But I still guessed that meant no.
“You acted like a fucked-up, crazy-ass bitch when I met you,” I shared and her eyes shot back to me, squinty, but she was in a vulnerable place and couldn’t quite hide the hurt even if she had to know I spoke truth. “But, girl, when you touched your belly, it was like you were stroking the miracle you know that’s growing inside you. You give it good, I’ll give you that,” I told her, nodding my head. “That wall you got around you is built tall and edged in razor wire, keeping anyone out that might cause you harm. Thing is, you built that wall, let your man live back there with you, and you’re gonna have your baby behind it with the two of you. I think you’ve made a good start.”
She dropped a hand to her belly, looking down at it, and saying, “What if I fuck this up?”
“You sitting alone in your car, my guess, tough as nails, yet worried to the point of tears, I’m not thinking that’s gonna be a problem.”
She looked again to me but didn’t move her hand from her belly.
“Shit like that can rear up, you don’t even know it.”
“Don’t let it,” I returned.
The impatient snap was back. “Simple as that, you think?”
“I don’t think anything about parenthood is simple and, I don’t want to fuck with your head, girl, but even if you get beyond thinking stupid shit like this, you’re still gonna have other stuff rear up.”
The snap was now angry. “This shit isn’t stupid.”
I leaned close and hissed, “Yes it is. Because, Krystal, if you can build that wall to protect yourself, what are you gonna do for your child? Whatever happened with your mom did not break you. You’re still standing. You got a bar. You got friends. You got a man. You got a baby on the way. You’re hot. You’re crazy, but you’re funny. You don’t take any shit and got the balls to give it. Not sure a baby doctor would list all those things in the pro column of how to be a good mother and live your life in a way you teach your child valuable lessons of how to be a survivor. But the way this world runs and all the fucked-up, crazy-ass shit in it a parent has to shield their kid from the best they can, especially in this burg, which seems like a magnet for it, I’d say that doctor didn’t know shit from Shinola.”
She’d tucked her chin in her neck as I spoke but when I was done, it came out and she declared, “Jesus, girlfriend, don’t beat around the bush.”
“I don’t like to see women crying in their cars and being down on themselves. And for future reference, even though you won’t need it, just so you know, I can be sensitive. It’s that I’m just as good, swinging both ways.”
“Well, if you’d swing your ass out of my car, I could get home before the ice cream melts and ruins my trunk.”
I grinned.
It was all good now.
She lifted her eyebrows as a prompt to exit said vehicle.
I grinned bigger and opened the door.
I’d swung out but hadn’t cleared the door before I heard her call, “Jus.”
I bent down to look at her.
“Thanks,” she muttered, but she did it looking me right in the eye.
“Don’t mention it, Krys, but do put me on your babysitting list. I love babies.”
She rolled her eyes, turned forward and kept muttering as she said, “Whatever.”
I grinned again but only because I saw her lips were quirked up.
Then I moved out of the door, shut it and made my way to the sidewalk.
I didn’t watch her pull out and drive away but I saw her go as I made my way back to my truck.
I threw my plastic bag in and then wondered how to kill more time while Deke blew insulation into the walls of my house.
I got in my truck and wondered why I wondered how to kill time.
There were two always ready answers, just one that required the right time of the day.
That being booze.
The other was food.
So I got right back out of my truck and headed to the diner.
*
It was dark by the time I got home since I moved from food to booze and spent the afternoon and early evening shooting the breeze in Bubba’s with Jim-Billy, meeting Izzy, another bartender, and the female-mullet-haired Twyla—who did make Krys look like a friendly Girl Scout selling cookies—and eventually talking Jim-Billy into going to dinner at the Italian place with me (my treat, which meant talking him into it took two seconds).
The afternoon and dinner with Jim-Billy was awesome. He was a hoot, a sweet-as-heck guy, and I learned quickly why everyone looked at him and talked about him with such affection.
Now, I was home and I couldn’t see much because I didn’t have any light in the main space because I had no working outlets in there.
What I had was moonlight dimmed by tall pine.
And warmth.
I could see the creamy white foam in the walls.