Cement Heart

by Beth Ehemann

  I’m a little late today, but how’s it going over there?

  I gathered up my sweaty clothes and shoved them into my bag as I waited for her response.

  M: Awful. I tried to make chocolate chip pancakes this morning and started a small fire. The kitchen is a total loss. I don’t know what I’m going to do.

  Holy fuck.

  For the second time that day, my heart sank.

  Holy shit. Are you serious? What can I do? You guys can come stay at my place for now.

  My hands shook so hard I almost dropped my phone twice. I sat down on the bench and stared down at it, silently begging it to beep. I needed her to respond.

  M: Just kidding. LOL

  What? LOL?

  Are you kidding me right now? That was a joke?

  M: Consider it payback for the hookers text. ;)

  Holy crap. What a little shit.

  There’s a big difference between women you pay for sex and your entire kitchen burning down. Thanks for giving me a damn heart attack.

  “Who are you texting?”

  I looked up and Louie was staring at me from across the locker room.

  Brody walked up and stopped next to him. “Yeah, you’re smiling like an idiot.”

  “No one,” I said defensively as I stood up and shoved my phone into my bag. “See you ladies in two days.”

  I headed outside and tossed my bag down in the passenger seat just as my phone started buzzing like crazy. Before I started my engine, I checked my messages. Three of them, all from Michelle.

  M: Ha! A little scare is good for you from time to time.

  M: Viper, answer me. I was just kidding.

  M: Hey! You’re not really mad, are you? Please answer me.

  I couldn’t stop the mischievous smile from forming on my lips as I drove out of the parking lot and headed straight for her house, after one quick stop.

  DOING MY BEST to look pissed off, I rang her doorbell. I had to concentrate on keeping my eyebrows down low and not smiling when she rounded the corner and walked toward the door. The look on her face made it really hard, though. She was biting her lip and her eyes looked sad as she pulled the door open.

  “Listen, I know my joke was stupid. I never should have scared you like that,” she rambled as I stepped inside, keeping my hands hidden behind my back. “I feel so bad and I’m really sorry.”

  I kept my eyes down on the floor, because I knew if I looked up at her, I was going to start laughing. “I don’t even know what to say to what you did, Michelle. Except…” I pulled the pizza out from behind my back. “A little scare is good for you from time to time.”

  She looked down at the pizza and back up at me, her mouth dropping open as her blue eyes grew huge. “You big jerk!”

  I flinched as she balled up her fist and punched my arm.

  “I thought you were mad at me!” She hit me three more times. “I felt bad.”

  “You can’t fool the master,” I said in my cockiest tone with a smirk on my face.

  She rolled her eyes and groaned in annoyance as she grabbed the pizza box from me and stomped off toward the kitchen.

  I followed along behind her, enjoying the view so much it made me angry with myself.

  We walked into the kitchen and Maura was sitting in her highchair, desperately trying to pinch weird little pieces of cereal or something in between her fingers.

  “Hey, little one.” I bent down and kissed the top of her head, pausing to take a closer look at her tray. “What are these?”

  “They’re called Puffs. Kinda like cereal for babies, but they pretty much melt in your mouth so even without teeth, they can have them.” She flipped the lid off of the pizza and got a stack of paper plates out of the cabinet.

  I grabbed one of the pieces of cereal and put it in my mouth as Maura stared right at me.

  “They’re pretty good, huh?” I said. A huge grin broke out across her face as she picked up another piece and tried to feed it to me. I opened my mouth and she slowly put the cereal in, craning her neck just a little to watch me chew it. “Mmmm, so yummy. Thank you.” I rubbed her soft cheek as I stood up. “Hey,”—I looked around the kitchen and into the family room—“where’s my little buddy?”

  Matthew always came running to greet me at the front door.

  “He’s in there,”—she nodded toward the couch—“curled up under a blanket, sick.”

  I walked around the couch and sure enough, Matthew was wrapped in a little ball, staring at the TV.

  “What’s up, my man?” I said softly as I sat down next to him.

