Welcome, Caller, This Is Chloe (22 page)

Whack
. “No.”
Whack
. “I stopped by Minnie’s Place this
afternoon, and they told me your grandmother moved out. I figured she’d want her swing.”

“And of course you stopped by Minnie’s Place to see if they had some toasters that needed to be fixed.”

Whack
. “No, I stopped by Minnie’s Place because Clem told me to.”

“Clementine? What does
she
have to do with anything?”

Whack. Whack. Whack
. A line of sweat trickled along the dark waves of his rumpled hair. “Clem—hell, the whole radio staff-told me to stop being a first-class jerk.”

A nice, non-dragon-like heat settled over me. My radio family was in my corner.

Still avoiding my gaze, Duncan put down the hammer and picked up a screwdriver and a handful of screws. One by one he twisted the screws into place. With the last one in, he tugged and yanked at the joints. “Clem told me I needed to talk to your grandmother.” He hoisted the swing on his shoulder. His shirt came untucked, showing a sliver of hard, strained back muscle. “About you. About us.” The swing wobbled, dipped, and almost crashed to the floor.

Part of me wanted to stay away, to watch him sweat and strain under this heavy load, but I couldn’t. When someone needed help, I was there.

I crossed the porch and steadied the swing. Duncan didn’t push me away. “Did you talk to Grams?” I asked.

He hooked one chain to the armrest, the line dividing his forehead. “Yes.”

“And?”

His entire face, not just his forehead, folded in a frown. “She told me to get you a pair of size seven red platform shoes with laces and a tassel, preferably in the original 1940s box.”

I laughed. I knew Grams, and she knew me. She also must have figured out that Duncan wasn’t good at the whole people thing. Or talking thing. “Did you find the shoes?” I asked, keeping my tone flat, almost uninterested.

Duncan went to the other side of the swing and hooked on the other chain, his face serious. “No, but Rhonda, who runs the shoe department at the thrift store, is keeping her eyes open for me.” He tugged on the chains and turned to me. “This stuff is hard for me.”

When he didn’t elaborate, I prompted, “Stuff?”

“You. Me.” He shoved the hammer and screwdriver into his toolbox. “This week I got some stuff settled with my mom—good stuff. She’s away from Stu and at home, and with that out of the way I’ve been thinking about you.” His cheeks flushed. “A lot.” Another long silence settled over us as he rearranged his tools.

Quiet. Must. Keep. Quiet.

He clicked close the toolbox lid, cupped his hands around the back of his neck, and looked at me. “I’m not like other guys. I don’t have the luxury of taking girls out on dates. I work all the time, and even then I don’t have enough money to take you to a movie or even to a beach fair. Hell, Chloe, I don’t have a stupid
TV, so I can’t ask you over to watch one of Haley’s DVDs. Plus I’m not good with people. With relationships. With words. I have a hard time saying what I mean.” His shoulders bunched, then fell. “I guess what I’m trying to say is I’d make a crappy boyfriend.”

A little part of my heart softened. Duncan cared. And while I wanted to grin like the ceramic squirrel and throw myself into his arms, I needed to ask the question. “What about the girl on the beach? You seemed to be getting along just fine with her.”

“It’s a long story.”

I crossed my arms over my chest.

He unclenched his hands from his neck and tugged on the swing chains again and again. Mom would be thrilled with his triple safety check. “Okay. I was with her that night because she needed someone, anyone, to hold her and help her deal with some . . . some bad stuff.”

“But you won’t tell me the whole story?”

A shadow crossed his face. “It’s not my story to tell.”

I threw my hands in the air. “Aaaaargh!”

A surprised Duncan reached for me, but I sidestepped his hand and positioned myself behind the squirrel.

“What is it? What did I do?” he asked.

“It’s what you’re not doing. You’re not telling me how you
feel
.”

“Feel?”

“About
her
?”

He looked at me as if I were a talking squirrel. “I don’t have
any feelings for her. Well, maybe concerned and kind of obligated.” He shucked a hand through his hair. “Nothing like what I feel for you.”

