Chapter 5
“What?” I asked, even though I’d heard him perfectly.
“She doesn’t know,” he said, his smug smirk in place.
“That’s because you’re lying,” I said, walking toward my car.
“Lying?”
“Yeah, making stuff up. She’s not a lie detector.” I unlocked my car with my key fob, but since he’d followed me, I paused before opening the door and faced him.
“What was I supposed to do? We’re strangers.”
“Answer her questions honestly.”
“How could I honestly tell her what our strengths are? We don’t know each other.”
“It wasn’t the strength question as much as the actual stories you made up.
” I changed my voice to a low-pitched impersonation of him as I said, “I asked her if I could help her with flowers and she said no. She never asks for help. She gives me back rubs, and I return the favor with a solid pounding.”
He choked out a surprised laugh. “I did not say that last one.”
“You implied it.”
Tires squealed on the main street and a car honked loudly, drawing our attention. Back to me, Elijah said, “Well, it’s on the table if you’d like to offer a back rub.”
“I would not,” I said.
He shrugged. “Just letting you know.”
“Let me know less, please,” I said.
He released a low chuckle. “So what do you propose for session two if lying is not allowed?”
There wouldn’t be a second session, but Tara could tell him that, so I said, “The truth. Or as close to the truth as we can manage.”
“How?” he asked.
“Get creative.”
“Okay, fine. I accept your challenge. But if we’re going to be truthful with our new therapist, then we need to do the homework she assigns.”
I tucked the key fob I’d been clutching back into my purse. “You want to stare into my eyes every day for five minutes for the next week?”
“She’s going to ask us if we did it,” he said.
“And I’ll tell her the truth. I’ll say no, we didn’t get a chance.”
“How about we say that on the days we were together, we did?”
“Look at that, you can be creative with the truth.”
He smiled. “I still think I’m going to win.”
I opened my car door. “I wonder how you’ll look bald.”
“I wonder what song you’ll pick for karaoke,” he said.
I shut my door and pressed the ignition button.
I was more annoyed that Tara thought I wouldn’t do karaoke than I was at the idea of doing it.
Just because there were things I’d had to miss out on in high school because of home drama didn’t mean I couldn’t put myself out there.
I’d do it. I could have fun. So what if I couldn’t sing?
So what if everyone would be staring at me and judging me and wanting me off the stage? I could have fun.
I checked my phone, which showed four missed calls, then backed out of my parking spot. At the first stoplight I came to, I pulled up the first voicemail and listened.
“Hey Sutton, it’s Bailey. I know you ordered two cases of limes, but there was a distribution problem this week and I can only send one. Sorry! Hopefully we’ll sort it out for next week.”
I clicked through to the next message, which was from Raya. “Don’t let Mac tell you I was late for delivery this morning. He was five minutes early, I was five minutes late. Which is basically on time. If he wasn’t early, he wouldn’t have cared.”
I rolled my eyes and eased off the line as the light turned green. The next message played. “It’s Mac. Talk to Raya. I can’t wait around in the mornings. It gets me off schedule. Don’t make me drop you.”
“A bit dramatic, Mac,” I mumbled, flipping on my blinker.
The last message was from my mom. “What’s for dinner? Are you bringing anything home?”
I’d gone grocery shopping that morning, but I didn’t feel like cooking. Today, I would stop by Mom’s favorite fast-food restaurant—Cane’s.
I got us each a box with three chicken fingers and fries and drove home.
“Hey, Mom.”
“I took my meds,” she said.
“You what?” I asked, coming into the living room to see her sitting up on the couch, a feat that was very hard for her to accomplish alone with stitches in her stomach and one arm in a sling. “It’s not time for your meds.”
“My leg hurts.”
“Mom, you weren’t supposed to take your pills for another two hours. I told you that. It’s on the schedule.”
“It’s fine,” she said.
I contemplated whether to call the doctor, but she seemed fine. It had been four hours since her last dose. I made a note to move her pills to a high shelf in the kitchen.
“I brought you Cane’s.” I set the bag on the coffee table in front of her and reached for the television tray on the side of the couch.
My eyes collided with the framed family picture she kept on the end table from when I was ten or so.
My dad had a smile on his face as my arms were tightly wrapped around his middle, a wide smile on my own face.
My mom stood on my other side, her hand resting on my shoulder, her eyes soft and her lips upturned.
I wondered why she kept the picture there in a place where she had to see it so much.
I was tempted to tuck it into the drawer.
Or throw it across the room. Either option would work for me. I resisted the urge.
“Cane’s?” she said. “I can’t have Cane’s. The doctor said I need to avoid greasy foods.”
The doctor also told you how often to take your pain meds and not to watch television, but you don’t find those important. I didn’t say that out loud. It wouldn’t be helpful.
“I thought you went shopping this morning,” she said.
“I did,” I responded. “I’ll make you some chicken stir-fry.”
“That’s better,” she said.
I moved the bag of Cane’s to the kitchen.
It would still be my dinner. I could save her box for the next day.
I marked the pain meds onto the schedule that she had taken out of turn and moved the pills to a high shelf.
Then I picked at the Cane’s as I seared a chicken breast and washed rice and cut up vegetables.
I wasn’t the chef for our restaurant, but I had spent a fair amount of time in the kitchen with prep and development and I missed it.
I missed being in my own city, with my own space, and my really nice apartment, and a job that I felt competent in.
“Is something burning?” Mom asked from the other room.
Nothing was burning. “No!” I called back.
“The bits on the bottom of the pan are probably burning. Turn down the heat and just stir them a little. Add some more oil too.”
“I got it, Mom,” I said. “Thanks.”
When the food was done, I plated it and brought it to her in the living room with a glass of water, setting it on the tray I’d positioned earlier.
“Can you get me the salt?”
“You haven’t even tasted it,” I said.
“I just know I like salt.”
“Will you just taste it first?”
She did. She carefully selected a piece of chicken, a bit of broccoli, and a scoop of rice to sample. She chewed her first bite and nodded slowly. “Very nice, honey. Good job.”
“Thanks.”
“I’d still like some salt.”
I sighed. “I’ll get the shaker.”