Fool That I Am (2 page)

“What do you mean my cell phone bill has already been paid?”
Billie asked the woman on the end of the line incredulously. She was sitting at
the break room table on her lunch break the next day and was using her time in
between bites of her PB&J to do damage control on her bills.

The patient response from the customer service rep on the
end of the line replied, “Yes, ma’am, it appears that there was a cash payment
made on your account in the amount of $200. That took care of your past due
balance of $68.79, your current balance of $65.42, and leaves a credit balance
on your account of $65.79, which should take care of your next bill unless there
are overage charges.”

“But there must be some mistake,” Billie insisted earnestly.
“I did not make that payment. I was calling today for an extension. That’s
someone else’s payment that was applied to my account by accident.”

Billie could hear the furious clicking of fingers on a
keyboard over the line as the CSR looked further into her account. “No, ma’am,
this is your payment. There is a note on the account from the sales associate
in the store that a man wanted to know your balance, but she did not give him
the information since he wasn’t on your account. He asked if he could pay any
amount and have the credit roll over, and the associate told him yes. That’s
all the information I see. It appears as if you have a guardian angel, Mrs.
Hardesty,” the chipper representative informed her happily.

“It’s ‘Ms.’ Hardesty,” Billie corrected her absently while
her mind raced. “Thank you so much for your time.” She already knew who had
paid her bill, but she dutifully typed in her dad’s cell number anyway.

After several rings, a deep voice answered. “How’s my Billie
Jean Queen today?” he boomed across the phone in greeting.

A warm smile lit up her face upon hearing the old term of
endearment. “I’m just fine, Daddy. You and Momma doing alright?” she asked,
peeling off the lid of her generic blueberry yogurt.

“Fair to middlin’, baby, fair to middlin’. What’s going on?
The kids alright?” he asked, trying to mask the hint of worry in his voice. As
the only child of George and Marla Kincaid, Billie and her kids were the sole
recipients of all their worry. Derrick’s hospitalization had done a number on
them all and the anxiety it had engendered wouldn’t fade any time soon.

Billie rushed to assure him, “They’re great, Dad. Everybody
is just fine. I was just going to ask a quick question.” Already knowing the
answer, Billie continued, “Did you pay some money on my cell phone bill the
other day?”

Confusion clouded his voice as he replied, “No, I sure
didn’t, but I can go do it today. How much do you need?”

Her heart warmed even as frustration bloomed in her chest.
“I don’t need any money, Dad, I swear. We’ve got everything we need and all the
bills are paid,” she fibbed guiltily. “Besides, Mom just took the kids on a
huge shopping spree for winter clothes, so you’ve already helped out enough.
Sorry to cut this short, but my lunch break is almost over. Love you, Daddy!”
She purposely hurried him off the phone before he could start another lecture
on letting them give her some money.

Resignedly, George responded, “Ok, baby. I love you, too.
Call me if you need anything.”

As soon as she ended the call, she was furiously sending a
text to Sam:
I need to talk to you tonight. You can come over for dinner or
just swing by any time, if you’re free.

She drummed her fingers impatiently while she waited for the
reply. It wasn’t long in coming, either. Less than a minute later, her phone
pinged with a response:
 Sounds ominous. What’s for dinner?

She couldn’t help the silly smile that tipped up her cheeks
as she replied:
 Fish sticks, mac and cheese, and bagged salad. Gourmet
fare.

Seconds later, he replied with a short confirmation:
My
fave. I’ll be there at 6.

A voice broke into her reverie. “Uh, oh. She got that goofy
look on her face again, you guys. She must be texting that hunky Sam again,”
one of her coworkers, Connie Vasquez, called across the room.

“
Cállate,
Consuela,” Billie chastised the nurse with
mock severity as the other nurses laughed good-naturedly.

Connie, a lovely 28-year old Hispanic woman with a
noticeable accent, pursed her lips and cocked her hip as she surveyed Billie
who was blushing furiously. “Mmmm, I am regretting my decision to teach you
Spanish,
chica
. When are you going to quit dancing around that man and
screw his brains out?”

“Yeah, Billie! If you don’t make a move soon, some other
bitch is going to come along and snatch him up. I know if I wasn’t already
married and sixty pounds overweight, I would be all over him like white on
rice,” another nurse named Jessica chimed in as she waited impatiently for her
frozen meal to cook in the microwave.

Billie forced a laugh and tried to deflect their comments.
“I really don’t think it’s appropriate for nurses who wear Dora the Explorer
and Transformers scrubs to be using that kind of language.”

