Chapter 6
Not Looking Like That
Mia
It didn’t take long for news of PoCo’s hockey star’s return to get around. And like usual, I found out from Cora.
I’d started an assignment this week working nights.
It was a short-term placement with someone who’d had a hip replacment, and I was hoping to be assigned a day shift by the time school was out for the summer.
It was hard to sleep while Arne was home.
Cora was supposed to help Mom keep an eye on him, but she wasn’t reliable.
And Mom had the best of intentions, but she was limited in what she could do.
I came in from my shift late enough that I’d missed Arne getting off to school.
Mom had texted that he’d made the bus. With that concern dealt with, I was ready for a small meal and as much sleep as I could get.
Mom and Cora were sitting at the table in the kitchen.
I opened the fridge to grab juice and make sure Arne’s lunch was gone.
Okay, points to Cora. Mom was having a bad day, so Cora must have gotten him packed and to the bus stop.
“Thanks for taking care of Arne.” I dropped into a chair, pouring juice into a glass. Drinking coffee now would make sleep impossible.
“He has his lunch, his homework, and his pj’s for dressing up. I wish I could wear pajamas to school.”
I considered. “Maybe you could. Is it against the dress code?”
Cora rolled her eyes. “I wasn’t serious.” The stupid was understood at the end of that sentence.
I turned to my mother. “How are you?”
She shrugged, smiling. “Oh, you know.” That was code for not good but not complaining.
“When do you see the doctor again?”
She waved a hand. “Next month. It’s on the fridge.”
Cora rolled her eyes at the ridiculousness of using an old-school calendar, but Mom never missed her appointments, and Cora often did.
“I can give you a massage, if you want.” There wasn’t a lot I could do for her, but sometimes a massage helped.
She patted my hand. “Maybe after you sleep. You must be tired.”
I was always tired.
“Mom, we have to tell her,” Cora interrupted.
I straightened in my seat. “Tell me what?” Was it about Arne?
Mom frowned at Cora, but it didn’t do any good. Mom was usually in too much pain to do much disciplining. Cora and Dorian were only too happy to tell me I wasn’t in charge of them. Unless Bruce stepped in, which he did only occasionally, they were mostly free to do as they wished.
Cora looked out of the corner of her eyes at me. “Your ex is back.”
“Erik?” Why? Had he gotten an acting job up here? They shot a lot of shows in Vancouver. He owed child support and had been avoiding my calls for the past couple of months, so I didn’t know what he was doing.
She rolled her eyes. “Not that loser. The hockey player.”
I set my glass down again carefully. “Justin? Justin Johnson?” It had been most of eleven years since I had any claim on Justin.
“He was just here for his grandmother’s funeral.
Why would he be back so soon?” I didn’t need more talk about our local celebrity when Arne was getting interested in hockey.
“No idea. But he’s staying at his grandmother’s house. She didn’t die there, did she? Because that would be groooooss.”
My heart thumped at the news, but my brain answered Cora’s question. “No, she was in a home the past couple of years.”
“She was a lovely person,” my mom added.
She was. She was the only member of the Johnson family I’d had any contact with since Justin and I broke up. Justin’s twin Jess had been here, but we avoided each other.
Cora shuddered. “At least he’s not staying in a house where someone died.”
Lots of people did, especially now that people were more interested in ending life in their own home, but no need to further upset Cora’s delicate sensitivities.
Ours was an older house—it was possible someone had died here.
It would have been fun to tell her that, but I didn’t have the bandwidth to deal with the ensuing theatrics.
“He’s probably just here to check the place out. Then he’ll be gone again.” Justin had never stayed before. Mrs. Johnson had told me that Jess took care of any business that came up for her.
But Cora was shaking her head. “Nope. Someone in my English class said her aunt works for the company that takes care of the house and he had them stock up on groceries. Like, a lot.”
That didn’t sound good. Unless, maybe Jess was coming too?
Cora smirked at me. “You want to go say hi to him? You’re single, he’s single—maybe you could keep him this time. I bet he makes a lot of money.”
If it wasn’t so horrifying a thought, I’d laugh at her optimism.
I was eleven years older, with a kid. I didn’t have time to keep my hair colored and trimmed and I didn’t have money for expensive clothes.
The ties that bound me here, that had split us up eleven years ago, were thicker now than they’d ever been.
“Cora,” Mom admonished. “Your sister isn’t like that.”
Exactly. Well, money was part of what ended us, but it was all woven in with family.
Mom cocked her head, frown lines crossing her brow. “Cora has a point. You might run into him somewhere while he’s here.”
I’d have to be careful where I went, if Justin was sticking around. Not that we weren’t totally over, but I’d been happy that we never had to do the awkward meetings in the grocery aisles or run into each other on dates at the same restaurant. Like I had time and energy to date now either.
Cora smirked. “Yeah, better to run into him accidentally. But wear makeup and do something with your hair first.”
“I didn’t mean that,” Mom said. “But she should be prepared.”
The orange juice sat heavy in my stomach.
Justin’s grandmother’s house was only half a kilometer away.
We might see each other. I didn’t like the way Mom and Cora were staring at me.
Imagine if I came around a corner in the grocery store and bumped into him, with every eye watching us. What if Arne was with me?
No, I didn’t want to imagine what might happen. What the hell was Justin doing here? I really needed to know. And not in a “my friend’s brother’s sister heard” kind of way from Cora. I wasn’t going to get much sleep with this hanging over me. I might as well ask the source and get this settled.
I pushed to my feet. “I won’t be long.”
Mom’s eyes widened. “Are you sure?”
I nodded.
“Noooo! Not looking like that.” Cora’s voice trailed after me.
I refused to shower and dress up. Justin and I were done, and I wasn’t going to even try to impress him.
It was a three-minute drive to Mrs. Johnson’s house. Long enough for me to second-guess myself. Cora’s information was that the house had ordered groceries, but not whether anyone was there yet. I was tempted to turn around, but I’d sleep better knowing he wasn’t there.
I rounded the last corner to see a strange car in the driveway. I pulled to the side of the street in front of the house. Was this stupid? If he was only here for a couple of days, or if it was Jess, not him, then I could rest.
A long breath, and I got out, shutting the car door. If it was, say, a real estate agent, I’d look like an idiot. But that was still better than running into Justin unexpectedly.
I’d just started up the sidewalk when the screen door opened and a man stepped out.
Tall, broad shoulders, messy brown hair and a full bushy beard. Familiar blue eyes that locked on mine. My heartbeat picked up the way it always used to, whenever I saw him, since that first day in science class.
He was wearing sweats and a T-shirt, one hand in a cast covered with scribbles, and a bandage on the other wrist. I was too aware of my own appearance, hair falling out of my ponytail, wrinkled scrubs, no makeup. There’d be dark circles under my eyes and my lips were chapped.
What did I think I was doing?