If You Could See What I See (29 page)

“Yes, well, you don’t want to be pregnant alongside your mother.” For some reason I found that hilarious, too, and it’s so not funny.

“I know. That would be Disaster City! Poor Mom. Pregnant again. It’s embarrassing and sickening that Mom and Dad still do it.”

“Yeah, that’s embarrassing. And the baby is proof of it. They can’t even deny it.”

Cassidy, my namesake, fingered the collar of her prim and proper nightgown. “I like to think they only did it three times, one for me, one for Hayden, one for Regan. We’ll pretend this is the fourth time only. Anyhow, I was caught sneaking in and I’m grounded for a longer amount of time now. I feel like I’m always grounded.”

“Does seem like you have to be home a lot.”

“I don’t mind being home, but I don’t like being
grounded
.”

“Yeah, it’s tough. Brutal.”

She nodded, then her face lightened. “So, Hayden and I are making holiday wreaths today. You want to make one with us? We’re making them for your house to welcome you here. Also, after that, Mom and I are making pumpkin chocolate chip muffins. They are the best. Want to help? And since I can’t go out tonight, we’re going to make baklava together and watch Martha Stewart’s cooking shows. Regan is volunteering at the animal shelter, but then he’ll be home to watch Martha with us. Doesn’t that sound like fun?”

“Oh, it does, Cassidy, it does.” I don’t like cooking or, as my mother would say, “the domestic arts.”

Later, after the wreath making, Lacey and I sat down to eat pumpkin chocolate chip muffins and have coffee. Lacey muttered to me, “Cassidy can’t help it that she inherited a few cells of the slut gene.”

“But she cooks like a dream,” I said.

“That’s true. A dreamy, slutty cook.”

We clinked our muffins together, as if we were saying cheers.

 

I bravely tried to take a bath that night.

I turned on the water. I felt my heart rate rise with the steam, my hands freezing, going numb, as visions of black swirled through my mind. I tried to stick my toes in, couldn’t do it. I tried to stick a finger in, no go.

I turned off the bathwater, drained it, wrapped a towel around myself, and stumbled out to my deck, past that thing in my closet I hid from myself. I collapsed into the green Adirondack chair until I could breathe again. I stayed outside until I could no longer see the bathwater of my past. Pop Pop barked at me. I couldn’t bark back.

That night I dreamed of Aaron pushing me into the tub as I struggled and kicked. He covered me with black feathers, then detergent. It was the black feathers that drowned me.

 

Planning a fashion show or, in our case, a Fashion Story, is like trying to hike up a mountain in impossibly high heels during a rockslide.

Especially since we were doing something special—okay,
odd—
with it.

I approved the ads for the newspaper for The Fashion Story after we’d been round and round about what the announcement should say and what photo should be displayed. We decided to use a photo of Grandma in a strawberry field. She was wearing a red, flowing, silky dress that blew in the wind, and her rubies.

The words below it: “My name is Regan O’Rourke. You’re invited to the Lace, Satin, and Baubles Fashion Story. Let me tell you how I went from picking strawberries to designing brassieres.”

I hoped people showed up, or all this work in finding the location, building a runway, deciding on the decor, bringing in a gargantuan amount of lighting, paying for some sort of dessert, and readying our “models” and their outfits would be for nothing.

As Grandma said to me a week before, “We’re going for broke. Might as well make the whole damn thing pretty.”

Broke isn’t pretty. I kept hiking up the mountain with the rockslide in my heels.

 

“Three days before that bad typhoon, whoosh whoosh, I see it in my dream,” Kalani said, wriggling her fingers at Lacey and me over Skype. “I see palm trees blowing. I see beach and pink dragon on beach and I see water like lake, with fish. I think I . . . what the word . . . Tory know this word . . . ah!” She pointed a finger in the air. “New American word for me: psychic! I think I psychic!”

“Good for you,” I said. “Then you’ll be able to tell me the future. Kalani, did you get the shipment out that we talked about?”

