I turned my head to my alarm clock and felt my temper flare because it might not be unusual for it to happen at night, even late at night, say eleven-ish, but it was unusual for it to happen at one fifty-three in the freaking morning.
“You dick!” Tina shouted. “Did you fuck her before comin’ to me? Hunh? Did you?”
God, it sounded like they were right outside my bedroom door.
And if it sounded like that to me, it might sound like that to Kate and Keira.
I threw back the covers, ran to get Tim’s robe, shrugged it on and nabbed Joe’s remote from my nightstand as I walked quickly to the backdoor.
“Fuck that! Fuck you! And fuck her!” Tina shrieked.
I hit the remote to disable the alarm as Joe taught us to do, slid the door open and stepped out on my deck. I looked to my left to see that Tina and Cory were, for some unknown and ungodly reason, playing out their latest drama on her deck.
“You have got to be shittin’ me!” Tina screamed to whatever Cory mumbled (I never heard Cory during the screeching, only Tina, then again they probably heard Tina in Bangladesh, she was that loud). “You dick!”
I ran down the steps into my yard and across to Tina’s.
I was at the foot of her side deck steps when I spoke. “Hey, could you keep it down?”
Tina’s eyes came to me and Cory, whose back was to me, turned.
Cory was a decent looking guy, nothing to write home about but he wasn’t ugly. What made him unattractive was that I got the sense he was clueless and pretty much didn’t care what kind of shit he had to take, just as long as he got laid as often as he could.
Tina, on the other hand, was very pretty, dark curly hair, blue eyes, great skin. She had a bit of extra weight on her but she carried it well and used it to her advantage, therefore it looked good but, unfortunately, she knew it.
She liked to get herself some, as Cheryl would say, and she liked to control what she got which made Cory perfect for her, in a way. Cory loved his wife, though, which kind of sucked for Tina. She’d bitten off more than she could chew with him and I always wondered why she didn’t spit him out.
All of this I didn’t know for certain, I wasn’t close to Tina. She was the only neighbor who was not friendly (at all). I’d gotten most of it from Feb, Myrtle and Pearl.
Tina’s eyes focused on me through the dark and she snapped, “Fuck you too.”
I opened my mouth to speak but I didn’t when I saw Tina’s body straighten with a jolt, she looked over my shoulder and her face paled, I saw it even in the dark.
Then I heard Joe rumble from behind me, “Speak to her again like that, Tina, I’ll wring your goddamned neck.”
Slowly I turned to see he was, indeed, behind me, very close behind me wearing jeans, a tee and, like me, he had bare feet.
Oh, and he looked pretty ticked.
“Cal –” Tina started.
“Shut it,” Joe growled. “Vi’s got two girls who don’t need to hear your filthy mouth. I hear this shit again, it’s gonna piss me off and you don’t wanna piss me off.”
“I –” Tina started again but Joe’s eyes cut to Cory.
“Pick one or lose both, but be a fuckin’ man, for Christ’s sakes. You let her get outta hand again, I’ll hold you responsible.”
“All right, Cal,” Cory said quickly, his hands coming up. “We’ll be cool.”
Joe didn’t respond, he didn’t need to, I suspected even Tina wouldn’t wake the sleeping giant that was Joe Callahan again.
Then Joe, obviously done with Tina and Cory, grabbed my arm and turned us both toward my yard. He didn’t let my arm go as he marched me through my backyard, up my deck stairs and to the sliding glass door. Then he slid my door shut, yanked the remote out of my hand and pressed some buttons. Then he marched me to the steps and down them again.
We were almost in his yard before it registered on me that we were heading to his house.
“Joe, where are we going?”
“You shut it too,” Joe growled at me and I felt my chest squeeze because he was still pissed but now it seemed he was pissed at me.
“Joe –” I began but he pulled me up his steps, through his opened sliding glass door and he threw it closed.
Then he backed me up against the wall by the door, his body got in my space and he got in my face.
“What’d you think?” he was still growling and I was breathing hard, not knowing what was happening.
It was the dead of night. How was it that one minute I was sleeping, the next minute I was listening to Tina shrieking, the next minute I was listening to Joe be threatening and the next minute I was in his house, he was in my face and he was pissed at me?
He was right, I’d been a bitch to him but not recently, it had been hours ago.
“Joe, I wanna go home,” I said quietly.
He ignored my request. “Tell me what you thought.”
What I thought at that moment, was maybe I should answer his demand, perhaps that might help, though I didn’t understand his demand which was a problem.
Therefore, tentatively, I asked, “Thought about what?”
“About us.”
“What?” I whispered.
“I make a promise to you in my sleep or something?” Joe clipped.