Chapter Nine
“Hey. This seat taken?”
Kayla startled from her semi-trance, took her fingers from her hair and set the charcoal pencil down. “Um. No, I guess not.”
Brock smiled at her and slid his ever-present laptop onto the bar in front of the seat next to her. He made a show of leaning over her shoulder but she slapped the sketch book shut and glared at him. He backed away, hands up in mock surrender. “Sorry.”
She sipped her ginger ale, unwilling to acknowledge the strange little tingles running along her skin at his proximity. As he settled himself and spent an inordinate amount of time flirting with the cute and much-younger-than-her bartender who’d materialized in front of him, she stared straight ahead, focusing on the gleaming line of glasses on the shelves.
“I need a meeting,” she blurted out, her hands clutched together in her lap. “I’m guessing you might know where I could find one.”
He turned to her, his smile that odd combination of sweet and amused. “Where have you been going?”
“A place I don’t want to go anymore.”
“Okay. Well, mine’s at St. Francis, downtown.”
She unclenched her fingers and fiddled with her straw, swallowing the panic that was sneaking into her consciousness. When she felt a hand on her arm, she flinched, sending the half-empty glass of pale amber soda and ice flying down the bar before it rolled off and landed on the rubber mats without shattering.
“Shit,” she muttered, getting up and heading around to grab it. But Brock touched her arm again, firmer this time, his face neutral. “Please don’t,” she said, pulling away from him.
“Do you need a meeting now? I can find one for us. God knows there’s hardly an hour of any day I couldn’t use one.”
She shut her eyes then opened them. “Yes, actually. I could.”
When he turned back to his laptop, she took a few minutes to study his profile—strong jawline covered in a light-brown, close-trimmed beard, well-proportioned eyes and nose. It was a handsome face—but not too much so. She put her hands on the bar’s edge, gripping it tight, to keep from touching his jawline.
“I think he needs a friend,” she’d insisted to Trent several weeks ago.
“Got one,” he cried, startling her again. “Right here.” He pointed to the screen.
She squinted at the map, noting that it was in a community center, not far from her halfway house. She shook her head. “No, that’s where I was going. I can’t…go back there.”
“Why not?” He leaned forward, trying to catch her gaze. “What happened?”
She sighed and looked up at the ceiling. “There’s this woman there and she brings her kid. And it gets on my nerves.”
“Meetings aren’t supposed to include kids. I know of some that offer a sort of daycare, though.” He turned back to his screen. “You’re not so much into kids, are you?”
“No.” She didn’t move, but inside, she felt as if she could leap out of her skin, crawl down the bar, lie under the taps and drink until her stomach exploded. She scratched her nose with shaking fingers. “Shit.”
“Tell you what, I’ll drive us over there. You’ve been skipping them. I know the signs. I see them in my own mirror sometimes.” His smile was so kind, so genuine. She hardened herself to it. “I’ll see this illicit kid for myself.” He pretended to look serious which made her smile.
“Fine.” She shoved her sketches and pencils into her backpack and shouldered it. “Let’s go then.”
He waved down the bar to the hovering cutie-pie who hadn’t taken her eyes off him the whole time he’d been sitting there, then tucked his laptop into a case and held out a hand, indicating she should walk ahead of him. She shook her head, nervous, panicky, and in need of something…anything…to soothe her nerves.
He shrugged and started toward the door, holding it open for her, same for the car door. She frowned at him as he meandered around the front of the car and got in. “You don’t have to try to impress me, you know.”
Without responding, he touched the ignition button and the powerful, expensive, German-made motor roared to life. “Nice car,” she said.
“Thanks.” He pulled out of the FitzPub parking lot and into the midday traffic, whistling under his breath.
“We’re gonna be late,” she said, hearing the petulance in her own voice as they waited out a long red light.
“You know as well as I do that it doesn’t matter.” He gunned the car through the intersection, wove through the three lanes of traffic and got them to the rundown community center with four minutes to spare.
“Again, trying to impress me…” She was desperate to sound normal, or at least something approaching it.
He grabbed his phone from its holder. “Nah. I’d try something else if I wanted to make an impression.” He winked at her. She blinked fast and fumbled with the door handle, spilling herself out onto the asphalt—right onto her hands and knees. Within a few seconds, she saw his shoes beneath her. A hand was on her elbow. She pulled away from him.
