The History in Us Page 3

  “No. Rejected again,” I sighed. Penelope reached out for my arm, sympathetically rubbing up and down my sleeve.

  “It will happen. You’re amazing. That imagination of yours is a gift.”

  A gift, I laughed. More like a curse, as I couldn’t seem to get any notice for the stories I submitted. I heard it was harder than romance novels to get a bite of interest in a young adult tale with female heroines saving princes. It was part of the reason my former Creative Writing teacher recommended submitting my latest piece to a contest sponsored by Tribune Publishing. The Perseverance Project was a writing competition and Professor Johnson thought one of my pieces would be an excellent entry. Winner received a publishing contract. Not wanting to discuss my current rejection further in front of our interviewee, I shifted the conversation to our bedroom selection.

  We had room, sort of. Penelope and I could share, or we had a dining room with glass doors, which could be closed off from the living space with some privacy curtains. We didn’t need the dining room and I was willing to take the space, if it prevented us from moving. To my surprise, Kentucky wanted the dining room alcove, claiming it had character. She also wanted the room the next day. She admitted she was in a bit of a bind with her current roommate situation and needed to get out immediately. I wanted to run some references, but Penelope accepted Kentucky’s plea. She showed us her recent paystubs from a sports management firm, telling us her degree had been in sports marketing and recreational facility management. She wasn’t kidding about the jock types. They were big money for her—the bigger the better. And just like that, Tuck, as she told us to call her, was the newest addition to our living arrangement.

  Levi

  Ever have one of those moments where you feel as if the world is working against you? It’s never the big things that bring you down, but the little things. Like Katie Carter being in my class, stirring up thoughts of the past, or in this case, equally disturbing shit inside a dirty diaper. Why the fuck don’t they have a changing table in the guys’ bathroom? I cursed as I jiggled AJ, momentarily at a loss. There were days I was convinced the universe purposely collided with me. Alicia leaving me. No luck with daycare. No changing station in the men’s room. The end of my rope was unraveling, and then…

  “Can I help you?”

  I spun to find china-blue saucers staring at me and my eyes closed in confirmation of the Almighty’s despise.

  “Nope. I’m fine,” I lied, my lips clenched in a smile I’d perfected over my lifetime. The one where my cheeks sucked inward and my mouth spread too wide. My teeth showed up front, and clenched in the back.

  Her eyes shifted left and then back to the squirming AJ in my arms. Her nose crinkled and her freckles seemed to spread. I could connect the dots of them, but I currently had bigger issues.

  “You don’t seem fine.” Hesitantly, her hand rose and pressed against AJ’s back. “What’s wrong, sweet baby?” she cooed. I’d heard all the stories of how a baby can be a chick-magnet but I didn’t need that at the moment. I needed a diaper changing station, stat.

  “He’s yours?” Her eyes shot up to mine as AJ stopped crying. She pulled back her soothing hand, but the instant her touch disappeared, he wailed again. I nodded in assent, aware of the stench coming from AJ.

  “I need a restroom.” My eyes closed briefly. Idiot. “For the baby.”

  “Oh, no changing station in the men’s room? Is that even politically correct?” Her lips curled as she teased me, but AJ’s agitation grew.

  “I don’t know.” I couldn’t take my eyes off her lips, but I didn’t have time to debate the legality of changing stations.

  “I could take him.”

  I blinked.

  “I mean, I could change him in the ladies’ room.” Instantly, her expression fell. “I mean, that sounds kind of creepy, but I’m just trying…” Her words faltered, and she looked off to the left again. The awkward pause lasted only a beat before her hand covered my elbow and she tugged me in the direction she glanced.

  Ladies’ room.

  “I can’t go in there,” I snorted, but her eyes scanned the length of my body, and I felt that look everywhere. Every. Where.

  “I somehow sense you’re not a stranger to the ladies’ room.”

  Laughter burst forth from me at the awkwardness of the moment and her directness.