I grabbed the porch railing to steady myself. “What did you just say?”

“About what?”

This should not be so difficult. Deep breath in. Deep breath out. “Dunc, do you like me?”

“More than any girl I’ve ever met.” The words were so fast and unfiltered, I knew they came straight from his heart. I also knew Duncan was a guy with baggage.

But he had broad shoulders
.

He had serious communication issues.

But he was here at least trying to talk
.

Duncan’s watch beeped, and I bit back a groan.

He also had two jobs and no time for fun. No time for me.

He jabbed at his watch until it stopped beeping and rolled his head along his shoulders. “I need to go to work,” he said, the words dull and heavy.

“I know.”

“But I don’t want to.”

The porch door flew open, and Grams waved us over. “Get inside, Dunc. Got us some hot potatoes. And after you eat, I need you to hang those shelves and move the bookcase. The movers put it in the wrong place. And I need you to check the washing machine. I’m not sure they hooked it up right. I sure as hell don’t want another flood.”

I almost snorted at Grams’s sudden neediness. If I didn’t adore her so much, I’d call her a master manipulator.

“I’d have to call the thrift store and tell them I’ll be late,” Duncan said, fiddling with the strap on his watch.

“I’m sure the toasters won’t be too upset,” I added with a smile. Duncan was confused and confusing to talk to, but he was still nice, the kind of guy who’d be late for work just to help out my eighty-two-year-old grandmother.

“Get your heinies in gear,” Grams said. “We have a lot of work to do.”

Relief washed over Duncan’s face at the word
work
. He ushered me into the Tuna Can, where we ate twice-baked potatoes and worked side by side, neither of us mentioning stuff or feelings or relationships as we tackled Grams’s ever-growing fix-it list. He stayed long past dark until another beep sounded.

We were alphabetizing Grams’s DVD collection—seriously, Grams would make the best evil villainess if she ever chose to switch to the dark side—when I pulled my phone from my purse and frowned at the display.

“What’s wrong?” Dunc asked.

“I don’t recognize the number, but it’s flagged
Urgent.”
I showed him the display.

Duncan sighed. “I know who it is.”

URGENT

Come home. Now!

Hetta

I HEARD THE MUSIC WELL BEFORE DUNCAN AND I PULLED INTO
the duplex driveway. Loud and metallic, it cut the night and pulsed from Duncan’s house, which was ablaze with light and filled with people.

“She promised,” Duncan said on a half whisper. “And I believed her.” He glowered at an old Chevy Camaro parked in the driveway next to Hetta’s Oldsmobile. “She’s partying again. That’s Stu’s car.”

“Stu. That would be Mr. Loser-User-and-Abuser? I thought she left him, that everything was good.”

“This morning when I left for school, it was.” The words came out in a growl. “But this is how things work with Mom. She makes promises and gets clean. Sometimes she goes for days, sometimes weeks or months, but it never lasts. She always goes back to him. To it.”

“It?” I forced myself to ask.

“Meth.” The single word came from a dark, ugly place Duncan clearly despised. His wide shoulders trembled.

I settled my hand on his knee. “I’m sorry, Duncan.” Sorry he didn’t have a cell phone gallery full of happy family pictures. Sorry he didn’t have any brothers to teach him to play Garbage Games. Sorry he didn’t have a grandma to make him twice-baked potatoes.

He slipped his hand over mine. “Me, too.” His jaw tightened as his gaze moved to the house.

“What are you going to do?”

“Depends.”

“On?”

“On how far she’s cranked.” He let go of my hand and reached for the door handle. “Why don’t you stay here?”

“Why don’t I not?”

“Sometimes it’s . . . uh . . . not very nice. Stu can get pretty ugly.”

“All the more reason for you not to go alone.”

I watched the battle in his head. He wanted me with him, but he didn’t want me exposed to this “not nice” world. But he didn’t have a choice. With a queenly tilt of my head, I got out of the car.

Despite the chilly night, the air inside the duplex was hot and steamy and smelled of too many bodies and a strange, tangy smoke. The heavy metal music shook the walls.

