Face the Music Page 2

  “Whatever.” I don’t have the energy to get into it with these hags. Kathy and her friends have tried to make me uncomfortable enough to leave the church since Bethany ran off with Ben’s brother. What can I say? We’re a tightly knit group.

  I’m almost to the door when Kathy cuts me off by stepping into the aisle in front of me, her perfectly made up face pinched. Her mouth is pursed, turning her lips white. “You should really reconsider your church wardrobe. It’s very distracting and the Bible says—”

  “Don’t be a nasty, judgmental bitch?”

  Her pointy chin jerks back in offense. “There is a big difference between judgment and discernment, and I—”

  I throw my palm up in her face. “I don’t care.”

  I walk around her, and she gasps. Yeah, I get the feeling ol’ Kathy isn’t used to people sticking up for themselves.

  “You are a sick and depraved woman! You need to repent!”

  I don’t turn around as I push through the door yelling, “And you need a good, hard dicking!”

  “How dare—”

  The door slams behind me, cutting off Kathy’s last words.

  She’s been after Ben for as long as I’ve known him. She has to be close to my age, twenty-nine, although she dresses and acts more like she’s eighty. I’m sure like most women our age, her biological clock is ticking. Not that I know much about that. My biological clock died my junior year in high school. But Kathy’s looking for a good man to settle down and pop out some babies with. She has her sights set on Ben, and she’s wasting her time.

  Ben Langley is hot, but he’s also taken. Claimed forever by the ghost of his wife.

  The one thing Kathy and I have in common? Neither of us can do shit to change his mind.

  Ben

  “What’s a period?”

  I freeze midchew. The wad of baked potato in my cheek turns to sand as I look into the big, round, curious eyes of my daughter. “What?”

  Cop out? Yes. But stalling is how I’ve learned to deal with her increasingly difficult questions. My hope is that with her short attention span, she’ll forget she asked. At the very least, my stalling tactic will give me a second to either redirect her attention or come up with an age-appropriate answer. As she gets older, both are becoming nearly impossible to do.

  Elliot is her mother’s daughter. Maggie never bought into anything blindly. She always investigated and questioned, and she wasn’t satisfied until she got all the answers.

  “What is a period?” Elliot repeats the words slowly, drawn out, then rolls her eyes. “A peer-ee-od.”

  I force down the dry potato by flushing it with a gulp of water, then clear the frog from my throat. “A period is punctuation used at the end of a sentence.” Please buy it and move on. Buy it and move o—

  “The other kind of period, Dad. The bloody kind.” She shovels food in her mouth, sour cream gathered at each corner of her lips. How can she ask such mature questions and still look so young?

  “Where did you hear about… that?” Another attempt to divert? Absolutely. I am so not ready for this discussion.

  “Colette told me.” She licks her lips.

  Colette, her nineteen-year-old babysitter. I rub my temples, missing Elliot’s old nanny, Bethany, more and more every day. Also hating my brother for falling in love with Bethany and stealing her away to Los Angeles. She went from being Elliot’s nanny to my sister-in-law. Life is crazy.

  “What did Colette say?”

  Elliot pulls her glass of milk from her lips, leaving behind a white mustache. “She said she didn’t want to take me to the park because she had a period and then grabbed her stomach like this and made this sound on the couch.” She moans and groans, her eyes pinching closed in agony.

  “Okay, I get it.”

  She stops and looks at me expectantly across our small dinner table.

  I catch the eyes of my wife, Maggie, in a framed photo over Elliot’s shoulder and beg her for guidance. You were supposed to be here for this, not me. What the hell do I say?

  “Dad?”

  My eyes snap to hers. “Yes, so um… a period is…” I clear my throat and take another swig of water. “When a woman gets to a certain age—”

  “Nineteen? Like Colette?”

  “Um… no, uh…” I wonder if I could pull up some kind of girl-talk tutorial on my phone. There has to be a right way and a wrong way to have this talk. I expected we’d get here eventually, but not this soon. “I believe it’s different for all women—the age, I mean, but all women have—” My phone rings from its charging spot all the way across the room. I leap up to get it.

