Jack Kursed (25 page)

Her body language told another
story.

Erica was a happy
woman, but she deeply hated the scar on the side of her face. She
hid it as often as possible. If she wasn't able to keep her head
turned at an obscure angle, she would rest her head on her hand on
that side. She felt ugly, and had a hard time taking Jack at his
word that she was beautiful. He didn't care. She would choose to
believe what she wanted, and that wouldn't stop him from admiring
her when she wasn't looking. Or even when she
was
looking. He was a jerk like
that.

He hung on her every word,
storing away every detail. There were very few people he took an
interest in over the decades.

"I get so pissed off at
some of the parents I deal with," she was saying. "Skipping
parent-teacher conferences, not giving a shit at all about what
their kids are doing. In the meantime you got people like me who
can't have kids, yet they don't give a rat's ass about their
own."

Jack laughed. As the conversation went
on, he realized she was just as blunt as he was.

"Sorry," she said. "I guess I should
watch my mouth more."

"I hope I'm not one of those asshole
parents."

"No way. Tiffany adores
you."

"Well, she shouldn't."

Erica smiled and turned to face him
head on, forgetting all about her scar.

"So, tell me about you," she said. "A
single foster-father, you don't hear about that too often. What do
you do for a living?"

He looked back at Victoria and Tiffany
once again, trying to gauge how much time he had. He held in a
laugh when he saw Victoria's body tense and jerk. She was actually
competing with the girl.

"I own a convenience
store."

"Really?" she asked,
genuinely interested. "Where at?"

"Ah, see, I have this rule. I don't
give out too much info to my foster-child's teacher."

"Cute, cute."

They talked for a few more
minutes before Victoria and Tiffany headed toward them. The vampire
had a look of utter disgust on her face.

"Are children born with some innate
ability to play video games?" she asked. "I won one game out of
five."

Victoria almost sounded
like an old irritated vampire, and not a thirty-year-old mortal.
Jack raised an eyebrow, and she adjusted her attitude
appropriately.

As they left the diner Victoria
stopped him.

"Keep the teacher around as long as
you can."

"Why?"

"Because every rude thing you say,
every inappropriate comment you make, she likes."

He nodded thoughtfully. "I
guess it's good I'm a rude, inappropriate guy."

*****

It was two o'clock in the
morning as Jack sat on his couch. A Roger Corman movie played
quietly on TV as he studied Tiffany's camera once again. The only
uniform he could think of that would be a dark blue would be a
policeman or possibly a security guard. He met a few milkmen in the
past that wore a blue uniform, but doubted one time-traveled from
the early twentieth century to conduct a shady meeting in an
alley.

It took a few calls and
nearly an hour, but as one Roger Corman movie led into another, he
had basically the life history of the six police officers on street
duty the night he met Tiffany.

He didn't know why he was
bothering. It made no difference to him who was murdered in a back
alley. It wasn't Victoria, Tiffany, or Erica, and that ended the
list of people whom he felt the slightest affection. Whoever it
was, whatever was happening in the photo, they had made no effort
to get to Tiffany. It wouldn't make any sense to do so. She wasn't
a credible witness, wasn't a threat, and probably couldn't describe
anyone if she had to, besides calling someone a monster.

Boredom, as always, was
the biggest reason he had six peoples' lives in front of him. It
didn't escape Jack's attention that one of the men on duty that
night was Officer Mark Taylor, the very same officer that visited
Tiffany's class.

Jack could smell the
corruption on the man. Taylor was obviously an asshole. Searching
through Tiffany's pack, questioning her camera, his general
attitude. But was the man involved in other activities, such as
working with a vampire and killing people in dark
alleys?

He didn't know, and didn't
care. As long as Tiffany was safe, all was right in the world.
Still, as he looked over the six officers' files, he knew he should
have a backup plan in place.

His train of thought came
to a screeching halt as a scream pierced his ears from upstairs. He
hesitated for only a moment before jumping from the couch and
taking the steps two at a time. Throwing open Tiffany's bedroom
door, he saw her silhouette sitting up in bed. He flipped on the
light and absorbed the room in a second. No vampires, werewolves,
witches, or ghouls. No shadows creeping across the floor. He ran to
her side and grabbed her by the shoulders.

"Tiffany! What's
wrong?"

The girl screamed for another five
seconds, searching the room in a panic. She couldn't stop crying
and her words were hard to understand.

"I had a bad dream, Jack," she managed
to say.

Jack shook his head, thankful that's
all it was.

"Don't we all?"

The scent grabbed his nose at the same
time he rested his hand in the wet spot on her bed. He wrinkled his
nose in disgust as anger took hold.

"Ah, Tiffany. Are you shitting me? You
pissed the damn bed?"

Tiffany saw the look of
horror on Jack's face and cried even more. "I'm so sorry. I didn't
mean to."

"Whatever. Look, go take a bath while
I clean this mess up. Don't put your piss-stained pajamas in the
basket. Put them in a bag. You got that?"

Tiffany nodded and left
the room, crying the entire time. She crossed the hall and closed
the bathroom door behind her. Jack carefully folded the sheets,
mindful of where he was touching. He gathered the mattress pad as
well as the blanket and carried everything to the
basement.

