A Life Less Ordinary (27 page)

Hub
waved his hand, urging her to go on.

She
shook her head and shrugged.  “An angry husband, busted by the usual evidence,
tracked Max down.  At the office.”

“Good
Lord!”

“Yeah,
Max used more colourful words – some of which I’m almost positive were in a
different language.  Especially when the guy pulled a knife.”

“Jesus!”

“
That’s much closer to
what Max said at that point, too.”

“
Were you hurt?” Hub
demanded, putting his drink down and grabbing her hand, his eyes darting almost
frantically as he tried to determine if she was injured.

“
No, no – well, I hit my
elbow on the door when Max pushed me into the inner office and blocked the
door, the bastard.”

Hub
blinked.  “The bastard?”

She
rolled her eyes and explained patiently, “How am I supposed to help him if I’m
stuck in a different room?  I had to yell I was calling for help and dialling
9-1-1.”

“I
suspect Max can more than take care of himself,” Hub replied drily.

Daisy
waved his words away.  “Yeah, yeah – Max has that big, bad, tough guy thing
going on, shaved head and all, but he’s not as young as he used to be, you
know.” 

She
shook her head, a worried frown wrinkling her forehead.

“So,
what happened?” Hub urged when Daisy appeared content to sit, staring pensively
into space.

Daisy
started.  “Oh – Max let me out in less than five minutes.  The guy was out cold
on the floor and Max didn’t have a scratch on him.”

“Impressive,”
Hub murmured sarcastically.

Daisy
shrugged.

“That’s
never happened before,” Hub added.  “Max should -”

“No,
no, it’s happened before,” Daisy corrected absently.  “Although this is the
first time I’ve had to call the cops.  Max usually manages to defuse the
situation before it gets that far.”

“What?”
Hub sputtered.  “How could I not know about that?”

“You
were never home,” Daisy replied simply.  There was no emotion in her voice; she
was simply stating a fact.

Hub
huffed a sigh and leaned forward, resting his arms on his knees.

“I
– wasn’t a very good husband to you, was I?” he asked softly, staring at the
drink he cradled in his hands.

“I
thought you were a normal husband,” Daisy said gently, staring at her own
glass. 

She
was too worn out to be angry, and she didn’t have the heart at the moment to be
cruel. 

She
continued, “You worked long hours to support us, especially when I was home
with the kids.  It’s really only been the last couple of years -”

She
grimaced. 

“Probably
when you started your affair, huh?”

Hub
nodded tiredly, never looking away from the glass in his hands.

Daisy
straightened and glanced in the direction of the bedrooms. 

“Where’re
the kids?” she asked.  “I don’t really want to talk about this if they can
overhear us.”

“They’re
over at Rebecca’s, staying the night with Tris.”

“Oh,
right,” Daisy said, memory kicking in.  “Big date with Jackson.”

Hub
shrugged.  “Does she ever have small dates?” he asked.

Daisy
shot him a fulminating look.

“Sorry,”
he sighed.

Daisy
took a sip of her drink in silence.

Hub
leaned back on the couch, and sighed again.

“I
move out on Monday,” he said quietly.

Daisy
kept her eyes on the TV as she said, “I know.”

He
glanced around the living room. 

“We’ve
lived here for almost twenty years,” he murmured.

Daisy
nodded, her mouth tight, her eyes resolutely on the television. 

“We
bought it when we decided it was time to start trying for a baby,” she agreed.

He
gazed around the room in silence for a long moment, then asked fondly,
“Remember the ugly colour in this room when we moved in?”

“Ha! 
Who could forget?  Rebecca called it a cross between projectile vomit and
diarrhea.”

“She
was right.”

“Manny’s
description of the colours in the bedrooms was even more brutal.”

“With
good reason,” Hub groaned.  “I thought that shit-green would never get covered
by the primer.  How many coats did we end up using, anyway?”

Daisy
grinned.  “That’s tough to know for sure, especially after Manny took a pail
and just threw the primer against the wall.”

Hub
chuckled.  “Oh, lord, do I remember that!  It didn’t end well for Manny.”

Daisy
began to laugh.  “N-n-no – she ended up covered in the primer herself.”

“Because
she got more primer on Rebecca than on the wall, and then Rebecca simply poured
hers over Manny’s head!”

Daisy
howled with laughter.  “Dear God – the
look
on her
face
!”

“M-Manny’s
or Rebecca’s?”

“Either! 
Both!” Daisy gasped, clutching her stomach as she laughed, tears springing to
her eyes.

“Then
Rebecca – in the living room -”

“You
mean when she started talking to the walls, begging them to just let the primer
do its job?”  Daisy asked.

Now
they were both almost in tears, speaking in quick gasps.

“She
swore the paint was possessed!” Hub hooted.

“She
started c-calling on all the saints she could remember with every new roller of
primer, and saying a little prayer -”

“Was
that before or after she started bargaining with the walls?  Trying to strike a
deal with whatever paint gods might be listening?”

“No,
that was Manny.  I think she ended up vowing to dedicate her life to paint
research if only the primer would cooperate and get rid of those awful
colours.  Of course, she had that primer in her hair for days afterwards, so
maybe she did do a lot of paint research...”

They
rocked on the couch, laughing so hard they couldn’t catch their breath, tears
rolling down their cheeks.

They
finally sputtered into silence and smiled at each other, in perfect accord for
the first time in weeks, warmed by shared memories and years of history.

Hub’s
face softened just before he leaned over and kissed her.

