“I wish Dad was here,” Tonya said as they walked back to the house. “I miss him every day.”
“You and me both, honey. I really miss him.”
Tonya's father had died in a car accident three years earlier. He'd been driving alone, minding his own business, when a man swerved across the road and collided with him. The man had been drinking and taking drugs, and of course he’d been uninsured, which meant Tonya's mom had gotten no compensation at all. Her dad wasn't the sharpest pencil in the box when it came to financing, and he'd failed to take out any life insurance. Tonya was still cross with him for neglecting his financial duty to his wife and daughter, but it was too late. Things were what they were.
“How was work, love?” her mom asked.
“Okay, until you called and told me your news.” Tonya ran the tap and filled the kettle. “I had to go out and cry.”
“Oh, honey. Maybe I shouldn't have rung you.”
Tonya looked at her mom. She looked tired and drained. In her youth, she'd been Miss Sandpoint and a regular in local fashion shows. She had the same golden hair as Tonya, but she'd put on a bit of weight and no longer looked her best. Tonya blamed the steroids she'd had to take the first time she’d had cancer.
“Dr. Crosby saw me and asked me what the matter was.”
“Oh, I like him.”
“You and all the other women in the town. But he's a womanizer, and he's a very demanding man.”
“I wouldn't mind being demanded by him.”
“Mom, jeez. What a thought for your daughter to have: her mom with her boss.”
“What did he say to you?”
Tonya put two cups down on the kitchen table and opened the fridge. “He told me to go and see him tomorrow.”
“What for?”
“I told him about our financial situation.”
“You what? You did what? Tonya, I asked you never to tell anybody about our finances. It’s nobody's business but ours.”
Tonya cringed. She knew how her mother hated what she'd done, but she'd wanted to get it off her chest. “Sorry, Mom, but I sometimes need someone to talk to.”
“You can talk to me. What do you think he wants?”
“I have no idea. I'll see tomorrow.”
The next morning Tonya wasn't late; she was ten minutes early. She was anxious to speak with Dr. Crosby. She hung her jacket over her chair and went through the waiting room to a corridor off which the doctors each had their own consulting rooms. She knocked on Dr. Crosby's door.
“Come in,” he shouted. When she entered the room, there was an aroma of freshly showered male. He was, as always, impeccably dressed in a suit, white shirt, and red tie.
“Dr. Crosby, you asked me to come and see you today.”
“Ah, yes. Tonya. Please sit down.”
He loved the way Tonya dressed. She always wore a modest skirt and a blouse. He liked it most when she wore a white blouse because he could, more often than not, see her bra.
“You have some financial concerns, and I'd like to help you,” he said as he was filling out a form on his desk.
“Any help would be much appreciated.”
He stopped writing and looked in her eyes, Mediterranean blue and as honest as any eyes he'd ever seen. “I will pay off all your debts.”
Tonya spluttered. “What? Did you say—”
He nodded. “You heard me correctly.”
“Wow. I don't know what to say. It will take me a lifetime to pay you back, though.”
“No, it won't, because it's a gift. But I want something in return.” She looked at his face as it took on a stern appearance. “I want you to be my girlfriend.”
Tonya began to wonder whether there was really something wrong with her hearing. What the hell was he playing at? His girlfriend?
“Er...how exactly do imagine it working?”
“|Simple. I pay your debts off in full, and you date me. I like you, and I think you're very beautiful indeed.”
“But wouldn't that make me your whore?”
He laughed. “How?”
“You're paying me to be your girlfriend, and I assume that includes having sex with you,” Tonya said frankly.
“I can't imagine anything better than having sex with you. Look at you. You are so beautiful.”
“I...I don't know what to say. How do I know you would be faithful to me? I mean you have a bit of a reputation with the ladies.”
“You would have my word.”
Tonya smoothed her skirt and stood you. “Let me think. It's all a bit surreal, not to say a bit weird.”
*****
The same evening, Tonya paid a visit to Lucy, her best and only friend. Lucy lived in a large house with her new husband, Steve, who owned a trucking company.
“It's so nice here,” Tonya said as they sat down on the terrace with a glass of wine.
“I'm so lucky. Steve is great, and his business is doing really well,” Lucy said, running her hand over her brunette hair.
“You two were lovers at sixteen, weren't you?”