Place Your Betts (The Marilyns) (14 page)

“Oh, Tom.” Betts touched his hand. The first thing Betts would do, after comforting her baby, was to find a sporting goods store and buy it out of Louisville Sluggers. Or she’d bounce the little bitch off the hood of the Mustang and make it look like an accident. Or better yet, she’d sic Mama on her. “She didn’t mean it. She wasn’t thinking.”

“I know. That’s the worst part. It was a thoughtless comment. She can’t see what’s right in front of her. How could I have missed that?” He took another drink.

“Do you still have feelings for her?” Betts glanced at the gumbo. It was boiling, but she didn’t care if it exploded. She wasn’t letting go of her son’s hand.

“I’m tired of being invisible.”

“Make her see you.” Betts squeezed his hand. “No one can make you feel second best but you.”

Something she had trouble remembering around Gabe.

“I know.” Tom picked at the label again. His shoulders slumped. He was the picture of defeat.

Her heart broke for him, and tears burned the inside of her nose. This pain was a thousand times worse than any she’d experienced over her own problems. She took a deep swallow of water and steadied herself. What she wouldn’t give to scoop him up and rock away his sadness. But he outweighed her by a good forty pounds, and she was nothing but an acquaintance. Her baby was hurting, and there was nothing she could do. Helplessness magnified the pain tenfold. Tears spilled over, and she slid out of the seat and hustled over to the stove to tend the boiling gumbo. After covering it, she turned it on low. Tom needed to know that he wasn’t alone in the low self-esteem department; it was all she could give him.

“I need to show you something. Give me a minute.” Betts covertly blew her nose as she walked into her bedroom and opened her desk drawer. The old photo album had a red, tattered cover and pages yellowed with time. The picture she pulled out wasn’t worth a thousand words; in fact, it rendered most people speechless. Betts walked back into the living room and set it in front of Tom.

“Not all of us are born pretty or cool or popular.” Betts sat across from him and concentrated really hard on controlling the tears.

“Whoa.” He picked up the photo. “Is that you?” Tom glanced at Betts and back at the picture. “No way.”

Betts sniffed and smiled. “Way. That’s my freshman year in high school.” With braces and the humid New Orleans air frizzing her permed red hair into an Afro, she was Don King meets Little Orphan Annie with headgear.

“What’s with the big hair?” Tom grinned.

Good. He was smiling, and his mind was off Kaitlin.

Betts shrugged. “I didn’t know any better.”

“Why are you showing me this?” Tom didn’t sound suspicious, just matter-of-fact.

“Because not everyone has the cool life. Things change. People change. I know I seem…well…” She was about to say old enough to be your mother. “Really old but I remember high school, and there was this guy. Quarterback of the football team, richest family in the county, cutest guy I’d ever seen.”

“Let me guess, you liked him but he didn’t like you?” Sarcasm—another trait Tom had gotten from her.

“No, actually we dated, hot and heavy, all summer.”

Tom looked down at the picture again.

“It was two years after that unfortunate thing was taken. I was different, at least on the outside.” But the same old shy, unsure girl on the inside.

“What happened?” The first bit of interest.

“We…um…that is to say…we…”
Screwed around
wasn’t sending the right message. “Dated and then he dumped me.” Scared and pregnant and alone. “What I’m trying to say is that sometimes the reality isn’t half as good as the fantasy.”

Tom’s face fell. The sad puppy-dog eyes were back.

Way to go, Mom. First real-life lesson and she’d made it worse. Too bad he already knew the truth about Santa and the tooth fairy or she could have squashed all his dreams at once.

Several seconds of uncomfortable silence hung in the air.

“Nice MacBook.” Tom pointed to her laptop with his root beer.

“Thanks.” Thank God for the subject change. Betts pulled the silver MacBook Pro to her. “I was just working on the details of the release for my new single.”

“Cool. Need any help with the song?” Tom sat up with excitement. “Want me to listen to it for you?”

Anything to chase away the awkwardness swirling around them. “Thanks. I’d love for you to hear
City Girl
.” She pulled up the audio file and played it for him.

Tom closed his eyes, his head bouncing lightly to the rhythm of the ballad. She did the very same thing. Her heart swelled so much that it threatened to swallow her body. Did he feel music like she did?

