Fly by Night (38 page)

“We kept it on for a year but the place just wasn't safe for an elderly person.”

“Could someone stay there?” Amelia asked.

He looked long and hard at her before answering. Like she was an intruder and had butted up against a boundary of which she was unaware.

“Not without utilities.” The way he said it made her feel distanced, like an uninvited guest and that no matter how many photos hung on their dining room wall, she'd never be a member of his family.

He studied her more as a warning. As if she better not have designs on coming up to stay at his mother's house. It was a protectiveness she'd felt about her father at the Mall of America the day they'd met, but hadn't felt from him until now—his turf, his home court, and she would forever be the visiting team.

She'd wanted to respond, but it was only a feeling, no words. Instead she looked away. Amelia felt Bryce's tension too as he stepped behind her.

“More coffee?” Charlotte asked.

“Sure.” Amelia held out her mug.

TJ walked back by the fire and sat on the hearth bench.

“You're welcome up here anytime,” Charlotte said and reached to hug her. “You all have plans for Christmas?” the woman asked in a soft voice.

“Alex, my son, will be here the day before Christmas Eve and then leaving the day after.”

“Short visit. But why not come up? Our kids'll be here too.”

Amelia glanced over at TJ.

“We'll see.”

“Oh.” Charlotte turned too. “Don't mind him.”

 

30

Amelia didn't want to leave. Every time she glanced at the threadbare baby quilt Charlotte had used to line the bottom of the crate for the pups, she felt an ache.

They stopped twice during the four-hour drive at rest stops along the highway to feed Lacey and Junior. Everywhere snow was piled high and the bright clear-as-a-bell sky and sun were blinding. They set the tote Charlotte had given them filled with food down on the attached chairs in an information center/rest stop near the Kettle River in Minnesota, preparing for a feeding.

The only person in the information center was a man in park ranger dress who looked more like a high school student. He'd perked up, trying to look busy as soon as they walked in. Amelia could tell the young man had probably been on his phone.

“Welcome to Minnesota, folks,” he said in an effort at a smile. “Where ya headed?”

“Oh,” Bryce said. “Just back to the Twin Cities,” he said and set the pups down on the glass counter as Amelia got formula ready, shaking each bottle like mad until the granules dissolved.

“Can I?” the young man asked as he lifted Lacey and then Junior as Bryce discussed road conditions. “Hey, little guys,” the young man said. “How old?”

“Coupla weeks,” Bryce said. So far the road had been icy in spots and the little traffic there was, was moving slow.

“Can I feed one?” the man asked.

“Sure.” Amelia showed the young man how as he balanced Lacey on his lap.

“I swear to God they're bigger since yesterday,” Amelia said and lifted Junior over her head like a human scale, gauging his weight.

Bryce agreed.

They watched as the pup sniffed the air and began to look around.

“You're right, he does look like Mr. Magoo,” Bryce said to Amelia.

“Who's Mr. Magoo?” the young man asked.

“The cartoon?” Amelia said. “You know. Guy who wears thick glasses? Makes all these funny mix-up mistakes?”

The young man shrugged and shook his head.

“We're old, Am,” Bryce said.

“Can't wait 'til their bodies get fatter than their heads like Charlotte said should happen.” Amelia examined and gently pinched the body fat around Junior's ribs.

“Charlotte's really sweet,” Bryce said, taking Junior to feed.

“And him?”

“Umm—complex. A lot going on there: wolf hunt, his mom died. You.”

She looked at Bryce.

“Me, huh.” She watched the two men as the pups began eating. Watching Bryce she felt a longing that was new. Familiar, new, and was scared for a moment, wondering if the bottom of her life had dropped out.

“Maybe I should just sign the place over to him,” she muttered. “Except I'm afraid I'd never hear from them after that.”

She'd said it in a way as to invite Bryce's disagreement, to defend what she wanted, to say that TJ would never do that, but he didn't. Having someone dislike her because she was born was a new experience. Dislike was something she was far more used to having earned.

