Chapter 6 #2
Bane scowled at him, but in all actuality, understood it.
Janie had been the same way and he’d had to be extra gentle to win her over.
Bane stepped up right beside Daisy and waved a hand in her field of vision.
She immediately stopped edging and released the trigger on the edger, then reached for one of her ear pods to remove it so she could hear her father. “You got company.”
“What?” she asked, realizing only when he stepped away from her that Charlie was standing behind him, and Carson was sitting on the tractor. “Oh, I didn’t know you were coming by today.”
“I didn’t either,” Charlie said as she fumbled with her phone to turn off the music, took out the other ear pod and dropped them both into her pocket.
“Carson has been begging me since we got home from having dinner with your family the other night to come back. I told him it wasn’t nice to come by uninvited, but he pointed out that your mom and dad said any time.
So, after much more begging on his part, here we are. ”
“I see,” Daisy said, smiling at him, but still feeling a little uneasy now that the initial surprise had worn off.
“I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. We just thought we’d say hi, and see if maybe you might want to go have a late lunch with us.”
“It’s almost 2:00 in the afternoon. I ate lunch two hours ago,” Daisy said.
“Nothing says you can’t have an afternoon snack while two of your favorite friends gorge themselves on whatever it is you’d like to have.”
Daisy smiled.
“Go have something to eat, Daisy. Get out from under us,” Bane said, as he walked by, headed back toward Carson with a pair of noise reducing ear muffs in his hand.
“I have work to do!” Daisy called out as he got further away. “And I promised to go check on Emmalyn later.”
“Didn’t you say Everly got her some meds?”
“Well, yeah.”
“And that Bam cooked enough for two days, even if Barron eats, too?”
“That’s not the point, Daddy.”
“Sure it is. Go do something for you. Charlie, go take her away from here. Make her have a good time.”
“Yeah, come have fun with me and Carson…” Charlie started.
“Nope. Carson is staying with me. We got yard work to do. You and Daisy go, do something not involving kids, and not involving parents.”
Daisy stood almost motionless, trying to determine when her father became such a dictator. Her gaze traveled hesitantly to Charlie, who seemed crestfallen.
“You know what? You don’t have to. It’s alright, I understand,” Charlie said.
She sighed. “No, you don’t understand. But if you want to know, I’ll tell you at least some of it.”
“I’d like to get to know you, Daisy. But if you’re not interested, all you have to do is say so. I’m not unreasonable. Fair warning, though. Carson has decided your dad is some kind of god worthy of hero worship. We may be around from time to time anyway. I hope we can be friends.”
“That’s not it at all, Charlie. It’s just…” she looked away for a second, then back to him, her expression almost afraid. “I’m broken. I don’t know how to fix me.”
“Tell me how to help,” he said.
“I’m not sure you can help. I may be like this forever,” she confessed, her voice going softer and quieter.
“You, just like this, is just fine with me. But I’d like you to be really happy. So if I can help you get to that point, just tell me what you need.”
“You are far too nice to me,” she said, smiling at him.
“I’m just being me. Trying to let you know that I really, really like you. I care about you and I haven’t cared about anyone in a long time. I was raised to be honest, and to let people know when they matter to you. You matter to me.”
“For now,” Daisy said with a snicker, trying to make light of the moment.
“For always, Daisy.”
Daisy’s smile faltered and the lawn tractor with her dad and Carson riding it came back up and made the turn to head back down the field toward the tree line.
She watched them as they made the turn, laughing as Carson put his whole little body into turning the tractor.
As they started back down the field, following the pattern they’d begun, she brought her attention back to Charlie. “Where is Carson’s mother?”
“She passed when he was just a toddler.”
“So, you’re telling me she’s really gone.
There won’t be anyone popping up claiming to be your wife or fiancée, hurling insults at me and threatening me, passing out photos of me and him and leaving them on all the windshields of the vehicles everywhere I frequent, with home-wrecker written across them in red? ”
His face went from genuine care to anger in about 2.4 seconds. “Is that what happened? Who the hell did that to you?”
“It doesn’t matter anymore. I’m just so afraid to trust anybody. I believed him when he said he was divorced. But he wasn’t. He was still very married and I fell for it all. I was such a fool,” she said, her eyes filling with tears she fought furiously to blink away.
Charlie stepped closer to her and placed a single finger beneath her chin, lifting her face so she’d look into his eyes. “First, I need to make sure that you’re alright. Then I need to pay this sonofabitch a visit.”
