by Amie Knight
“We aren’t telling Adrian anything,” Ainsley deadpanned.
Bummer. I wanted to see his face when she told him. They always got to have fun without me!
“But you’ll video it for me, right? Oh, oh, oh. You could do one of those big gender reveals with cakes or balloons or something!”
Ainsley rolled her eyes while she dug into her burger and fries. “Nope. I’m keeping this simple. I think he’s going to be shocked enough without a grand gesture.”
I nodded, seeing her point. “Yep, you’re probably right. Still, a little video for your very best friend in the world wouldn’t hurt.”
The look she gave me across the table told me I wasn’t getting my video.
“Can I get y’all any refills?” the waitress asked from beside us, drawing my attention.
“I’m going to be an aunt!” I yelled to the poor, unsuspecting lady.
“No, but we’ll take the check. I gotta get this crazy lady out of here. She’s making a scene,” Ainsley said from behind her glass of sweet tea.
I didn’t care at all about making a scene. I was so happy. We were having a baby.
I’d soon have my own sweet baby angel to cuddle and I wouldn’t have to wait until Fridays to do it.
My One
He’d Protect Me
He’d Stick Up For Me Always
He’d Like Me For Me
So far today had been a total poop storm. I hadn’t even gotten a phone call, much less a video from Ainsley or Adrian. I’d woken up with a bit of a sore throat. I’d tried to sit down and get some work done only to have my computer completely crap out on me. So after I’d run around town trying to find a place that could fix it as soon as possible and then I’d had to come here. And that was just a whole other kind of awful that I didn’t even want to acknowledge.
I slipped into the booth and acid crawled up the back of my throat. There she sat. My mother. My stomach clenched. Her blond hair was down and curled on the sides and front in the same style it had been for the last twenty or so years. Her blue eyes stared back at me, pink eyeshadow and dark, black eyeliner framing them. She wore a faded gray T-shirt and jeans and even from across the table I could smell the cigarette smoke coming off of her in waves. She looked like she’d just stepped off the set of a bad eighties movie. You could take the girl out of the trailer park, but you couldn’t take the trailer park out of the girl. And that’s where my momma had grown up. Poor, with abusive parents who drank and partied more than their meager income had allowed, and my momma had suffered for it. And unbeknownst to her, I had suffered for it, too, because for some reason my momma thought that because she hadn’t drunk herself silly and had taken care of me when my father had left us in the dust, she had done me a solid. So now I owed her. For life.
She smiled at me. “Hey, baby girl,” she said in that way that was too loud. Because she wanted everyone to hear what a good momma she was. It was the same reason she posted picture after picture on Facebook of me and her when we saw each other. Which was rare, but you’d never know it from her social media pages. To the outside world, my momma was the best. When really, she wasn’t much of anything to me but a nuisance and money sucker. And a disappointment. A big freaking disappointment. I didn’t have any siblings. I didn’t have a father. All I had was her. And that was just plain sad. Because that really meant all I had was me.
She’d called me earlier in the week asking for me to meet her and I’d begrudgingly agreed because if I didn’t I knew she’d only show up at my apartment. And once she was in, she took forever to leave. I could only stomach her in small increments, so I’d opted to meet her downstairs for coffee at Letty’s.
I took a deep breath and smiled. “Hey, Momma.”
Maybe she wouldn’t disappoint me today. Maybe she just wanted to see me. Hang out. It had been three months after all, and she only lived thirty minutes away. I’d give her a chance just like I always did because even though my momma was complete crap, I prayed and hoped for her to be more.
“Whatcha been up to?” she asked, picking up her menu, glancing it over, not even looking me in the eye.
I knew she didn’t really care what I’d been doing. “You know, the usual. Working. Volunteering at the hospital.”
“Mmmhmm.” She kept looking over her menu, totally immersed in what I would undoubtedly be buying her for breakfast instead of what I was saying.
“Having sex with random men whenever I get the chance.”
“Oh, that’s good, baby girl. Real good. What are you getting?” Her eyes finally met mine.
