Don't Make Me Beautiful, Page 3

  “You do corporate law. That’s valuable.”

  “It’s not the same as something like environmental law or divorce law or anything. What I do impacts people, but in such an abstract way it’s pretty much not even there for me. Like, I don’t get that warm fuzzy feeling that what I do means something to people, changes lives, that kind of thing. I wish I’d gone into another type of law.”

  “You could always switch.” Brian knows where this is going. This is not the first time they’ve had this conversation, but he feels compelled to go through the motions with her. It’s how she works things out in her own mind.

  “And lose my spot at the firm? No thanks. Besides, I can always do that kind of thing in my off time.”

  “When you have off time, that is.”

  “Yeah,” she says, her voice going soft again, “when I finally have some. Liam’ll probably be twenty before that happens.”

  “No, come on. Don’t talk like that. You’re doing the best you can.”

  Her tone changes abruptly. “Listen, I have to go, Brian. Thanks for letting me moan about work again.”

  “Anytime. See you Sunday?”

  “Yeah. Sunday at nine or so. Oh, and I’m taking a few days off, so I’ll keep him with me until Wednesday. Give Li-Li a kiss for me, would ya?”

  “Sure. He’ll be psyched about the sleep-over. You want to talk to him?”

  “I can’t, I have to go. The team has been in meetings until midnight all week. It’s nuts. Tell him to Skype me in the morning at breakfast.”

  “Will do. See you soon.”

  “Bye.”

  Brian hangs up the phone and walks down the hall to his son’s bedroom. Liam is already under the covers, the Marlins’ stat book propped up on his chest. Brian already knows what page Liam is reading before he bends over to check it out.

  “They’re going to have to change Wilson’s stats,” Liam says.

  “Yep. Every game all the players’ stats change just a little.”

  “But this is a big one,” says Liam, reaching over to get a pen from his nightstand. He writes in the book. “There. It’s changed.” Closing the book, he puts it down on his bedside table along with the pen. “Tonight was the best ever.” He smiles, revealing several grown-up teeth and a space where the next one is growing in.

  “You’re right. Best ever.” Brian leans over and kisses his son on one cheek and then the other. “One from me and one from Mom.” He sits up, tucking Liam’s covers in around him. “She had to go to a meeting, but she says she wants you to Skype her in the morning. You’re going to do a sleep-over from Sunday to Wednesday. She’s going to take you to school and everything.”

  Liam grins from ear to ear. “Cool.” Then is expression falls. “But what will you do? Won’t you be lonely?”

  Brian caresses his son’s cheek. “Oh, I’ll make it through all right. I’ll invite Hank over for some pizza and television or something, maybe take a couple long bike rides.”

  “Good,” says Liam, rolling over onto his side, his eyes falling closed. “Night, Daddy-o.”

  “Night, baby-o.”

  “I’m not a baby,” Liam says, his words getting lost in a yawn.

  “You’ll always be my baby, Li-Li,” Brian says, watching as his son drifts off to sleep in seconds.

  He stays there for a minute or two, looking down at his son’s angelic face. So perfect when they’re asleep. Being a single dad to a kid like Liam is a lot of work, but he wouldn’t change it for the world.

  He leaves his son’s room thinking about his life to date. He has his job restoring furniture, his boy, his house with the kick butt workshop, and a few close friends. What else does a guy need?

  In the back of his mind he answers that having a woman to love and share his bed with would be a great addition, but he ignores that thought. When the right girl comes along he’ll consider the idea; until then, he isn’t in any hurry to find her. His life is full enough, and forcing things to happen had never worked out well for him in the past. He’s convinced that destiny will connect him with the girl of his dreams - the beautiful, sexy, intelligent, strong woman he knows he’s meant to be with. All he has to do is be patient, be a good dad, and wait for her to appear.

