badly for Chancey Bo Clearwater, and after four days, he’d take what he could get. With Michael engrossed in Britain’s Got Talent, Seamus switched on his laptop, drumming his fingers on the base while it logged in and the programmes started up. The Skype window opened, blinding white against the dim backdrop of the ambient light in the living room. Offline. Damn. Just in case, he opened the browser and checked in on Facebook: no sign of Chancey there, either, although there was a post on his profile from a couple of hours ago:
Dee Clearwater is at C&P with Chancey Clearwater.
That had to be a good thing, surely? Father and daughter out for an evening of dancing together. For all of Seamus’s disappointment that his crazy idea had fallen by the wayside, he didn’t hold it against Dee. How could he, when she was the most important thing in Chancey’s life, his very reason for living? No, he’d go for Paddy and Aidan’s wedding and damn well enjoy it. Of course, if he’d not left in the first place…
Whilst Seamus wasn’t one for regrets, he had thought about what might have been if he’d stayed. Maybe it would never have been more than the one night. Or maybe they’d have made a go of a relationship. Would Dee have accepted him? Or would she have felt betrayed and reacted the way she had to her mother’s announcement? Well, it was too late now he was back in Ireland.
Seamus clicked the ‘like’ button on the post Dee had tagged her dad in and glanced absently over his laptop at the TV, or into it really. His mind was wandering. I should probably do something. Go for last orders, take the dog for a walk, anything but sit in watching Saturday night TV. Walk the dog to the pub? Aye. That’ll do nicely. He pulled down the screen of his laptop, catching the ping before it shut. He opened it again.
New message.
From.
“Dee?”
He opened it, a little puzzled but guessing it was only because he’d ‘liked’ her post about C&P, soon discovering he was way off track.
Hi Seamus. It’s Dee – I’m Chancey Clearwater’s daughter. Dunno if he’s told you much about me. (This must be so freaking weird for you, I know.) We only met each other that one time, when I was doing the Salina Rodeo. Do you remember? Whatever, not really the point. Listen, I’m sorry for writing to you but tonight was…bad. Like really, really stupid type bad in a week that was already a total cluster. I’m rambling, I’m sorta nervous. Lemme get to the point. I thought you and Daddy were together? Like dating or partners or boyfriends or word you like? (Don’t ask me how I found out about you guys because I would get in so much trouble if Daddy knew I snooped… Shit.) So, what’s happened? Did you guys break up or something? Coz I’d rather Daddy was talking to you than making out with Boss Tina at the dance hall. ZOMG. You don’t even know how embarrassing that was!! Anyway, can you please get him to stop ruining my life?! Please?! Talk to him or something! Thanks! Dee. x
“What the hell?”
Seamus shoved the laptop hard, almost knocking it onto the floor, completely forgetting his house guest, until Michael jumped, and his tea jumped with him, right out of the cup. The liquid landed with a loud splat on the hardwood floor.
“Oh God, I’m sorry, Seamus. I’ll get a cloth right away now.” Michael shot to his feet and flew from the room.
Seamus grabbed his hair and tugged, staring up at the ceiling, his mind whirring with thoughts that he couldn’t grasp, while his temper swirled around and around, building, set to explode. He slammed the laptop shut and got up.
“I’m going out,” he said, and out he went. No coat, no dog, nothing but the t-shirt and jogging pants he’d been lounging in, before a hundred-weight of shit hit the fan. The speed he was moving, he was almost running, and as his rage soared, he took off, his brain shutting down, leaving the darkness and his fury for company.
Sometime later—Seamus had no idea how much exactly—he finally started to tune in to his surroundings. His feet pelted the wet road at around half his heart rate, and the rain was still coming down. It was a fine, misty rain, soaking through his clothes to frigid skin that belied the heat of his continuing—though somewhat lessened—rage.
Other than ‘making out with Boss Tina’, Dee’s message had been lost to fight or flight, and he’d need to read it again to take in the rest of it, which likely explained why she’d contacted him out of the blue. They didn’t know each other. They’d met in passing once, and he thought she’d maybe been in Chancey’s pickup on a couple of occasions when he’d stopped by for his wages. Stupidly, since Chancey’s call earlier in the week, Seamus had been thinking how he could get to know Dee better, because this thing with Chancey was way past being a hook-up, or so he’d thought.
And kissing Tina, of all people; she had to be fifty-five if she was day. Not that age mattered. After all, Chance was going on for twenty years Seamus’s senior. But Tina was a good-looking woman, the kind of woman Chancey would find attractive, irresistible, maybe.
“But I thought we had something,” Seamus muttered to the image of Chancey in his mind’s eye, where, in spite of his alleged infidelity, he was still sexy enough to prompt a response. Seamus forced both the image and the arousal away and shook his head. “I’m a fuckin’ eejit.”
