Instead, I climb out of the booth and slide my arms into my black faux-leather jacket. It’s early May and the days are growing longer and warmer, but there’s still a chill to the air.
Though I try for a quick wave and getaway at the restaurant door, Gord insists that I need an escort to my car at the back of the parking lot. So I spend the entire way hugging my purse, clutching my keys, and praying to God that he doesn’t try to kiss me. There is no way in hell my lips are going anywhere near this guy.
“This is me,” I announce, stopping in front of my black Grand Prix.
He shakes his head with mock dismay, his eyes roaming the body, settling on the rust that eats away at the rear wheel well. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“It still works.” Thanks to the help of my friend Keith, who knows enough about cars to fix whatever ails it and takes payment in the form of beer IOUs. I owe the guy about twenty cases by now.
Gord slides a business card out of his pocket and hands it to me. “You need to come by my store. I’ll get you into a good, safe car for a steal. As little as five.”
“Five hundred?” That’s more than what I paid for this car, a 2000 model with a hundred and thirty thousand miles on it.
He chuckles, but it carries a superior twinge. “Well, I guess we could see what arrangements can be made for the woman Gord Mayberry is dating.”
Oh, God. He just referred to himself in the third person.
His hot, sweaty hand closes over mine, and I immediately tense. “I had a great time tonight, Catherine.”
“Really?” Were we on the same date?
“Oh, believe me, I had my reservations. Plenty of people warned me about you when I told them we were going out. You know, especially because of that whole Philips thing.”
That whole Philips “thing.”
Gord’s gaze lingers over the simple black dress that peeks out from beneath my open jacket. I chose it because it flatters my slim, toned frame and, back when I was getting ready for my blind date and had real hope for Lou’s “tall, successful blond” nephew, I wanted to look good.
“I’d like to do this again,” he says, taking a step closer.
I plaster on my friendliest smile as I take a big step back. “How about I call you?” I am never calling him. Ever.
If he realizes that’s a standard blow-off line, I can’t tell. “I’ll be waiting. Anxiously.” His green eyes drift down to my mouth and he hesitates for a second before swooping in, so fast that I barely have time to turn my head. His wet lips land on my cheek.
With an awkward giggle, I pry my hand from his grip and duck into my car, slamming my palm against the door lock before he gets the foolish idea to try again.
Ugh. Thank God this night is over.
Chapter 3
March 2010
“Go to hell!” I kick my shoes off at the door, purposely leaving them astray.
“Don’t you dare speak to me like that! I am your mother. You will respect me!” My mom is hot on my heels as I storm into the kitchen.
“Why should I? You don’t respect me. You don’t give a shit about me.”
“I did what I had to do.” She grabs my arm, pulls me back to face her. “He was going to ruin your life!”
“No, you have ruined my life. If people at school hear about this . . .” I shudder at the thought. Balsam High has a total of six hundred students, and they have nothing to do except gossip. Plus, I swear, half of them are in love with Scott.
“You didn’t seem to care what anyone at school thought when you were sneaking out and whoring around.”
My mouth drops open. Did my mother just call me a whore? Anger wells deep in my throat, and I blink back the tears. “Well, we can’t all be a frigid bitch like you, I guess.”
The slap she delivers is biting, and I’m sure the sound carries past the kitchen in this 1950s backsplit. It’s the first time she’s ever hit me. I’m stunned with surprise, frozen as the sting blossoms on my cheek.
And then my hand is swinging, the sound equally cringeworthy.
She reaches up to cup her reddening cheek, her face filled with shock.
“No wonder Dad’s never home. He can’t stand you either.” I spin on my heels and march up the stairs to my room, ignoring the fear on Emma and Jack’s faces, as they sit perched at the top, listening to every word.
“What was that you said? I can barely hear you over that noise.” There’s just the faintest twinge of a German accent in my mother’s voice, a remnant of her life in Berlin before she moved to America with my grandparents at ten years old, but you have to listen hard to catch it.
I let my car coast toward the stop sign. “Sorry. It’s a crack in my catalytic converter. Or something like that.” Keith says he doesn’t have the equipment to fix it and it’s going to cost me a small bundle at the shop. Maybe I should take up Gord Mayberry on that deal for a new car, after all. “I said I’ll be by at six thirty with Brenna.” My parents take Brenna every Saturday, giving me a chance to pull an all-day shift on the busiest day of the week without losing a large chunk to a babysitter.
She sighs. “Why don’t you just drop her off on Friday nights from now on, so she’s not sitting at the diner while you work?”
“I don’t want to impose on you and Dad any more than I already have.”
“She’s our granddaughter, Catherine. It’s never an imposition.”
Right. Then why does she make it feel like it is, every Saturday that I pick Brenna up and she goes through all the things she couldn’t do that day because of Brenna’s short attention span. That’s always been my mother’s MO: offer the help and then not so subtly complain about it. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning, then.”
“We’ll be here.”
My shoulders sag with relief as I toss my phone to the passenger seat. I have that same reaction after every conversation with her. I can’t see us ever growing to be friends, but at least we’re on speaking terms again. There was a long stretch of time—almost five years—where I would have nothing to do with her, or Dad by default.
Gord used the term “rocky relationship” earlier. I’d call it more “volcanic.” I’m still trying to work around the rock-hard layers of mistrust, wariness, and resentment that formed after it finally exploded.