Chapter 1 #2
Vince smiled back. He couldn’t help himself. “I hope I’ll see you again,” he offered up, but instead of answering, this time she turned and gave him a brief wave over her shoulder before disappearing down the hall.
Crap. It didn’t look like Lace was as interested in him as he was in her.
That wasn’t something Vincent normally had to worry about. Women, in his experience, practically salivated over him and threw themselves at his feet. With his broad shoulders and his Sothard good looks, he…
Double crap. How could he have forgotten? He was dressed head to toe in a polka-dot, clown moo-moo that disguised his toned physique. And his face was slathered in white, oil-based grease paint, with a large, red honker of a nose, front and center. Of course she hadn’t seen how handsome he was.
Vincent wanted to groan. Of all times to be dressed in clown-garb, did it have to be when his libido had finally stirred, signaling actual interest in a woman after at least a year’s hiatus?
It figured.
But he couldn’t wallow in regret. He still had a job to do.
And he had to stop being a freaking pussy about it.
Taking one last, longing look to where Lace had turned a corner and disappeared, Vincent pulled up his big-boy-boxers and headed back toward the pediatric chemo-suite.
He could do this.
Vince didn’t know if it was the semi-pep talk he’d received from the two professionals in the hallway, or if having faced things in this room once, he was simply better equipped for his feelings the second time around.
But with his renewed attempt at “clowning”, Vince was actually able to put his trepidation aside and throw his whole heart into really making the kids laugh.
That one child, in particular, if he were being honest.
She was tiny thing, like a pixie, but with no hair, no eyebrows, pale, and…alone?
That last bit seemed odd. She looked to be the only kid in the room who wasn’t accompanied by at least one adult.
Still, despite her isolation, she’d given up some serious giggles over Vincent’s antics, as if he was the funniest clown she’d ever seen.
He might have been hamming it up a little extra for her, but the reward of her smiles was enough to have him pulling out tricks he hadn’t attempted in years; paper umbrellas from her hair, a stuffed rabbit up his sleeve, and that snazzy hat-roll up his arm? Yup. He’d nailed it.
Vince had also gotten the okay to bring in balloons today—something he’d practiced ad nauseum when he was younger—and after making a dog for one kid and a dinosaur for another, the little sprite of interest had asked for something he’d never attempted before.
That was how he found himself making a very complex blob fish.
Vince had to look up the damned thing, on the sly, on his phone, but right now he’d have to say he was killing it. And if her excited face was any indicator, the small-fry agreed.
Two more twists, and…
“Here he is, my little princess. Blobby,” Vincent expounded with a flourish as he presented her with her fish.
Not bad, if he said so himself. He’d even managed to give the thing large, pink lips.
“Thank you,” the girl said, shyly, holding the balloon creation like it was gold. “He’s pretty. I’ll keep him forever, Mr. Clown.”
Right. Mr. Clown.
Vincent figured it might be time to attempt his new name, and who better to help him cement it. “I tell you what. Why don’t you call me Cenzo. Cenzo the Clown,” he offered. “I’m trying that out for size today. What do you think?”
She pursed her lips and shook her little head.
Not going to cut it, huh?
“Uh, uh. You need a name that ends in O,” she told him sagely. “Good clown names end in O. Like Pogo, or Pippo.” Her face took on a definitive cast. “Or like my favorite Sesame Street characters, Elmo and Gonzo.”
Vincent tried to maintain a straight face, which was tough, because she seemed to be taking this very seriously.
She stroked her balloon fish absently while she continued to think. “For you…? You’re big and puffy in your clown suit,” she continued speculatively. “Almost fluffy…”
Her eyes lit in an “aha” moment, and Vincent couldn’t wait to see what she’d come up with.
“Fluffo,” she told him conclusively, breaking into a huge smile. “Fluffo the clown.”
It wouldn’t have been Vincent’s first choice, but it was good enough, and there was absolutely no way he was going to disappoint this little fairy of a girl.
“Wow. I’d say you’ve picked the perfect name for me,” he told her solemnly, sticking out his hand. “Fluffo the clown it is, and I’m very pleased to meet you…”
Vincent paused, waiting for her to fill in her name.
“Inez,” she said a little shyly now, placing her small hand quickly in his before snatching it back. Apparently, her burst of creativity had been the extent of the courage she could muster, because all of a sudden, she shrank back.
“Inez. That’s a beautiful name,” Vince told her, trying to draw her back in.
What was it young kids liked to talk about these days? Siblings? Pets, maybe? He’d give it a try. “Do your siblings and pets have pretty names like yours, too?”
Instead of enthusiasm, Inez’s face almost crumpled in on itself as she shook her head.
“What?” Vince prodded gently. “No brothers or sisters?” he asked. “No pets?”
“I don’t have a real family. Yet.” She spoke with her head down, almost mumbling into her pink sweatshirt until she’d flashed a little fire saying that last word.
While Vincent wondered what she meant, she gave him an explanation that laid herself bare. “I live with some foster brothers and sisters in a new house,” she explained. “When I got cancer, my other fosters couldn’t take care of me anymore, so I got moved.”
Vincent’s heart nearly broke.
This poor little thing was undergoing some of the roughest shit imaginable, while simultaneously being thrust into a new living situation to accommodate the grown-ups who were supposed to have been advocating for her.
Vince began getting hot under the collar, which didn’t diminish in the least as he looked around. “So… Who’s here with you today? Your new foster parents?”
Inez shrugged, her hands running over her blob fish. “The social worker lady picks me up every week and brings me here. My new foster parents have so many kids, they can’t take time to be at the hospital.”
Vincent tried hard to cut the fosters some slack since they were doing a good thing by opening their doors to needy kids, but the agency professional who was paid to do shit like this? Not so much.
“Where is she now? Your social worker lady?” Vincent asked, trying to keep the anger out of his voice. He was steamed, wondering what kind of unfeeling bitch could just leave this child here to deal with things on her own while she…what? Went for coffee?
Inez answered pragmatically. “She drops me off, then the nurses call her when I’m done so she can come get me,” Inez told him matter-of-factly.
“So, there’s no one here with you? Ever?” Vincent almost didn’t recognize his own voice; it was so choked with emotion.
“No, but the nurses are really nice,” Inez continued. “They give me juice and cookies.”
Juice and cookies.
Those words were said as if that was all little Inez ever expected to receive from the world.
His heart bled.
Surely, there was something he could do.
He might be a single man who would never be considered as an appropriate foster father…
Or would he? That was something Vince was going to look into.
But, that aside, surely no one would stop his clown persona from coming in to “entertain” Inez while she underwent her chemo treatments. He wanted to be there for her.
First things first, however. He needed to find out Inez’s infusion schedule.
And… if it happened to coincide with some of the shifts from his mystery woman in scrubs, all the better.