Authors: Samantha Young

Smokeless Fire (40 page)

BOOK: Smokeless Fire

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His Barista uniform was hilarious to me. Barista seemed like such a feminine term anyway, but the full on mocha apron with coffee steam swirls just added to my enjoyment.

I could see he had calmed down as he spoke.

“Look, I’m sorry ok. What’s with the sporadic tantrums?” he said, leaning on the door with his palms.

I was suddenly very grateful to have such a perceptive pain in the butt for a sibling.

“I didn’t get it,” I barely whispered.

“What? I thought it was already decided?”

“Apparently not. They said my pictures were too...earnest,” I scoffed. “I mean, whoever knew there was even such a thing, let alone it being a bad thing. I’m sorry if I was rough on you, I just know how hard it is, even with college let alone without it, trying to make it out here.”

“Do Dad and Mom know?”

“No, I’m not telling them either until I find something else. I still have my job at the paper; I’m just looking for something different. Something catering more to my sense of propriety,” I laughed. “It’d be nice to go home at night and not feel sleazy and useless and short a few brain cells. Sorry, ok? Truce?”

“Of course.”

Danny leaned across the shut door to give me a hug. No matter how much we fought, we always forgave each other.

We were really close growing up. I was still in diapers myself when he was born but I remember feeling like he was some precious thing that needed protecting. I was always telling my mom to ‘be careful’ and ‘hold his head so it doesn’t fall off’. She always laughed and followed my haphazard instructions. Even now, he still seemed like he needed my protection, from himself.

“Love ya, shorty. I’ll tell Mom and Dad that you’re busy and can’t drive me anymore, ok.”

“Thanks, brat. Love ya, too. See you Friday night right? Mom’s birthday? What’d you get her?”

“A purple scarf. Bohemian. You? Wait- the massage right? She
has
actually brought it up one time already this week.”

“Really? Good. Yeah that’s what she seems to like and I can’t find anything I could ever give her that would make her happy other than that. Maybe I should’ve been a masseuse. That’s holistic, she would have approved.”

“You know you don’t like it though. Just because you’re good at something doesn’t mean that’s what you should be doing.” He smiled at me angelically like he was making a point. “Dad’s already got the piñata in the basement. It’s the year of the Tiger. Man it’s hideous. They are so wack.”

We both laughed as he turned to walk away and into our parent’s house.

As I watched him leave I pulled from the curb and drove up the hill, headed up to the ridge to overlook the city as I sometimes did when I needed to think. It was weird to some, but noise actually soothed me.

We’ve lived in the city our whole lives.

Looking out at the buildings and lights of a foggy Chicago, I needed to think tonight. My life was definitely not going as planned.

Thinking of the past made me feel...I don’t know. I mean for one thing, why did my parents name me Sherry Elizabeth? I always thought my parents were odd for naming their only daughter after a housewife buzz “I’m just putting the sherry in the with the chicken, dear” liquor from the sixties.

That was better than some of the names my hippie parents could have came up with. I could’ve been Wind Song or Spring Lake or Harmony Meadows.

My mom was from the sixties, and you could tell by looking at her. She didn’t look old, she looked great for her age in fact, but she was a free spirit so to speak. I blamed good genes not her choice of lifestyle; vegan, makeup free and in tune with nature.

The Pattersons: Mom, Margaret and Dad, Robert, were really into otherworldly things and practices.

Dad had always gotten mom a piñata for whatever the Chinese year was for her birthday, for good luck and union with the universe, and whatever. Mom was a feng shui designer and somehow made a decent living off of it. Dad was a dentist. Figure that one out, 'cause I never did.

Danny and I were always being lectured about the importance of things in and of this world, whatever they may be at the time: free speech, free will, free healthcare. I was more conservative than they were, but I let them have their fun and try to put their ideas of what the world should be to them in my brain.

And Matt, don’t get me started on Matthew Borell. What did he think he was going to accomplish by stalking me? I thought this kind of stuff only happened to super models. I wasn’t even the super model type! My short legs stopped right where they should and went no further. What was it that he saw in me that was so desirable?

