Feels Like Falling Read online

  My plan was to ignore her. But then, right as I was driving around trying to find a place to stay, my phone rang, and it was Janet saying, “Girl, why didn’t you tell us you dumped Harry?”

  “How’d you even know about that?”

  “I saw him down at the store. Saddest damn thing you ever seen in your life. He’s all weepy and pathetic.” She paused. Maybe she was waiting for me to feel sad or something, but I wasn’t. “All I know is that it’s high time you got to finding yourself a man who can look after you.”

  One who could look after me… I’d been with a man who could look after me once. At least, I thought he could. I had been young then. Eighteen. And right pretty too. At least, that’s what people always told me.

  Frank was older, just graduating from college when I was graduating from high school. And that summer he’d come back home… well, that summer’d been the most magical of my life. Frank’s momma, she’d said I was a quick study. I didn’t know what quick study meant back then.

  Frank was a little bit fancy compared to the other boys I’d dated. He had this ’57 Thunderbird that he was fixing up and his daddy owned some auto parts stores. Frank was going places. I thought I was going with him. I reckon that I talked like Frank and dressed like Frank and acted like Frank because I didn’t know who I was, same as why I act like Harry now. I guess when you grow up an orphan, you don’t know who to be. You want everybody to like you, just hoping and praying that one of those foster families is going to stick, so you start acting as nice as you can, trying to be like whoever you’re living with, hoping that maybe they’ll forget you’re even there, just let you stay so you don’t have to go anywhere new where maybe the dad looks at you kind of funny when the mom isn’t around or one of the bigger kids beats up on you and says you fell.

  I used to swear up and down and sideways and around that when I was big enough I was going to have a family of my own. I was going to have a bunch of kids and a nice husband, and we were all going to love each other, and then I’d know what a family was all about. I’d have one of my own and they wouldn’t ever leave me.

  I thought it’d be with Frank. Hell, I knew it would. But Frank, he’d turned out to be like all the rest, worse even.

  “Hello, earth to Di. You’ve missed two of our Thursday nights out in the last two months. You know how pissy Robin gets about that. You coming or not?”

  Robin did get pissy. And that wasn’t good for anybody.

  “Oh, um,” I stammered. “Yeah. Let me change my clothes, and I’ll meet you out there.”

  “Where are you staying now that you and Harry split? Just give me the address of your new place, and I’ll pick you up.”

  My new place. I hadn’t told a single one of them about living in my car—or my new job, for that matter. Tonight would be as good a time as any. Maybe just the job. I couldn’t stand always being the one down on her luck.

  “That’s all right. I might be a little late.”

  We were a ragtag group, these ladies and me. Janet had been married to Ray, her high school sweetheart, since the day after graduation. They seemed real happy together still. Two kids, hard workers, the kind of family that you dream about having one day. They had a nice little brick house in a subdivision outside of town. They’d earned it together and that made it perfect.

  Then there was Robin, a big biker chick, always in leather. She’d been married to Cal, then Chuck, and now she was married to Cal again. They’d fight and make up, fight and make up, but at the end of the day, they couldn’t live without each other. I wouldn’t want to be around a bunch of fighting all the time, but not being able to live without someone? That seemed pretty nice to me.

  Frank crossed my mind when I thought about my girls and their men, but I pushed him away just as fast. Hell, I hadn’t seen him in more than twenty years, kind of a long time to be pining away for some man who left you high and dry one day and probably hadn’t given you another thought. I wondered where he was now, what kind of horse he’d hitched his wagon to.

  Probably somebody like my friend Cheyenne. She was tall and thin and blond. She’d never smoked like the rest of us, so she didn’t have those little lines starting to form around her lips. She had Kevin around her little finger, that was for sure. Married fifteen years, three kids, and he still looked at her like she was the Crown Jewels.

