"When I was 15, my foster mom, Jodi, was diagnosed with cancer and she and her husband decided they couldn't foster anymore. I wasn't close to either of them, they were mostly disinterested in us girls who lived with them. They weren't unkind, just sort of indifferent and checked out. They watched a lot of t.v. and didn't take a big interest in getting to know who any of us were. We co-existed and they mostly gave us what we needed physically, but emotionally, they were not parents to us, at least not in the way I define parenthood. But I was comfortable where I was, I liked the house, I liked the girls I lived with and I thought life was as okay for me as it was gonna be in that situation.
"Anyway, when I was moved, I moved in with another couple and they made no bones about the fact that me and the other girls living there were drains on them, even though, as far as I could tell, the main reason we were there was for the checks we brought in. Me and Genevieve and Abby, the other girls who lived there, were mostly their slaves. We cooked, we cleaned, and we took care of their six year old twin boys who, it must be said, were good birth control for us girls if that was what they were trying to teach us. Our foster parents sat on their butts and if they wanted something, they hollered at us to run and fetch it for them. My foster mom, Carol, constantly made remarks about me, my body, my hair, my lack of personality, just being nasty. She was specifically mean to me, but she had an equal opportunity policy when it came to our care. She didn't spend one more cent than she had to on our needs, which meant that our clothes were constantly old and too small. At school, girls made fun of me because they thought I wore my clothes overly tight to get the boys to notice me. They called me a slut and worse and the boys treated me like one and so I steered clear of everyone as much as possible.
"I wasn't exactly brimming with self confidence as it was, but Carol made it her job to make me feel even worse about myself. This didn't exactly make me eager to put myself out there as far as making friends or dating. I ate my lunch in the library every day, and I went home after school and cleaned Carol and Billy's house. The day I turned 18, I got a job at The Hilton, and moved out with the intention of sleeping on Genevieve's couch for three months (she had moved out of our foster home and in with her boyfriend six months earlier), until I had enough money saved up for a security deposit on an apartment. Two months in to my stay there, her boyfriend made a pass at me, Gen threw me out and I had nowhere to go and so I worked during the day, went to the library after work and slept at a table in the corner for three hours until they closed and then wandered to several different coffee shops nursing coffees until it was time to go back to work, where thankfully, they have a shower in the employee restroom that they don't mind us using.
"I slept at a shelter downtown one night but an old man tried to crawl into my cot with me in the middle of the night and someone stole the pair of shoes I had left at the end of my bed before I went to sleep. I couldn't risk someone stealing the money I had saved for an apartment, which I was carrying all in cash. I would have been right back where I started and that was unthinkable."
I glance at Jake and there is a hard look on his face, his jaw clenching. I go on anyway. I don't feel like I can stop myself now.
"At the end of that month, I had enough money for a security deposit at any one of the apartments I had looked at. I called around and found the one that I could move into that day. I slept on the floor using my backpack as a pillow and a ratty, pink blanket I had had since I was a kid, until I could afford some used furniture. I got my GED that next year since I had moved out and started working before I graduated."
He is still listening intently to me and he takes my hand and squeezes it, giving me a small reassuring smile, although his face remains tense under it and there's something behind his eyes that looks like heartbreak.
I take a huge sip of wine. While I've been talking, Jake has slowly been working and now two seasoned steaks are in a pan on the stove and he's cutting several red potatoes into quarters that he's just rinsed in the sink on the counter in front of him.
"Want me to do that?" I ask nodding towards the potatoes.
"No, I want you to sit there and relax and sip your wine and talk to me," he smiles now, his face relaxing.
"You've been through so much, Evie," he says, glancing up at me with sad eyes.
"Yeah, but the thing is, in some ways I'm lucky for it."
He frowns, "How so?"
"Well, how many people do you think walk into their apartment at the end of the day, small and simple as it may be, and look around and feel like one of the luckiest people in the world? How many people truly appreciate what they have because they know what it feels like to have absolutely nothing? I went through a lot to get where I am and I don't take anything I have for granted, ever. That's my reward."
He's looking at me intensely, a fire in his eyes that almost looks like pride. I don't exactly understand it, but I appreciate it. Finally, he says quietly, "I never would have thought to look at it that way."
We're both silent for several minutes as he puts the potatoes in a bowl and pours in some olive oil and then opens a drawer and starts pulling out spices and tossing those in the bowl as well. Then he mixes it all with a spoon and pours the mixture on a baking sheet.
He turns to the stove and as he's turning the dials and putting the baking sheet in the oven, I watch his back muscles flex under his t-shirt and check out his amazing ass and wonder what it is about a man in jeans and bare feet that is just so damned sexy.
I take another huge gulp of wine.
He takes a bagged Caesar salad out of the fridge and brings it back to the counter, winking and saying, "Not everything home made. Don't hold it against me."
I laugh. "Please. I'm already completely impressed."
"Reserve that until you've tasted everything," he grins and the mood seems to have lightened.
He turns the steaks over and as he's mixing the salad in a bowl, he says, "Evie, the eulogy you gave for your friend, Willow. Tell me about that." He looks up at me and his eyes are sharp, focused.
"I'm talking too much about myself, again. How does that happen every time I'm with you?"