Steve flew down the stairs like he had wings and ran out of the building. His head was swimming, his throat was dry, his dick was hard, and his heart was beating so fast that he thought he might pass out. He didn’t want her to go, but he couldn’t give in and let her stay. He didn’t know why she was there or what she’d seen in him, but after that … horrible … thing they’d just had up there, she was seeing him more clearly. It only took her a day to see reality. He knew what he had to do. So he went and did it.
Kayla didn’t know what to do with herself. She thought about going after him, but she knew in no uncertain terms that that was a bad idea. They both had to calm down, and Kayla had to figure out how to convince him that her feelings for him were real. It was going to be even harder now than it had been an hour ago, because she saw the look of rejection on his face. She sat down on the bed and hugged a pillow to herself.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered into the room, wiping the tear that had spilled down her cheek. “I’m hurting you so much … I’m making it worse. “I’m so sorry, baby. I’m trying …” An image of Candy in orgasmic release on top of Steve appeared out of nowhere. Kayla made a face and then shook her head resignedly. The revolving door of women that she knew had been there but never had to deal with bothered her a lot more than she’d expected them to. She suspected that he was embellishing to scare her off, but she knew those embellishments were based in truth, and without warning the jealousy had turned her blood a molten green. “Oh, Steve, you’re going to be so sorry, too.” Kayla cried into the pillow for just a few moments longer before laying herself down and crying herself to sleep.
When she woke up the overcast skies had turned a little darker. She looked at the clock and realized she’d been asleep for a couple hours. Steve clearly was not in the room. She sighed heavily and went to the bathroom to splash cold water over her tear-streaked face. When she came out she sat in the chair and got her head on straight. You’re a big girl, Kayla chided herself, it’s time to gather yourself up and find something to do.
Just then a movement outside the window caught her attention. Ray was on the fire escape with his back to her smoking a cigarette. He was literally just a few feet away, separated by the closed window. She stood up quickly and backed up a step. Had he been watching her? Did he see what they were doing before Steve left? Had he been watching her sleep? He lifted his hand from the railing and took a long, slow drag on his cigarette, exhaling loudly, as if he was trying to tell her he’d heard every word and watched every sleepy breath. Kayla was frozen for just a moment, the shock of his potential voyeurism hitting home. She also realized that she’d forgotten to lock the window after wringing out her jeans. Kayla very slowly tiptoed to the double-hung panes of glass and twisted the very Victorian-looking latch. The moment she had he turned just his profile to her and smiled with a toothy grin that gave her the creeps. In response, Kayla pulled the drab, brown curtains over the wondow, locking his body and his gaze completely out. Now she understood Steve’s insistence that she not tangle with the man. She could see through the small gap in the curtain that he’d gone back into his own window, but she gave the frame a shake to make sure it was secure.
Now more than ever, Kayla had to busy herself. It was a small room, smaller even than Steve’s basement apartment she knew so well, so it wasn’t like there was a whole lot to do. She straightened up what she could amidst the drying laundry and found a small stash of cleaning supplies in the process. So, she washed the dishes in the bathroom sink and dried them before putting them back where they appeared to belong on the long dresser, then she cleaned the bathroom. She was relieved to have the chores to occupy her; it gave her something to focus on other than Mr. Creepy. Or all those women Steve was sleeping with. Or where destination Steve went and where her Steve was. Unfortuantely, she ran out of chores quicker than she would have liked, because as always, her husband kept a pretty tidy apartment in the first place. The only thing she really wanted to do was vacuum the carpet, but that would entail finding a vacuum cleaner, and she wondered if there was a community closet on the floor somewhere like Stephanie had at her dorm where the tools were kept. But it would mean leaving the room, and she didn’t need any more convincing on that. Not to mention, if Steve found out she’d snuck out he’d be livid – something she didn’t want to risk right now.
It was when she checked the laundry laying over a drawer that she saw the strip of condoms inside. The feelings those condoms evoked in her hurt; but they also gave her a sense of relief. She thought about the solicitation charge on Steve’s rap sheet. Every dark haired woman he’d once had feelings for laughed at her from within. Della hung on him, Marina flirted with him, and Candy humped him. The reality of his promiscuousness was right there in front of her. In the form of that strip of square, gold wrappers.
Kayla was not thinking straight. She had to calm down, because this part of his life happened, it was no different from when she’d meet him four years from now. She didn’t let it bother her then, so why was it upsetting her so much now?
Because I’m watching it happen right in front of me.
This wasn’t something Kayla was ever meant to see. She felt like an intruder on something very private in Steve’s life. Something he was so very ashamed of and that to this day he had pushed somewhere he wouldn’t be able to easily access it. Sometimes unshared time was novel and sweet. Sometimes it was a gift. And sometimes … sometimes it was something that should have stayed unshared. Now the guilt was overwhelming, and she wasn’t convinced she’d done the right thing coming here, after all.
