Father's Keeper (6 page)

My heartbeat rushed and thumped in my
ears and I felt like I was trapped underwater for an instant as my body let
loose its final rush of release. And then I lay there panting. Breathing hard
and wishing he’d come in and catch me, touch me, love me.

The phone rang and I jumped.

I’d grown up in the house so I didn’t
give it a second thought. I answered it.

“Jennifer?” There was shock in that
voice. And chagrin.

I almost hung up. Instead I said,
‘Yes, mother.”

“What are you doing there?” she asked,
her voice sounding almost petulant. How had I forgotten that my mother never
liked to be anything but the center of attention. Me being here meant that
maybe Gil wasn’t focused solely on her and her disappearing act.

“Pit stop,” I said, offering up as
little information as possible just to drive her crazy. “Carl and I were
passing through. I figured I’d check on my father.” I’d also said that to drive
her crazy. Because for all of her protesting and insistence that I accept Gil
as my dad, once I did she’d seemed all tweaked about it. Reminding me often
that he wasn’t
really
my father but that she was my mom. She couldn’t
stand anyone else to be viewed favorably, it seemed.

“Ah, I see. Is Gil there?”

“Nope.”

“Where is he?” she snapped, not at all
happy with my brevity. Which made me smile, if you must know.

“Don’t know.” I laid back on her bed,
smelling my own sexual actions on her perfumed air.

“Well can you take a message,
Jennifer, or have you lost
all
your manners?”

“What was I thinking, mother? I mean
it’s a sin to be rude isn’t it. If you were here I’d be in trouble.” I made
sure to drag out
if you were here
and she caught it. She went silent for
a moment and I waited.

“Would you just tell him that I have
some things I’d like him to send and I’ll call later with an address.”

“Fine.”

“Thank you, Jennifer. I have to go.”

“Oh, okay,” I hissed. “And I’m fine,
by the way, thanks for asking.” And I slammed the phone down so hard my fingers
tingled.

I put her pearls in my pocket and
smoothed the bed. No reason for Gil to be upset and know what I’d done. No need
for him to have to deal with it all. He’d have enough to deal with tonight when
Marian called back.

* * * *

I realized at one point that Gil was
in his workshop. I could hear him moving around in there, working on his latest
stained glass project. I was pretty sure he’d said it was for the church and I
pictured some Archangel, flaming sword in hand, gracing the table in Gil’s
space. I thought of Gil’s hands and where they had been. I thought of the sweet
stolen orgasm he’d worked out of me and the way his lips had felt and I
finished my coffee. Then I hit the shower.

I lingered in there, not doing
anything other than focusing on the feel of the rivulets of hot water running
down over me. I washed my hair and felt it tangle under my fingers.

When I dried off and tossed on jeans
and a yellow top, I checked the time. I had a few hours before I had to go to
the tavern for my short shift. I braided my wet hair and briefly wondered what
Carl would think. What Gil would think. Shit, what I would think. Then I walked
the three miles to Josie’s.

Chapter
7

“You want to what?” Josie’s hair was
pink lemonade pink and I’d done a double take when I walked in. Her bright blue
eyes were still as startling as ever, especially with the candy colored hair.

“Chop it off. Whack it, hack it,
donate it.” I flopped in her turquoise styling chair and she kissed my cheek.

“We missed you around here. Still
crazy and impulsive I see.”

“Come on! We’ve been best friends
forever. Are you really surprised that a new life means I want new hair?” I
twirled the long dark caramel colored strands around my hand and eyed myself in
the mirror. No makeup, pale skin, blue eyes, freckled just above the apples of
my cheeks. Defiant. Above all, I saw a defiant woman who was going to announce
via her hair that shit was going to change, thank you very much.

Carl loved my hair. Loved it long.
Loved to twine his fingers in it and use it as a rein in bed or just played
with it. He liked to twirl it and brush it and even braid it on occasion. Carl
was going to toss a nut. The thought made me laugh.

Even Gil would be surprised because my
hair was one of my best features just like my mom. Maybe that was why I was
cutting it. With my hair long I was a dead ringer for Marian.

You think he did that with you because
you look like your mother…

I shook the thought off and focused on
Josie. “I think if we go close to the chin we can donate to charity,” she was
rambling.

“Good, chop it. I’m thinking a chin
length cut--fierce obviously and a crisp bang.”

“Say fringe, baby. It’s so much more
chic,” Josie said, misting my hair with water and then putting the cape on me.
She started to comb me out.

“Like I said, a crisp
bang
.”

Josie snorted and hovered her sharp
shears near my hair. “You ready?”

“Wait,” I said, feeling a little blip
of fear. “What about color?”

She grinned and the blip turned into a
wave of fear. “Don’t look so terrified!” Josie said.

“I can’t help it.”

“I’m saying keep it natural color and
all but how about a blazing blue streak near the front?”

“What in blue blazes,” I laughed.

“Exactly.”

“Fuck it. Let’s go for it,” I said.

“Done and done,” my best friend said
and turned me from the mirror and started to cut.

I sighed, fidgeting with the edge of
my cape. “I heard you’re working for John again.”

“Yep.”

“You moving here?”

“Don’t think so,” I said.

“How’s Gil doing?” Her voice was soft
and her shears clickety clacked like chattering birds in my ear.

“He’s hanging in there. No one likes
to be dumped right?” I tried to sound breezy and uninvolved but she knew me too
well.

“Stuff okay between you two?” Her face
held the possibility of suspicion.

“Carl really likes him,” I said
quickly, to reintroduce Carl into the equation.

“That’s nice, but are things okay with
you two?”

“Of course. I could kick my mother’s
ass, but things are fine between me and Gil.”

“You watching out for him?” she asked,
looking at my hair and not my face.

