Stacy's Dad Has Got It Going On (3 page)

Picking up last night’s tea mug, she
hopped up off the floor and nearly tripped on the paperback by her door.
Oh
yeah
. Not only had she forgotten her plan to lend the book to Stacy’s dad,
she’d forgotten Stacy’s dad was even at their house. Stacy spent enough
evenings vegging in front of the TV—it could just as easily have been her out
there.

When Savannah stepped out of her
bedroom, she very nearly jumped back in. She couldn’t stop herself from
reacting audibly when she caught sight of a topless Eric in the middle of the
living space. When she gasped, he looked up and met her gaze straight on. The
look on his face matched the expression she figured must be painted across
hers—your average ‘deer caught in the headlights’ look.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” he said, throwing a
white T-shirt over his head. “Sorry, I just wanted to get out of my suit. You’d
been holed up in your room so long I thought…”

“Nine o’clock tea break,” she
interrupted. She tried to be subtle as she gazed over the back of the couch to
see if he was wearing any pants. He was. “If you want, you can change in my
bedroom while I put the kettle on.”

“Uhh…” He blinked a few times, but she
couldn’t read his expression. “Yeah, I can do that. Whatever makes you most
comfortable.”

Or least uncomfortable.

“For sure,” she said with an organic
smile. “Just watch my papers and stuff. I study on the floor.”

He smiled too, though he gave her a
teasing look as he walked by the kitchen with plaid pyjama pants in hand.
Was
it so strange to study on the floor?
Not that she cared much what other
people thought. She took her bag of chocolate chip cookies down from the
cupboard and set a few out on a plate as she waited for the water to boil. What
did Stacy’s dad think of her, she wondered. Did he know she’d kept her marks
high enough to maintain her scholarship even into third year? Did Stacy talk
about her roommate at all with her parents, or was Savannah only part of the
furniture? At least being classified as ‘furniture’ was better than being seen
as the roommate from hell, which she knew she wasn’t. She was quiet and kept to
herself, but she was sociable too. After all, Stacy was her best friend. But
there were limitations on everything, as far as Savannah was concerned. Even if
you get along great with your roommate, you don’t want to spend every waking
hour with her.

And then Savannah thought about her
space—her room. Eric was in there now. How long did it take to change from
dress pants into pyjama pants? He must be in there perusing her bookshelf and
looking at her knick-knacks. A tingle of excitement ran through her at the
thought of him picking up the little stuffed dog on her pillow and feeling how
soft its fur was, or finding the secret romance stashed under her bed.

Eric emerged from Savannah’s bedroom
just as the electric kettle clicked off. She nearly poured boiling water all
over herself when he walked by holding his suit pants in one hand and dark grey
jockey-boxers in the other. It wasn’t just the fact that she could
see
his underwear, it was also the fact that if his underwear was in his hand, that
meant he wasn’t wearing it.

“Thanks,” Eric said to her, nodding as
he folded his pants over the back of Stacy’s chair. “Nice to have a moment of
privacy.”

“No probs. I made you a cup of tea.
How do you take it?”

He sat down heavily on the couch in
his plain flannel pants and white T-shirt—and probably no underwear! “Oh,
thanks. That’s sweet of you. I just take a little milk if you have it.”

“For sure,” she replied, still
watching him as she opened the fridge door. She was surprised that he wasn’t
getting up to fetch his own mug. If he turned out to be one of those men who
expected any woman who happened to be in the room to wait on him hand and foot,
she would soon be lobbying for his expulsion.

When she brought him his cup of tea,
she understood. His eyes looked red, like his two minutes of solitude had
brought every sore thought surging into the foreground of his mind. He must
have darted by her so quickly because he didn’t want her to see him like this.
She would have done the same thing. She hated when people asked that dreaded
question, “What’s wrong?” If she said, “Nothing,” they only pushed harder. And
if she told them what was wrong, she spent half the night crying.

Savannah piled her book on top of her
plate of cookies, and carried her tea into the living room. “I thought you
might like this,” she said.