  I sighed as I walked into the Beach Pub, already crowded and smelling of chicken wings and cigarettes. You couldn’t technically smoke in bars anymore, but technically doesn’t always pan out. Just like normal, Robin was in her leather jacket, Janet was in some sort of tight T-shirt she was too big to be wearing, and Cheyenne was in a crop top she was too old to be wearing—even though she looked damn good in it.

  There was a big margarita waiting at my usual spot at the Beach Pub. The night was off to a good start. I could sip it real slow and not spend a penny.

  “Your breakup special,” Robin said with a wink.

  Cheyenne stood up and hugged me. “I’m so sorry, baby. Why didn’t you tell us? Why won’t you ever let us help you?”

  Why wouldn’t I ever let them help me?

  I waved her off. “Oh, Cheyenne, you know good as anyone I can take care of myself. Always have.”

  “But maybe we want to take care of you sometimes, Di. Like you take care of all of us all the time.”

  I did take care of them. Lord knows I did, but it wasn’t with heavy stuff like this. I was always helping Cheyenne memorize lines for whatever local play she’d decided to try out for. She was pretty, but the woman could not memorize a line to save her life. And Janet and Ray were always working, so I picked their kids up from after-school care or took them to basketball or something. And Robin had got this wild hair to sell jam at the farmers market and sometimes I’d help her on Saturdays when I wasn’t working.

  But that’s what foster care had taught me. To take care of other people but never, ever depend on them to take care of you. Because they wouldn’t. In the end, no one would take care of you but you.

  “Girl, where are you staying?” Janet chimed in.

  This was the big moment. I had to tell them. Any one of my friends would take me in for a few days without a second thought. Of course they would. I almost said it, that I was staying in my car. But then Robin said, “Di, I respect the hell out of you. You never let this shit get you down. Not breakups, not job stuff. Nothing. You just keep rolling and you always land on your feet.”

  She was right. I always landed on my feet. A cat with nine lives. Maybe more. I might have nothing—not one thing in all this world—but I had these girls, and, what’s more, I had their respect. And that meant more to me than hot water and a clean towel in the bathroom or getting dressed in front of a mirror. It meant more to me than sleeping in a real bed with sheets and covers and a pillow.

  I didn’t answer Janet. I just said, “I called and checked on Phillip today, and the nurse put him on the line. He talked a little to me.” I could feel myself beaming. If Phillip was okay, I was okay.

  “You’re gonna get him out one day, girl,” Cheyenne said. Once a cheerleader, always a cheerleader.

  “Oh yeah,” Janet said. “If anybody can do it, Di, it’s you.”

  “Speaking of…” Cheyenne pulled a napkin out of her bag and handed it to me. There was a drawing on it.

  “What’s this?” I took a sip of margarita.

  “Kevin drew this up for you. He’s been saving all his scrap wood and metal and roofing for your beach shack. But then he got to thinking.… You know that hideous houseboat that washed up on the island across from the Cape Carolina docks that nobody’s done anything about?”

  “Yeah,” I said, not quite following her.

  “Well, he talked to the city, and they said if we could rehab it and you would pay the slip rent, you could keep it.”

  I was still confused.

  “Your restaurant, Di,” Robin said, filling in the blanks for me.

  I picked up the napkin, st
aring at it with my mouth open. “So what you’re saying is that he’d take this side out, and this would be the window where people ordered?”

  She nodded.

  “Like right there on the dock?”

  She smiled and nodded again. “And he said it’d be real easy to rig up everything you need for a commercial kitchen in there because there’s already a regular kitchen, so the water and electric and everything are hooked up. It’ll just need a few tweaks.”

  Tears sprang to my eyes. Not because I was so far away from ever achieving that dream, but because my girl and her man loved me enough to take my dream and make it their own. “It’s not the best time right now,” I started.

  “It’s okay, sweetie,” Cheyenne said. “You know he’d do the work for free and get everything as cheap as he could. The city said it will be at least six months before they get it sent over to the salvage yard.”

