Chapter 5 #3
“My grandmother had an ancient box that weighed more than Lyra, but it was broken,” Silas told me. “We watch some animation. Some very good movies.” They looked at each other and both started to hum, and Lyra smiled.
“I love movies,” I said. “But not action or scary stuff.”
“No simulants,” he agreed, and I frowned.
“I love made-for-TV movies, especially the ones about the holidays,” I clarified. “They’ll start showing new ones in the fall and then I’m glued to—well, I used to watch those on my old TV.”
“But someone broke it,” she put in, and I turned to her, concerned.
“You don’t have to worry about someone coming here and breaking things,” I told her seriously. I thought that she might have been scared after she’d seen my former apartment, since I had been. I was still looking over my shoulder all the time, and I jumped at every loud noise.
“I know that no one’s coming to this house,” she said casually. “Silas wouldn’t let them.” Then she continued to eat some of the food on her plate, up until her brother had to go to work.
Before I’d moved in, he’d put her to bed early but then let her read for as long as she’d wanted while a teenager from the next block had babysat for a few hours.
But when that girl had left, Lyra had been alone in the house until he’d returned, something that I didn’t like at all.
Silas worked Thursday through Saturday at Chateau Moderne, but he was busy on the other nights of the week, too, loading at a warehouse.
He also worked days as a mover, for a company that didn’t seem exactly right to me.
I hadn’t ever looked into Michigan moving regulations, but I was aware that licensing…
anyway, he hadn’t told me to bug off when I’d asked a few questions about it, but I knew how Dax had gotten annoyed when I tried to get involved in his business. I wasn’t going to do that again.
We both walked him to the door when he left for the club, with Lyra talking a mile a minute about what they were going to do this weekend and with me listening and watching them.
They really seemed to enjoy hanging out together, and he wasn’t telling her that he would be sleeping in and then he would need to watch a football game/go shopping/play basketball.
Those were the activities that had prevented Dax from hanging out with me.
My ex-fiancé hadn’t liked it when I’d suggested that he do those things while I was at my desk at Whitaker Enterprises, and he’d gotten mad when I’d said that I wanted him to make more time for me.
But breaking into his business was hard, and he’d been tired which had made him crabby.
Despite all his various jobs, Silas was now nodding and suggesting that they could go to the library, go to the park, swim at the pool, and do a lot of other fun things together. “Write our plans in your notebook like Harriet the Spy,” he advised.
“I will. I love you, Silas,” she said, and scampered up to her bedroom. She didn’t like to watch him leave, since it made her sad.
“I love you, Ly,” he called back, and then he looked up and down the block. “My ride is late.”
I glanced over at my car, wondering if I should have let him take it.
He had followed my eyes. “No, don’t worry about it. I don’t have a license,” he mentioned. “It got revoked.”
I wasn’t an expert in criminal defense (which had been a real disappointment to several of Dax’s friends and relatives), but I did know that to get your license revoked, you had to have been in serious trouble. “Drinking and driving?” I ventured.
“No, but a whole lot of other dumbass shit,” he said.
“You know how you said that you didn’t like action movies?
For a lot of years, I went around like I was in one.
I was in the movie where the bad guy causes problems for everyone and runs from the cops a lot.
My license got revoked and I tried to get it back, but that was denied. ”
“Did you ever try again?”
“I got a little busy because a little girl came to live with me, and I didn’t think there was much chance of getting it anyway.
I’d been holding on to my car but I needed the money so I sold it, and now I don’t need the expense of a new one.
We do ok without me driving but it would be nice.
I wouldn’t be an asshole anymore, speeding and breaking the law all the time. ”
I hadn’t even considered that he would, because I had seen how he was with his sister.
He was careful and gentle, and I didn’t think he’d do anything to jeopardize her or their set-up here.
“No,” I said, but I was nodding because I agreed.
“I could try to help you restore your license, if you wanted.”
“You would?” he asked, and I nodded again. “You seem like you’re pretty good at the legal stuff.”
“How do you know that?”
“I called your bosses and pretended that I wanted to hire you away, and they told me that they couldn’t let you go because their whole damn company would implode,” he answered. I laughed, and he nodded as well. “Good, now you don’t look so nervous about me leaving.”
