Stranger

by Megan Hart

He waited. Still Life with Chopsticks. The dark arches of his brows were so perfect I wanted to run my fingertips over them. I wanted to kiss him.

  “I don’t want you to think that I just…do that.” Although I had. Although I did.

  Sam’s mouth curved the tiniest bit at the corners. “I don’t want you to think I do, either.”

  We looked at each other another moment before he shrugged and bent to his food like we’d had an entire discussion and come to a conclusion. I wasn’t convinced, but I wasn’t sure what else to say about it. I ate, too, and the food was so good I had to sigh.

  “I haven’t had Chinese in forever,” I told him.

  “That’s like a sacrilege. How can you not, like, eat Chinese at least once a week?” Sam offered me an egg roll.

  “Uh, a little thing called money?” I took it and cracked it open to let the steam out and drizzled duck sauce into the shredded cabbagey goodness inside.

  “Oh, that,” Sam said, scoffing. “Money.”

  “It’s easy to laugh about if you have a lot of it.” I crunched into the egg roll’s crispy outer layer.

  “If I had a lot of money, would that make you like me better, or worse?”

  I looked up, thinking he must be joking, but he looked serious. “Neither.”

  Sam lifted a chunk of chicken with his chopsticks and used it to point at me. “You’re sure?”

  “Why, Sam? Are you a secret millionaire?” I looked to the side, at his boots. “Because I have to say, if you are, you’re really good at keeping it a secret.”

  He laughed and drew in his legs, bumping the table. “No. I’m pretty poor, actually.

  Starving artist and all that.”

  “Really?”

  He nodded. “I’m wallpaper.”

  I took a minute to chew before I let on that I had no clue what he meant by that. “Huh?”

  “Wallpaper.” He waved around the room. “People go to dinner, they eat and talk. They don’t pay attention to the wallpaper. Or to the dude playing ‘Killing Me Softly’ on the guitar.”

  “I think if I heard a dude playing ‘Killing Me Softly’ on the guitar, I’d pay attention.” Not to mention if said dude was Sam, who couldn’t possibly ever blend into the background.

  Sam shook his head and looked mournful. “Not so, I’m afraid. Nobody ever says anything about the fact I change all the words, so I’m positive nobody’s ever listening.”

  I laughed at the mental image of Sam bent over his guitar, crooning different lyrics to songs while all around him people drank wine and flirted with everyone but him. Sam grinned and sat back to tip his beer to his lips. I watched his throat work as he swallowed.

  “You play guitar for a living?”

  “A living? Arguable. Do I earn money doing it? Yes.”

  “Wow.” I made an impressed face.

  Sam laughed. “Yeah. My family’s so proud.”

  The way he said it made me think that wasn’t quite true.

  “Do you think you’ll get a record deal or anything?” Not being particularly creative myself, it was pretty cool to meet someone who was.

  Sam laughed again, this time louder. “Oh…right. Hey, you never know. I’d be satisfied getting paid to play for people who actually listen to me sing, at this point.”

  “Someday,” I said, because it’s what you said to people when they shared they had a dream.

  “Yeah,” Sam answered. “Someday.”

  We both drank in silence for a moment.

  “So, about that night,” Sam said, catching me looking. “If you don’t really do that, and I don’t really do that, how come we both did it?”

  I couldn’t tell him that I’d thought he was my rentboy. “I don’t know.”

  “Fate?” He drank more beer, this time with an eye on me.

  “I don’t believe in fate.”

  “Luck?” He grinned and licked his lips and set the bottle on the table.

  “Maybe luck. But, Sam…”

  He held up a hand to stop me, and I did. He unfolded himself inch by inch from his chair and gathered up the garbage while he talked. “You don’t have to say it. You don’t want a boyfriend. You’re not into dating. You just want to be friends.”

  I didn’t get up to help him, but he didn’t really look as if he needed any. He even found my trash can in its hidden place beneath the sink. “Why would you assume I’d say that?”

  Sam washed his hands at the sink and turned. “Were you going to say something different?”

