11. Umbrella
UMbrELLA
CALLUM J. WRIGHT
JORDAN
Lavender. That’s the first thought I have when I begin to wake.
Warm, spring lavender fills every inhale.
With every exhale, I want to burrow deeper into the sensational weight wrapped around me.
I’m in a dream. One where the weighted blanket draped across my chest isn’t an inconsequential piece of fabric I need to help me sleep, but instead the woman who—despite my best efforts and, to my great shame—has filled my dreams for weeks.
I shift a hairsbreath and that weighted blanket mewls, pretzeling itself tighter around my waist, doing absolutely nothing to encourage me to wake up and face the day.
Then my skin pimples with awareness. A creak of the floor. The rooster crows. Which is particularly strange since I don’t own a rooster, and I don’t remember falling asleep in the barn’s loft last night.
The next, semi-coherent thought that suddenly races through my now active brain is, I’m being watched.
Squinting my exhausted eyes open, a few things become clear very quickly.
The first, I’m staring at Emory’s bedroom ceiling.
It’s wallpapered with a green base, the exact shade of her eyes, and patterns of ferns outlined in cream, something I didn’t notice last night when she’d exhausted herself with emotions after Pam’s death, and I carried her to her room.
I’d intended to leave her alone, sleep on the couch or in the barn loft like I have more than once over the last few weeks, but in a moment that I can only assume was one of her lowest, Emory wordlessly took my hand and guided me back to her bed, letting me wrap myself around her for the night.
Yeah, I hate myself.
She was vulnerable, and in a moment of weakness, I took advantage.
I shouldn’t have stayed. Shouldn’t have allowed myself to have a taste of something that I know isn’t real.
But I also cannot bring myself to move, hopelessly memorizing the way it feels to wake up with Emory in my arms. How her wild, red hair hides a portion of her face so I can only see a hint of her long eyelashes brushed against her cheek and the pink of her lips, barely open as she softly snores, breath hitting my bare chest.
Then, the second and far more alarming reality is the fact that Molly is standing beside us in her jammies, a puzzled look across her face as she stares at the state of Emory and me in her mother’s bed.
Everything that happened in this bedroom last night was innocent and totally PG, but I didn’t plan for Molly to get the visual she is now.
Her green eyes are wide and excited, though tinted red and puffy after a night of crying.
She looks like she’s gearing up to squeal, hands fisted at her chest. That, or she’s ready to jump into this bed and join us in what I just know—if any of this were real—would be the best cuddle of my entire life.
But before she can scream or launch herself under the covers, I bring my finger to my lips, encouraging her to keep quiet.
Removing myself from beneath Emory is a sad but necessary chore.
The toll the last few days have taken, emotionally and physically, are likely the only reason she stirs but doesn’t wake when I carefully slip out from underneath her, replacing my body with one of the thousands of pillows she keeps on her bed.
I’ve never understood why women seem to need so many, but I’ve got to admit, after a night of perfect sleep, I see the appeal—though I think the pillows had little to do with my contentment.
I’d spend the rest of my life in that bed. Bury me there. I never want to leave.
But, sadly, I do.
Finally, when Molly slips her hand into mine as we tiptoe down the hallway towards the kitchen—where I plan to make breakfast for both of the girls who’ve unknowingly tattooed their names permanently across my heart—I know I’ll never recover.
“You don’t have a shirt on,” is the first thing Molly says when we reach the kitchen.
“I don’t.” I feel my cheeks heat but needlessly so.
Nothing happened aside from me not wanting Emory’s bed to smell like alpaca and a life changing snuggle.
She changed into an oversized shirt and sweatpants, too, but I don’t think Molly needs all the finer details.
“I’m sorry. I can grab a shirt from my bag outside if you—”
“No!” she says. “I like it. Now I can see all your tattoos. I like the bird best. But those are pretty, too.” She points to where a pair of playing cards is tattooed on my chest. “Those are aces.”
“They are.” I nod, considering whether I should tell her what they mean to me. They’re a memory. A salute, drawn there almost ten years ago on the day Molly was born.
“My Pop plays cards with me sometimes. He says aces are the best hand to start with, but I don’t really know what that means.”
“It means, if you’re holding the aces, you’re extra lucky.”
She nods, shrugs, then looks away and down the hall towards the closed spare room. “Is she?”
