Chapter 5 #4
Almost like she was drawn to it, she rose from the bed and headed to the window.
When she pulled back the curtains a tiny bit, she could see Blue’s house, and into the living room window.
There he was, the baby right there beside him, and he was sitting on the sofa, staring into nothing.
A fleeting thought ran through her mind: Does he ever think about me? She knew the answer to that.
When he thought about women, the women he thought about sure weren’t her.
They were younger, prettier, firmer, and didn’t look like ten miles of bad road.
She wasn’t on his radar except as a nursemaid, but she wasn’t going to hold that against him.
After watching for a minute or two, she crossed the room back to the bed and slipped under the covers.
Loneliness had become such a part of her days and nights that she didn’t know how to live without it.
But she’d sure like to get a chance to try.
Blue sent Anne a simple text before she got off work on Thursday evening: You should come over for a sec when you get home.
He wasn’t sure if she’d even see it, but in seconds she answered: Is everything okay?
That made him chuckle, so he sent back: Yeah. Surprise.
Her response made him laugh aloud: I’m worried.
He’d gotten all of the little load of laundry he’d done for Indigo’s new things folded and put away when he heard Anne’s car pull up in the drive next door. In less than a minute, she tapped on the door. “Come on in!” he called out.
“Hey! What’s up?” Anne asked. Blue turned with a smile, but it almost disappeared when he caught sight of her face.
She looked tired―really, really tired. “You okay?” he asked.
“Yeah. It’s just been a long, hard night,” she said and dropped onto his sofa.
“Long and hard?”
She nodded. “Yeah. We lost two patients tonight. A couple of teenagers in a wreck. Torn all to pieces. It was,” she said, then paused before swallowing and adding, “hard.”
Blue didn’t know what to say. It had never occurred to him that Anne saw those kinds of things at work.
He’d always pictured her with a stethoscope and a thermometer, taking temperatures from little kids and helping old people to the bathroom and back into bed.
Seeing people actually die wasn’t something he thought she did.
What should I say? he wondered, so he tried, “That’s terrible. Want something to drink?”
“No. Thanks. I want to go to bed and try to forget about everything I saw. Nobody knows…” she said and trailed off.
What would a decent person say to that? he thought to himself. He finally said, “No. I can’t say I know what that’s like. But I’m sorry you had to see it.”
She looked up at him and smiled. “You know, I think I’ll take that drink.”
“Soda or beer?”
With a laugh she answered, “Beer. Definitely beer!”
He pulled out the last one and popped the top. Well, that was it for his beer supply. He’d have to do without until he got paid, and even then he might not be able to afford any. Handing it to her, he smiled. “Here ya go.”
“Aren’t you going to have one?”
He shook his head. “Already did. Don’t need another one.” That was a lie, but he didn’t want her to turn it down just because it was his last one. She’d been more than generous with him, and he wanted to return that favor.
“Oh.” Blue watched as she took a swig and settled back into the sofa. Then she sat up straight. “Oh! What was it you wanted me to see?”
“Well,” he said, standing from the arm of the sofa where he’d been sitting, “come in here and look. I’ve been busy.
” He crossed the room to the little bedroom he’d decided to use as a nursery.
Wasn’t like there were a lot of choices―the house only had two bedrooms and he had to have one big enough for his own bed―but it was big enough for a tiny baby.
“Whaddya think?” he asked as he gently pushed the door open.
The baby bed sat against the far wall, a little mobile clamped to its end.
Its mattress sported a sheet covered in cartoon pictures of tiny sheep.
About three feet away was the rocking chair.
The rug it sat on was worn and dirty, but it helped to deaden the sound and make the room quieter.
He stood there, quite proud of himself, and looked around.
Yeah, it was shabby, but it was better than a basket any day.
“This is nice! You did a good job!” she whispered as she looked around.
“Oh, it’s not so nice, but at least she’s got a bed, and I’ve got a place to rock her.
I need to find some kind of little chest,” he said, pointing to the laundry basket full of clean and folded clothes, the very one that had been her bed until that evening.
“And a few pictures to put on the wall. And I should probably paint in here. It could use a new rug too.”
“All very doable,” Anne told him. “But you did a good job. Looks nice.”
“Thanks.” He stood there, watching his tiny child sleep, then hung his head. “Oh, hell, who am I kidding? This place is a shithole. No baby should have to grow up here,” he muttered under his breath.
Anne’s hand was warm on his shoulder as she whispered to him, “One step at a time, Brent. Don’t be so impatient with yourself.”
He sighed deeply. There wouldn’t be money for paint or a rug, or even pictures for the walls, with the next paycheck or the next or the one after that.
