A Song for Julia Read online

  She nodded. Her face was red, and she was breathing heavily, eyes wide. She looked panicked. “I’m all right. It just startled me.”

  My dad chuckled, then leaned forward to place his palms on the floor and push himself up. “I guess so! You screamed like you was being attacked.”

  Julia swallowed. “I guess I thought I was.”

  “Well, crap,” my dad responded as he finally got himself upright. He reached down and picked up his belt, carefully hanging it over his shoulder. “Sorry about that. Sometimes when I work the late shift I come in and watch a little TV before going to bed. I’m Jack Wilson … Sean and Dougal’s dad.”

  She looked a little puzzled—she’d not heard the first name I was born with.

  “I’m Julia Thompson.” She shifted her position a little, and I couldn’t keep my eyes off of her leg, bare all the way up to her thigh.

  “Nice to meet you, Julia,” my dad said and then chuckled. Julia’s eyes darted over to me, and she turned a dark red color, then shifted the blanket and covered her bare leg. That’s when I realized I was wearing nothing but boxer shorts.

  Crap.

  “Ah, Christ on a crutch, go get some clothes on!” my dad shouted at me.

  I coughed. “Be right back,” and stepped back in the doorway.

  “Don’t bother!” my dad shouted. “Everybody go back to sleep! We’ll sort this out in the morning!”

  I was sure we would. Dad would pepper me with questions, no doubt about that. In five years, I’d never brought a girl around here. Forget what Julia was thinking—what the hell was I thinking? I didn’t bring women around because that would imply more than it was. That they’d be there tomorrow. That I had some reason I wanted my family to meet them. Sean didn’t need people just popping in and out of his life without warning. And as I’ve said before, I don’t do relationships. I’ve got enough problems without that.

  So now I’m stuck with the question: why did I ask her in? Why didn’t we just exchange numbers when she brought me here, and then follow up in the morning to figure out the car situation? For that matter, why the hell hadn’t I screwed her in Washington? When she offered herself up like a nice, pretty birthday present all wrapped up in green and blue wrapping, which would have been a lot of fun to take off?

  I wasn’t one to pass up an easy lay.

  As I finally drifted off to sleep again, I think I almost had it. If it had gone any further, the possibility of this being something more than one night was too clear. Or worse, if she’d really meant it, really meant that it was a one time thing—one night of fun and games and then we’re done—then maybe I’d find myself in the position of … being hurt?

  For just a second, I wondered what the girls I’d been with over the last couple years felt. But I didn’t want to examine that too closely, because I just might not like the answer. It’s not like they didn’t know what they were getting into. As I told Serena, I’ve never pretended to be something I’m not. I’ve never pretended to want anything but a fun time for the night. I’ve never pretended to be material for a long-term relationship, because all that means is pain anyway, and who the hell wants that?

  I’ve never wanted a relationship. But lately, one-night stands, screwing around with girls I didn’t know … it just wasn’t enough anymore. Lately, I’d started to realize that even though I was around people all the time, I just felt so damn alone.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Use Your Fork Please (Julia)

  I woke up to the smell of bacon and fresh ground coffee, but I didn’t open my eyes. That’s because my head felt like a thousand pound gorilla was sitting on it, and my eyes were coated with sandpaper. Instead, I poked my nose out from under the blanket and inhaled. Oh God, that smelled good.

  I’ve gone to a lot of different schools over the years. I’ve eaten in a dozen embassies and a lot of official functions, including two at the White House. Harvard’s dining service, including the dining room at Cabot Hall, compares favorably. It’s usually very good, filling, well done, and soul-less.

  Home cooked meals? Hardly ever. Once the twins were born, my mom employed a housekeeper and cook. Sure, the food was always good. But it wasn’t the same as what I miss from when I was really young: sitting around the kitchen table with my mom and dad and Carrie on Sunday morning. Some of my earliest and happiest memories are those times. My parents were happier, my mother often smiled and laughed, and Carrie and I felt loved.

