Chapter Ten #2
Billy doesn’t get mad. Instead, he laughs. “Okay, I didn’t say there was. I’m just wondering why you handed over your key to her. Don’t you two have a hate-hate thing going on?”
“Yeah.”
Billy smirks, turning the wheel off the main street and into a more residential area. “And yet, you just handed the Ice Queen herself the key to your house? Make it make sense for me, big guy.”
My fingers curl reflexively at my side. In the back seat, Mark and Maria stay suspiciously quiet, probably just as curious, but not as ballsy as Billy here. I bet he thinks I won’t punch the driver... I’m still debating. “Anyone ever tell you you’re annoying?”
He shakes his shaggy blonde hair and clicks his teeth. “Every day of my life. So, you and Tris?”
“And nosy,” I add, my jaw shifting as I work it side to side. “She’s going to let Ellie out for me. That’s all.”
Billy nods his head slowly in a way that has my whole body tensing. “Ohhhh, okay. Got it. Yeah, because you couldn’t have possibly done that yourself after this call or anything.”
Mark clears his throat in the back seat, and Maria leans forward, pointing to a house with an elderly woman waving in the front of it. “This is it,” she says.
We get out of the rig, boots hitting the road, and before grabbing our gear, I punch Billy right in the arm.
“What was that for?” He rubs his arm, but he’s fighting a grin. Despite asking the question, it’s clear he knows.
I don’t bother answering him. I don’t want to spend another second thinking about this. It’s time to do my job. At least here I can be useful and know exactly what I’m doing.
After our call, a few more come in. One is a BBQ that caught fire, the twelfth one in the three and a half weeks since the kick off of the summer here in Turtle Bay. The crew has started taking bets on exactly how many we’ll have by Labor Day.
“What do you think, Chief?” Mark asks, eagerly.
Chief fills his plate, then passes me the bowl of green beans.
It’s a custom that our crew goes grocery shopping, cooks, eats dinner, and cleans up all together.
Tonight is green beans, mashed potatoes, and BBQ chicken.
A pun that Billy couldn’t pass up after today’s call, and to his credit, they’re actually delicious.
“I think every year it’s more than the last and less than the next,” he says, sitting at the head of the table before taking a bite. “Well done, everyone. This is tasty.”
“Yeah, but I still can’t stop thinking about that bacon mac and cheese you made the other day,” Billy chimes in. “I say we make that again on Friday.”
I fill my plate and do my best to eat more than I did at lunch.
I’m too big a guy to be skipping meals. The last thing anyone wants is me walking around here hangry on top of my already, how did Callie put it?
Ah, yeah, on top of my dazzling personality.
It’s been getting easier these last two and a half months since moving here, but sometimes it feels like day one all over again.
As everyone eats and talks, I find my thoughts drifting to one of the last times I had BBQ chicken.
It was about a year ago at a firehouse just like this, but completely different.
“Boys, boys, relax! There’s plenty for everyone,” Krystal calls out across the kitchen.
I’m down the hall, doing a final check on some inventory for the rig, but it sounds like the food is ready, and despite what she said, there’s no way that Krystal made enough for this crew.
“Not if the Captain gets in here before I get mine,” Olson answers her, just in time for me to walk through the door with a wide grin because he’s absolutely right.
As soon as Krystal sees me, her beautiful brown eyes light up, and her long brown hair bounces as she rushes me and jumps into my arms, stealing a kiss.
“At least pretend like I’m your superior while we’re at work, Krys.” I try to sound serious, but her smile is so infectious that it has me giving up entirely.
“Not gonna happen.” She kisses my nose, and the crew lets out a collective mockery of ‘awws’.
Here we go.
I glare at each of them until it stops, but as soon as I look back at the woman wrapped around me, my woman, my glaring stops completely.
“I heard there was BBQ chicken.” I wiggle my brows.
She grins and hops down. Olson sets the table, and Peters places the side dishes on the table. When she reaches the stove, she looks at all of us, pulling our attention so that we’re all looking as she reveals three trays of BBQ chicken. Her specialty.
“What do you think? This enough?”
It wasn’t any special occasion, but looking back now, every moment feels special when you’d give everything for one more.