He offered a weak smile in return.
“The book or the cookies?”

“Well, both. I was just thinking no
sense watching stupid TV shows all night, right? I read this autobiography a
few years ago, and I really liked it. There’s a part in it that you reminded me
of when we were talking…” Was she really going to bring this up again with her
roommate’s dad? “…uh, talking about sanitary napkins and all that, because she
writes about going to a job interview in the city and leaving blood all over
the chair. In her village, they just bled out and didn’t worry about it. So,
not to spoil it for you, but the man interviewing her takes her to the store
and buys her a box of pads and, like, takes one out and tells her how to use
it.”

She couldn’t believe she was going on
and on about periods, and Eric wasn’t even squirming. Before she studied
biology, she felt uncomfortable talking about these things, even with other
girls. Now, with everything they discussed in lectures and everything she
encountered in labs, she wasn’t so squeamish or so bashful.

“I’ll certainly give it a look,” Eric
said, flipping the book over and gazing at the photo on the back cover. “And
I’ll get right on these cookies too.” 

Stacy came out of her room with fresh
linens and an ear for conversation. They probably wanted some time to discuss
family affairs. Happy to have made him smile, even if it took a chocolate chip
bribe, Savannah picked up her tea, took three cookies in hand, and left them to
it.

* * * *

After falling asleep in a book,
Savannah sprang up from the floor, rolled the kink out of her neck, and surged
into the morning kitchen. It must be late—Stacy was back from her run, and
already busy juicing colourful produce.

“Will you cut that out?” her father
called from the couch.

“No!” Stacy snapped. “You drink my
booze, you suffer the consequences.”

As much as Savannah didn’t want to get
involved, she couldn’t help asking, “What?”

Stacy nodded toward the couch. “My
father got into the rum that what’s-his-face brought me back from the
Dominican. He was up drinking all night, and he called in sick to work. How’s
that for setting a good example for your daughter?” She only stopped juicing
because her glass was filled to the brim. “No wonder mom had an affair,” Stacy
muttered.

Frozen to the kitchen tile, Savannah
stared at the art cards on the fridge. How could she possibly reply to a
statement like that? Though the tension hurt her heart, she stayed in Stacy’s
and Eric’s midst just long enough to fill up the kettle and stick a tea bag in
her travel mug.

“Are we taking the bus together?”
Stacy asked.

Savannah nodded as she raced to the
bathroom. “I’ll be quick in the shower.”

“Good,” Stacy said, “because I have
Invertebrate Zoology first thing, and my T.A. already hates me.”

After showering and dressing in tight
brown cords and a T-shirt, Savannah fixed her tea while Eric snored on the
couch. She felt strangely disappointed in him. More than she should have been,
all things considered. She’d never been cheated on, or been married for
twenty-something years, for that matter. She was in no position to judge his
response.

On the bus to campus, Savannah tried
to avoid the topic, but Stacy was the kind of person who liked to talk things
through. “In a way, I can’t believe she did it. I mean, if dad hadn’t caught
her red-handed, I would have said he was paranoid.”

“But?” Savannah asked.

Stacy leaned against the bus window.
“I guess she hasn’t seemed really happy for a while. But it’s hard for me to
know what goes on between them. I don’t even live there anymore.”

Though she hated to pose the question
yet again, Savannah asked, “Do you know how long he’s staying with us?”

“He’ll be out on his ass soon if he
keeps drinking my liquor!”

Savannah laughed. “Oh, I didn’t get to
tell you! Chris asked me to Kingsley’s tomorrow night.”

Stacy nearly did a spit take on that
one. “No way! He did?”

“Yeah, to see his band.” Savannah took
a self-satisfied sip of tea while Stacy looked on, slack-jawed. “Why are you so
surprised? I’m an eligible bachelorette,” she laughed.

“Yeah, no, I know that,” Stacy said.
“Just, Chris is so…I mean, he’s…”

“He’s cool.” Savannah offered a
decisive nod. “I know. That’s why I like him. Our classes are full of geeks
like us…”

Stacy poked her in the side. “Hey,
speak for yourself missy.”

