Authors: Nona Raines
by Nona Raines
"Don't let me disturb you." He turned and disappeared into the hall. Andie was nonplussed.
"I'll be back in a minute. Sit down, Dad." She hurried to catch up with Matt.
She found him standing in the kitchen stroking Daisy's velvety ears. The dog looked at Andie anxiously, her tail drooping, with an animal's sense that something was not right. Her leash was draped over the back of a chair.
"I took her out for a quick walk," Matt said. "I think she's feeling better now."
"Thanks." She hung the leash back on its peg near the door. Not knowing what else to do, she stroked the dog's back and risked a look at Matthew. His stony-faced demeanor had not cracked.
Matthew inclined his head toward the den. "Is he the reason you haven't called me back all week?"
Andie stiffened. She wasn't going to defend herself to Matthew—she had nothing to defend. "No. I didn't know he'd be like this." Before she could say more, Matt spoke again.
"I didn't know your father was a drinker." The matter-of-fact tone of his voice chilled her.
Andie flinched. Of course she was upset with her dad, but Matthew had no right to judge. She thought of her father, the family man, the teacher, the loving husband. It hurt to think of all of that being wiped away with one word—
drinker
.
No. That's not who he was. "He's been depressed." She looked away awkwardly. "Since my mom died."
"Drinking won't bring her back."
"And you think I don't know that?" she snapped.
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Matthew lifted his gaze to meet Andie's, then glanced at the empty whiskey bottle on the counter. "You shouldn't have poured out his booze. If he wants it bad enough, he'll only go out and buy more."
What was Matthew doing, sticking his nose where it didn't belong, dispensing advice as if he really cared? What was this, more pity?
He gestured to the coffee maker near the cluttered sink.
"See if that'll sober him up a little." He hesitated. "How often does he get like this?"
Andie wanted not to answer, wanted to protect her father and herself a little longer. She knew Matthew was judging her father and possibly her, too. But she'd kept this secret for so long and it weighed too heavily for her not to share it.
"A few times since my mother died. Not this bad, though.
Well, except once." She glanced at him, hesitating. The forbidding look on his face did not make it easy for her to continue. "It was a few months after my mom died. He'd gone back to work. He'd taken time off while my mom was so sick, and...well, I knew he wasn't handling things too well, but neither was I. Maybe I was too wrapped up in myself to realize how tough it was for him."
Andie shook her head. She'd also been wrapped up in getting back on track with Douglas. She wanted to kick herself now for wasting time on him when she should have been thinking about her father.
"I was at work when I got a call from one of his friends, another teacher at his school. He didn't show up for work that morning, hadn't called in sick, nothing. She was afraid 140
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something had happened to him. All the way over in the car I kept picturing the worst, that he'd had a heart attack or something. And when I got here..." Her words fell off in a sigh of defeat.
But Matthew finished for her. "He was drunk."
She still shied away from that term. Logically, she knew alcoholism didn't care about a person's station in life, but part of her still thought of a drunk as some homeless man on the street or some barfly passed out in his own drool. But she knew anyone could be an alcoholic. Anyone but her father.
"He'd passed out. He...yes, he'd been drinking. But he was terrified when he realized what he'd done. He swore it would never happen again. And it hasn't."
"As far as you know."
Anger flashed through Andie. Didn't he understand her father was suffering? Needing to do something, she grabbed a soggy dishcloth from the sink and began scrubbing the messy counter. She was sick of his disapproving, holier-than-thou attitude.
It didn't help matters when he added, "You cleaning up his mess isn't going to help him, either."
She threw the dishcloth back into the sink and faced him.
"What do you know about it?"
"I know all about drunks." His eyes were empty. "I grew up with one."
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Andie gaped at him. "Your mother?"
"No. My stepfather." In the overhead light of the kitchen, Matthew's face looked tired and drawn.
"I told you my dad died when I was a kid. A heart attack.
He was a young guy, in his thirties. No history of sickness, no warning, just one day—bam, he was gone. There wasn't much insurance, so my mother had to go to work. But I guess she felt bad we didn't have a father figure growing up. I think that's one of the reasons she married Don. Maybe she loved him, too, or thought she did. I don't know. I know she loved my father, my real father. But I think she married Don mostly for Adam and me."
Andie was silent. She didn't want to interrupt the quiet flow of his memory.
"Don seemed like an okay guy. He had a decent job, and seemed to care about my mother. He was even nice to us kids. He drank some, but things were pretty good for a while.
Then shit started happening. He got laid off from his job, started drinking a little more, found another job, hurt his back and couldn't work for a while, drank even more. You get the drift."
Andie nodded. Yes. She did.
"After a while, he stopped working completely. All he did all day was sit around and drink. And my mother was back to working two jobs, except now she had three people to support instead of two."
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"She didn't try to divorce him?"
He shook his head. "You didn't know my mom. If she was anything, she was loyal. I tried asking her one time why she didn't get rid of him. She said she'd made a promise, and she wouldn't throw Don out when he was sick and needed her. By then I don't think he needed anything but the booze. But I was a kid. I didn't have a say."
From the way he spoke of his mother, Andie knew how much he loved her. But she wondered if part of him, a part he never acknowledged, was angry at her, too. Angry she left her sons in a situation that went from bad to worse.
"Did he...was he abusive?" she asked.
"Not in a physical sense. Verbally, yeah. It wasn't too bad, though, because half the time he was passed out."
She studied him, wondering how much he was downplaying. "Adam hated his guts. He got out as soon as he could."
"And you?"
He shrugged. "I couldn't leave my mom. She needed me."
Andie swallowed the hard lump in her throat. He'd wanted to protect his mother. What a burden for Matthew to have put on himself.
