Smokey

Be careful what you wish for. I’d said that phrase so many times over the years that it had all but become a mantra. Now, I could look in the mirror and say it to the man looking back at me.

I’d spent every day since Eddie’s birth wishing her mother had lived, and that we could have had the opportunity to raise our child in a two-parent home. Yearning for a slice of normalcy, yet knowing it would never be, every day I wished Eddie could have a life similar to most of her friends. The thought of her being abandoned by a stepmother prevented me from being serious with anyone over the last sixteen years, leaving her mother, Christine, as my last relationship.

If I could call it that.

It was the longest one night stand in the history of mankind. The end result was the best thing that ever happened to me even if it didn’t go how I’d hoped. Now, fate comes knocking on my door once again, and my wishes are granted.

Kind of.

I’d wanted the ability to raise a child in a family setting. Much to my surprise, my prayers had been answered with Sandy’s pregnancy. Embracing the situation, however, required going against the grain of a lifetime of efforts to protect Eddie from harm.

But I had to do what was right.

We sat in a local coffee shop talking as if we’d just met.

I took a sip of coffee, pushed the cup aside, and studied her. She was a gorgeous woman, if she was nothing else.

“You’re walking through the grocery store parking lot, and there’s a wallet in front of you. You bend down, pick it up, and open it. Twelve $100 bills, and a handwritten note is all that’s inside. No ID, no credit cards, nothing. The note says, Apple juice, graham crackers, and bananas. That’s it. What do you do?”

She grinned. “Where do you come up with this shit?”

“My vault. Answer the question.”

“I load my groceries in my car, lock it, and then go to the customer service counter, and turn it in.”

I nodded. “Good answer.”

“Why does the note say those things? Apple juice, graham crackers, and bananas?”

I shrugged. “They’re things a kid would eat. I was trying to tug at your subconscious heart strings a little.”

“Oh.”

She twisted her mouth to the side and gazed down at the table. After a moment, she looked up. “What if the baby’s a boy. Eighteen years down the road, are you going to encourage him to ride in a club?”

“Nope.”

“Why not?”

“It’s not a place for everyone. If he decides on his own that that’s what he wants, so be it. He’ll get no influence from me.”

“You’re his father. He’ll admire you. He’ll naturally want to follow in your footsteps.”

I widened my eyes. “Who says I’ll still be in a club when he’s old enough to make decisions?”

“So, you’ll quit, or whatever?”

“Maybe.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“Favorite album?”

She chuckled. “I thought you were going to say color.”

“I’m only asking important shit. Favorite album?”

“How can my favorite album be important?”

I glared at her in disbelief. “The type of music you listen to defines who you are. Okay, instead of favorite, if you were stuck on a fucking island, and you were going to be there for two years before anyone rescued you, what one album – if you could only have one – would you have with you?”

She twisted a lock of hair with her index finger and gazed down at the floor. After taking a few drinks of her coffee, she stopped fucking with her hair and looked up. “I don’t know. What about you?”

“Rolling Stones, Sticky Fingers.”

“Don’t know it,” she said.

I grinned. “You will.”

She hoisted her coffee, appeared to realize it was empty, and set it aside.

“Want another?” I asked.

“No thank you. I’m full.” She appeared to be preoccupied in thought, so I let her be. After a moment, she focused on me. “I think maybe Maroon Five, It Won’t Be Soon Before Long.”

“The album?”

“Uh huh.”

“Do you like Coldplay?”

She shrugged. “I mean. I don’t know. Kind of, but not--”

“You’ve said enough.”

“Why?” she asked. “Do you?”

“No, and if you did, I was going to leave. Coldplay’s a deal breaker.”

She laughed. “Really?”

“Yep.”

She chuckled, and then seemed to have an epiphany. “If you could meet anyone, dead or alive, and go to lunch with them, who would it be, and what would you say?” she blurted.

“Good one,” I said. “Let me think.”

After a moment, I met her gaze. “Kennedy. JFK. I’d tell him not to go down Elm Street.”

She looked surprised. “Why?”

“I think he would have made a great president. Things might be different now if he would have stayed in office. Same question to you.”

“That’s easy,” she said. “Doris Day.”

My jaw dropped. “Doris Day?”

“Uh huh.”

“What the fuck? Really?”

She grinned and nodded eagerly as if truly satisfied she’d given the answer she wanted to. “She was always smiling, and her smile is infectious. Every time I see her movies, I either smile or cry, and her movies are awesome. Pillow Talk? Oh my God, that was so good. And Send Me No Flowers? Lover Come Back? Move Over darling? They were awesome. And Please Don’t Eat the Daisies? Yeah. It’d be Doris Day for me.”

“What would you say to her?”

“Thank you. That’s it. I’d just say thanks for making me smile.”

Her blonde hair normally hung straight down over her shoulders. She’d fixed it differently, and it was fixed into a mass of curls, leaving it not near as long, but twice as big. I studied it, and wondered just how much time she spent making it that way.

After deciding she must have spent an hour doing it, my focus went from her hair to her face. With her elbow resting on the edge of the table, and her cheek against her fist, she seemed to be daydreaming.

I let her sit there for a moment, lost in whatever she was thinking of. When her eyes appeared to focus again, I grinned. “I like your hair. It’s different today.”

