Nectar: DD Prince (43 page)

As me and my foster sisters got ready for our big day they were giggly but I was deep in thought about the guy, the ice cream parlor hottie. I hadn’t stopped thinking about him the past 2 days and the past 2 nights. But that had been my last day at that job so the chances of seeing him again were small. He’d flirted with me but I’d been like a deer in the headlights. I wished I was older, more confident, and that I’d given him my phone number. I was
so
over Nick, so over guys that were like Nick.

I had a sneaking suspicion Nick was trying to get my attention because he knew that tomorrow I’d be moving into my own apartment. He wanted alone time with me.  He and I had done the alone thing plenty of times and I didn’t need to go down that road again. It wasn’t exactly symbiotic.

Nick texted that he wanted to attend the graduation ceremony but I had only a limited number of tickets to give out for family members and friends and since I had no one but Dad I’d given my extra tickets to the other girls who had other guests. I’d only sent one to my father at his last known address along with the Facebook inbox message and a note to pick his ticket up at the school office if he did get a chance to come.

I was ready for new things. A new place, college in the fall, and new opportunities. Maybe a new guy, too. One who was ready to be a man, not a boy living in 1 bedroom apartment shared with 2 other guys who rotated using the bedroom when they had girls over with the never-innovative sock on the doorknob as the clue that the room was “in use.” Gross. I told Nick I wasn’t using that room for sex. We’d done it in there once and never again. We’d done it a few times in his car but it was certainly not very fulfilling! Neither the car nor the bedroom had been cleaned in months. He undoubtedly saw my upcoming apartment as an ‘in’. No thanks! He’d already texted me three times today, trying to get me to agree to ‘talk’ later on tonight.

As I walked up on the podium to receive my diploma I had the surprise of my life.  My Dad, in the audience, smiling at me.  He sat beside Rose, who was chatting softly to him while snapping pictures of me.  Nick was sitting behind my Dad, dressed up and smiling at me, too. I avoided his gaze, tried not to think about how handsome he looked. Looks weren’t everything! Why was he even here? I bet Ruby gave him a ticket; she’d been trying to get us back together.

After the ceremony was over we were all in the school’s courtyard for photos.  Dad rushed to me. He looked good. I’d only ever seen him in a suit once, at my Mom’s funeral. This was that same suit. He had his dirty blonde hair gelled back and he smelled like expensive cologne. He looked together-looking. Seeing him like this reminded me of how he was before Mom died. His green eyes sparkled. He was good-looking for his age. Everyone said I had his eyes. He’d never been perfect but we did things together.  He taught me to cook, I’d hang out with him while he tinkered with his car, he’d hold me high in the air with an airplane ride to bed every night that he was home at bedtime, read me bedtime stories with such effort and emotion, doing different voices for every character. He wasn’t the perfect father or husband before she died but after she died, he was like a shell of a man who tried to drink and gamble away his pain.

He swung me around in a giant hug, making me squeal. “Athena! I’m so proud. You look all grown up. Look at you. Someone take our picture!” He called out to the rest of our group and Rose hurried over with her camera. Susie, my social worker, eyed my dad warily.

I knew she’d lost patience with him over the years.  Getting me to agree to be a ward of the courts made her life so much easier because she didn’t have to continually try to reach him to find out what was what with him, to get him involved in decisions that needed to be made, and so forth.  When it’d finally happened and he lost his parental rights it had been 11 months since he’d made contact.  He always managed to miss birthdays.

It hurt that he could go that length of time without checking on me, leaving others to raise me. It hurt but I wasn’t the sort to start laying blame aloud. I always just thought of him as broken.

He’d found her dead in the bathtub with slit wrists one day. It was a day when I was supposed to have been picked up from school late after a field trip that required parents to pick up the kids because it got us back after 7:00 at night. That night was a long one and I’d sat in the principal’s office for hours and hours while they tried to find someone to pick me up. The principal had been huffy and snippy, too, clearly with plans for the evening that had to be cancelled due to this poor little neglected girl who hadn’t been picked up from school.

