Page 9 of Deep Gap

“Nah, training Tallulah was a favor for Trig. Jovie is my girl. She’s getting up there. I wouldn’t want to add another puppy into the mix and have it take away from our last few years together.”

I owe Jovie that much for her undivided attention. I’d been intense, focused on jumping through hoops to get her stateside and simply having my dog when I got back from my last tour. Both of my parents passed away while I was enlisted. The fact that someone was there to love me unconditionally probably saved my life. Hell, reading the article the base newspaper wrote about what it took to get Jovie home is the reason Mac and Karen introduced themselves to me. It’s how I got involved in training service animals for vets.

Once you get me on the subject of the dogs and the vets we serve, I’m unable to hold back. Enlisting at eighteen, I was as lost for what to do next as I was when I’d separated from the Army a decade later. But, being raised on a farm, I love animals and I took to my current job like a fish to water. The path may be unconventional, yet I’m certain this is what I was put on this earth to do.

Greer listens intently. I recognize I’m monopolizing the conversation and try to provide indirect opportunities for her to open up about herself. She stays silent. My side cramps up underneath my ribs. I shift in my seat, trying to respect her privacy and unnerved that she might find me boring.

I am older than Greer is. Maybe that’s the issue. Yet, the female friends that Trig’s wife has introduced me to have been younger than Greer and they’re a chatty bunch. Or perhaps since many of them work at Sweet Caroline’s, those women are livelier and skilled at flirting. It does help if you’re a stripper and accustomed to knowing exactly how to ensnare a man’s attention.

My throat goes dry and I pick up my hours-old coffee that’s in the cupholder.

“Is that from Baked Beans?” Greer rolls her lips.

“Uh, yeah. I got it on the way in this morning. It’s cold. I’d offer you a sip…”

“Would you mind?” She picks up where I trail off.

“Knock yourself out.”

The cup passes between us. Greer closes her eyes, pressing the recycled plastic lid to her mouth. She releases a sigh of contentment after the single sip, placing the coffee back in the spot in the console between us.

“I took my mom to Baked Beans once. They have the most amazing—”

“Chocolate croissants,” we say at the same time.

Suddenly, we have something in common.

“Trig’s stepdaughter is a barista there. She’s got purple hair,” I say, stumbling over the fact that I’m not sure how else to describe the complexities of their relationship. Then I wonder if calling out the shade made me sound like a guileless geezer who can’t accept other people’s life choices. I bite my tongue before doing something as insane as complimenting Greer’s appearance in a lame attempt to get myself out of the hole I’m digging.

“I saw her. I thought she was very pretty.”

And just like that, it’s gone and Greer is pensive, finding the scenery of more interest than my company.

________________

I slam the passenger door and codfish a few times before I can finally push the words out of my mouth.

“I’m sorry.”

“You aren’t the first person, with the help of the wind, to shut a car door too hard.” Byron shrugs off my apology.

“I’m not good company. This thing happened last night that I haven’t been able to get off my mind. And cars make me anxious.” And men make me just as nervous.

It’s better to leave that part out, though. We’re almost two hundred miles from Brighton. The last thing I need to do is offend Byron any more than I have and wind up hitchhiking across North Carolina to get home.

Stupid, run-down home that it is. It’s still nice to have something to call my own. A place to go where I don’t have to worry I’ll be recognized, and where I can just be the crazy mixed up me that’s just south of terrified of driving in a car and a map dot away from quaking in my boots each time Byron rubs the scruff on his chiseled chin.

“Okay,” he says, handing me the ax.

Byron shuts the hatchback, surveying the area the Christmas tree farmer has instructed us the evergreens the size Byron wants for his living room are.

“That’s it? Okay? I tell you I’m a nutcase and you turn your back on me while I’m holding a sharp object.”

There hadn’t been a point where I’d seriously gotten into any scuffles with other inmates. However, I knew how to defend myself against Waylon’s advances because I learned how to in prison.

A throaty laugh escapes Byron. “Are you planning on bludgeoning me to death?”

“No.” I use the duh voice I often used with Ellis when we were kids.

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