Cookie Cutter (21 page)

I wait for it to happen.

“Ally, honey, come on.”

But it never does.

She doesn’t have anything to say as a matter of fact. She only gives the both of us a look of disgust before turning to go back inside.

“Of course.” James throws his arms up into the air and curses the sky. “Fine!”

Meg watches James start to go. After which, she looks to me for something. What I don’t know. I can’t imagine she expects sympathy from me right now – not after I just found out that after all the years of me crying on her shoulder over how I thought he was seeing someone else, it was her the entire time.

No. I don’t feel sorry for her.

Not today.

Not ever.

She turns to leave when she realizes she can’t break my cold stare.  Carter puts an arm around me. He rubs a hand along my arm and it feels good but I don’t know if I can deal with this right now.

“You okay?”

I nod then gesture toward my ex-husband as he tries to open his car door, failing miserably.

“He really shouldn’t drive like this.”

The last thing Ally needs is to lose her father. Asshole or not. Carter peers over his shoulder at James, who’s trying to find his keys even though they’re right there in his hand. I can tell from the expression he’s wearing, which says he’d much rather punch James in the face than help him out right now, that he wants to say no.

“I’ll make sure he gets home,” he says – because he’s Carter Blackwood, and a nice guy.

I smile apologetically up at him. “Thanks.”

After a weak tussle, Carter manages to get the keys from James and Paul tells him he’ll follow behind to make sure Carter gets home after.

When they leave, I’m surrounded by friends who care but I don’t have anything to say to them right now. I go back into the house where I don’t have to deal with the drama of what’s about to start going around the rumor mill. I shut the door. I lock up. I turn the lights out. Then I slide down to the floor and close my eyes, trying to breathe.

“You okay?” Ally asks from the top of the stairs.

I nod. “You?”

She shrugs.

“You wanna talk about it?” I ask her even though I can’t say I have any idea whatsoever what to say right now.

“Not really,” she says. “Is that okay?”

I close my eyes for a moment. I rest my head against the door then I open them and look up at my daughter who shouldn’t be dealing with this type of bullshit. Not at her age.

“I don’t think I know what’s okay and what’s not okay anymore to be truthful, Ally.”

She stands there. I can barely see her except for a silhouette and I hate that I don’t know what she’s thinking.

She sniffles and then says, “I think I’m gonna go to bed.”

“What about your cookies?”

“Forget the cookies, they get what they get.”

A shadow only, she moves slowly down the hall and disappears. It only takes me another ten minutes to get myself up and get my mind moving past what just happened outside my home. I walk to the kitchen and pull the now burned batch of sugar cookies Ally was last working on, out of the oven. I slide them into the trash. Then I finish baking the rest of the batch she made.

Chapter 16. Carter

About halfway down Spirit Drive, James is already passed out in the passenger’s seat of his borrowed Mercedes. He leaves me with no choice but to search him for his wallet when we stop at a light so I can find out where he lives. I open it to find his license and in the front flap, there’s a picture of him with Iris and Ally. One of those professionally taken photos from quite a while ago. Ally is young, maybe four or five. The picture looks worn and something in me has me taking the photo out for a closer look.

Iris is smiling. It’s a good smile: a genuine smile. I’m guessing it’s because of Ally, based on how she’s holding her in her arms and doesn’t seem to want to let go. James is there, included in the tight knit looking threesome, of course, but I can tell from his expression that he was disconnected even back in the early days of their relationship.

I go to put it back, and that’s when I see the picture that’s been slipped in behind this one. It is a photo booth string of James with Meg – one where they’re touching tongues. In the next, she’s licking his cheek. There’s another where they’re full on making out and in the last pic, Meg is taking her top off. Who knows when this one was taken. Honestly, I don’t give a shit, but I know Iris wouldn’t want her picture touching it so I tuck the one of the three of them into my shirt pocket and go about my original business of finding his address.

Once I know where I’m headed, I check the rear view mirror every once in a while and I can see Naked Paul behind me in his old, beat-up Beetle.  He’s seat dancing to something and I smile at the guy’s love for life.

We hit a pothole and James bounces awake next to me.

“Take me back.” He sits up to look around and see where he is.

“Not a chance in hell,” I tell him.

“What are you doing here?”

“I promised Iris I’d get you home, so . . .”

I leave it at that and he huffs out his disapproval then crosses his arms as he stares out the window. “Well aren’t you just Prince fucking Charming!”

“Hardly, but Iris doesn’t need to deal with anymore of your bullshit than she has to.”

James swings his head around. “I love her.”