  “No.” I shook my head and stood, too. “I just didn’t like that you assumed you knew what I was going to say.”

  We smiled at each other. Sam looked at the clock, then back at me. “We can be friends.”

  “We can?” His answer surprised me. Disappointed me, too, a little, I’ll admit.

  “Sure.” Sam grinned. “Until we can both no longer deny our unquenchable passion for one another.”

  I laughed. “Is it time for you to leave?”

  “Yes.” He straightened. “I think it is.”

  I walked him to the front door, and down the stairs to the back door of the funeral home, where he hesitated on the covered porch and I pretended my heart wasn’t jumping into my throat.

  “This is kind of a pain,” Sam said.

  I thought he meant the kiss thing—should he or shouldn’t he? I was half voting for should, even though I knew it should be shouldn’t. “What?”

  “The door. You don’t have your own entrance?”

  “Oh. I do, but I don’t use it. When I started renovating the apartment I blocked off the door with the shelves in the kitchen. It’s safer that way.”

  Sam nodded, solemn. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. Well, good night, Grace. Thanks for letting me invite myself to dinner.”

  “You’re welcome,” I said, and meant it. “We should do it again.”

  “Sure. Friends eat dinner together, right?”

  I nodded and before I could stop myself, I reached to run a finger along the line of buttons on the front of his shirt. “Sam?”

  “Yeah?” He shifted, just barely, when my finger stopped somewhere in the middle of his chest and I pulled it away.

  “About that unquenchable-passion thing…”

  He smiled and jumped down the two steps to the sidewalk. “Just think about it.”

  I sighed and watched him walk away. “I’m thinking about it.”

  “Keep thinking about it!” he called over his shoulder, and I went inside and closed the door.

  I thought about it, all right. Too much. It was pretty much all I thought about for the next week, but Sam never called. Not that he’d promised to call. Just that after he’d showed up with dinner, I’d expected him to. Shit. I’d wanted him to, and that pissed me off more than the fact he didn’t.

  I could have tracked him down, but I refused. I didn’t need Sam’s long legs, his shaggy hair, his big, big hands. I didn’t need his smile.

  I didn’t need Sam, period.

  Sunday dinner was neither worse nor better than I’d expected it to be. My niece and nephew romped with my parents’ dog, Reba, a purebred hunting spaniel they’d rescued a few years ago. My sister helped my mom in the kitchen while my dad and Jerry lounged in front of the television in the den. I wasn’t needed in the kitchen where the two whirling dervishes of domesticity tackled the cleaning of dishes with the precision of an army heading to battle. This left me with nothing to do but climb the stairs to the room I’d shared with Hannah.

  I meant to look for some old photo albums. My best friend Mo was getting married next year and I wanted to give her something different than just a set of wineglasses or a gravy boat. I looked around the room, which had once been papered with posters of rock stars and unicorns but now featured plain green walls hung with prints of flowers. The twin beds were the same, covered now in matching comforters with a battered nightstand between them. This was where the kids slept when they spent the night.

  I still had junk he
re, in the crawlspace. I tugged open the small half door set into the wall.

  Craig and Hannah had both teased me that “Big Jim” lived in there, and that if I didn’t do what they wanted, Big Jim would come out and get me. I’d gotten them back by hiding there one night and making scratching and moaning noises that had scared them both so badly they’d called the police. I was pretty sure Hannah still hadn’t forgiven me for that little stunt.

  The cubbyhole was frigid in the winter and sweltering in the summer, which made it not the best place to store precious things, especially not in cardboard boxes. I dragged the three with my name on them out into the center of the room. I remembered packing them up before I left for college, labeling the contents of each. I remembered thinking how important it was to save these memories of childhood and high school. Test papers, notes passed in class, a journal in which I’d written the name of my first crush.

  They didn’t seem so important now, not even the collection of plastic Smurfs that tumbled out of their disintegrating shoe box. I lined them up. Smurfette, Brainy, Handy. My favorite was the little Smurf lifting a beer to his happy grin. Him I tucked into my jeans pocket, but the others I divided into two piles to give to Simon and Melanie.

