“Brad, we never talked. We didn’t –” laugh. Tears are starting to run down his cheeks. Oh God.
“Talked?” he repeats, sounding confused. “About what?”
This is going nowhere. Wrap it up. I set my hand on his knee, squeeze. “You’re a good guy.”
“Oh, no,” he says, suddenly loud. “Don’t do that. Don’t ‘good guy’ me. I’m better than that. I’m a great guy. I’ve stuck by you. I’ve been there for you.”
He has. He’s put up with my crazy hours, all the homework and housework and babysitting I’ve had to do. On the other hand, I’ve put up with his roommate – the missing link – his CrossFit obsession, the wicked Grandmother of the West, and all those nicknames.
“You have, Brad. Which is what makes this so hard.” My voice is gentle, but it doesn’t make any difference. Now he’s actually sobbing, giant shoulders heaving, tears streaming down his face, his nose running. I flick my gaze to the garage apartment. “Brad . . .” I say helplessly. How can he have felt this deeply without me realizing it?
Now he’s buried his face in his hands. I try to rub his shoulder but he shakes me off. “Just go. Go away, Alice.”
More tears.
“Brad –” I say helplessly. “I feel –”
“You feel nothing,” he says. “You don’t even know how to feel. Get out of my car.”
My feet have barely hit the driveway when he yanks the door shut, then peels out with a screech of tires, zooms down the road, totally unlike himself. He usually drives like a little old lady.
I’m staring after him, biting my thumbnail, which I haven’t done in years. Jase slams the hood closed, wipes his greasy hands on some rag. After the roar of the car fades away, the silence is particularly loud.
“Well . . . that could have gone better,” Jase says. “Don’t you ever get tired of this, Al?”
“Do you want to talk about it?” Samantha asks at nearly the same time.
I shake my head. Should I have known how he felt? Where were the signs? “I didn’t . . .” Wait. Is that the same silver car, idling across the road?
“He’s wrong. About the feelings thing. He was just pissed. Guys are dicks when their pride gets hurt,” Jase offers.
“My fault,” I say absently. “He was never a dick before.”
“Want me to beat him up for you?” he asks. “He’s big, but I could hire henchmen. George would go for it if there was a cool uniform.”
“Tim would help,” adds Samantha.
The stalker car jerks into reverse, then forward, like a replay of Brad. One of Joel’s castoffs? Tim’s drug connection? Whatever. The least of my problems.
Speak of the devil. I turn at the sound of Tim’s feet banging down the garage steps. He’s whistling, head bent, counting change. “I’ll be back around seven, guys, do you wanna –”
The tension in the air is practically solid. He looks back and forth between us. “Alice? Sam? What’d I do?”
After they all leave, I plop down on the steps next to George. He looks at me, head cocked. “He cried.”
Sighing, I tug him onto my lap, resting my chin on the top of his head. His fly-away hair tickles my nose as I inhale his scent – chalk and grass and hose water. “Yup, I know.”
“I’ve never seen someone so big cry like that. It was kind of like when the Cowardly Lion cries.”
It sure was.
Guess that makes me Tin Alice.
Today’s meeting is at the hospital, the same one Mr Garrett is at. I come late, and my AA sponsor, Dominic, scowls at me when I slouch into the chair next to him.
“Unavoidably delayed,” I mutter.
“Avoid it next time,” he mutters back.
This is how Dominic got to be my sponsor: he copped on to me fast. Almost as fast as Mr Garrett, who had the advantage of being my Cub Scout troop leader long ago. It was Mr G. who told me to go to AA, and Mr G. I went with, at first. But some days he couldn’t, was working or doing something with the kids. Those days I would still go, but I would sit – or stand – near the door. Then I’d leave early. Never when Mr Garrett was there, but when he wasn’t, every time. Earlier and earlier. After I did this four or five times, Dominic grabbed me by the side of my T-shirt as he was walking in the door, towed me over to the seat next to him, and pulled me down. We were way in the back of the room, as far from the door as could be. He’s this boxy-shouldered guy, young, huge hands, skinny but strong, deep tan skin with one of those permanent five-o’clock-shadow types. When I started to get up ten minutes before the end of the meeting, he stuck his foot out in front of mine, like he was going to trip me. “What is this, kindergarten?” I hissed out of the corner of my mouth. He mouthed, “Later.” The minute the meeting ended I said, “I didn’t know there was assigned seating at these things. You want to see my ID now? You’re an asshole.”
He stared at me, no expression. “No. No. You found me out. Don’t leave early. Asshole.”
No messing around with Dom.
Later I found out other stuff. That he was twenty-two. That he got married right out of SBH because he got his girlfriend pregnant on prom night. “In the car, on the way there,” he always adds. “I didn’t even buy her a corsage.” That his wife left and took the baby when they’d been married a year. That he spent the next six months so smashed, he still doesn’t remember if he went to work or not. That now he’s been clean for three years.
So, here we all are, at the end of the meeting, all holding hands like it really is kindergarten. A few months ago, that would have seemed lame as hell; something you do all the time when you’re little, crossing the street with your mom and all that. But after you’re, say, ten, who does it? But I actually kind of like it, here, sandwiched between Tough Guy Dominic and Mr Smooth Jake, who I formerly knew as Coach Somers, my gym teacher from Hodges. He smiles at me, which trust me, he never did when I was at Hodges on his team. He was more given, back then, to asking me to drop and give him fifty for my lousy attitude. Back then, I thought he was a bitter-ass old guy who didn’t get teenagers. He’s maybe in his late twenties.
Now, as I head out to get coffee with Dominic, Jake tosses me a salute. Feels good.
Dom and I are at Cuppa Joe and Piece-a Pie – sucky coffee, awesome pie – talking about whether he should buy this old junker truck with 100,000 miles on it – when he suddenly looks up, eyebrows raised, then smirks at me. “Some guy hates one of us. My bet’s on you. Because if looks could incinerate, you’d be a smoking pile of ashes.”
“It’s usually the girls I piss off – my money’s on you. Where is he?”
“Riiight, I forgot you were the big Casanova. Third table from the left. I’m pretty sure that one-fingered salute was all yours. He has good aim. If he had a gun –”
“No man detests me like that except my pop.” I pretend to be cracking my neck to get a glimpse of the guy.
Yeah, he looks like he hates my ass, all right. It’s Alice’s Brad.
“Need to go make amends?” Dominic asks. “I’m sure he’d be happy to accept it. If not, he only outweighs you by, maybe ninety to a hundred pounds. Might show some mercy and leave you almost dead instead of a bloody smear on the floor.”
“You seem to