Back at the cottage, Michael had gone to bed, leaving the living room spick and span. He was a good kid, well-trained, respectful, polite. It was a crying shame his stepdad was a bigoted old bastard. He was probably a decent man in all other ways, but at that moment it would take a saint of a human being to impress Seamus. He went to the fridge and grabbed a can of beer, got halfway back to the living room, returned to the fridge and grabbed the other three cans, and back to the living room again, where he stood, staring at the closed laptop on the table. Everything had been grand—until he’d read that message.
He switched on his stereo, connected his iPod and hit ‘play’: The Cranberries’ ‘Linger’. He had to laugh. It was that or break stuff. Taking a deep breath and a good swig of beer, Seamus retrieved the laptop and sat on the floor with his back to the sofa. Above him, he heard Tess jump down off the bed and land on the floor, followed by the tap-tap-tap-tap of claws on stairs; she cautiously crept into the room.
“Hey, girl, there y’are,” Seamus said. Tess approached nervously, her tail wagging a little too fast to be a sign she was happy to see him. He patted the sofa cushion behind him, and she hopped up, snuggling against his shoulders. “You’re a good girl,” he murmured, soothed by the warm, gentle pressure of her back against his.
“Right. Let’s have another look at yer.”
He opened the laptop and waited for it to restart everything, and as the screen brightened, Dee’s message slowly came into view. He re-read it, trying to take in every word without looking at the last couple of lines. How had she worked out they were ‘together’? They’d said nothing to indicate they were anything but friends. And if she was so pissed off with her mother f
or getting married, then surely she’d feel the same about her dad being involved with someone? After all, wasn’t that why she’d sent the message? Because Chancey had kissed Tina? And what the hell was Seamus, four-fecking-thousand miles away, supposed to do about it?
But that was kids. They only saw the world from their own narrow, selfish point of view. I can’t fix this, so I’m going to ask a grown-up to make it better. That’s what the message was, essentially, and staring at it now didn’t change what it said, or how angry Seamus was. Because he’d been made a fool of.
No.
That was a lie. He was hurting.
He glugged down the rest of the first can of beer, opened a second, which was technically his sixth, as he’d already drunk a four-pack before Dee’s message. His iPod delivered more accompaniment to his melancholy in the form of ‘Man on a Wire’ by The Script. Yesterday’s love…was it even that much? Just the idea of Chancey being with—
“You stupid, stupid…” The scrunched empty can dug into his palm, and he grimaced through the pain, letting out a small grunt and then panting heavily. This was not who he was. OK, he had his downs, but he was mostly an up kind of guy. This kind of foolishness was what people in films did, or lovesick teenagers, not twenty-seven-year-old men with their own place, a job, a dog and, apparently, a lodger. It had to end now. He had to get his head back together, go back to being who he was before…
Before he fell in love.
Another can of beer washed down a further ten minutes of staring at that message, wondering what he should do about it, if anything at all. He could maybe reply, tell her to talk to her parents. In the Williams household, they’d always talked through problems. They’d still had their screaming rows. That was natural, normal, and quickly fixed, because they talked things through. He doubted Dee had been honest with either of her parents, and who could blame her? They were both acting like kids themselves.
At the end of his seventh beer, Seamus considered his options. It was almost two in the morning, and it was Sunday now, so it didn’t really matter, but there was no point to putting up with a numb bum and doing nothing. He glanced down at the screen, all set to switch off and go to bed.
Another message.
Not Dee.
Shay. We need to talk.
Chapter Eighteen:
Comin’ Out Swinging
“You’re drunk,” Seamus accused by way of greeting. No Hi, Chancey, it’s been a while—just the obvious. Chancey ran a hand through his hair and snorted. Yeah, he’d had one or five since he’d come home. But he wasn’t the only one it seemed.
“You look as sober as a priest yerself. Been dippin’ into the sacramental wine there, Shay?”
“What do you want, Chance?”
Chancey had been injured too many times on the job to wince at something like this, even if thoughts came at him like mis-flung darts. Eager to get back to your barely legal boyfriend? No, he wouldn’t give Seamus the pleasure of seeing him wince, even if he was bleeding inside.
“I wanted to give you an answer.”
“Oh?”
“About seeing you when you come back to the States.”
Seamus had always held his liquor well when they met up at Rack ’Em. The only ways he’d been able to tell Seamus was sloshed was the red colour suffusing his cheeks, and his laugh—bold at the least of times—became even heartier and more rich. And he was always singing.
Seamus Williams was not singing now, but he was most definitely drunk.
“Let’s hear it, then.”
“I won’t be seein’ you. I’ve got Dee to think about, and my work, and I can’t just pick up and—”
“Fine.”
“Fine?”
“I said it was.”
“Seamus, you were the one who left your goodbyes with the bartender. I’m not going to—”
“I heard you, Chancey. I said it’s fine.”
His jaw was set tight. No friendly smile now. No rich, warm laugh. Nothing about him that reminded Chancey of the old Seamus.
“Well…all right, then.”
“It’s late, I ought to be going.”