  In another box I found the albums. A long time ago I’d decorated the plain vinyl covers with stickers, most of which had lost their glue and fallen off. The inside pages were the sticky kind with plastic laid overtop, and many of the pictures had faded. I flipped through them, marveling at the fashions and hairstyles we’d once considered so “in,” then put them aside.

  Tucked just inside the top flap of one of the boxes was a newer photo album, the kind with slots for the pictures.

  I pulled it out and touched the photos in it. Me and Ben. We looked so young. Happy, too.

  We had been happy.

  I put the album aside. I didn’t have time for memories right now. I’d take them with me.

  Who knew when I might suffer some insane desire to read old notes from old boyfriends at three in the morning?

  I carried the boxes downstairs and put them by the back door, then called for my niece and nephew. They left off tormenting the dog and ran to me. I had my hands, cupping the bounty of Smurfs, behind my back.

  “Pick one,” I told them. They of course both picked the same one. Before a struggle could ensue, I held out the hand holding Smurfette to Melanie and the other to Simon, who furrowed his brow.

  “What’re these?”

  “They’re nerfs,” said his sister with the utmost scorn.

  “Smurfs,” I corrected.

  Simon laughed and held his up. “They’re weird.”

  Since Simon said everything was weird, I didn’t take offense. In the next moment, two pairs of small hands grabbed me for hugs and two small faces beamed as they thanked me.

  “Mama! Look what Aunt Grace gave us!” Melanie held out her new treasures.

  Hannah looked. “Oh, God. Where’d you get those?”

  “Out of the cubbyhole.”

  My sister made a face. “I hope you washed them first.”

  Of course I hadn’t, and both kids were gleeful to inform her of that. More struggles ensued as the Smurfs were deemed unfit for use until they’d been sanitized. Simon didn’t want to give his up until Hannah told him they could pretend the sink was a swimming pool. Then he was more than happy to spend the next twenty minutes dipping the small figures in and out of the soapy water even after his sister lost interest.

  “Are you sure you want to give them those?” Hannah asked.

  “Sure. Why not?” I lifted the boxes. “Get the door for me, would you?”

  She did and followed me out into the carport while I settled them into the trunk of my car.

  “Well, you might want to keep them. They might be worth money or something.”

  “I doubt they’re worth that much, even on eBay. Besides, the kids will like them.” I closed the trunk.

  “But you might want to keep them for your kids someday.”

  I turned to face my sister, who still looked tired. She hadn’t said much during dinner, a slack picked up neatly by my mother, but I’d noticed. “I’m not worried about that, Hannah.”

  “Are you sure? Because—”

  “I’m sure.”

  We stared at each other. She fidgeted. I recognized the half-defiant look in her eyes, but the reason for it escaped me.

  “Well. When you do have kids, we’ll give them back.”

  “Holy hell, Hannah, will you give it a rest? I’m not going to have kids for a long time, if ever!” The words snapped too loudly in the carport.

  Hannah frowned. “What do you mean, ‘if ever’?”

  I tried to shrug away the conversation. “Nothing. I mean, maybe I should get married first, you know? Let me find a guy first.”

  “You have lots of guys, I thought.”

  We stared at each other. I couldn’t figure her out. Was she disapproving? Was she angling for more information?

  “Yeah, but I’m not marrying any of them.”

  Hannah’s jaw set. “Obviously.”

  “What do you care?” I cried, hands on my hips. “What business is it of yours, anyway?”

  “Obviously none!”

  “That’s right,” I told her. “None.”

  We glared. The back door opened and Jerry stuck his head out. Neither of us turned to look at him.

  “You ready to go?” He sounded bored. Then again, he usually did.

  Hannah looked, then, and her frown straightened to neutrality. “Sure. Are the kids ready?”

  Jerry shrugged. “Dunno.”