Kayla felt like she was spiraling, and that’s because she was. Her heightened emotions were completely out of control right now, feeding off of the legitimately unstable ones inside of her already; a side effect Rolf could not have predicted. She understood, now, that when Steve realized where he was and what she’d seen that he was going to take it very hard. She shouldn’t have come here …
… But … wasn’t that the plan? All along, wasn’t that the point of the jump project? Wasn’t that why they’d drilled phone numbers and addresses into one another for, literally, years, so that they could find each other no matter what? She was so conflicted she didn’t know what to do. And then she saw something else in that drawer … something that she knew so well, because it had belonged to her for the 16 years she’d thought Steve was dead. Right now it belonged to her husband, and the sight of it immediately calmed her.
“Oh, Steve,” she whispered. The shoebox in her hand was a lot newer than the one that currently lived in a drawer in Steve’s bedside table in 2009. She’d opened it for comfort hundreds of times before he’d come back in 2006. She was so drawn to it now, the embodiment of her husband, that she just acted on pure instinct. When she looked inside some contents had changed. There was a photo of Britta that was like new, rather than the polaroid of she and Steve, which wouldn’t be taken for four more years. There was also a photo of him and Bo that she’d never seen, and a bunch of black and white pictures of him as a child with his mother, then a little older with Marcus from the orphanage. And then … there was … a toy train, burned and ancient looking. She knew every contour of this precious, single memento from Steve’s innocence. She fingered it delicately and was reminded exactly why she was there. Because this man wasn’t her husband yet, but he would be. Steve kept them together for eleven days, she was only on day two. The man he’d become was here, this box that she’d coveted for 16 years proved it. Kayla smiled and was so taken by it that she didn’t hear the door open. The hands that roughly tore the train and cigar box from her were not gentle in the process.
“What the f*ck do you think you’re doing?!” Steve roared.
“I … I was …”
“You were what? Spying on me? Going through my stuff?! What gives you the right?!” He was seething as he fumbled to get the train back into the box.
The door was open, and Kayla had to get hold of the situation. “Steve close the door,” she said.
“Yeah, I’m gonna close it, as soon as I walk you out of it!”
“I’ll explain, just close the door,” she begged.
“You’ll explain now, little girl!”
The memory of Ray’s creepy smile motivated her, so she reached past him to do it herself, but Steve caught her left arm in serious anger. Kayla sucked in her breath at his handling of her sore wrist, and she wasn’t welcoming the pain this time. She reacted on a far healthier instinct than she did last night, wrenching herself out of his grip – and the expression on his face changed on a dime. Steve let her go immediately.
“Kayla, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it,” he said genuinely. She turned from him and gently rubbed at her wrist.
“It’s fine,” she said shortly. She knew he didn’t intend to hurt her, he’d just forgotten about the sprain. Didn’t mean it didn’t hurt.
Steve exhaled loudly and shuffled his feet. “I’m mad as hell, but I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
“I believe you.” Kayla turned back to him, her tone measured. “Right now just please let me shut the door. Ray was outside on the fire escape, and I’m not sure if he was watch—”
Steve immediately slammed the door hard, turned both locks, and put up the chain.
“He try to get in here?”
“No, I locked the window. He was smoking a cigarette, then went back into his room.”
Steve went to the window and pulled aside the curtain to make sure Ray was gone. Satisfied for the moment, he came back and put the shoebox back into his drawer and closed it, the drying tank top hanging out over the front. Then he slowly reached for Kayla’s arm. “Old man’s bad news,” he said as he gently held it in his hands, tender underside facing up. “What were you doing in that drawer?” The remorseful look in his eye told of the storm inside of him, but his tone was clearly unhappy.
“I know what it looks like.” Steve eyed her. “I know, I’m – I’m sorry. I wasn’t snooping, I was just trying to straighten up, and—and I saw it there.” He glanced up at her as if to say so what? Telling him that it was familiar and she needed to connect with it was not going to go over, so she just cut to the apologies, which were more than warranted. “I was curious, I’m sorry. I don’t have a good explanation.”
Steve let out a sarcastic breath. “Or maybe you would if you weren’t ‘waiting it out?’” he used her words from last night.
“Something like that,” she conceded, as honest with him as she could let herself be. Then she touched her right hand to his arm. I was wrong.“ He looked away, so she tipped his chin to look her in the eye and repeated very solemnly, “I was wrong, Steve. I’m sorry.” He gave her an appreciative look, then took a deep breath like a period on the end of that discussion.
Steve hadn’t yet dropped her arm and was now staring at it. “I dunno what the hell’s the matter with me,” he said as he stroked his thumb lightly over her arm. “I’m sorry I hurt you, Sweetness.”
