Wrong Turn, Right Direction

  “Oh, yeah?” he chuckles. “What’s your type, exactly?” He’s stirring the sauce, his back to me. It makes it easier to be honest when I answer.

  “Kind. Supportive. Lets me do my own thing. Doesn’t treat me like I need help all the time, like I’m weak.”

  He stops stirring. “Offering someone help isn’t the same thing as calling them weak.” He turns to look at me. “Accepting help doesn’t make you weak, either.”

  I raise a brow at him. “Do you accept help?”

  He turns his head to look at the box of pasta. “You got that food down from the shelf for me, didn’t you? You didn’t hear me complain about it.”

  I have to smile at that. “That’s not the same thing.” I get up quickly to check the baby and come back after assuring myself he hasn’t moved an inch.

  Thibault returns to the sauce, giving me his back. “If you say so.”

  I chew on my lip as I consider what he’s said. Am I being stubborn? “I’ve accepted your help.”

  He nods. “Yes, you have. Some of it, anyway.”

  “I’m here at your house. That was a big help to me, you giving me a ride and a place to hang out for a while so I can gather my thoughts and have a nap.”

  “Any idea where you’re going from here?” he asks.

  His shoulders are moving with his cooking efforts, and I’m enjoying staring at them without him knowing. He is so solid. His body’s almost as hard as his skull. I smile at my thoughts.

  He turns around and catches me. “What’s so funny?”

  I shake my head, the easy humor dropping away. “Nothing.” I take a sip of water. “In answer to your question about where I’m going from here, I can honestly say I have no idea.”

  He bangs the spoon on the side of the saucepan and then sets it down on the counter. Limping in a circle, he leans against the sink and folds his arms across his chest. “You could stay here. For a little while. Until you figure it out.”

  I shake my head. “No, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “How come?”

  “Well, as you know, there’s a certain guy looking for me, and he’s not the nicest guy in the world, either. I need to leave the area—the sooner, the better. Probably tonight would be a good idea. I’ll have to check the bus schedule.”

  “Do you know where you’re going?”

  City names flash through my head: Baton Rouge, Atlanta, New York, Seattle . . . None of them sounds right. “No.”

  “Tell me about Pavel,” he says. He lifts his chin, like he’s challenging me.

  “Tell me about Charlie,” I counter.

  “What’s he got to do with anything?”

  I shrug. “You want to know all about my life. Maybe I want to know a little bit about yours.”

  He presses his lips together for a few seconds and then gives me a slight nod. “Deal. I’ll tell you about Charlie, and then you can tell me about Pavel.”

  “Fine.” I’m not sure I really expect him to come clean on this. I can tell by the way his eyes are darting around now that he’s regretting his decision. “You can back out if you want, though. Anytime, just say the word, and we’ll keep our secrets to ourselves.”

  He pushes off the counter and goes back to his sauce and pasta, stirring both. “No, it’s not a problem. I just have to figure out where to start.”

  “How about at the beginning?”

  He smiles at me over his shoulder. “Now, why didn’t I think of that?”

  I laugh but leave it at that. If I keep playing with words, it’ll just delay the story, and this one interests me probably more than it should. I walk over to the living room threshold and check on the baby as Thibault starts talking.

  “Toni got caught up in him pretty quick. I didn’t know why she fell so fast at the time, but I found out later that she did it to keep our friendship with Lucky and the others tight.”

  I turn to look at him. “I don’t get it.”

  He sighs. “There’s a lot of backstory, but basically, all the guys I work with . . . we’ve been friends since we were kids. We all hung out on the streets together. When Toni and Lucky were younger, they kind of hooked up—which I didn’t find out about until much later—but at the time it happened, Toni was worried something between them would break up our group, and that group was all we had . . . it meant everything to us . . . so she latched onto the first guy she found so she could get away from Lucky. That was Charlie.”

  “And he wasn’t a good guy?”

  His voice goes deeper with emotion. “No. He was a really, really bad guy.”

  “How bad?”