  That was a long, long time ago—before Alexandra was born, before my father got the first of several promotions. By the time we were on post in Brussels, I guess I was eleven or so, that warmth was all a memory. My parents were too stressed, my dad was too busy, and most of my free time was spent alone or with my guard.

  Yes, really. I had a guard. He was actually a great guy, a Marine corporal named Barry Lewis. My dad was a senior NATO attaché, and it was right after the Gulf War. There were threats, so the ambassador assigned guards to all of us. I guess it might have been embarrassing at school, but I didn’t exactly go to a public school, and I wasn’t the only kid there with a bodyguard.

  Corporal Lewis was a great guy. An unrepentant chaser of girls and a car fanatic, he bought two antique cars and somehow persuaded the powers-that-be to allow him to keep them in the embassy garage. I remember sitting in the garage, perched on a stool, while he worked on his cars, chattering non-stop to me about cars, girls, growing up in Texas and whatever else came into his head. I had a little girl’s crush on him, but I also looked up to him like a big brother.

  I always wondered what happened to Corporal Lewis. We moved on to China, and I suppose he moved back to the fleet, and I never saw him again. In fact, we didn’t even have an opportunity to say goodbye. Right before my family left Brussels, he was sent home on leave due to a death in his family. I never heard from him again.

  For just a few minutes, smelling the food cooking before I opened my eyes, I was nine years old, happy, excited for what was coming that weekend, getting ready for breakfast with my family. I pulled my jeans on under the blanket, then got up and followed the smell of bacon.

  As I walked toward the kitchen, my eyes fell again on the beautiful grand piano in the corner of the room. It was polished, well maintained. I didn’t know what a police officer in Boston made, but I did know that a piano like that costs upwards of twenty thousand dollars.

  Crank’s dad was in the kitchen. Last night he’d been in a Boston Police Department uniform, but now he was in jeans and a t-shirt, and an old, well-worn apron with “World’s Greatest Mom” embroidered on it. It looked handmade. He was sipping from a cup of coffee in one hand and flipping a pancake with the spatula in the other. The radio on the shelf was tuned in to WBUR, the volume down fairly low as the Car Talk guys joked and laughed with a caller. I watched him for a few seconds and couldn’t help but smile. It was such a domestic scene, and he looked as content a man as I’d ever seen.

  “Good morning,” I said quietly.

  He turned toward me and raised an eyebrow. “Good morning! Coffee?”

  I nodded. “Yes, please.”

  Without looking, he reached up and grabbed a mug, then placed it on the counter and filled it with rich smelling coffee.

  “Cream’s in the fridge,” he said. He slid a tin of sugar close to the cup, reached in a drawer and handed me a spoon.

  “I’m Julia Thompson,” I said. “I’m, uh, sorry about the surprise last night.”

  He let out a deep chuckle. “Nice to meet you, Julia. Though I gotta admit, sitting on a girl in the middle of the night is not how I usually introduce myself. I’m Jack. Have a seat and enjoy your coffee. The boys probably won’t wake up until I start banging things on their doors.”

  I tucked myself into one of the seats at the kitchen table. It was a beautiful table, polished, well cared for and old. I don’t know how old, I’m no judge of furniture, but I had a feeling the table had been here thirty years.

  “Sorry to be a sudden drop-in guest
like this,” I said, shifting in my seat. “We were up playing some bloody game with Sean until really late, and they didn’t want me to drive home.”

  “Not safe to drive when you’re too tired,” Jack replied. “Glad to hear those two thought of something responsible for a change.”

  “All the same, I do appreciate it.”

  He turned toward me and flashed a heart-stopping grin. It was easy enough to see where Crank got his charm. “Not a problem, missy, not a problem. Where you from?”

  Always an awkward question. I’m not really from anywhere. My father’s side of the family is from San Francisco, but I’ve never lived there, just visited occasionally for holidays. He’s retired now, and my sisters are all there, so I guess they’ll think of it as home, or at least Alexandra and the twins will. Carrie was a senior in high school by the time he retired, so she’ll only have one year in California. I finally responded the way I usually do, “We moved around a lot.”

  “Military?”

  “Foreign Service.”

