“Grayson, get out of my drawers!” Wendy yells to her three-year-old son before returning to me. “I swear he’s always getting into everything,” she complains. “So . . . how is Blake’s cousin?”
I roll my eyes. Married for going on sixteen years and saddled with five children, Wendy hangs on every detail of my life. I guess she likes to live vicariously through me. Not that I’ve offered much in the way of excitement lately. Me picking up Connor is the first time I’ve left Colorado in two years since Blake passed away, and she’s foaming at the mouth for details.
“Not much to report. He seems nice.”
“Come on, Demi,” she pleads. “Is he ugly or missing teeth? You know gang rape is prevalent in prisons, and some guys get their teeth knocked out so they can give better—”
“Yeah, I’ve heard that,” I interrupt her. “Sorry cuz. I’ve got nothing.”
“Well . . . I’ve been looking forward to this call all day,” she clucks, grumpily, clearly disappointed in my details . . . or lack thereof. Realizing begging is not producing the outcome she is desperately seeking, she moves on to a new tactic: manipulation. “You know, J.J. was tossing Mary-Anne’s baton around this morning and ended up hitting himself in the face with it. He chipped a tooth and busted his lip wide open, screaming bloody murder for an hour. And as I held him,” she drones on dramatically, “bleeding all over my shirt, and simultaneously packed four school lunches, I thought to myself, I’m going to talk to Demi tonight, and she’s going to give me an amazingly detailed play-by-play of her day. And with that thought, I smiled all day long. But, apparently,” she heaves a theatric sigh, “you have nothing,” she finishes morosely.
“Okay, Wendy,” I huff, rolling my eyes. “I’ll give you a play-by-play, but can I tell it in third person point of view? You know, like I’m narrating?”
After a small pause, she states simply, “I’ll allow it.”
Standing up, I head over to the mirror just above the dresser and grab my hairbrush. Just to be a smartass I muster up my best imitation of a sultry southern accent and begin. “Demi Stevens, the poor lonely widow, was embarking on a journey across states. Her destination was far from glamorous, but she had no choice. She had made a promise to her husband before he passed. And she’d keep that promise.”
“I really like your narration voice,” she jeers sarcastically. “Keep going.”
“When Connor Stevens exited the prison gates and laid eyes on Demi, his deceased cousin’s wife, he had to work hard to hide his attraction to her. There aren’t many women that can pull off windblown hair and sweat-soaked, wrinkled clothing, but Demi could.”
“What does he look like?” Wendy asks, her kids yelping and hollering in the background. I imagine she’s contemplating locking herself in the bathroom or closet, desperate to hear me over the noise being made by her loud clan.
Brushing my hair, I continue. “Connor was a large man with bulging biceps and tattoos everywhere. Heat immediately blanketed Demi’s skin as she drank him in. It only took minutes before the two were hot and sweaty . . .” I let the last word drag, for dramatic effect, “in Demi’s car. The ride to the hotel was a hot one as the air conditioning in the car was broken, and Arizona heat is unforgiving.”
“Mary-Anne, stop picking your nose!” Wendy shouts.
“As they reached the door to Demi’s room, she asked, ‘How about dinner?’ To which Connor replied, ‘Sounds good.’”
“There. You happy now?” I snip.
“Yeah. Riveted,” Wendy says, dryly. “You’re mean for the hot and sweaty part.”
“What did you think would happen?” I ask, laughing. “We’d meet, and I’d bang my husband’s cousin in my car outside the prison?”
“No,” she argues, the word dragging slightly, as if she thought exactly that. “But it would have been a cool story.”
“He’s Blake’s cousin, Wendy,” I point out.
“So,” she replies.
“And he just got out of prison for murder,” I add.
“Manslaughter,” she counters. “Which means it was kind of justified murder.”