  “I thought you said no phone during dinner.”

  “I’m finished eating, so it’s okay.” I’m not even close to finished, but I’d rather go to bed hungry than continue this conversation. I see my secretary’s name on the caller ID. “Donna, what’s up?”

  “I’m sorry to bother you, but I just got a message from the Domestic Organization of Ethical Evangelicals.”

  I turn back to my curious daughter, who is practically drumming her fingers waiting for me. “What did they want?”

  “They’re sending a representative to interview you tomorrow morning.”

  I tense. The DOEE is the watchdog for all evangelical churches. If they’re reaching out to me, that can only mean a complaint has been made about one of the church staff. “What for?”

  “They didn’t say.”

  I smile apologetically at a disappointed looking Elliot. “It’s work. It’ll just be another minute.”

  “Ben, you know they wouldn’t be making a visit to our office unless whatever complaint was made had already been substantiated.”

  The throb of a headache pulses between my ears. “Don’t worry. We have a solid staff, and if someone did do something horrible, it’s better we find out about it and take care of it as soon as we can. It’s just weird because no complaints have been made to me. Whoever filed the complaint went straight to the top.”

  “I guess you’ll get more information tomorrow. They’re going to be here at eight o’clock in the morning.”

  “Okay, I’ll see then. Thanks, Donna.”

  I hang up and pull up Colette’s contact on my phone. It rings, but I end up with her voicemail. I leave her a message asking if she could come early tomorrow, and after I hang up, I also send a text.

  I bring my phone back to the table in case Colette responds. She’s not as dependable as Bethany was, so there’s a good chance I won’t hear from her before morning. Which means I’ll have to take Elliot to the meeting with me and see if Donna can drop her at school while I’m with the DOEE.

  What could they want to talk to me about? My mind spins with a million possibilities.

  “Are you going to answer my question?”

  I blink. “Right, that. So, um… where was I?”

  “You were saying it could happen at all different ages.”

  Crap, her memory is too good. While Maggie was pregnant, I prayed for a smart, healthy child. God answered, and now I’m wishing I would’ve prayed for health and maybe not so much intelligence. “At all different ages, what happens is, in a woman’s reproductive organs—”

  “What is reproductive organs?”

  I drop my head into my hands and groan. I am so not prepared for this. “I have a lot on my mind tonight. Would it be all right if we continue this tomorrow?”

  “Or I could ask Colette?”

  Do I trust Colette to give Elliot age appropriate answers? Or will Elliot be subjected to the kind of information that will scare her enough that she’ll never want to get married and make a baby?

  I frown, considering that.

  I look into my sweet daughter’s eyes and say, “Yeah, just ask Colette.”

  Ashleigh

  “So I guess we’re not best friends anymore, huh?” With the phone pressed to my ear, my eyes glued to my laptop, I shove an angry bite of Honey Nut Cheerios into my mouth while waiting for Bethany
’s answer.

  “Are you eating cereal? It’s almost five o’clock at night.”

  “Juthst awnsther da kwethsthion!”

  She grumbles, something about “not this again,” and sighs. “You know you can’t believe everything you read—”

  “So—” I swallow my food. “You and Jesse didn’t stop at a baby store in Calabasas yesterday as TMZ reported? You’re telling me that you in fact did not”—I squint at the screen and read word-for-word—“‘lovingly lean into each other while picking out baby clothes—more blue than pink’ and that you did not ‘kiss and hold eye contact over a crib with a seven-thousand dollar price tag’?”

  “Amazing the crap information the paps will pay money for.”

  “When did you find out you were pregnant and when were you going to tell me?” I shove another bite of semi-soggy cereal in my mouth.

  “Are we really going through this again?” Bethany sounds tired. Not sleepy, just sick of my shit. Too bad.

