“Yes, I heard that. I’m sorry.”
Andi shrugged.
“Her death made you decide to move back?”
“I knew my dad would need help with my sister,” Andi said. It was the truth, but not so true that she could look him in the eye when she said it.
Pete chewed for a moment, nodding. “How is your sister?” he asked.
“Fine,” Andi answered. “She’s happy. Probably happier than you.”
She regretted the last as being snarky, but Pete seemed to overlook it.
“She always was,” he said. “In high school you two still looked a lot alike, but even from a distance I could tell the difference. She was always the one smiling and you never did.”
Andi found herself surprised, and slightly pleased, that he’d been aware of her at all.
“So, besides wanting to have lunch with me and chat about old times, do you have a reason for showing up here?” she asked him.
Pete’s expression sobered and he seemed to choose his words carefully.
“I just wanted to come by, as…uh…a commercial neighbor and to tell you how sorry I am that your coffee shop thing ran into trouble.”
“Ran into trouble or ran into your father?” she asked.
Pete shrugged. “You aren’t the first person to suggest that it might be the same thing.”
Andi had obviously meant to wound, but Pete didn’t show any signs of being offended. Instead he continued to chat in a manner that was as matter-of-fact as their discussion about high school.
“I want you to know that as the head of Guthrie Foods, I can assure you that Guthrie Foods has no objection to any business plan you might have for your property.”
Andi’s eyes narrowed and she surveyed his face with skepticism. “Is this kind of like your father recusing himself from the council vote?” she asked. “It sounds really good and makes you look really fair. The real purpose being just public relations.”
“No,” Pete told her firmly. “That’s not what I’m after at all. What I’m telling you, with complete sincerity, is that it’s
me, not my father, who speaks for Guthrie Foods. And my take on it is that a rising tide lifts all boats. I want to see stores in the neighborhood succeed. If you find a way to bring customers to this corner, then I’m all for that and my company supports that.”
“So you wouldn’t care what kind of business I might open here?”
“If you decided to open a supermarket, I might be worried,” he said, grinning at her. “Beyond that, I think whatever you decide to do here will be fine with me and I vow to say so publicly before the city council if you need me to.”
The rain had stopped by the time Andi arrived back home. Pop’s truck was in the driveway, but the house was empty. The thumping sound of a basketball against the driveway drew her out to the back porch.
Pop was seated on the swing. The sight of him brought a momentary rush of memory to Andi. So many times she had seen the two of them, Mom and Pop, seated on that swing. Her absence loomed large. Behind him their small backyard with its huge buckeye tree shaded everything.
“Hi Andi! Hi Andi! Hi Andi! Hi Andi!”
She turned to see a familiar face playing basketball with Jelly. “Hi, Tony,” she replied.
“I made a basket!” he announced. “I made a basket! I made a basket!”
“Good for you.”
“Andi’s my girlfriend. Andi’s my girlfriend. Andi’s my girlfriend.”
“Shut up and play,” Jelly reprimanded him.
“Shut up and play. Shut up and play.”
Andi took the seat next to her father. “What is Tony Giolecki doing here?” she asked.
“His grandma had a doctor’s appointment. You know she doesn’t have any help. None of her friends or neighbors are willing to take Tony on.”
“But, Pop, you’ve got enough to manage with Jelly,” Andi said. “You shouldn’t have to take on another special needs kid.”
Pop shrugged. “Jelly pretty much takes care of herself. Besides if we don’t help, who will?”
“I made a basket!” the singsong voice announced from the driveway. “I made a basket! I made a basket!”
Tony and Jelly had been classmates since elementary school. Tony represented some of the most scary stuff about special needs kids. His diagnosis broke up his parents’ marriage. They both ended up fleeing from his care and he was left with his aging grandmother who did the best she could. Tony was annoying and repetitive, prone to wandering away if he wasn’t watched and he was just smart enough to get himself into a lot of trouble. His IQ was probably 20 points above Jelly’s but he had none of her sweetness or biddability. He could be stubborn and belligerent. He would often take things, almost compulsively. Though he’d voluntarily handed them over at the end of a visit. And he’d had a crush on Andi that went back as far as elementary school. He told anyone and everyone that “Jelly was his best friend. But Andi was his girlfriend.”