He drew a deep breath. "Mostly he was a nothing. A waste of space. He'd drink, stagger around some, mumble, and pass out someplace. He was sort of too pathetic to hate. But I hated seeing my mother slave her guts out for a guy who was just plain useless. It sucked."
Andie felt an overwhelming urge to touch him and placed her hand on his arm. The words
pity project
pinged in her 143
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brain, but she pushed them aside. For these few moments, they were unimportant. Her resentment melted away.
He looked down at her hand and covered it with his own.
"What happened?" she asked.
"Well, like I said, I stayed. Not that it did her much good."
His last words were spoken so quietly she barely heard them.
"She worked in a supermarket during the day and cleaned offices at night. She was on her way home from her night job when her car got clipped by some kid who ran a stop sign. He was drunk. She just couldn't get away from the drunks."
"Oh, Matthew, I'm so sorry." The most useless words in the English language, but they came from Andie's heart.
"Yeah." He drew himself out of the past with a small shake of his head.
Andie sensed there was more. "You tried to help her," she heard herself say. "You did everything you could."
"So did she. She did everything to save him, and it ended up killing her." Andie knew he was holding back, afraid if he let his emotions go, they might explode.
"That wasn't your—"
He moved away abruptly, breaking her hold. "I've got to go." He nodded toward the coffee pot. "See if you can get some down your father's throat."
"I don't get it." Andie's voice halted him. "You stayed with your mother because she needed you. But you don't understand my father needs me?"
"My mother wasn't a drunk," he answered.
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Just like that. Andie felt light-headed with shock. How could he dismiss her father with one word? "My dad is not some drunk!"
"Then why's he passed out in the next room, Andie? Go ahead, pour his booze down the drain, throw out his empty bottles, clean up after his dog. Clean
him
up, when he gets so bad he pisses himself."
Andie recoiled. "That's disgusting!"
His expression told her he couldn't care less if he'd offended her. "Yeah, well, drunks do that, you know."
"He's not like that."
Matthew blew. "They're all like that. They're selfish and they don't care who they hurt! They take and take, and no matter how much you give, it's never enough. I saw what happened to my mother. Do you think I'm going sit by and watch it happen again to someone else I..." He stopped.
Swallowed hard. "I won't. I won't do it."
"Then don't." Andie's constricted throat ached. She knew what he was doing. She was only surprised it hurt so much.
"Don't watch."
Her response startled him. "
What
?"
"There's the door." She wasn't like Tania. She didn't thrive on confrontation, it made her sick to her stomach. Her insides were in knots, and she was sweating. "No one's making you stay."
He looked dazed. "You
want
me to go?"
"That's what
you
want, isn't it?" She was handing him the perfect reason for dumping her. He could leave now and still play the good guy. Her eyes stung. God, don't let her start 145
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crying now. How pathetic. All she had now was her pride, and she had to hold on to what little was left.
But it hurt. It shouldn't hurt, because how long had she really known Matt? A few days? She wasn't supposed to have feelings for him. That was never the plan. But the feelings were there, and so was the aching hole in her chest. It hurt like hell. And she wanted to kick herself because she had played the fool. Again.
Pity fuck
.
Anger was her only defense against the pain. She had to make him go before she broke down. Had to say something mean and unforgiveable. "You're as bad as Douglas ever was."
His face changed then from confusion to out and out fury.
"How the hell can you compare me to him?" His eyes blazed and a muscle jumped in his cheek.
Andie had never seen him angry, really angry, before. He was always so good-natured and easy-going. This new aspect of Matthew frightened her, and she fought the urge to shrink back. But the need to hurt him the way he was hurting her made her press on. "He didn't have the guts to tell me the truth and neither do you. Just go."
His mouth tightened in a grim line. "You don't know what the hell you're talking about." He jerked the sliding door open. "You want me out? Fine. I'm out."
Andie grabbed the door handle and slammed it shut with all her might. It was only then, as she stood there trembling, she allowed herself to cry.
Matthew stumbled into his house and fell onto the sofa.
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Fuck.
What had just happened? He couldn't wrap his brain around it. Things had gone so well with Andie over the weekend, and he'd swear she was beginning to trust him. He thought she'd be open to extending their relationship beyond the weekend. He liked her—a lot—and hoped she'd give them a chance to know each other better.
Then all of a sudden she gives him the cold shoulder and accuses him of—
what the fuck?
—being just like Douglas? He got pissed off all over again just thinking about it. Why the hell had Andie compared him to a lying, cheating dick like her ex? For God's sake, he was trying to protect her from falling into the same trap his mom had. He hadn't been able to help his mother at all. He'd been a kid, but even so, he'd felt guilty and helpless. If he'd been older he could have gotten a job, a real job, so she didn't have to work so much. And then she could have kicked Don to the curb.
But because he was a kid, he had no choices. Now he was grown. And he couldn't—no, he
wouldn't
—watch another person he loved get sucked dry by a drunk. Yeah, he'd fallen for Andie. No point trying to hide it. He pictured Adam shaking his head in disgust, hear his brother's voice. "Wash Boy, you're such a dumbass."
Too late now. Love crept up on him, landed him a big old sucker-punch and tossed him right on his ass. He'd laugh, if it weren't so fucked up. Andie hated his guts and he had no idea why.
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Daisy was barking her fool head off.
It was driving Matthew crazy. He'd put in a long hard day at work—extra hours, actually, since the blow-up with Andie.
Trying anything to keep from thinking about her, to keep from calling her and making a complete ass of himself.
Now all he wanted to do was have a shower, sit in his underwear in front of the TV, and suck down a few root beers.
But before he did any of that, he had to quiet his own dogs because the neighbor's stupid dog wouldn't shut up.