  “At the time, I just thought he was kind of an asshole.” He looks at me. “Sorry, but there’s no nice word for that guy.”

  “That’s okay. I’ve heard that word before. You’re good.”

  He looks down at his hands, staring at them, twisting them around each other as he flexes his muscles. I don’t know who this Charlie guy is, but I’d bet if he were here, he’d be getting a black eye from Mister Delacroix.

  “Anyway, she was with him for a few years. And we found out later that he’d been abusing her. A lot.”

  I feel sick. Now we’re entering the kind of world I live in. “You saw it?”

  “I saw the bruises, but she always gave us good reasons for them being there that had nothing to do with Charlie. She played sports, she was tough, she picked fights with people . . . She always had an excuse.” He shakes his head. “But I should have known better.”

  “Because you’ve got that Superman complex.”

  “No. Because I’m not blind, and I love my sister. But I was very self-absorbed back then.” He stops, looking as though he’s gathering his thoughts and emotions before finishing, maybe traveling down memory lane a bit. “Anyway, long story short, the abuse got so bad that my sister got a gun. And then one day he came after her, and she defended herself.”

  “She shot him?” I was not expecting this ending. I figured he was going to say there was a big fight and some jail time for someone. I picture the diminutive woman who drove me over here in her SUV, and I suppose I could see her kicking ass and taking names, but shooting someone? That takes a special kind of badassery I don’t think I’m capable of. Her life must have been hell with that Charlie guy. A trickle of pity for her drips into my heart. No wonder she’s so angry all the time.

  Thibault looks tortured as he rubs his chest over his heart, staring blankly at the wall. “She called me on the phone as she kneeled over his dead body. She was screaming and screaming . . .” He pauses for a long while, as if reliving it. He frowns and his eyes get shiny, and when he speaks again, his voice is rough. “I’ll never forget that moment. It was like living in a waking nightmare; it follows me everywhere to this day.” He shakes his head and refocuses his gaze on me. “So, yeah . . . She shot him and she killed him. And she served time for it.” He turns around and grabs the wooden spoon, jamming it into the saucepan. “And I will never forgive myself for not paying attention to her and what was going on in her life. I could have stopped all of that from happening. She ended up in jail, and she ruined her life . . . Or she nearly did. She’s got deep scars that’ll probably never go away.”

  I walk over and tap him on the arm to be sure he’s with me in the present and can hear me. “You can’t say it’s your fault. She’s a grown woman. That’s not fair to put it all on yourself.”

  He shrugs. “It’s how it is. When you love someone, you have to be there for her. You have to pay attention to the details of her life and not accept lies and excuses as the truth.”

  Now I understand why Toni said Thibault lives with ghosts. These are pretty powerful memories, and not something anyone could forget easily. Or at all. I know exactly how he feels. “Is that why you’re in security?”

  “I was in security before that happened, which only makes it worse. I should have seen it. I’m trained to deal with violent people.” He takes a long breath and lets it out slowly, as if practici
ng some sort of relaxation technique. It doesn’t appear to be helping. He looks like he’s either going to cry or punch a hole in the wall.

  I don’t fear him in the least, though. He’s only mad at himself. Poor guy. He really does have a complex, but at least I can understand why now. I feel bad for him and his sister. What a horrible thing to live through. He and I are really not that different, now that I think about it. We’ve both been involved with violent crime, both trying to find our way back to peace, struggling, sometimes succeeding, more often failing; at least in my case. It looks like he’s doing all right for himself, and his sister appears to have picked up the pieces of her life and carried on.

  The ticking of the clock breaks through my thoughts. It’s getting late, and I still don’t have a plan. The door on the front of the clock opens all of a sudden, and the little wooden bird comes out, making me jump. “Cuck-oo! Cuck-oo! Cuck-oo! Cuck-oo! Cuck-oo! Cuck-oo!”

  “That little bird thinks you’re crazy,” I say, pointing at the clock. “Cuckoo, he called you.”

  Thibault tries to smile. “Maybe I am.”

