“What are you doing here?” I asked as I folded my arms in front of me when I saw him standing there at the front entrance.
“I was worried about you. You didn’t come home last night,” he said as he swung his bottle of sambuca around.
“I did come home, and you were passed out on the couch. I went to bed, and this morning I got up and came to work.”
“You didn’t even say goodbye or tell me you loved me,” he said as he started to cry.
“Mike, you need to go home now,” I said, infuriated.
“But Alex, baby, I love you,” he said as he reached out to grab me and pull me closer.
“Go home,” I said, pushing him away as he lost his grip on his bottle of sambuca and it poured all down the front of me. “Now look what you’ve done. I’m serious, Mike, go home.”
I turned and walked back upstairs. Dealing with Mike was like dealing with a small child. He just wouldn’t listen. His drinking had gone too far. Now he was coming to my work all tanked up, and God only knew what would be next.
“Everything okay, O’Neil?” Billings asked when I walked back in.
“You could say that,” I replied, still trying to get used to the stench that now filled the air around me.
“What the hell happened to you?” Anderson asked, looking at the stain down the front of my shirt.
“My husband, that’s what happened,” I said, shaking my head. I looked at the stain, trying to figure out how I was going to make it through the day.
“I have an extra shirt in my car,” Carmella offered.
“Do you guys care if I use the shower?” I asked. “I’m meeting a friend for lunch and...”
“You stink,” Anderson said. “Go ahead and use the shower.”
Carmella brought me her extra shirt and helped me find towels. I couldn’t wait to get under the hot water and wash the stench of the sambuca off. Goddamned Mike. I couldn’t believe he did that. His drinking had been out of hand for some time, but not like this.
It had been a gradual buildup. At first he started drinking earlier in the day, then he was drunk all the time, and then his speech was constantly slurred. Now it had come to this; now I stunk because of him.
As the hot water eased my stress away, I let the shampoo and soap work their magic. When I felt confident that all traces of the offending alcohol were gone, I opened the shower door and reached for the fluffy yellow towel that Carmella had grabbed for me.
It was so soft against my skin, and I felt so relaxed, more than I had in days. Part of me just wanted to stay in there, but I knew I had to go back out, so I reached for my clothes. But they weren’t where I left them. My eyes darted around the room, trying to figure out if I had set them somewhere else and forgotten, but they were nowhere else to be seen.
Wrapping the towel tightly around myself, I got up and started searching the room, hoping to find them somewhere, anywhere. Good God, I thought. I can’t go out there in front of all of them like this.
No matter how hard I searched, I couldn’t find any of my clothes, not even a sock. I closed my eyes and pulled the towel tighter around myself. Goddamned jerks, I thought as I tilted my head to the side and gathered my confidence before walking back out to them.
“Where are my clothes?” I asked, quietly at first.
Every one of them turned and looked at me. I could feel their eyes giving me the once-over from my feet up to my face. There wasn’t an inch of my body that their eyes didn’t fondle. Thank God for the towel. I was surprised they at least left me that.
“I said, where are my clothes?” I was a little louder that time.
“Getting a little cold there, O’Neil,” Billings said as he chuckled.
“No, I just want my goddamned clothes,” I said, starting to get upset.
“You know, you’re cute when you’re angry,” Anderson said with a laugh.
“Guys, give her her clothes,” Chance said. “Enough is enough.”
Billings handed me my clothes and I turned and headed back to the shower to get dressed. Goddamned animals, I thought to myself. No wonder most of them aren’t married.
After I was dressed, I went back out there holding my head high. I wasn’t about to let them win the battle of the sexes. I was a confident woman, despite the fact that they’d just tried to humiliate me.
“You’re pretty quiet,” Billings said as I poured my coffee.
“Hmm,” I answered.
“Giving us the cold shoulder, are you?” Anderson asked.
“Leave her alone,” Carmella said. “Can’t you see that she’s having a bad day?”
“And the last thing I need is you guys trying to humiliate me,” I added.
“Humiliate you?” Billings asked. “We aren’t trying to humiliate you.”
“Then why the hell did you guys take my clothes and make me walk out here naked?” I asked.
“You didn’t walk out here naked, sweetie, but I wish you did,” Anderson laughed. “It happens to all of us when we come to work here. We never had a chance to do it to you before because you don’t live here with us. We were trying to make you feel like one of the guys, but I guess it backfired.”
All of a sudden I felt like an idiot. They weren’t harassing me or trying to humiliate me at all. They were trying to give me everything I’d been missing out on and I didn’t even realize it. I felt so bad for tearing into them.
“Aw, thanks, guys,” I said. “I had no idea.”
“Consider yourself initiated,” Billings laughed.
“So, who are you going to lunch with?” Anderson asked.
“An old friend. My best friend, actually. We went to high school together.”
“We’ll miss you here. It’s coleslaw day and it’s always a treat to see the strings hanging out from between your teeth,” Billings chuckled.
I choked on my coffee at his remark and it flew from my mouth onto Chance, who was sitting across the table from me for a change.
“Don’t say things like that when my mouth is full,” I laughed.