“Ya. Ya. I get boxes and boxes of thongs out. Those hardly no panty at all, not cover nothing on the you know”—she turned around and put her butt up so we could see it on Skype—“the boom boom.”

“You’re right—”

“And I check the lace, like we talk about, Meggie. Those things, mostly lace.”

“Pretty, aren’t they?”

“Ya. Pretty. You could wear them, Meeegie, but not you, Lacey. Not with that big boom boom.” She smiled. “Look see your tummy!” Kalani helpfully pointed at Lacey’s tummy as if Lacey didn’t know how big it was.

“Yes, it’s a healthy baby,” Lacey said, under her breath she said, “You nonstop-talking skinny bird face.”

“Bird face?” I whispered.

“That Tory,” Kalani said. “She know fashion. I talk to her yesterday. She say I need crimson-tide lipstick. She send me some. You know Tory?”

“I think we do remember Tory,” Lacey said. She wasn’t in a good mood. “We’re not that dumb.”

“No, you not dumb, Laceeey. You no talk like that.” Kalani shook her finger at Lacey. “You not dumb. You just fat. Fat lady now.”

“Oh, fuck you very much,” Lacey said, with a teeth-clenched smile. Her morning sickness was particularly bad today. I elbowed her. Kalani did not hear the f word.

“Yes. You welcome, fat lady. That you name now?” Kalani clapped her hands together. Whooee!

“No, that is not her name, Kalani,” I snapped. That was enough. “Call her Lacey.”

“Don’t call me fat lady unless you want me to call you skinny crow,” Lacey said, jaw tight. “I don’t need to hear that.”

Kalani’s face fell into sadness. Cultural mishaps, that’s what these are, but she heard the tone. “Ah. Ya. Okay. This bad.”

I could see she was tearing up.

“Kalani.” I tried to distract her. “Tell us more about being psychic.”

The tears flooded her eyes. “Ya. That new American word for me. I see typhoon in my dream three days before, then it come with pink dragon.” The tears rolled down her cheeks. “I go now. Bye-bye, seeesters. I love you. I love you.”

She de-Skyped us.

“Shoot,” I breathed. “If I were psychic I could have seen that coming.”

“This fat lady real mad now,” Lacey said, shoving her chair back. “Real mad. Ya.”

 

On Tuesday night, with Pop Pop bouncing beside me, grinning, in trouble because he’d had another fight at doggy day care and was on probation
again,
I came home to a hamster home complete with colorful tubes and a hamster running on a wheel. A bag full of hamster stuff like food and shavings for the cage sat beside it.

Regan had written a note: “This is a nice girl hamster. My friend Seth is allergic to it, so his parents are making him give her up. Her name is Ham the Hamster. I think you’ll like her because she’s a good listener and curious. I’ll come and visit. Seth wants to come, too.”

I bent down and peered into the cage. Ham the Hamster was running with all her might on a wheel. I don’t know why. “You’re going to tire yourself out,” I told her. She took no notice.

I carried her in and put her by Mrs. Friendly, the lizard. Mrs. Friendly stuck his tongue out.

Pop Pop darted in and went to play with Jeepers. Jeepers didn’t want to play. I could hear him hissing.

I had a hissy cat, a weird dog on probation, a bored lizard, and a hamster that ran for no reason. I did not have a police chief. I walked outside my house, leaned over my deck, stared up at Blake’s house, and hurt. That’s how pathetic I am: I watch his
house.
I reminded myself of Tory.

I drank a beer on my deck, then ate a slice of chocolate cake from Cassidy, then a piece of chicken dipped in salsa and peaches mixed together.

I went to bed at two. I tried to sleep. I couldn’t. First the red and black scene assailed me, then I had to curl up around my pillow and pretend I was hugging Blake.

The pillow wasn’t Blake. That’s why I couldn’t sleep.

 

“Hello, Meggie.”

I stopped sprinting down the street. It was dark, it was pouring down rain, and I was chasing Pop Pop. That pesky dog had squiggled around me when I’d opened the door for Jeepers to come back in. I shoved my feet into running shoes and cursed that grinning canine as he took off. I knew he was laughing at me.

