DALTON
Inviting myself over to Elizabeth’s apartment may have been overstepping some boundaries, but I didn’t care. If we were going to be friends, then I was going to react the same way I would when any of my other friends were having a bad day. If Harrison was distracted at work and needed to get something off his chest, I wouldn’t second-guess heading over to his place after work with a six-pack or inviting him over to watch some sporting event. The biggest question is who am I trying to convince this of more, myself or Elizabeth?
Since I left my appointment this afternoon, she had sent me three text messages and I knew they were all intended to start a conversation about her canceling. I wasn’t going to let her get out of this night though. Hayes had been periodically babysitting for me for years now. He knew all the first aid basics. In a short bit of time, I’d be trusting him with my life during a fire, so I’d also trust him with Katie’s life. Elizabeth was nervous about Hayes watching Eva and I understood. I played a bit dirty when I asked Blair to reach out to Elizabeth after the third text message. It worked though.
She walked Eva over to my house where Hayes was already busy prepping his world-famous macaroni and cheese. It was just the orange kind that came in a box, but he put on a show in the kitchen that had the girls cracking up laughing. It was the perfect opportunity to guide Elizabeth out the door and back down to her apartment.
We’ve shared space alone before, but standing in her kitchen this time felt different. There was a feeling surrounding us that I couldn’t quite name. She was a bundle of nerves just the same, bustling around the kitchen trying to prep for our take-out food that was going to be here soon. It was cute the way she couldn’t stand still. She was in the middle of washing the wine glasses that she swore were just too dusty for us the bring out of when I walked up behind her.
I gently placed one hand on her hip and the other around the base of the wine glass that had already been scrubbed twice. “Elizabeth,” I said softly into her ear, “the wine glasses are fine.”
“They’re dirty,” she said, in almost a whining voice.
“I’ve taken shots of tequila from glasses with worms in them, Liz, you can stop cleaning and just breathe.”
She quietly giggled and then set the glass on the drying rack. I could feel her take a deep breath and then she turned around to face me. This was the first time we shared space like this and my mind was trying to process all of the emotions. There was no doubt that I was attracted to her, but it was so much more. In a different lifetime, I would have taken advantage of the way she was looking at me and gone in for a kiss, but I couldn’t get my brain to function that way. Instead, it went into panic mode and I took a step back for breathing room.
“There,” I grinned, “You look better already.”
“I don’t know what is wrong with me,” she admitted. “I think I’m just nervous about Eva being with Hayes. She’s never had a male babysitter before and I still don’t know him that well.”
“Elizabeth, I’m not going to hold you hostage here. If you really think you need to go get Eva and we call this night a wash, that’s okay.”
She shook her head, “No, I trust you and that means I trust who you trust with Katie.” She let out a long breath, “Today has just been a long day.”
Earlier today at my appointment she tried to hide her feelings, but I could tell something was off. The smile was fake and she snapped at the smallest inconvenience. She didn’t snap at me, but when one of the resistance bands snapped she tossed it down and curse under her breath. That was so unlike her. She tried to tell me nothing was wrong, but I called her out on her bullshit immediately.
“Are you ready to talk about it yet?” Elizabeth shook her head and I was about ready to dig some more then there was a knock at the door. She was saved for the moment by our dinner. Much to her dismay, I got to the door first and paid our delivery driver. Once the food was out on the table, I tried to get answers once again. “I just want to let you know that I’m a safe space for you, Liz. I know how it feels to hold everything in, it isn’t good for you. I’ll keep my mouth shut unless you want me to say something. Promise.”
I reach across the table with my pinkie. She looks down at it a lightly laughs before meeting me halfway and hooking our pinkies together. “My dad called me today.”
“I see,” I responded even though I didn’t really see. Not everybody got along with their parents, so I assumed it was just rooted in that.
“Maybe I should explain more. I don’t talk with my dad and he knows this. Since I wouldn’t have answered a call from him or my mom, he used my aunt’s phone. Now I can’t trust my aunt, so it just keeps getting worse and worse.”
“Did he do something to do?”
Elizabeth takes a drink of the wine she poured and shrugged, “That’s a loaded question. He kind of did a bit of everything. He was a shitty dad and a pretty crappy husband, but my mom is a devout Catholic, and divorce would be a mortal sin. She’d never leave him, but at the same time I think she just thinks marriage is dealing with being miserable.”