  I go into the adjoining room and pick up the baby, needing to feel his warm body near me and wanting to inhale his sweet smell. This is where I find peace now, as fragile as it is. “I don’t know you that well, but I think you’re a good guy, Thibault. Too hard on yourself, of course, but I get that.” I walk across the carpet and into the kitchen, handing him the baby. I’m not sure if Tee’s magic will work on Thibault as well as it works on me, but it’s worth a shot. “Could you hold him for me?”

  “Sure.” Thibault adjusts the bundle to be over his shoulder so he can gently pat the baby’s back. He turns sideways and smells the baby’s head, closing his eyes, a vague smile appearing to lighten the darkness that surrounded him.

  Yep. Works on him, too. I walk out into the hallway where it connects to the kitchen.

  “Where are you going?” Thibault calls out.

  “I’m going to wash my hands. Take care of business.”

  “Yeah, okay. I’ll just hold this little critter for you until you get back.”

  I talk to him from inside the small bathroom under the stairs. “Maybe you can show me how to wrap Tee up like you did. He seems to like being trussed up in that blanket like a mummy.”

  “Sure!” he yells to be heard over the running water I’m using to wash my hands.

  When I come out, I find him rubbing Tee’s back gently.

  “We call that the baby burrito wrap,” he says. “Guaranteed to quiet a fussy baby.” Tee hiccups and Thibault tips his head down and inhales deeply.

  “He smells good, huh?” I come over to get a whiff of that baby magic myself. I lean in, the scents of my boy and Thibault’s cologne mingling together. It’s a heady thing, to be so near this man when he’s holding my child so tenderly. It makes me a little dizzy. It’s almost too emotionally charged for me to handle. I pull the baby away from him without a word and turn around so he won’t catch the look I’m pretty sure is on my face. I need to put some distance between us. My heart is aching for something it can never have. Not with this man, anyway, and not in this town.

  Walking over to the kitchen table, I take a seat. “I guess it’s my turn to confess my worst moment.” There’s no better way to get myself back on solid ground than to remind myself how messy my life is right now.

  Thibault walks to the corner of the kitchen, where there’s a bedroom dresser against the wall. “Why don’t you bring Tee over here, and I’ll show you my wrapping technique while you tell me your story.”

  I join him, hoping the instructions will help distract him from listening too hard. This story represents the most humiliating moments of my life, not something I’m proud to share. But he told me about his past, and now it’s my turn. I never back away from a deal once I’ve agreed to it.

  I hand over Baby Tee, and Thibault places him on top of the dresser, where there’s a cloth-covered cushion. He unwraps the baby and then starts his lesson. Tee remains asleep. “Fold a corner of the blanket down and put his head on the folded corner.” He glances at me, giving me a look that I think is meant to be encouraging. It’s time for me to start talking.

  I clear my throat. “My parents were both drug addicts. In and out of jail as long as I can remember.”

  He keeps all of his attention on the baby, which I very much appreciate. “Tuck his arms down at his sides or across his chest. He’ll let you know what he prefers.”

  “So, when I was twelve, and both my parents got arrested together, my grandma took me in. She’s the one who raised me after that. She got legal custody and everything.”

  He nods, letting me know he’s listening. “Start with the left part of the blanket and bring it over across his body, tucking it in really tight under him on the opposite side.”

  “We didn’t have much, but we had each other. She helped me with my schoolwork. Helped me see the value of an education. She didn’t go beyond junior high herself, and she always regretted it.”

  “Then do the bottom, bringing it up and folding it down if it’s too long.”

  I’m struck by how gentle Thibault is with those big, muscular hands of his. I’ve always noticed men’s hands for some reason. Maybe because they’ve often been used against me, so I have to keep an eye on them. But his hands are not the kind that worry me. They do make me think of him in other ways, though. They make me wonder whether he’s as gentle with women as he is with babies. Imagining him that way makes me tingle in certain places, and I lose my train of thought.

  “Got it?” he asks, jarring me out of my mesmerized state.