  “Follow me,” she whispered, as if we conspired for espionage instead of changing a diaper. Her body led the way, her hand never leaving my elbow. Peering around the open doorway, she led me directly to a large stall and locked the door. Pressed against it with her back, she covered her mouth, suppressing a giggle, and I smiled before getting down to business with AJ.

  As I focused on my task, delicate fingers came into view at AJ’s head. A tender hand wrapped over his matted, dark hair and I watched as her thumb traced around his ear, an ear with a device to help him hear. Damn, Alicia, I cursed, but the greater guilt rested with me. That was God’s curse. The screams of children would haunt me to the grave, but my child may never properly hear.

  “He’s so cute. How old is he?”

  “Just over six months.” Glancing down at my son, I stared. Where had the time gone? The past months were a blur. How was I going to manage this on my own? The answer came instantly: I wasn’t. I wasn’t doing well alone. My face fell as I drank in AJ with his dark eyes and jet black head of hair. He was a combination of Alicia and me, but he would never be a part of her. She’d made no contact with me over the last few weeks. No returned phone calls. No response to text messages. Complete abandonment.

  I watched as Katie’s thumb continued to curl under and around AJ’s small cup of an ear and the tiny plastic insert meant to enhance his hearing. What must she think, I wondered, afraid to ask, and making the assumption she wanted an explanation from me.

  “He’s hard of hearing,” I mumbled, never certain if AJ could hear me, but knowing he didn’t have the knowledge to understand words said yet anyway. Thoughts jumped only briefly to my own disability, as the world would label me. How would she react to that tragedy?

  “He’s really beautiful,” she whispered at my side, and I looked up to find her staring down at AJ. Her expression puzzled me. Katie Carter had always been a mystery to me. It wasn’t a compliment in her tone as much as amazement—a wonder that something so small could be so incredible. He was incredible, I agreed, but there was something deeper in her observation. I wanted to see what she saw, but every day I struggled. With his diagnosis, it was AJ and I with the world against us. I had to keep moving forward. Eyes forward. Don’t look back, the general said. Don’t look back, echoed in my head.

  “Anyway, thanks for leading us in here,” I grumbled, snapping the final snaps of his undershirt.

  “Is there a man in here?” A high-pitched female voice rose over the stall and filled in the space around us. Katie and I stared at one another, caught in our mission. The expression on her face was priceless. It confirmed she’d probably never been in trouble a day in her life. Her hand rose to cover those sweet rose-colored lips, curving into a smile and suppressing another giggle. The fight to control her laughter nearly broke me. She was so cute.

  “There better not be a man in here. The university does not condone hanky-panky in the bathroom stalls,” the voice scolded.

  “What are we, in high school?” I whispered to Katie. Her palm flattened over her mouth as she bent slightly at the waist. Any moment, laughter would detonate from her, exposing us both. Her head shook, willing me to remain quiet in the small space. A single slender finger even crossed her lips to quiet me. But I was never good at doing what I was told.

  “Uh.” The sound escaped before I questioned what I was doing. The noise was made in jest as I picked up AJ, but when I turned to face Katie, the expression on her innocent face spurred me onward. Inappropriate. Unnecessary. Completely warranted. If I was going to be accused of doing something naughty, it was going to sound naughty in the bathroom stall. My hips gyrat
ed forward despite holding AJ in order to emphasis my intentions. I pinned Katie with my glare.

  “Uh, uh.” I thrust forward again disguising it with a step toward her.

  “Uh, uh.” Katie's back hit the stall, palms flattening against the metal, and the door rattled. We didn’t touch, but our eyes carried on a conversation—hers begging me to stop, while laughter bubbled inside her and mine encouraging her to play along, feeling naughty like a schoolboy. I moaned deeply, closing my eyes, momentarily forgetting AJ and imagining Katie pinned against the stall with me buried deep inside her. My eyes sprang open instantly, reminding me that I held AJ, but enjoying the mischievousness of teasing Katie. Her mouth formed a perfect circle, and visions of what her sweet mouth might do to parts of me wrestled in my head.