  Chapter Seven

  SHE’S SITTING UP ON THE couch when it happens. Unable to sleep in bed or even lying down on the couch from the pain, this is the only place where her eyes will close and the pain will recede for twenty minutes at a time or so. She’s caught bits and pieces of sleep here and there throughout the night and morning. It’s easier once John is gone, working most of this Saturday at a side job to make up for the one he lost last week.

  One minute the room is silent but for the clock ticking, and the next, the boom of shattering glass startles her out of her nap and makes her feel for a moment that she’s having a heart attack. The curtains that for some reason flew up, float gently back into place.

  It takes her a moment to figure out what just happened. When something touches her toe, she looks down, leaning over with effort and wincing with the pain of her injured ribs.

  She sees a ball. White with red laces. A baseball? What’s a baseball doing in here? Then she puts it all together. Someone hit a ball through her window. Panic sets in. John is going to blame this on her. Even though she doesn’t play baseball, she doesn’t go outside, and she hasn’t talked to a neighbor since she moved in three years ago, this will be her fault.

  She stands, huffing through the pain with short, quick breaths. Shuffling over to the window, she peeks around the edge of the sheer drapes. There’s a large hole in one of the panes of glass. On the carpet, big shards of it are mixed in with little pieces that twinkle in the light that seeps in under the curtains.

  Her blood goes cold. Oh my god. What am I going to do?

  It should be easy to manage; she knows this. It’s just a broken window. In her old life she would have talked to the person who did it, called the glass company, and had someone out to fix it the same day. Maybe even called the insurance company to see if she had coverage. But that’s not what she does now, and it’s not even a consideration. Panic gets in the way of any rational thought process. She can’t call a person to come over; they’ll see her and then John will know they saw her and she’ll pay. Besides … she doesn’t even have a phone.

  The sound of footsteps moving fast up her front porch comes through the now open window pane and the doorbell rings, once and then many times, over and over. A small fist knocks on the door.

  “Hello?! Is anyone home? Please! I need to get my baseball back!” It’s a child and he sounds panicked. He’s moaning and talking to himself now. It breaks her heart to think he might be worried about what he’s done. He has nothing to fear from her or John. He would never touch a stranger like he touches her. He likes everyone, or so he lets them think.

  She’s so lost in thought that she doesn’t realize the footsteps have started again but this time they’re coming towards the front window, not the front door. “Will you please give me back my ball? I’m really sorry. My dad will be really mad at me if I don’t bring his ball back. It’s special. We caught it. It’s a fly ball, not a regular one.”

  She jumps to the side, dropping the curtains and pressing her back against the wall next to the window. She’s breathing heavily, panicking like a trapped animal.

  He taps on the window. “I saw you in there. Are you hiding? Please can I have my ball?”

  Realizing that he’s not going to go away until the ball is back in his hands, she tiptoes over to the coffee table and bends over to get it. The pain is so sudden, it causes her to breathe in sharply. She stands upright again, immediately giving up on the idea of picking up the ball. From where she’s standing, the boy’s shadowed form is visible through the curtains. He’s pressing his face up to the glass. She can hear him as clear as if he’s standing right there in the room next to her, his voice coming through the broken pane.

  “I’m really sorry. I’ll
pay you for the window. I have money in my piggy bank at home. Just don’t tell my dad, okay? He’ll be so mad at me.”

  Nicole swallows the tears that are coming. The idea that this boy might suffer at the hands of a man like she does is too much to bear. Not a child. Children could never do anything that wrong.

  She moves closer to the ball and kicks it backwards, out from behind the table. Step by step, she uses her toes to maneuver it towards the front door. She can’t bend over to pick it up, but she can kick the thing to the door. It’s one of those rare occasions when it’s not locked. John must have been in a hurry when he left. Giving this boy his ball back is the least she can do to ensure his safety. If she had a phone she’d even call the police for him.

  The boy leaves the window and goes to the front door again, knocking once more. “Are you giving me my ball back? Are you in there?”

  Nicole gets the ball onto the tile floor. It rolls this way and that, not cooperating with her plan to get it to the boy very well. “I’m coming,” she says, her voice very rusty and almost unintelligible. “I’m coming,” she says again, her eye on the door. He finally stops knocking.