Duncan tucked me under his arm as we weaved through the bodies in the kitchen toward the living room, where a thin woman
with dark hair and huge gray eyes called out, “Dunkeroo!” She flapped her arms like an agitated sparrow.

“She’s gone,” Duncan said between clenched teeth. “There’s no use talking to her tonight.”

His mom flittered toward us with open arms, her hands gesturing wildly. “Hey, folks, this is my son, Dunkeroo.”

Duncan hauled me down a short hall. “Let me get my stuff.”

His mom followed, digging her birdlike hand into his arm. “Aren’t you happy to see me?”

In this heat, Duncan had taken the scarf from his neck, and I saw his pulse quicken. “You promised. You promised this time you’d stay away from him, that you’d stay clean. For me.”

She looked at him with a perplexed frown, then she laughed, a high-pitched cackle that hurt my ears. Her hands fluttered, and an angry, red hole in her forearm oozed a foul-smelling yellow pus. “But it’s all for you, Dunkeroo. Everything’s for you. Whatever you want, it’s yours. We can do anything. Absolutely anything. Stu and I rule the world.”

A man in tight blue jeans and a silky shirt open to the waist slung an arm around Duncan’s mom. Slime. The guy was pure slime. Slicked-back hair, practiced smile, and unlike most people in the room, he had a clear, steady gaze. “Hey, son,” he said.

“I’m not your son.” Duncan’s mouth barely moved. “My last name sure as hell isn’t Drug-Dealing-Scum.”

The petite gray-eyed woman on Stu’s arm hurtled her body at Duncan, her bony hands pummeled him, one flailing fist after
another, like a windmill. “You will not talk to Stu that way. Not now. Not ever!” Her hand connected with Duncan’s mouth, and blood spurted from his lip. The blood oozed down Duncan’s chin, a single drop falling to the floor.

Dizziness grabbed me, but I didn’t let it take hold.

He wiped the trickle of blood from his mouth. Without a word, he guided me into a small bedroom with a mattress on the floor and a bookshelf that served as a dresser. He moved quickly, tossing clothes into a small garbage can next to his bed. He ducked into the hallway and came back with a toothbrush and other toiletries, which he tossed into the trash can. My heart twisted as I realized this wasn’t the first time Duncan Moore packed his things in a garbage can to leave his mom and this place.

He hoisted the trash can under one arm. With his free hand, he took mine and dragged me out of the room past the crush of bodies and his wild-eyed mom. In the kitchen I stumbled to a halt when I saw the girl from the beach, the one Duncan had held in his arms. There was nothing frail or mouselike about her tonight. She danced on one of the chairs, her hands pumping above her, her lanky hair flailing wildly.

“She’s gone, too.” Dunc dragged me out of the room so fast faces and bodies blurred.

In the driveway we slowed enough for me to spot Hetta, his cabbage-scented neighbor. “I’m going to have to call the cops,” she said. “I told you last time, no more.”

Duncan waved at the old woman. “Do what you need to do, Hetta. When she clears out, you know where to find me.”

Duncan tucked me into the passenger seat of my car and took the keys. It was only then I realized my knees were shaking so much they knocked together. Duncan was right. That hadn’t been nice. Is this what Duncan had to live with every day of his life? No wonder he thought the radio station was fun. No wonder he didn’t get close to people. People close to him kept letting him down. Just this morning Dunc’s mom had promised to stop partying.

Duncan drove from the duplex, and I quieted my booming heart so I could hear myself think. He needed a place to go, somewhere far from those people. “If you want, you can stay at my house. We have tons of room, and I’m sure my parents wouldn’t mind after they heard about the circumstances.”

Duncan shook his head. “It’s okay. I have a place.”

“Are you sure that will hold you?” I asked as Duncan unfolded an old, rickety nurse’s cot in the corner of the KDRS storeroom.

An hour ago he’d been helping me alphabetize Brad Pitt movies. Now he was escaping his meth-addict mother and her drug-dealing boyfriend and sleeping in a storeroom.