It's Never Enough: Book 1 in the Never Series

by Susan Soares

  I paused for a beat. “A shit load? Really?”

  “Yup.” She started to close the bathroom door but stuck her head back out to say, “Hey maybe if Tatas and Taters is hiring, you could get a job there, and we’d be the tits and ass girls!”

  I shoved her face back inside the bathroom. “Get ready!”

  Her cackle was loud and made me smile. I looked down at my chest. The round, full, B cups stared back at me. These girls are for home shows only.

  ***

  At six fifteen, we pulled up to the house that my dad and Fiona’s mom shared. Fifteen minutes after we were told to be there. Fiona always took obscenely long showers.

  “We’re telling your mom it’s all your fault that we’re late,” I said as we exited the car. Janet was a stickler for being on time. And the last thing I wanted was an earful on being late from someone who was no longer my stepmother.

  “Whatever,” Fiona said as she twisted the doorknob. “Not a word about the job.” She waggled a finger at me.

  I smiled my you-can-totally-trust-me smile. “Cross my heart and hope to—”

  “I’ll kill you,” Fiona said as we walked inside. “Mom?” she called out.

  “In the dining room girls,” Janet snipped. Yup, she was pissed.

  We crossed into the dining room together. My dad stood and came towards me for a hug. Janet stayed in her seat.

  “Sorry, Mom,” Fiona said as she kissed her mother’s cheek. “Mallory was running late.” Fiona stuck her tongue out at me.

  I mouthed the word bitch to her only to have her wink back at me.

  “Nice to see you, honey,” my dad said after planting a bourbon-soaked kiss on my cheek. “You too, Fiona.”

  “Thanks, Jack. You too.”

  We all sat and placed our cloth napkins on our laps. I scanned the table: chicken parmesan, garlic bread heavy with butter and oil topped off with melted cheese, rigatoni swimming in meat sauce, and zucchini casserole.

  “Um, Janet,” I cleared my throat. “Is there any salad?”

  She let out a heavy sigh. Her long black eyelashes fluttered as she cast her gaze downward. “Mallory, I’m sorry. In the midst of creating this feast for our dinner I failed to make the salad.”

  Ouch.

  “I can go whip one up,” Fiona said coming to my defense.

  “No, I’m sorry,” Janet dropped her body back into her chair. “I didn’t mean to snap at you. I’m just so incredibly tired.” She placed her hand to her forehead like she was checking her temperature or something.

  Fiona and I exchanged concerned glares. Was there something majorly bad that they were going to announce to us? Over chicken parm and garlic bread?

  “Now don’t go freaking out on us girls,” my dad said. “I’ve seen that look you two gave each other before.” Even through the bourbon my dad was pretty astute. “Janet’s fine; we’re all fine.” He took another sip of his drink, the ice cubes ringing against his glass like music.

  Fiona and I both dropped our shoulders and relaxed.

  “I’ll just go make myself a quick salad,” I said, pushing myself to standing.

  “She’s just pregnant, that’s all,” my dad said after downing the last of his drink.

  My body crashed back down into my seat. “She’s what?” I said.

  “You’re what?” Fiona asked at the same time.

  “Pregnant. I’m pregnant.” Janet said. Her little heart- shaped mouth curled into a sheepish grin. Her pink lipstick extended just beyond her lip line and settled into the fine lines that surrounded her lips. Her jet-black hair that always looked so lustrous looked dull and limp hanging in a low ponytail.

  Fiona’s eyes darted to her mother’s face. “You’re what? But how? You’re too…too…old.”

  Ohmigod, she said it. She just called her mother old.

  “Excuse me?” Janet’s blue eyes appeared to blacken like a shark’s before it kills.

  Fiona tossed her napkin onto her empty plate. “I’m sorry, Mom, but come on now, you’re forty-five. Aren’t your eggs, like, all dried up by now?”

  Ohmigod. It was horrible. I looked to my dad. He sat stoically with half of his face hidden beneath his bushy auburn beard. His gray eyes cast towards his empty drink. Why wasn’t he defending her?

