Starting From Scratch (3 page)

and still wearing her police officer’s uniform. My mouth

went dry, as it always does when I see her imposing figure

in full regalia. She is nearly six feet tall, with skin the color

of the unsweetened cocoa powder my grandmother used to

make brownies from scratch, deep and smooth and even.

e uniform was cut surprisingly well for her; it didn’t look

like she was a woman trying to wear a man’s clothes. Her

waist tapered in, her hips flared slightly with her gun

holster on one side and her nightstick on the other, and

her broad shoulders told you how alarmingly strong she is.

Any lesbian who doesn’t immediately entertain fantasies of

J.T. pushing her up against the wall and slowly, thoroughly,

frisking her from behind (my fantasies include use of her

handcuffs) needs to have her libido checked.

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“Hey, Red,” she said as she saw me come in, using the

familiar nickname she’d given me when I was twenty-five.

“You look as sexy as always.”

“What did I tell you about making me blush,” I

scolded her, feeling my face warm as I playfully slapped at

her arm.

She bent down to kiss me on the cheek. “at it

clashes with your hair.”

“at’s right.”

“Not my fault. You’re too damn good-looking.” She

gave me a lazy wink. Nope. No hot-blooded woman would

stand a chance resisting J.T.’s charms. Not a one.

“I’d give your wife a hug,” I told her, “but she’s too

busy loving up my dog.”

Maddie laughed. “Oh, all right. I can’t help it if he’s

the man of my dreams.” She set Steve on the floor and he

gave J.T. a quick sniff as she bent down to ruffle his fur,

then set off on his usual tour of the house, the first thing

he always did when we came to visit. Well, second thing

after lavishing attention on Maddie.

She wrapped her arms around me and squeezed.

Maddie gives the best hugs of anybody I know; you feel

like you really mean something to her and she’s happy to

have the opportunity to show you.

“How’s the knee?” I gestured down with my chin as

she limped to the stove.

“Open that wine and I’ll tell you all about it,” she

ordered.

We sat and chatted and ate dinner and drank wine,

catching up on the weeks since we’d seen each other.

Maddie was scheduled for knee surgery the following

week. Torn ACL. I don’t handle medical, surgical, or any

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Starting From Scratch

kind of ‘cal’ very well. As soon as Maddie got into any sort

of sentence that began with, “then they cut this,” or “after

they slice through that,” I slapped my hands over my ears

and began to sing “She’ll Be Comin’ Around the

Mountain” at the top of my lungs. I’m ridiculously

squeamish. Pathetically so. I can’t even have
Grey’s Anatomy

on my television during a surgical scene. e second I see

anything bloody, I run squealing from the room in horror.

So, Maddie knew better than to go into detail about what

they were going to do to her in that operating room. As far

as I knew, she was going into the hospital, they were going

to fix her knee, and then she’d come home and recover.

And that’s all the information I needed to have.

“Are you nervous?” I asked her as J.T. set a cup of

after-dinner coffee in front of me. My stomach was full to

bursting with the pot roast Maddie had cooking in her

crock pot all day long, and the sips I took from my cup

were miniscule. Steve was crashed out under the table, his

chin resting on my foot.

e sigh Maddie blew out told me she didn’t really

want to admit what she was about to tell me. “Yeah. Yeah, I

am.” She took a sip of her coffee. J.T. reached over and

covered Maddie’s hand with her larger one. “I know

everything will be fine. I’m not really all that worried about

the surgery itself. I just want my recovery and rehab to go

quickly. And they’ve already told me it may not. I ain’t as

young as I used to be,” she added, trying for a cocky grin

but it ended up looking more like she smelled something

foul.

At thirty-eight, Maddie was four years older than I,

and I couldn’t imagine trying to get around on one leg for

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longer than a couple hours without wanting to pull my

own hair out, so I understood her worry.

“You just have to remember to take your time, not to

push harder than your body tells you to, and let J.T. wait on

you.” I gave that last comment with a wink.

“I’ve already told her that,” J.T. said. “But you know

how stubborn my wife can be.”

“It’s not stubbornness that’s going to be the problem,”

Maddie told us. “It’s going to be the frustration. I’m going

to get frustrated and that’s going to piss me off.”

J.T. and I nodded in unison, knowing Maddie spoke

the absolute truth.

“So,” she added, eyes on me, “I’m going to ask you to

call before you pop in. Okay?” I knew her well enough to

read her face. She was trying not to hurt my feelings, but

was also trying to make a point. “I don’t want you showing

up unannounced on a day when I’m crying my eyes out or

throwing dishes.”

I smiled, not the least bit offended. “Understood. I

promise to call.”

“Good. ank you.” She sipped again. “Which brings

me to something I need to talk to you about.”

“Well, that’s kind of ominous,” I said, because it was.

“Are you breaking up with me?”

She laughed. “Never, baby.”

“Okay, good. What’s up then?”

“Remember when you left Christine?” She gazed into

her cup.

“Of course.” Christine was an ex from many years ago

with a taste for alcohol and a volatile temper. We were

together for about six months. I made her angry once. She

slapped me once. at was the end of that.

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Starting From Scratch

“And we helped you go get your stuff from her place

without a moment’s notice, just dropped everything we

were doing and got you the hell out of there?”

I squinted at her, wondering exactly where she was

going with this, thinking I wasn’t going to like it judging

by the fact that she hadn’t looked up from her coffee yet.

“Uh-huh.”

“And you thanked us so much and said that you owed

us, big time, and whenever we had a favor to call in just to

name it?”