“Is that one of the reasons you never got married?”
“Perhaps subconsciously. Maybe that is why I always picked red-flag men to date, that was all I ever knew.”
“I don’t think you can blame your dad for meeting the wrong men, Liz.”
“That’s twice tonight,” she interrupted me to say.
“What’s that?”
“Liz,” she answered. “Usually you call me Elizabeth, but twice you’ve called me Liz.”
“You did say I could call you Liz or Elizabeth. I kind of like, Liz, it fits you. Is that okay?”
She smiles, “Yeah, it works. As long as you don’t call me Lizzie. That is what my dad used to call me and it makes my skin crawl.”
“Dang, you really do have issues with him. What exactly happened that caused this full slash of him from your life?”
“My dad had a drinking and a gambling problem. One night he was at some bar with friends, playing poker and drinking. He won a hand and this guy refused to pay him. Since they were both drunk, they started fighting. The guy tried to leave, but my dad wasn’t the guy of man to back down from anything. He got into his car and ran him down.”
“Fuck,” I was a bit surprised by Elizabeth’s honesty, I expected that it would take longer for her to open up to me. “What happened to the guy?”
“Thankfully,” she rolls her eyes, “he didn’t die. He was seriously injured though and my dad was arrested and charged with driving under the influence and attempted vehicular manslaughter. He went away to prison and I thought that would fix everything.”
“I take it that you still struggled with your relationship with your mom?”
“Yep, even after he went to prison, my mom insisted that he was a good man and just made a mistake. He repented and that was good enough for her. She had the audacity to be mad at me because every couple of years when he was up for parole, I spoke in front of the board to keep him in jail. That, combined with the sinful way I conceived Eva was enough to sever that relationship.”
“Ouch, so running a man over with your car is fine, but having a baby via IUI is where she draws the line?”
Elizabeth scoffed, “Yep, that’s my mom for you.”
“That’s…horrible.”
“It hurt. I was becoming a mother myself and my own mother wasn’t around. She picked her husband over her daughter.”
“So your dad called you? What does that mean?”
“It means that he is finally out of prison.”
“Oh.” It was a bad response, but at this point, I didn’t know what to say.
“I know, my life is a mess.” I try to speak up and correct her, but she waved me off. “Don’t worry, Dalton, I know it is a lot. This is why I keep it to myself. The last time I went before the parole board, they decided to grant him parole. He was a model citizen and had found new faith in the Lord,” the statement laced with sarcasm. “Before they took him from the hearing room, he turned to me and smirked, told me he couldn’t wait to meet his granddaughter. I knew at that moment I had to get away from my parents.”
All the pieces are starting to come together. “And that is why you moved here?”
She nodded her head, answering my question. “I was willing to move anywhere that was at least two states away from my mom, because of course she was welcoming him back home with open arms. I was lucky when my friend Shay called and said she had an opening at her hospital.”
A lump formed in my throat, I worried what her answer to my question might be, but I needed to know. “Are you worried for your safety? Like, if your dad might track you down and do something?”
She shakes her head, “No, it’s not like that. He’ll probably find ways to bother me and harass me, especially since I was one of the reasons he was in prison for so long, but as long as we’re far away, we’re out of range for anything.”
“You know if you were ever worried about something, I’m here, okay?”
“That’s sweet, Dalton. It really is.” She gave me a half smile before standing up to work on clearing the dinner mess. I wasn’t going to sit around and let her do all the work, especially after she just opened up to me in a very deep way.
“I can get that,” we both grabbed for the remaining plate at the same time, our fingers touching. A zing traveled through my entire body as we stood there with our eyes locked on each other. I barely blinked and Elizabeth’s lips were on mine. Her lips were so soft, so warm, so tender. I dropped my hand from the plate and cupped her cheek with mine. I was just getting ready to pull her closer to me when she jumped back as if a fire had started between the two of us.
“Oh God, I’m so sorry!”
She tries to pull away, but I quickly take her hand, “Elizabeth, it’s okay.”
She shakes he head emphatically and backs away, pulling her hand from mine. “That was so stupid. This...this can’t happen. That was not cool. Oh God, I’m so embarrassed.”
“Eliz…” I start to say her name, but she turns and runs down the hall into her bedroom. I’m left standing in the kitchen confused as hell and questioning everything.