Daisy
froze for a moment, a thousand thoughts flashing through her mind.  How he
shouldn’t be doing this and there was still the other woman – and yet, he was
also still her husband of twenty-one years, her lover for longer than that, and
he was familiar and comfortable and – yes – safe.

Except
all of that was over now, with an unfamiliar, uncomfortable and dangerous
future looming ahead of her.

On
Monday, they would begin the process of formally separating their lives.

Tonight
– tonight, Daisy thought as she relaxed and began to kiss him back, was a
chance to say good-bye to everything that had been good about their past
together before saying hello to an uncertain and frightening future.

Besides,
she thought as he pressed her back on the couch, what would it hurt?

~~~~~

It
was dark when Rebecca opened her eyes and blinked at the unfamiliar wall.  The
hotel room was dimly illuminated by the light of the street lamps seeping
through the curtains.  Jackson stirred beside her, pressed warmly against her
back, his arm resting comfortably over her waist.  His breath lightly brushed
against the skin of her neck and back, and she shivered.

He
started awake, lifting his head and looking down at her in the shadows.

“What
time is it?” he mumbled, his voice thick with sleep.

Rebecca
glanced at the clock.  “It’s early.  Only ten.”

He
lowered his head back to the pillow and nuzzled her shoulder, the stubble of his
whiskers lightly rasping against her skin.  She shivered again at the
sensation.

“You
know, if you’d agreed to come to my place, we wouldn’t need to get out of bed
at all tonight,” he murmured into her ear, dropping a lingering kiss on the
back of her shoulder.

“Oh?”
Rebecca teased lightly.  “Would you have been as creative if your kids were
down the hall?”

“You’d
be surprised,” Jackson assured her.

Rebecca
laughed softly and patted his hand.  “I’ll take your word for it,” she said.

Jackson
froze, and Rebecca knew he was suddenly fully awake, but not for any reason she
was going to like.  He lifted his head to look at her in the darkness of the
hotel room. She bit her lip, and tensed, waiting for him to speak.

“Rebecca,”
he said slowly, “you have no intention of ever spending the night at my place
or meeting my kids.  Do you?”

“Jackson
– it’s just a bad time,” she protested weakly.  “I mean – Tris isn’t handling
her parents absence well, and two or three weeks ago, when I pushed Jaime about
coming home, she ended up hanging up on me and I haven’t talked to her since. 
Tris is barely speaking to me any more frequently.  Her dad’s gone off to a
Buddhist monastery in France, of all places, and he calls once a week but he’s
not coming back any time soon, either.  But he will at least talk to me on the
phone!  Honestly, Jackson, this is not the time to meet your kids or introduce
anything new into the mix.”

She
rolled over and met his eyes.

“I’m
sorry,” she said softly.

“Are
you?” he asked.  He slowly cocked his head to one side, his dark eyes watchful
and sad.  “You don’t really want anything to change, do you?”

Rebecca
swallowed and forced herself to meet his gaze steadily.

“No,”
she replied simply.  “I like things the way they are, at least for right now. 
And – I really am worried about Tris.  I’m just not sure how to deal with her
and her parents.”

Jackson
cupped her face and stroked his thumb over her cheek.

“You
don’t have to do this on your own,” he murmured.

“I’m
not.  I have Daisy here, and Manny long distance, and unlike my daughter and
son-in-law, Manny will come home if I ask her to.”

Jackson
heaved a heavy sigh and rolled onto his back, rubbing his hands wearily over
his face.

“That’s
not exactly what I meant,” he said ruefully.

Rebecca
laughed as she slipped from the bed and stood with nothing but the shadows
cloaking her body.  She looked down at him.

“I
appreciate the offer – I really do,” she said.  “But – really – I’m okay. 
Daisy and Manny will get Tris and me through this.  They always do.”

He
gave her a sad half-smile before his gaze drifted down to her nude body.

“So,
you really only need me for sex,” he teased, not quite lightly.

She
pulled off the covers, exposing him to her hungry eyes as she grinned
wickedly. 

“Not
really,” she replied.  “I have some pretty impressive vibrators.”

She
climbed on to the bed and straddled him, not quite touching his body as she
hovered over him.  She leaned forward and braced herself with her hands on
either side of his face.  He put his hands on her waist, then slid one hand to
her back as the other stroked up to fondle her breast.

“So
what
am
I needed for?” he asked huskily.

Rebecca
shrugged, and almost purred with pleasure as his hands continued their
explorations.

“Well,”
she mused, “you do hold doors for me when my arms are full.”

“I
am nothing if not a gentleman.”

“You’ve
killed a spider or two in your day.”

“Glad
to help.”

She
slowly lowered herself on top of him.

“And
you’ve fixed my car.”

“Free
car maintenance – that’s always a plus.”

She
gave him a slow, sensuous kiss that he more than returned in kind.

She
drew back slightly and said, “But the real reason, of course, is because
without you, I’d still be wondering how to set up my DVR, not to mention my new
phone.”

He
chuckled as he stroked his hands sensuously up her back.

“I
always knew those IT classes would come in handy,” he murmured. 

She
shrieked as he suddenly rolled her over and pinned her, laughing, beneath him.

“Well,
I guess when you’re second best, you just have to try harder,” he said huskily
and lowered his mouth to hers.

~~~~~

TJ
glanced up as Leah padded quietly down the hallway and paused on the threshold
of the living room.

“Hey,”
Leah said softly, her voice rough with sleep.

“Hey,”
he replied.  “What are you doing up?”