“Uh-huh…” I drawled it out, feeling the sudden need

to squirm. J.T. seemed to find her fingernails very

interesting and my eyes zipped back and forth between her

and Maddie. ey obviously needed something from me,

and I was okay with that. ey’d taken great care of me

more than once and I loved them both like family. “All

right. What’s going on? What is it?”

Maddie took a deep breath. “When I scheduled my

surgery, I forgot about one teeny, tiny thing. I have

something that starts two days later and I won’t be able to

do it because I’ll be laid up. Plus, with rehab and physical

therapy, it’s probably going to be at least three or four

weeks before I can even think of participating.”

“Participating in what?” I asked, a sinking feeling

settling over me. I set my cup down, the coffee suddenly

sitting like lead pellets in my stomach.

“And I apologize for the short notice. I’ve been sort of

preoccupied.” She indicated her knee with her eyes.

“Participating in what?” I asked again.

“Tee-ball.”

And there it was.

I groaned.

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Starting three years before, each spring and summer

Maddie coached a tee-ball team of five- and six-year-old

boys and girls. She enjoyed it immensely, despite the fact

that it was sometimes stressful. She had done it as a favor

initially. e computer consulting company she worked for

sponsored a team each year, a dozen little kids running

around in bright green T-shirts with the company logo

splashed across the front, trying hard to learn the rules of

the game and have fun at the same time. Maddie’s boss

asked her if she’d be interested in coaching a team. Maddie

said yes, more out of a desire to please the boss than a

desire to actually lead a bunch of kids. To her surprise, she

found it to be fulfilling.

Which, by no means, meant I would. I groaned again

and dropped my forehead to the table in front of me.

“You’ll be great at it,” Maddie said, as the buttering-up

began. “It’s just practice. e first few weeks. I’ll be able to

take over after that.”

“Me and kids, Maddie?”

“Kids
love
you.”

“I never know what to say to them,” I whined,

knowing the chances of me getting out of this were slim to

none, but vowing to protest as much as possible anyway.

“at’s why they love you. You talk to them like

they’re grown up.”

“I talk to them like they’re grown up because I don’t

know what to say to kids.” Maybe repeating myself would

help me get through to her. “Can’t somebody from your

office do it?”

“I don’t trust anybody there with my kids,” she said,

surprising me.

“God, I don’t know…”

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Starting From Scratch

“It’s only for a few weeks, Avery,” Maddie said. Her

voice had changed, from “hey, this’ll be fun” to “all right, I

know you don’t want to, but you owe me.”

And she was right. I did owe her. em. Maddie and

J.T. had gotten me out of a really bad situation. I was truly

afraid of Christine, but there were a few things I'd really

needed. If I went to get them alone and she caught me, she

might snap. Paranoid? Probably. I didn’t care. Having J.T.

there in uniform was a huge comfort. Surprisingly, I’d

never heard from Christine again…not that I didn’t

change my phone number and jump every time my

doorbell rang for the next month.

I sighed the sigh of defeat, knowing there was no way

out. I owed Maddie big, she needed me, and that was all

there was to it. “Fine.”

“Oh, thank you,” she squealed, popping up from her

chair and hobbling around the table to throw her arms

around my neck. Her blonde hair smelled like lilacs and I

couldn’t help but smile at her exuberant gratitude. “You’re

the best.”

“Yeah, yeah. I hope you’ll be a character witness at my

trial after I kill all the children for driving me up the wall.”

“Not going to happen. ey’re going to love you and

you’re going to love them.”

I shook my head. “I haven’t the foggiest idea how to

coach a tee-ball team.”

“No worries. I’ll give you my notes.”

“Notes? You have notes?” I got up and helped myself

to the last of the wine from dinner, exchanging my coffee

for something a bit stronger. And more numbing. J.T.

chuckled from her seat. I turned on her and pointed a

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finger in her direction. “And you. Don’t you sit there and

laugh. You haven’t helped at all.”

She shrugged, still grinning. “Hey, I know who’s boss.

It ain’t you.”

“Yeah, no shit.” I sat back down and took a slug of my

wine.

18

CHAPTER TWO

My grandmother’s assisted living apartment complex

didn’t have some fancy name that made it sound like a

nursing home. It wasn’t Shady Acres or Whispering

Winds or Lofty Pine Manor. It was just 217 Jefferson

Road and I think that’s why she liked it.

As far as I’m concerned, Colleen Avery King was truly

a woman ahead of her time. She was a career woman when

it was uncommon—and frowned upon. She was the right

hand of the County Commissioner and pretty much ran

his office for the better part of thirty-five years. She retired

at seventy with a notable pension, as well as income from

the smart investments she’d made. Her financial prowess

was the reason I was able to go to a good college without

more than a couple of small loans.

It was true that she didn’t need my financial help

(she’d been insulted when I offered to help her with her

rent, and she’d told me so in no uncertain terms), but she

was still my grandmother and she’d raised me, so I liked to

help out any way I could. us, the grocery bags I unloaded

from my car on Sunday afternoon. Eggs (you can never

have enough eggs), half-n-half (Grandma hates plain milk

in her tea), boneless chicken breasts, bread, and a sour

cream coffee cake I’d baked that morning. I figured she

could serve it to her coffee klatch—three friends in the

Georgia Beers

complex that came over every Monday for lunch. I knew

she’d scold me for bringing her these things, but I also

knew she was eighty-five years old and just couldn’t get out

and about to the grocery store as often as she liked. Not

that she’d ever admit it. So, it made me feel like I was

helping her out, which would be worth the reprimand.

“Hey there, Ms. King.” e front security desk was

manned by Jamal, as usual, and his teeth gleamed like new-

fallen snow in a face as black as pitch when he smiled at