Dream On (Stories of Serendipity #2) (6 page)

As he was packing up on Sunday, Renae walked him out to the car. 

“Thank you for coming, Dalton.”  She hugged him tightly around the waist.

“It’s no problem, ‘Nae.  I would have come sooner if I had realized…”
  He bit back what he was about to say.  She had tried to tell him their dad was sick, and he hadn’t taken her seriously enough.

“Well, I would like nothing better than to bring up the whole prodigal son thing again, but I know there’s nothing that’s going to change.  You’re going back to your life, and I’m staying here in this one.”  She shrugged.

“Hey.  Come here.”  He pulled his big sister into a hug.  “I’ll come back in a couple of weeks and work the herd.  I’ll start coming back more regularly and help you out.  I know things have been hard on you, and I’m sorry I’m not around more.  I’ll try to change that.”  Dalton knew her life hadn’t been easy, and he had been ignoring that for too long.  He really did need to change it.  There was no need for his sister to be the only one responsible for taking care of his parents in their twilight years.

He managed to make it back to Dallas, and went ahead and got ready to go to The Church. He wore his standard attire of faded jeans, riding boots, and white tee shirt, with his leather vest.
 It was extremely tame by The Church’s standards, but he was comfortable in it, and it didn’t seem to hinder his ability to take women home.  

Although, he
tonight found that he didn’t really see anybody he wanted to take home.  He kept thinking back to Alyssa Fuller, the name of his dream lady.  He kept finding himself looking for her in the crowd of faces in the bar.  Dalton thought for sure she must be somebody he knew, and his subconscious had assigned her to his dreams.  

Ever since that night she had stood naked in front of her mirror, her image had been emblazoned in his brain.
 He had never seen her face before then.  He wondered how the woman never seemed to use a mirror.  He had only seen her that one time, but he would never forget her.  Her long legs needed to be wrapped around his waist, while his hands kneaded her breasts, as he buried his face in her hair.  He imagined holding her and kissing her.  He woke in the mornings wishing he could bring her the pleasure she could not seem to bring to herself.  

Back in the p
resent, he drank his drink down and tried to find a pleasant face.  He felt like talking tonight.

Two hours later
he was at Denny’s with Deanna, trying to talk to her.

“What do you do?”

“What do you want me to do?”  She eyed him suggestively, playing with the button on his vest.

“Talk to me.
 That’s what I want you to do.”  He took a bite of his hamburger.

“Well, I’m a waitress.
 And I live in an apartment with a friend of mine.”  She had stopped playing with the button and was looking at him.  She stole one of his fries.

“Do you want me to order you something?”

“No, I’m not hungry.”

“What do you want to be doing?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, do you want to waitress your whole life?”

Deanna shrugged.  “I don’t know.  What do you do?”

“I’m a bartender, but I know I’m not going to do that my whole life.
 I have an agricultural sciences degree.  I just didn’t want to do that right out of college.  I wanted to live a little first.”

“How do y
ou know when you’re done living and you’re ready to be a ...agricultural sciences person?”  She struggled with the words, and then stole another one of Dalton’s French fries.

Dalton finished chewing his last bite of burger while he thought about that.
 “That’s the million dollar question, right there, honey.”

“Can we go fuck now?”

He looked at her squarely.  “Not tonight.”

That night, he lay in bed thinking.  He didn’t know what had come over him.  Deanna was pretty enough.  Certainly prettier than other women he’d been with.  She turned him on, too.  That wasn’t it.  He couldn’t figure out why he didn’t take her home and fuck her brains out, like he usually did.  What possessed him to take her to Denny’s?  Was he trying to date somebody?  He didn’t date.  

He thought back to what his dad had said about his subconscious telling him to settle down.
 Was that what this was?  Dream lady was settled, but she didn’t seem any happier than he was.  She lay in bed every night, unable to get herself off, sighing herself to sleep.  Did he want that?  No.  He didn’t.