  Six months might as well have been an eternity. But if I could work for Gray for three months before she went back home, maybe even stretch it out to four, and save every single penny, maybe, just maybe I could make it work.

  I thought about that boat on the napkin again that night as I crawled into the backseat of the Impala in the parking lot of a bar across town that was full of Thursday night cars, most of which wouldn’t be going nowhere until morning. I lay on my pillow, balling up a shirt and putting it over the seat belt buckle so it didn’t dig into my side. In the morning, I’d drive over to the marina, take out my little duffel bag, take a shower, put on some clean clothes, and brush my teeth. I only had two pairs of underwear left, so I was planning on sneaking them into a load with Gray’s stuff. Or if that didn’t work, I’d do a load at the laundromat.

  I won’t lie. The fact that the car door didn’t lock made it real hard for me to get settled. But I told myself that fear was a luxury for rich people. Fear is for people who can afford to change their circumstances.

  I closed my eyes and felt my heart rate slowing down. I pretended that I was back in that apartment in the projects, all snuggled in the bed when Momma was there and she was acting right and Elizabeth and Charles and Phillip and me were all curled in with her like kittens. Even when he couldn’t be around anybody else, Phillip could always snuggle up with Momma. I let myself be in that moment where I was that little girl and I was something like happy. I didn’t know any better. I had my momma and I had my brothers and my sister, and that was all I needed.

  As I felt myself start to doze off, it wasn’t Momma’s voice I heard in my head, as I sometimes did. Instead, it was Janet’s.

  If anybody can do it, Di, it’s you.

  CHAPTER 5

  gray: moonshine

  It was Friday already. Friday Friday. The Friday. The night when I was going on my first date in about a hundred years, my first date since my separation.

  When I’d e-mailed one of my favorite fashion blogger friends about what to wear, she’d begged me to take selfies of my options to let her post on her blog as a part of her “Sexy CEOs at Every Size” series. Then she would let her readers vote in real time on Twitter via hashtag. I told her I would sooner die. Although a few hours later I realized that posting my foray into dating for her one million followers might have been less horrifying than having Marcy there to help.

  “Marcy, stop it!” I scolded yet again. “I’m not hiking this dress up any farther. It is short enough as it is.”

  “I still say it looks better without the Spanx,” she said.

  I stood back from the mirror and looked at my simple hot-pink dress with a bit of flair at the waist. I didn’t look half bad.

  Marcy was right; the Spanx didn’t really matter. “But,” I whispered, “they kind of make my ringworm not itch.”

  Marcy shook her head. “You are so gross. Where is he taking you, fungus fighter?”

  I smirked and shrugged, slipping my feet into heeled sandals and tying them around my ankles. “He said somewhere that I’m guaranteed not to see anyone we know.”

  “If I was out with someone that hot, I’d want everyone to see,” she said. “You should take him to Full Circle so that the whole town will be talking about how you’re winning your divorce.”

  I rolled my eyes. “More like laugh at me for being such a pervy old lady.”

  Secretly, though, I did sort of wish that news that I was out with the tennis pro would get back to my ex. He could say it was pathetic or clichéd or whatever he wanted to, but, deep down, a taste of his own medicine would annoy the hell out of him.

  “Hey,” Marcy said, “what’s Greg’s schedule like?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Well, let’s see. When I’m there to monitor him, he rolls in about ten, works for a half hour-ish, flirts with the interns for an hour or so, takes a long lunch, goes out on a ‘call,’ i.e., home to take a nap, and rolls back in around four fifty-seven to see if anyone wants to do happy hour.”

  Suddenly my mood had soured like ice cream left out in the sun. I didn’t want to think about my husband or my divorce or his perky, coed fiancée. I just wanted to go out and have a good time.

  “Why do you care?” I added.

  Marcy shrugged. “Just wondering.”

  The doorbell rang, and I raised my eyebrows. “He’s ten minutes early,” I whispered.

  She winked. “Just couldn’t wait.”