“Do you provide towels with your showers?” Chance asked.
“Sorry, no towels or clothes,” I said as I got up and grabbed my purse.
***
I sat at The Wooden Spoon waiting for Allison. It was a tiny little diner, but it had been our favorite lunch spot for years. Over time, many different people had owned it, but they never changed the name.
It wasn’t the greatest-looking place by any means. Many people would have called it a hole in the wall. But it was quaint and quiet, a place where we could talk. I loved going there for a bite to eat and great conversation.
When she walked in, heads turned at every table. She was beautiful with her red curls and ivory skin. Her emerald skirt suit set it all off. She worked as a legal secretary, but she was a fashion diva and had the slim build to go along with it.
I’d always envied her tiny body that made the men stare whenever she walked by. She, on the other hand, said she’d always envied my curves. She said more men stared at me than at her. I’d married my high school sweetheart right after graduation, so I’d never noticed.
“Alex, how are you?” she asked as she walked over to the table.
“Good, good. How are you?” I asked as I stood up and hugged her.
She sat down and the waitress brought our menus. I always found it odd that the menu never changed; we always ordered the same thing, and yet they still brought menus every time.
“So what’s new in the legal world?” I asked.
“Not a lot, but last night it sounded like you might have some things going on. Tell me about it.”
“I don’t know where to start,” I said, playing with my napkin and shaking my head. “The more I think about it, the more muddled up the whole mess seems. Mike’s getting worse, he wants me to quit my job, I think I have a crush on my jackass boss...”
“Can I take your order?” the waitress interrupted.
“I’ll have a plain bacon c
heeseburger deluxe,” I said. “Make sure there’s nothing on that but bacon and cheese, and I’ll have gravy for the fries.”
“I’ll have chicken fingers with onion rings on the side,” Allison said.
“And can I get you ladies anything to drink?” the waitress asked as she took our menus from us.
“I’ll have a Pepsi,” I said.
“A Sprite for me,” Allison said. The waitress left with our orders. “Okay,” Allison said, turning back towards me. “Why don’t you start with Mike? What’s going on with him?”
“Oh God, Allison, it’s so bad. I can’t even stand to be around him anymore. He’s drunk all the time. I mean slurring-his-words drunk. When he breathes on me all I can smell is alcohol. He’s not attractive at all to me anymore. In fact, he disgusts me.”
“Have you talked to him about his drinking? Maybe if he went to AA...”
“I’ve tried. It doesn’t do any good. He doesn’t want to quit drinking. He’s perfectly happy with his life the way it is, but I’m not. He won’t work. The truth is he can’t. He’s unemployable. The way he drinks, he can’t get up in the morning and go to work. It’s impossible. I’m stuck paying all the bills while he sits home and drinks all day. I can’t take it anymore.”
“What about Emily?” she asked as she folded her napkin in her lap.
“Emily’s doing okay, but I don’t think it’s good for her to be around that. When she’s not in school, she’s with him.”
“He drinks around her?”
“Of course. There’s never a time when he doesn’t drink. Seriously, Allison, I can’t remember a time when I haven’t seen him without a bottle in his hand.”
“You can’t have that,” she said as she looked down at the table.
“It gets worse,” I said. “Lately he’s been bugging me to quit my job, but if I do then we won’t have any money coming in.”
“That’s ridiculous. Why does he want you to quit your job?”
“It’s a long story. You remember how I was acting chief for a while? Well, they hired out of the local station for the permanent position. He was mad and started focusing on the fact that I’m not home enough.”
“So he’s upset because you didn’t get a raise,” she said as the waitress brought our food.
“Yes,” I said. “Now he’s trying to convince me that every fire could kill me and leave Emily without a mother. He’s got my mind so messed up that I hesitated at a fire the other night and almost cost a couple of my teammates their lives.”
“Alex, you need to stop listening to Mike. Any time anyone leaves their house to go to work could be the last time, whether they’re a firefighter, a police officer, a teacher, a lawyer, or a waitress. You never know what each day is going to bring. You just have to hope for the best.”
“I know that, but I’m so lost. Then today he showed up at the station with a bottle of sambuca in his hand and dumped it all over me.”
“Okay, that’s going too far. You need to do something about him.”
“I know I do. I just don’t know if I’m ready.”
“OK, so what’s going on with your work? Do you want to quit your job?”
“Allison, I love my job and I love the guys I work with—most of the time. I did think about quitting when I didn’t get the promotion. I worked hard for it, and it was heartbreaking to see it go to someone else. But then today they stole my clothes when I was in the shower to make me feel like one of the guys, and I realized that the camaraderie there is unlike anything I’d find anywhere else.”
“It sounds like your mind is made up,” she said as she took a sip of her Sprite.
“It is. I could never leave my job.”
“Who did they hire to take the position?”
“That’s another problem,” I said as I put my burger back down on my plate. “Do you remember Chance Friedman from high school?”
“Ha ha, geek city. Of course I remember him. He loved torturing the hell out of you.”
“He’s the new chief.”
“No way,” she said as she put her fork back down and stared at me.