  “My eggs are perfectly viable until I hit menopause young lady, and that is way, way off in my future!” Janet’s nostrils flared.

  “Fiona, I understand you’re shocked,” my dad said.

  “I think shocked is an understatement, Jack,” Fiona said and then looked to me. “You’re awfully quiet.”

  My shoulders inadvertently raised and lowered. “I was just…” My thoughts were streaming too fast to comprehend them. I’d be twenty years old when the baby was born. It wasn’t exactly the ideal sibling relationship I’d always hoped for but it was still a family. One concrete picture kept playing through my mind. “I guess I was just thinking it might be kind of nice to all be a family again. You know, with a new little sibling.” Family—a word that had taunted me all my life.

  ***

  When I was in the second grade, I had to write a paper on my family. This came about just three months after my mom had taken off. The bright lights of Vegas and the chance at winning it big were much more appealing to her than the mundane life of a housewife. All the kids in my class were so excited about the project and being able to write about something we all knew. If you couldn’t write about your family, what could you write about? Mrs. Gleeson made general statements about how there were all sorts of different families and that we needed to be respectful of each other. There had been a meeting with my teacher, the principal, and my father after my mom left. I was a “special case,” and they were supposed to keep an eye on me. When all the kids left to go to lunch, I stayed back and asked Mrs. Gleeson if I could write that my mom was still around in my story even though she was gone. She said yes, and that was the first time I realized how important it was for me to fit in.

  My dad was totally lost raising a young girl on his own. I don’t think love was his main factor in finding a woman to marry because I’m pretty sure his main goal was to find a nice woman that would be a nice parent for me. Unfortunately, he tried to do this over and over again. First came replacement mom number one and her twin eleven-year-old boys. She worked as a candle maker at a big factory and constantly came home smelling like floral or spices. Her boys were the worst. They constantly bullied me and tore up my stuffed animals. She only lasted a year.

  Next came replacement mom number two and her three kids—two girls and one boy. The boy was her golden child. Apparently, he was a miracle baby who wasn’t supposed to survive after he was born. She treated him like a king, and he totally abused his power. She’d make him whatever he wanted for dinner and make her daughters and me make our own food. She totally neglected everyone but him. Once my dad realized she wasn’t just neglecting him but also his kid, they got divorced.

  Then came replacement mom number three. She was a nurse—which made me feel comfortable since I was always afraid of getting hurt—and her son who was two years older than me. He was a piece of shit. Every chance he could, he’d punch me in the leg or monkey bite my arm. He loved to collect bags of insects and then show them to me. Ants, worms, beetles, he even came at me one day with a bag of some dead bees he’d found. His mother didn’t seem to care, and I soon found out why. Being a nurse, she had easy access to drugs, and soon it overtook her. Thankfully, my dad kicked her and her bug-collector son out as soon as he realized it.

  Finally, my dad brought home replacement mom number four. Janet. She came with Fiona. Fiona was so beautiful that I was totally intimidated by her. I was sixteen, and she was seventeen. Once she told me about the horrible marriages and stepsiblings she’d had to deal with, I just knew that we were going to bond. Janet and my dad seemed to be in sync also. We even started a tradition of family game nights on Fridays. We’d sit around eating pizza and playing card or board games until m
idnight. In the summer, we’d sit out on the covered porch, and in the winter we sat in front of the fireplace. It was picturesque. Janet was nice to me, and Fiona had become more like a sister to me than anyone else I’d ever met. We were all so happy. I finally felt like I was part of a family. A real actual family, and it made everything about me feel whole again.

  Sadly, that feeling didn’t last. Like lots of couples, my dad and Janet quickly grew apart. The odds weren’t in their favor from the start: fourth marriage for my dad and third for Janet. They probably had a fifteen percent chance at best. They split amicably, but of course, it was never the same again. My one true family had shattered, and it made me feel like that second grader all over again. With a big hole inside me that nothing could seem to fill.

  ***

  Maybe now the word family would actually mean something if it all worked out somehow.

  “Oh, Hun,” my dad said, swirling the phantom contents of his glass while sharing an uncomfortable look with Janet.

