Don't Make Me Beautiful (4 page)

“Don’t even try it.
 
Listen, when are you getting in again?
 
Do you need a ride?”

“I should be in late tomorrow night.
 
I’ll come get Liam around nine in the morning Sunday.
 
Thanks for the offer, but I have a ride.”

“New boyfriend?” Brian asks, hoping the answer is yes.

“No.
 
Agnes is picking me up.”

“Agnes my neighbor, right?”

“Yep.
 
The one and only.”

“She’s a lifesaver.
 
But you should get your boyfriend to pick you up.”

“I don’t want to.
 
Stop trying to question me while acting like you’re not.
 
If you want to know something just ask it.”

“Fine.
 
Do you have a boyfriend?
 
Are you dating?”

“Why?
 
Are you jealous?”
 
She’s joking.
 
They both know that’s not going to happen.

“Yeah right.
 
No, I was just thinking that it’s about time you stopped traveling all over the place for work and settled down a little.”

She pauses before responding.
 
“Are you trying to make me feel guilty, Brian?
 
Don’t you think I do enough of that to myself?”

“I’m sorry.
 
I didn’t mean it that way.
 
I just meant … never mind.
 
No matter what I say now it’s going to come out wrong.
 
Better quit while I’m ahead.”

“Don’t tell me you’ve finally learned something about women.”

“Divorce tends to make a big impression on me like that.”

“Good.
 
Better late than never.
 
Your next wife can send me a thank you card, I guess.”

“You okay?” Brian asks, sensing something in her voice beyond the playing around.

“Yeah.”
 
She sighs heavily.
 
“I’m just … frustrated I guess.
 
I’m working my ass off, doing fine at work and all … but I feel like something’s missing. Like I’m not working for something valuable, you know?”

“You do corporate law.
 
That’s valuable.”

“It’s not the same as something like environmental law or divorce law or anything.
 
What I do impacts people, but in such an abstract way it’s pretty much not even there for me.
 
Like, I don’t get that warm fuzzy feeling that what I do means something to people, changes lives, that kind of thing.
 
I wish I’d gone into another type of law.”

“You could always switch.”
 
Brian knows where this is going.
 
This is not the first time they’ve had this conversation, but he feels compelled to go through the motions with her.
 
It’s how she works things out in her own mind.

“And lose my spot at the firm?
 
No thanks.
 
Besides, I can always do that kind of thing in my off time.”

“When you have off time, that is.”

“Yeah,” she says, her voice going soft again, “when I finally have some.
 
Liam’ll probably be twenty before that happens.”

“No, come on.
 
Don’t talk like that.
 
You’re doing the best you can.”

Her tone changes abruptly.
 
“Listen, I have to go, Brian.
 
Thanks for letting me moan about work again.”

“Anytime.
 
See you Sunday?”

“Yeah.
 
Sunday at nine or so. Oh, and I’m taking a few days off, so I’ll keep him with me until Wednesday.
 
Give Li-Li a kiss for me, would ya?”

“Sure.
 
He’ll be psyched about the sleep-over.
 
You want to talk to him?”

“I can’t, I have to go.
 
The team has been in meetings until midnight all week.
 
It’s nuts.
 
Tell him to Skype me in the morning at breakfast.”

“Will do.
 
See you soon.”

“Bye.”

Brian hangs up the phone and walks down the hall to his son’s bedroom.
 
Liam is already under the covers, the Marlins’ stat book propped up on his chest.
 
Brian already knows what page Liam is reading before he bends over to check it out.

“They’re going to have to change Wilson’s stats,” Liam says.

“Yep.
 
Every game all the players’ stats change just a little.”

“But this is a big one,” says Liam, reaching over to get a pen from his nightstand.
 
He writes in the book.
 
“There.
 
It’s changed.”
 
Closing the book, he puts it down on his bedside table along with the pen.
 
“Tonight was the best ever.”
 
He smiles, revealing several grown-up teeth and a space where the next one is growing in.

“You’re right.
 
Best ever.”
 
Brian leans over and kisses his son on one cheek and then the other.
 
“One from me and one from Mom.”
 
He sits up, tucking Liam’s covers in around him.
 
“She had to go to a meeting, but she says she wants you to Skype her in the morning.
 
You’re going to do a sleep-over from Sunday to Wednesday.
 
She’s going to take you to school and everything.”

Liam grins from ear to ear.
 
“Cool.”
 
Then is expression falls.
 
“But what will you do?
 
Won’t you be lonely?”

Brian caresses his son’s cheek.
 
“Oh, I’ll make it through all right.
 
I’ll invite Hank over for some pizza and television or something, maybe take a couple long bike rides.”

“Good,” says Liam, rolling over onto his side, his eyes falling closed.
 
“Night, Daddy-o.”

“Night, baby-o.”

“I’m not a baby,” Liam says, his words getting lost in a yawn.

“You’ll always be my baby, Li-Li,” Brian says, watching as his son drifts off to sleep in seconds.

He stays there for a minute or two, looking down at his son’s angelic face.
 
So perfect when they’re asleep
.
 
Being a single dad to a kid like Liam is a lot of work, but he wouldn’t change it for the world.

He leaves his son’s room thinking about his life to date.
 
He has his job restoring furniture, his boy, his house with the kick butt workshop, and a few close friends.
 
What else does a guy need?

In the back of his mind he answers that having a woman to love and share his bed with would be a great addition, but he ignores that thought.
 