“You don’t want to… Y’know?” Chancey’s cock was in the mood, but he couldn’t say that his heart was particularly up for it. He just couldn’t stand the thought that Seamus really might have someone else warming his bed. Jesus, so stupid. Skype wasn’t a lifetime commitment. I now pronounce thee cyber-partners, forsaking all others…
Seamus studied him for a minute, opened his mouth like he might say something—like he might say many, many somethings—and then clamped it shut tight.
“Take care of yourself, Chance.”
The window with Seamus’s handsome face disappeared, and Chancey was left staring at the chat window.
What the hell? he wrote, but Seamus was offline.
<<< >>>
Deidra wasn’t talking to him the next morning when he laid homemade pancakes on the table in front of her. He’d told her in the car that she was grounded for her potty mouth back at the C&P Dance Hall, and she could forget their plans for weekend driving lessons, he’d be taking her phone, and she might as well kiss Nate goodbye (not literally) because she wasn’t going to see him for a week either.
She’d rolled her teary eyes and said, “We have four classes together, Daddy, you can’t keep us apart.”
So he made it a week and a half for being a smartass.
Chancey had a hell of a hangover that morning—the sort of doozy that felt like his head might split open and a little chick would pop right out. He made himself some hangover cure, threw it back, gagged, and sat down to try and eat a pancake with his daughter, like a civilised human being whose love life wasn’t a total wreck.
“You want to talk about last night?” he asked calmly, his shoulders tensing in case she came at him yelling. He didn’t think his head could handle the pitch Dee reached when she was really worked up.
She grumbled something at him.
“Well, those were almost words,” he said. “I might cut some time off your punishment for good behaviour. You know, having a conversation with your father about why you acted like a brat last night.”
“A brat?” She scoffed. Dee was still dressed in her pyjamas, the ones her mother had bought her on a tour in Texas. They had big smiling cows all over the pants. She hadn’t combed her hair, and the dark curls were tangled and wild. Bedhead. Her Sunday hairdo. “You were the one kissing someone else.”
“Someone…else?”
Suddenly everything clicked, and Chancey’s head began to throb even worse than it had before. He reached out for his daughter’s hand and said, “Darlin’, you know sometimes two people just aren’t meant to be.”
Kaylee and her new marriage and that stupid, completely unsolicited kiss with Boss Tina… He’d thought Dee was too old, too clever to think that her parents would ever get back together again. But maybe he was just hoping to save her some pain. After all, it wasn’t an uncommon fantasy—especially when the folks stayed fairly all right friends, as he and Kaylee had.
She bit her lower lip. “I just…don’t think Boss Tina’s the one.”
“Yeah, definitely not,” Chancey agreed. Lord, that woman’s boots had been on fire, but her kiss had not. It was like kissing a sister. “Dee, you can’t be so reactionary all the time. The woman kissed me. We’re not getting married. Hell, we aren’t even going to date.”
“Good.”
“But if I wanted to date her, I could.”
Dee pulled her hand back. “I just think…you should give other people a shot. You know? You say some people aren’t meant to be, but…did you try hard enough, Daddy?”
“Honey, we tried.”
The only way he’d have been able to keep Kaylee Clearwater in his life would have been to rope her and tie her to the apple tree out back, and even then he figured she would have weaselled her way out of her bindings eventually. Kaylee was never meant to be anchored. If they were still married,
well, he’d probably be reading about her affairs in the tabloids.
Dee stabbed her pancake and pouted.
<<< >>>
Chancey rode along the trail, guiding a small group of guests with him as he went. He kept enough of his mind on what he was doing so that no one would veer off into the woods and get lost, but most of his damn fool brain was wandering.
His ex-wife…
His daughter…
His boyfriend… Never-was-boyfriend… Ex-boyfriend?
Fuck it. Seamus. Undefinable Seamus who had gone and made it even more undefinable by telling him to take care of himself. What the hell did that mean? Take care of himself? He took care of himself every damn day. That was a capital G Goodbye, was what that was.
It had been almost two weeks since their last conversation, and Chancey had not been back on Facebook or Skype, though he’d left the app on his phone, in case… In case what? Seamus pulls his head out of his ass? Yeah, probably that one. You’re just waiting around for the day when he drops the youngin’ and remembers he has someone older and more experienced.
Goddamnit.
They had never said they were exclusive. Except Chancey had naturally assumed that was the state of things. Rather, he hadn’t wanted to be with anyone else. Sure, it was frustrating as hell that he couldn’t feel Seamus’s arms wrapped around him, that he couldn’t climb into bed with Seamus and they couldn’t intertwine their bodies, that he couldn’t kiss the taste of Guinness from Seamus’s pink lips… But that didn’t mean he wanted those things from someone else. And he didn’t want Seamus getting those things from anyone else either. Maybe he should have made that clear from the beginning.
No bringing teenagers home at three in the morning.
You moron, he chastised himself. Why didn’t you ask him? He’s been straight with you from the first day you met him—why didn’t you just ask who the kid was?
Damn fool pride.
He wondered if Paddy and Aidan had set a wedding date yet. He imagined it hadn’t already come and gone, though what did he know? They could do a Justice of the Peace sort of thing.
Seeds of Tyrone Box Set Page 33