QUEENIE BABY: On Assignment (8 page)

"Stay for dinner," he said. "Let's catch up and see what happens."

Still trying to tell me what to do, I thought. "Not sure about dinner, but I'll take a beer." I looked away first. My brother-in-law jumped into action and dug around in the red cooler full of ice and beer.
 

He handed me a Coors Lite. "See I got some of the good stuff just for you, Sis. Go ahead and take my turn," he said pointing to the game and spitting some chew on the ground. He gave me a smile. There were bits of tobacco stuck to his front teeth. His lower lip was protruding slightly. He still had the athletic farm boy physique, but between the beer and my sister's cooking he was starting to get a gut.
 

My sister and Dan had gotten married right after high school and started having kids a couple of years later. Dan had a decent job with benefits as an HVAC technician for the City of Dover for almost ten years. He loved hunting, ATVs, beer, and my sister. He liked to tease me about being prissy, which I’m not, but he couldn't resist waving deer meat at me whenever I came over for dinner.
 

“I’m not really up for Corn Hole today Dan after last night,” I said.

"Don’t blame you. Heard that Granddaddy showed most of Annapolis his whatnots," he laughed.

For all his redneck idiosyncrasies he had an infectious laugh. I smiled. "He tried too."

He shook his head. "Can't wait 'til I'm that old," he said loudly and spit again. "I'm going to wave my whatnots anywhere I want." His contractor buddies howled. My sister made a face. I didn't want to think about Dan's whatnots waving anywhere.
 

I opened my beer and took a sip. Yep—just like I remembered. I would definitely be switching to water soon. I'd had enough alcohol in the last twenty-four hours to get me on a rehab reality show. I turned to Rick. “So how’s life been treating you?”

“Well enough, I suppose,” he said thoughtfully. “Doing better now,” he added suggestively.

Was my high school boyfriend actually making a play for me now? I asked myself. And, more importantly, why am I liking it? I needed to get away from his hard body and chiseled good looks for a minute. “I’m going to see if Ashley needs some help.”

He shrugged. “I’ll be here when you get back.”

I hurried off towards the house, picking my way through the screen porch construction to the back door. My sister’s big stupid yellow Lab, Sally, saw me coming and busted through the screen door. Two giant paws connected with my chest and sent me backwards down the stairs. I fell with a thud onto the bare wood floor. Sally licked my face and slobbered on me. I could hear my brother-in-law guffawing in the background. Great.
 

Granddaddy’s head appeared through the broken screen door. “Stop foolin’ with that idiot dog and get in here. Yer sister needs help and I’m hungry.”

As I pushed Sally off of me, Rick appeared at my side. “You okay?” he asked, helping me up.

“Just fine,” I replied wiping dog drool off my shirt.
 

He laughed. “Some things never change. Remember that time we were at Brian’s party and you walked into the sliding glass door. How many stitches did you get?”

“The dog knocked me down!” I said testily. “I’m not as clumsy as I used to be. I get up on stage on a regular basis, you know.”

He gave me a smoky look. “That just got my imagination revved up.”

“Well, rev it down!” I said and stomped up the stairs.

It looked like a toy factory had just exploded in the middle of my sister’s living room. Sponge Bob blared loudly on the over-sized television. Her country chic decor was a mixture of wood and Wal-Mart. Wooden shelves with heart-shaped cut outs loaded with country knick knacks adorned the pink and blue striped walls. Ruffled pastel blue curtains covered the windows. Two deer heads were mounted on either side of television. One of the deer’s eyes was crossed. Granddaddy sat on the overstuffed sectional with built-in recliners and wooden flip-down tables, happily munching on a big piece of jerky.

The large, eat-in kitchen was almost organized by comparison. Unfortunately, the theme for this room was teddy bears. A teddy bear border ran the length of the kitchen, teddy bear pictures hung on every square inch of wall space, and teddy bear figurines littered the windowsill.
 

My sister looked up when I came in. “Can you hand me some salt?"

“Sure,” I said, reaching for a salt shaker shaped like—you guessed it—a teddy bear.

“So how’s it going with Rick,” she asked with a coy smile.
 

I looked over her shoulder into the bowl. “What’s that?” I asked changing the subject.