It hurt her feelings. Amelia snorted a chuckle to hide them. Sometimes you get a truth you don't want to hear, and Amelia wondered why she was hiding such feelings from Bryce from whom she'd never hid a thing.

“Be right back.” She motioned and rushed off to the ladies' restroom.

“Shower's closed,” the young man piped up after her.

“That's okay,” she answered with a wave.

Inside Amelia paused in front of her reflection in the mirror. She watched her eyes tear.

“Shit.” She hated crying. Hated the situation she was in. Hated that she didn't know what the hell she was doing anymore. Hated that she suddenly felt scared with Bryce, with the pups, wishing that things would go back to the way they were in Rhode Island, yet was grateful they never would.

“—just a fucking psycho,” she muttered. And she'd been doing so much of it in the last few days. Her irises became even greener in the saline bath. She reared back in surprise, suddenly seeing TJ's expression in them.

“Shit.” She shook her head as if there was no use in anything.

Yanking out one tan paper towel after the other, she ran the faucet until the water turned cold and then saturated the towel. Holding it up to her eyes, she sighed. It felt cool but refreshing. Damn it, Bryce would know she'd been upset. He always did. He'd probably known by the way she'd just walked off to find the bathrooms and now she was taking so long.

She then waved her hands toward her eyes and even turned on the hand dryer, bending over to dry her face .

“Okay.” Last look in the mirror, wishing she had bangs to help obscure her eyes. Then she pulled several more fistfuls of paper towels from the dispenser and hurried back toward the information desk to clean up after the feeding.

Amelia bent over, laying down a layer of paper behind the information desk. She positioned her back toward Bryce so he wouldn't see her face.

“There,” she said. “When she's done,” Amelia instructed the young man, “just set her down on these to do her thing.”

She then rested her elbow on the info desk and began recounting the story of how they'd come to find Lacey and Junior as both men set the pups down on the towels.

The pups began to play. Lacey placed her paws on Junior's back and raised herself to peek over his back and then dropped down, rolling over as he stood over her, pawing her.

“Now that's a power move,” Bryce commented as they sniffed about in the bunches of paper towels.

“I'll clean this all up, I swear,” she assured the young man.

“Hey—no problem.” He shook his head. “Please—this is the most exciting thing that's happened all winter.” He looked at her in such a way that Amelia believed him.

“And you're saving me from chemistry,” he said and set his elbows on the counter, resting on them. He'd been leaning over the center of a thick college textbook. “Been cramming for next week's final.” His phone was lying across the pages. “At least trying to.”

*   *   *

They switched drivers. Amelia climbed behind the wheel. She felt Bryce studying her as she started to blubber.

“So you want to talk about it?” Bryce asked.

She looked at him. The way he looked back, she knew he meant the night before.

“Not now.” Her chin quivered and she had that post-cry shudder.

“Then when?”

“It's just crazy shit.” She waved her hand.

“Like what?” he asked. She felt his eyes on her.

“Like us.”

“What about us?”

“Everything's different.” She choked up.

He waited for her to go on.

“I love you too much as a person to lose you, Bryce.”

She felt him turn to her.

“Why would you lose me?”

“What if we don't like each other?”

“We already like each other.”

She glanced at him.

“Yeah but as lovers.”

“It's been happening in me for a long time, Am.” His eyes were serious, his voice quiet. “Guess I wasn't sure how you felt.” It made her shy. She felt embarrassed to feel him as a man. Yet she liked it. There'd been many times when he'd hugged her in the past few months that it had felt so good she'd not wanted to let go. Hugs of consolation, of comfort, but she'd felt something else and had cut it off.

“Maybe we should get to know each other better or something,” she stuttered.

He laughed as if just having been told a good joke and looked around outside.

“Like how?” He snorted and made a face. “Go out on a date?” He lifted his hands. “I could drive around the block and then come upstairs to pick you up?”

She started to snicker.

“Come on, Amelia, I've smelled your farts.”

He said the last sentence in such a formal way that she was laughing by the time he'd finished speaking.