Another nurse named Irene Jansen, a salt-and-pepper-haired,
fit and attractive lady of 61 years,  gracefully slid her body in the
chair across the table from Billie and said, “Believe me, honey, we’ve all
heard worse from the kids that troop in and out of these exam rooms. Just
today, I had a 12-year-old boy tell me to go ‘fuck myself’ when I told him he
had to get a booster shot before sixth grade. Yesterday, a two year old girl
kept screaming ‘Shit! Shit!’ over and over again while we tried to waterpik the
wax buildup out of her ears.”

Billie had to concede their point. She had been shocked at
some of the things she had seen and heard over the last three years while
working in the office of the pediatric practice in Radcliff. Having never
worked in the medical field before, she had been in for a rude awakening during
the first six months of her employment. Even though she still performed the
same basic functions as she had for the real estate office such as filing,
answering phones, scheduling, and computer work, it was still vastly different
when working with anxious mothers and sick children.

The staff of the office had quickly become her closest
friends and allies. They were a diverse group of women of all ages, sizes,
backgrounds, and ethnicities, but they were all funny, patient, caring, and
irreverent by turns and took great delight in nosing their way into Billie’s
life. There were two doctors in this practice and the nurses took turns
rotating from one doctor to the other so they got to know all the patients and
each doctor’s preferences. Dr. Gupta, a middle-aged Indian man with a very
thick accent, was charmingly funny and liked to make the kids laugh with his
over-the-top mispronunciations and purposeful mixing of metaphors. He was also
good to the nurses and staff without ever crossing any professional boundaries.
Dr. Williams, however, was a different matter. She was professional, no doubt,
but her demeanor was clipped and, at times, impatient with both the staff and
the children. It still puzzled Billie why a 42-year-old woman with no children
or apparent love for them would go into pediatrics. Behind her back, the nurses
called her “Popsicle” because of her tall, slender frame and icy demeanor.
Needless to say, Billie took her kids to see Dr. Gupta when they were sick.

“Don’t try to change the subject, Billie,” Connie warned
her, pronouncing her name BEE-lee. “I don’t care what you say, if that hunky
man is paying your bills and finding excuses to come to your house, he is
not
just your friend. He wants to get into your panties and is just waiting for you
to give him the green light.”

Before she could refute that statement, Shanay, the other
office worker who was going to nursing school at night, threw her two cents in
as she walked in the door. “I may be only twenty-one, but even I can see that
he’s got it bad for you, girlfriend. I don’t understand the problem. He’s damn
sexy, got a good job, and he’s good with your kids. What more do you want?”

Billie took a deep sigh and reminded herself that these were
her friends and they just wanted what was best for her. “We’ve been over this a
thousand times, guys. It’s complicated and messy. He’s my ex-husband’s best
friend! He has never once, in all our years of friendship, indicated he was
interested in any other kind of relationship with me. End of story. Let’s move
on.”

Taking a large bite of her Hot Pocket, Jessica still managed
to ask, “Fine. No more Sam talk for now. Besides, we got bigger fish to fry. I
just want to know one thing…we going out this Friday night or what?”

“Count me out. I got a big project due next Monday, so I’ll
be working on it all weekend with my study group,” Shanay volunteered
mournfully.

Irene, always up for a good time if it involved beer, chimed
in, “Well, you can count me in as long as I’m not the DD. I don’t have the
grandkids this weekend, so I am ready to have some fun.”

“You are always ready to have some fun,
abuela
,”
Connie laughed. “I am sooo ready to do some dancing. Maybe I will land me another
handsome soldier to buy my drinks,
sí?”
she teased as she sashayed
across the floor to retrieve her plasticware of leftovers from the fridge.

Jessica, a round-faced, round-bodied woman of 35 with long,
red corkscrew curls and freckles, clapped her hands excitedly. “Yes! I have
been looking forward to another girls’ night out! Billie, will you be DD
again?”

Billie nodded eagerly as she replied, “Of course! Chad has
the kids this weekend, so I’m free. You know I’m always up for some karaoke.”
Billie wasn’t averse to drinking, but she knew that if she was the designated
driver, all her non-alcoholic drinks would be free for the night.

“If I was as good a singer as you are, honey, I would love
karaoke, too. I still say you should try out for one of them reality shows they
have on TV. With your voice and your body, you would win hands down,” Irene
said around a mouth full of Ramen noodles.

Uncomfortable with compliments, Billie awkwardly shrugged
before replying, “Who wants the burden of being famous? I wouldn’t say no to
the money, mind you, but all that attention from everyone is just frightening.”

Shanay, unpacking her leftover sushi, raised one plucked
eyebrow and said, “I’ve seen you up on that stage, girl. Once you have a
microphone in your hand, you quit worrying about being scared and the fact that
you have the attention of everyone in the room.”