Seated beside her father, she watched the two playing basketball. Tony was more naturally athletic and several inches taller, but he couldn’t stop talking. Jelly focused more clearly
on the task, whether it was bouncing the ball in the driveway or throwing it up to the rim. She only needed to bide her time until Tony distracted himself to get a clear shot.
“ALL RIGHT!” Jelly hollered in celebration.
“Two points!” Tony said.
“One hundred thousand, cash or bond,” Jelly corrected.
Andi rolled her eyes. “Even basketball is about
Law & Order
,” she pointed out to her father. “Maybe we should try to get Jelly interested in some other show.”
He shook his head. “Your mother and I tried that for years,” he said. “We played a million hours of family friendly sitcoms. We got not one spark of interest from her.”
“Then maybe we should talk to somebody.”
“We did,” he said. “We had a behaviorist assess her.”
“And?”
He chuckled. “As I recall it was a very high-level technical explanation that translated into everyday English, means different strokes for different folks. Nobody’s entertainment choices make sense to anybody else.”
Andi raised an eyebrow at that.
“Stupid shrinks!” Andi commented with a heavy sigh.
The two of them sat there silently in the slight sway of the swing as they watched a strangely rule-free but cooperative basketball game. The rain had washed away the heat, the dust, the pollen, and the breeze that had come with it kept the afternoon from being sticky.
Pop had swapped his typical sport shirt for a faded T-shirt that advertised a long-defunct manufacturing company on the edge of town. He was still as trim and muscled as he’d been as a younger man. His secret was that he simply loved to work.
Whether it was tuning up an old car or replacing a length of pipe in the basement, he kept busy. And somehow that had always kept him healthy and strong. But he was not one of those active men who couldn’t relax. Pop had spent a million hours of his life just sitting quietly reading a book or talking with his wife or Andi. He seemed to enjoy that as well as more productive pursuits.
“So, how was your day?” he asked her.
Andi shrugged. “I want to talk to you about something,” she said. “And I need for you not to overreact or get too worried about me.”
Pop patted her on the hand. “I always worry about you,” he said. “That’s my job.”
Andi gave him a small half smile. “I know you do,” she said. “I know you’ve been kind of doing double duty lately, with Mom gone and both Jelly and I to worry about.”
Her father’s brow furrowed with curiosity.
“I’ve always had two daughters,” he pointed out.
“Yeah, I know,” Andi said. “But Mom was pretty much the point person for Jelly. I was the only daughter that you really had to be responsible for.”
Her father offered a wane smile. “I’m sure that’s how it seems to you,” he said.
“That’s how it was,” Andi said, very matter-of-fact. “Mom was in charge of raising Jelly and you were in charge of raising me. I’m not complaining or criticizing. I’m sure it was very hard to have twin girls who were so different, who had such different needs. And honestly, I think it worked perfectly for the two of you. You and Mom were always so in tune with one another. I guess that’s an advantage of being…soul mates
or whatever, that each of you could be both mother and father to your daughters.”
Pop shook his head. “It’s curious sometimes how different things look from the outside than from the inside,” he said. “Your mother and I had a lot of things going for us. Not everything, but many things. If she were here, I think she’d agree that our girls have always been
our
girls.”
“But she was more with Jelly and you were more with me.” Andi heard herself belaboring the point, but she couldn’t quite stop.
Pop didn’t corroborate, instead he urged her to the point.
“I promise not to worry more than I need to,” he told her. “What do you want to tell me? Are you moving back to Chicago?”
“Moving?” Andi was completely caught off guard by the suggestion. “No, of course not. I’m opening the car wash.”
Once the words were out in the open, all the uncertainty and fear that she’d cloaked around them seemed released as well. It was a car wash. She knew a lot about running a car wash. And what she didn’t know, Pop would tell her.
“You’re opening the car wash?” The surprise was evident on his face. “I thought we went over this. The old hand wash is no longer competitive with the technology of the tunnel wash.”
“I know,” Andi said, nodding. “I’ve…we’ve found a way around that we think. I’m opening a…a bikini car wash.”
“Bikini?”
“Yes,” she told him. “It will be women only doing the hand wash and we’ll all be dressed in bikinis.”
