3. 3
3
Will carried a large mixing bowl brimming with popcorn to the living room and spoke in his best faux-British accent, “ ‘Ere you go, yo’ majesty. ”
Starla’s ocean-blue eyes lit up with excitement, and she let out a giddy giggle. Her crooked smile warmed his heart. “Thank you!”
Snatching the large container with her small hands, she nestled into her usual spot on the leather couch and wrapped herself in a princess-patterned throw.
A few stray pieces of popcorn tumbled to the floor only to be quickly vacuumed up by Gremlin, their portly pug. Her rotund body never seemed to impede her surprising speed and timing, especially when it came to fallen food.
“What are we watching tonight, Starla?” Will sat, wrapping an arm around her.
“I don’t know yet.”
“Pick something good,” Will muttered, plucking up a few buttery kernels .
As Starla scrolled through the selections, she took a deep breath and looked at her father. “Papa, can I ask you a question?”
“Sure. Shoot,” he said, lobbing popcorn into his smiling mouth.
“What’s a gigolo? ”
As the last syllable came out of her young mouth, Will choked. “ Excuse me? Where did you learn that word?”
“Well,” she turned her body toward him, “Samantha said that her Mom said that you’re a gigolo.”
Will cleared his throat. “A gigolo… is an adult word.”
“Okay, but what is it?”
“It’s,” he thought long and hard about the next few words, “a… person who makes love with people… for money.”
“Makes love?”
He knew this conversation had to happen one day. He just hoped it would have been later …
Like when Starla was in grad school.
“Remember when you asked me where babies come from?”
“Yeah, I’m still a little confused about that.” She nodded, bobbing tendrils of her curly chestnut-colored hair with the movement .
“Well, we can talk about that more when you’re a little older, okay? The important thing is I’m not a gigolo, honey. That’s just what Samantha’s Mommy wishes I was.” Will could practically see the gears of his daughter’s mind turning.
“Why?”
“Because nobody wants to make babies with her.”
“She said that’s why you dress funny when cleaning houses sometimes. Do you need to wear a costume to make babies?”
“No, sweetheart. You don’t.” He chuckled uncomfortably. “People pay me to clean their houses in those costumes because it’s fun, and they think it’s… um… entertaining . But there is no baby-making involved, I promise.”
“Why would they say those things then?”
“Some people are so miserable that they have to make other people feel bad. Samantha’s Mom is just a bi—”
He stopped himself.
“—A bitter lady. Just ignore Samantha, okay? Samantha’s Mommy is just mad that she asked to,” he swallowed hard, “um… try to make a baby with me. But, you see, I turned her down.”
“Why?”
“Because I already have one.” He booped her on the nose with his index finger .
“Dad! You got butter on me!” She wiped her nose furiously.
The truth was Samantha’s mother, Charlotte, was Will’s first client. She had heard through Samantha about Starla’s medical issues and frequent school absences. She invited Will over to help out around her home and lawn for some extra cash.
One day, while her husband was away on business, she offered Will triple to do the work dressed as a scantily-clad cowboy, a somewhat masturbatory fantasy she’d confessed to having had for decades.
With a pile of bills from Jackson General Hospital and the cost of Starla’s new port and insulin, Will wasn’t in a position to turn the money down.
With a promise to keep quiet about the tawdry activities and to keep her hands to herself, he agreed to do lawn work and furniture assembly in the ten-gallon hat, boxers, and ass-less chaps she’d provided.
While her diamond-adorned hands never strayed from the pockets of her crochet romper, Charlotte hadn’t kept the first half of her promise. Fortunately for him, she blabbed to a gathering of her closest female friends at their next weekly book club .
Will started receiving calls from a bevy of horny housewives in the Jackson Hole area with similar offers. Within a month, he found himself rotating through a roster of opulent homes dressed in whatever costume the owner requested.
He quickly ditched the lawn work due to its lack of discretion and offered a variety of private services within the homes, executing tasks from dusting in fatigues and dog tags to cleaning dishes in scrub bottoms and a stethoscope to assembling furniture in a headband and leather jacket (a favorite among the middle-aged die-hard George Michael fans).
The costumed cleaning cost extra but soon became an honest way to earn enough dough to get the bills out of collections. Six months later, Will was able to put the minimum down payment on the modest home where he and Starla lived now.
He recalled the uncomfortable exchange with Charlotte the last time he’d seen her. She’d traipsed downstairs in a red, see-through nightgown while Will was brushing grime from the grout on her tiled kitchen island in a Trojan soldier uniform. Behind him, she slid a hand into his painted-on gold shorts and rudely helped herself to a fistful of flaccid dick .
He jerked away in repulsed horror and fired her as a client on the spot.
Spurned and vengeful, Charlotte spent the following week telling anyone in her social circle who’d listen that he’d made a pass at her .
Thankfully, that rumor backfired and only seemed to invite more business.
The allegations made his client list double in no time.
Will questioned the new career choice long before the groping, lonely mother trampled his boundaries. Having his clients fawn over him was flattering, sure, but it felt like only a small leap from costumed cleaner to prostitute. It was a leap he was not willing to make for any amount.
He knew one day when she was old enough, he would have to answer to his daughter about it all.
Thankfully, today was not the day.