It had been a rip-roaring day at work. A huge order was lost, then found; another order ended up in Seattle instead of Tampa; and Lacey had to leave work in the middle of a meeting with our accountant, who had grim news, to go to school and relieve Regan of an abandoned kitten he’d found and snuck into his coat.

“Hi, Blake.” I stopped and pushed my wet hair out of my eyes. I was sweating. I had on sweatpants and a holey sweatshirt. I was panting, too. Dang. I needed to exercise more.

“Out for a run?”

Blake had clearly been out for a run. He was in an army T-shirt and shorts. He was soaked, too. “No. I’m chasing Pop Pop.”

“Ah, okay. Where is he?”

“He ran . . .” I panted again, feeling like an old woman. “He ran off. He’s a bad dog. He has a strange grin, he fights with other dogs, he barks at me as if we’re having a conversation, and he teases Jeepers.” I wiped sweat off my forehead. “I have to go and find him.”

“I’ll help you.”

“You will?”

“Yes. Of course.”

And that was that.

The glow from the street light illuminated his face. He didn’t seem angry, the way he had been the last time I saw him. In fact, he seemed . . . tired.

Tired and sad.

“Are you okay, Blake?”

He didn’t answer for a second. He turned his head to the right, then back at me and smiled . . . slightly. “I think I’m about to get better.”

“Ah.” I was still panting and I willed myself to stop. Unfortunately, looking at Blake made me pant, too. “I’m glad to hear it.”

Those gray-blue eyes traveled over my face; over my hair; for a mini-millisecond dropped to my chest, which I was thrilled to see; then focused on my eyes. “Good to see you, Meggie.”

“Good to see you, too.”

“Okay, let’s go find Pop Pop.” Blake has a low voice, seductive and gravelly, and it sailed right on through my body. I loved his voice. It sounded so . . . trustworthy.

I could trust him. I wouldn’t, but I could.

A half hour later Pop Pop, who had obeyed Blake’s command to “come,” but not mine, was snoring slightly while Blake and I were at my kitchen table eating spaghetti next to the trunk of my maple tree.

“I love spaghetti,” I said. I felt . . . happy. Relieved. I was with Blake! “I could eat it every day. Sometimes I do.” I did not add that whenever I have spaghetti I also eat corn flakes cereal at the same time.

“I love steak. But I have to tell you that your spaghetti is now at the top of my list.”

“Thank you. I’ll give credit to the jar of sauce I bought. Not surprised you love steak.”

Blake leaned back and crossed his arms, smiling. He had run home to shower and was now in jeans and a blue shirt. He had a huge chest and a commanding sort of body. The man made me tingle.

I had jumped into the shower, too, and pulled on jeans and a pink blouse, then squished my curls with mousse and put on lipstick. I wished I had a delicate, lacy bra. Maybe I would bring Grandma’s box home....

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“It is not surprising to me that a man like you likes steak. I would not assume that you would like eating quiche or tiny pink cupcakes.”

He winked. “Got me. I don’t like quiche and I can’t imagine eating a tiny pink cupcake.”

Jeepers hissed at him.

Blake hissed back at the cat, which I found so funny, as I did the same, then he said to me, “How is Tay?”

Oh, he was smart. Get me in a squishy, happy mood, then ask a pointed question. “I would hate to be across a table from you being cross-examined.”

“Did you go home with him?”

I let that question hang in the air, heavy and insulting. “I’m surprised you have to ask. Didn’t you look out your window to see my car that night?”

“You didn’t take your car with you. Your sister drove you to the bar. I asked her because I wanted to make sure you weren’t driving home and to make sure she looked out for you. And no, I wouldn’t have checked anyhow. That’s too stalkerish for me. I would actually have to walk down to the bottom of my driveway and look for your car, and I wouldn’t allow myself to do that.” His jaw was pretty tight. “So, did you?”

I bristled. “It’s not your business, is it, Blake?”

He leaned forward, elbows on the table, arms muscled out. “No, it’s not, but I’m asking anyhow. Did you go home with him?”