“Yeah, she gets up there and becomes all ‘Sasha Fierce’ and
owns that shit,” Connie chimed in around a mouthful of
arroz con pollo
.
“But once she steps off that stage, she goes back to her shy and mousy little
self.”

Irene looked over the top of her glasses at Billie and
added, “Honey, if I was your age again and looked half as good as you do, I
would own the world. All you gotta do is have confidence. Forget fear, forget
that men believe they rule the world. We’re the ones with the vagina, honey.
We
freaking own the world and don’t you ever forget it.”

Billie laughed out loud as the whole break room erupted into
raucous cheers and more ribald comments. She loved each and every one of her
coworkers and knew that they all had her best interests at heart. She had never
had sisters growing up, but she imagined that the relationship she had with
these four women wasn’t far off the mark.

As Billie threw away her trash and headed back up to her
desk, she thought about what Irene said about confidence and fear. It was so
much easier said than done. Fear ruled her life and confidence was hard to come
by after years of marriage to a man that systematically tore her down. But they
were right about one thing: all of that disappeared when she was on the stage.
There was some kind of magic that happened whenever the lights were on her, the
music filled her ears, and she began to sing. It was the one secret pride she
held close. She was a damn good singer and that was the one thing that Chad
could never take away from her.

That evening, Billie put on her Super Mom cape and leaped
into action. After picking up Derrick from the afterschool program and Lola from
daycare, she rushed home to begin the mad dash toward bedtime. Thankfully,
Derrick always got his homework done during the program, so he was able to
assist her by picking up the TV room, bringing in the trashcans from the end of
the driveway, getting the mail, and meeting Lola’s insistent demands for apple
juice. Meanwhile, Billie changed out of her Snoopy scrubs and into a fitted
pair of jeans and a Betty Boop tee shirt and pulled her hair back into a sloppy
half-bun/half-ponytail.

In short order, she was busy putting a load of laundry into
the washer, pulling out the clean towels from the dryer and folding them,
loading the dishwasher, flipping through the mail to weed out the junk, and
asking a million questions about Derrick’s day while Lola sang a song at the
top of her lungs. By the time 5:30 rolled around, she was thoroughly exhausted,
but still mustered the energy to start fixing dinner.

Billie found out the hard way that the more effort she put
into dinner, the less the kids would eat it. Therefore, dinner was usually
simple fare that kids enjoyed such as tonight’s menu. The silver lining to
having kid-friendly dinners was that it was faster and easier to fix and Billie
usually didn’t eat as much of it since she was sick of most of it by now.

By 6 pm, the fish sticks were in the oven, the mac and
cheese was done, and a large bowl of salad was sitting on the table along with
the ranch dressing and a basket of toasted Hawaiian rolls. Haute cuisine it was
not, but it was affordable and decently nutritious. Billie’s nerves were shot
as she buzzed around adding glasses of sweet tea for her, Sam, and Derrick and
refilling Lola’s sippy cup with more watered-down apple juice. While she was
always happy to see Sam, she was not looking forward to her showdown with him
about money.

Finally, a booming knock of “shave and a haircut” landed on
the front door sending Lola screaming down the hallway with shouts of “Uncle
Sam! Uncle Sam is here!” Derrick, who was too old for such displays, played it
cool by casually leaning in the kitchen doorframe so he could see Sam when he
came in the door.

Billie’s stomach fluttered in pleasure when a deep, cheerful
voice carried through the house. “There’s the most beautiful girl in the world!
Come here and let me steal some of that sugar behind your ear!” Girlish
giggling and high-pitched squeals soon followed as Sam scooped the little girl
up into his arms and pretended to chomp on her neck with playful “nom, nom,
nom” sounds. Finishing up his routine, he hefted Lola into the air like a
heavyweight dumbbell and bench-pressed her toward the ceiling while she counted
out the reps to ten. When he was done, he deposited her back to the floor where
she staggered away drunkenly while giggling like mad.
Apparently, he has
that effect on girls of all ages,
thought Billie sardonically.

Next, it was Derrick’s turn to greet Sam and he tried so
hard not to be too obvious, but Billie could read the eagerness for Sam’s
attention in the set of Derrick’s shoulders and the large grin that split across
his face. Sam pulled the slender boy into a brief one-armed hug and ruffled his
hair lightly.

“I heard you’re out of reading material again, dude,” Sam
told the smiling boy while pulling a small card out of his wallet. “Here’s a
gift card to Amazon to download some new books to your Kindle, but there’s a
catch,” he warned as he snatched it back from Derrick’s grasping fingers.