“Here.” Starla handed over the remote and sighed like she’d just worked a double shift. “I don’t know what to choose. Too many options.”
Will laughed. For a six-year-old, sometimes Starla sounded like a full-blown adult. It never failed to make him laugh.
“I got just the thing.”
“What? ”
“I’ll show you a classic tonight. It’s black-and-white but bear with me. I think you’ll like it.”
“Nooooooo! Papa, those movies are so boring !”
“They’re not boring , they’re art .”
“They kiss and stuff.” She stuffed her mouth full of popcorn and spoke again as she crunched. “It’s gross!”
“Love isn’t gross. You wouldn’t even be here without love,” he added, pulling her in for a side hug. Gremlin jumped up on the couch beside them. “Plus, I love you, and that’s cool, right? That’s not gross. I love Gremlin here and—”
Before Will had time to finish, Gremlin buried her short face in the bowl of popcorn.
“ No, no, no! ”
By the time Will pulled her back, Gremlin looked like an overgrown hamster, cheeks puffy and stuffed to the brim.
“ Bad Gremlin! ”
Starla laughed as her father plucked up the voracious pug and plopped her back on the floor. Gremlin raised her front paw and batted his calf as if to plead for more.
“ Take your stinking paws off me, you damned dirty ape ,” Will growled playfully. He grimaced at the slobbered bowl in his daughter’s hands. Will took it, strode through the living room, pressed the lever on the trash can with a barefoot, and dumped the bowl’s contents. “Probably got Gremlin goober on it now.”
He started another bag popping in the microwave and then stuck his head out into the living room. “Soon as this is done, you ready to give this movie a shot?”
Starla dramatically deflated against the back of the couch. “What’s it about?”
Will suddenly wondered if he’s shown her Gone With the Wind too many times already. The kid was already picking up some of Scarlet O’Hara’s over-the-top mannerisms. “It’s about a cafe owner who has to decide whether or not to help his ex-girlfriend and her husband escape the nazis.”
“What’s a nazi?” Her small face stared up at him.
Shit. “Um, nazis are bad guys from the Second World War. They killed about six million Jewish people.”
“Woah.” Her eyes bulged. “Are they still around?”
“No.” His head bobbled a little. “I mean, I guess it depends on who you ask, but the war has been over for a while, and everything is fine… ish… now.”
“Oh. Okay.” She flicked a stray piece of popcorn off her lap and delighted in Gremlin’s intense hunt for it. Finally, the dog found it, scarfed the piece up, and eagerly licked the ghostly remnants of butter from the floorboard where she’d found it.
“Sounds a bit… boring.”
“Aww, come on. Give it a shot. It’s one of my all-time favorites .”
“Ugh…. fine. ”
Relieved the barrage of questions had fizzled, Will returned with the fresh popcorn, popped the DVD in the player, and settled back in.
“Cas-a-blay-an-ka?”
“ Casablanca .” He smiled. “You’re gonna love it.”
Twenty minutes in, Starla was asleep, snuggled in her father’s warm embrace. He stroked her hair as the plot of the romance unfolded before his eyes. It was as if he were seeing it for the first time. The movie had stirred emotions he’d not felt in the better half of a decade.
Passion.
Companionship.
Love.
The movies always made it seem so easy…
Boy meets girl. Boy marries girl. Boy and girl have a baby and live happily ever after .
His life, however, had been anything but a fairy tale. His was more like boy meets girl. Boy and girl have a baby. Girl discovers drugs. Girl leaves boy and baby for her dealer…
Starla was his life now.
He cherished all that he had but longed to have someone with whom to share it. He was stumbling through life with a daughter, one painful learning curve at a time.
Will scooped up Starla and carried her to her ballerina-themed bedroom, walls the color of Pepto Bismol. He laid her down and swiped her bangs from her cherubic face. He’d nearly made it back to the door when Starla stirred.
“Papa?” she cooed.
“Yeah?”
“You gotta do it like a burrito.”
He laughed, understanding what it meant. He returned to her side, tucking the covers atop her in snugly on both sides until she was encased in a snug wrap.
“Thank you,” she muttered with a yawn, extremities tucked in tightly to her sides as if rolled in a soft tortilla shell.
“You’re welcome. I love you. Get some sleep.”
“Love you, too.” She blew him a comically loud kiss, and Will left the room, leaving the door ajar .
Walking back down the hallway to the living room, he was struck by the wall of lonely, almost deafening silence. He settled back into the couch and pressed play on the remote. As the classic film roared back to life, he glanced at the precariously-balanced stack of films on the TV stand. Every tale full of romance and new adventure. People taking risks, baring their souls, clutching on to old love letters, seeking out a soulmate in a single glass slipper, holding boomboxes on suburban streets, and chasing moving trains all in the name of love.
Will wondered if he would ever find a love worth fighting for. A woman who completed him. A romance that John Hughes would pounce on the movie rights to.
As Casablanca droned on, he fed Gremlin a handful of cold popcorn and tried to shake the gnawing and pointless notions from his mind. Who was he kidding? He was no prince with a castle waiting to sweep a beautiful stranger off her feet.
He was just a shirtless Cinderella, scrubbing floors in off-season Halloween outfits to afford insulin and a mortgage on a two-bedroom house with a crumbling back porch.