The "What If" Guy (3 page)

Elliott’s eyes shifted to mine in horror. “Mom?”

I grasped his wiry shoulders, and squeezed. “He’s kidding.”

My dad’s scoff made me bristle. “Don’t be a wimp. Shovel ’er up, and I’ll mount ’er on my wall.”

“Shut up, dammit.” I led Elliott to the passenger side of my car. “Just sit in the car. He’s kidding.”

“It’s not funny.” Elliott jerked open the door, then flopped into the seat.

“I know.”

He glared at my father. “Why does he keep calling me ’kid’? I have a name.”

“He knows it, hon.”

“I hate him.”

My shoulders slumped. I didn’t want my son to hate his grandfather. “You don’t hate him.”

“Well… I don’t like him.”

I cast a sharp glance at my dad. “I don’t like him very much right now, either.”

Apparently, I needed to lay down a few more
rules. “Dad?”

“Oh, lighten up.” He lit another smoke and watched me from the corner of his eye. “I was just messin’ with Elliott. He needs it. He’s so—”

My jaw clenched. “Just because he’s not like you—”

“It’s good for him. He’s been raised by his mother. Hasn’t had a man in his life to teach him how to be.”

“How to be?”

He shrugged. “You know…manly.”

I shook my head, aggravation boiling my blood. “He’s twelve. Why the need to make him manly?”

“His dad’s never been around, and you never took up with anyone else. It would have been good for him to have a man in his life.” He took a long drag and squinted at me.

I’d said those very same words to myself at least seven thousand
times over the past twelve years.

Once Elliott’s father, Cliff, had left, I’d raised my standards to an almost unreachable level that no man lived up to. I’d used poor judgment with Cliff, and vowed not to do that again.

I’d been attending art school when we met. He was a bartender at a club that my friends and I snuck into using fake IDs. Cliff and I had a short-lived fling that ended as quickly as it began. I moved on and met someone special—fell for him—only to find out a couple of months later that I was pregnant with Cliff’s child.

Away from my hometown for the first time in my life and determined to become an artist, I was proud that I’d left Fairfield. I
had gotten out of that small town. I
was going places. I
wouldn’t go back home in shame.

Cliff did the honorable thing and offered to marry me. Regrettably, I accepted.

If I had to face my father, knocked up, at least I’d have a fiancé on my arm. So what if we lived in Cliff’s grandmother’s basement and his car had been repossessed? I was going to make our relationship work.

I didn’t.

I was eight months pregnant when Cliff left—without fanfare. One night, he called from his shift at the fourth job he’d had since we’d met. When I asked what time he’d be home, he said, “I won’t. This family thing just isn’t for me.”

And that was that. Cliff was long gone, and his grandmother asked me to move out. Too ashamed to go back to Fairfield with a giant belly and no husband, I quit school and started working as a waitress to pay the bills.

Five weeks later, Elliott was born. My son was everything to me. One look into his deep brown eyes, and I fell for him. We took on the world—together.

“I take it you disagree, Auto?”

My dad’s voice interrupted my thoughts and I faced him. Elliott was creative and musical, two things my father couldn’t relate to. El probably did seem weird
to him. But that didn’t have anything to do with my needing a man.

“I don’t want to discuss this,” I said.

I was on the side of a road with a dead coyote and a car full of our meager possessions. I’d lost so much that was important to me, and was trying to forge a relationship with the father I’d all but abandoned. Talking with him about my need for a man wasn’t the place to start.

My father walked back to his rusty car, tossing his cigarette butt on the pavement. “I’ll tell you what, you can cook me a roast tonight, instead of coyote.” He smirked, then sat behind the wheel with a groan.

I watched him drive away, and fingered several wrinkled twenties in my pocket. The last of my money. Now, after my lovely morning, I had to go into Fisk’s Fine Foods to face Ramona.

Great. That’s just great.

I hoped their chocolate selection was good. And cheap.

Chapter Two

“Oh my gosh, Autumn Cole? Is that you?”

I knew that voice, even though I hadn’t heard it in fourteen years. The hair on the back of my neck stood at attention.

The last time I’d seen Holly Momsen was on the day I’d left Fairfield for college.