“I like it.” He nodded and then chewed on the inside of his cheek—something his daddy did. “Only I would have held back on the refrain until the end and then let them have it.”

Betts bristled, mashed her lips together, and smiled. She wanted…no, needed him to like her, but criticism over her music wasn’t something she took lightly. Forcing herself to relax, she nodded for him to go on.

“Like this.” Tom’s deep baritone voice sang the song his way.

He had an amazing voice, true and full. Again, tears came to her eyes. This was another piece of her, something else she could claim…proof that he was hers. So much had been taken away, but no one could remove the
her
from him. Birthdays, Christmases, his first tooth and scraped knees, spelling tests, family dinners had been stolen, but the
her
could never be taken away. The tears were fast and furious. Betts leaned over and grabbed a dishtowel from the drawer next to the sink. “Excuse me.”

Tom looked at her like was she an alien from the planet Wacko. “Okay. Um. I think I need to go.”

Betts wiped her face. “No, stay. It’s just that you made the song so much better. I wasn’t expecting that. I’ve been trying to figure out what was wrong for a while, and you showed me.”

“Oh.” He didn’t look convinced.

“Sing it again so I can get it down.” Betts shuffled through her pile of papers until she found the sheet music.

His brow crunched up in several lines. “You’re not gonna start crying again?”

“Nope.” Betts swiped at her face and blew her nose. “All done.”

Tom sang the refrain again, and his voice was as beautiful as before.

Betts made the necessary changes on the sheet music.

“That was wonderful. Your voice is…wow. I didn’t expect it.”

Tom smiled and hunched his shoulders. “Ms. Gigi was always trying to get me to sing in the church choir.”

“You should have taken her up on it.” Betts leaned closer to Tom. “You really do have talent. I’d love to start those music lessons soon.”

“I don’t know.” Tom glanced in the direction of his house. “I don’t think my dad would like it.”

Betts waved a hand. “Don’t worry about him. I’ll take care of it.”

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Someone pounded on the door.

“Speak of the devil.” Betts got up and pushed the button to open the door. Her emotions were so raw she didn’t think she could handle Gabe right now. “You rang?”

“Where’s Tom?” Gabe had changed out of his work clothes into clean jeans and a chambray button-down.

“I have him duct taped in the closet. I was waiting until dark to make my getaway.”

Gabe bounded up the steps.

“Dad, I’m here.”

Betts pointed to her kitchen table.

Gabe’s eyes scanned her face. “Why is your face red?”

“It was hard work tying him up.” Betts stepped aside. “Come in, make yourself at home.” Sarcasm always made her feel better.

Gabe inhaled deeply. “Is that chicken and sausage gumbo?”

“What are you? A bottomless pit?” Betts moved to the stove to guard the food. “And no. You’re not staying for supper.”

“Well, now. That’s not neighborly.” Gabe slid across from Tom, kicked back, and laced his hands behind his head. “What’s it gonna take, Red?”

Her breath hitched. Red had been his pet name for her when she was young enough to think it was cute. Now, the past was too close to the surface for it to be comfortable. Anger was a whole lot safer than nostalgia. Betts folded her arms and narrowed her eyes. “I want that driveway lock gone. Permanently.”

“Done.” Gabe grinned.

Betts glared at him. It was too easy. One bull-charging experience to bond them and he was all smiles? Not in a million years. “Fine.”

She glanced at Tom and understood. Gabe was being nice in front of the boy. It made sense. She shook her head and gritted her teeth. A point in favor of his parenting skills.

With great restraint, she dialed down the anger, opened the oven, and pulled out the dirty rice. Two could play the civil game.

“How do you two know each other?” Tom looked from one to the other.

“Red and I—”

“Don’t call me that.” Betts slapped three bowls onto the counter. Clearly she needed some anger management techniques because civil wasn’t in her. “I hate that nickname.”

“As I was saying, Red and I go way back.” Gabe’s eyes darted around the room like he was looking for the right words to materialize. “We, um…well—”

“What your father’s trying to say is that we dated.” Betts exhaled loudly. “Once upon a time, he was my boyfriend.” She smacked a ladle full of gumbo in each bowl. If he called her Red one more time, he’d be wearing his bowl for a hat. But she was smiling from ear to ear so she definitely wasn’t angry anymore. The harder she smiled the less she believed it.

