Victim Of Circumstance

by Freya Barker

  The days are long, the nights empty, and my own company leaves a lot to be desired. I don’t know how to snap myself out of it. I’ve even started picking up shifts on my days off, just so I don’t end up sitting at home feeling sorry for myself. It’s pathetic.

  “Your shift was over twenty minutes ago.”

  I look up from refilling the bottles of condiments to where Jason is sticking his head out of the kitchen.

  “I know,” I mumble. “I’m just finishing this up, then I’m out of here.”

  “You off tomorrow?”

  “Yeah, unless you guys need me to come in?”

  My voice is a little too hopeful and Jason picks up on it.

  “Jesus, Robin. You’ve been here almost every day for the past few weeks. Take a break. I’m sure you’ve got Christmas shopping and stuff to do as well.”

  “I work Christmas, remember? I’ve got all I need.”

  He rolls his eyes and I can just hear his mumble before he ducks back into the kitchen.

  “Except a life.”

  Isn’t that the truth?

  Donna slips behind the counter and puts in an order with the kitchen before turning to me.

  “He’s right you know.”

  Great. I guess she heard. I quickly look over to see if Becca heard as well, but she’s talking to the family who just walked into the diner. I really don’t want her to be privy to this conversation.

  I brace an arm on the counter and plant my other fist on my hip.

  “About?”

  “Don’t play coy. We’ve all see you mope around and that’s not like you. Go out, do something fun, get a dog, join the book club. Anything to get you out of this funk.”

  Wow. I didn’t realize I’d been that obvious.

  “Don’t hold back on my account,” I snap defensively, even though I know she’s right.

  “I didn’t,” she says matter-of-factly. The straightforward mother of three boys shrugs. “Everybody’s been pussyfooting around since whatever started with that public lip-lock outside weeks ago ended shortly thereafter.”

  She has to bring him up.

  I heard from him, the Monday after Thanksgiving. A text message stating ‘We need to talk,’ and nothing since. Now I’d heard from Tank he’d been with Frank Hanson when he died, so I’d cut him some slack, but I promised myself I’d done all the chasing I would. So I waited until I saw him driving his old pickup truck past the diner last week, and it was clear that ‘need to talk’ was not that high on his list of priorities.

  So I’m done. I’m consciously snuffing out that little spark of hope that after all these years there might be someone out there for me. My next step is to stop moping.

  I pull my apron off and grab my purse from the drawer.

  “I’m outta here.”

  “Grab the garbage on your way out?” Donna holds up the bag and I take it from her hands. “Enjoy your day off,” she calls after me, and I lift a hand in response.

  I’m in a foul mood.

  Outside I duck into the dark alley beside the diner. The lid is heavy on the large bin, and I struggle to get it open. Swearing under my breath, I manage to lift it just enough to shove the bag inside.

  A rustle sounds behind me and I swing around, letting the lid slam shut in the process. I squint and scan the alley. I don’t see a thing, but when I turn toward the street I hear what sounds like a faint whimper behind me. My eyes do another scan of the deep shadows, and this time I see the glint of a pair of eyes peeking out from the far side of the dumpster.

  Meeow.

  A cat—or rather, a kitten no bigger than my hand—comes out of hiding and carefully walks closer.

  Meeow.

  I go down on one knee and hold out my hand for her to sniff, which she does tentatively. I don’t really know if it’s a her, but she strikes me as one; dainty and petite. Big eyes in a tiny face, she looks like a tabby, predominantly gray with some black-brown markings.

  “Hey, little one,” I coo, scratching behind her ear with a finger.

  She leans her head into my touch but when I reach farther to pick her up, she suddenly darts past me. Straight for the curb.

  I scramble to my feet and rush after her. Blind to the danger, she’s already running into the middle of the street when I notice headlights shining on her and she promptly sits down on her butt. Oh hell no. Dropping my purse I dive for her, both hands out. The loud honk of a horn startles the kitten and she suddenly moves but it’s too late; my fingers are already closing around her.