  His eyes shifted to me when he heard my voice, but he just groaned.

  I set my hand on his head, rubbing his forehead with my thumb. “What’s wrong with you?”

  “My tummy hurts.” His voice cracked as his eyes started to water.

  I didn’t know what to do. “Can I get you anything? You want some pizza?”

  “No!” Michelle shouted from the kitchen. “He’s been throwing up on and off all day. Food is out of the question for now, especially pizza.”

  “Throwing up is bad, right? He can dehydrate?” I called to Michelle as I stared down at Matthew. The poor little guy was as white as I’d ever seen him, with dark circles under his eyes. He looked awful. I had to do something.

  “Yeah, he can,” —she put her hands on her hips and shrugged— “but I can’t get him to drink anything. I filled that cup on the coffee table at nine o’clock this morning. He’s barely touched it.”

  She was right. The Thomas the Train cup was filled almost all the way to the top.

  I leaned down close to him. “Hey, buddy… did you know sometimes I get the stomach flu too?”

  He turned his head just a little toward me. “You do?”

  “Yep, sometimes. And you know what makes me feel better?”

  “What?” he asked in a gravelly little voice.

  “When I drink Gatorade. It has these magic little electrolyte thingies in there that make your stomach feel so much better. Want me to run and get you some?”

  He didn’t look too enthusiastic, but he did nod, so I kissed his forehead and walked back to the kitchen. “You don’t have Gatorade in the house, right?”

  Michelle looked around the kitchen, thinking for a quick second, before shaking her head. “No, we haven’t had Gatorade in the house… for a long time.”

  I knew what that pause was. She knew what that pause was. Neither of us wanted to acknowledge the pause.

  “Okay, I’m gonna run to the store. Do you need anything else?”

  “Nope.” She sighed. “We’re good on everything else.”

  “Okay, be back soon.”

  ABOUT HALF AN hour later, I walked back through the front door carrying four plastic bags.

  Michelle stared at the bags with wide eyes as I walked through the kitchen and set them on the table. “How much Gatorade did you buy?”

  “A lot,” I sighed, looking at the bags and then back at her. “It’s not just Gatorade, though. The pharmacist said saltines would be good for his tummy if he felt like eating, so I got two boxes. Then I was trying to think of fun ways to try and get him to drink, and I found a package of silly straws, so I got those too. Then I thought maybe we could bribe him to drink, so I got him a color book and crayons.”

  Michelle sucked in a quick breath and swallowed as she looked back and forth between me and the bags on the table. “You got all that stuff for him?”

  “Of course,” I replied. “He’s my buddy. I feel bad that he’s so sick.”

  All of a sudden, Matthew’s little head popped up on the other side of the couch. “Did you get blue Gatorade? It’s my favorite.”

  “Ha!” I pumped my fist in the air in celebration. “I sure did. Would you also like a silly straw?”

  Matthew cracked a small smile as he nodded.

  “Coming right up!” I called to him. I turned to ask Michelle where his cups were, but she was gone. A sniffling sound came from around the c
orner and I followed it. Michelle was leaning against the dining room wall, wiping her eyes on the sleeve of her shirt.

  I leaned my shoulder against the wall so I could face her, not saying anything for a second. After a few more sniffles and another wipe on her sleeve, I finally asked, “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah.” She shoved her fingers into the corners of her eyes before wiping the tears on her jeans.

  “What is this? What’s happening?”

  She shrugged. “It’s just… nice. It’s been a while now that I’ve been doing it on my own and to have you here and the way you jumped into action and helped out…” Her voice cracked and trailed off. I stepped into the kitchen and grabbed a box of tissues off of the counter.

  Matthew poked his head up from the couch again. “What’s wrong? Is Momma okay?”

  I looked down at the tissues and back up at him. “Oh yeah, she’s fine. She just has a really big booger and I’m giving her tissues.”

  He giggled and lay back down.

  I slowly slid back around the corner and pulled a tissue out of the box.