“As best as you can look out for a
grown adult male set in his ways,” I snorted. “And why does everyone think I’m
Gil’s keeper or his handler or something?”

“Do they?” she asked.

“Do what?”

“Does
everyone
think that?” Her
bright blue eyes studied me then and I felt like she could look in my head and
see what had happened between me and Gil the night before. My cheeks blazed and
I looked away.

“Well, it feels that way,” I said.

“Sorry, toots.” She handed me an eight
inch section of my hair and I stroked it.

“Wow,” I said, rubbing my fingers in
the silky hair.

“yeah, wow. Gorgeous hair. It’ll
brighten someone’s day for sure.”

“Good. Glad I could do some kind of
good.”

“Oh, honey, you always do good. It’s
just sometimes you fuck up along the way. Join the club.”

“Thanks for having me,” I joked but
when she turned me to the mirror and left me to mix my color, I said it again.
“Wow.”

* * * *

John whistled through his teeth and
Greg, the busboy, did a double take. “What’s happening hot stuff?” John asked.

“Not much.’ I tied on my tavern apron
and wiped down the bar. Old tasks from old jobs come back fairly easily. Too
easily for comfort sometimes.

“Loving the ‘do. What’s your boy toy
gonna think?”

John had found out that Carl was a
whole year younger than me and would now proceed to tease me mercilessly--boy
toy, cradle robber, MILF, cougar. The list of teasing would go on and on and on
until I either died or broke up with Carl.

I shrugged and cracked a bottle of
water from the cooler. “It’s my hair. Doesn’t much matter what he thinks.”

“Wow. Someone is grumpy tonight.” His
smile faded and he leaned in. “You okay, kiddo? Something up?”

I blew out a sigh and watched a tiny
strand of cobalt blue hair flutter by my cheekbone. I was still catching sight
of my cropped locks in my peripheral vision. It would take some getting used
to. “My mother called earlier. I guess it freaked me out.”

And I masturbated in her bed while
smelling her husband’s pillow like a teenager. That freaked me out too.

A burble of laughter escaped me at my
own errant thought and John frowned. “You wanna start tomorrow instead?”

“Hell, no! I need to work. I need to
move and do something, earn some money and not be in my mother’s house all the
time,” I said.

Mr. Jenkins, the town boozer yelled
“Jennifer, Jennifer! A beer, if you will.”

“How long’s he been here?” I asked
John. I was shocked Mr. Jenkins wasn’t dead. He’d opened and closed the bar
when I was in high school. He should be pickled or buried at this point.

“How long we been open?” John said,
drawing a beer. Mr. Jenkins didn’t drive. He’d lost his license long before I’d
ever even gotten mine.

I grunted, took the beer over and
delivered it. I took my tip and his pay and listened to him tell me a story
about his wife that he’d told me every since I could remember. His wife Rose
had died during childbirth. Mr. Jenkins had one daughter with her, Michelle.
Michelle Jenkins had left town like her ass was on fire the moment she
graduated high school. It couldn’t have been easy having the town drunk, and
the town joke, as a dad. But most of us still felt sorry for him.

“She threw all my clothes out on the
lawn,” he laughed, winding down. “But we made up and she got pregnant with
Shelly
…
” and then his eyes teared up as usual
and he took down half his draft in a swallow.

“I’ll get you some pretzels, Mr.
Jenkins,” I said softly.

“Thank you, darlin’. You’re an angel.”

“Quite the opposite,” I said under my
breath and filled a bowl with pretzels. Then I gave John my dollar tip and
treated Mr. Jenkins to a beef stick. He needed something in his stomach. He
looked like an animated scarecrow.

“Don’t get too attached, we’ve all
tried to help him, Jen.”

“I know,” I said, waving my hand
dismissively as I took the snack back. I just felt a sympathy for misfits.

I heard a familiar boisterous voice
and steeled myself. Before I could turn, I heard “You must be new here,
gorgeous” and then a firm tap on the ass. When I turned Carl looked startled.

“Do you always spank the help?” I
asked.

“I knew it was you,” he lied. His face
said he hadn’t but I listened to him talk. “I’d know that ass anywhere, Jenny,”
he said, softly.

“Don’t call me Jenny and don’t lie to
me, Carl.”

I glanced at John who shrugged. He
couldn’t tell if Carl was lying and to be honest, neither could I. I thought he
was, but was I really sure? Bottom line, Carl wasn’t going to be with me till
death do us part. Was it really important in the long run?

“I wasn’t Jen. I swear.” He leaned in
and kissed me, fingering the blue streak in my hair. “Sexy,” he said. “Really
sexy. What time do you get off, girl?”

“Whenever you get me off,” I laughed
and let it go. “Now, I’m on the clock, Carl. What can I get you?”

I got him an import on draft and he
stole a kiss in the hall, touching my breast and rubbing against me for a
moment. I let him and laughed when he said in my ear. “I want to come all over
that blue streak in your hair.”

“I’m sure you do.”

About ten minutes before my shift
ended, Gil walked in. Drunk and angry.

Chapter
8

“What the fuck did you do to your
hair, Jenny?” He grabbed my arm.

I tried on a smile. “Something new. I
cut it off and donated it and got a little something extra.”

“You look so different,” he said.

“Now I don’t look like Marian,” I
said, feeling a bit put-off. The least he could do was say he liked it before
he made me feel like shit.

“You don’t look like Marian at all,”
he said. His voice was only slightly slurred, it was the shine in his eye and
the cut of his jaw that told me he’d had one too many.

“Oh, please.” I took off my apron and
poured myself a beer for the end of shift. John handed me my tips and then
skeedaddled. He could tell that Gil was off and that meant something was wrong.
Gil was a man who kept a good handle on himself and rarely if ever had too much
to drink.