“I just want them to forget about me,” she begged. “If they find me here, she’ll humiliate me here, too.”
He shook his head as he pulled her in for a hug, holding her to him, but gently, without pressure.
“You’re going to be happy again, no matter what that takes.
I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t hoping it was me in some form or fashion, but even if it’s something or somebody else, if that’s what you want, that’s what you’re going to get.
Anything it takes. Then I’m going to find a way to make him pay, and his psycho wife, too. ”
“I just want to forget.” She took a step back, away from him and he let her go. “I already left everything behind and came home. I don’t want to have to leave home, too.”
“You won’t. And I mean what I said. You’re going to be happy again. That’s our mission — no matter what it is that makes you happy. And we’re starting with food. Now. You ready?”
Daisy laughed softly. “You’re stubborn, you know that?”
“I’ve been told that before. I prefer to think of it as persistence. Seriously, though. No expectations. Just someone who cares about a very kind lady, taking that very kind lady out to relax and eat and just have no worries for a while. When you want to come back, we will. Deal?”
She smiled and shook her head. “Okay. Deal.”
“What do you want to eat?”
“Surprise me.”
“I was thinking steak. I found a great steakhouse on the other side of town during the week. If you don’t like beef, they have other things, too.”
“Are you kidding? I adore steak! Let me trade these shorts for jeans and I’ll be right back,” she said as she turned and started up the steps.
“I’ll be right here,” he said. “But don’t forget I’m starving!” he called after her.
Daisy hurried inside closing the door hard as she rushed through the living room.
“Do not slam the door, Daisy!” Janie called out.
“Sorry! I’m in a hurry,” Daisy answered.
“Why are you hurrying?” Janie asked, her voice raised so Daisy could hear her from the living room.
“I’m going to eat with Charlie! He says he’s starving,” Daisy said with a laugh.
Almost immediately Janie was standing in her doorway, tapping on her closed bedroom door. “Can I come in?!” Janie asked, her mouth pressed to the seam of the door.
“I’m changing!”
“I know, but I have questions!”
Daisy laughed. “Fine.”
Janie opened Daisy’s door and slipped in, closing it carefully behind herself.
Daisy was wearing a pair of jeans, and was in the process of pulling on a shirt, then tearing it off and tossing it to her bed. “I can’t find anything I like!”
“Have you tried your brown one, with the brown sequins on the edges and the fringe over the waistline?”
“It ties in the back, though. It might come loose,” Daisy said.
“Seriously? If I tie it, it won’t come loose. You just don’t want to wear it.”
“I like it. I just don’t want to make too much of a big deal and make him to think it’s a date.”
“Daisy, honey?” Janie said, catching the next shirt Daisy tossed toward the bed. “Is it a date?”
Daisy stopped searching her closet and looked back at her mother. “I think it could be. If I let it.”
“I think that young man would be thrilled to take you on a date. It doesn’t mean you have to marry him. But he seems really nice. And your dad thinks highly of him. I mean, how often is that going to happen?” Janie asked.
Daisy laughed. “Never.”
“I’m just saying, take your head out of the equation just for a minute. What would you feel good wearing?”
Daisy smiled at her mother and pulled on the brown shirt with the sequins edging it, and the fringe.
She turned her back to her mother and waited while it was tied in a snug knot at the spot her bra strap would sit, if she was wearing one.
This shirt didn’t allow for one. She pulled her pony-tail holder out and shook out her long wavy dark hair, then turned around to face her mother. “What do you think?”
“Gorgeous!”
“You sure?”
“Not a doubt about it,” Janie said. She watched as Daisy pulled on her favorite beat to hell pair of light tan cowboy boots, checked her reflection one more time, then kissed her mother and ran out of the room.
“Be careful, baby!” Janie called after her.
“I will!” Daisy called back.
Janie went into the living room and to the front door that had just been slammed again as Daisy left. She opened the door and walked out on the porch to watch them leaving. “Y’all have fun!” she called out.
Charlie and Daisy looked back quickly, waving at her just before Charlie helped her into his car, then closed the door before walking around to the driver’s side.
Janie continued to watch as the young man made a U-turn in the road between theirs and Bam’s houses and drove away. Once they were out of sight, she closed her eyes, and whispered a small prayer. “Please, God, let him make her so happy that she’ll never think of anything else again.”