Kayla tilted her head. “So, I’m Sweetness, again.”
Steve nodded resignedly but continued looking at her arm. “You’re too sweet to have jerks like me put bruises on you like this.” He was right, there were four pronounced fingertip bruises on the inside of her lower arm to accompany the completely unrelated sprain. She couldn’t deny the fact that he did, indeed, put them there last night in the bar. But she enabled it. Welcomed it. Felt a desperate comfort by it. Now it was adding fuel to the hating fire within him.
“I … realize I don’t know you very well … but I know you didn’t mean to hurt me. You don’t hurt people.”
“Wanna bet?”
“No, I wouldn’t want you to lose your money.” Steve laughed at that, and Kayla smiled, too. “You would never try to hurt me. Don’t try to tell me you’re a bad guy and you do bad things, because that doesn’t mean you hurt people.”
“I did hurt you.” He punctuated the bitter words by raised her arm up toward her as evidence. “I put these bruises on your arm! I squeezed so tight, that I—”
“That you let go,” she insisted. “Ok. You hurt me. But as soon as you saw I was in pain, you let go. You didn’t mean to hurt me.”
Steve wanted to hold her, but he stayed his ground, continuing to stroke his thumbs over the bruises he marred her beautiful, alabaster skin with. Then he felt it. Her arms going around him, pulling him into an embrace. She was the one holding him. No one had held him in such a very long time.
No words were exchanged while Steve buried his face in her shoulder. She smelled good. How could she smell so good after being rain-soaked and air-dried? It wasn’t a scent like Candy’s or the other women that he tended to attract, Kayla smelled like a burst of yellow light.
Steve let her go before he wouldn’t be able to and turned to grab the ace bandage. It was still slightly damp, but he couldn’t take seeing those bruises on her. “Come here.” Kayla sat on the edge of the bed while Steve faced her in the chair and very gingerly wrapped his wife’s arm. It was just like she showed him. Kayla smiled while she watched him use her technique, and a warm feeling spread through her.
“Very textbook, Mr. Johnson.”
Steve grinned. “Well, I learned from Nurse Brady, so I figured I’d better do it right.”
“I’m really glad you got a chance,” she smiled.
Steve gave her a lopsided grin. “Anybody ever tell you you’re weird, baby?” She chuckled, because she agreed that it was a very weird statement. He wasn’t going to understand it, and so she was fine with the weirdness. “There, how’s that feel?” he asked as he secured it with the two beige claws that always ended up getting lost before some genius invented self-sticking ace bandages.
“Pretty good.”
Steve nodded and sat back. He wanted to get up, but he’d brush her legs if he did, so he stayed put. They said nothing of their previous actions, but they both felt them. A moment later, Kayla started filling the silence.
“So, ah … thank you for the free phone this morning.” Steve shrugged a nod and found a place to put his eye while he bounced his leg up and down. She was hoping it would start a conversation, but Steve was mum. “How, um … How long have you known Dixie?”
Steve shrugged again. “While.”
“Is she—”
“Thanks for straightening up. The servants try to keep up with the place, but there are only so many square feet they can get to in a day, ya know?”
Kayla tucked her leg under her and grinned. “Oh, I dunno, I think you could be the mansion type.”
Steve looked at her like she’d grown a second head. “What gave it away, my trust fund digs, here?”
“Your hands,” she said. “You have very talented hands.”
“Don’t start that again,” he eyed her.
Kayla rolled her eyes, mostly at herself for the poor choice of words. “I was being serious, I’ll bet you could do really well with a great big fixer upper.”
“Yeah, I’m a regular Bob Villa.”
“Maybe you are. Maybe you could do anything they do on This Old House and do it even better.”
“You’re dreamin’, baby.” But she watched him think about it even as he denied it. She couldn’t exactly tell him that she’d once watched him drywall half the ceiling in their family room all by himself, but the gears were turning in his head as if he’d heard her think it.
It got very silent again, and this time Kayla tried to face the elephant in the room. “Are we going to talk about what happened?”
“No,” he answered her immediately looking her very pointedly in the eye.
“I think we should talk about it.”
Steve adjusted his patch before resting his arms on either side of the chair. “What is there to talk about?”
Kayla wanted to scoot up, but Steve’s body language was clear, so instead she actually inched back and tucked her other leg underneath her to sit cross-legged on the bed. “I think I—came on—a little strong, and … I’m sorry I upset you.”
“Upset me?”
“Aren’t you?”
“As in mad?” She nodded. “No,” he shook his head. “You’re just makin’ my balls blue.”
Kayla leveled a really annoyed look upon him. “Do you have to cheapen everything?”
“Yeah, I do.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m not the man for you, baby.”
“You’re the only man for me.” She said it before she could stop herself.
“I’m a one-eyed bum.” But his voice wavered with the chill her words sent through him.