“Potato salad. And stop changing the subject.” She looked up at me. “What happened to you?” she asked taking in my muddy shirt.

“Sally knocked me down,” I replied.

She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “I swear I don’t know how you get from point A to point B without falling down. Wash your hands and help me get finished up.”

“Your dog attacked me,” I insisted scrubbing my hands. “I didn’t trip.” Sally decided to trot up to me just at that moment and look up at me with big sad puppy dog eyes.

My sister and I looked down at her. “Yeah sure,” my sister said. “That dog attacked you. She’s scared of everything.”

I gave Sally’s head a pat. She was cute. She cowered and peed all over the floor. My sister gave me an evil look and handed me a bunch of paper towels. “Why did you pet her? You know she can’t control herself.”
 

Geez! “Why can’t you have a normal dog that doesn’t pee every time someone looks at it?” Sally wagged her tail. She was happy to be the topic of conversation.

“Oh,” my sister said sarcastically, “and your dog is the epitome of self-control.”

“Well, he doesn’t pee all over everything!”

“Yeah, he’s just vindictive and he bites!” she said.

“Maybe a little vindictive,” I agreed, “but definitely not a biter.”

“He bit me!” she cried.

“Yeah, but you deserved it. You tried to take food away from him.”

My sister gave me an exasperated look. “Uh, my food, remember?”

“That he took because you forgot to give him a goodie after he went outside.” It was all quite reasonable.

“Argh!” my sister cried in frustration.

“Maybe we should just agree to disagree,” I suggested. She threw a spoonful of potato salad at me. I ducked and it splattered against the wall. She nailed a smiling teddy bear right between the eyes.
 

“Mommy!” yelled Tiffany imperiously from the doorway. “We don’t throw food.”

My sister paused in mid-throw and looked over at our audience of children. “You’re right, Tiff,” she said regaining control. “Aunt Diana and I were just having some fun.”

“Sounded like you two were fightin’,” said Jason, ever observant. I shooed the kids back into the living room and then turned back to the sink to wash my hands again.
 

“You so get on my last nerve,” my sister whispered.

“Ditto!” I whispered back. “And why are you trying to fix me up with my old boyfriend? It didn’t work then and it isn’t going to work now.”

She turned to me and said, “It didn’t work then because you didn’t try to make it work. Rick is a great guy and you never gave him a fair chance.”

“He didn’t want me to go to college. He didn’t want me to sing. All he wanted was for me to support him while he did what he wanted to do with his life. He never gave me a chance.” It was all true. Rick had been controlling in high school. He had his life planned out and expected me to lockstep with him. Sure, he cared about me, and in many ways he built his life around me, but he never asked me what I wanted out of life.

I looked at my sister, but she wasn’t looking at me. I spun around. Rick was standing in the kitchen doorway. “I never knew you felt that way,” he said quietly. “You never said anything.”

“I guess I didn’t know how at eighteen,” I said. “I’m sorry.”

“Me too,” he said and walked away.

There was always drama at my sister’s. Always. “Thanks so much, Ashley,” I said.

“Hey, don’t blame me. You’re the one with all the unresolved issues.” She picked up a handful of paper plates, plastic utensils, and napkins and shoved them at me. “Time to eat,” she said brightly.

*****

Dinner consisted of barbecued deer tenderloin with a few pieces of chicken for the not so adventurous (meaning me), potato salad, pretzel salad, cole slaw, baked beans, and an assortment of chips. Not going to win a healthy eating award, but good nonetheless. The sun was starting to fade and the temperature had dropped, but it was still pleasant to sit outside at the picnic tables. Made it feel like summer was just around the corner. I could almost forget the unpleasantness in the kitchen. Of course, it would have been easier if Rick hadn’t been sitting directly in front of me.

I could feel his eyes on me. This was so annoying. Why did my sister have to arrange this reunion?
 

He was still staring. “What!” I said looking up.

“Just thinking,” he replied cryptically. I ignored the bait. I was not going there again. He went on. “Just thinking about how things could have turned out a lot different if we had better communication.”