Finally my Aunt Carol had come along and brought me to her home. She hadn’t told me about my Mom. She let me overhear her on the phone telling someone else that she was stuck watching me for the evening because my father was a wreck, mourning his dead wife who’d killed herself. What a way for me to find out. She was a witch, my Dad’s sister.

She hadn’t bothered with me for all these years, just wrote me off. Mom hadn’t had any family step up either.  I heard she had an older brother but it seemed she was a bit of a black sheep with her family or something, too. I really had no idea. No one sought me out after she died.

I may not have had siblings by blood but there were many foster kids I’d shared homes and rooms with that I thought of as family and would’ve gladly been an auntie to their kids if I was needed.

So, here Dad was, all smiles for the camera, looking well-fed, well-groomed, and yet there was a weird aura about him, something in his eyes, a nervousness in his laugh. He seemed off, like there was something shifty going on. He kept checking his phone and looking around suspiciously.  When everyone had gotten their fill of camera flashes in their eyes Rose tried to corral everyone so we could go back to her house where a big buffet and gifts were waiting.

“Please join us, Gregory,” she said to my Dad.

“I’d love to!” he beamed, “Tia, ride with me. We can catch up on the way back.”

I nodded, feeling like something was way off. Did he have something to tell me? I was happy to see him. It’d been ages since I’d seen him, but something was off, I could just feel it.

He had a decent enough car, surprisingly. We drove through a coffee shop drive-thru for Dad to get a coffee and me to get an iced cappuccino on our way and then we parked so Dad could get out and have a cigarette first, knowing I wouldn’t want him smoking in the car with me.

“Thanks so much for coming, Dad.”

“Like I’d miss it!” He gave me an ‘Are you kidding’ look. As if he hadn’t missed other milestones, like my first communion, my confirmation, school plays, every single birthday since my 10
th
, and so forth.

“What’s new, then? You working?” I asked.

He nodded, “Yeah, I’ve been working at an auto parts place over on Dufferin Street for about 7 months.  I do parts counter, a few minor repairs. Got a nice apartment. Got myself a nice girlfriend, too. You’ll like her. Sadie. She’s a schoolteacher. Teaches kindergarten. This is her car.”

“Really? That’s awesome.” It’d been the longest he’d held down a job for ages and this was the first relationship he’d ever told me about. He knew what was going on with me already; I’d filled him in with my Facebook message where I’d invited him to come to the grad ceremony.

“Something off, though, Dad? You seem stressed.”

He nodded quickly and lifted the lid off his coffee and took a sip, “Yeah, we need to talk.”

I frowned, “Okay?”

He sat down on a picnic table outside the coffee shop and picked at an imaginary thread on his suit pants, “I’m in some trouble. Chickens coming home to roost, sorta thing.”

My heart lurched, “What kind of trouble?”

He let out a heavy sigh, “I have old debts from when I was gambling. I haven’t gambled in a long time, Tia. I go to a support group. The debt was sold to someone high up in organized crime, someone who hates my guts and has a vendetta from years back. He’s decided to make life --- difficult.”

I nodded, urging him to continue, feeling dread spread through my gut.

“I need to figure this out, find a way to get them paid. They’ve already given me an extension but they want a marker. I just need a few days to sort this out. I was hoping you could help me.”

“How? How could I help you?” I didn’t have any money. Well, $248 in my savings account from my job at the ice cream parlor but that was it.

“You need to be my marker.” He said, resigned.

“Your what?”

“Yeah. I know it’s not ideal but I have a plan to clear it up and then there won’t be anything else. This is the last loose end from my old life, Tia. I’m really sorry to drag you into this but I have no choice.”

“Dad…” I began.

I noticed a black SUV pull in beside us. The passenger window rolled down and a shady-looking guy in the passenger side wearing dark sunglasses was eyeing us.

“Tia, it’s just for a few days. I have a plan, I…” He glanced over his shoulder and then his shoulders slumped.

