Page 7 of Mr. Mistletoe
After watching as Mack does all the work with James lifting one suitcase, they’re in Ms. Faye’s house. I lean back watching them, and as Mack talks to James about whatever, Kimberly walks or rather sprints over to me. She has a small smile on her face. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about the wedding until now, I was just…” She stops.
“You were just what?” I ask her.
She blinks but doesn’t finish her sentence. She shakes her head. “Can I just get a hug goodnight? It feels weird to be here and not hug you goodnight.”
I playfully scoff. I lean down and pull her into a hug. One that lasts longer than it should. I turn into the crook of her neck and inhale. I feel goosebumps appear on her exposed arms. “You made a mistake coming here, Mamita,” I say to her.
“What do you mean?” she asks as she tries to loosen the hold.
I pull her closer to me by her waist. “You should’ve never told me you were getting married because the only man of honor that I will be at your wedding, baby, is the man with the honor to marry your ass.” I plant a small kiss on her favorite spot behind her ear. The brim of my Stetson covers it but I don’t care if James sees. I’d fight him for her.
I pull away and Kimberly is staring at me, wide-eyed. I tilt my head and tip my Stetson at her. “Baby aren’t you just a hot mess. Look at ya, flustered and all cause o’ me.” I grab her chin between my forefinger and thumb. “Let me take a good look at ya.”
She’s so beautiful even if I haven’t seen her in years. From her perfect chocolate skin that glistens when the Fairhope sun hits it, to those big brown eyes that could get a man staring at her for eternity. Her body doesn’t hurt at all, she’s curvy, and it’s a beautiful sight to behold. Her hair is in a French braid down her back but I can’t wait to see it in all its glory.
“You’re staring,” she clears her throat.
“Right. Well, have a goodnight, Mamita. Sleep tight, sweetness.” I wink as I remove my Stetson and place it on her head like I used to do.
I turn to walk away and I stop when I feel her hand on my elbow. I face her, “Deac, I blame this on the jet lag but the next time you so much as kiss me again while my fiancée is right there, I will beat your ass from here all the way to California,” she says with false anger in her eyes.
I wanted to scream out and tell her that I’m a fucking god and I can tell when she’s lying. I haven’t been able to read her mind; we need to be connected for me to do that, but there are all the signs there. I know Kimberly like the back of my hand.
“I wondered when hurricane Kimberly woul’ make an appearance. The niceness doesn’t become you.” I grin throwing her off. “But you’re right, darlin’, where are my manners when it comes to your fiancée? The man that you actually committed to?”
She glares at me. “Fuck you, Deacon.”
I smirk. “We’re not in the Big Apple, darlin’, you’re now in my town. I do as I please and what I’m going to do is show you what it’s like to be a flower that is plucked out of someone else’s garden,” I blow her a kiss and snatch my elbow out of her hold. I get around my truck and get in.
Kimberly’s temper must’ve gotten the best of her because she kicks the passenger side of my truck a couple of times and then stomps her ass into Ms. Faye’s house. The entire time she doesn’t even realize she still has my Stetson on. I watch her ass as it moves while she walks in the house. Mack comes out a minute later, and we head out. “She’s pissed,” he says with amusement in his tone.
I snicker. “I know.” The moment I press play on my music, Brett Young’sIn Case You Didn’t Knowcomes on. I guess I really do wear my heart on my sleeves but that’s okay, it’s time for little miss asshole to see that she’s with the wrong man and she tried to pass up on the right one just because she was scared.
Kimberly
I wake up in shock toKilling me Softlyby The Fugees blasting. James groans and wakes. “What is that?” he asks from the floor. To keep this damned pretend mess going, it has to appear real.
James is too close of a friend for me and him to share a bed. I don’t want to give off signals when none are there. After losing my temper with Deacon last night, it made me realize I need to act better. Be more of myself with how he knows me instead of acting like a complete clown.