  With her body pressed against me, and her little heart hammering out a staccato rhythm, I straighten up just as I hear a door slam.

  “Do you have some kind of death wish or something?”

  I don’t have to look to see who the harsh voice belongs to. My whole body recognizes it. Bottled up anger bubbles to the surface, but rather than have it out in the middle of the street in front of the diner, I turn on my heel, snatch up my purse, and stalk toward my SUV.

  Somewhere along the line, the kitten started purring and I feel the vibrations where I hold her against my chest. Luckily I locate my keys easily and unlock my door, relieved when I hear his truck door slam again before I get behind the wheel. Guess he’s no more in the mood for a confrontation than I am.

  The little fur ball curls on my lap when I try to fit the keys in the ignition, my hands trembling.

  I half-expect the headlights of his truck to follow me home, and am surprised when I turn left but see him continuing north. I force down the disappointment that follows and focus on getting us home.

  Us. It would appear I have a cat.

  Not only have I become a grumpy reject, to add insult to injury, I’m officially a middle-aged cat lady. I’m also completely unprepared. I don’t have food, I don’t have a bowl; I don’t have a goddamn litter box.

  I almost turn around to hit up the grocery store, but remember I have a can of tuna in the pantry and an old box in the garage I can fill with newspaper. She’ll be fine.

  Ten minutes later, she’s hungrily scarfed up half of the tuna, ignored her box, and peed on the kitchen mat. I see we have some work to do. I picked her up and berated her—something she seems to enjoy since the purring is back again—when someone knocks on my door.

  Gray

  Fucking hell.

  My heart almost stopped when I saw her diving into the damn road, and the angry words were out of my mouth before I could check them.

  I know I waited too long getting back to her; things just kept popping up.

  I’d been full of good intentions after Frank’s death, but then I was contacted by a lawyer, stating he was the executor for Frank’s estate. That meant a trip back to Clare to his office, where I was handed a copy of the will I already had and assigned with the task of making Frank’s funeral arrangements. Luckily only a small ceremony, he’d been very specific in his instructions and wanted no fanfare.

  Since then I’ve spent most nights at the bar, getting a feel for the place, but also going through Frank’s belongings in the apartment upstairs. Enzo had been willing to help when I asked him, since a lot of the old man’s belongings meant nothing to me, but potentially a lot to someone else.

  Frank had made it sound easy, just toss everything out you don’t want, but I didn’t have the heart to do that. I’m just learning how precious mementos are. All I have left of my life before are memories I’m lucky I’ve retained, but I don’t have anything tangible. It all disappeared when the bank sold my parents’ place. All I had was what had been in my possession when I was arrested, or what Jimmy was able to salvage.

  To my surprise, in going through shelves and cupboards and boxes in the old man’s apartment, I discovered he’d retained a few mementos as well. A high school yearbook from the year my sister graduated, several pictures of her spread over the pages. A snapshot of the annual fair that showed my dad with me on his shoulders and my very pregnant mom tucked under his arm. Those were happier days, before Dad was laid
off from General Motors.

  Little things, hidden away among the seventy-some years of life accumulated in creaky drawers and on dusty shelves.

  I don’t know why, but it seemed important to sort through the past and find a new beginning to start a future from. That meant sorting through the stuff, cleaning the apartment, painting it, and getting a handle on my new and unexpected reality.

  Then I was going to sit down with Robin, when I had something real to offer her.

  Looks like fate wasn’t quite as patient.

  I lift my free hand and knock on her door, the other holding the supplies I picked up in town.

  “Can I come in?” I ask when she opens the door, the damn cat snuggled against her chest, and looking pissed as all get out. Still beautiful, though.

  “Why?”

  The question stumps me for a moment. I should’ve expected her to be direct.

  “Because there are things I want to tell you.” When she looks at me dubiously, I quickly add, “And I bought kitty litter and toys.”