We’d known each other since preschool, and in every photograph I had of my birthday parties, Holly stood next to me with a grin. In my high school dance portraits we smiled, arm-in-arm, complete with bad hair, puffy-sleeved dresses, and pimple-faced dates.

After graduation, Holly had stayed in Fairfield to marry her long-time boyfriend, Cody Judd, and I’d headed to Seattle for bigger and better things. She’d helped me pack my possessions into the back of my light blue Chevelle, then we’d hugged and cried and vowed to stay in touch. For the first few months, we’d written each other religiously. She’d described her wedding plans, and I’d told her about the teacher’s aide who’d asked me out—the most amazing man I’d ever met. We’d tried to share everything, so we didn’t feel like we were hundreds of miles apart.

And then I’d found out I was pregnant. After that, all of Holly’s letters had gone unanswered.

When she’d left a message on my answering machine asking me to be her maid-of-honor, I’d ignored it. When the wedding invitation came in the mail, I’d thrown it in the garbage. Holly was the closest friend I’d had, and I’d dropped her like a box of rocks. Not because I didn’t like her anymore, but because I’d no longer liked myself.

I turned slowly to face Holly, and it dawned on me how awful I looked. Wearing battered yoga pants and an oversized sweatshirt, I smelled like exhaust fumes and cigarette smoke from riding in my father’s car. To top it off, I was shopping with a pissed-off twelve-year-old vegetarian who couldn’t find meatless patties among Fisk’s limited selection, and I barely had enough money for the candy bar I craved.

“Holly? Oh my gosh, how
are
you?” My voice squeaked, and I tossed several boxes of cereal into my cart, trying to appear casual. “It’s good to see you.”

Holly approached me, a happy, drooling baby sitting in the front of her cart. She looked every bit as adorable as she’d looked in high school. Short and waif-like, her honey-blonde hair was now cut into a flippy bob, and the jeans she wore couldn’t have been any bigger than a size two. I instinctively sucked in my tummy.

She eyed my cart, now filled with eight boxes of cereal. “I heard you were coming back to town, but didn’t believe it.”

I tried to remain chipper, despite the mountain of awkwardness between us. “You didn’t believe it? Why’s that?”

Her smile flattened. “You
never
come back. Not even for weddings.”

I deserved that. I suck
. I set another box of cereal atop the pile in my cart. “Listen, about that… ” Blood rushed to my cheeks.

“Mom?” Elliott came around the corner carrying a stack of boxes and a few frozen meals. “They didn’t have any veggie sausage, but they had those crackers that Grandpa asked for.”

“Just toss them in the basket,” I said.

He dropped his armload into the cart and furrowed his brow. “In the mood for some cereal, Mom?”

I felt so stupid. I had Fisk’s entire stock of Cheerios in my basket, and my son had pointed out how idiotic I looked in front of the friend I’d treated horribly. Super.

“Yes. You’re starting school, so I thought I would get you some breakfast foods.” My voice sounded sharp, and I glanced at Holly, who watched me with tempered interest. “I’m constantly reminding him to eat something before he goes to school.”

“Right,” she replied. “So, this is your son? I’d heard years ago that you were pregnant and married.”

I put a couple of boxes of cereal back on the shelf. “Um, no. It’s just Elliott and me.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Holly’s gaze softened. “Divorced?”

I put my arm around Elliott and squeezed. “No. It’s always been just us.”

Holly blinked at me, then turned to Elliott. “What’s your name?”

He smiled and pushed his glasses up on his nose. “Elliott.”

“It’s very nice to meet you. I’ll bet you’re almost the same age as my oldest, Tabitha. You’re what? Ten?”

I cringed. This sort of thing always happened to El. Small for his age, he looked more like a fourth- or fifth-grader instead of the sixth-grader he was.

“I’m twelve,” he said.

“Middle school. Very cool.” Her gaze returned to me. “Is he your only one?”

I nodded and tickled the chubby baby’s chin, invoking a damp smile. “Yes. And you? You have two?”

“Lord, no. I’ve got five. The rest are outside in the minivan, watching cartoons. Thank God for the DVD player.”

Holy Moses, five kids?

“Wow, Holly, congratulations. Who is this little one?” I discreetly wiped the baby’s drool off my hand.

“This is my youngest, Ty,” Holly announced proudly. “And Thomas, Trevor, Tanner, and Tabitha are in the van. Tabitha’s your age, Elliott. She’s in sixth grade.”