“Dang.” Tom shook his head. “I would have never guessed.”

“It was a very long time ago.” Gabe yawned. He made it sound like an epoch and a couple of eons had passed since they were together.

Understanding dawned, and Tom studied his father. “Weren’t you the quarterback?”

“Unrelated.” Betts’s cheeks flamed, so she did an about-face and turned back to the stove. Just her luck, she had the only teenager in the world who paid attention. A smile twitched at the corner of her lips. Tom was smart as a whip.

“How come you never mentioned it?” Tom whispered, but the RV didn’t allow for privacy.

So he and his father had the type of relationship where they discussed personal things? One of the reasons she’d rushed over here in a whirlwind of maternal protection was because she was afraid that Gabe parented with fear like his father. Her pulse pounded in her temples. Another point in Gabe’s favor. She was starting to like him in spite of herself.

Gabe yawned again. “It never came up.”

Read—it meant nothing to him. That should stoke her anger, but instead, it was a potshot that went straight to her soul. Maybe it was the chemistry they still had that had given her some small hope she’d meant as much to him as he had to her. More tears welled up. Today, she was just one giant snotty mass of emotions. Betts turned around and checked the date on her watch. Damn. Was it the law of the universe that all significant personal situations must coincide with PMS?

Betts swiped at her tears and busied herself looking for a French bread. Mama told her that she’d stopped by Best Bakery in Houma on the way here. She finally found the bread in the cabinet above the refrigerator.

When her voice was back to normal and her face perfectly composed, she loaded up their bowls waitress-style on her arm, grabbed the French bread with the other hand, and turned around. “Tom, prepare yourself for a shocking high school revelation about your father.”

“What?” Tom sat on the edge of his chair, eager for a glimpse of his father’s past. At his age, she’d been eager for any info about her father. Too bad her father hadn’t been as eager to learn about her.

“He had a mullet.” Betts shook her head. “I know. Scary.”

Tom looked blank. “I don’t get it. What’s a mullet?”

“It’s a haircut…. Business in the front, and party in the back. Very cool and popular at the time.” Gabe shot her the boyish grin.

Betts looked away. “The only place that hairstyle was ever popular was the Texas School for the Blind—”

“What can I say? I’m a very cool guy.”

“Clark Gable Swanson, a legend in his own mind.” Betts shook her head and set the food down.

“Impressive.” Tom nodded at her waitressing ability.

“I’ve waited lots of tables in my day—”

“Not in a while, though.” Gabe snorted. “You live the cush life now.”

Why did he make that sound like hell’s number one sin?

“Excuse me.” Betts slapped a bowl down in front of him. If some hot gumbo sloshed over the side and spilled down the front of his shirt, it was only by accident. “I waited tables three nights, week before last.” Carefully, she placed Tom’s in front of him. “My mother owns a bar and takes perverse pleasure in calling me at all hours when she’s short-handed.”

“Do people recognize you taking their orders?” Tom reached for one of the napkins Betts had placed in a basket in the middle of the table.

She sat down in front of her own bowl. “Sure. Mama’s a shrewd businesswoman. She tweets when I’m working in the bar. People come from all over and pack the place.”

“You don’t mind?” Tom took a bite of gumbo.

Betts shrugged. “Not too much. Compared to some of her other stunts, using me to make money is minor. Plus, I love that bar. It’s where I was discovered.”

“How did that happen?” Tom dipped a piece of French bread into his gumbo, sloshed it around, and took a bite. Betts nodded. The boy knew the proper way to eat Cajun food.

Betts turned all her attention on Tom and did her best to forget Gabe was sitting directly across from her, watching her every move.

“The man who owned the bar at the time—LeMaster Boudreaux—had a brother who scouted talent for a Christian label. Mama pestered Uncle Lee—that’s what I later called Mr. Boudreaux—until he got his brother to listen to me. Mama promised to go out on a date with Uncle Lee if he’d bury the hatchet and called the brother he hadn’t spoken to in over a decade.”

Gabe’s brow knitted, and his eyes squinted almost closed as he continued to study Betts. It looked awfully like a glare. Maybe the gumbo was too spicy for him?

Betts turned back to Tom. “The Christian label signed me, then I crossed over to country.” She shrugged. “And the rest, as they say, is history.”