She left and closed the door behind her, slamming the door closed on my excitement and my need to have her approval.
I didn’t grow up with a mother who guided me in life, but one who stood on the sidelines for her own protection, as futile as it was.
Silly me for even considering Ellen was becoming that mother figure to me I so desperately needed.
A familiar pink and black checked backpack slid onto the desk next to me right before Angie followed, slipping into the seat. She’d taken to sitting in the back row of class with me.
“Hey,” she said, chomping on a piece of gum. Peppermint, by the smell of it. “Have a good weekend?”
“Yeah. I did.” My grin shook as a flood of warm ripples ran down my spine. This girl didn’t care about my past. What I’d done or where I’d been. Somehow she kept injecting herself into my life with a smile and kind word. “Yours?”
“All right. My little sister got sick with croup, so Mom had to take her to the hospital. She was so bone-tired Sunday I had to watch both of my younger siblings. That sucked, but my brother, Josiah, wasn’t a jerk and helped so yeah.” She shrugged. “It was decent. You ready for this test on Thursday?”
“Not even in my dreams,” I admitted. “Any chance you’d be willing to help?”
I’d put it off for weeks. Asking didn’t come easy to me, even prior to incarceration. But I no longer lived in a ramshackle of a home, and I was taking Nancy’s long ago given advice.
It wouldn’t kill you to open up. It is possible for you to have friends again. A life.
I scoffed then, but so much changed in the last month.
Now, I naively pictured girls’ nights with laughter and meat and cheese boards while watching reality television or frivolous sitcoms I could now view on my forty-inch flat screen TV.
“Sure. I can help with your accounting if you tell me all about how you know Hudson Valentine.”
She said his name like he was a prince. The mere mention of his name sent a warm flutter to my stomach, which I tried to push down.
“There’s nothing to tell.”
Truth was, he was growing on me, too. I hadn’t agreed to a job or interview with his company and he didn’t press. I was procrastinating calling David. Their job offers were too much, and too obviously overpaying me to give me something better than I deserved.
Was it possible to request a salary less than offered? They wouldn’t take it.
It was my pride in all of this I kept getting hung up on, but I wanted to work for what I earned, not be given it without cause.
Regardless, I was almost feeling… settled. Growing a tiny mustard seed of hope, I could do this. I could be an ex-con and not be entirely judged for it.
Which was why I was taking the bullet and asking Angie to my home. She was growing on me, too. I noticed she was bubbly when excited, but quiet in class. Smart as hell. At least when it came to accounting but if she could figure that out and get straight A’s, she was a borderline genius as far as I was concerned.
“Please.” She rolled her eyes like I was being ridiculous. “It’s Hudson, and if you haven’t noticed yet by looking at him, there’s a lot to talk about when it comes to him.”
She laughed then and signed into her laptop. “What day works for you?”
“Tonight? Or tomorrow afternoon if you don’t have class.”
“I can do both. Want to do your place? My house is madness and when I study in public I do too much people-watching.”
“My house. That’d be great.”
“Good. Give me your address and I’ll be there tonight at seven. I’m done with class at noon tomorrow so I can help a few hours then, too, if you need more help.”
She pulled up her Google calendar and started typing in her appointments with me. I looked over her shoulder at the screen. Her calendar was full, classes color coordinated.
“You are… organized.”
“Anal retentive is what my mom calls me, but I need it. She works two jobs, I have one, and I have a younger brother and sister who need my help a lot of times. The only way I can survive is if I write everything down.”
I rattled off my new address, quieting my voice at the end when our professor walked into the room.
He always wore a wrinkled, short-sleeve button-up plaid shirt with khaki pants two sizes too big. They bunched at the waist, making him look ridiculous. A handful of times he came in with the powder of white donuts at the corners of his mouth. His hair was slick, shining and I suspected it was longer on the top of his head due to a balding spot he attempted to hide with a combover.
He was kind and reasonable, well respected, but his voice was so dry and monotone I often had a difficult time staying awake in class.
“Thanks,” I whispered to Angie.
“We all need help every once in a while. No shame in that.”
And that was a lesson I needed to remember.
17
Lilly
I fell back into my gray couch and sighed. Scrubbing my hands down my face and then back to my hair, I moaned to Angie. “I’m never going to understand this.”
“You have it,” she corrected, grinning at me with pale, full lips. “You just keep forgetting it.”
“What’s the difference?”
She laughed and tugged my hand so I fell forward, back to where our work was spread out all over the coffee table. “It’s just a T account. You can do this.”
“Just a T account,” I mumbled and grumbled. “It’s backward math is what it is, and it’s giving me an ulcer.”
“It’s pretty rare for stress to actually cause an ulcer. The vast majority are caused by bacteria, not your body’s response to stress.”
“Well, aren’t you a walking encyclopedia today.”
She laughed again, ruining my sour disposition. I learned this afternoon Angie was always happy. I turned down her offer for a ride back to my apartment and took the bus home which meant by the time I arrived, she was already parked in the small guest lot and waiting for me.
“I could have driven you,” she’d said.
“I know,” I’d responded.
I changed the subject to homework and her siblings, who I learned were six and three, named Mike and Vena. She went on to say that she and Josiah’s dad bailed on their mom when they were only two. Her mom was now remarried, but her stepdad was a semi-truck driver and spent most of the time on the road, which is why she had to help her mom with her brother and sister so much. I continued peppering her with questions, not giving her much of an opportunity to ask about me.
The less she knew about me, the better. And no one needed to know being in cars since the accident had induced more than one panic attack. Being alone with Hudson was bad enough, but I certainly didn’t need to lose it around the only person at school who talked to me.
Slowly, cracks were forming. Painful little splinters splitting open the cell I put around my heart for protection. They pricked at my chest every day.
Or maybe I really was getting an ulcer.
“Okay.” I grabbed my pen and worksheets I printed off in the student center’s printing office. “Help me figure this out before my head explodes.”