Beauty and the Mustache (20 page)

“
Because I like you,” she
said, “and I don’t want anything from you.”

―
Ray
Bradbury,
Fahrenheit 451

The next morning
I awoke to the sound of voices. Actually, just
once voice.

It was Drew’s.

This was surprising
because we had not parted on friendly terms when he’d dropped me
off the night before.

The drive home was silent.
I jumped out of his truck as soon as he slowed enough for it to be
safe. I heard him curse just before I shut the passenger door. He
had walked me to the porch despite my chilly disregard of him, and
I’d slammed the front door in his face.

Presently it sounded like
he was reading aloud. His voice was low, even, soft, and very, very
near. I opened my eyes and glanced around the den from beneath my
half-closed lids. He was sitting with his back to me in a wooden
chair, and my mother was turned slightly toward him.

The first thing I noticed
was that he was wearing his exercise clothes. His back was damp
with sweat. The second thing I noticed was the passage he was
reading. It was one of my favorites from Elizabeth Gaskell’s very
romantic novel
North and South
in which Mr. Thornton—dashing and desirable, yet
scorned by the uppity Ms. Hale—makes his proposal. Miss Hale
believes, quite pridefully and wrongly, that he makes the offer of
marriage only because he is honor bound to do so. Therefore, Miss
Hale rejects the dreamy Mr. Thornton.

“‘
I do not want to be
relieved from any obligation,’ said he, goaded by her calm manner.
‘Fancied, or not fancied—I question not myself to know which—I
choose to believe that I owe my very life to you—ay—smile, and
think it an exaggeration if you will. I believe it, because it adds
a value to that life to think—oh, Miss Hale!’ continued he,
lowering his voice to such a tender intensity of passion that she
shivered and trembled before him….”

Stupid Miss Hale.

Why are heroines in
romantic novels—despite their cleanliness and enviable
lifestyles—so unlikeable? It’s like they’ve been hit with a vanilla
ninny stick, devoid of personality and blind to the gift before
them. They’re doomed to wander in ignorance until the last thirty
pages of the book. By then I’m usually actively rooting against a
happy ending because the fantastical fictional men deserve
better.

This is true for
ninety-eight percent of romance novels, with notable exceptions
being Jane Austen’s heroines Elizabeth Bennett and Anne
Elliot.

In real life, it’s the
other way around.

Men are so clueless,
self-centered, and undeserving, each a bland replica of the other.
They’re motivated by sex, sports, hunting, cars, and food. If they
can’t screw it, cheer for it, shoot it, drive it, or consume it,
then it might as well be a diva cup or a maxi pad.

I closed my eyes and
concentrated on the sound of his voice because despite my mixed and
uncategorized feelings about him, Drew was coming to the best
part.

“
She did not speak; she
did not move. The tears of wounded pride fell hot and fast. He
waited awhile, longing for her to say something, even a taunt, to
which he might reply. But she was silent. He took up his hat. ‘One
word more. You look as if you thought it tainted you to be…to
be….’” Drew stumbled over the passage then paused.

I opened my eyes in time
to see his shoulders rise and fall with a deep breath. When he
continued, his voice was more subdued, almost sad. “‘You look as if
you thought it tainted you to be loved by me. You cannot avoid it.
Nay, I, if I would, cannot cleanse you from it. But I would not, if
I could. I have never loved any woman before: my life has been too
busy, my thoughts too much absorbed with other things. Now I love,
and will love. But do not be afraid of too much expression on my
part….’”

He stopped reading, and I
got the impression in the stretching silence that he would not
continue.

My eyes were drawn to movement on the bed
where my mother lay. She lifted her hand and set it on his knee. I
saw that her eyes were still closed as though she slept, and I
strained to hear the words she spoke.

“
You read very well,
Andrew. Very nice.” Her words were slurred, and this made my eyes
sting. Her words had been slurred and slow for the past few days, a
byproduct of the morphine.

“
Thank you, Bethany.” He
covered her hand with his, and I frowned at the familiarity of the
gesture.

“
Where have you been?” she
asked.

I could see his
hesitation; it was a tangible thing, a struggle. At last, he said,
“I know I haven’t been around much.” My heart twisted a little when
I heard the compassion in his voice. “How are you
feeling?”

“
Oh, not so bad. How’re
you?”

“
I’m…well.”

“
How long have you been
here?”

“
About a
half-hour.”

I frowned at the entire
exchange. My mother didn’t seem at all surprised that Drew—Andrew
as she called him—had taken it upon himself to read her awake after
entering the house and positioning himself in the room she shared
with her daughter.

Something was amiss. Rather, I was missing
something.

“
Is Ashley awake?” Momma
asked.

I quickly closed my eyes,
endeavored for complete motionless, and heard his chair creak as he
shifted his weight.

After a few beats he said,
“I don’t think so. She hasn’t moved since I came in.”

The chair creaked again,
presumably when he turned back to my mother.

There was a trace of
amusement in her voice when she next spoke. “And what do you think
of my Ashley?”

I stopped breathing, all
my muscles tensed, and I became absorbed in my own stillness. He
didn’t respond right away, but his chair creaked again.

I tried to imagine his expression. If our
previous encounters were any indication, his face was likely
screwed up in distaste.

“
I’ve
known you for three years. In all that time you failed to mention
that Ash
was short for Ashley.” His
tone held a mild accusation.

“
I didn’t, did I?” Momma
sounded pleased with herself. “Does the fact that she’s my daughter
and not my son make her any less remarkable? Is she less worthy of
your friendship because she is a woman?”

“
Hard to miss that’s she’s
a woman, now that I’ve seen her.”