  Ever since she ran off to Los Angeles with the most wanted, most famous, most talented Jesse Lee, she’s all but forgotten about me. I’m stuck in Surprise, Arizona—ironic because the city couldn’t be less surprising. She’s rubbing elbows with the rich and famous, shacked up in a one-hundred-year-old renovated farmhouse in the Hollywood Hills and living like a queen. If I sound jealous, it’s because I am. But mostly, I miss her.

  I’m a twenty-nine-year-old woman working at a nightclub and living with a roommate who drives me crazy. Talk about being stunted at twenty-one. I blew off high school, never graduated, and have no education or experience besides serving drinks. Planning ahead was never my thing. Hell, even looking ahead was never my thing. I’m a live-in-the-moment kind of a girl, and look where that’s gotten me.

  “Yes, Jesse and I were in a baby store, but that’s the only part of that story that’s true.”

  “You’re not pregnant?”

  “No. If I were, you’d be the first person to know because you’re my best friend, idiot!”

  I smile and close my laptop. “Good. I was hoping you’d say that.”

  “We were picking out some stuff for Ryder and Jade’s baby, Katie. So all pink. And yes, we kissed in front of a crib when Jesse suggested we test out the mattress’s durability.”

  I snort-laugh. “Classic Jesse.” I carry my bowl to the sink and groan when I see it’s full of dirty dishes from my roommate’s three in the morning dinner party. “I miss you.” I add my bowl to the pile.

  “You must be staring at some kind of mess then.”

  “Dishes.” I leave them and vow to see how many days they’ll sit there before my roomie washes her shit.

  “It’s nice to know you’re getting a taste of what it was like to have you for a roommate.”

  I drop onto the couch, put up my feet, and rub my eyes. “I was never as bad as Stormie. If I’d known she was such a slob, I never would’ve asked her to move in.”

  “I had a feeling you two working together and living together might end up being an issue, but you didn’t listen to me.” I hear her garage door opening and she warns me the phone might switch to Bluetooth seconds before it does. “Are you there?”

  “Ugh. Unfortunately, yes.” I look around my small living room, feeling the walls close in. “I’m so over my life.”

  “Which part? The parties? The late nights and even later mornings? The nameless men and awkward after-sex goodbyes?”

  “Hey, I never do the awkward after-sex goodbyes! I sneak out in the middle of the night.” I blow out a breath. “And no, I just feel so… impotent.”

  “Not a word I would ever choose to describe you, but go on.”

  I curl to my side. “Maybe it’s because my thirtieth birthday is coming up, or maybe it’s because you left and I’m stuck in this tiny apartment with Stormie and all her prosexual bullshit, but I’m feeling stifled and icky. Are you laughing?”

  She clears her throat. “No, no, I’m…” Another throat clear. “Nothing, go on.”

  “I guess I just figured at this point in my life, I would’ve accomplished more.”

  “It’s not too late, you know. You could go back to school, take some of those beauty courses you’re always saying you should’ve taken.”

  “And compete with a bunch of eighteen-year-olds fresh out of high school? No thanks. Besides, I like my job. I like bartending and meeting new people. What other job can I get where I can sing, dance, flirt, and take a shot of tequila while on the clock?” Basically a list of everything I’m good at.

  “Good point.”

  “I need something. I don’t know, a hobby or something.”

  “Why don’t you volunteer at the church? There are a thousand things you could do, and they really need all the help they can get. Bonus, you get to spend extra time with Ben.” Her voice sounds lighter when she mentions me spending time with Ben. She knows I have a crush on the guy, but what she refuses to admit is that he and I have nothing in common.

  He’s a single dad with an early bedtime.

  My nights don’t even start until ten o’clock.

  He’s two-percent milk.

  I’m flaming whiskey shots.

  He’s oxfords and Dockers.

  I’m fishnets and leopard print.

  He’s morality.

  I’m debauchery.

  He’s a pastor, for crying out loud.

  I worship the god of fun.

  Nothing about us matches up.

  “I’ll put a call in to Ben,” she says, making my stomach do that annoying flippy thing it always does when someone mentions his name.

  It’s really unfair that he’s not ugly.

  He’s a walking lesson in denying the desires of the flesh—something he once preached on. Just because I go to church to gawk doesn’t mean I don’t listen to the sermons… sometimes.