She made sure we all had more than enough, and some of the crew even took home leftovers.
She was thoughtful like that, always taking care of others before herself and going out of her way to make people’s days better.
She’d say, “Si puedes dar, das.” Which roughly translates to “If you can give, you give.” To her, it was law, the way she was raised, but to everyone else, to me, her big heart was everything. It’s the reason I’m still here.
“What do you think, Captain?” Chief asks, and I haven’t the slightest idea what he’s referring to.
“You okay?” Billy asks, his eyes dragging from mine to where my fork is in my hand, with concern written all over his face.
I stare at the folded metal in my hand.
Oops.
“What was the question?” I ask, clearing my throat and bending the mangled metal back until it almost resembles a fork again. Everyone exchanges looks, but no one says anything about it.
“They’re still discussing BBQ fires,” Maria says, waving her fork toward Mark and Billy.
Chief Mason watches me with all too knowing eyes as I try to come up with some sort of answer.
“I don’t know,” I finally say, giving up on choosing a number just to make them happy.
“Oh, c’mon. You gotta’ at least try to guess,” Billy encourages, but I frankly don’t give a damn.
“No, I don’t,” I say with finality.
Beside me, Chief exhales loudly, showing his disappointment once again, but my mind is far past the conversation at this table. These dinners are meant to make us feel like a family, but right now, they’re only making me miss the one I had with Krystal.
“If anyone needs me, I’ll be in my bunk.” I get up from the table, dumping my dinner and placing my dish in the dishwasher. I don’t want to make small talk. I want to be left alone.
By the time I make it to the living quarters and into my designated bunk, my phone vibrates in my pocket.
“To what do I owe the pleasure?” I answer.
“You sound like you’re in a good mood,” Tom says sarcastically over the line.
“The best. It’s all sunshine and rainbows comin’ out of my ass,” I say, dryly. “Why don’t you come on over and see for yourself?”
Tom chuckles over the line before letting out a long sigh. “Maybe some other time.”
“Damn, got my hopes up for nothing.” I take my shoes off and place them on the mat by my door.
The rooms are small, four simple painted white brick walls with a bed in them, but they do the job.
From what I’ve gathered, Chief is living upstairs in one of the bigger rooms with its own private bathroom.
Everything else is shared in the common areas.
“Sorry to disappoint you, but listen. I’m driving home. Do you want me to stop and let Ellie out for you before I do?”
I can hear the blinker from his truck flickering in the background. I check the time, and it’s a little after seven. Tris will have made it home by now.
“No, it’s alright. I got it covered.”
“Really? Because it’s no big deal. I could stop by, play with her, and throw the ball a few times.”
I pinch the bridge of my nose because I know Tom. He loves to help, to fix things, to make the people he cares about’s lives easier in any way he can. It’s great, but it’s also a pain.
“It’s taken care of. I’m sure she’s getting plenty of exercise.” I realize the moment the words leave my mouth that I put my foot in it.
“Getting?”
“Yeah,” I drawl.
“Care to elaborate?” I can hear the amusement in his voice through the phone.
“Not really.” I lay back on the bed, throwing my arm over my face.
“I could just go there and see for myself. Oh look,” he says, a lilt in his voice. “That’s your street, right up ahead.”
“I wouldn’t if I were you,” I warn, a smirk starting on my face as it occurs to me the trouble that Tris would give Tom for “checking up” on her and Ellie.
She’d probably chew his ear off for the trouble of answering the door.
Then again, I’ll probably get an earful as well if she thinks I sent him. “Tom, don’t go there.”
“Who’s watching Ellie, Levi?”
“She’s with Tris,” I grumble, the words tasting sour as I say them out loud.
A bark of laughter has me pulling the phone back from my ear.
“On second thought, go ahead and check on her. Let me know if she chases you off with a stick or just her bare hands.”
“Woooo,” he hollers. “That’s the last person I ever expected you to trust with Ellie. Damn, I mean, I guess it’s convenient.”
“Mhm. Is that all?” I ask, ready for this conversation to be over with before Tom starts in on more questions.
“Yeah, yeah. That’s all,” he finally relents.
“Talk soon.”
Afew hours later, I find myself tossing and turning.
I pull the thick cotton quilt off of me and roll out of bed.