At this Momma barked a
subdued laugh. “Yes…yes, she is a woman. I’m afraid she’s not much
of a girl, though. She’s been a woman more than half her life. Like
you, she grew up fast.”

Drew remained silent, and
I heard my mom say, “Oh, you can speak freely. If she’s asleep, no
amount of us talking is going to wake her up. She’s a solid
sleeper, always has been.”

“
Not that solid. The first
time I had the pleasure of meeting her, I’d just unknowingly woken
her up.”

“
Ah, yes. Jethro told me
about that. She gave you a nipple squeeze?”

Drew grumbled something
and Momma laughed. “You’re not starting any engines now, so tell
me—what do you think of Ash?”

I felt him falter, then he
surprised the voodoo out of me by saying, “She is… remarkable…and
beautiful.”

Pretty face, nice piece of
ass.

I ground my teeth together.

“
Yes. She is. She is
tremendously beautiful, like her daddy is beautiful. Billy has it
too, and Roscoe to an extent. I know you don’t like it when I talk
about Darrell—Ashley hates him the same as you—but she’s got the
look of him, whether she wants it or not.”

“
If that’s the case, I
think I understand a bit better now how Christine could fall for
Darrell so hard after knowing him for such a short time.” He said
this very softly like he was talking to himself.

What the what?

“
Do you now?” Momma asked.
I recognized the tone she used. She’d use it on me when she felt
I’d discovered something obvious, or when she wanted to encourage
me in a particular direction.

“
Yes. I do,” Drew said.
“And it’s not very convenient either.”

My mother snorted. “Lord,
getting stupid for someone never is convenient. Your sister fell
for Darrell, same as me, same as the others. You got stupid for
that gold digger you told me about. She had the long game and
played you for years before making her move. You must’ve
been
real
stupid
for her. Nothing makes smart people more stupid than
beauty.”

I heard the smile in
Drew’s voice when he responded. “Being stupid is not an experience
I’d like to repeat.”

Momma was silent for a
long moment. “Now, you know better than that. You know you’re not
the only person to get burned in the history of humanity. If you
don’t want to repeat that experience, then don’t repeat it. This
time, get stupid for more than beauty. Get stupid for worth, with
someone like my Ash.”

What the WHAT?

Is this how Drew knew my
family? Because his sister Christine had been conned by my father?
And when had Christine fallen for my father’s line? And where was
Christine? And when did Drew meet my mother and my brothers? And
who was this gold digger? And why was Momma talking to Drew like he
was her most trusted friend?

I had mixed feelings about
overhearing this conversation. The angel on my shoulder wanted to
put an end to it; the devil on my other shoulder wanted to keep on
listening. I knew so little about Drew. Asking my brothers about
him was pointless unless I wanted to know how good of a shot he was
or what kind of car he drove.

Despite my good
intentions, the devil won.

Drew sighed.
“Bethany….”

She cut him off. “No, you
listen. I’m not proposing anything. I’m just using Ashley as an
example. She’s got so much worth. She’s priceless, and she’s
beautiful. You said it yourself. Though she does her best to hide
it, I think. Some people reject their God-given gifts because
society makes them feel ashamed when they shine.”

“
Why did you lie to me?”
He didn’t sound angry. He sounded curious. “Why pretend like Ash
was a man?”

“
I didn’t lie…not exactly.
I just…didn’t correct your assumptions. I liked talking about her
to someone who knew what her courage meant, what it meant for her
to escape on her own, to want something better, to work for it and
succeed. You admired her when I let you think she was a man; I
don’t see why that should change now.”

“
It hasn’t.” He said this
begrudgingly. Even I could hear the resentment in his
voice.

“
How inconvenient for
you.” She said this on a laugh. “Must be hard for a guy like you to
admire a woman for her brains and goodness before you get a chance
to disregard her because of her gender and beauty.”

“
That’s not true.” His
voice had a hard edge to it. “I admire plenty of women. I admire
you.”

“
And you think of me as a
replacement for the mother you never had, and for the sister you
lost.” I couldn’t believe how she was speaking to him. I couldn’t
believe that he let her. “I know you, Andrew. I know your family
treated you despicably. You don’t want to get hurt. I understand
that—maybe I understand better than most people do. But not all
good-looking women are gold-digging opportunists.”

“
I know that.”

“
You know what I think? I
think you like her.”

Drew made a funny sound:
not a rejection of her statement, but not a confirmation
either.

She continued, “You do!
You like her. You admit she’s lovely. You admit you admire her.
Admit you like my Ash.”

“
I’m not admitting
anything.”

“
Why not?”

“
Because you’re her
mother, not my sister.”

“
So?”

“
So, other than her
goodness, sweetness, gracefulness, and wit, what I like about
Ashley Winston shouldn’t be discussed with Ashley Winston’s
mother.”

If I hadn’t already been
as still as I statue, his words, so earnestly spoken, would have
stunned me. Did he really see these things in me? Or was he just
being kind to my mother?

“
Oh,
this sounds good. Now I
really
want to know,” Momma
said.

“
Trust me, you
don’t.”

“
Are you
falling for my Ashley?” Momma
tsked
. “What did she do, outsmart
you?”

“
Something like
that.”

It took all my stillness
superpowers not to sit up in the bed and yell,
WHAT the WHAT?
My brain was
overflowing with new and confusing information.

“
How’d we get on this
subject?” He sounded truly mystified and a little
annoyed.

“
I’m trying to make you
see reason before I depart this earth and leave you bereft of
motherly wisdom. And I’m trying to do the same for all my
chickens….”