For a minute he just continued to stare at her uncomprehendingly, but suddenly his face changed. And to Andi’s dis
pleasure he burst out laughing. Not a friendly, appreciative chuckle, but a deep, male belly laugh.
“I’m not kidding about this,” Andi insisted.
He was nodding as he tried to regain his composure. “Oh, I’m sure you’re not kidding,” he said. “I can always count on you to be completely serious when it comes to business. And I know that you will always figure out a way to make something out of nothing and now you’ve gone and done it again.”
“I’m opening as soon as possible,” Andi said. “I’m determined to do this, but it is your building, your equipment, you do have a say.”
He was still smiling broadly, but his eyes were more serious. “You think I would go against you?” he asked. “You’re a grown woman, Andi. You don’t need your pop to tell you what a hornet’s nest you’re going to stir up in this town.”
She nodded.
“Do you think it will work?”
“I’m sure it will for a while,” he said. “I’d say you’re likely to get an excellent summer season out of it.”
“So, are you okay with this?”
Her father wrapped his arms around her neck and pulled her close enough to kiss the top of her head. “If you told me you’d decided to take up bank robbery, I’d trust you to think it all through and know what you’re getting into. Beyond that, Andi, I want you to do what you think is the right thing to do. Sometimes I may not be of the same opinion. But it’s your life and your choices and that’s what I want to give you. Not everyone has that.”
It wasn’t a rousing endorsement, but Andi was grateful that Pop wasn’t going to try to talk her out of it. In fact, he seemed
perfectly willing to give her as much technical advice and equipment refurbishing help as she needed.
“The ladies at the church are not going to like this,” she pointed out to him, hoping that he already understood that.
He agreed. “Andi, they are just plain going to hate it,” he said. “And they are going to give you grief like you’ve never gotten in your life. But all that’s good. The madder folks are, the more attention that it gets, the better your receipts will be. That’s the nature of a business like this. The push-back is worth twice as much as the push. If your customers just wanted to see some girls in bathing suits, they’d go to the swimming pool. They’ll pay to see you because it’s illicit and objectionable.”
Andi didn’t quite like the idea of being illicit and objectionable, but she knew he was probably right. They weren’t going to be making the cars clean enough for surgery nor were they going to be doing lap dances for the customers. It was all about the appearance of something shady, something forbidden. That’s what the customers were going to be buying.
“I made a basket! I made a basket! I made a basket! Andi, did you see me? Andi, did you see me? Andi, did you see me?”
“I saw you, Tony,” she called out.
“I made a basket! I made a basket!”
The sun was getting low before Tony’s grandmother showed up to get him. She seemed tired and worn-out and Tony whined to stay.
Pop invited them for dinner and the older woman accepted with gratitude. So with cooking and dinner and cleanup and goodbyes, it was nearly ten o’clock before Andi was alone in her upstairs bedroom.
From the bottom of her chest of drawers, Andi began pulling out swimsuits. She had several, and, for the most part, they were fairly modest and mostly functional. When Andi had gone to the lake or the pool, she’d been a swimmer rather than a sunbather. Skimpy bikinis weren’t really for swimming. But she did find a nice-looking two-piece with a brightly colored halter-top. The swim-short bottoms were a far cry from a bikini. But she remembered the suit looking cute on her and she hastily stripped down to try it on. It felt just fine. It wasn’t too tight or too loose. It seemed perfect. With that thought in mind, she stepped in front of the full-length mirror and her smile faded.
“Ouch!” she said aloud.
She turned round and looked over her shoulder to view her backside. “Double ouch!”
The equipment at the car wash wasn’t the only thing that needed to be toned up.
PETE’S DISTANCE FOR
his morning run had increased enough that he could actually make it to the track and get around once before his progress became iffy.
Today he was trying to puff it through to the half-mile marker on the second lap. In high school, he’d discovered that creating a focal point could steady his breathing and distract him from the pain in his legs. A pace runner was ideal for this. If he could find somebody on the track who was going at the right speed, he’d just follow, focusing in on the heel of the runner’s shoe or, if he was closer, the logo on the back of his shirt. This morning he was intent on a metallic silver stripe along the legs of a pair of pink shorts. As the muscles moved with each footfall, the fabric caught the light in slightly different ways altering the brightness of the color. Silver. Gray. Silver. Gray. Silver. Gray. Like a flashing beacon, it kept him moving forward.