But I don’t buy in to his gibberish simply because he says it with a little bit of umph. “More bullshit.”

“Who the fuck do you think you are, anyway? You don’t know what I feel.”  He taps his chest like there’s something in there.

I know better though. “I know if you love someone, fucking someone else isn’t an option. It’s not even a fleeting fucking thought.”

He’s quiet now but I’m pissed off and not quite finished.

“I know if you loved Iris at all you wouldn’t have looked twice at her friend, much less screwed around with her behind her back.”

“Fuck you,” he slurs and points at me.

“Ouch, good one.”

“You have no idea about Iris and me,” he spits out at me. “We’ve known each other a long
time – and we’ll know each other for even longer.” He hiccups. “But you,” he laughs, “you’ll be gone by the end of the month.”

We pull up to his house and I help him out of the car. It takes every ounce of self-control not to throw him into the dirt and leave him there, but I don’t. I signal Paul to wait while I drag James up to his front door and when I open it for him, I can feel how empty it is inside.

Just like him.

I shove the keys to his car into his hands and turn to go.

“She’ll come back to me!” he yells as I approach Paul’s Beetle. “She’ll come back and you’ll just be some fling she forgets about in no time!”

“Goodnight, James.” I flip him the bird over my shoulder without looking back. I slide into the passenger’s side of the Beetle and Paul pulls away.

Fuck James.

Even if there is some truth to what he says. I am the new guy, after all. I don’t know a whole lot about them or what their story is.  For all I know, this has all happened before and I’m some distraction for Iris to get her through a tough time.

That’s not Iris though.

She’s great mom; protective of her daughter. Straightforward and more of the heart-on-her-sleeve type as opposed to a one-night-stand kind of woman.

“That guy’s a dick,” Paul says after he turns his radio down, some.

Like I don’t know that.
“Yeah.”

“Always has been.”

“I’m sure.”

“Iris deserves better,” he says.

“That she does.”

The street lights pass by.

“Maybe something along the lines of a sexy home renovator with bulging biceps and an ass to die for.”

I look over at him, a little taken aback by his description. All I can think of to say is, “You hitting on me, Paul?”

He laughs and waves. “God no, I have a bro-friend. But don’t think I haven’t noticed you noticing me, big guy.” He winks at me and then watches the road.

“Can I ask you a question?” I say after a few minutes of silence.  We’re almost home now.

“Sure thing.”

“Iris ever see anyone before . . . you know.”

Paul laughs hysterically. So much so that he has to pull the car over so he doesn’t hit a light pole.

“When those two moved in, he was the only man for Iris. And when he moved out, he was still the only man for her. I’ve never seen another of the male species go in or out of there other than James – until you.”

His answer makes me breathe easier, I won’t lie but I don’t know what the point is anyway. James is right. I’ll be gone by the month’s end. Then what? Paul composes himself and gets us the rest of the way home, mumbling a few times to himself. I spend my journey thinking.

“Other men,” he mutters as we park. “James was just trying to get your panties in a wad, Carter.” He studies me for a moment. “From the looks of it, he was successful.”

I give him a smile. The best one I can. “Thanks for the help tonight.”

“No problem, mon amie,” he says. His accent resembles something somewhere between French and Italian.

When we get out, I eye Iris’s house as Paul enters his, but instead of swinging back by to see if she’s okay, I head back into my own to work on the renovation some more.

After all, it’s what I do.

Half way through laying the wood flooring down in the master bedroom, I can’t seem to concentrate, or find my motivation. I toss the tools aside, grab a water out of the fridge and fall into the futon.  Just as I’m about to grab for my cell phone, it rings.

When I see who it is, calling, it’s like he has a sixth sense. “Hey Frank.”

“Hey, kid, what’s wrong?”

I clear my throat. “What makes you think anything’s wrong?”

And he laughs at my blatant cover up. “You think I don’t know when my favorite nephew’s upset about something? I’m hurt.”

He’s being sarcastic. “Asshole.”

“Come on, tell your favorite uncle what’s troubling you,” he says.

I can’t say I know where to start.

“Before I die, Carter.”

“I’m not sure,” I tell him, honestly. “I met this woman.”

“Uh oh.”

“Exactly! And I don’t know when whatever’s going on between us became something more than just teasing and a little harmless flirtation but I’m confused – and kind of pissed.”

He laughs. “Pissed at what?”

“I had plan, Frank. A five to ten year plan.” I wave my arm around at nothing. “This wasn’t part of it.”

I wait after reminding him of my creed, for some deep and meaningful advice to come, but the only thing he can give me is, “Maybe it is.”

“What?”