When the right girl comes along he’ll consider the idea; until then, he isn’t in any hurry to find her.
 
His life is full enough, and forcing things to happen had never worked out well for him in the past.
 
He’s convinced that destiny will connect him with the girl of his dreams - the beautiful, sexy, intelligent, strong woman he knows he’s meant to be with.
 
All he has to do is be patient, be a good dad, and wait for her to appear.

Chapter Seven

SHE’S SITTING UP ON THE couch when it happens.
 
Unable to sleep in bed or even lying down on the couch from the pain, this is the only place where her eyes will close and the pain will recede for twenty minutes at a time or so.
 
She’s caught bits and pieces of sleep here and there throughout the night and morning.
 
It’s easier once John is gone, working most of this Saturday at a side job to make up for the one he lost last week.

One minute the room is silent but for the clock ticking, and the next, the boom of shattering glass startles her out of her nap and makes her feel for a moment that she’s having a heart attack.
 
The curtains that for some reason flew up, float gently back into place.

It takes her a moment to figure out what just happened.
 
When something touches her toe, she looks down, leaning over with effort and wincing with the pain of her injured ribs.

She sees a ball.
 
White with red laces.
 
A baseball?
 
What’s a baseball doing in here?
 
Then she puts it all together.
 
Someone hit a ball through her window.
 
Panic sets in.
 
John is going to blame this on her.
 
Even though she doesn’t play baseball, she doesn’t go outside, and she hasn’t talked to a neighbor since she moved in three years ago, this will be her fault.

She stands, huffing through the pain with short, quick breaths.
 
Shuffling over to the window, she peeks around the edge of the sheer drapes.
 
There’s a large hole in one of the panes of glass.
 
On the carpet, big shards of it are mixed in with little pieces that twinkle in the light that seeps in under the curtains.

Her blood goes cold.
 
Oh my god.
 
What am I going to do?

It should be easy to manage; she knows this.
 
It’s just a broken window.
 
In her old life she would have talked to the person who did it, called the glass company, and had someone out to fix it the same day.
 
Maybe even called the insurance company to see if she had coverage.
 
But that’s not what she does now, and it’s not even a consideration.
 
Panic gets in the way of any rational thought process.
 
She can’t call a person to come over; they’ll see her and then John will
know
they saw her and she’ll pay.
 
Besides … she doesn’t even have a phone.

The sound of footsteps moving fast up her front porch comes through the now open window pane and the doorbell rings, once and then many times, over and over.
 
A small fist knocks on the door.

“Hello?!
 
Is anyone home?
 
Please!
 
I need to get my baseball back!”
 
It’s a child and he sounds panicked.
 
He’s moaning and talking to himself now.
 
It breaks her heart to think he might be worried about what he’s done.
 
He has nothing to fear from her or John.
 
He would never touch a stranger like he touches her.
 
He likes everyone, or so he lets them think.

She’s so lost in thought that she doesn’t realize the footsteps have started again but this time they’re coming towards the front window, not the front door.
 
“Will you please give me back my ball?
 
I’m really sorry.
 
My dad will be really mad at me if I don’t bring his ball back.
 
It’s special.
 
We caught it.
 
It’s a fly ball, not a regular one.”

She jumps to the side, dropping the curtains and pressing her back against the wall next to the window.
 
She’s breathing heavily, panicking like a trapped animal.

He taps on the window.
 
“I saw you in there.
 
Are you hiding?
 
Please can I have my ball?”

Realizing that he’s not going to go away until the ball is back in his hands, she tiptoes over to the coffee table and bends over to get it. The pain is so sudden, it causes her to breathe in sharply.
 
She stands upright again, immediately giving up on the idea of picking up the ball. From where she’s standing, the boy’s shadowed form is visible through the curtains.
 
He’s pressing his face up to the glass.
 
She can hear him as clear as if he’s standing right there in the room next to her, his voice coming through the broken pane.

“I’m really sorry.
 
I’ll pay you for the window.
 
I have money in my piggy bank at home.
 
Just don’t tell my dad, okay?
 
He’ll be so mad at me.”

Nicole swallows the tears that are coming.
 
The idea that this boy might suffer at the hands of a man like she does is too much to bear.
 
Not a child.
 
Children could never do anything that wrong.

She moves closer to the ball and kicks it backwards, out from behind the table.
 
Step by step, she uses her toes to maneuver it towards the front door.
 
She can’t bend over to pick it up, but she can kick the thing to the door.
 
It’s one of those rare occasions when it’s not locked.
 
John must have been in a hurry when he left.
 
Giving this boy his ball back is the least she can do to ensure his safety.
 
If she had a phone she’d even call the police for him.

The boy leaves the window and goes to the front door again, knocking once more.
 
“Are you giving me my ball back?
 
Are you in there?”

Nicole gets the ball onto the tile floor.
 
It rolls this way and that, not cooperating with her plan to get it to the boy very well.
 
“I’m coming,” she says, her voice very rusty and almost unintelligible.
 
“I’m coming,” she says again, her eye on the door.
 
He finally stops knocking.

She reaches the front door and stops, her hand hovering near the latch.
 
The fear of touching it is almost enough to make her turn away and go back to the couch.
 
Or maybe the kitchen where the little boy won’t be able to see her shadow through any curtains.
 
But she pushes through the pain, the thought of him being in trouble too urgent to ignore.