The Denver Cereal (25 page)

“
I’m going to pay him
back!” Jill exclaimed. “It’s just for Katy . . . her
meds . . .”

“
But he told you to take
it shopping today?” Sandy asked. Stepping off the elevator, she
followed Jill to Jacob’s room. “Do I have to watch you pay him
back, because I like the details, but I’m not
really . . .”

Sandy pushed the door
open. Standing in the doorway, she saw a man kneeling by an
electrical plug. When he looked up, she gasped. Sandy grabbed Jill
and pulled her from the room. Sandy slammed closed the
door.

“
What?” Jill
asked.

“
That’s the
guy.”

So I’m asking
 
.
 
.
 
.

“
Maybe you can stop going
to every hair stylist in the city,” Jacob said.

“
I . . .
I . . . I . . .”

“
Go.”

“
But . . .”

“
Go!” As Aden ran toward
the door, Jacob yelled, “Just leave
the . . .”

Aden stopped at the door
and threw the box to Jacob. Aden ran past a stunned girl standing
at the door.

“
Jill?” Aden asked as he
passed.

The girl
nodded.

“
Aden. Go on in. He’s
waiting for you.”

Just as Aden rounded the
nurses’ station, he heard the elevator bell ring. With a burst of
speed, he slipped through the closing elevator doors.

~~~~~~~~

“
Hi,” Jill
said.

Jacob scooted over in the
bed. Jill sat down next to him. She leaned toward him, closed her
eyes, and was swept away, again, by his lips. Each delicate kiss
led to a deeper kiss. The motion of his lips brought a well of
warmth that rose through her core. If she thought it possible, Jill
would swear she had kiss orgasms. Breaking off the kiss was like
coming to the end of a great ride at Disneyland. He left her
willing to wait in a long, long line for the chance to take the
ride again.

“
I have something for
you,” Jacob said.

His left hand stroked her
hair. The bruise on her cheekbone was turning purple and a little
yellow. He kissed her bruised cheek.

“
I can’t really get on
bended knee, but the moment I can, I will.”

Jill jerked back from him.
She puzzled at his statement. Shaking her head slightly, she said,
“What?”

“
Shh,” Jacob said. “I’ve
practiced.”

“
You . . .
I . . . I mean . . .”

Jacob sighed. Jill wasn’t
going to make this easy for him. He put his fingertips over her
sputtering mouth.

“
Will you marry
me?”

Jacob removed his
fingertips from her mouth. Jill’s face broke into a huge blushing
smile.

“
Really? I mean, I know
that I said that I would marry you . . . and you
asked at Pete’s, but . . .” Jill’s words came in a
flood. “You haven’t even known me a week. And we’ve only had sex
once and you don’t know . . . I mean, I suck in
bed . . . and I have a child
and . . .”

Jacob flopped back on the
bed. Jill laughed at the exasperated look on his face.

“
Well, what about the sex
thing?” Jill asked. “I really don’t know anything,
and . . .”

“
I think people learn from
each other. I don’t know anything, not one thing, about really
pleasing you,” Jacob said. “But I’m more than ready to spend a
lifetime learning from you.”

Jill blushed and looked at
her hands.

“
So what do you say?”
Jacob asked.

At that moment, the nurse
propped opened the door to Jacob’s room. Two male attendants
followed the nurse into the room. Moving quickly, the nurse began
unhooking Jacob from the machines by his bed. Jill stood from the
bed.

“
What’s going on?” Jacob
asked.

“
There’s an opening in the
surgical suite. The doctor that was here this morning?”

“
Smuyth?”

“
He put you on an
unofficial waiting list.” The nurse shrugged. “They’ll do your
fusion today.”

The attendants pushed the
bed away from the wall.

“
Right this moment?” Jacob
asked.

“
It was a last-minute
cancellation. The scheduled patient spiked a fever,” the nurse
said. “You’ll be out this evening sometime. I’m sure you two can
talk then.”

Rolling toward the door,
Jacob retrieved the box from its hiding place under the covers. He
tossed it to Jill. She caught it.

“
I love you, Jill. Go
shopping. I’ll see you tonight. Tell Aden to check his
Blackberry.”

The room door closed and
Jill looked at the box in her hand. She opened the tattered old box
to find a plush ring box. Biting her lip, she couldn’t decide what
to do.

Should she wait for
Jacob?

Should she just open
it?

ARG!

~~~~~~~~

The closing elevator doors
clipped Aden’s shirt and then bounced open again. Sandy’s head
jerked up when he rushed into the elevator. Her stunned face
switched to annoyance.

“
Are you stalking me now?”
Sandy asked. She pressed the lobby button over and over until the
elevator doors closed again.

“
Stalking?” Aden asked.
“I . . . Listen, I’ve looked all over the city for
you. I’ve been to every hair stylist Jake or I could
find.”

Sandy raised an eyebrow
and smirked. “You came to
my
salon.”

Aden nodded.

“
Okay, you don’t want to
talk to me. I get that. But I . . . I’d like to
understand. Jake says people tell you what’s going on if you ask.
So I’m asking.”

Sandy crossed her arms
over her chest and shook her head.

“
We worked out together
for six years. Same machines. Same weights. Same time. We
talked . . . a lot . . . every
day . . . for years. Then the one time I asked you
out, you never came back to the gym.”

“
Oh, I go, just not when
you’re there.”

“
What did I do?” Aden
asked. “I asked you out. You said you’d like to go out with me. You
said you’d been waiting for me to ask for a long time. Then you
changed your number or gave me a fake or . . . I
thought you liked me.”

“
Hmmfpt.”

“
Well, I liked
you . . .
like
you.”

The elevator bounced when
it hit the ground floor. The doors slid open.