“You can talk dirty all you want. It won’t scare me away.”
“Yeah, I think we both know that’s not true. You got real good and scared up against that wall over there.”
Well on that we was right. But not for that reason. And there was no way she could explain it. “That wasn’t fear, Steve. That was just me trying to slow down.”
“That was you havin’ buyer’s remorse, that’s what that was, baby.”
“No. I’m not afraid of you. I liked what you were doing. I was just surprised I’d let myself go that fast.”
“I know what I saw,” Steve whispered.
Kayla looked down and closed her eyes heavily. When she looked back up, Steve was scrutinizing her with a very piercing stare that she could practically feel. “Steve,”
“Why do you call me that?”
“Because it’s your name.”
“People call me Patch, now.”
Kayla unfolded her legs and sat at the very edge of the bed so she could take his hand in hers. It was his left hand. “People call you that because you let them. What happened to you was awful, and despite what you may think, Bo is going to carry that guilt with him until the day he dies. It happened, and he can’t take it back now. But it is over, and you don’t have to let it define who you are. You’re a beautiful man, and I only see the man wearing that patch, not the patch wearing the man.” Then she kissed his ring finger, the meaning, of course, lost on him.
Steve was touched. It was the most beautiful thing anyone had ever said to him. “Kayla,” he said solemnly, “you don’t know me or what kind of man I really am.” It was first time in this very long 24-hour period that he let his true vulnerability show.
Kayla shook her head slowly. “Oh, but I do. I know enough. Why can’t you just accept that I have feelings for you?”
He covered the vulnerability as quickly as he could and allowed his expression to turn. “Because, little girl. A leopard can’t change his spots.”
She wasn’t going to convince him. She sighed and finally got up and headed to the bathroom. “I’m not sorry for kissing you or … anything else,” she said. Then she closed the bathroom door behind her. Steve was sorry, though. For being weak. And selfish. Which was why he was packing up her bag for her when she came out of the bathroom. “What are you doing?” she asked alarmed.
“You’re going home. They got laundrymats in Salem, dry your clothes when you get there. Got you a ticket for the 7:27 bus.” Kayla’s stomach dropped. “Nice undies,” he leered as he retrieved a pair of underwear from the bag he’d just stuffed her still wet jeans into.
“You bought me a bus ticket?”
“Now, listen, I’m a good bag-packer, and the wet stuff ain’t that wet anymore, so it’s separated from the dry stuff.”
“Is that where you went?”
Steve took out the night shirt. It was navy blue and looked like an oversized t-shirt. “Aw, baby, I would have liked to have seen you wear this night-nighty to bed,” he teased, folding it back up and packing it away.
“I’m not leaving.”
“Yeah, you are,” he raised his voice sternly. “I told you, I’m not the man for you.”
“Why?!”
“Well, baby, that’s easy, I’m too much man for you.” Kayla started to reply, but Steve added, “I think we proved that when you panicked that I was about to f*ck your brains out against the wall.” Kayla loved it when Steve used that phrase to describe how much he wanted her. It never failed to turn her on. Until right now. “So, no more pretendin’. Now get your crap out of my bathroom, and we’ll go have a nice goodbye dinner.”
Kayla stuck out her chin, stubbornly angry. “Dinner?”
“That’s right, I’m gonna make sure you got a good meal in you, and then I’m taking you to Union Station.”
Kayla saw no way out of this. Her options were to sit in the middle of his bed and refuse to budge short of being hauled out over his shoulder, or she could go quietly and not behave like a brat in a temper tantrum. Her gut was screaming for the temper tantrum, because this man standing in front of her was temporary no matter how you sliced it, and once primary Steve arrived, he was going to need her to be there. But a voice in her head – a much quieter one that was meek and afraid to speak up – told her that if her Steve took another ten days (or more) to get here that things were going to be very complicated if she didn’t go back to Salem. She didn’t cry or panic – yet. Instead she got very strategic as she watched him zip up her duffel bag.
“You ready, Sweetness?”
“Guess so.”
That was too easy. What the hell was she planning?
When they left the hotel there was no sign of Ray, but Frank was back behind the Plexiglas. “See ya, Foxy!” he yelled.
“Go to hell, Frank!” Steve replied for her.
“See ya there, dude!” To which Steve flipped him off.
Pietro’s was a typical Chicago coffee shop with a menu that had pretty much everything. It wasn’t very crowded, so when they walked in Steve just sat them down in a booth in the back corner.
“You hungry?”
She was actually. “Yep.”
“I’ll bet you’re a fresh little salad kind of girl.”
“Actually, I’m starving. I’m going to have an appetizer and a salad before my dinner. How about you?”
“So that’s how you’re playin’ it,” Steve said out loud. Kayla grinned as she perused the menu, because she knew he’d figured her out right at the get go.
“I guess it is.”