  “Really?” he said, cracking another grin. “You know, my cousin Louis worked for the State Department, years ago. But he got in some trouble. Served his parents right for giving him a French name.”

  That startled a laugh out of me.

  “I always said you can’t trust the French, and look at what’s going on now, huh?”

  I shrugged and grinned but didn’t reply. I didn’t want to get into a political discussion. I liked Crank’s dad. He seemed genuine, and that’s a rare commodity.

  “I’m making pancakes and bacon,” he said, a wry smile on his face. “But if you’re one of those girls who only eats lettuce, I’ve got some of that, too.”

  “I love pancakes and bacon,” I said. “Sounds like heaven. Though you weren’t planning on having guests, I don’t want to impose.”

  He made a sound somewhere between a groan and a loud grunt. “You’re not imposing! Don’t say another word, I’ll be upset if you leave. Besides, you must be pretty special if Crank brought you around to the house.”

  “What?” I asked. I was startled by his statement and a little anxious.

  “My son doesn’t bring girls around the house, ever. He doesn’t even mention them. You, he mentioned, and then brought you here to meet Sean? You must be pretty special.”

  “Oh …” I said, sitting back in my seat. I’m not sure I wanted to know where this conversation was headed. “I don’t think he necessarily brought me here specifically, like …” I got tongue-tied. Which is hardly normal for me. “He mentioned me to you?”

  “Aggghh … I shouldn’t have opened my big fat mouth. But yeah, he mentioned you when he got home from Washington last Sunday.”

  Against my better judgment, I said, “I guess I’d be prying if I asked what he said.”

  Jack broke into laughter. “Yeah, I guess you would. Let me put it this way: something about you really caught his eye. He doesn’t talk about girls, ever.”

  I sat back in the chair and sipped my coffee, crossing one arm across my chest. My head was still hurting, and thinking about Crank made it hurt worse. For the first time in a long time, I found myself having really mixed feelings about a guy. He was fun to be around, but he was confusing as hell. And not exactly welcoming. Somehow I didn’t think Jack knew that his son had told me to stay the hell away last night.

  Was I just lonely? It had been so long since I’d allowed myself to really care about anyone.

  Jack looked thoughtful for a second as he took a load of bacon off the electric griddle and laid it on a bed of paper towels to let the grease drain. He turned toward me. “The old lady always told me I don’t have any tact,” he said. “I said something wrong, didn’t I?”

  I looked at him and gave a warm smile. “I don’t know,” I replied. “Crank seems to be something special himself.”

  “Are you two serious?” he asked.

  “We aren’t anything,” I replied.

  “Oh, that’s too bad,” he said, his tone frank.

  I didn’t reply to that. I knew I should be uncomfortable talking about this with him, but for some reason, I wasn’t at all. Jack made me feel welcome here with an openness I wasn’t at all accustomed to. It was strange. I couldn’t possibly imagine having this conversation with my own parents. I couldn’t imagine discussing anything at all with them. “I don’t know that either one of us is really looking to be involved with anyone right now,” I said.

  He shrugged. “Sometimes you go looking and don’t find anything, and sometimes it slaps you upside the head like a good Irish Catholic mother.”

  I giggled. “Well, to tell you the truth, after last weekend I didn’t think I’d ever see Crank again. But we got in a car accident last night. I kind of backed into his car and wrecked it. So I ended up here because I offered him a ride home.”

  “Holy Mary, Mother of God,” he said. “He finally got himself a car? And already wrecked it?”

  “Oh no,” I said, my eyes widening. “He just got it?”

  “Must have,” he said. “He’s always mooching rides to the T.”

  “Oh, God, I feel terrible.”

  That, of course, was when Crank walked into the room. He wore … no, I must be imagining it. No, he was really wearing them. Too small Mickey Mouse pajama pants, with a plain white t-shirt that didn’t fit all that well, either. Not that I was complaining.

  “Feel terrible about what?” he asked, stumbling toward the coffee pot.

  “Your car!” I replied.