“Carter, haven’t you learned by now that you can’t keep people out forever? It’s just not possible, son.”

“I’m not---”

“Bullshit! You’ve been trying to keep your dad out for years; probably since your mom died. And ever since you were disbarred, you’ve been moving around, trying to keep life out. Hell, you haven’t dated someone seriously since Cheryl because you’re trying to keep women out. Who knows what you’ll do when you get sick of yourself.”

I sit there, stunned. Annoyed. Peeved. I mean where does he come off telling me what I’m doing and how I’m doing it? He’s supposed to agree with me.

“Say what you really mean, Frank.”

“Listen kid, I know you’ve had it rough. I know it kicks you in the gut every day that goes by and you don’t hear from your old man but face it, Sacramento's where you were born, Carter. That doesn’t mean it’s where you belong.”

His words sting a little, I’m not gonna lie. Despite my relationship issues with dad, growing up, I always loved my home. Mom was there – and Tony. I had friends, at least I did before the hooplah at the law firm, but something still rings true to what Frank is saying. “Think I’ll ever be able to go back?”

Frank’s breath is heavy on the other end. He blows out some air for what feels like an hour. He knows all the gory details of everything that’s happened between my dad and me over the years. I pretty much know what he’s going to say. “Do you want to?”

And that’s not it.

I think about my brother, yes, but then I also think about Iris, and Ally even. Meg, and Paul, the Beatrice. I never would have guessed in a million years that I’d connect with people in a neighborhood like this on the coast opposite where I grew up. “I don’t know. I’m . . . this place is . . . and these people . . .”

I can’t seem to get my thoughts straight but I don’t have to, because as though he knows what I’m trying to say, without saying it at all, Frank says, “Sometimes, when you find your home, you find your home.”

“But mom wanted---”

“Your mother would be proud of the man you’ve turned into, Carter.” He has a sharp edge to his words. “She didn’t give a single shit about all that other crap. She wanted her sons to be happy. Period. Whether that’s in a courtroom or a construction site has always been up to you.”

My chest heaves and I have to fight back the urge to sob like that eight year old kid whose dad didn’t have a second to look at the bird house he’d built.

Luckily, Frank doesn’t wait for a reply.

“I’m not saying you don’t belong there too, Kid. When you’re supposed to go back, you’ll go back.”

I nod. It’s all I can do. I hear someone calling for my uncle in the background.

“I gotta go, Carter. You gonna be okay, sport?”

I nod. Then I laugh. He can’t see me.

“Yeah. Hey, Frank?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks.”

“Just make sure you call me when you’re ready for building with the big dogs.”

“Will do.”

I check the time when I end the call. It’s far too late to go check up on Iris even though that’s the only place I really want to be right now. Besides, I don’t know if she wants me to at this point. Plus she’s with Ally. They’re dealing with enough right now.

“Tomorrow,” I say. “I’ll check in tomorrow.” Then I start working on the floor again.

* * *

The next morning, I wake up late enough to know I’ll have to wait for Iris to get home from work to talk to her about everything that happened last night. But when I take the trash out about a half hour later, I see her car in the driveway across the street still and my stomach does a nose dive.

I check the time again. Then the date.

“Nope, she should definitely be at work,” I tell the trashcan.

I stare over at Iris’s front door like she’ll be coming out of it at any moment. When she doesn’t, I find myself without the boldness I’ve had the past few weeks. The fact that she’s home and knows I’m home and didn’t come over to talk about . . . whatever, bothers me. Instead, I head back inside and try to tell myself I don’t care if she’s made a judgment call, or what she thinks of the fact that I had a cushy job in the palm of my hands and then pissed it away.

I said
try
. I did not say
succeed
.

In fact I feel so incredibly bad that even after the long, hot shower I take to try and rejuvenate myself and redirect my energies, I still can’t get the look on Iris’s face from last night out of my head. I slide some jeans on and a t-shirt, which I don’t even look at, and my jacket, before I storm across the street and right up to her door.

I knock.

And knock and knock and knock.

“Iris!”

I knock again, harder this time. I ring the doorbell. I peek in through her window. I step back and holler at the damn house.

“Iris. Your car is sitting in the driveway.” I point to it. “I know you’re in there.”

“I know how to jimmy a lock if you need me to,” a low, feminine voice informs me. Alex comes striding up the sidewalk with a crowbar in her hands and I have to laugh.

Mostly at myself.

“I don’t think it’s going to come to that Alex, but thanks for the offer.”

“Makin’ quite the scene out here, big guy.”

I wave at the door. “She’s avoiding me.”