  Something passes over her face I can’t quite identify, but she steps aside and waves me in. I walk straight into the kitchen and start pulling out the shit I just loaded up my cart with at the grocery store.

  “How’d you know I needed that?”

  I pivot my head to find her peeking over my shoulder.

  “The fact you almost threw yourself in front of my truck to rescue that cat made it pretty clear you’d be taking it home. You crawling behind the wheel still holding the damn thing confirmed it.”

  The corner of her mouth twitches.

  “Smartass,” she mumbles.

  “No, I’m not,” I contradict her, turning so I’m facing her. “I’m a little slow on the uptake.”

  She peers at me, judging me, and coming to a conclusion when she hands me the ball of fur and heads for the fridge.

  “Hang on to her for a minute.”

  I look down in the kitten’s big green eyes boldly staring back at me. Then I lift it up, scan the area between its hind legs and bite off a grin.

  “What are you gonna call it?” I ask when she resurfaces with a couple of bottles of water, handing one over.

  “Haven’t had a chance to think about it yet. Maybe Ally? Since that’s where I found her.”

  “You might scar him for life with a name like that.”

  “Why? It’s a perfectly good—” Her mouth snaps shut and her eyes narrow as she reaches for the cat, holding him up much like I did seconds ago. “Son of a bitch. I was so sure…”

  “He’s probably too young to remember you thought he looked like a girl.”

  With the cat in one hand and her water in the other, she saunters into the living room, sitting down in the lone club chair, leaving the couch for me.

  Message received.

  Instead of agonizing over where to start, I tell her about Frank: his generous legacy, his guilt, his illness, and his death. The words come easy when I don’t think too hard or worry about how they’ll be perceived.

  She listens intently, especially when I talk about the last days with him and repeat some of the things he told me.

  “He was right,” I confess looking straight at her. “I was wasting my life, going through the motions, and keeping expectations as low as I could.” I run a hand through my hair, because here is where it becomes tricky. Where one wrong word could make all the difference. “I did that inside and continued after my release. Then I met you and suddenly everything seemed possible. The world I’d so tightly controlled and limited, suddenly open wide. It felt like…like craving the water but discovering you can’t swim when you jump in.”

  Her hand, which has been absently stroking the sleeping kitten in her lap, scoops him up and sets him down on the floor. Then she gets up and sits on the couch with me. On the far side, with her knees pulled up, and her arms wrapped around them, but still on the same couch. Progress.

  “I got scared. When you talked about the holidays, and family, it scared me shitless.” I take a long swig from my water, buying time to sort through my thoughts. “When you’re inside, you learn fast that hope is weakness. Hope is disappointment. Hope is pain, even crippling sometimes.”

  “I think I understand that,” she says in a soft voice and my heart swells a little. “I don’t mean to compare myself to you, or your experience, but 9/11 was the day I was set free and yet for the eighteen years since then, I’ve been scared to hope. I’m scared still.”

  The day she was set free was the day her husband died.

  I’m starting to get a better understanding of the woman I saw with her arms spread and face to the sun. Much like I did when I stepped out of the gates of Rockwood Penitentiary. Feeling the clear air in my lungs and freedom on my face.

  Perhaps we’re not so different, she and I.

  I stretch my arm along the back of the couch, my fingers lightly brushing at her hair.

  “I am too,” I admit, dropping my hand to her knee. A sigh of relief escapes me when she covers it with hers. Still an arm’s length away, but infinitely closer. “Do you think we could try this again? Maybe wading in instead of diving off the cliff?”

  A smile stretches over her face and her gorgeous eyes, glinting silver with a sheen of tears, meet mine.

  “I’d like that.”

  Fuck, now I can feel my own eyes burning as that hope blooms inside my chest once again.

  I lean over and kiss the top of her hand before I get to my feet.

  “Where are you going?” she asks, looking surprised as she stands up as well.

  “Home, so I can plan our first date.”

  She smiles at that.

  “I’m off tomorrow,” she offers.

  “I’ll pick you up for dinner at six.”