He thought about Alyssa Fuller’s life.
 Her kids were great.  He had laughed aloud at the memory of her son wanting to have a “passenger hunt.”  It wasn’t until Alyssa had corrected him that Dalton realized the boy meant “scavenger hunt.”  Every time he said something with “th," it came out “f," like something would be somefing.  It was damn cute.  And the daughter was really struggling with her reading.  Dalton felt a pang of empathy for her frustrations.  He recalled the stories Alyssa told the youngsters before bed.  They had a fascination with cockroaches, so she would tell the story of Goldilocks and the three Cockroaches, and instead of the Three Little Pigs, she told the Three Little Cockroaches.  She also had a song about Scooby Doo, which she sang to the tune of the Brahm’s Lullaby.  

Dalton reminisced to times when his own mother had sung to him, while rocking him.
 He had insisted on it until he was old enough to not need it, but his mother never refused.  Something about that creaky old chair soothed both of them, it seemed.  Now his mother just seemed angry at him all of the time.  Dalton knew it was probably because he didn’t come home more often, but lately it didn’t even seem like she was glad to see him anymore. 

Dalton wondered if she blamed him for Dad getting sick.  He sure as hell felt guilty enough, blaming himself, without her blaming him, too.  It was his fault, he knew.  If he had come back whe
n Renae called and asked him to, he would have been helping Richard out with the cows, and he probably wouldn’t have over-exerted himself.

Dalton punched his pillow, as he rolled over and tried to find a comfortable position.
 

He looked forward to sweet dreams that night, as he went to sleep.

“Say goodbye to Mommy!  Tell her you’ll see her next week.”  Steven had Cayden in one arm and Sierra in the other.  He was marching down the driveway, without really giving them a chance to say anything.

“Bye Mommy!”
 Sierra said.  “I’ll miss you!”

“I’ll miss you too, baby!” Alyssa called after her.

“I love you Mommy!” Cayden shouted as Steven shut the car door.

Alyssa blew a kiss and willed the tears not to fall.
 She did this ever other week, it really should be easier by now.  For some reason though, it wasn’t, and she suspected it would always be hard to see her kids handed off to Steven.

He was a good dad, just a terrible husband.
 Their custody situation was a good one, they each got equal time with the children, and they split holidays.  It was a win-win situation.  Except the kids never got to be with two parents at the same time.  So, while it was a win-win for the parents, the kids lost out every time.

As per her usual Sunday night, passing the kids off to Steve routine, she grabbed a bottle of red wine and drew a bubble bath.
 As she sank down into the tub, she felt the tensions of her body dissipate, but the tensions of her mind were still there.  Alyssa knew they would go away with enough wine, but she hated Monday mornings at school hung-over.  She had had enough of those.  So she limited her wine intake to a couple of glasses.

She forced her thoughts to the weekend.
 The birthday party at the pizza place, watching the kids play video games, was a rare treat for them.  Afterwards they had gone to the new water feature at the public park.  There were colorful fountains that shot water into the air, as well as poured it down on the children.  Since the weather hadn’t turned cold yet, it was still fun for the kids.  And parents didn’t have to worry about sudden chills.

Alyssa tried her best to make the weekends fun for the kids.
 She told herself it wasn’t because of Steven, but she couldn’t lie.  She knew that part of it had to be because he had gobs of money and bought the kids everything they asked for, whether they needed it or not.  And he never consulted with Alyssa about what she thought might be appropriate for them.  Her opinion about the kids didn’t matter to him at all.  He didn’t seem to see the hypocrisy of his uber-Christian values and how they related to the expensive toys he bought the kids.

When she didn’t have the kids, Monday evenings were laundry .  Tuesday evenings were floors.  Wednesday evenings were for Alyssa and the girls.

