An image of his equipment flashes in my mind’s eye. Yikes. Cringing hard, I beat that thought back where it belongs, in the dark filthy basement of my mind.
The silence continues. I’m starting to wonder if he has a hearing disability. Which is fine. I’d like some acknowledgement that he can read lips, however.
“Do we understand each other?” I carefully annunciate.
He blinks, face devoid of even a shred of humanity. “Kiss. My. Ass. Lady,” he carefully annunciates. Then he puts his head down and returns to his task.
So not hearing impaired, just your run-of-the-mill a-hole.
I’ve never had so much hostility directed at me from a complete stranger and it’s got me on my heels. “Henderson––”
“The name is Hendricks––Hendricks,” he interrupts, his deep baritone holding a cutthroat edge. “If that’s too difficult for your tiny brain to grasp, don’t bother speaking to me at all. Your little stunt cost me four season tickets that were supposed to go to charity.”
Uhhh…My little stunt? “Hendricks,” I pronounce clearly minutes later, after I shake off all the dismay I’m feeling. “I apologize. I’m sorry. Okay? My son is out there.” I point to the front door. “And I’d like to get settled. I know we got off on the wrong foot, but you have to understand that it was rather scary finding you naked in my brother’s house.”
He continues cleaning, stuffing more trash into the bag.
“Can I get you to agree that you won’t subject my son to any of the aforementioned things?”
“Aforementioned?” This, apparently, is what gets his attention. His face pinches like I farted the word. For a moment, he makes me question whether I used it incorrectly. Dang, he’s got me shook.
He stops what he’s doing to eyeball me weirdly. “You don’t remember me?” His tone leans toward…scorn? Disbelief maybe? The only thing I’m sure of is that it ain’t good.
“Why would I remember you?” His steady, blank stare sends a full-body shiver sliding over my skin. My stomach and face fall simultaneously. “Should I…remember you?” I add with less certainty and a lot less tenacity.
I could’ve have slept with him. A: football players aren’t my thing. And B: after Ronan, I was a single mother with a baby. Opportunities were not coming my way often. Besides, my privates have about an inch of dust on them from lack of use. All that said, there’s a lot in my early twenties I’ve tried to forget. In other words, I don’t know what I don’t know.
More silence ensues. Anticipation wraps around my windpipe, nearly strangling me to death as I await his answer.
“Nah,” is his only reply. Not even a ripple mars his flat expression.
Something tells me there’s a lot he’s not saying. Mercy, this is gonna be one long summer. I take his lack of argument as tacit agreement and go fetch my son.
Chapter Three
“He’s Uncle Cal’s friend, but I don’t want you around him.”
I glance up from putting Sam’s clothes in the dresser in the upstairs bedroom, and find his attention entirely on his iPad. “Sam? I don’t want you anywhere near the angry dude, okay?”
I don’t care what Camilla said, this guy is hostile times ten. With his attention fixed on his video game, Sam nods.
“Repeat what I just said to you so that I know you heard me.”
“Don’t go near the angry dude.”
“Okay, good.”
After I get Sam’s room set up, I go downstairs to unpack my things. This house is built in the shape of a horseshoe. Which means that from the master bedroom, where I’m staying, I can see the guest bedroom across the way. I pray he pulls the drapes closed. Otherwise I’m in for a show––one I hope gets canceled immediately.
My cellphone rings. Ronan’s name appears on the screen and I steal myself for an argument. We’ve been doing a lot of that since he decided to be part of our lives again.
I’m a walking poster child for bad choices. Ronan McCabe was only one of many I made in my early twenties, back when I was drinking my bodyweight every night. At the time I was living in L.A. modeling, and he was singing in dive bars. Anyone that watched him perform could see he had all the charisma, baggage, and talent necessary to one day become a huge star.
We set the land speed record for falling in love and breaking up, complete with a screaming match on Sunset Blvd. where he practically pushed me out of his moving car. Not my finest moment. Not my worst, either. I can’t regret it completely, though. He gave me Sam as a goodbye gift.
Two years after we broke up Variety published a glowing article on the rising star of folk rock. Once I knew where to find him, it felt wrong to keep his son from him. He started coming around, spending time with us. Unfortunately, Ronan was battling his own demons back then. We tried to make it work as best as two completely screwed-up people can––more for Sam’s sake than any unresolved feelings––until one day he stopped coming around altogether.