“Well, you know what I mean.” Taking a
long sip of soothing hot tea, Savannah watched their familiar route pass by out
the window. “I just want something a little different. Every day is so much the
same.” She pictured Chris with his relaxed sense of style leaning back in his
high lab chair while their T.A. talked about this and that. His expression
always seemed so carefree. To watch him, he seemed like he wasn’t paying even
the slightest bit of attention to the lesson. He never seemed to listen, but he
always got A’s on his lab reports, so what did that say? He went home every
night and did his readings just like her. He was naturally brilliant. She and
Chris were the same, but different. Chris was cool. She was not.

* * * *

Cool
was such an elusive quality, Savannah
reflected as she dragged her book bag behind her. She ascended the stairs to
her apartment slowly this afternoon, lost in deep contemplation. What did it
take to come off as cool? Clothes. “Cool” clothes. Savannah had cool clothes,
didn’t she? Well, they were cool when she bought them. At least, she thought
they were. Chris wore children’s T-shirts from the 1980’s. Who would ever have
anticipated thirty years ago that those tops would be cool again? Dang, Super
Mario Brothers? That came out before she was born! But, if memory served, she
still had her favourite Sailor Moon top packed away in the back of her closet. It
would be nice and tight now, and her boobs would look kick-ass in it. Would she
look cool in a T-shirt from her childhood? That’s what seemed to be in, so
she’d give it a try.

Stacy’s shoes weren’t at the front
door and her father wasn’t strewn across the couch, so she must have taken him
out for a cheerful dinner. Kicking off her cross-trainers, Savannah slid down
the waxed wood hallway and opened the door to her room.

“Oh, Jesus!”

Savannah gasped as Stacy’s dad
shrieked like a five-year old and shielded his penis with his hands. He was
naked. Totally naked. Why was he naked? Hell, besides that, why was he in her
room? Oh, because she’d told him he could change there if he wanted some
privacy. So he’d done just that, or, at least, he was in the middle of doing it
when she walked in on him. Naked. And…
good
naked. Wow! Eric was fit.
Dang, he had nice abs. Great chest. Hardly any hair—that’s just the way a chest
ought to look, she figured. Not all thick with a carpet of fuzz, but smooth and
just a little gleaming, like he’d been out in the sun and worked up a bit of a
sweat.

As Eric grasped for his jockey-boxers
laid out on her bed, Savannah thought to herself,
I should say “Ooops!” and
“I’m sorry,” then shut the door and leave him to change.
But for some reason,
she didn’t do any of those things. She stood in the door frame watching as he
fought with his underwear. He was obviously distressed by her presence because
he hopped around the room, jabbing his foot at the leg holes between black
cotton, and always missing.

As far as she could recall, Savannah
had never seen a blond guy without his clothes on. Eric’s pubic hair surprised
her. It was dark. Not jet black or anything, maybe not even quite brown, but it
was dark compared to his bleach-blond head. Her experience with male nudity was
quite narrow—a high school boyfriend and another in first-year university, both
of whom belonged to the black fuzz brigade. There’d been nobody since. She knew
guys were a distraction, and she shirked their siren’s song as best she could
to maintain her scholarship.

Though Eric’s nakedness made her heart
beat strong in her chest, it didn’t offend her. She watched him struggle into
his underwear and then simply said, “How’s it going?”

“Uhh…” Eric dove for his pair of jeans
resting on Savannah’s bed and forced his legs into theirs. “I’m just
getting…uhh…” He didn’t look at her, even after he’d pulled on his polo shirt.
“Just finished getting dressed…” Picking his pyjamas up off the bed, he looked
down at the cotton and flannel and said, “I didn’t know you were home. Sorry
if…”

“No biggie,” she interrupted. And then
she laughed because that was totally the wrong phrasing. “I mean no problem.
Hell, next time you can walk in on me naked.”