  “Thanks.” She sniffed again as she took the tissue from me. “I’m sorry. This is so stupid. You probably think I’m a neurotic moron now.”

  “Not even a little bit,” I said in my most serious tone.

  Her eyes flipped up to mine as they started to water again. “I don’t know why I’m so worked up to begin with. My son gets the stomach flu and it sends me into a fucking tailspin.”

  I don’t think I’d ever heard her swear before. I found it inappropriately hot.

  “Hey. You don’t have to justify anything to me, okay? And about the Gatorade, I was happy to help out. He’s really become my little buddy lately, and I feel bad that he feels so crappy.”

  “You have been around a lot more, and it’s been really nice… for him and for me.” She wiped the mascara from under her eyes. “He’s smiling more than he has the last several months, and I didn’t realize how lonely I was. The texts you send me in the morning are usually the highlight of my day.” She looked up at me quickly and shook her head like she’d said something wrong. “I didn’t mean it like that—”

  “I know.” I reached out and swiped a tear from her cheek. “It’s okay.”

  “Anyway.” She wiped her eyes again and looked up at me with a forced grin. “Enough boo-hooing for one night. I’m gonna get my boy some Gatorade while you cut the pizza, okay?”

  I narrowed my eyes at her. “I have a better idea. Toss that pizza.”

  TWO HOURS AND a quick trip to the grocery store later, Michelle and I were sitting on the couch in a total food coma, stuffed to the brim with peach BBQ chicken over roasted potato wedges and Parmesan asparagus.

  “Oh my God,” Michelle moaned. “That was the best thing I’ve ever eaten in my entire life.”

  “I’m glad you liked it.” I smiled at her. “You can apologize when you’re ready.”

  She lifted her head and frowned at me. “Apologize?”

  “You know darn well that when I told you I could cook, you doubted me. What did you say to me? I believe it was ‘prove it’?”

  “If I could get up, I’d walk over and hit you,” she threatened, pulling the corner of her lip up in a smirk.

  “And you”—I leaned over and rustled Matthew’s hair—“are doing so good with the Gatorade. Keep it up, champ.”

  Matthew was on his second glass of Gatorade and so far, so good. Nothing had come back up, and he even had a little color back in his face.

  “The night finished off a lot better than the morning started out, I’ll tell ya that.” Michelle yawned. “And you’re right. I’m sorry.”

  I peeked at her out of the corner of my eye. “Huh?”

  “You’re right,” she repeated, sterner this time. “When you said you could cook, I totally thought you were lying, but you definitely proved it, and I’m sorry.”

  “Wow!” I teased. “Bet that was fun to say.”

  “Not at all.” She rolled her eyes.

  I looked at the clock on my phone. “All right, well I better get going. I have some errands to run tomorrow morning before we head out of town for our road trip.”

  “Wait.” She sat up suddenly. “I want to ask you something, but you have to promise not to laugh at me.”

  “Okay.” I laughed. “I promise.”

  “You’re already laughing.” She sighed.

  “My bad. Here, let me try again…” I cleared my throat and put on my best serious face. “Okay, try again. I’m ready now.”

  “So, I’ve been thinking about this for several days, but I wasn’t really sure I wanted to ask until tonight. I really don’t want Matthew and Maura growing up remembering their mom was on a first-name basis with the pizza delivery man. Will you… teach me?”

  My eyebrows shot up. “Teach you to cook?”

  She bit her lip and nodded.

  “Hell yeah. I would love to.”

  “Really?” Hope filled her eyes and made them sparkle like I’d never seen before.

  “Yeah, really. I’ll be back tomorrow after I run my errands, at like two o’clock, and we’ll work on dinner, okay?”

  “I’ll be ready,” she said confidently.

  UP EARLY WITH a bounce in my step, I ran my errands in record time and grabbed a few things from the grocery store that I was pretty certain Michelle didn’t have stocked in her kitchen. I had a little extra time to kill before heading to Michelle’s, so I stopped by Gam’s and brought her a box of almond crescent cookies, her favorite.