“You’ve got two hours to eat up, then that bus leaves with you on it.”
“M’kay,” she said lazily.
“M’kay,” he mocked. She didn’t react, and Steve knew that was a bad sign. “Anyone ever tell you your stubborn?”
“So, I’m weird and stubborn. Got it.”
Steve set his menu down in a huff. “Are you gonna go to Union with me, or are you gonna be givin’ me problems?”
“Ya know what, I’ll make you a deal. Have a real dinner with me, no patronizing, no sarcasam. Just enjoy yourself and talk to me like a normal person, and I’ll go quietly. How’s that?”
“That’s too good to be true, that’s what that is.”
“I mean it. I’ll go to the train station. Just have a real dinner with real conversation.”
“Real conversation? You mean like that 20 Questions thing last night?”
For once, no. “I don’t want to play any games, I just want an honest conversation with no agenda.”
“Come on, baby.”
“Why not?”
“There’s a whole lot of reasons why not.”
“Let yourself have a nice dinner with me,” she said with emphasis on each word. “We’re here, and we have two hours. What’s the problem, scared you’re gonna like me too much to make me leave?”
Yes.
Steve rubbed the back of his neck, then adjusted his patch before relenting. F*ck it. “Yeah, Ok.”
“O—Ok? So, yes?”
“Yeah.”
Really?”
“You want me to change my mind?”
“No! Ok, great!”
“Yeah, great,” he parroted without enthusiasm.
“Ok, first rule, you can’t be all Debbie Downer.”
Whoever that was. “Fine, second rule, I ask a question, you answer it.”
Kayla hedged here. “This isn’t 20 Questions, we’re just having dinner.”
“And if I make conversation, then you make it back at me.” Kayla didn’t reply. “You can’t have your cake and eat it, too, little girl.”
“Fine. Third rule, you don’t call me that anymore.”
“Why not? I like it.”
“I don’t.”
“What? You’re little, and you’re a girl.”
“I’m a woman, Steve. I’ve got a lot more life experience than you think, I’m not a virgin by a long shot, and there’s nothing about me that’s a girl.”
Flaming jealousy erupted in Steve. Of whom he had no idea, but he wanted to punch them in the face. He also had to admit that he was surprised, because despite her fearless mouth, she looked as virtuous as they come. He fought to tamp down the anger for this phantom sexual partner and replied to her. “Fine. Sweetness.”
“Better,” she smiled.
True to her word, Kayla ordered a lot of food. The waitress smiled to herself wondering where this girl was going to put it all, but she dutifully took their order, which Steve matched course for course – which in a coffee shop was a little weird – and brought them each a tall glass of the cheap beer they had on tap. Kayla started in on it immediately, and Steve got down to the business of keeping his word.
“Me first,” he said.
“We’re not playing a game,” she practically whined. “Just talk to me.”
“About what?”
She looked for something safe. “How about movies, have you seen any movies lately?”
“Do I look like the type that takes in a flick?”
“Yes.” she insisted as she sipped her beer. “What’s out now?” She didn’t want any more misdating issues.
“I don’t think we’d like the same things, baby.”
“I think you’d be surprised at some of the things I like.” Steve stared at her. Was she flirting with him again? Why? She needed to make up her mind. “I meant,” she paused, “you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover.”
“Ok, baby, Blade Runner.”
“The one with the androids, right? Harrison Ford?”
“Replicants,” he corrected, mildly surprised, “yeah.”
“Sure I know that one.” And she hated it, Steve had made her sit through that mind-numbingly slow film a long time ago.
A big plate of potato skins arrived at the table, and Kayla was taken aback at how greasy they were.
“God, did they pour the oil over them, because I don’t think this kind of grease occurs in nature.”
“Hey, you ordered ‘em.” He had her there. Both of them dug in, and she would deny it if ever questioned, but it was pretty delicious grease. “So, a boyfriend take you to that one?”
“Kind of,” she said.
“He’s kind of a boyfriend?”
“Yes, my boyfriend took me. We’re not together now.”
“Maybe you should rethink that.” He shoved an entire potato skin in his mouth
“Oh, I am,” she assured him. Steve didn’t like that. “Seen anything else?”
“Haven’t seen Best Little Whorehouse in Texas yet, but it looks to be right up my alley. You wanna go see that one with me, baby?”
“You asking me out on a date?” He hated that enthusiasticly hopeful look on her face, because it was making him enthusiastic and hopeful.
“It’s a movie about a whorehouse!”
“With Dolly Parton! Who doesn’t like Dolly Parton?”
