The Boots My Mother Gave Me (29 page)

I was in the bay putting a four-inch lift on a customer’s Jeep. The guys returned from lunch, the first they had seen of me since I came back to town.

“Well, look who it is...Harley LeBeau. I thought you were headed for the big time,” Ricky joked, walking into the bay. “What are you doing slumming around these parts?”

“Are you sure your hands will make it?” Mark added. “I doubt they’ve seen a wrench in years. Somebody get the Epsom salts.” He walked to me, giving me a hug. Par for course at the garage, as long as the guys picked on you, you knew they liked having you around.

“It’s good to see you, too.” I grinned, returning his hug. “The only thing swollen enough to soak around here is your ego,” I said, patting Mark on the back, turning to Ricky for an embrace. “I thought you’d be retired by now.”

“The daughter wants to get her Master’s degree. Somebody’s gotta pay for it.”

“Aw. You’re a good dad, Ricky.”

“Well, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes,” I heard a voice behind me. Turning around, there stood Pete. Pete had shown me everything I knew about mechanic work.

“Pete!” I met him with a bear hug. It amazed me, really, having grown up with my father. Everywhere I went, somehow, I met the most incredible men who gave me hope, a reason to believe.

“You have come into yourself, girl. Look at you, all grown up, such a pretty thing. I heard you got engaged a few years back. Did you get married?”

“No, Pete, I didn’t. Just not for me, marriage,” I answered briefly, catching the movement of a little body out of my peripheral vision. I followed the flash to find a kid, maybe four years old, running full speed ahead directly toward the road. I ran after him, catching him just before he reached the edge of the sidewalk. I knelt down, my heart pounding, and turned him to me. He smiled, totally oblivious to his close call.

I smiled back, as a pair of cargo pants quickly entered my vision behind the boy. Surely a worried parent, he knelt down to the child, putting his arm protectively around the kid’s shoulders. I looked up, my hand resting on my forehead, blocking my eyes from the sun’s rays. Surely, they failed me. I blinked hard, opening them again.
Jeremiah?

“Hi, stranger,” he said to me. “You okay, Tate?” He inspected the child. I looked to the boy, and back to Jeremiah, thoroughly tongue-tied. I had nothing to say. What could I say? “Harley, this is Tatum...Tate.”

“Hi, Harwey.” Tate extended his hand. I put mine in his, shaking it.

“Hi, Tate.” I looked from him to Jeremiah, searching for the similarities, my heart feeling wrung out.
Did he have a son? A child?

A woman joined them, bending down as she scooped Tate up in her arms, kissing him on the cheek. “Don’t ever do that again. You want to put Mommy into an early grave?” she scolded. Jeremiah and I stood to join her. As my eyes found the woman’s face, she looked familiar.

“Harley! It’s me, Cassidy Isaacs. From high school.”

“Cassidy,” I spoke aloud, as it finally clicked.

“How are you doing?” she asked. “What are you doing home? Do you live here now? I thought you lived in New York, or Texas, or somewhere. I can’t keep track of you.”

“I’m good. I’m just here for a little while. How about yourself? What are you up to these days?” I inquired, as socially expected.

“This is what I’ve been up to,” she referred to Tate. “We came from lunch, Jeremiah wanted to show Tate that car.” She nodded in Charlene’s direction. I finally had her all fixed up, shiny red topcoat, black racing stripes, and black leather interior. She was hot, absolutely smoking. My once primer gray, homely Charlene matured into a fully functional, sleek, sexy, running machine, sure to make many a young man purr.

“It looks good, Harley. She’s pretty bitchin’,” Jeremiah said, his hands covering Tate’s ears.

“Oh, that’s your car? That old gray one you drove senior year?” Cassidy asked. “No wonder you were so nosey about that car.” She swatted Jeremiah lightly. “How did Tate get away from you?”

“He’s quick. I turned my head for a second and he was gone,” Jeremiah explained.

“You turned your head for a second, huh? Some things never change.” She smiled. “We better get going. Good seeing you, Harley.”

“You too.”

“Bye, Harwey,” Tate said, waving his hand, as Cassidy walked away with him, he looked over her shoulder.