I grasped the menu too tight in my fists. Why did I do this to myself? She didn’t deserve my attention or my time. You know why, Miranda. Because no matter how awful she is, she’s still your mother.
Pasting a fake smile to my mouth, I answered, “Probably a pastry and some coffee.”
My mother pursed her lips. “You know you don’t need a pastry, baby. How are you ever going to find a man, Miranda?” Her eyes roved over my body, her expression turning into disgust. She leaned across the table, her voice lowering to what she would probably call a whisper, but it sounded all too loud to my ears. “You need to stop eating sweets. If you lost fifteen pounds, you’d be beautiful and could have any man you want. You have such a pretty face.”
My face flushed in embarrassment and anger. I used to cry when she delivered these backhanded compliments. Now I just got unbelievably angry.
I bit my tongue. Because I wanted to tell her the only reason she was so skinny was because she smoked like a chimney instead of eating. I wanted to tell her that my body wasn’t her concern. And that even though I was a bit off on the healthy side, I liked me. And I still thought I was pretty dang good-looking even though, yes, I was carrying an extra fifteen pounds. But I didn’t. Because I didn’t want to create a scene and my mother loved a scene. She loved the drama. She loved to play the victim. Oh, how she’d love to tell her friends how her daughter embarrassed her. How little respect I had for my sweet momma. How she’d raised me all on her own and I was so very ungrateful. So, I wouldn’t give her that. I’d ignore her, which seemed to really get her riled.
Letty approached the table, a big smile on her face. “Hey, sweet angel,” she said, gazing down at me. “What can I get y’all?” She tilted her head and her blue-gray hair didn’t move an inch. She always had it styled in a big bouffant that was hair sprayed to the high heavens. She had kind hazel green eyes and a smile that was wide and welcoming. She wore a Letty’s Café shirt and dark blue jeans, a small white apron at her waist. In a better life, this sweet woman could have been my momma. But it wasn’t a better life. I looked across the table at my poor white-trash momma and cringed. It was my life and it sucked at the moment.
Looking back up at Letty, I answered, “I’ll have a cream cheese pastry and coffee with lots of cream and sugar, please.”
She wrote in her pad, smiling. “Good choice, Miranda. They are fresh out of the oven.” She looked over at my momma. “And what about you?”
Momma ordered, but I completely zoned out. What did she want? More money? A favor? I never knew why my momma called me out of the blue, but I could always guarantee it was because she needed something.
Letty placed our orders and brought back coffee before my momma finally fessed up. “I need to borrow some money, baby girl. I lost my job at the call center. They laid off like twenty people and I was relatively new, so I was one of the first to go.”
I sighed. Of course. Ninety percent of the time my momma needed something it was money. And I’d be happy to give her money except when my momma said borrow she actually meant have because I never saw a dime of that money again.
I stirred my coffee and looked down at the mug, dreading this conversation but knowing it had to happen.
“I’m happy to lend you some cash until you find something, Momma, but when should I expect you to pay me back?”
I didn’t want to be a queen b, but I lent my momma enough money to
know she was never going to pay me back and I couldn’t continue to let her suck me dry. I wasn’t rolling in the dough over here. I was a young girl straight out of college, trying to build my work from home business like a fiend. I needed the money I made.
She blanched and clutched at the collar of her shirt like a set of pearls, mouth open wide.
“That’s not fair, baby. You know I’ll pay you back when I can. I’ve just been having hard times. I’m gonna try to start cleaning some houses soon.” Her lips trembled with emotion. Her shoulders sank with disappointment. Her eyes were downcast. She looked positively pitiful. I almost felt guilty. I almost handed over my whole checkbook and let her go to town. My momma was good.
But I knew her too well. She was a fantastic actress.
I kept my voice level. My tone as sweet as pie. “That’s fine, momma. I just need a date. I don’t have a ton of money and I have bills to pay, too. How much do you need?”