It was hopeless. He simply didn’t have the money to raise a child.
The credit card would be maxed out soon, and then what?
He felt Anne turn back toward the living room and he went too, pulling the door quietly closed behind him.
Anne made her way toward the front door. “Thanks for the beer. You should get some sleep. You have to work in the morning.”
“Yeah. True. See you in the morning,” he said. “Oh, wait! You have the day off,” he said and chuckled. “My boss told me to stay home tomorrow without pay because I wanted off an hour early to take Indigo to the doctor.”
Anne turned, her mouth gaping. “Are you serious?”
“Yeah. He’s a piece of shit,” Blue told her. “And he was harassing me for talking on the phone on my lunch break.”
“You need a different job,” she said, her eyes still wide.
“Nobody would want me. I don’t have any real training, and no money to get any. It’s the best I can do.”
“No. You can do better. I’m sure of it. By the way,” she said, “we need to talk about SNAP and WIC. You probably qualify for something, and that would help you with formula and cereal and stuff for her.”
Blue shook his head. “No. I don’t take charity.”
“It’s not charity. It’s designed for people who work but don’t get paid much. And you should take advantage of it. Your taxes are paying for other people to use it. You should use it yourself.”
“Yeah, well, you never had to do that,” Blue said in a huff.
Anne gave him a snarky smile and planted her hands on her hips.
“Oh, yeah? I wasn’t always a nurse. When my ex walked off, I was a stay-at-home mom.
I had no skills. My kids and I lived on pennies a month for two years so I could go to nursing school.
I got a little government assistance, but not much.
It was a horrible time for me, but I made it.
I did what I had to so my kids would have food to eat and clothes to wear.
Charity is what you give someone who can’t or won’t help themselves.
You’re not a charity case, Brent. You work hard, but you don’t get paid for what you do.
And we’re going to talk about all of that, okay? ”
He felt like such a failure. Sure, he’d never had much, but it hadn’t mattered. It was just him. Now there was a child involved, and he had to do better, but he didn’t know how. “Yeah, okay. We can talk about it,” he said. “Go get some sleep.”
Anne sighed and gave him a tiny smile, then leaned in and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “Okay. You too. Night, Brent.”
He was a little surprised, but he liked the feel of her lips on his skin. “Night.” The door closed behind her and he was alone again.
But he wasn’t alone. There was a little person in the next room who depended on him for everything. He made up his mind right then that if he had to take a day off work without pay, he was going to make it count.
In the quiet of her house next door, Anne looked in on her sleeping children. They were little angels. So was the little one next door. And Blue?
Oh, god, if he had grabbed her and kissed her before she walked out the door, she wouldn’t have been able to say no.
Everything inside her yearned to feel his arms around her, but she knew that was a silly fantasy.
She’d seen the women he’d paraded in and out of the house.
Big boobs, round asses, tight bellies. They weren’t thirty-five-year-old moms. Instead, they were girls in their twenties, beautiful girls, girls who’d turn the head of a guy like Blue. He’d never want her.
She poured herself a glass of sweet tea and sat down on the sofa in the low lamplight.
As she sat there, memories from her earlier years flooded her mind, of her and Joel, her ex, and all the things they’d done together.
He’d been such a gentleman, so kind and thoughtful.
And apparently she hadn’t been the only one he’d treated that way, scum-sucking rat bastard.
She thought about when Polly was born, how excited they’d both been when they brought her home.
Then she thought about when they’d brought Toady home, and she remembered Joel getting them in the house, getting them settled, and going out to play golf with a buddy.
He’d left her there, straight out of the hospital, with a new baby and a small child.
If her mother hadn’t been able to come and help her out, she didn’t know what she would’ve done.
But her mom had a job, and so did the rest of her relatives, and no one really had time to help her out much.
Then she’d started school, and that had been horrible.
Long hours, trying to work and go to school at the same time, running the kids here and there, leaving them wherever she could find childcare.
She’d had a good life, and then there’d been a huge rough patch before everything leveled out again.
But Blue had never had that. He’d had a rough time all his life.
What kind of person did it take to survive against those odds?
Being tough was all that had saved him. But didn’t he deserve to have things just a little easier?
It seemed the guy just couldn’t catch a break.
What if I’m his break? What if I’m the one who finally gives him a life that’s a little easier?
More than anything else, she wanted to be that person, the one he could depend on, the one who made his evenings pleasant, instead of a constant struggle to have food, clothes, and a roof over his head.
She wanted Indigo to have the support network her kids never had.
But would Brent want her to be that support network? Maybe eventually. All she could do was hope.