“I’m fine, Jesus. Spare me the hero moves already.” She drew herself up, trying to act more indignant than she felt.
He grinned at her and crooked his elbow. “Shall we? I need to evaluate their breach of kid etiquette and you need some support. I can tell.”
“You can’t either.” She sniffed and hesitated, her palms sweaty at the thought of touching him—not to mention the fact that she was flirting with him like some flighty girl.
“Oh, yes I can. You forget, fair lady, I see my own face when I’m in need of an extra meeting. I know it well.”
She sighed and slid her hand inside his proffered arm, swallowing against the dryness in her throat when he patted her hand then pressed it to his side. He was warm. She could feel it emanating from his torso. It scared her for a split second. She hadn’t touched anyone, much less a man, in almost five years.
He waited along with her, as if sensing her discomfort. All the while keeping her hand prisoner, pinned to his oh-so-warm side. She swallowed again. “Okay. Let’s go.” Her voice sounded croaky and old.
He nodded and they headed across the packed parking lot toward the doors which were propped open, welcoming the huddled, smoking stragglers. When they stepped into the hallway, with its cluttered billboards and stacks of free newspapers, she expected him to release her hand. But he didn’t. He kept walking until they were in the main, chair-lined, coffee-scented room.
“Caffeine?” he asked, letting her hand go.
She nodded, incapable of speech, her vocal cords frozen from the tiny intimacy. She wrung her hands, watching him fetch them a couple of Styrofoam cups of black liquid. He smiled at her again, setting her nerves twitching. She took the cup and sat in the nearest chair before she fell over and embarrassed herself even further.
He sat next to her, sipping while the rest of the group filed into their seats. She gripped the hot cup of coffee, letting the smell of it fill her nasal passages. It was an odor she’d always associate with these big rooms, crowded with people so desperate they’d show up in the middle of a workday afternoon just to be around each other, to gather strength from their collective desperation.
She sighed and closed her eyes, putting herself in a different place in her head. A place she’d been unable to locate since she’d skipped her usual three meetings a week. Then she heard it. The distinct bleat of an unhappy toddler.
The murmurings around her quieted. She tried the Serenity Prayer but the wailing kept creeping in around the edges. She heaved a sigh and opened her eyes, catching sight of the harried-looking woman with the hunched shoulders trying to shush the kid.
“I see what you mean,” Brock whispered to her as he watched the woman set the unhappy child in the chair next to her.
“I have permission,” she hissed at the people glaring at her. “It’s this, or I’m gonna go back to using.”
Kayla stared at her and decided that she’d used that morning. Her pupils were too small and her nose was running. She had a horrific rash on her neck and up one cheek.
“Shush, please honey,” she begged the kid, who was trying to climb down.
“Jesus,” Brock muttered.
Kayla glanced at him. He was staring at the child who was of indeterminate gender and coated in a layer of dirt. Brock got up and threw away his empty cup then stood near the percolator, his eyes never straying from the hapless woman.
The moderator called the room to order, made some announcements, and reminded everyone to remain open-minded to the situations of their fellow persons in the room. A not-too-indirect rebuke of the glaring going on, all pointed in one direction. Kayla averted her gaze from the woman, who was swiping at her nose and trying to entice the kid back to the chair with a candy bar.
They stood and recited the Prayer. The call went out for speakers. Kayla waited, letting the simple regularity soothe her. She was in a room full of people who understood her pain, for the most part. At least they got the addiction part. Her face flushed hot as her mind turned to what therapists had always called her ‘inciting incident’. The abuse by her stepfather, which had morphed from ‘just’ fondling to a whole lot worse over the years
She sighed and banished him from her thoughts. She was here to heal, not to dwell.
Let go, let God and all that shit.
Brock remained standing, as if unable to stop watching the child as he or she climbed up and down out of the chair, his or her mouth smeared with chocolate and other unnamable goo. Kayle took a breath and got a whiff of piss, which made her want to gag.
The speakers commenced, each giving their version of the same old story. For the millionth time, Kayla wondered how or why this even helped. It was depressing as shit, listening to all these losers.
It was the scheduled regularity of them. The sameness. The knowing what to expect and that there were others out there worse off than you.
She’d heard all the reasons. And yet, every time she came to one of these, she’d find her mind wandering, her ire rising and her frustration growing.