Her face contorted into an awful sneer. And that’s when she showed her true colors. I’d been waiting all morning and there she was. It was almost a relief because this I could handle. This I was used to. This mean, awful woman and her ugly words were just a normal day for me.
“Don’t you dare act like you’re doing me any favors, Miranda Elaine. You little uppity bitch. You owe me.” Her words hit me like battery acid, but I’d heard those words often enough to build up some serious scar tissue. Those scars made me as tough as nails. Her venom hardly fazed me at all anymore.
I stared at her as she continued to hurl insults my way.
“I took care of you when your good for nothing father wanted to abort you. I should have listened to him. But I didn’t, and I raised you all on my own. I fed you. I clothed you. I didn’t have to and you better remember that, girl.”
I heard the deep scrape of a chair being pulled out somewhere from behind me, so I turned around, horrified and embarrassed that someone might have overheard how horribly my mother was speaking to me. I thought we’d been alone.
No. What were the odds? Horrified was the understatement of the entire century because there stood my mean, hot neighbor, looking too big for the small coffee shop. He walked toward our table like some kind of avenging angel, with his stride sure and chest puffed. His limp was almost nonexistent this morning. My eyes widened in alarm. His cold orbs hit mine and I knew.
Oh, God, he’d heard her. My face flushed even as he approached. My mother was still prattling on in the background, but I didn’t hear a word over the thunder of his footsteps approaching. They were all I could concentrate on. Well, that and the width of his chest and the grandeur of his height.
He stopped right next to our booth and turned to me. “Move over.”
It obviously wasn’t a request because before I could register what he was demanding, he was already muscling his way into our booth. Right on my side! So I moved over quickly and I moved some more because great googly moogly, this dude was a behemoth of man. I kept going until I was right up against the wall. He squeezed himself into our tiny booth, pushing the table toward my mother to make some room for all of his muscles and height.
My mother and I just stared at our sexy intruder. What did he think he was doing? Why was he in my booth? What in the ever loving son of a monkey was going on here?
Finally, my mother found her voice. Unfortunately for us all. “Who are you?” she breathed, half in awe, half a little put out.
His right hand shot out across the table. It sat there a minute before my mom finally placed her small hand in his big one.
“Holden,” he said before finishing. “Holden Steel.”
I looked around the café beyond bewildered. What in the heck was happening? And his name was Holden? Holden Steel he’d said. I rolled my eyes to the ceiling. Of course, even his name was drool worthy, sounding like the very definition of a hot fictional book boyfriend. I couldn’t even with him. It was as if God himself was taunting me with this Holden, having him be everything I’d ever wanted and nothing I needed.
My mother took him in from the roots of his hair down to his cold eyes and past to where the table met his hard stomach through his navy-blue T-shirt. I knew she saw what I saw. Her lips tipped up in a smile because if my mom knew anything, it was how to score a man. She’d been through dozens in my life, never settling. Always looking for her next conquest.
I shook my head at her. The grass was always greener on the other side for her. Only all she knew how to do was pick weeds.
“Hi, Holden. I’m Luanne Jacobs.” She looked over at me. “And how do you know my Miranda?” she asked before turning back to Holden, a gleam in her eye, a flirtatious curve to her mouth. I wanted to strangle the woman.
Holden straightened beside me and scowled harder than I’d ever seen. Which was a feat, because I’d seen this man frown a heck of a lot. “Your Miranda, huh?” he asked my momma in a condescending tone.
I stiffened at his question, so incredibly nervous at the situation. I was worried my mother would embarrass me further but even more concerned about why Holden was sitting next to me looking like an angry maniac.
A large, warm hand grasped my thigh gently, giving it the smallest of squeezes and I looked over at Holden, completely stunned.
His eyes met mine and for the briefest of moments, they softened. And with his hand on my thigh and his warm eyes on mine, the side of his body pressed so very close mine, I relaxed a little.
“Yes, she’s mine.” My momma laughed and continued, “I know we look more like sisters, but believe it or not she’s my daughter.”