“I made it big. I like big hair. Well, sometimes.”

“I like it, too.”

She made the “O” face, and then rapped her knuckles against the table. “What do you eat on a hot dog?”

“Mustard and relish,” I said flatly. Anything else is sacrilegious.”

She shook her head. “I disagree.”

I was curious to hear what she had to say about my favorite comfort food. She didn’t know it, but she picked the wrong guy to fuck with about hot dogs. “What do you eat on them?”

“Sport peppers and chili.”

“Good answer.” It was the only answer she could have provided that I would have accepted as being remotely close to proper. “Ever eat ‘em with ketchup?”

She scrunched her nose. “I don’t even eat it on French fries.”

“No shit? What do you dip ‘em in?”

“Horseradish sauce and barbeque.”

“No shit. Makes eating ‘em at McDonald’s tough, huh?”

“Nope.” She reached for her purse, stuck her hand inside, and after a digging around, pulled out a fistful of horseradish packets. “I keep these in my purse.”

“You keep fucking horseradish sauce in your purse?”

She tossed the packets in her bag. “I get it at Arby’s. Every time I’m in there I get about fifty of them.”

I nodded toward her purse. “What else you got in there?”

She dumped it onto the table and grinned.

Surprised at her willingness to dump her life onto the table, I sifted through the pile. A wallet. iPod. A dozen packets of horseradish. A red bikini bottom. A flip-top box of gum. Fingernail clippers. Earbuds. A pair of sunglasses. Three pens. Hand sanitizer. Lip gloss. A phone. A fingernail file. Car keys complete with pepper spray. Lipstick. Three different colors of fingernail polish. A folding pocketknife. A red bikini top. Three sleeves of takeout chopsticks. Numerous gum wrappers.

“Quite an assortment.”

She shrugged. “I just cleaned it.”

“Didn’t bother putting the bikini or the chopsticks up?”

She reached for the chopsticks and shook her head. “I always have chopsticks.”

“Why?”

“In case I need to eat something, and there aren’t any.”

I was fascinated. “Do you eat everything with them?”

“Anything I can pick up. Not hamburgers or hotdogs, but a lot of other things.”

I found her response, and her affinity for the wooden sticks, cute.

“What about the bikini?”

“In case I want to lay in the sun.”

“You just hop into it, huh?”

“Uh huh.”

“Change in your car?”

“Wherever. The beach. My car. Whatever.”

I nodded toward her keys. “What are you going to do with that can of Mace?”

“Spray someone.”

“Like who?”

She reached for it as if offended. “Whoever nabs me.”

“Are they after you?” I asked, stone-faced. “The men in the black helicopters?”

“Don’t be a dick. I’m a girl. Men try to snatch us all the time. If someone tries, I’m going to spray them. Or, cut them with that knife.”

“That’ll just piss ‘em off. I’ll show you how to use a gun. Put a bullet in their chest and they’ll let go every time.”

“I don’t have a gun.”

“You will.”

“I don’t know if I could--”

“I’ll teach you how to use one.”

She put the car keys in her purse, and then sighed. “I run everywhere at night. I’m always scared someone’s going to get me. I run from store to my car. I run in and out of the gas station. I run in and out of the club. Everywhere.”

“How often do you go to the club?”

“Oh, I work at one.”

I took a sip of the lukewarm coffee. “I thought you were a waitress at the fish place? With Lex?”

“I am. But I work at the Main Attraction, too.”

I choked on my coffee. “The strip club?”

“Uh huh.”

I shook my head. “Not anymore, you don’t.”

She cocked her head to the side and stared. “Excuse me?”

“I want you to quit.”

“And when did you start telling me what to do?”

“If we’re going to try and make this work, we’ve got to have some ground rules. You working at a strip club isn’t good for the baby, for you, or for me.”

“I need the money.”

“I’ve got plenty of money.”

She shook her head. “I need it to pay my rent. Sometimes the restaurant, especially in the off season--”

I turned my palm to face her. “Just stop. That’s another thing we were going to talk about. I need to talk to Eddie, but I was thinking. Maybe in like two weeks. How about you move in?”

She stared at me with wide eyes and an open mouth. “Huh?’

“Move in,” I said. “Being pregnant ain’t easy, especially if you’re alone. Doctor’s appointments, being sick, and once you get to six or seven months--”

“Move in? You and me? Together?”

I nodded. “What else did you think we were going to do? Share custody or something stupid? You get the kid one week, me the next?”

“I didn’t--”

“Look,” I said. “In case I didn’t make myself clear before, I want to try and make this work. You and me. Relationship. Learn to live with each other. Have a baby. Raise it together. Have a family.”

She squinted and then stared. “But we don’t love each other.”

“Maybe we will in time.”

She appeared to accept my response. After a moment’s thought, she raised her index finger. “First rule. No other women. Ever. Not one. No excuses. If you ever cheat, me and the baby are gone.”

I shrugged. “No problem, I don’t cheat. My first rule. Quit the strip club.”

“Okay.”

I made a fist and held it over the center of the table.

She looked at it, and then at me. She clenched her hand into a fist, and pounded it into mine.

On that day, in the coffee shop, we made a pact.

An agreement.

I found it exciting in many respects.

Well, all except for one.

Telling Eddie.