  He shrugged. “I know you’ll make good on it. And I’m not missing much, last night was the first time I’d driven it anywhere other than the 7-11 around the corner.”

  “Oh, wow. Now I really feel terrible.”

  “Seriously,” Crank said, “don’t.” He put what looked like about fifteen spoons of sugar in his coffee, doused that with a liberal helping of cream, then stirred.

  “If you’re gonna take all the sugar in the house,” Jack said in a booming tone, “you’d better be prepared to go buy some later.”

  “Sure, Dad,” Crank said. His face flashed irritation.

  “How’d your show go last night?” As Jack asked the question, I heard footsteps in the living room, then saw Sean walk by the doorway and keep going, reading a thick textbook as he walked.

  “It was all right,” Crank replied, at the same time I said, “It was amazing.”

  Jack smiled and brought the plate of bacon and set it in the center of the table. Crank said, “Coming from someone with your musical taste, I’ll take that as a real compliment.”

  “You’re a musician?” Jack asked.

  “Not really,” I said. “Skilled, but no talent.”

  “Oh?” Crank said. “You didn’t say that. What do you play?”

  I shook my head. “Piano. I’d be embarrassed to play in front of you. But my mom had me in lessons from the time I was two.”

  “Since you were two?” he asked, his tone incredulous. “Suzuki lessons?”

  I nodded, taking a sip of my coffee and trying to pretend I wasn’t incredibly uncomfortable. I couldn’t figure Crank out. Last night, he was well beyond the verge of offensive. Why was he so friendly now? What changed? Just his mood? If he was that moody, then he was right—I should stay the hell away.

  Jack chimed in, “Your mother wanted you to take Suzuki lessons when you were that young. But it was too expensive.”

  Crank’s face flashed irritation, almost anger. That was the second time in a few minutes. Like his father couldn’t say anything right. Of course, who was I to speak? It’s not like I’ve got the best relationship with my mother. On the other hand, Jack was so nice. Crank changed the subject. “What’s for breakfast?” Which was obviously not a well thought out question, since his father was at that very moment placing a huge platter of pancakes on the table.

  Jack gave him a scornful look and spoke in a gruff, sarcastic voice. “Go get your brother. Breakfast will be a surprise.”

  Crank o
pened his mouth, then thought better of it and walked out of the kitchen.

  “I never said I raised a pack of geniuses,” Jack said, shaking his head and giving me a sly smile.

  I tried to hold it in, but I couldn’t. After a few seconds, I burst into laughter, and he joined in. It felt good.

  A minute or so later, Sean and Crank came back in. Crank sat to my left, nearest the kitchen wall, and Sean to my right. Their father took the seat across from me. He startled me by reaching out and taking both boys’ hands. They, in turn, reached out to grab mine, and all of them bowed their heads. Never one to disrespect customs, I did the same, staring holes in the table. I was hyper aware of the fact that my left hand was in Crank’s. His was hard, much larger than mine. Warm, but not sweaty. I could feel the calluses from playing guitar on his fingertips.

  “Bless us, oh Lord, for this bounty which we are about to receive through Christ, our Lord, Amen.” It sounded like he was rushing through. In my family, we only said grace for major holidays, if then, but I remembered enough to know he’d left out about half the words. Jack paused half a second then said, “Eat up.”

  Sean let go of my hand instantly and reached out to grab a stack of pancakes. Jack swatted at his hand. “We serve guests first, Sean! And use your fork, please.”

  Crank’s hand lingered around mine, no longer than a second after Sean let go. Not enough to mean anything, he was just slow, I guess. But it was oddly uncomfortable and very comfortable at the same time. Confusing. Like everything else about him.

  Before I knew it, Sean and Crank piled my plate high with more calories than I normally eat in a year. I didn’t care. The pancakes had an odd texture, light and sweet, because of the rice flour, and I’d be happy if I could take fifty pounds of bacon to my grave with me. For the first few minutes, I concentrated on eating and deliberately ignoring Crank, because the last thing I wanted to do was pay attention to the fact that he was sitting two feet away from me in his pajamas. Or what looked to have been his pajamas ten years ago.