He passed a pair of runners on the inside track. They were
moving slow and one of them was chattering. He saw them only in his peripheral vision, not allowing himself to be distracted. He could not, however, fail to hear what was said.
“Look! It’s the man from the grocery store. Isn’t it? Isn’t it the man from the grocery store? I can make a positive ID from a lineup.”
Pete ignored the weird comment. He could feel the heaviness in his legs, now. He willed away the lethargy in his limbs and urged himself into fierce concentration. Silver. Gray. Silver. Gray.
“Why is the grocery man staring at that lady’s butt?”
Pete misstepped, the toe of his shoe caught on the track surface and he went sprawling across two lanes. Before he even hit the ground a body crashed into his. It was a jumble of arms and legs. Pete’s hands clutched at the air, instinctively seeking something to hold on to.
The other person in the mishap was obviously doing the same thing. Unfortunately what she grabbed to break her fall was a large handful of his private parts. The cotton-Lycra liner of his running shorts was great for movement, but was never meant to hold off a frontal attack. As they slammed into the ground, he heard a sound like a squealing pig and realized it was his own voice’s nonlanguage version of “letgo-a-me!”
The instant she released him, Pete scrambled to his feet.
He looked down to see that the woman he’d tripped up was none other than Andi Wolkowicz.
“Are you okay?” he managed to choke out.
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
“Your leg is bleeding bad!” her companion announced.
Pete glanced up to see Andi’s sister. “You should get on the horn to dispatch and tell them to send a bus.”
“Huh?”
“He doesn’t need an ambulance,” Andi both answered and translated. “It’s just a scrape. I’ve got a first-aid kit in the truck.”
Pete looked down at his injury. Blood ran in small rivulets down his shin.
Other runners were going around them as Andi got to her feet.
“Come on, let’s get that cleaned up,” she said.
Pete took a couple of steps and found that he was not too steady. His knee was beginning to swell. He limped a couple of steps before Andi wrapped his arm around her shoulder.
“I’m okay,” he assured her. But the shoulder was welcome and he leaned on it more than he should.
“Let me, let me help, too,” the sister said, grabbing his other arm.
“It’s okay, Jelly,” she said. “I’ve got him.”
“I’ve got him, too.”
Pete was not able to lean on two shoulders, so for the width of the track, he just walked it off, with his arms around two women.
They led him to an old white truck with a sign on the door that read: St. Hyacinth Senior Service Meals on Wheels. Andi put down the tailgate and had him sit on it while she searched for the first-aid kit in the cab.
“I’m sorry it hurts, Mr. Grocery Man,” the sister said.
He looked up at her and managed a small grin of reassurance. The sister looked so much like Andi and yet, not at all. It was the same face, same eyes, same complexion. The hair
was different, but there was something else as well, something unique. It was that guileless smile that made her expression somehow ageless and almost otherworldly.
“Call me Pete,” he told her.
“I know, Pete,” she said. “I remember you from school. I’m Jelly.”
“Hi, Jelly, I remember you, too.”
Andi sat the red plastic box beside him and flipped it open. She pulled out a pack of alcohol pads and tore open the packing.
“I’m going to clean this up.”
The damp gauze was cool against the undamaged skin and burned like fire over the scraped and bleeding places. Pete was holding his breath, trying not to wince aloud. As she leaned over him, Pete became very aware of her, the scent of her hair, the warmth emanating from her skin. With a sudden jolt of unexpected reaction, Pete realized just how long it had been since he’d felt a woman’s touch. It had never been his plan to live a monkish life. But he’d also been very stern with himself, not wanting to become the kind of man his father was. Andi’s nearness was like a wrecking ball, assaulting the carefully built walls he’d constructed. Deliberately, Pete focused his thoughts elsewhere. Mentally he was surveying the canned food aisle.
Green beans, string beans, lima beans, mushrooms.
His successful self-distraction came to an abrupt halt when Jelly asked, “Why were you staring at that lady’s butt?”