  “Oh.” The sound escaped her, the timing impeccable, surprising us both. It was my turn to struggle with laughter, her expression too funny—a mixture of innocent freckles and round eyes glinting with playful deception.

  “Are you all right in there?” I'd shortened the distance between us and the door rattled at Katie's back as someone banged on the other side. She squeaked at the movement behind her, her breath hitching like I imagine it might upon entrance into her. A shock, swift and sharp. Her typically soft voice responded breathlessly. “I'm fine.”

  Those were two of the worst words combined in the English language. My eyes squinted in question. Fine was in opposition to the Katie Carter I remembered. She’d been sweet, bold, willful. The combination of words pissed me off. My face pressed closer to hers and I whispered toward her ear.

  “Those are my least favorite words.” A flirtatious warning of things better left unsaid, her already-wide eyes opened even wider, and that lake blue color begged me to jump into the deep end. She was the type of girl who could refresh me, and I wanted to dive in. The squirming baby in my arms brought reality crashing back.

  “He has my hair.” Hushed and husky, her voice did nothing to lessen the wayward thoughts in my head. Plump little digits curled over straw-colored strands and she tucked a finger inside his tight grip to remove tiny fingers. His small hand wrapped around her index instead, and a pinch of something strangely similar to jealousy caught my breath. I refused to be jealous of my son, but I wanted her hands on me.

  The door rattled one more time, and Katie flinched.

  “Are you sure you're okay in there?”

  “I'm...” Katie’s deep blues pierced me. Her hesitation was part of her good-girl aura. “I'll be finished in a second.”

  “Wrong again,” I breathed against her cheek, while I inhaled skin I imagined sweaty and sweet from our predicament. Her index finger was still within AJ’s grasp, but our faces were closer. Our position familiar, a tidal wave of memory washed over me. I could kiss her, I thought.

  “What's the question?” She mouthed innocently as I watched her lips, and I almost said, go out with me. But AJ kicked and the silence of the bathroom signaled we were alone. Escape was timely. Retreat, retreat, echoed in my head. I stepped back abruptly and a new expression was written over Katie's sweet face—dread. We made a mistake, it said. I recognized the writing. I’d read it earlier in the summer and something inside me sealed up again.

  Katie

  Remember that over-active imagination? It definitely got the best of me. To think that someone as strikingly good looking as Levi Walker—the man, not the boy—would be attracted to me was appropriately placed near a toilet. My imagination was full of crap. He wasn’t attracted to me anymore than he was when he kissed me before he left for the military, but my heart galloped with the distinct memory.

  It had been a warm summer’s eve, and I was all of thirteen. My aunt Tricia and uncle Leon hosted a party in honor of Levi. He had graduated from high school and immediately enlisted in the army. Being six years younger than him, I didn’t know much about him other than he seemed to be favored by my aunt because he was the younger brother of an ex-boyfriend. My uncle Leon was also his basketball coach throughout his high school years. Somehow Levi Walker had always been a part of my life, but on the periphery.

  I was thirteen just barely, but I didn’t look like a thirteen-year-old. My face did, but my body held the signs of a young woman. Levi Walker would have been almost nineteen. The party was lively, rambunctious like a Carter gathering could be. All my aunts and uncles were present, including siblings and partners on my aunt Karyn’s side of the family. People were drinking. Teenagers were daring. And I had been treated to a collision with Levi.

  Exiting the restroom, I wasn’t paying attention and walked smack into him. Lanky and lean, his body seemed impressive to me at thirteen. Regardless of being an older guy, he smiled at me. Me—shy, quiet Katie Carter.

  “Whoa, there.” His rugged voice stilled me along with his long fingers around my wrists as my palms flattened on his chest to steady myself.

  “I’m sorry,” I muttered, looking down at my feet. A gentle finger pressed under my chin and raised it to meet dark eyes, glassy and dazed from drinking.