  “You don’t have to do that. I work late on Saturdays, so it would be torture to have to get up early on Sunday—”

  “I bet you woke up early to go to the service this morning though.”

  “No, I got off work at three o’clock this morning and stayed up until church. I finally went to bed at noon, hence the five p.m. cereal. Volunteering would be different. I’d be expected to show up on time and, ya know, sober.”

  “Don’t poo-poo it yet! Not until we have more information. I’ll call you tomorrow and let you know what I find out. I have to run. I’m meeting Jade for dinner.”

  I stick my tongue out at her before saying, “Bye.”

  Bethany is living the life.

  Since when do I feel a little stuck in mine?

  Maybe volunteering at the church wouldn’t be so bad. It would give me something to do, the view would be amazing (thanks to Pastor Ben), and I’d be feeding that weird place inside me that is desperate to do something outside of gorging myself on fun.

  I nuzzle in deeper to the couch, thinking maybe I’ll catch a couple more hours of sleep. A scent hits my nose and burns. The smell is coming from the couch cushion beneath my cheek. I suck in a full breath, hoping I’m not smelling what I think I’m smelling, that somehow, I’ve been mistaken.

  I once heard that ghosts can accompany a scent, so that when you get that whiff of Grandma’s old perfume from out of nowhere, you know it’s Grandma peeking in on you.

  If that’s what this is, then I’m being visited by a dead pirate hooker because the smell is rotting fish and sex. I push up off the couch and look down, hoping I don’t see a wet spot from Stormie’s sex sesh last night. I don’t, which means these scents are hidden deep within the fabric and now deep within my nose.

  “Stormie!” I yell, tossing the throw blanket onto the floor as if it’s covered in a billion marching seamen. “Get out here!”

  After I call her a few more times, she finally stumbles out from the hallway with her fitted sheet wrapped around her from the boobs down. Her black hair falls around her shoulders and the heavy makeup she wore to work last night is still there, just rearranged o
n her face. She squints into the sunlit room, searching the space before bringing her gaze to mine. “What the fuck? I thought the cops were here by the way you were yelling.”

  “What’s rule number four?” I demand.

  Her face scrunches up as if she’s trying to do long division in her head.

  “No sex in communal spaces!”

  “Oh.” Her eyes dart toward the kitchen. “Yeah, about that—”

  I gasp, loudly, and close my eyes. “So help me God, don’t tell me you fucked in the same place we eat.” When she doesn’t confirm or deny, I open my eyes and find guilt written all over her face. “You didn’t.”

  “It’s a stupid rule.”

  “What is wrong with your bed? Or your floor? You have your own fucking bathroom even. Why must you do it on the couch and in the kitchen? Have some respect, for fuck’s sake.” I stomp past her to my room and curse her vagina to hell.

  “I’m sorry, okay? Just chill out.”

  I slam the door, bury my head in my pillows, and fall asleep.

  Chapter Two

  Ben

  “You’re late.” Donna’s eyes are wide with worry, and although she’s smiling, her expression is sharp. She takes Elliot’s backpack from my shoulder and hands me a cup of coffee. “They got here twenty minutes ago.”

  “They’re early. I’m on time.” I check the clock—it’s five past eight. “Almost.”

  Elliot races to Donna’s desk to dig through the bowl of hard candy.

  “It’s too early for candy, Elliot,” I say, stopping on the way to my office. “Save it for after school.”

  “I got her. You go.” Donna fishes out a red hard candy, Elliot’s favorite.

  “You’ll need to leave in ten minutes to get her to school on time.”

  “I got it.” She motions to my collar. “Fix that.”

  I fix where my collar was stuck up on one side. “Thanks. Pray.”

  “I will.”

  I clear my throat and take a second to gather my composure after our rushed morning. Colette never did get back to me, forcing me to get Elliot up and ready for school earlier than she’s used to. After six hundred clothing rejections and two different breakfast refusals, I concluded that there is no making my girl happy when she’s tired.