“Jelly!” Andi scolded.
“What?” she asked, innocently.
At first Pete was so surprised, he had no idea what the young woman was talking about. Had he been staring at
Andi? No he couldn’t have been, she was facing him and his eyes had been on his leg.
“I wasn’t,” he defended.
“Uh-huh, uh-huh,” Jelly insisted nodding. “You saw him, too, Andi. When he was running on the track he was staring at that lady’s butt.”
Pete flushed with embarrassment. “I wasn’t staring,” he quickly defended. “I was…I was maintaining a focal point.”
“Main taming a folkel point?” Jelly repeated.
“It helps when I run, I…” Pete struggled for an answer that the young woman might comprehend. “I look at something, I really look at it hard and it helps me do my best.”
“Okay,” Jelly said. She was thoughtful. “So why did you look at her butt?”
“I wasn’t looking at her butt.”
“Oh yeah, you were.”
“No! Yes, I mean, not her butt per se.”
“What’s a purr say?”
“It means not exactly her butt,” Andi translated.
“Right,” Pete agreed. “I was not exactly looking at her butt. I was looking at the silver stripe on her running shorts.”
Jelly nodded slowly. “Okay,” she said. “I guess that’s a good reason to wear shorts without stripes, huh. So guys won’t stare at your butt.”
“I…” he began.
Andi laid her hand upon his own. “Let it go,” she said. “Sometimes with Jelly, you just have to let it go.” She turned toward her sister. “We’re not talking about this anymore.”
“I’m just saying that I’m only wearing shorts that are one color.”
“Enough.”
“Okay.”
An embarrassed silence settled around the three. Andi dabbed some antibiotic ointment on his abrasions.
“I didn’t know you were a runner,” Pete said, finally.
“It’s my first day out,” Andi answered. “When I left Chicago, I left my gym membership.” As if that explained everything.
“Is that where you’ve been? Chicago?”
“Yes.”
“And now you’re back in Plainview to help your father.”
“No,” Jelly quickly disagreed. “Andi doesn’t help Pop, I do. I help Pop deliver the meals on wheels. Andi doesn’t help. Andi doesn’t help at all. But she
is
going to wash our truck.”
“Jelly!” Andi’s tone was scolding.
“What?”
Andi glanced uneasily at Pete. He didn’t understand what was going on, but figured it wasn’t any of his business.
Andi retrieved a roll of emergency bandage from the first-aid kit and held it up to him in question.
Pete shook his head. “I don’t think I’m going to need that,” he told her as he surveyed his shin. Without the blood running down, the injury looked pretty tame.
“Still, you should probably cover these cuts with something.”
“I’ve got some Band-Aids at home,” he said. “I think I’ll be able to patch myself up.”
“And you’re going to need some ice on that knee.”
He nodded, having concluded the same thing. “I’ll put it up for a half hour or so with a cold pack.”
“Well, at least let us help you to your car.”
“I ran over here.”
“You live near here?”
“Not too far, about ten blocks, I guess.”
“I’ll drive you,” Andi said. “You can’t walk that far.”
“Oh, I’m sure I’m all right,” he assured her. “You need to finish your run.”
“It’s my first day out,” she answered. “I was pretty much finished when I started. Come on, we’ll take you home.”
She snapped the lid back on the first-aid kit and once Pete was on his feet, she put up the tailgate on the truck.
He leaned on the truck as he made his way to the passenger door. Jelly was there first and held it open for him.
“After you,” he said politely.
Jelly frowned. “I don’t like to sit in the middle,” she explained.
“Jelly,” her sister scolded. “He’s hurt and he’s a guest.”
“But I don’t like to sit in the middle,” she repeated.
“It’s okay,” Pete said. He hoisted himself into the truck and eased himself across the bench seat. His left knee would not bend sufficiently to accommodate the gearshift. So he tried sprawling slightly sideways, but Jelly wouldn’t let him get away with that.
“Scoot over, you’re hogging the whole seat!” she complained.
Pete tried to rearrange himself, but there was just no way to make himself fit easily into the small truck cab.
“My left leg is stiff,” he explained to Andi. “I need to stretch it out on your side of the gearshift.”
“Oh sure, of course,” Andi answered.