Sandy tilted her head to
the side. She sneered, and said, “But you love your
wife
? Is that
it?”

Aden grabbed her arm when
she pressed past him. Sandy glowered at him.

“
Will you hear me
out?”

Knowing she had to wait
for Jill anyway, Sandy shrugged. She would never admit it, but she
had missed him. She’d always looked forward to seeing him at the
gym. Even now, when she
knew
he wasn’t there, she still looked for his car in
the parking lot.

Holding her arm tight, he
guided them through the hospital to a shady spot just outside the
door.

“
I’m not married,” Aden
said. “I was married . . . a long time ago. But I
haven’t been married in ten years. I haven’t even dated
in . . . eight or nine years. Why do you think I am
married?”

“
Why should I believe
you?”

“
We can go upstairs and
ask Jake,” Aden said.

“
Right, like a guy isn’t
going to lie for his buddy.”

“
Jacob Marlowe is my boss
and my friend. We aren’t buddies. Plus, Jacob Marlowe doesn’t lie.
He just doesn’t.”

“
Oh,” Sandy said.
“I . . . I thought you were a biker.”

“
A biker?”

“
Because of your tattoos,”
Sandy said.

“
Oh,” Aden flushed. His
arms, neck, and back had been covered with tattoos. Thanks to laser
technology, his adolescent gestures at identity were almost gone.
“No, I work for Jake. I’m his assistant.”

“
Jill and I went to high
school with his assistant.”

“
Molly?”

Sandy nodded her
head.

“
Molly is Jake’s
bookkeeper for his rehabilitation business. I work for Lipson. Jake
has me and another assistant, Blane.”

“
Oh,” Sandy
said.

“
Why did you think I was
married?”

“
I went into the locker
room and this girl told me line and verse about you, your wife,
your kids, and all this stuff. I . . .”

“
Tall? Thin? White-blonde
hair?” Aden asked.

“
Very pretty. A lot
prettier than me,” Sandy said.

“
Lexi.”

“
Right. Lexi.”

“
I call her Lexi Luther
because she’s like my archnemesis,” Aden said. “Okay. Well that
makes more sense. Thanks.”

Aden and Sandy stood
facing each other. The uncomfortable silence stretched.

“
Are you
married?”

“
No,” Aden said. “I was
married. She left when our daughter was a couple months old. We
weren’t actually divorced until four years ago. I kind of hoped she
would disappear, but . . . Jake made me
file.”

“
Jake’s had a big impact
on you,” Sandy said.

“
You could say that,” Aden
replied. “I have two kids. They live with me most of the time.
Would you like to see their pictures?”

Sandy nodded. Aden opened
his wallet and pulled out his favorite picture of Nash and
Noelle.

“
I dropped them at their
mom’s house before I came here. I . . . They’re my
life.”

“
Why would Lexi say all
that stuff?”

“
Oh,” Aden sighed.
“Because I fucked up. After Nuala left — that’s my ex-wife — I
wasn’t in a great place. I was still . . .
drinking . . . and I was going to be a rock star.
Mostly, I worked during the days and spent the nights at clubs. I
didn’t know what it even meant to have kids . . . I
thought women took care of all of that. Real evolved, huh? I
thought if I got another woman right away, I could keep living the
way I was . . . you know, not have to change. Lexi
and I . . . got together, and . . . It
didn’t go well.”

“
What happened?” Sandy
asked.

“
I can’t imagine you want
to hear all of this crap,” Aden said.

“
Actually . . .” Sandy said. She dared to look
at his face for the first time. “I do want to hear about it. My dad
left my mom when I was a couple months old . . . and
I have a particular interest in stories just like
this . . . stories like mine.”

Aden sighed.

“
Lexi moved in right away.
But Noelle, my daughter, never liked her. She cried until I got
home from work. I was at work one day when Lexi called to say she
had moved out. Fuck me and fuck my stupid kids.
I . . .” Aden shook his head. “It was totally my
fault. I just had no idea of what I was doing. What happened with
you?”

“
My mom got jobs to
support us. It was hard on her . . . really
hard . . . like it’s been for Jill. She met my
step-dad when I was eight or nine.” Sandy smiled. “He was Catholic,
so we all converted. And, he was a really great guy. He was my
dad.”

“
Was?”

“
He
smoked . . . He was older than Mom by fifteen years
or so. He died a couple years ago. Lung cancer. So, you can see why
I want to know what happened with you and your kids.”

“
I was such an idiot.
People at work would leave their dogs in the car so I thought I’d
leave the kids in the car. They mostly sleep anyway. I would see
them on my breaks.”

“
WHAT?”

“
I know,” Aden said. “I
told you I was an idiot.”

“
What
happened?”

“
I went on my first break
and I saw this woman by the car. She was singing to Noelle and
rocking her side to side. My son, Nash, was sitting on the hood of
the car eating a candy bar. When I got close, she looked up and
said, ‘She’s really just lonely. How about if I take them today?’ I
was like, ‘What?’” Aden laughed. “That was Jake’s mom, Celia. Big
Sam Lipson came up behind me. He looked at me, then Celia. He just
laughed. They started a day care for Lipson employees the next day
and you know what? A hundred kids showed up that day and a hundred
more the following Monday. Nobody had day care for their kids. No
accidents, that’s what Celia said. ‘It’s no accident Sam invited me
to lunch today.’ I . . . Yeah.”

~~~~~~~~

“
Oooh, Val, what plow did
you find him behind?” Ramon said. A slight, Asian man, Ramon’s
exaggerated inflection and silk, leopard-print caftan announced,
“GAY HOLLYWOOD STYLIST” like a neon sign. “He’s absolutely
Neanderthal-dreamy. Look at all that hair!”