He gripped the sides of
the washer after starting a cycle. He didn't know much about
bed-wetting, but sincerely hoped changing and washing sheets
wouldn't end up turning into a chore for him. His anger rose as he
thought that if Tiffany wasn't with him he wouldn't even own sheets
and blankets.

A small sobbing sound came from the
vent above the washer. It took Jack a moment to realize it was
Tiffany crying in the bathroom two floors above him. Her
uncontrolled sadness blended with the bathwater running.

For the first time in his
life, guilt and regret rushed in to push out his usual anger. He
pulled out his phone and tried to control his own emotions. Erica
sounded exactly as he expected, tired and grumpy.

"Hello?"

"I made Tiffany cry. How do I fix
it?"

"What? Who is
this?"

"It's Jack. Don't act like other guys
call you. They don't."

"Jack? Jack who?"

"Jack from school. We saw each other a
few hours ago. Wake the hell up."

"It's almost three in the
morning."

"I know what time it is. I don't
sleep."

She suddenly perked up.
"Yeah. I want to know what that means."

"Later. How do I stop Tiffany from
crying?"

"Let me guess, you said something
stupid. Just apologize to her. Be yourself, and
apologize."

"That's the worst advice I
ever heard. Being myself is what made her cry in the first
place."

"If it's that bad, than why are you
asking me? I can't have kids, remember? Why are you coming to me
for parenting advice?"

"Because I value your opinion. I trust
you."

There was a slight pause.
"Really?"

"Yes. Seriously, you think
that's it? If I go up there and say I'm sorry, we'll be
cool?"

"Just give her one
of those smiles of yours. It always makes
me
melt."

"What?"

He could almost see her blushing on
the other end.

"I'm tired. I'm saying things without
a filter right now."

"Welcome to my
world. Except for the
tired
part."

"Well, unless you need something else,
I'm hanging up. And not a word about my legs."

"No word will be said. But Erica,
thank you."

"You're very
welcome."

Jack made his way back to the second
floor and put an ear to the door. He could still her Tiffany
crying. He knocked on the door a few times.

"Tiffany? Can I come in a
second?"

"No. Go away."

"Well, the bad news
is that it's
my
house. So I'm giving you ten seconds to wrap a towel around
yourself."

He counted aloud to ten
and then slowly opened the bathroom door. Tiffany sat in the tub
with a towel around her entire body, half of it being in the tub.
Jack was mad for only a moment, but decided the situation was more
humorous than anything else. His chest hiccuped when he saw her red
eyes and tear-stained cheeks. He sat on the toilet and offered her
a smile.

"How are you feeling?"

She was quiet, lowering
her head to stare at the bathwater.

"I'm really sorry I peed in the
bed."

"No, I'm sorry for getting
upset."

He'd offered apologies before in his
life, but this time there was something different.
Sincerity.

"I wish I was like you.
You never sleep, so you don't have bad dreams."

"Tiffany," he said, wiping a tear from
her cheek. "Don't ever say you want to be like me. I'm not a nice
person. And nightmares aren't the end of the world."

"You
are
the nicest person. I
wish you were my real dad."

Jack smiled at the girl's
words. He sat next to the tub and handed her a brush so she could
comb the knots out of her hair, something they should have done
before she went to bed. Her towel got even wetter as she shifted it
around to free an arm.

"What was your nightmare
about?"

"I dreamed Miss Simmons
and the monster were chasing me, and I couldn't get away from
them."

"Listen to me. You
don't have to worry about Miss Simmons
or
the monster."

"You don't believe me about the
monster. No one believes me."

"That's not true. I
believe you."

She stopped brushing her hair and
looked at him, her eyes full of hope. Then her expression changed
into one of doubt.

"You're just saying that to make me
feel better."

Jack wondered if he was
making another bad decision, trying to convince the girl she
actually saw a monster. Truth won out in the end.

"I'm not gonna go into details, but
you saw something in that alley. He probably had long teeth and red
eyes."

Tiffany's eyes went wide
as she reached out to hug Jack. He frowned as she pressed the wet
towel into him, getting his own shirt soaked.

"You believe me," she said, her little
voice strained with emotion.

"Yup."

"Is the monster gonna get
me?"

"Not as long as I'm
alive," he said, laughing at his choice of words. "They won't
bother you, Tiffany. There's no reason to."

The girl wouldn't let go,
and Jack surprisingly didn’t mind.

"Okay. Finish your bath, and I'll make
us some chocolate milk. I'll set up a blanket and pillow on the
couch, and you can sleep downstairs tonight."

Tiffany's enthusiasm
returned. "I can? Will you be there?"

"Yeah. So, you forgive me?"

She beamed at him and nodded. He went
to leave, but she had one more thing to say.

"You're an angel, Jack."

"Thank you very much."

He waited until he was in
the hall and out of earshot before laughing.

"Angel of death, maybe."

CHAPTER 12

Jack studied the parents'
faces as he parked along the playground outside school. Some of
them hated the routine, and actually snapped and barked at their
children as they left their cars. He loved the routine. He loved
cooking breakfast for Tiffany. He would play music on his iPhone
and laugh as the girl swayed in her seat while eating.

Jack noticed Robert the ex-bully
chasing someone on the playground. When he saw Tiffany he stopped
and made his way inside school. Jack nudged Tiffany on the
shoulder.

"You got that little
bastard scared of you," he said. "Flex for me."