  She reaches the front door and stops, her hand hovering near the latch. The fear of touching it is almost enough to make her turn away and go back to the couch. Or maybe the kitchen where the little boy won’t be able to see her shadow through any curtains. But she pushes through the pain, the thought of him being in trouble too urgent to ignore.

  The latch moves slowly out of its catch as the handle mechanism turns. She opens the door a crack, just far enough to look through the space with one eye.

  The little boy doesn’t even wait for her to speak. “Thank you very much. I’m sorry about the window. I was trying to hit a fly ball and I messed up. It went really far but the wrong way. The really wrong way.”

  “Don’t worry about it,” she says, pushing the ball to the door with her toes. It’s almost to the crack.

  “Why are you whispering?” the boy asks. He drops the volume of his voice to match hers. “Is someone asleep in there?”

  “No. It’s just me.” The ball is against the crack in the door but it won’t go through. It’s too big.

  “Are you okay? Your voice sounds funny.”

  “I’m fine. Here’s your ball.” She opens the door just a bit more, intending to kick the ball through it. But the edge of the door pushes the ball away and it rolls back.

  The boy must have seen it because he bends down and reaches in to go after it, his shoulder hitting the door and pushing it in farther.

  Nicole wasn’t expecting the handle to come towards her, so she’s totally unprepared for it to bang into her sore ribs. Gasping with the pain, she backs up two steps and the door swings in even more.

  The boy looks up to say something and stops, his mouth open and the words he was about to say unspoken.

  The ball rolls down the grout between two tiles and makes its way slowly towards the kitchen. For a couple seconds, that’s the only sound in the house.

  Then the boy screams.

  He scrambles back out of the doorway and onto the porch. Getting to his feet, his face pale, he stares for another moment at Nicole and then turns and runs.

  Without saying another word, he flies down the stairs and across the front yard, soon disappearing around the corner two houses down on the other side of the street.

  Tears well up in Nicole’s eyes. He looked and sounded so sweet. He’s just a little boy who wanted his baseball, and now he’ll probably have nightmares for a month. She doesn’t really know what she’s crying about exactly, but it doesn’t matter. What’s done is done - her face, the ball, the window… Nothing she can do will change any of it. Maybe the tears are for the powerlessness that has become the sad, sorry theme of her life.

  Closing the door most of the way, she looks over her shoulder. The ball has finally stopped at the entrance to the kitchen. She walks over to it slowly and uses her feet to kick it once again until it’s at the entrance. Opening the door very carefully, she uses the bottom of her foot to push it over the threshold. It rolls just a foot and stops in the middle of the porch. She worries about leaving it there, knowing if John comes home he’ll see it or maybe even trip over it. A small smile appears at that thought, but then goes away immediately as she thinks about what he’d do after he got up. No. I hope he doesn’t trip. Seeing him go down would be fun, but then the aftermath wouldn’t be at all.

  She considers getting a broom to move the ball away from the doorway when a movement at the corner of the street catches her eye. The little boy is hiding next to some bushes in the neighbor’s lawn.

  Relief washes through her. She shuts the door and stands still behind it, waiting while breathing slowly and calmly. Minutes later, she hears the soft padding of sneaking feet on the steps, then shortly thereafter, the sound of them running away.

  Opening the door a crack, she sees that the ball is gone and the little boy is streaking away. Down the sidewalk he goes and around the corner until he’s out of sight, running like there’s a monster from his worst nightmares chasing him.

  She smiles sadly as she goes into the kitchen to get the garbage can. Maybe if she cleans up all the glass and removes all the obvious signs of the window breaking, John won’t notice and she’ll be spared giving an explanation. Even one night’s delay is worth the effort, painful as it might be.