Steve took a beat then cracked up. He loosened up quite a bit after that, and they fell into the same easy rapport they’d had while looking at the statues. From the end of the potato skins to the cups of soup that came with their dinners, all the way through the last leaf of the salads that thankfully took their sweet time to arrive, they talked all about actors, movies, television, and pop culture. Steve was a big fan of some radio disk jockey named Larry Lujack and asked her if she’d ever heard his Animal Stories. She had not, so Steve wasted no time cracking himself up retelling them to her. His amusement was completely infectious, and she just wanted him to keep talking. When he told her that he first discovered the program on this last jail stint, it led Kayla to a change in subject.
“So, what were you in jail for?”
The bus boy cleared the latest round of plates, and Steve held up his beer glass and shook it to indicate another. “Why you wanna know?”
Kayla shrugged. “Just curious.”
“More of that, huh? Ya know, curiosity killed the cat.”
“Yes, well, my brother tells me all the time to stop taking in strays. I never did listen.”
“That’s just what I am, baby. A big ole’ stray tomcat.”
“You know, once you take in a stray, they’re not stray anymore.”
“Bo tell you that, too?”
“Nope,” she said arrogantly. Steve nodded.
“What’s Bo up to these days?” Kayla did not see that coming and didn’t reply right away. “You wanted real talk, I’m really talkin’.”
“No, that’s fine,” she said gently. The problem was that she wasn’t 100% sure where he was right now, because she didn’t remember exactly when he’d come back. It might not even have been this year. “He’s still in the merchant marines, actually,” she correctly guessed.
“He got married and went back on the ship?”
Uh oh. Technically, Bo wouldn’t be married for another two or three years, that she knew for sure. But she’d already told him that he was married to Hope. Now she was going to have to find a way out of this anachronism.
“Ah … yes. it was just a justice of the peace, they’re going to have a real wedding, um, later.” Steve looked at her sideways but didn’t queston her. “You two would be a great team—“
“We two will never be a great anything other than enemies.” Steve flicked his patch with his finger. “Just ‘cause I’m askin’ doesn’t make me his buddy.”
Kayla nodded, unwilling to argue with him. “Ok. Sorry.” Steve shrugged non-commitally.
Kayla took a few gulps of her beer. “How do you know Dixie?”
“Pixie Stick?”
“Is there more than one Dixie?”
“Just her. You wanna know if she’s one of my f*ck buddies?” he taunted, using his new favorite term.
Kayla flared hot. “You said you’d drop the bullshit. I’m making conversation, now follow your own rule, please, and make it back.”
“Oooh … testy.” Kayla couldn’t help but feel some of that fire quell, Steve had used that same phrase on her so many times before, the familiarity felt good.
“You promised,” she smiled through her admonishment.
“Calm down, baby. She’s a friend.”
“Just a friend?”
“Yeah, not f*ck budies.” Kayla looked … pleased?
“Why did she owe you a favor? How do you know her?” Steve let the waitress set down another beer for each of them and watched Kayla chug what was left in her first so that she could take it away.
“Her pimp was smackin’ her around down on Lower Wacker one night. Dude was – let’s say I was sent to collect an overdue payment from him. He’s beatin’ her up real good, and she’s so strung out she doesn’t know her own name cuz that’s how he keeps ‘em under control, shoots ‘em up with heroin so they have to keep comin’ back. So, I had myself a real nice conversation with him, after which he was in traction. I take her home …,” his voice had become sad. “… and this kid answers the door. He’s six years old … all alone with the TV babysittin’ him. Steve looked away then back at her. “He was starvin’ Sweetness.” Visions of Max and Frankie sticking close to Steve when Kayla had first laid eyes on them came to her, and she knew where this was going. “He was as skinny as his mama, a couple of pixie sticks. So, I got her clean. Took a while, but that boy needed his mama. Ran outta money doin’ it before I could fill her fridge. Broke into a few garden apartments, stole a few stereos, and bought her and the little boy some nice clothes, too. Should’ve quit while I was ahead,” he smiled sardonically, “that last B&E did me in, didn’t know it was a cop’s house. Off to Cook County I went.”
Kayla was so proud she couldn’t speak. She took his hand in hers and squeezed it. “You went to jail for her,” she realized with far more wonderment in her voice than Steve was comfortable with. “You were looking out for her, taking care of her.”
“Yeah, and now she takes good care of me,” he winked.
“Steve,’ she warned, letting him go. She knew he was trying to get a rise out of her, because he’d just said they weren’t … those kinds of friends.
“Sorry,” he held up a hand.
“How’s her little boy now?”
Steve smiled. “Kid’s an ox now she makes enough money to keep food on the table. Helps that she brings home dinner every night from leftovers at the restaurant.”
“So … she’s not your girlfriend, then.”
“I just said she’s not, how many ways you want me to say it? No.”
“Still think you’re not a good man, Robin Hood?” Steve ignored her and ate the last potato skin.
A third beer a piece later, Kayla’s buzz had found her again. Steve was making her laugh, and the warmth he felt every time the happy sound reached him made his own smile light up his face. And, oh, how Kayla loved his face.