This particular Wednesday, they were going to the Gin, for karaoke night.
 Alyssa typically didn’t participate, but she had been known to entertain the fifteen or sixteen Wednesday-night-bar patrons, when she was drunk enough.  She and her friends had discovered tequila let her do anything.

When she got there, Summer and Jessie were already at the table, waiting for her with three shots of tequila, dressed with a lime and a salted rim.  Alyssa giggled inwardly, as always when she looked at her friends.  They were polar opposites on the physical spectrum.

Summer was a tiny pixie, barely five foot three, with short, spiky hair, which was currently died platinum blonde.  She ran a bookstore here in town called A Summer Place, but her main claim to fame was she saw dead people.  Not really, but she did have a self-proclaimed "sixth sense" that her friends tried not to make fun of her for.  She was in a committed long-distance relationship with her partner, Bo, who lived in Dallas and ran a paranormal investigation service. 

In contrast, Jessie was almost Amazonian in stature.  She was five foot ten, with long, wavy brunette hair, and a muscular, toned body from working on her ranch.  Jessie raised goats, and made cheese.  She had struggled a lot to make her bus
iness profitable and wasn’t always successful with it.  But she came to girls’ night, whether she could afford it or not.  More often than not, she went home with some guy she ran into.  Casual sex was her forte, as long as there were no strings attached.

“A little early for all this madness, isn’t it?”
 She eyed them, pointedly looking at the shots lined up on the table.

“Quit your whining.
 We’ve been waiting for you to get here.”  Jessie clinked her glass to Alyssa’s first, then Summer’s, then licked the salt from the rim, drank the shot and stuck the lime in her mouth.

Summer followed suit, and they both turned to look at Alyssa, who shrugged her shoulders and licked the salt from the rim of the glass, turned up her glass, and savored the burn as she followed its progress down her throat before it exploded into her stomach.
 She sucked on the lime daintily, trying to look nonchalant.

The truth was, Alyssa loved tequila.
 Dressed, naked, whatever.  Tequila made her feel like a totally different person, and she loved the feeling of freedom and lack of inhibition that came over her when she drank it.  She knew it was wrong on so many levels, but she couldn’t help it.  She didn’t drink it often, but when she did, look out.  

“So girls, how’s things?”  Alyssa asked, relishing the burn in her stomach.

Jessie grunted, and took a swig of her beer.  “I would be a lot better with some great sex, but I think I’m going to have to forgo it tonight.  I’ve got three Mama goats who are about to domino, and I need to be at the house when they do.  They’re due tonight or tomorrow, and they’re all new mamas, who have no idea what to expect.  I’ve got a cot set up in the barn to spend the night with them.”

“Is that necessary?”  Alyssa was curious.

“Probably not. I’m more anxious about it than they are, most likely.  I just want to make sure all the babies make it.”  Jessie shrugged, trying to act nonchalant, but Alyssa knew she worried about her goats.  She loved each and every one of them.  She had named them all, and loved to describe each one’s personality to whoever would sit still long enough to listen.

She turned to Summer, “How about you?  How’s Bo?”

Summer turned almost giddy.  “She’s great!  I just came back from a visit with her.  I went on an excursion with her to a hotel near there.  We had a great time.  A lady had committed suicide and another guy had died there.  It was such an amazing experience.”

“I can only imagine the kind of sex that sort of experience would lead to.”  Jessie giggled into her palm before motioning to the waitress for another round of drinks.

“Well, I’m not going to kiss and tell…”

“Oh, I totally wish you would.  I’ve always wondered about lesbian sex.”  Alyssa choked on her drink when Jessie said this.

“I haven’t.  Please don’t share that with us, Summer.  I love you dearly, but that’s not something I’ve ever been curious about.”

Summer was laughing openly at the both of them.  “Don’t worry, Al.  I’m not going to divulge my secrets.  I don’t think you could handle it, with your skewed views on sex, and Jessie, I’m not about to give you the satisfaction.  You’ll just have to go on wondering.”