They'd already slept next to each other on dive projects for years, gone to plays, movies; they'd never been apart for more than twenty-four hours, forty-eight at the most. It would be a whole recalibration, moments they'd share but with an added dimension. It was as exciting as it was terrifying.

“I don't want to fuck it up. I fuck everything up, you know that.” She started to hiccup; it felt so little-girlish. “You're everything to me.” Her voice came out in breathy, snot-filled gasps.

They were both quiet for a while until Lacey began to grunt.

“And what in God's name are we gonna tell Jen?”

He snickered. “She's practically living with Doby anyway, besides Jen probably already knows. She always knows these things.”

A silent moment passed.

“You know, Am?” He reached to touch the side of her neck. She turned toward the feel of his hand, momentarily not recognizing the touch. “Sometimes you just gotta hold your nose and leap. Take a chance that maybe you'll be happy.”

His words made her cry.

Bryce hit the emergency flashers and reached to take the wheel. Slowly steering from the passenger side, he pulled over onto the snowy shoulder that had been cleared by the plow.

His arms were around her before she had the chance to lean toward him. Their bulky down coats crushed together like two Pillsbury dough people trying to make up after a fight. He kissed her again and she grabbed his coat, kissing him back. The taste of his mouth was good.

 

31

There was no parking on the entire street. Bryce double-parked, flipped on the emergency flashers, and began to unload the dog crate and supplies as Amelia carried Lacey and Junior up to the apartment. Both pups were tucked in Amelia's coat, their heads peeping out.

Music was playing behind the apartment door. Amelia knocked.

“Special delivery,” Bryce said in a fake voice.

“Right, Bryce,” Jen groused through the door and then opened it, sounding annoyed with her phone tucked in the crook of her neck, in the middle of a conversation until she spotted Junior.

“Puppies?” She screamed once, and then again when she saw Lacey. “Call ya back,” she said and tossed the phone on the carpet.

Amelia and Bryce laughed.

Amelia held up Lacey.

Jen started screaming with excitement, which elicited crying and howling as she reached for Lacey.

“Shh, oh my God, oh my God, little sweetie,” Jen kept saying.

“This is Lacey,” Amelia said as she handed the pup over. The dog began trembling, her head pulled in as close to her body as possible during the transfer.

“Sorry I scared you.” Jen held Lacey, kissing her on the top of the head as she drew her close. “Hi, baby. Don't be scared,” she said in a quiet voice. “I'm just a nutcase.” She looked at Amelia with a serious face. “My God, they're babies.”

Amelia nodded. “We're bottle feeding.”

Jen began rocking as she tucked Lacey into every warm nook she could find near her neck.

“Whose are these?” Jen asked.

Amelia looked at Bryce. “Ours.”

“Holy shit.” Jen looked from Bryce to Amelia.

“It's a long, strange story,” she began to explain.

“Not
that
long,” Jen said. “Monday, no dogs. Tuesday, two of 'em. So what's up with that?”

“True.”

“Hey—” Jen stopped and narrowed her eyes. “Now wait a minute.” She pulled back, looking more closely at Bryce and Amelia and squinted. Her eyes registered something as Amelia looked away.

“Ahem,” Bryce interrupted. “Where do you want the crate?”

“Coffee table's fine.” Amelia pointed. Her voice came out formal, like directing one of the staff at Sea Life.

“I'll go find a parking spot.” Bryce headed for the door.

Neither woman spoke until Bryce left and the door was shut.

“Huh.” Jen inhaled in surprise, covering her mouth with her free hand as if to muffle a scream. She then grabbed Amelia by the elbow and dragged her sideways, inching past Bryce's aquarium and down the hallway into the bedroom. Jen shut the door even though they were alone. She took Junior from Amelia too, tucking him under her chin next to his sister.

Her face was frozen into a smile as her mouth moved like a ventriloquist's, her voice barely audible.

“You guys fucked,” she said, her mouth fixed into a smile of surprise. “Don't tell me you didn't.”

Amelia looked away.