  “Yeah. Got it.” I pause, giving myself a moment to get back on track. Where was I? Oh, yeah . . . “I started junior college to get my AA degree, but my grandma passed during my first year.”

  He looks up at me, pausing his baby-wrapping lesson. “I’m really sorry to hear that. You must have been devastated.”

  “Thanks. Yeah, I was.” I nod and look at the floor to keep my emotions in check. The day I lost my grandmother will go down in my personal history as the worst day of my life. I speak my thoughts aloud by accident. “It was the day I realized what being alone truly meant. She was all I had.” A hitch in my chest keeps me from saying anything else, thank goodness.

  “Did you finish? School, I mean?”

  His question helps me get over the emotional hump. Yes, let’s talk about the aftermath. “Yeah, I finished. Got my AA degree, but I couldn’t keep going to get my four-year degree right away because I had to get a job to pay off the loans I took out to pay for my books and such. I also had to pay for my apartment and food. When my grandma was alive, I lived with her, but after she died I had to move out. I had a little savings that lasted me until the end of my second year, but it all dried up eventually.”

  He points at the baby. “After you have the bottom of the blanket secured like that, grab that last side over and tuck it under really tight.”

  I nod, trying to smile. I’m pretty sure he’s using this baby-wrapping lesson to distract me from my pain, which I really appreciate. He’s a nice man, this Thibault Delacroix. “I tried to get a job as a bookkeeper, but no one would hire me. They said I didn’t have enough experience.”

  He holds up the baby. “Voilà: baby burrito.” He hands Tee over to me, and I gather him in the crook of my arm, staring down at him as I tell the rest of the story.

  “I got desperate. I thought I could just get a job doing something, even if it wasn’t doing financial stuff, but everywhere I went, all I got were doors closed in my face. I even tried to get a job at a fast-food place, but the economy was so terrible, none of them were hiring. I couldn’t even get an interview. I had bills to pay, and I wanted to finish school, too, but I had no money, no family . . . no hope left. It felt like the entire universe was conspiring against me.”

  “So what did you do?” He reaches up and moves a bit of the baby’s blanket away from his face and tucks it under his chin. I
t’s a small gesture, but thoughtful. It warms my heart and makes me feel like I’m in a safe place. I haven’t felt this sensation in a long, long time. It gives me the push I need to finish my sad story.

  “So, there was this guy in my neighborhood who said he wanted to help me out.”

  “Uh-oh,” Thibault says. “Sounds like bad news.”

  “It was. He is. But I felt like I didn’t have a choice. I’d tried to do the right thing over and over, and it just wasn’t working out . . . So I took him up on his offer.” I look up at Thibault, angry at my past, fully expecting his judgment to come, swift and sure. What I did was wrong and terrible, and there’s no way out of that. I did what I did and I am who I am.

  “What happened then?” His words come out soft. I don’t yet feel his judgment, but he hasn’t heard the worst of it.

  I shrug, feeling my walls strengthening around me. They protect me from being hurt. I first erected them on the day I met with Pavel to discuss his proposal, and I haven’t let them down since. They’re a permanent part of who I am now. “I started working . . . standing on the corner. You know . . . turning tricks.” Despite my self-protection, my walls, and the years I’ve spent telling myself that what other people think of me means nothing, my face burns with embarrassment. I wasn’t raised to sell my body; I was raised to use my mind to support myself, but the world had a different plan for me.

  His expression slowly shifts. He looks angry. His face takes on a red tinge.

  “I know. Disgusting, right?” I look away. I can’t stand to see the distaste there.

  “No, hey, it’s not like that.” He takes me by the upper arms, squeezing lightly and then patting me awkwardly, trying to get me to look at him. “I wasn’t thinking you’re disgusting. I would never do that. I’m not judging you.”

  I look at him, trying to figure out from his expression if he’s serious or just being nice. I don’t see any deceit there. Maybe pity or frustration.

  “What you did . . . it’s not easy. It’s not easy to be put in that situation and feel like you don’t have any other choice. I just wish I’d known you then . . . so I could have helped you.”