  “Don’t say it,” Fiona said, her arms crossing over her chest.

  “We’re not.” Janet cleared her throat. “Getting back together.”

  My head spun to my dad. “What? What the hell happened here?”

  My dad puckered his lips like he’d just eaten a large lemon. “Look, girls, sometimes a bad storm knocks the cable out here, and you have to kill some time.”

  Silence. Janet’s eyes bore into my dad.

  “I’m kidding!” he yelled. “Look.” He cleared his throat and put both elbows on the table. “What happened, happened. We’re both very happy about the baby. It’s just that…” He looked to Janet, a confused look in his eyes.

  “We’re not good together.” Janet chewed on her bottom lip. “Jack and I are like oil and vinegar; we just don’t mix.” She scanned Fiona and me, giving us an I’m sorry grin, and then placed a piece of chicken parm on her plate.

  My dad followed her lead and grabbed the largest chunk of garlic bread.

  “Hold on.” I pressed my hands on my thighs to stop them from bouncing. “You two got a little crazy one night, made a baby, aren’t getting back together, and that’s the end of it?”

  My dad shrugged. “What more do you want to hear?”

  My mouth gaped open for so long that I half expected to swallow a fly. “I want to hear that for the sake of the baby, you’ll try to work things out!” Wasn’t that what parents were supposed to do? For the sake of a baby? Then again, my dad and Fiona’s mom weren’t the spokespeople for balanced parents. They just weren’t the type to stick around once the going got tough.

  “Mallory, what’s done is done, and Janet and I will raise this baby as we see fit.” He popped a large chunk of bread in his mouth, bits of Parmesan cheese sticking in his beard.

  “No!” I shouted, surprising myself. “No!” I stood up. “You two are acting like two teenagers who got drunk one night and, oops, the condom broke! When are you going to grow up? When are you going to take responsibility for your actions? When are you going to think about anyone else besides yourselves?” I felt like the broken-hearted ten-year-old girl inside me was about to burst out into a temper tantrum.

  “Mal,” Fiona tried to interject, but I couldn’t stop.

  “When are you going to act like a parent?” I shoved my chair into the table and started for the door.

  I heard Fiona behind me as I booked it to the car. “Mallory, wait!”

  With brute force, I thrust the door open and dropped into the driver’s seat. Fiona fell in beside me.

  “Damn, don’t make me chase you,” she huffed.

  My head felt like it weighed a hundred pounds. “They’re nuts, right? It’s not just me, right?”

  Fiona laughed. “Oh yeah, they’re bat-shit crazy.” She picked on a piece of garlic bread she’d snagged on her way out.

  “Exactly.” I slapped the dashboard. “The two of them are staying apart, in the same friggin’ house, screwed one night, and are now having a baby?” It sounded asinine as I said it. “What the—”

  “Fuck.” Fiona took the word out of my mouth.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The next morning, I was sitting in my usual booth at Perked with my mocha latte while still stewing over the news my father and Janet had dumped on us the night before. The scent of chocolate permeated my nose, and hot mocha flavoring danced across my taste buds as I took a long sip. My phone showed two missed calls from my dad and one missed call from Janet. I wasn’t ready to talk to either of them. Maybe it shouldn’t have bothered me so much. Maybe it all stemmed from the fact that I never felt like I truly had a real family, and the thought of it for one brief moment made me feel happy. Maybe I was just kidding myself thinking that would ever happen. Maybe I’d never feel whole, and that was just something I had to accept. Tension vibrated through my entire body. I needed to relax. The coffee and chocolate probably weren’t helping matters any.

  Hearing bright laughter from the check-out stand caused me to look up. There with Eliza, I saw Casper’s daughter—Zoey, I thought her name was. Quickly, I closed my book and gathered my things.

  The two were engaged in conversation, and I kept waiting for a break to interject. “Hey, Mallory, do you need something else?” Eliza asked, her false lashes fluttering at me.

  “Oh no, thanks,” I focused on Zoey. “Could I, um, ask you something?”

  She placed her hand to her chest. “Me?”