Pete didn’t look at her, but he could hear the discomfiture in her voice. He straddled the long piece of black metal, vacillating between giving Andi plenty of room near the gas pedal
or plenty of room to change gears. In fact, there was not a lot of room for either.
Jelly bounced in beside him, squeezing him further in Andi’s direction.
He murmured an apology.
“These trucks, they’re not really all that roomy for three people,” she said.
“Andi always gets to drive,” Jelly said. “I don’t get to drive. But I could. I know I could. But Pop says if you can’t read, you can’t drive. I don’t know why because you shouldn’t read when you’re driving anyway.” She hesitated. When neither Pete nor Andi responded, Jelly went for confirmation. “That’s right, right? You can’t read and drive. That’s silly. Isn’t it silly?”
“Yes, Jelly,” Andi said. “It’s very silly. But you can’t drive because you don’t have a license.”
Jelly sighed heavily. “Yeah, that.” Her deflation was only momentary. “I drove a go-cart once,” she told Pete. “I drove really, really fast. You don’t need a license to drive a go-cart.”
“I guess not,” he agreed.
“I wasn’t speeding away from a crime scene,” she clarified.
Andi turned over the ignition and the little truck sputtered to life. As she stepped on the clutch and placed her right hand on the shifting knob, she shifted into Reverse. That gear was unfortunately to the far left and all the way down. Putting her hand squarely in Pete’s crotch.
He pretended that he didn’t notice. So did she.
She backed out of the parking spot quickly. And once she shifted into first, Pete let out a long breath. There wouldn’t be any more backing up. He’d make sure of that, even if he had to direct her around the block three times. As it turned
out, he got her through the streets and to the front of his home without incident.
“This is it here,” Pete pointed out. “Third house on the left.”
He heard her sharp intake of breath. “What a great house!”
“Thanks.”
“It must have been wonderful growing up here.”
“Oh, yeah, you know it must have been.”
She turned sharply to look at him. “You didn’t grow up here?”
“Me? No. I bought it a few years ago.”
“Oh, I thought it must be your parents’ house,” Andi said. “It seems like such a family place.”
“Yeah, it does.”
Pete didn’t want to say more. He didn’t want to stir it all up in his mind or be caught in some kind of long explanation. The house had said “family” to him. And he’d bought it with that idea, that ideal, as a dream on his horizon. But it had turned out to be a mirage. Now the house served him as little more than a big dorm room with high property taxes.
He glanced over at Jelly who had her earbuds in place and was quietly rocking to the music she heard playing. She showed no indication of moving.
“Maybe getting out on the driver’s side would be better anyway,” he said.
“Oh yeah, sure,” Andi said and unhooked her seat belt as she opened the door.
Pete scooted in that direction. He heard the slam of a front door and rapid footsteps when he stepped out into the sunshine. He caught sight of Mrs. Joffee hurrying down her walkway. When she caught sight of him, she halted abruptly,
then, after an instant of hesitation, she continued forward more slowly.
“What’s happened, Pete? Have you been in an accident?”
“Nothing much,” he assured her, surprised at her concern. “I just fell down and these ladies gave me a ride home.”
She smiled at Andi. “Hello.”
Andi gave her a polite nod and responded, “Hi.”
“Do you need help getting up the stairs?” Andi asked him.
“No, I think I can make it.”
“Let me help you that far, anyway,” she said. As she offered a shoulder, she asked a question. “Who is your busybody neighbor?”
“Oh, it’s Mrs. Joffee, from the department store.”
“Yeah,” Andi said nodding. “I thought she looked familiar, but I couldn’t place her. So she’s like your personal mother hen, huh.”
“No, not at all,” Pete said. “We get along, but typically, she doesn’t pay much attention to me. I must look a lot worse than I feel.”
They’d reached the bottom of the stairs. The eight steps looked very formidable, but Pete couldn’t ask her to help him. If she went to the top of the steps, she might ask to see inside the house. He couldn’t let that happen. She liked the house. Her first reaction to it had been the same as his own. He couldn’t let her see it as it was inside. An untidy collection of still-packed boxes and dirty laundry scattered on the floor. It was a family house and somehow he couldn’t bear for Andi not to see it that way.