The house was old, built back in the ’50s, so there was no great room. No cathedral ceilings. It was segmented into small rooms that, unfortunately, separated its occupants. But it worked for Ethan and me because it was just the two of us and we liked to hang together.
The renters before me had dogs that didn’t behave, so the carpet was new. Not even close to top of the line, but it was still clean and I took care of it so it looked nice.
The hall off the side to the left led to two bedrooms, a utility room, and a bathroom that Ethan and I shared. My landlord had let me paint Ethan’s room blue and it was decorated in boy. My room was a continuation of the boho feel but super-charged, painted a subdued turquoise and stuffed full of stuff, from furniture to knickknacks to pictures.
The door off to the right led to a kitchen that wasn’t all that big, but it was big enough to put a relatively nice kitchen table in it, which also worked for Ethan and me. We didn’t need a fancy dining room table (or dining room). Not for just him and me.
No one would be banging down my door to beg me to let them take pictures for some decorator’s magazine. But I liked it. It was me. It made me feel safe and comfortable and like I’d accomplished something. It surrounded my kid in me, hopefully making him feel the same way, but also showing him he should be himself and get off on that no matter what that was and no matter what anyone thought about it.
I could tell by the look on Trent’s face that he was uncertain about all of that.
I didn’t give a fuck. I’d never been to Trent’s house, but knowing his wife, I pictured doilies.
“You wanted to talk?” I prompted, and he looked to me.
“Yeah, you got any coffee?”
Recovering addicts and their coffee.
Shit.
I walked to the kitchen feeling Trent following me and trying not to think of Merry.
I achieved this miraculous feat but only by allowing thoughts of Trent to leak in. How he’d sorted his shit out after he left me. How he’d been clean and sober now for nine years, with his woman for eight, married to her for seven, and devoted to her and their daughter and newborn son.
And how he had not given any of that shit to Ethan and me.
Though, now he gave it to Ethan. Coming to me first to “touch base” and “make sure all’s good after that crazy guy went on a rampage.”
That had eventually led to the disclosure of his real purpose for seeking me out—he wanted to meet Ethan and he wanted Ethan’s new little sister to know she had a big brother.
Possibly more than all that, Trent wanted to make his wife happy.
For my part, I did not want anything to do with any of his shit. He’d bailed, he could stay fucked off for all I cared. I went from waitressing at a shit bar to stripping because I needed the money to take care of my kid. I ate shit and paid big with anyone I knew to get them to help me out, watching Ethan when me or my mom had to work. I took money from my buddy, Ryan, knowing that he would never get in there with me, even if he didn’t hide it real good that’s what he wanted, just because I needed his cash so fucking bad.
And I’d been blinded to a man who treated me right, who made me feel special, who doted on Ethan, a man who I was certain was a good man.
A man who turned out to be a madman.
But it wasn’t about me. Trent was clean and sober, had a solid job and a family.
It was about Ethan.
I’d asked my kid. He’d hidden he was over the moon excited at the prospect of finally having a dad.
But I caught it.
So I’d let it happen.
A couple of short meets, attended by me, moved into a couple of dinners, also attended by me.
Then, when it came clear Trent actually had pulled it together, his wife Peggy was an okay woman, and Ethan enjoyed being with them, I let them take him alone. Eventually, this led to him spending the night or entire weekends.
Ethan dug it, albeit cautiously. He’d not had a dad for a long time and he was my boy, so he was smart enough not to go all in.
And he loved the big family he had now, what with me and Mom; Feb and Colt and their kid, Jack; Feb’s brother, Morrie, his wife, Dee, and their kids; Feb and Morrie’s mom and dad, Jack and Jackie (the J&J of J&J’s), as well as all they brought with them. Then there was my girl Vi, her man, Cal, and their kids; Colt’s colleague Mike and his woman, Dusty, and all that came with them; Feb’s besties, Mimi and Jessie, who’d adopted me right along with everyone else.
In other words, I’d done what I needed to do. I’d traveled a lonesome road paved with shit and snipers aiming at me from each side, but I got my kid what he needed.
A nice house in an okay neighborhood in a small town (mostly) filled with good people. And a big family who gave a fuckuva lot more than a passing shit.
Add Ethan’s birth dad and his growing family, and my boy, sweet and social, was in seventh heaven.
I was not.
Ethan never knew that and he never would.
Thinking on this was not much better than thinking about Merry, so I quickly made Trent a cup of joe the way he liked it. I nuked it, since I’d turned off the half-empty pot before I took off to slam my head against the brick wall of my life. When the microwave dinged, I handed him the mug and leaned a hip against the counter across the room from him, leveling my eyes on him.
“What’s up?” I repeated my question of earlier.
Trent took a sip and put the coffee on the counter beside him.
Not granite counters. Not marble. No fucking way. There wasn’t a granite, marble, or trendy cement counter within a five-block radius.
Mustard-yellow, old-style Formica. This matched the fridge and the stove, both having been in that house since America celebrated its bicentennial.