  Chapter Eight

  BRIAN’S READING THE LATEST SPORTS news online when Liam bursts into the side door and runs through the kitchen and into his room. He’s going so fast, it’s like the hounds of hell are at his heels. Brian frowns as he hears first one door opening, then another, and finally one slamming shut. His son is on a tear, and if Brian doesn’t find out what’s going on, there will probably be a mess to clean up later. Sometimes the little guy gets a bit too wild, although not as often as he used to. This is the first year that he’s actually been calm and rational on a regular basis, enough to have a semi-adult conversation, but Brian’s not naive enough to think that a six-year-old boy is going to be mature all the time. Breakdowns and cry-fests are still a regular part of the program.

  Getting up from the kitchen stool, he closes his computer putting its operating system to sleep. He walks down the hallway towards the bedrooms, stopping at the end of the short corridor and looking from his own room to Liam’s. The master bedroom door is open, and he could have sworn he closed it to keep the room cooler. The air conditioning vents don’t treat all spaces equally and he hates sleeping in a hot room. Liam’s door is closed.

  Walking over to close his door, his eye catches the baseball on the stand on top of his dresser. It’s off-kilter just the smallest bit, but it’s enough to cause his heart to sink. I should have known it would be too tempting. His decision to keep the stand at a level Liam could reach seems foolhardy in hindsight.

  Closing the door, he turns to walk the other direction. Down the hall a few paces puts him at Liam’s door. He knocks softly, the sound of his son’s weeping coming through the hollow-core door.

  “Liam, can I come in?”

  “No,” comes his muffled response. “I need to be alone.”

  “I’d really like to come in and talk, son.”

  “No, Dad. Not right now. Later.”

  Brian sighs. Of course he could just open the door and force the conversation on his young son, but instead he decides to let Liam handle this on his own. At least for now. Liam needs to have the experience of battling his emotions and coming to terms with them without Brian babying him through the process. He’s not sure who it’s going to be harder for, though, Liam or him. He goes back to his bedroom and takes a closer look at the ball.

  Picking it up, he can see that it’s been hit more than that one time at the Marlins’ ball field. There are two additional scuffs on the white leather and one of them is right on top of Wilson’s autograph. Not that the ball’s monetary value was the true measure of its worth for Brian, but he can’t help thin
king how it just went down significantly. Brian sighs and then shrugs. Damn kids. Always looking for trouble. The ball is no longer in pristine condition, but what the heck … at least it has another memory attached to it he’s sure they’ll laugh about later.

  As he’s putting the ball back in the holder, he feels a sharp prick and yanks his hand back, dropping the ball on the ground. The first finger of his right hand has a pinprick of blood on it. Looking at it closer, Brian sees the tiniest sliver of glass sticking out of his skin.

  “What the hell?” he says out loud into the room. Moving to the attached bathroom, he finds enough light enough to confirm there is, in fact, some glass stuck in his finger pad. He uses tweezers to take it out and then soaps his hand to make sure there will be no infection later. His job is all about hand-work and he can’t afford to lose the ability to use his fingers.

  He mulls over the situation as he finishes cleaning up. No wonder Liam’s so miserable. Not only did he take the ball and play with it, it looks like he also put it through someone’s window. Great. I wonder how much that’s going to set me back in dollars and neighborly relations. They’d only been in the neighborhood for four months, his first bachelor pad since the divorce was finalized. Now he’s going to have to bake some brownies or something to smooth over the ruffled feathers. He puts on a bandage and turns out the light, leaving his room for the kitchen.

  If memory serves, there’s a box of fudge brownie mix in the pantry and he has the eggs and oil he’ll need to put it all together without having to grocery shop.

  Chapter Nine

  SHE JUMPS A LITTLE WHEN the front door slams shut.

  “Honey, I’m home!” John says loudly, dropping his tool belt on the ground by the door with a loud bang. “Where are ya?”

  “I’m in here,” Nicole says, clearing her throat to get the frog out. Fear has her voice sounding strangled.

  He comes into the living room with a big bouquet of flowers in his hand and a huge smile lighting up his face. “Got these for ya.”