“See you later, Tate.” I waved.

Jeremiah lagged behind. “How long you in town for?”

“I’m not sure.”

“I heard your mom left.” He scuffed his shoe in the gravel, intermittently looking from me to the ground. “I figured you’d surface.”

“Jeremiah, you coming?” Cassidy yelled to him from up the street.

“In a minute,” he answered, returning to me. He handed me a card with his name on it and an address on the back. “I rent my dad’s place out, so I live in town now,” he explained. “If you need anything...anything, you know where to find me. It’s good seeing you.” The sunlight caught his beautiful browns, accompanied by his long, curly, captivating lashes.

“You too,” I returned his sentiment, our bodies leaning as far toward one another as humanly possible while standing erect, neither of us committing to a hug.

He turned and walked away, looking back at me over his shoulder a few times, I watched him fade into the distance. I spun around, heading back to the garage, and there they stood, Ricky, Mark, and Pete, all of them, leaning up against the bay, watching like hawks.

“You guys are nothing but a bunch of gossips!” I giggled. “Worse than the women down at the beauty salon.”

“Who needs TV, when we have
The Days of Our Lives
right here on Main Street?” Ricky bantered.

“Ha, ha, ha,” I mocked, less than enthused, returning to my work, on the Jeep.

“Don’t you want to know the scoop?” Mark teased, as they crowded around me. I did want to know the scoop. I wanted to know all of it, every juicy detail, but I wasn’t going to let them know that.

“Quit taunting her,” Pete said. “There is no scoop. She’s been trying to find a father for that kid ever since she lost her husband, and I believe your boy is her primary target.”

Oh, thank God!
I exclaimed to myself, relieved Jeremiah was not Tate’s father. I couldn’t imagine him the father of anybody’s child, except...
Whoa!
I almost finished that sentence. “He’s not my boy. He’s a grown man, fully capable of making his own decisions,” I defended. “It doesn’t surprise me he’s following around after her. He did the same thing in high school.”

“Do I sense some contention in your voice?” Ricky rattled my chain.

“I believe you do. Sure sounded like contention to me.” Mark smiled delightedly.

“You guys really shouldn’t say words you can’t spell,” Pete chimed in. We laughed. Much to my surprise, it was nice to be back at Benny’s with the guys. “Get back to work, both of ya,” Pete said. Mark and Ricky obliged.

“Contention...C-U-N,” Mark started spelling the word.

“Whoa, you better stop right there. I don’t think you want to finish that one,” Ricky warned. “It starts with C-O-N, anyway. Pete, where’d you find this guy, eh?” I shook my head, smiling, my mind returning to Jeremiah and Cassidy, and our high school prom.

Our first prom, junior year, Jeremiah took Cassidy. I reluctantly agreed to go at all. I went with Danny, a kid from the neighborhood, one of the guys I played football with. Mom and Kat helped me get ready. I prepared in my bathrobe, curlers in my hair, when Jeremiah called in a panic. He couldn’t get his tie right, his dad wasn’t home, and he had to pick up Cassidy in fifteen minutes. Luckily, I tied Gramps’ tie often as a kid, a special thing we shared. I hopped in the old flatbed Ford and headed down the road.

“Miah,” I called, walking through the front door.

“I’m up here.” I made my way to the upstairs bathroom, the one with the claw foot tub. There he was, stuffing himself into a monkey suit. I giggled, and marveled, at his discomfort. He looked so handsome. “I can’t get this top button to close,” he muttered.

“Well, that’s because your neck’s too big. You’ve been doing too many shoulder shrugs in the weight room,” I dismissed. Going to him, I lined the buttons up, and put the tie on over the shirt without buttoning them. “See, you don’t have to button them. You just put the tie on over it. It looks kind of cool that way, a little more casual.”

“Where’d you learn that?”

“Where do you think?”

“Kit-Kat,” he said knowingly. “Hey, nice rollers,” he commented on my hair, smiling.

I smiled back, playfully countering by tightening my grip on his tie as I finished.

“How do you get the knot to look like that? Mine was all twisted.”