What’s up with the T names
? The dusty minivan parked outside appeared to be rocking back and forth.

“That’s quite a family. And you’re still with Cody?”

She nodded, beaming. “Thirteen years and still going strong. We took over his dad’s farm a couple years ago.”

I pictured the small pea farm Cody had grown up on. “That’s great.”

“Mom,” a childlike voice called.

I peeked around Holly’s cart to see a pretty little girl with long hair the color of spun gold staring at her mother with her hands on her hips. Tabitha looked just like Holly, twenty years before. I glanced at Elliott, who’d taken notice as well, his cheeks pink.

“I’ll be there in a minute,” Holly said over her shoulder.

“Trevor pulled on my iPod cord, and now it’s broken, and Thomas is crying because he was going to borrow it for the field trip tomorrow, and I told them both to stop yelling, and so Tanner gave me a wet willy, and his breath smells like garbage.” Tabitha spouted the minivan play-by-play without taking a breath.

I stifled a giggle.

Holly closed her eyes and shook her head. “Listen, it was nice to see you. I have to be going now.” She pushed her empty cart back to the corral, picked up the baby, then offered me an apologetic shrug.

“It was good to see you, too.” I bit my lip.

I wanted to say more. To apologize for being a giant jerk. To ask her to be my friend again, because moving back home made me feel like crying. But I said nothing. I just watched as she walked toward the door with the baby screaming on her hip.

“Bye,” I called.

She glanced back at me and hesitated for a second, her hand hovering above the door handle. “Bye. Nice to meet you, Elliott.”

Elliott’s hand went up in a robotic wave, his eyes still locked on Tabitha, who followed her mother out, complaining the whole time. I nudged my son. “Got a crush?”

Casting me a dirty look, he snatched a candy bar off of a nearby rack. “No. Stop it. Can I get this?”

I sucked in a breath, mentally tallying our grocery bill. “We’re on a tight budget.”

“Then why did you put eight boxes of cereal in the cart?” He raised an eyebrow. “That lady made you nervous.”

Holly pulled her minivan into the street and drove away with a seatbelt hanging out of one of the sliding doors. “She used to be my friend. A long time ago.”

“What happened?”

I looked at my son. It’s never fun to admit to your child that you behaved badly. “I was a horrible friend.”

Elliott’s eyes grew wide. “What did you do?”

“Just get your candy bar and stop asking questions.”

I had some serious fences to mend.

§

“How can there be just one
hallway?”

Elliott looked stricken, but I tried to appear at ease.

Monday morning, we stood in the main entryway of Palouse Plains Grade and Middle School—yes, they’re combined. The school had three hallways
total
—two utilized for grade school and only one designated for sixth, seventh, and eighth grades. A row of beige lockers lined one side of the hall. Many lockers hung open, and several backpacks had been left unattended.

Elliott examined the open bags and abandoned books and binders. “Why are their bags on the floor? Doesn’t their stuff get jacked?”

“School out here is different,” I said.

The school in Seattle I’d worked so hard to send him to was very different from this single corridor that passed for a middle school. His other school featured classes in figure drawing, stringed instruments, and poetry, among the standard courses. Palouse Plains offered only the basics, with a handful of contact sports thrown in for extracurricular activities.

I led Elliott to the office, where a woman with a fuzzy beehive hairdo watched us expectantly. She looked just like Miss Price, the head secretary when I’d attended school here, years before. She grinned, her crooked teeth reminding me of a jack-o-lantern. It was nearly Halloween, and the paper streamer with black cats and candy corn hanging above her head didn’t help.

“Hello, Autumn.”

Holy crap, it
is
Miss Price.
I studied her curiously. She’d been pretty old when I’d been a student here, so she had to be in her eighties by now, if not her early hundreds. What was this woman doing to keep herself alive? Hyperbaric chambers at night?

“Miss Price,” I blurted.

“You remember me?”

“Of course I do.”

Miss Price wrung her gnarled hands. “That’s sweet, dear.”

We looked at each other for an uncomfortable moment. Her gaze bounced between mine and Elliott’s with unabashed curiosity.

“So…I’m back in town.”

“I heard.”

Of course you did.
“I need to enroll my son in school.”