“Dad, you can’t expect me to…who are these people? What on earth have you gotten yourself into?”

Dad’s face took on a look of desperation, “Sweet pea, I’m sorry. I’ve been such a fuck up.”

He hadn’t called me that since I was little, since before Mom died.

“You need to go with these guys. Trust me. I’ll make this better. It’ll be better.”

“It’s my high school fucking graduation!” I shrieked, looking over to the SUV. Was this them?

Dad blanched. I’ve never before sworn at him, never raised my voice at him. I’ve always treated him like he’s fragile. The front passenger and rear passenger doors of the black SUV opened and two big burly guys in suits looked out.

“Problem, O’Connor?” the burly guy from the back seat asked in a gravelly voice.

“Naw, no. Not at all. Not at all. We just need one minute.” Dad was like a stuttering fool, ”Tia, please.” His eyes plead with me.

“Dad…” I folded my arms. I could not believe he came to my grad to set me up to be his marker. That it was the only reason he came!

Burly guy from the front seat lifted his shades off, “We need to go, O’Connor.”

I took a step back as the two of them got out, leaving their doors opened, revealing a big scary looking black dude in the back and a younger blond pissed-off looking but hot guy in a suit in the driver’s seat.

Dad leaned forward and took my hands in his and his face had a look of desperation that made my scalp prickle, “They’ll kill me,” he whispered.

What the ---? What would make him use me as a marker? Did he think they wouldn’t kill
me
? Did he think they wouldn’t hurt me? How much money did he owe these guys and how would he even pay them off?

He’d let me down countless times. In the early days of foster care he’d promise that his life was almost together enough to gain custody back. He’d promise to take me places, buy me things --- I never needed or wanted things but he always tossed promises around and he never ever kept them. Why would I believe him now?  Why would he put me at risk, make this even an option?

“Just hang tight. They’ll keep you comfortably in a luxury hotel suite or something like that. You’ll be fine. Look at it like a little getaway.”

I tilted my head at my dad, dumbfounded. This couldn’t be real. Back at Rose and Cal’s, they were waiting for me. There was a big beautiful cake congratulating me, Mia, and Bethany for all graduating. Ruby, her brother Connor, the other girls, and everyone’s friends and relatives were all there. There was a table filled with everyone’s favorite foods. There were graduation gifts.  Tonight there was a dance and all my friends would be there.  He was ruining this, a pivotal day that I’d worked so hard for. I was a nearly straight A student. I was on the motherfucking honor roll. I’d beaten the odds despite my screwed up childhood with a loser father and a mom lost to suicide. I didn’t deserve this. Something like a combination of pain and rage rose in me.

“Athena, sweet pea; trust me.” His eyes implored me.

“How much do you owe? Do you even have a way to pay them back?”

He nodded, “It’s not out of my reach, and I have a plan.”

“It must be pretty bad for them to want human collateral, Dad! What’ll they do to me if you don’t pay?”

He put his hands on my shoulders and said, “I just need you to trust me.”

I held my breath.  Burly man #1 and burly man #2 seemed like they were staring me down from behind their Men-In-Black sunglasses.

I was about to open my mouth to say No, no way but then the hot blond guy came out of the vehicle and rounded it. He strode to the passenger side where this standoff was happening and took my elbow and ushered me into the SUV, his mouth in a tight line. Burly guy #2 opened the back door. It happened so fast that I was in the vehicle before I had a chance to protest.

“In!” Blond hot guy was dressed like Mr. GQ and he was angry. He blurted at the goons, “For fuck sakes,” then he gave Dad a chilling death stare. Before I had a chance to react, angry hot guy got back in the driver’s seat. Then we were pulling away from my Dad who was standing there with his hands in his pockets watching the SUV pull away.

I was sandwiched in between backseat burly guy #2 and the big scary-looking black dude. I glanced over my shoulder out the window to see my Dad take a sip of his coffee and dial a number on his phone.  Backseat burly guy passed the big black burly guy on the other side of me my seatbelt and he fastened it for me.