  Instead of claiming her smiling lips with mine, I press a kiss to her forehead and walk out the door.

  But that smile stays with me all night.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Robin

  This is ridiculous.

  I discard yet another outfit onto the pile forming on the floor of my closet. The man has seen me naked, had his hands and mouth on my not so glorious curves. Those same curves are currently giving me a headache. Somewhere in the past few years I guess I’ve packed on a few pounds, because none of my dressy clothes fit anymore.

  They date back to when I was casually dating Andrew, and I haven’t really had reason to wear them since. God, I can’t believe that was eight years ago. Time flies, and after the painful misunderstanding around the state of my so-called relationship with Andrew, it seemed safer to not date at all.

  Until now.

  I blow the hair out of my face and contemplate what’s left in my closet. I snag a lonely pair of black jeans off the hanger and shoot up a little prayer they zip. They do, but now I have a little muffin top where my belly bulges. Oh, for fuck’s sakes. Get a grip. I resolutely turn my back to the mirror and reach for a black V-neck T-shirt and a colorful duster cardigan that has seen better days.

  My sudden nerves about dinner with Gray have nothing to do with how I look or what I wear, but those make for an easy distraction. Now that I’m dressed, with fifteen minutes to kill before he gets here, the real issue resurfaces.

  He’s shared a lot, both about his history and his thoughts. I’ve dropped hints about my past—he knows my marriage wasn’t great, which is more than most—but there’s a whole lot I left out.

  Dinner out implies conversation and I know the idea is to get to know each other better, but there are some things I keep close to my chest for a reason. Heck, I’ve known Kim almost as long as I’ve lived here in Beaverton—she’s a good friend—but she doesn’t even know what little I told him. My mother knows some, but my daughter doesn’t; at least not from me. Yet I get the sense someone as intense as Gray won’t rest until he has answers.

  My phone rings, and for a second before I check my call display, I wonder if perhaps Gray is cancelling, but it’s Shirley’s new number.
r />   “Hey, lady. How are things?”

  “Have you seen or heard from Mike?”

  She sounds rushed and I’m instantly on full alert.

  “No. Why?”

  “The boys called. Their father contacted both of them yesterday. Apparently he stayed with his brother in Midland for a while, but was talking about coming back to Beaverton. They said he sounded desperate and claimed he wanted to make things right with me. He was trying to milk the boys for information. Almost two months he’s been silent, but I knew it wouldn’t last forever.”

  “Oh, shit, Shirley. Look, I was off today but maybe call Kim? At least to give her a heads-up.”

  “Yeah, I will. I’m just worried he’s going to bother you guys at the diner.”

  “You worry about yourself, we can take care of things here.” There’s a knock at the door and I start moving in that direction. “Does he know where your aunt lives?” I glance through the peephole and see Gray on my doorstep.

  “Last time he saw her, she was still living in Ann Arbor. I can’t remember if I told him she moved to Grand Rapids. I don’t think so.”

  I open the door and wave Gray in. Fuck me; he looks good in dark washed jeans and an untucked dress shirt over a white tee. I hold up my finger and mouth, “One minute.”

  “Still, be careful,” I tell Shirley, as I watch Gray bend over the back of the couch, picking up the kitten. He’s not even trying and I’m drooling. How sad is that? “Keep your eyes open, Shirl, okay? He’s not gonna get far with us. We’ve got your back.”

  Gray’s eyes come to mine and he raises an eyebrow. I shake my head as Shirley starts talking.

  “Thanks, that means a lot. I figure with the trial date coming up, he’s panicking.”

  “Trial coming up?” I ask, my attention suddenly snapping back to the phone call.

  “February third. Gladwin District Courthouse.”

  “Shit, that’s right too. I’ll remind Kim. I’m sure she’ll want to be there for you as well. I will for sure.”

  “Thank you, Robin. I appreciate you so much.” She sniffles before she adds softly, “Ironic, isn’t it? Working with someone for years and it takes something like this to form a friendship.”