“I love your smile,” Kayla said. Steve’s heart leapt. “But what’s with your hair?”
“My hair? Baby, what’s your obsession with my hair?”
“What are you trying to say about yourself, that you’re some kind of James Dean?”
“You’re getting’ drunk again.”
“I’m perfectly sober.”
“You’re perfectly runnin’ on at the mouth, now.”
Kayla shoved several French fries at once into her mouth and objected. “I’m just saying you should stop with the dippity do.”
Steve snorted. “The dippity do?!”
“Or whatever the hell you’re greasing it back with, has mousse come out yet?”
“What’s it matter to you, baby?!”
“I like it when I can grab on to it while you’re kissing me.”
Steve’s penis stirred. “Well that’s just fine, baby, ‘cause I’m not gonna be kissin’ you again.”
Kayla took several large sips of her beer. “Right. Forgot,” she said. “Nevermind.”
“See, told ya, didn’t I? Drunk. Runnin’ on at the mouth. That’s ok, you’re a cute drunk.”
“I am a cute drunk,” she agreed, and Steve laughed.
“So, what big, sad tragedy are you chasin’ away with that buzz you like so much?”
Kayla sobered up very quickly. Her face fell, and her good humor fell further. She didn’t have to speak for Steve to realize he’d just stepped in something deep. “Nothing,” she insisted. But it clearly wasn’t nothing. In fact, it was so not nothing that Steve was downright alarmed at her diametric change in mood. Something had just spooked her, and he knew he’d hit upon something important. Kayla pushed her food away, and Steve treaded very carefully.
“Did someone hurt you, Kayla?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She was suddenly on the defensive. How did that happen?
“You are, I can see it. You’re runnin’ away from something. Is that why you came here? Are you in some kind of trouble?”
If only she could have enjoyed the real concern in his voice, but instead she was in a fight for her focus. “I’m finished. We can go to the bus stop now.”
Now Steve was really alarmed. Her body language, her tone of voice, it was very anxious. “You want to leave now? Tell me what it is, Kayla.”
“Just drop it, I’m not running from anything.”
“Then why are you here? Just tell me, Kayla, I mean it, I want to know why”
“I came to see you—”
“You came to see me, right! Meanwhile you’ve got a good job waiting at home, a boyfriend, a great big family.”
“I never said I had a boyfriend.”
“Blade Runner guy?” Kayla rolled her eyes, aggravated. “You’ve got a good life in Salem, Sweetness.”
“My life isn’t in Salem right now. I want my life to be here. With you.”
“You don’t know a thing about me.”
“I know everything about you. It’s that simple, I know you, and I—” she stopped herself from saying she loved him, but just barely. “—and I want to be with you.”
“I’m a piece of sh*t, Kayla.”
“You’re going to become my hero. Because a good man has always lived inside of you from the day you were born. I know this as surely as I’m standing in front of you.”
What she said took Steve’s breath away. “How?” he barely whispered.
Kayla shrugged. “Ok. All those science fiction movies we were talking about. What do you think of time travel?”
“Oh. I get it. You’re from the future,” he deadpanned.
Kayla nodded another shrug. “Could be.”
“Don’t tell me. We get married after an epic courtship that’s against the odds and where your parents hate me but love wins the happily ever after. Right?”
“Sure, why not?”
“I told you before, Sweetness, because I’m not the man for you.”
“You felt like the man for me when we were going at it in your room.”
“You want me to make sweet love to you, baby, is that it?”
This was not where this conversation was supposed to go, but the alcohol was affecting her, and she was tired of the non-stop fighting for purchase. If she told him yes, there was going to be trouble, and if she told him no, it was going to add to the damage. “I know you want to.”
“We’ve been through this.”
Kayla was mad now, because knowing that he was sleeping with that drug addict hurt her. “That’s right, you’ve got your laundry list of women to use for sex.”
“Is that what you think?!”
“Well, that’s what you said!”
“No, I said I was sleeping with them, not that I was using them.”
“What’s the difference?!”
Steve sneered and finally told her the real truth. “I’m not usin’ them, baby, they’re usin’ me! Coke whores and hookers and crashing addicts – those are the kinds of women who want me! Not women like you! You think those women actually want me? They want to f*ck! They want the good f*ck, baby. They’re attracted to me, because I’m a sure thing. I couldn’t have any real feelings of my own. The guy with half a face has no standards, he just wants to get laid. So, they don’t want me, Kayla. They don’t want me. They use me. Not the other way around.”
Kayla was overwhelmed with sadness. The lump in her throat threatened to suffocate her. And she hated all of those women. For doing this to her husband. For treating him like he was an object instead of a human being. “I’m so sorry,” her voice broke. “God, baby, I’m sorry.”
“Did you just call me baby?”