“Yeah, kiddo. She is.” Kneeling down, I bring myself to Molly’s eye level and nearly fall apart when she throws herself into my arms. Comforting her comes as naturally as breathing.
Rubbing soothing circles against her back, shushing her ear, baking brownies…
giving her the entire world. I think I’d do anything if it meant I could take some of the pain away from her little, trembling body. “I’m sorry, Little Red. I’m so sorry.”
My hand, rubbing circles on her back, freezes when Molly whispers, “Ace.” She clings tighter to the hug around my neck, her tears slowing. “I’m extra lucky that you’re here with us now, Dr. Doolittle. Maybe that should be my nickname. Ace.”
“It’s perfect,” I manage, my voice cracking. I’m unsure that I’ll ever be able to use that particular moniker again, but I add in a whisper. “I’m the lucky one, though.”
I can’t say how long I stay there, kneeling on Emory’s kitchen floor, holding my best friend’s daughter in my arms and mourning the dichotomy of wishing things could be different for her and thanking God I get to be the one here with her and her mom now. Even just like this. As their friend.
Eventually, I peel myself from Molly’s tight hug and create a space for her to sit on the counter while I make a proper breakfast. From what I can tell, Molly and Emory live on a balanced diet of cereal, frozen fried foods—corndogs, chicken nuggets, mozzarella sticks—chocolate, and a daily smoothie from the hippie juice place in town.
But thanks to the yard full of chickens she has outside, Emory has an abundance of eggs.
She should be selling them, given the fact that I think their only use in this house is in the baked brownies Emory makes for her and Molly and, of course, dying livestock.
It isn’t long before I’ve foraged the refrigerator for vegetables, a feat worthy of miracle status, and I’ve made three, well-fortified omelets.
Molly kicks her feet contentedly from the counter while she eats her omelet, a new food experience I’m imagining, since she asked if she should pick it up and eat it like a pizza.
She asks for chocolate milk, and I oblige, only after she agrees to drink a glass of water first and eat one of the kids’ vitamins I found on the countertop, which for whatever reason feels important.
I already made a few, very early morning phone calls to Jack and Griffin Lovett, who I reconnected with last night, letting them know that Pam did pass and our plan to get her out of this house needs to happen as early as possible.
So I’m scarfing down my own breakfast and readying to head outside for farm chores when we hear Emory racing down the hallway.
Still in the baggy clothes she donned last night, she seems frantic as she comes around the corner and finds Molly and me in the kitchen.
“You’re still here,” she states, and it sounds like she wishes I wasn’t. Though her eyes slowly scan my torso and chest, landing on the pair of aces exactly like her daughter’s did. Something I never intended for her to see.
“Uh,” I run my hand through my hair, unsure of how to broach what happened last night or if I even should, and more than wishing I wasn’t half naked in her kitchen. “Yeah, sorry. I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
She comes closer, but only to hug Molly, kissing her forehead and whispering in her ear. Molly nods in affirmation to whatever secret conversation they’re having, before jumping off the counter and hugging me.
“See ya later, Ace,” she says, and my heart drops. Even after last night, never in a million years did I think I’d hear that nickname used again. Not by James’ daughter and especially not for me. “Thank you for the egg pocket.”
Emory bristles, no doubt remembering all the times I called James Ace, and immediately turns her back on me in favor of cleaning the dishes piled in the sink.
“Let me do that. You should eat.” I slip my hands into the sink and try to take over. “There’s coffee and an omelet with cheese and vegetables.”
She ignores me, scrubbing the frying pan and blocking me from helping.
“I know you don’t like to eat your veggies, but I think they’re hidden pretty well and—”
“I don’t eat breakfast. Thanks, anyway.” Grabbing a nearby towel, Emory steps away, drying the pan and pouring a new cup of coffee, though there’s one filled by the pot.
I’m not sure how to navigate this. Whether she’s embarrassed or angry or sad. It’s hard to say when I thought we mended something last night, but it’s clear she doesn’t want me here in the light of day.
“Emory…” I lower my voice but keep my distance so she doesn’t feel cornered in her own space. “About last night…”
“I thought you left.” She takes a sip of her coffee, back still turned to me. “I woke up and… never mind.”
You’re still here.
Her first words this morning, racing into the kitchen. Did she really think I’d leave her and Molly after yesterday? After last night…