Pushing his gold wire-framed glasses back up his nose,
Derrick smiled brightly and replied, “You name it, Sam! I’ll do it!”

“I’ll hold you to that, man. Now that it’s November, the
gutters on this house are getting full of leaves and other nasty stuff. You’re
going to help me climb the ladder and clean all the gutters on the house and
rake leaves the next weekend you’re home. Is it a deal?” Sam asked with an
arched black eyebrow.

“You bet! Can I have the card right now or do I have to
wait?” Derrick asked him covetously, his eyes trained on the little black
plastic card.

With a loud laugh and heavy clap on the back, Sam handed the
card to the excited boy and replied, “You can have it now, but you have to wait
until your mom says you can use it, okay? We all know who the boss is around
here, and it ain’t me.”

Feeling cranky at this latest gesture of monetary gifts,
Billie muttered, “Let’s just hope you remember that later.”

As Derrick ran back to his room to hide his precious card
and Lola chased after him to see where he would hide it, Sam turned to Billie
with his hands up in defensive mode. “It’s only for $25, B.J. Don’t get your
panties in a wad.”

Billie fixed him with her sternest glare, but that didn’t
deter her friend from enveloping her in a bear hug that made her squeak when he
picked her up off the floor for a second before placing her feet back on the
cracked linoleum.

“Let me go, you big oaf!” Billie laughed, even though she
didn’t really mean it. Every time his arms wrapped around her, she took a split
second to breathe deep of his scent of fresh air and Polo Black and catalogue
the sensation of his arms like steel bands around her and the feeling of his
muscled chest pressing tight against her breasts. Later that night, when she
was tucked into bed, she would take those memories out and relive them over and
over again as she imagined a different outcome.

Taking a much-needed step away from Sam’s overwhelming
presence, she made herself busy by pulling out plates, ketchup, and tartar
sauce while he sprawled in one of the mismatched chairs at the table. Billie
darted glances at him while he took a deep drink of his sweet tea. At well over
6’3”, Sam Garrett was the quintessential ex-football player with a large body
of muscles that were kept in peak condition by his job as a Field
Superintendent for a profitable construction company in Elizabethtown. When he
wasn’t actively supervising his crew, he was on the project with his guys by
helping to lift, carry, climb, or any other task that would help them meet
their deadline. His hair was as black and shiny as a raven’s wing, and usually
longer than it should be since he never took the time to keep it trimmed. Since
his Momma was a hairdresser, she usually was able to guilt him into her chair
about once a month.

His eyes, though, were her Achilles’ heel. Like falling into
the ocean on a sunny day, his eyes ranged from robin’s egg blue, then to teal,
and finally, deepening to sapphire on the rims and they were framed by deep
laugh lines honestly earned over years due to good humor and easy laughter. His
face was tanned from days spent in the sun and a dusting of 5 o’clock shadow wreathed
his high cheekbones, plump lips, and strong chin. She could tell he showered
before he came over because his hair was still damp and he was wearing artfully
ripped jeans, a red plaid shirt, and his construction boots. He was utterly
delicious and Billie bit her tongue before she could tell him so.

Placing her hand on her hip, she pointed her blunt-tipped
finger at him. “That right there is the exact reason you’re here tonight,” she
started, knowing he understood she was referring to the gift card. “We’re going
to have a serious discussion about money and boundaries, right after dinner.”

“Cut me some slack, woman. I came here to visit my good
friend and my favorite godchildren, not for a lecture. Now be a good serving
wench and bring me a hot plate of dinner,” Sam demanded with a broad grin.

Billie rolled her eyes good-naturedly and bent over to pull
the cookie sheet full of fish sticks out of the oven. Secretly, she hoped Sam
was checking out her behind, because she knew that it looked really good in
these jeans. “You better not let Renata hear you talk like that. From the few
times I met her, she seemed very liberal and outspoken.” She had also seemed
very beautiful and materialistic, but Billie would never point that out to Sam
for fear that it was her jealousy speaking.

Running his hand absently through his hair, he replied,
“Well, that won’t be an issue anymore. We broke up a week ago.”

She tried to keep her heart from rejoicing, because no
matter how she felt about him, he deserved to find a good woman who would love
him, treat him right, and give him children of his own. Sam was a special man
with a big heart and he would make some woman very happy…in bed and out.

“Oh, no!” Billie exclaimed half-heartedly. “What happened? I
thought you two were really hitting it off.” She kept her back turned to plate
up the fish sticks and to guard her expression from his eagle eyes.