  “Don’t be sorry, sweet thing.” His voice dripped and drizzled over me. No one had called me such names before, in such a tone, and my body trembled with an unfamiliar tingle. He’d moved my wrists to one hand, securing them in a firm grasp. “You can bump into me anytime you’d like.” His hooded eyes lowered, dipping to my full chest. I’d caught boys staring at me before, but the look he gave me could only be considered lascivious, one of my vocabulary words, but I wasn’t offended. My body hummed in response.

  He didn’t mean bump into him, literally—that much I knew—but I couldn’t think straight being that close to him. I cleared my throat and tried to look away, but the pressure of his fingertip deepened and he firmly held me in a locked gaze. “Aren’t you leaving for the army?” I asked stupidly.

  “I’m leaving for the army,” he repeated, swaying a little on his feet, tugging me with him. His eyes unfocused for a moment with the sadness in his tone. I noticed for how richly dark brown his eyes were, reminding me of chocolate candy. This wasn’t the first time I’d met Levi Walker. I’d always had a crush on him, but I’d never been this close to him. My foolish heart beat double time.

  He licked his lips and my eyes traced the motion of his tongue. My pulse raced as he held me pressed against him. My eyes refused to pull away from the curve of his mouth—puffy, pink, and prime for kissing.

  “Don’t look at me like that,” he groaned, briefly closing off his chocolaty eyes.

  “Like what?”

  “Like you want to kiss me.”

  I blinked several times, sensing the widening of my eyes. Had he read my thoughts? I certainly did not look at him like I wanted to kiss him, I adamantly argued in my head. Did I? Having never kissed a boy before, I was curious. And Levi Walker wasn’t just a boy. He was a man, going off to protect our country, and I was a silly girl, not even in high school yet.

  “I don’t want to kiss you.” The words were weak, my voice betraying me. I didn’t, right?

  “You know it’s customary to kiss a soldier before he goes off to war.”

  Suddenly, all I could think about was kissing Levi. But I couldn’t make the first move. I didn’t know how. I didn’t want to be that girl. I didn’t want to be Penelope.

  He appeared thoughtful—puzzled actually.

  “You don’t?” He blinked, his eyes widening, attempting to focus on mine. His finger caressed my chin morphing into a full palm cupping my jaw.

  “Nope.” I choked as I lied. I did want to kiss Levi Walker. The greater question was why? I was familiar with him, but didn’t really “know” him. Being from a small town, everyone recognizes each other, but I didn’t know the real Levi, the man before me. We rotated in similar circles but not in the same manner. He was older than me by six years, I reminded myself.

  “What do you want then?” His rough voice rasped as his eyes darted down to my lips. I bit the corner, a growing habit, and his lids drifted semi-closed as he stared at my t
eeth.

  “I want a hero.” I paused when his eyes shot back up to mine. “Will you be a hero one day, Levi?”

  I don’t know where the question came from. An over-active imagination and too many fairy tales as a child meant I believed in princes slaying dragons and heroes resulting from wars. Levi Walker was the first person I’d ever known who was going off to face an enemy, and I knew enough from current affairs to realize he was headed for battle.

  “If I become a hero, will you kiss me then?” His mouth curved slowly at one end, emphasizing a soft dip in his skin. Was that a dimple? I narrowed my eyes, focusing as he pulled the other side of his mouth upward, blazing two dimples at me. He teased me with that smile, hinting that he knew what he was doing. I shook my head to free the growing thought running through my mind: I very much wanted to kiss Levi Walker.

  As if reading my thoughts again, his mouth descended to mine. His lips wet and still. This wasn’t like the movies. I didn’t hear music in my head. My feet remained on the floor. But then…then…everything melted away, and the only sensation I felt was his mouth over mine, and mine moving in response, chasing after his. I suddenly couldn’t get close enough to him.

  “Levi, what the fuck, man?”

  The deep voice of another male broke us apart. Too embarrassed to look in the direction of who spoke to him, I buried my head in Levi’s chest without thinking. Levi released me so quickly, I staggered forward, and then he pushed me back, hands gripping my shoulders, separating us by a foot.

  “Levi, what the fuck are you doing? She’s like ten.”