“Yeah,” Kayla nodded tearfully, “and you love it.”
She was right, he kind of did. More reason to get her on that bus.
“All those women—”
“Kayla—”
“Are not me.” She got up from her side of the booth and sat down next to him on the other side.
“You’re still going home.”
“I am home.” Steve’s heart stopped. “You don’t kiss them. But you do kiss me.”
“I’m not kissing you,” he said breathily. Kayla shook her head and leaned her face into his. “Please, Kayla, don’t.”
“You really don’t want my kiss?” Their lips were two inches apart.
“No,” he said. Only he took her in his arms and covered her warm, soft lips with his own. Their tongues sought out each other, their bodies readied themselves, their souls clung to one another, and Kayla loved him with her whole heart making sure her lips made him feel her unspoken words. To the other people in the restaurant, they looked like a couple making out – a very mismatched and odd couple. But for these minutes that they held each other in their arms and kissed with unadulterated and pure affection, they were two complementing halves of a truly timeless whole.
When Steve pulled out of the kiss, Kayla didn’t want it to end. But it did end. Steve made sure of it. “You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, Sweetness,” he whispered while he placed a last kiss on her forehead. “Time to go.”
“Wh—what?”
“Dinner’s over. Time to go.”
“But … that kiss …”
“Was a goodbye kiss, baby.”
“It was more than that,” she said.
Steve nodded his genuine agreement and caressed her face with his hand. “Yeah,” he smiled sadly. “You’re right, it was. But it was also goodbye.”
“I see,” she said. She held on to his hand at her face and leaned her cheek into it, closing her eyes to the feel of him. Then she opened her eyes and met his. “Well, I promised I’d go didn’t I?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“And a Brady never welches.”
“Oh, yeah? I’m not so sure about that.” Kayla tried to stall with dessert, but he was done humoring her. “No, baby, this is the end of the road. I got stuff to do, and I can’t do it ‘til you go.”
“Wait, stuff? What stuff?”
“Food doesn’t grow on trees, Sweetness, gotta go make some money.”
“Hustling pool? I’d like to watch you play.”
“Nice as that sounds, I can promise you, if your brother taught you how to play I’ll be eating you for dessert.” This time neither of them reacted to the ripe statement. “But, naw, I got someone to meet. So, you’re all done. Let’s go.”
“Steve,”
“I said let’s go, Kayla,” and he absolutely meant it.
Steve paid the bill, and she walked very slowly behind him as he carried her duffel. She was moving like a snail, so he took her arm in his and forced her to keep up. Five blocks later, they were at Union Station where the greyhound busses departed from under the viaduct at Madison & Canal Streets. The entire look and feel of this side of the massive, historic building was a world away from the other three sides. This was positively seedy.
Steve dropped Kayla’s duffel bag between them and handed her the paper ticket he’d purchased for her. He didn’t want her to go, she could see it on his face. But that was too bad, because he was only going to make her life hell.
“So, when are we supposed to be married in this future that lives in your head?”
Kayla didn’t hesitate. “Six years from now.”
Ok, well, I’ll see you then. Kiss little Johnny and Janie for me.”
“It’s actually Stephanie, Joey, and Emily.” She was so sincere that it made the hairs stand up on the back of Steve’s neck. He had to look away. Kayla stood there and refused to cut him any slack, she wasn’t saying goodbye, this would have to be all him. If he could really do it, because she knew he cared about her.
“Bus is over there,” he nodded. The flat-nosed vehicle hadn’t changed at all in the last nearly 30 years. For all the changes to make vehicles cooler, more efficient, and more modern, the passenger bus had flown under that particular radar. The driver was loading bags into the three massive compartments beneath the red, white, and blue logo, so Steve nudged her. “Go on.”
“That’s it? You’re not going to say goodbye?”
Steve caressed her cheek in his hand again and rubbed his thumb across her lips. “Already said it, Sweetness. Put that goodbye right here on these pretty lips of yours.”
“Say it again.”
She didn’t wait for him, instead she stood on tip toes and placed a final kiss upon Steve’s lips that was tender and loving. Steve hung on to her lips with his for as long as he could before Kayla disengaged.
“Goodbye, Sweetness,” he whispered.
“Goodbye,” she whispered back.
Steve backed away. Slowly at first, but then he picked up speed, because if he didn’t he’d never be able to go through with it. Finally, with a last look that Kayla recognized as regret, Steve turned away from her and headed out of Union Station.
Kayla was a very observant person. She really knew how to keep her wits about her and understand her surroundings. Which was why she was able to stash her duffel bag in the nearby bank of lockers very quickly and not lose sight of him before she followed him out the door. She had no idea where he was going, but wherever it was, she’d be going with him. It was either that or sneak back into Steve’s room, because for the second and last time that day, the bus headed for Salem left Chicago without her.