A dark chuckle floated across the kitchen to tickle her ear.
“Come off it, Beej. You couldn’t stand Renata and you know it. I saw the look
on your face when she went off on one of her tangents about how men try to
suppress women in the workplace and how they just want women to stay at home
and have babies.”

Setting the bowl of mac and cheese on the table with the
platter of fish, she scowled as she replied, “Don’t get me started, Sam. That
woman had a lot of nerve saying that crap when she was riding around in a car
her daddy bought her while taking Women’s Studies college classes he’s paying
for. She’s never worked a day in her life!”

“I
knew
it!” he crowed in delight, reaching across
the table to snare a steaming fish stick. Popping it in his mouth, he
continued, “You’re too easy to read. It was doomed from the start, anyway. We’d
only been dating for three months and she was already talking about a ring and
which decorator to hire for my house.”

Billie forced a smile she didn’t feel and decided to let the
subject drop by calling the kids to supper. They both came running to the table
after assuring their mother they had washed their hands. After a brief tussle
over seating arrangements, they all finally settled down to eat the modest
dinner.

Even though Sam had come for dinner plenty of times over the
years, Billie never got tired of watching him interact with her kids. He was
patient and intuitive about their needs and switched seamlessly from talking
about Cinderella’s mice friends to discussions about the merits of water
Pokémon versus fire Pokémon. He even kept his cool when Lola started crying
after dumping too much ranch on her salad. He calmly got up, scraped it in the
trash, and got her a new bowl of salad with the perfect amount of dressing. In
between all this, he also managed to ask questions about Billie’s day at work,
remembered the names of her coworkers, and even asked after her parents.

When there was nothing left on the table but crumbs and
sticky cheese in the bottom of the bowl, the kids excused themselves. Lola
headed to the TV room to watch Disney Junior and Derrick grabbed Billie’s
laptop to search Amazon for his next book. That left Billie and Sam to take
care of the mess left behind by hungry kids.

Out of long practice, they worked as a team to clean the
kitchen. While she loaded the economy dishwasher with their dirty dishes, he
put away the condiments and leftover salad.  He got the washcloth and
wiped the kitchen table and she danced around him sweeping up the detritus left
on the floor from overzealous kids with imperfect eating habits. Fifteen
minutes later, the kitchen was clean and Billie pulled two beers out of the
fridge and handed one to Sam to celebrate.

Even though it was early November, the temperature outside
was only 60 degrees thanks to Kentucky’s notoriously fickle weather. “Let’s sit
on the back porch for a few minutes, if that’s okay with you?” she asked,
knowing he would agree. As he headed that way, she called out, “Hey, Derrick!
We’re going outside for a few! Watch your sister for me?”

“Sure, Mom! I’ll bring the laptop in there with her!” he
called back obligingly, eager to please since his palm had been recently
greased.

Billie stopped along the way to grab an old University of
Kentucky hoodie that had belonged to Chad. It was one of the few items that she
had kept of his, and only because it was a gift she had given him that he never
wore. Slipping it over her head, she joined Sam on the back porch to sit in the
large plastic lawn chairs that she got at Walmart on clearance a few weeks ago.
He was silent, drinking his beer while gazing at the clear dark sky where the
stars winked merrily at the crescent moon. Loathe to interrupt his pensive
mood, Billie sipped her beer and enjoyed the brisk fall breeze that carried the
scent of burning leaves and wood smoke.

“I love this time of year the best,” Sam confessed, breaking
their companionable silence. “To me, autumn is like that dark, peaceful moment
right before you fall asleep. Everything grows quiet, your brain slows down,
and your soul sighs in relief at another day done.”

Billie smiled at his poetic words, but she wasn’t surprised.
She knew that behind the rough exterior, Sam was a creative and talented
writer. When they were in high school, the three of them would spend hours
creating new music. Chad, who had fancied himself the next Kurt Cobain, would
pluck out the rhythm on his guitar and Billie would sing the melody, but it was
Sam who provided the words. Silly girl that she was, she had fallen for Chad’s
slick guitar-picking when she should have lost her heart to the romantic giant
who wrote with his heart. But it was too late for that now.

“I know what you mean,” Billie agreed. “Halloween is done
and there are still several weeks before the craziness of the holidays begins.
There’s nothing to do but just enjoy autumn’s last hurrah. It’s so beautiful.”

Sam met her eyes across the few inches that separated their
chairs, opened his mouth to say something, but then changed his mind. He
dropped his eyes and drained the rest of his beer. Finally, he cleared his
throat and said, “I know you invited me over for a lecture, B.J., but it won’t
do you any good. We’ve had this discussion before when you told me to quit
giving you cash. I let you win that battle and quit slipping money in your
purse-“