She blushed and I shook my head. Unfreakingbelievable. She was not sitting there flirting with this man. With Holden. I still couldn’t believe I finally knew his name. I also couldn’t believe how territorial I felt over him. I wanted to snarl and snap at my mother.
Holden squeezed my thigh quickly again before stating, “No, I’d never believe she’s your daughter.”
My mom beamed at him, excited at the fact that this beautiful man thought she was too young to be my momma.
“I can’t believe it at all. After all, what mother would sit in a restaurant and ask money from their young daughter and then call her an uppity bitch?”
I gasped and my momma’s smile fell. Her face froze in horror. Holden removed his hand from my thigh long enough to wrap it around my shoulders and bring me in closer to his body. His distinct smell assaulted my senses and I almost forgot about the witch sitting across from us. About the confrontation that was happening right before my eyes.
My mother’s face turned red as she watched Holden hug me to his body protectively. “You just wait a goddamn minute—” she started, but Holden cut her off.
“No, Luanne. You wait a goddamn minute.” The venom in his voice scared me, the finality. The eerie calmness of it. His voice said I’m not taking your bull crap so shut the heck up. And even though that voice terrified me, for some reason I moved closer to him, pressing my chest as close to his side as I could.
“What about this beautiful, selfless, caring young woman makes you think it’s okay to call her an uppity bitch? Maybe it’s how she takes care of the child in our building whose mother works overtime to support them. Or maybe it’s the way she donates books that she buys with her own money to the local libraries. Or perhaps it’s the fact that she gives her bitch of a mother money when she clearly doesn’t deserve it or appreciate it. Yeah, I gotta admit, I’m real fucking shocked Mae here is your daughter.”
My mother sat there red-faced, mouth open, completely shocked and speechless. Only she didn’t need to say anything. Holden was pretty much holding down the entire conversation.
“Ya know, Luanne, the only uppity bitch I see at this table is sitting across from me.” He grabbed my coffee cup off the table and brought it to his lips and took a sip, like he just hadn’t delivered a killer blow to my mother.
I stared at the coffee cup, the pink stain from my lip balm meeting the absolute gorgeousness of Holden’s l
ips. Hey, that was almost a kiss, right?
“Why, I’ve never. I don’t have to listen to this.” My mother collected her purse and made to get out of the booth.
“That’s right. You don’t have to listen to this. So you should probably get the fuck outta here.”
And then my mouth fell open because Holden was gangster as heck. I almost laughed at my mother’s stunned face. I may have even smiled a bit, which was bad, but I couldn’t help it. She had it coming.
My mother’s angry eyes shot to mine. “I’ll be in touch, Miranda,” she threatened, her eyes shooting daggers at me. I wilted further into Holden under her stare. Because while I was a grown woman, my mother still had some kind of ridiculous hold over me.
“Don’t bother. Mae won’t be taking your calls from now on.”
My face shot to Holden’s. I wouldn’t be taking her calls? But she was my mother.
“Not unless your call doesn’t include a favor or money, you feel me, Luanne?” Holden finished.
My mother didn’t answer him as she fled the restaurant like a bat out of hell. I let out a big breath I didn’t realize I’d been holding right into his chest.
Bringing his other arm around me, Holden held me tightly to him, my torso small and petite against his large frame. He was hugging me. How in the heck had this happened? We were hugging like friends and it felt so good. And he smelled so magnificent. And he stood up to my witch of a mother. Life was freaking crazy and even though my momma had just embarrassed the mess out of me, I felt amazing.
“You okay?” Holden asked into my hair and I nodded against his mouth.
Because I didn’t want to move. I didn’t want to breathe. I didn’t want this moment to end. Because maybe if it did, Holden would turn into my mean, hot neighbor again instead of the friend holding me. The friend protecting and supporting me. The friend helping me.
“Thank you,” I whispered into his chest, overwhelmed with emotion. No one had ever taken up for me like that. No one had ever gone to bat for me like Holden Steel had in that café beneath our apartments. I’d never forget that moment. It would be forever burned into my mind as one of the most epic times of my life.