Birthday Girl

The ceiling above me creaks, and I hear quick steps. Then there’s a thud before a door slams shut, and I can tell he’s finally coming down the stairs.

I grip the door handle and look over my shoulder. “I’ve got extra coffee. We can hit a drive-thru if you want something to eat real quick.”

But it’s not him who comes around the corner. Jordan is dressed in tight, dark blue jeans, rolled at the bottom, with Chucks, and she’s pulling her hair up into a ponytail while trying to hold a yellow rain coat under her arm.

I narrow my eyes on her. “Where’s Cole?”

“He’s, uh…not feeling too well,” she tells me, pulling her jacket on. “I’ll come and help you, though.”

Not feeling well. Code for hungover?

“No, that’s okay,” I tell her. “Stay here. It’s… safer. Thanks, though.”

Her eyes shoot up, focus on me, and then narrow. “Safer?” she questions like I just said I’m going out for a pedicure. “Or are you just worried you’ll spend more time holding my hand than getting any work done?”

I try to keep a straight face. She’s pretty smart.

Okay, yeah, sorry, honey, but yes. At least Cole has some experience—a little, mind you, but some—helping me during summers and weekends. I don’t need to get sidetracked explaining directions instead of giving them today.

“Tell you what…” She buttons up her rain coat, her sweet, shy demeanor slowly being replaced with a squarer set to her shoulders. “If the little lady can’t handle some rain in her hair or mud under her fingernails, then she’ll go back into the truck and wait for you. Where it’s safe. Okay?”

And then she arches an eyebrow at me like I shouldn’t even go there.

I don’t even know how to respond, anyway, because my brain is now blank, and I’m kind of forgetting why I have a Thermos in my hand.

I shake my head to clear it and yank the door open. “Fine. Get in the truck.”

This damn storm came out of nowhere.

I always watch the weather because sometimes it determines if we can work at all that day, so it’s kind of important. Especially in the summer.

I thought this one was missing us and swinging north, though. I shut off the engine and pull up the zipper of my jacket, squinting out the front windshield. The downpour is blurring everything beyond the glass, but I see a flash of orange and a yellow hardhat floating a few yards ahead and know some of the guys are here already.

Jordan pulls up her hood next to me, but I don’t look at her or instruct her on what to do. She can follow my lead if she wants to be here.

I hop out of the truck, hard raindrops instantly pummeling the top of my head and shoulders, making me instinctively duck a little as I slam the door and jog for the building. My boots splash through small puddles, and I dash over to the bed of a company truck, immediately pulling down the tailgate and piling up as many sandbags as I can load into my arms. Bright yellow appears at my side and, without a word, Jordan does the same, quickly loading more bags into her arms and following me around the side of the building to where the guys are waiting.

I drop the bags and glance through the steel frame of the structure, noticing the uncovered pallet of cement in the lower level. Son of a bitch. Nine men, including my best friend, stare at me, waiting for instructions. The wind blows the rain into the back of my jeans, soaking the material to my skin. “I want these bags around the entire perimeter!” I shout over the storm. “Three high! You got it?”

Quick nods follow.

“And get that cement covered, goddammit!”

I jerk my chin at the uncovered pallet getting ruined below. Rain or not, that always needs to be covered, just in case, and someone dropped the ball last shift.

Dutch, my best friend since high school, casts his brown eyes next to me, his expression instantly softening. I glance over to see Jordan, her hair tucked into the hood of her raincoat, but thankfully she doesn’t stick around to be introduced. Heading back to the truck, she pulls more sandbags out of the bed, and I turn back to Dutch who eyes me curiously.

I just shake my head. Not now. It’s not weird my son’s girlfriend wants to pay her way and be helpful, but it is weird that he’s not here, too. Does he know she took his place, helping out this morning? What kind of man is okay with that? I taught him to fulfill his obligations, goddammit.

Or maybe he just didn’t want to come with me.

I need to do something about him, but I don’t know what. This whole “waiting and seeing” tactic isn’t working. He needs a kick in the ass.

The men get to work, carrying stacks of three bags and setting them along the sides of the building, while I grab my utility knife out of the tool box in the truck and slice rectangles of blue tarp to staple around the first-floor frame. Before I know it, an hour has passed, the tarps are up, the sandbags are doing their job, and aside from me, everyone has seemed to vanish.

I toss my knife and staple gun back into the truck and slam the door, looking around the site for Jordan.

I haven’t seen her in a while. Regret starts to wind its way into my stomach. I should’ve given her some kind of direction out here. She probably doesn’t know her way around. It’s easy for people to get hurt if they aren’t trained.