I had always thought he was cute, gorgeous even, but never understood the opposite attraction. He hadn’t always been like this, well not quite like this.

We used to have fun and he used to be somewhat nice. Although he was always possessive and demanding, I kind of liked that in the beginning, it was exciting. Then it got very old and even scary. I was too chicken to call the cops. He wouldn’t have really hurt me was what I thought.

The next time he showed up on my doorstep in the middle of the night, I would definitely call the cops though. Yeah.

He wasn’t particularly thrilled about the breakup or the fact that I refused to sleep with him. It wasn’t love on either of our sides so I just couldn’t do it.

So, he hit me.

He actually swung his hand back like some movie gangster and slapped me across the face.

I hadn’t called the police that night either, which I regretted fiercely and I had to call in sick that next day. Thank goodness it was a Friday. I had the weekend for the bruises to dissipate and wouldn’t have to tell anyone what had happened.

I didn’t tell a soul, not even Danny.

I never spoke to Matt after that except to tell his answering machine to leave me alone, for good. We were together for all of five months, an eternity when I looked back.

He wasn’t Romeo, he was more like Heathcliff. I wasn’t Juliet either, which is why I thought I deserved such a man, because I couldn’t do any better. No one had ever told me I was pretty.

Ever.

So it must be true that I was a plain Jane with a plain life to boot.

As I pulled out of my hidden spot behind the shrubs and the city sign, I paused and ran my hands through my dark wavy curls in frustration, twirling the ends between my fingers. My nervous tick. Some people bit their nails, some paced, I twirled.

Why did life have to be so hard and
so
not what we planned?

My boss at the paper - bless her - was evil incarnate. I expected her to tell me the pictures were horrible and boring, especially since she’d have to find a replacement for me if I got hired somewhere else, but she was always harsh so I thought I could handle it.

She told me her second grade son could do better and she questioned how she could have even hired me in the first place. ‘The Devil Wears Prada’ had nothing on this lady, this she-beast. She acted like she was on some runway when she entered the lobby to the office, scarf blowing behind her like she was posing with a fan at some swanky photo shoot.

I could think of a few things to do with that scarf around her neck; tightening it being one of them.

My life at the Chicago Print wasn’t dazzling in any light. I was one of the photographers and followed the journalists around to snap whatever story they deemed worthy, fiction or non-fiction. I wondered how many stories one paper could do on the local politicians getting busted yet again with prostitutes.

Prostitutes! Something I never dreamed my camera lens would ever see.

Most of my personal pictures were of the city, the night life, the lakes…people. That was my interest; real life not sleaze.

As for my personal life, my short ugly stint with Matt was over. That was the extent of my love life. Even though I had my small family, I felt completely alone. How could you be alone in a city of thousands? Ask me. It wasn’t as hard as it sounded.

I sometimes felt like I was being watched though, even as a little girl I felt it. Like there was someone out there waiting for me or watching over me, maybe just seeing how I would turn out.

Mom thought I meant I was waiting for a boy. Maybe I was. She said ‘the right boy will come along one day, when the stars align in your favor’.

She also told me that guardian spirits from mother nature watch us. They might even intervene if we needed badly enough. That was a nice idea. If that were true, my guardian was on an indefinite coffee break, apparently having more of a social life than me. Probably making eyes at someone else’s guardian at the water cooler, causing problems.

For some reason, pulling away from the ridge, the lights, the noise, felt wrong, like it could be the last time. I didn’t get into all that stuff like my mom; fortune tellers and scientology and fate, so I didn’t really believe in premonitions or gut feelings, but I
was
always able to detect lies accurately.

Pulling up to the highway I felt a chill and the hair on my neck and arms stood up, making me stop again. The stars were particularly bright that night as I laid my head back on the headrest to settle myself, for one final last moment of peace before heading back to my nonexistent life. Then I realized something was missing.

“Where is the moon?”

End of Preview

You can find Shelly here:

www.shellycrane.blogspot.com

Table of Contents

Other books by Samantha Young

Prologue

PART ONE