“Did I?”
“Yeah, you did,” Silas said. “Things are ok. I talked to your ex.”
“What? When?” I asked quickly.
“I hope you’re excited because the problem might be resolved, and not at the thought of Dax, the douche donkey.”
I swallowed, a little unsure about why I’d felt the leap of emotion. “What happened?” But as I spoke, a car sped down the block and jerked to a stop in front of us.
“Here’s my ride.” He strode to the sidewalk. “Everything’s fine,” he said over his shoulder to me. “The problem’s resolved.”
“What does that mean?” I called, but he had already gotten into the car with the bartender I recognized from the club, the man who had given me a free drink the last time I’d been there.
He looked in my direction now but Silas pointed to the road, and the car sped off.
I glanced across the street and saw Mrs. Alford standing on her porch.
She was also watching the car, and she shook her head as its tires squealed slightly as it turned at the corner.
“Hello,” I called to her, and she slowly swiveled to look at me.
I wasn’t wearing anything even vaguely inappropriate, definitely no clubwear, but I felt an urge to tug down my shorts to make them longer.
Instead, I waved and smiled. She turned again and walked inside, and I began to think that Silas had been correct about her, and that she was a real piece of work.
I also looked at the corner where he had disappeared.
“The problem’s resolved,” he’d said. What did that mean?
How had it been resolved—through violence, intimidation, a cash transfer, the threat of legal action, or a casual conversation over a beer?
And which problem had he meant? The one about the diss track?
The one about how someone (Dax?) had broken into my apartment and destroyed my things?
The one about how I was only getting older every day and how was I ever going to meet someone else when all I did was work, work out, and then come home to a little girl who didn’t like me?
Or the one about how I wasn’t even ready to try to meet someone else, because how did you get over a guy you’d been with for so long—a fricking third of your fricking life?
Obviously, I wasn’t going to solve any of those problems myself right now, at least not by standing in the doorway and starting to sniffle.
I had other things to do. I cleaned up from our dinner and then sat at the kitchen table and worked for quite a while.
It was quiet upstairs except for a soft thump now and again.
Then I also heard small feet on the stairs and Lyra joined me in the kitchen.
“Hey,” I greeted her. “Are you looking for something to eat?”
She stared at me in much the same way that Mrs. Alford did, but then she looked at the floor. “No.”
“You had a good dinner,” I said approvingly and her lower lip pushed out slightly. Was she mad? “Are you bored? Did you finish all your books?”
“No.”
I checked my phone and saw that it was getting later but we still had some time, especially since she usually stayed up much past the hour that my parents had permitted. “I was thinking about making cookies,” I mentioned, and she immediately perked up.
“Really?”
“Sure. I think your grandma must have enjoyed baking, because she has a lot of tools here.”
“They’re in the garage but they belong to Silas,” she informed me. “I’m not supposed to go in there because I could get cut or stung. There are bees.”
“No, I meant baking tools. Like measuring spoons, a rolling pin, a flour sifter. Look,” I invited, and I opened the cupboards to show her what I meant.
Then we picked out what we’d need to use tonight and we also collected the ingredients.
I’d been thinking about my own mother and how she’d won me over, and I’d already prepared for this moment.
I smiled inwardly and congratulated myself on my foresight.
As we stirred and Lyra tested the chocolate chips by eating at least five or ten, she talked to me. “Silas and I don’t bake a lot. Never,” she said.
“I learned from my mom,” I told her. “She let me bake with her, but I wasn’t allowed to touch the oven or stove on my own. Your brother will let you know when you can do this on your own, too.”
“Ok.” She helped me crack the eggs and seemed fascinated by the goo left on her fingers.
“That’s called the white,” I said, and we talked about chickens for a while.
She was equally fascinated to learn that I had grown up with them and with other animals as well, and she had all kinds of questions about horses, about cows, and especially about their poop.
She definitely stuck out her lip when I explained how dealing with that issue was just part of life.
“Were you a farm girl?” Her face twisted, like it might have been the strangest thing she’d ever heard.