  She put the cookies on a plate and set them down in the middle of the table before she grabbed a root beer and handed it to me.

  “What?” I laughed, suddenly defensive as I noticed her staring at me with narrow eyes.

  She leaned her chin on her hand and kept staring, her eyes moving all over my face as I tossed a cookie in my mouth. “You. Something. What’s going on?”

  I shrugged. “Nothing’s going on. What are you talking about?”

  “I don’t know. I can’t pinpoint it, but you seem… giddy.”

  “I don’t do giddy,” I argued as I opened my root beer and took a huge gulp.

  “I know. That’s my point.”

  “Anyway, what’s new on your end?”

  “Lawrence, I’m nearly ninety years old. Just waking up is exciting.” She sighed and grabbed a cookie off of the plate.

  “That’s right. Someone has a birthday coming up.” I grinned at her as I wiggled my eyebrows up and down.

  “Yes, and I want a big damn party. This will probably be my last birthday.”

  I rolled my eyes at her. “You’ve been saying that about every birthday for the last ten years.”

  “Well, I really mean it this time, so you better go all out. I want a huge cake and some of those Chippendales dancers, okay?”

  I frowned at her and shook my head. “You’re out of your damn mind. I am not ordering you a stripper.”

  “Really?” She let her hand fall hard against the table and glared at me. “You’re not gonna grant a dying old lady her last wish?”

  “Have you always been this dramatic?” I laughed as I ate another cookie.

  “Pretty much, yes.”

  Wiping the powdered sugar off my hands onto my jeans, I stood up. “All right, sorry to cut the visit short, but I have to be somewhere. I’ll stop by when we get back into town, okay?”

  I bent down and kissed her wrinkly forehead.

  “Where do you have to be? What’s better than me?”

  “Uh…” I stammered. “I’m teaching a friend to cook today. Just something easy for dinner. No big deal.”

  Her eyes sparkled and she hit the table with her hand again. “I knew it!” she yelled.

  “Knew what?”

  “Is this little someone a woman?”

  I sighed, not wanting to answer her question. She stared at me pointedly, tapping her fingers on the table.

  “Yes,” I finally admitted. “It’s
a woman, but it’s not what you think. It’s Mike’s wife.”

  “Oh.” Her head jerked back a little in surprise. “That’s not at all what I was expecting.”

  “Exactly. It’s just a cooking lesson. Let’s leave it at that, okay?”

  “Okay,” she said unconvincingly. I gave her a wave and turned toward the front door. “Most men wouldn’t put cologne on for a cooking lesson, though!”

  I shook my head and reached for the doorknob as she yelled out one more time. “And don’t forget about my party. And the strippers. Maybe they can jump out of the cake!”

  “Good-bye!” I waved as I shook my head and closed the door.

  THE BEST SOUND ever greeted me as I walked through the front door of Michelle’s house.

  “Yay! Viper!” I heard the thud of Matthew’s footsteps running toward me.

  “My man!” I set the grocery bags down so I could catch him when he jumped into my arms like he always did.

  “How are you feeling today?” I scanned his face. Nice pink color. No dark circles. “You look great.”

  “I feel better.” He smiled as he wrapped his arms around my neck and squeezed so hard he made me cough. “You were right, the electricity worked!”

  I frowned at him. “Electricity?”

  “In the Gatorade.”

  “Oh! The electrolytes!” I laughed. “Yep, they seemed to work. I’m so glad. Want to help me carry these bags?” I lowered him gently to the ground, and he immediately grabbed two of the bags and dragged them along behind him on the wood floor. He dropped the bags in the doorway, almost making me trip on them, and ran off to the family room to watch TV.

  I pushed the bags on the floor into the kitchen with my foot. Michelle was standing by the island with the biggest smile on her face.

  “Oops! I’ll get those.” She ran over and picked up the abandoned bags. Her blond hair was pulled back in a messy ponytail and a pink apron hung from around her neck. She looked completely adorable standing there, all ready to go. “I’m so excited. I hardly slept last night.”