I roll my eyes hearing the music again. groaning, I get out of bed. “It’s my mother, let me just figure out why this music is so dang loud.” I consider changing from my t-shirt and sleep shorts but the less they suspect, the better.
I walk out of my room and I take the house in. The fact that my mom was able to move back to the same place brings back nostalgia. I slow down at the stairs as the fresh memory of a man I haven’t thought about hits me hard; my dad. He and my mother divorced and I moved to New York with her where her family was. He was left behind, alone. But I visited as much as I could. His boisterous laughter fills my thoughts, and I get so weak in the knees, I sit on the stairs. I place my face in my hands, trying to control myself so that I don’t cry. I take a deep breath in and another one out. My father died a year before my high school graduation and I couldn’t see Fairhope the same way. Everywhere I walked, everyone I saw, I couldn’t do it. Whitaker ‘Whit’ St. Andrews was loved by this town and loved even more by me. He was my whole world and when he left it, that shit crumbled. I couldn’t hold it together enough to go back when I graduated high school even though mom moved back.
Although the Fairhopes came for vacations, they stayed as long as they could, and I told the one man that I had a crush on from the day he called me ‘Mamita’ that I couldn’t go back with him. God, I couldn’t be around him while all I heard in my head was that my father loved him like his own son. So, I chose myself.
Giving Deacon my virginity was never a mistake, neither was hooking up with him the second time I went back when I was 20. I don’t want to regret anything that I did with him, even leaving him ,because if I say I have regrets then it means that my life is a lie right now. If I regret that I chose him over me when I could’ve chosen him to be with me and help me heal, then that would mean that I don’t want anyone else but him. Which is right but wrong. You see, I’ll always want Deacon Hiram Fairhope, that was what I realized. This is why I’m here now. We make sense of everything that we do. Deacon and I may have drifted over the years but it’s not on him. It’s on me. Deacon and I will always make sense. We’ll always be it for one another and I don’t think I could ever not want him. I want to fight for him and this is my way.
I sigh, not understanding why I’m feeling some type of way about everything ever since the second I stepped foot here. It must be the jetlag. The song changes and a Bobby Brown song,My Prerogative, comes on. I look up remembering my mission but then I’m stopped short by the country boy in my momma’s kitchen moving not only his head but the rest of his body to this damn song in sweats and a tank showcasing his tattoos and naturally toned body. What the actual fuck is he doing here! I am not ready for him yet. Seeing Deacon without a game plan can throw everything out the window and I might spill the beans. I’ve never been good at keeping things from him.
I take another step ready to say something to him but he turns off the stove, places the food on a plate and grabs a water bottle from the fridge then makes his way to the living room. I follow him and I’m stopped short again. Deacon places the food on the table then puts on gloves. He lifts my mother’s shirt a bit and I get ready to shout at him but then I see how he removes a bag of what I can tell is drainage fluid. He places the load safe and secure in a small bin on the side. He cleans the place where my mother had a catheter surgically put in while he bobs his head to the music humming while my mother sings along too. She even has a smile on her face and I know this isn’t the first time this has happened. He hooks a diffusion drip bag to the catheter and hands it to her to hold. He removes his gloves, placing them in that bin with the drainage. He stands, and when he reaches for the IV pole stand, I now take it all in. My mother is on dialysis but how? When? Nobody told me.
Tears form in my eyes. Lord, please don’t tell me my mother is dying. I can’t handle this. Is this town cursed or something? I sniffle and Deacon looks up at me. He’s not shocked to see me standing here which means he knew I was standing here. He takes the bag from my mother and hooks it to the pole stand. He presses the button for it to begin.
“Ms. Faye, I’ll be out back if you need me in a little bit.” I know what he’s doing, he’s giving us a minute.
“Momma…” I say softly once Deacon turns the music down a little bit.
My mom, the one that I mirror after; looks at me with her kind and gentle eyes. “Now, why in the hell are you crying?” she asks.