“It’s all about the tighten, and the dimple at the end. Gramps used to say anybody can tie a tie, but it’s how you finish that matters, that extra little touch. You see?” I showed him in the mirror. “Besides, you’re just nervous. You like this girl that much?”

“Aw, yeah. That looks really good,” he said, checking out the tie. “I guess I am a little nervous. I’ve never been out with her before. She seems a little high maintenance, but she’s gorgeous and a cheerleader.”

“Okay then, do you have a corsage and a boutonniere? You have to have flowers for girls when you take them out, especially high maintenance ones. You didn’t happen to pick up any jewelry did you?” I grinned at him.

“I think that’s what Dad left on the kitchen table this morning, something that goes on her wrist, and a thing that matches for my tux. I didn’t know I had to have jewelry for prom.” He looked at me, worried.

“Miah.” I rolled my eyes and swatted him. “I was joking about the jewelry. Speaking of, what about cufflinks?”

He dug through his father’s drawer in the dresser beside the sink. “Here, which ones should I wear?”

“Let’s do the black with gold trim,” I said, placing them inside the buttonholes at his wrist. “I’d think you would be used to dating gorgeous cheerleaders by now. I’ve never seen you date any other kind of girl.”

“Dad says girls, women, will make me nervous the rest of my life, so I better get used to it.”

“Just remember to offer her your arm, or put your hand in the small of her back when you’re escorting her, don’t just push through the crowd and leave her walking behind. Girls like it when guys are attentive to them,” I coached. “And if it gets chilly, give her your jacket. Put it around her shoulders nice and gentle. You know, be chivalrous.”

“Do you think Danny will know to do all that stuff?” he asked, grinning.

“Have you seen our friend Danny? He might be gentle, as an ox! I’ll be lucky to come home with both feet intact after dancing with him.” We laughed.

“So, what do you think?” He stood before me, simply the cutest thing.

“You look like a regular Dapper Don, my friend. Very handsome.”

He pulled me to him, hugging me. “Thanks, Harley-girl.”

I hugged him quickly, pulling away. “Now, you’re going to wrinkle your tux.” I shooed him out of the bathroom and down the stairs.

“You save me a dance?” he asked stopping at the front door.

Later that night at prom, we wound down from dancing to
This Is How We Do It
by Montell Jordan. Danny took a seat at the table, needing a breather, and Cassidy went to the bathroom to powder her nose for the tenth time. She didn’t dance much, except for the slow songs. The gymnasium was hot as a sauna, and she didn’t want to mess her hair up. I drank a bottle of water by the refreshment table as fast as I could get it down, fanning myself with my hand as Jeremiah approached. I hadn’t seen him all night except from across the room. I got the feeling Cassidy didn’t appreciate our friendship, so I stayed away.

He gave me the pocket square from his tux, which I used to wipe the dampness off my face and neck. I turned to hand it back to him, realizing I just wiped my nasty sweat all over it, thinking maybe I should throw it away. He took it without a second thought, and crammed it back in his pocket. I guess all those years of sharing each other’s t-shirt tails, to wipe our sweaty faces while playing football, had broken him in.

“You want to dance?” he asked, as the DJ played
Secret Garden
by Bruce Springsteen,
The Boss,
as we affectionately referred to him. I loved that song. I felt like he wrote it about me. Me and every other sixteen-year-old girl, right? I took his hand, following him to the dance floor as the song played. Jeremiah put his arms around my waist, leaving a space between, that space the chaperones, mostly teachers and parents, preferred all patrons of the dance maintain. I put my arms around his shoulders. “You having a good time?”

“A great time,” I said.

“I see your feet are still there.” He looked down at my shoes, returning my quiet laughter with his own. “You look really pretty.” He pulled me tighter to him.

The side of his face rested on mine, as he sang the words of the song, his voice warm and low in my ear. It felt like the room was spinning as my eyes caught the turning of the disco ball in the center of the gymnasium. Jeremiah’s arms around me, his body heat radiating, I felt light and warm, like when the summer sun beams down on you, heating you to your core. My eyes closed momentarily, opening to find Cassidy and Danny standing on the sidelines, watching us.