I make my way to the kitchen, hoping to put an end to the relentless growling of my stomach.
It’s been so loud I half expected the guys to start banging on the walls.
Scratching at my beard, I stop when I get to the kitchen and see that the light is already on.
The chief’s head pops out from behind the refrigerator door as I get closer. “Figured you’d be back here tonight,” he laughs to himself and pulls out two containers of leftovers, handing one over to me.
“Thanks.” I grab the container and heat it up, watching as it spins around in the microwave before joining him at the long dining room table. We eat in silence until he clears his throat.
“A few years back, my ex-wife and I...” He pauses. “We lost a baby. She was about five months along. It was a little girl.”
He looks far away as he speaks, like he’s reaching for the memory instead of the feelings tied to it.
Even so, he carries the weight of a man haunted, etched in pain he can’t quite hide.
I keep eating, giving him the space he seems to need, waiting while he takes his time finding the rest of the words.
“It changed Jassenia. She withdrew into herself, and I did what I’ve always done best. I buried myself in work.
I thought after having our boy, Scout, we’d find our way back to each other, but Jay and I had become strangers.
She wasn’t the woman I fell in love with anymore, or the best friend I thought I knew.
The doctors said she has postpartum depression.
One of the worst cases they’ve seen. I didn’t know how to be there for her, so I wasn’t.
I messed up. She handed me the cake and divorce papers on my son’s first birthday.
” He leans back in his chair, stabbing the potatoes on his plate haphazardly.
The pain and weight he carries, everything I noticed the first day I met him, it all makes more sense after understanding what he’s been through.
“And now, I haven’t seen him since Christmas because his mother won’t allow me to be a part of their lives. She wouldn’t even let me see him on his second birthday this past April.”
My heart sinks low in my chest as I take in everything he’s sharing, a slow, heavy pull that leaves me feeling hollowed out, like there’s no room to breathe around it.
He puts his fork down and looks me in the eyes, making sure he has my attention.
“I didn’t lose the love of my life. Not in the same way that you did.
But I did lose my baby girl, my wife whom I loved, and unless something changes, I may lose my son as well.
” He breathes in deeply, and my whole body tenses up as I start to get a feeling that I know where this is going.
“I won’t say I know how you feel, Levi.”
“Good, don’t,” I bite out.
“Because I’m not you,” he continues, like I didn’t say anything. “I will say that I know you’re hurting and I know you’re angry.”
“Yeah? What gave it away, Chief?” I retort, glad I finished most of my food before having this conversation, because I’ve lost my appetite.
“Well, for starters, you’re an asshole, King.” There’s no anger or judgment in his tone. He’s not yelling or angry. He’s just stating an observation.
“Well, I have news for you, Chief Garrett Mason. I always have been.” I drop my fork on the table and cross my arms. “Got anything else?”
“You’re taking it out on your crew. That anger? Walking around being a sarcastic ass all the time? That would be fine if that were all it was. But you’re hurting, and hurting people, hurt people.”
I scoff, rolling back my shoulders and turning my head.
“Who the hell am I hurting?”
His lip twitches slightly up on one side, and something gentle replaces the tension in his eyes. “Yourself, King.”
Out of everything I thought he was going to say, it wasn’t that. His words send a cold shiver down to my bones, hitting me like a baseball bat to the face.
“I know I’m angry, I know I’m hurting. This—This isn’t news to me,” I stammer, feeling my pulse rise.
“No, I’m sure you’ve got that figured out. But if you continue to live in this constant state of hurt, eventually you’re not going to be able to find your way out. You’re never going to be happy.” He cleans off and places our containers into the dishwasher before heading toward the open doorway.
“Are you happy, Chief?” I ask before he walks through.
He looks down before meeting my gaze over his shoulder. “I’m working on it.”
He heads back to his room, and I listen to his footsteps as they disappear down the hall, up the stairs, and past his door.
I’m left alone, sitting at the table, reliving every second of our conversation as it replays in my head until my body begs for rest. Eventually, I give in and head back to my bunk.
Who the hell am I hurting?
Yourself, King
The conversation replays over and over as my head sinks deeper into my pillow, until finally sleep takes me, and her face is the last thing I see.