“Well, that could be said about a lot of situations. But don’t delude yourself for a second into thinking we would somehow still be together if we were better communicators, whatever that means,” I said getting worked up. “We were eighteen and we had no business trying to plan out our lives together. It wasn’t going to work. Those situations never work out.” My voice had risen to a fevered pitch during my speech.

“Sounds like you’re communicatin’ just fine now, Sis,” said Dan from the end of the table. His cronies chuckled and high-fived him.
 

“Shut up, Dan,” I snapped and gathered up my plate.

“Look out,” he said, “Sis is getting fired up! Hold on to your cups everyone, she’s liable to knock ‘em all down.” Everyone including Granddaddy howled at that one. Geez, you knock one wedding cake over and nobody will ever let you live it down.
 

I dumped my plate in the trash and stormed off to the house. I locked myself in the pink and blue powder room and sat on the fluffy pink toilet seat cover. I stared mindlessly at the plaque on the wall asking patrons “who sprinkle when they tinkle” to “please be neat and wipe the seat.” Why was this getting to me so much? Was seeing an old boyfriend that mind blowing? Maybe there were some unresolved issues, but now was not the time in my life to go digging around in the past. I was focused on my music. Song writing was my great passion. Sure performing was fun and it paid the bills, but there was nothing quite like writing a song. The process was enthralling to me. Once I started I couldn’t stop. I hoped to one day sell some of my songs. That was how I envisioned my musical career progressing—not as some American Idol winning mega-star—but as a songwriter.

There was a knock at the door. “Aunt Diana, I got to poop,” said Josh.

“Can’t you poop in your bathroom?” I asked, standing up.

“Tiffany stuffed one of her dolls in the toilet.”

Great. “Just a minute,” I said. I washed my hands and straightened my hair in the mirror. “Time to go home, Diana,” I said to myself.

C
HAPTER
S
EVEN

THE PICNIC TABLES had been cleared and my brother-in-law was building an obscenely large fire in the fire pit. It was almost seven and the moon hung low in the star-filled sky. It was a shame I was feeling this way on such a perfect night. I loved a good bonfire. It made me feel young and alive; the smell of smoke, the crackle of burning wood, the contrast of the crisp night air at my back and the heat of the fire on my cheeks. Nothing like it. It reminded me of . . . .

“Are you done pouting yet,” asked Rick as he came up beside me.
 

“I haven’t even started,” I said without any real energy.

“Let’s call a truce.” He held up his hands.
 

I looked over at him. He was a good person, and we had practically grown up together. I had to give him a break. “Sure,” I said with a smile.

“Good,” he said smiling back. “So Diana,” he said in a good-to-see-you-again voice, “what have you been doing with yourself over the last decade?”

“Why Rick,” I said playing along, “according to my family, I’ve been living like a rock star. In reality I’m singing a couple of nights a week, writing songs in my spare time, and paying the bills by temping. How about you?” I asked.

“Well, nice of you to ask, Diana,” he said. “Until six months ago I was a supervisor on an oil rig working four days a week in the Gulf of Mexico. My wife of two years, Jill, didn’t seem to mind the arrangement. It made it a lot easier for her to hook up with her boyfriend from the gym.”

“Ouch!” I said sympathetically.

“Yeah, that’s what her boyfriend said when I came home a day early and he tripped and fell on the way out of my house,” Rick said grimly.

“Tripped, huh?” I said.

“Oh, yeah, he was even clumsier than you,” he said with a smile.
 

“And your wife?”
 

“Took him to the hospital and filed for divorce,” he said matter-of-factly.

“Any kids?” I asked. He shook his head no. “Wow, I’m sorry to hear that happened to you,” I said.
 

He nodded. “Well, you asked.”

“How did you end up back here?”

“My dad wanted to retire and asked me to come home and take over his contractor business. Seemed like a good idea to be around family again,” he said.

“How’s it going?” I asked.

“Getting better every day,” he replied and squeezed my arm. Before I could protest a blaze fifteen feet high erupted in front of us.
 

“Woohoo!” Dan hooted. “That there is a fire,” he announced, strutting around like rooster.

“What is it with men and fire?” I asked Rick.

“It’s dangerous,” he replied leaning over. “It can burn you or it can warm you—just like a woman,” he whispered in my ear sending warmth spreading in all directions.