And now there was that damn kid…
As if on cue, he or she let out a loud howl of protest when the mother tried to pin the kid into the chair with one thin arm. The current sad sack at the podium hesitated, with a glance over to the moderator who nodded and indicated he should keep going. As if anyone could be heard over the racket. Several people got up and walked out. The mother was crying now, tears mixing with the snot that had been running from her nose since she’d walked in—high as a fucking kite.
With a final loud cry, the kid slid from underneath his mother’s arm and started hightailing it to the back door. Kayla watched as if from a long way away while the woman leaned over her knees and puked.
“She’s been using,” a large woman in front of her said. “That’s even more against the dang rules.”
The moderator stood and made her slow, calm way back to the now shivering, blubbering mother. She sat and put her arm around the woman’s shaking shoulders and spoke in a low voice. Kayla was frozen in place, knowing she should help, do something productive. That was the point of these stupid gatherings. To show support for each other. But many times, they were as judgmental as she imagined a group of soccer moms would be.
Mad at herself for joining in with the judgey-ness, she got up and turned toward the somewhat less fraught-sounding kid noises at the back of the room. The dirty child was in a corner, trapped by Brock, who sat on the floor cross-legged in front of him, dangling a set of keys just out of the child’s reach. Kayla crouched down next to him, amazed at his patience, much less his interest.
“He looks awful,” she said, listening while the moderator calmed the near-hysterical junkie mother behind her.
“Yeah,” Brock said. “I think it’s a she.”
Up close, the kid was even worse and stank to high heaven. She drew back when she realized that the dark stain was pee, or worse. “God, that is gross.”
Brock glanced at her, his eyes flat, his lips turned downward. “Like she can help it? Look at her mother.” He jerked his chin toward the crowd that had gathered around the pitiful woman. “Have some sympathy.”
She sighed, sticking out her arm when the little stinker tried to scuttle away, getting her shirtsleeve coated in chocolate that he—or she—still had all over his, or her, hands.
“What kind of life must she have,” Brock said, running his fingers across the matted, tangled mop of dark-brown hair. “Huh, little one? You seem pretty hungry to me.” Like some kind of a magician, he pulled a package of peanut butter crackers out of his pocket.
Kayla watched as the kid eyed him, wariness in her blue eyes, already trained not to trust men.
That realization forced her down from where she’d been crouching all high and mighty, to her butt on the floor next to Brock. She smiled at the child, who smiled back at her around a mouthful of her thumb, while ignoring Brock. He handed her the crackers and Kayla opened them, holding one out. The kid snagged it and jammed it into her mouth like a feral animal, while taking furtive glances at the man next to her. She took a second one but almost choked on it she ate it so fast.
Brock picked her up and slapped her between her shoulder blades before she asphyxiated. Once she realized who had hold of her, she let out a heart-rending shriek of terror and flailed her arms and legs until Brock had to set her down. Kayla observed from her vantage point on the floor and was as shocked as anyone when the child flung herself into her lap, sobbing, but tearless, another clue as to how serious her dehydration must be.
She patted the kid’s back, unsure what else to do, while the mother kept puking and sobbing and the moderator called for an ambulance. When the professionals showed up, they loaded the woman into their rig then returned for her kid.
“I’ll take him,” the ambulance guy said, holding out his arms.
“She’s a she. And I don’t think she’ll go with you.” By this time, the kid had herself wrapped around Kayla’s neck and torso. An unpleasant warm wetness was spreading across her shirt. She tried peeling the child off but she held tight with a surprising strength.
“Are you a relative?” the man asked.
“No.” Brock helped her to her feet. The kid hardly weighed anything but Kayla was starting to feel claustrophobic.
The man sighed. “Do you mind riding with us? We can turn him…her, whatever…over to the proper authorities if her…his mother ends up…you know.”
Kayla glared at the guy, putting a protective arm around the kid who was sliming her neck with snot and crumbs. Her pulse was racing and somehow the thought of letting the kid go made her nauseated. She glanced at Brock. He smiled and put a hand on the kid’s sweaty head.
“We’ll come with you,” he said, alleviating her of the responsibility. Which was a good thing as her throat had closed up and sweat dripped down her back under her shirt as if she were absorbing every ounce of the child’s abject terror.