  Every line of her body stiffened. “Could you help them get ready to go, then? Simon needs his socks and they both need to find their shoes.”

  Jerry didn’t move. “Where are they?”

  “I don’t know,” my sister said. “That’s why you have to find them.”

  Jerry didn’t move for a moment longer, and with a disgusted sigh Hannah pushed past him. “Never mind. I’ll do it.”

  She disappeared into the house and he followed a moment later. My dad appeared in the doorway no more than a few seconds later. He gestured at my car.

  “Your car needs to be inspected.”

  “I know, Dad. I have an appointment next week.”

  “Next week? And what are you going to do before then? What if you get pulled over?”

  “I’ll try not to.” I hated defending myself to my dad, especially when he was right. “I wanted to take it to Reager’s, and next week was the soonest they could get me in.”

  “Why not take it to Joe’s place?”

  “Because Reager’s gives me a discount,” I told him flatly. “And Joe doesn’t.”

  My dad huffed. “I’ll call him.”

  “No, Dad! You won’t.” I held up my hand. “I’ve got it under control.”

  “You need new tires, too.” My dad came down the couple steps from the house into the carport and started circling my car. “When’s the last time you checked the oil? You put a lot of miles on this car, Gracie.”

  I bit my tongue against a smart retort. “It’s fine. Okay?”

  “Lookit there.” My dad reached down to run a finger along the grooves in my right front tire. “You’re going bald.”

  “So are you,” I said.

  He straightened and patted his head without looking offended. He didn’t laugh, either.

  “You need to take care of stuff like that for yourself. Be responsible.”

  I gritted my teeth. This was working my very last nerve on several different but interconnected levels. “You mean because I’m not responsible or because I don’t have a man to do it for me?”

  My dad didn’t bother to look ashamed. I’m sure because he wasn’t. “Am I wrong?”

  “Yes, Dad. You are. Absolutely.” I pointed to my car. “My car has a lot of miles on it, yes, but those tires were just rotated two months ago and the guy told me they’d last another few thousand miles.”<
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  “Maybe if you spent less money on silly things, you wouldn’t have to worry.”

  He had absolutely no idea where I spent most of my discretionary income, and there was no way I was going to clue him in. “That’s my business.”

  “The home is still my business, too, Grace, and it will be until the day I’m laid out in it.”

  “Dad!”

  God, he was stubborn. My dad just glared, arms crossed. Mine were crossed, too, and though I had no mirror I was sure my face was set into the same expression.

  “The home’s doing fine. I’m doing fine, too.”

  “I had a wife and three kids and none of us lacked for anything when I was running the business,” my dad said. “There’s no reason you shouldn’t be making ends meet.”

  If real-life conversation was like the Internet, I’d have said OMFG. I settled for, “I am more than making ends meet.”

  We stared each other down. My dad wanted more details, and I wasn’t going to give them.

  While I might concede that the business was still his business, my money wasn’t.

  “You see the books,” I told him. “You know I’m running in the black, no problem. And I’ll do what I have to in order to keep it that way. Renovations and upgrades take money.

  Keeping on top of things takes money. But we’re doing fine, and you know we are. Don’t worry about me, Dad.”

  “I’m your father. It’s my job to worry.”

  “I’m fine. I promise.”

  My dad didn’t look convinced, which made me less inclined to forgive him his fatherly right to be concerned. “You have to trust me, Dad.”

  He looked again at my tires. “I’ll pay for new tires.”

  “You don’t have to do that.”

  He glared again. “Gracie—”

  I tossed up my hands, beaten. “Fine. Fine, okay? You can buy me new tires. Great.”

  “Happy birthday and Merry Christmas,” my dad said.

  “Gee, thanks.”

  He ignored my sarcasm. “You’re welcome. Don’t forget to say goodbye to your mother,”

  he added as he went back into the house.

  OMFG.

  Kicking myself because my dad’s scrutiny had made me paranoid, I opened up my accounting program as soon as I got home. I had all my accounts listed on my laptop, while downstairs in my office I only listed the business accounts.