“And he’s not a geek anymore, unfortunately. He’s gorgeous, Allison. I want him with every fiber of my being, but at the same time I don’t want to find him attractive. I hate him. He’s such a jerk, and yet he makes me feel alive.”
“That’s quite the dilemma you have there,” she said, grinning.
“Don’t laugh,” I said. “It’s not funny. I can’t fall for him, Allison, I just can’t.”
“Why not?” she asked before she took another bite of her chicken fingers.
“Well, let’s see, the guy took the chief position out from under me, he’s acting like he owns the place…oh, and let’s not forget I have a husband.”
“Let’s put this in perspective, Alex. You don’t have a husband. You have a second child. Mike isn’t capable of carrying his own weight in your household. As for Chance, he was offered a job, he took it, and he gives orders because it’s part of his job. That makes him a bad guy why?”
I sat there for a few minutes unable to talk. Everything she said made perfect sense. Mike wasn’t capable of being a husband, and he hadn’t been for years. And Chance, well, he hadn’t done anything wrong. He’d taken a job that was offered to him. I had no right to be mad at him for that.
“I see your points,” I said. “But I still can’t fall for Chance while I’m still married to Mike.”
“I thought we both agreed that you needed to do something about that,” she said while she chewed away on one of her onion rings.
“What can I do?” I asked. “I’d need to find a babysitter for after school hours. It’s all so complicated.”
“Why is it difficult?” she asked. “If things were really that bad you’d find a way to leave.”
“You don’t understand,” I said after I took another sip of my Pepsi. “I’m on a limited budget as it is, and then finding childcare for Emily, well, that’s going to be almost impossible.”
“She’s eight, Alex. She’s almost old enough to stay on her own.”
“She’s deaf, Allison. It’s a whole different ballgame. Someone could break into the house and she wouldn’t know it. She needs someone there with her.”
“What time does she get off school?” she asked as she put down her fork.
“Around three thirty, why?”
“I finish work at four, and could swing by your place and stay there with her until you get home.”
“I don’t know. I’ve never left her with anyone besides Mike or I before,” I said as I played with my fork.
“Alex, I’ve known her since she was a baby. I even know basic sign language. You won’t need to worry about the extra expenses because I won’t charge you any money. It’s a perfect situation and you know it.”
“I’m just not sure that I’m ready,” I said, staring down at the table.
“Not sure if you’re ready to leave Emily with someone else, or not sure if you’re ready to leave Mike?”
I shook my head and sighed. “Both,” I admitted. “Mike and I married fresh out of high school. I don’t know how to leave him, or even if I could. He used to be a good guy, you know. I’m sure he could get back to that again. It’ll just take time.”
“Alex, you can’t fix people. Get that out of your head right now. He’s not the same person you knew back then and he’s not the same person you married. It’s not good for Emily to be around his drinking. Do you want her to grow up thinking that’s normal?”
“You don’t get it because you’ve never been married, but it’s not that easy. We have a history together. It’s hard to let that go.”
“A history of what? A couple of good years before he stopped supporting his family and started spending your money on his booze habit? That ship has sailed, Alex, whether you care to admit it or not. You said he’s refusing treatment, so he doesn’t even want to help himself. The only thing you can do at this point is help yourself and Emi
ly, and get out of there.”
“I know you’re right, but I don’t know if my heart can let go.”
“You told me you find him disgusting now, not even attractive. Is your heart even hanging on still? Or are you just there out of some self-made obligation to take care of him?” she asked as she folded up her napkin and put it on her plate.
“I don’t know,” I said, taking the last bite of my burger. “I honestly don’t know.”
“I think you need to figure that out. If you need someone to watch Emily, let me know. The offer still stands.”
***
“Alex, can you come into the office, please?” Chance called when I arrived back at the station. “I need your help with some paperwork.”
While I hated paperwork with a passion, I appreciated the opportunity to focus on something besides my own problems for a while. Drowning myself in schedules might be just what the doctor ordered.
“I’ll be right there,” I called back. “Just let me make a coffee first.”
“Make it snappy, would you?” he called back.
I hated it when he pulled rank. It felt like he was always trying to remind me that he was the boss. It’s not like I could forget. He had my office, after all.
“What’s the problem?” I asked when I walked in his office and sat down in front of the oak desk that used to be mine.
He’d done quite a bit of redecorating in there. The gray walls were now covered with pictures of his family: his parents, his sister, his brothers, and his cousins. None of his ex-wife, though, not a single one.
“The paperwork system here is different than what I’m used to. Can you get me up to speed?” he asked as he set his coffee cup down on the desk and looked up at me.
His green eyes penetrated mine, and as much as I tried I couldn’t look away from his stare. My eyes wandered down to his soft pink lips, and I wanted to reach out and touch them, kiss them.
I shook my head to try to bring myself back to reality. I prayed he couldn’t read my thoughts, that he didn’t know that I was crushing on him hard.
“You mean like a crash course?” I asked before I took a sip of my coffee.
“Exactly,” he said, flashing me a winning smile. “Of course, that will mean that you’ll need to spend a couple of days in here working closely with me.”