  “Yeah, we met, well, sort of met the other day. At your dad’s apartment?” I phrased it as a question to see if she had any clue of who I was.

  Her eyes studied me for a moment. “Oh wait, you’re the one who helps with the dogs, right?”

  “Mallory. Yes. That’s me. You had mentioned something about a yoga studio that day—”

  She nodded. “Zen. It’s on Main Street. About a five-minute walk from here. They’re great. They have classes every hour, and you can just walk in.”

  “Cool, thanks.”

  Taking a sip from her iced coffee, she politely smiled as I walked past her. When I began to push the door open to exit, I heard her call to me. “Don’t forget to be peaceful!”

  When I looked back, she winked at me. She was obviously making fun of her dad’s favorite catchphrase. But a little peace was just what I was looking for.

  ***

  At nine forty-five, I left the bookstore where I’d been killing time and walked next door to Zen. Luckily, I was already in yoga appropriate clothing: t-shirt and yoga pants. A low chime rang out as I opened the door. A girl with dark black hair that draped all across her back sat at a small desk.

  “Hi. I’m looking to take the ten a.m. class?” I asked permission.

  She grabbed a clipboard and placed it in front of me. “Fill this out. That’s forty-five for the class and a five dollar mat fee if you don’t already have one.”

  “Oh, okay. Yeah, I don’t have a mat.” I began filling out my information card. Who to contact in case of emergency? How intense was this class? “Is this a relaxing class?”

  “That will be fifty for today. And all yoga is relaxing.” She took my debit card and swiped it through the machine. From my observation, this girl was not very Zen. “Place your shoes and your purse over there by the wall.”

  “But that’s right by the front door. Isn’t that sort of inviting someone to come in and steal it?”

  She arched a perfectly plucked brow at me. “We lock the door at the beginning of class. Your items are perfectly safe. And absolutely no cell phones in the studio.” With that she ducked under the desk only to appear a moment later with a purple yoga mat, which she handed to me.

  Though uncomfortable, I placed my shoes and purse in the line with the others by the front wall, knowing that anyone looking in through the large front window could have a field day. Door locked or not it wouldn’t be hard to break that glass if they were really desperate. Fiona always said I went straight for the worst-case scenario. Either way, I shoved my phone snugly inside my bra
before walking into class.

  Class consisted of a lot of focused breathing and gentle stretching. Nothing that seemed too different than what I could do at home. At one point, we were in tabletop position, on hands and knees, and all I could think about was this guy Drew that I dated who only wanted to have sex from behind. If it had been good sex, I guess I wouldn’t have cared, but the fact that he could only be compared to a jackhammer left me with plenty of time to wonder why the hell I was on all fours letting this guy pound me. But he was hot, and I was seventeen and didn’t know shit. Live and learn.

  When class finished, I grabbed my belongings from the lobby; thankfully, they were still there, and I headed outside.

  “I like a girl who’s flexible.” His voice was deep and sultry.

  I spun around to see those green eyes staring back at me. My heart began to pound and I wasn’t sure if it was excitement or panic or both. “Devin?”

  “Ah, so she does remember my name.” A broad smile covered his face. “Good class?” He leaned casually against the side of the building.

  “How did you know I was here?” Beat, beat, beat. Him sitting in my seat at Perked. Him placing the note there. Him here now. Beat, beat, beat. It was panic. “Are you, like, following me?”

  “Mallory—” He moved from the wall and stepped a little closer to me.

  Fight or flight, fight or flight. “Because if you are that’s so not cool.”

  “Mallory—”

  “I mean, you’re cute and all, but this really isn’t cool.” I stepped back, and a little boy came running past me from behind.

  “There you are!” he said to Devin. “I was flipping out. I didn’t see you!”

  Devin smiled down at him. “Sorry, bud, I was just talking to my friend, Mallory.” He winked at me. “Mallory, this is my little brother Kyle. Kyle, this is Mallory.” It was silent for a beat, and then he added. “Kyle takes a karate class here on Saturdays.” He gestured to the karate studio behind me, and that’s when my eyes noticed the little boy was wearing a karate uniform.