  I casually strolled through the entrance hall, willing my heart to stop its pounding. Some of my nerves were because of Andrew, but most of them were because I hadn’t been on a date in years. This was probably a good opportunity to dust off the cobwebs. There was no future here, so the stakes were very, very low.

  When I opened the door, the first thing I noticed was that he had shaved. With his facial hair, he looked ruggedly sexy; but with a clean face, his big puppy-dog-brown eyes were even sweeter. And he looked younger… maybe a little too much younger.

  Andrew handed me a bottle of champagne, leaned over to kiss my cheek, put his hands on my hips, and said, “You are beautiful. Seriously.”

  I wanted not to smile, but who doesn’t want to hear that? I held up the champagne and said, “Thanks. I should put this in the fridge.”

  “I would have brought flowers,” he said, “but this seemed like more fun.”

  “I totally agree,” Marcy said, appearing from my bedroom. I cut my eyes at her, warning her without a word to behave herself. “Once you get this girl loosened up, she’s a blast.” She winked at Andrew, and I shook my head.

  She walked by me where I was standing at the fridge and whispered, “I changed my mind about getting married. When you’re done with him, can I please have him? Please, please?”

  “Go. Home.”

  And with that, Marcy was out the door.

  “So,” I said. “Do you want a glass of this now?” I looked out the window at what was a perfect sunset. “It would be a shame to waste this amazing view—especially since my sunsets in this house are numbered.”

  “Wait, what do you mean, ‘numbered’?” he asked with mild alarm, taking the bottle from me, grabbing a cloth off the stovetop, and popping it perfectly, letting it fizz over into the glasses without spilling a single drop.

  “Because we’re selling it in the divorce.”

  “You should keep it,” he said.

  I smiled. “I can’t keep it. I have to buy a house for one and a half. This is a house for three.”

  Andrew clinked his glass with mine and said, “Here’s to an amazing night with the most beautiful tennis mom in all the world.”

  I laughed. “I’m not sure if that’s a compliment.”

  He looked taken aback. “Have you seen the tennis moms out there? I think you know that was a major compliment.”

  Andrew put his hand on my lower back, leaving chill bumps when he took it away, and I pretended to shade my eyes from the sun to hide my blush. Come on. Pull yourself together.

  We sat down in the two Adirondack chairs facing the water, and I was very aware of Andrew’s eyes on me.


  “So here’s the big question: Why on earth aren’t you shacked up with some sexy sophomore this summer?” I asked.

  He laughed and shrugged. “I’m kind of over it, I guess. I did the college thing, and I had a couple years off on the tennis circuit. Grad school is a new leaf for me.” He paused and grinned at me. “I’m a serious, grown-up man now.” Then he added, “Drunk, loud girls aren’t my thing anymore.”

  I lifted my champagne flute. “Then this might have been a bad call. Champagne tends to up my volume.”

  Andrew ran his fingertips up my bare arm, where it was resting on the Adirondack chair. “I think I’m going to find you pretty irresistible at any volume.”

  I leaned my head back, closed my eyes, and smiled, the setting sun warm on my face. I wouldn’t admit it to Marcy, but this was one fairly fabulous first date. I had expected to feel uncomfortable, but Andrew had a way about him. He was soft-spoken yet totally self-assured, and his confidence was infectious. No one wants to admit that her husband leaving her for a younger woman makes her feel insecure, but, come on, who wouldn’t feel shaken?

  I was afraid that being with Andrew would make me feel old. But instead it made me feel young—especially two hours later when we were barefoot on the sandy floor of the crowded Hook, Line, and Sinker, one of Cape Carolina’s local bars, singing “Summer Nights” from Grease at the top of our lungs.

  Andrew let out a loud whoop at the end, swinging the microphone over his head. The bar crowd joined in. He took my hand and kissed it, bowing dramatically at all the other drunk people singing along. I was laughing so hard as he dragged me back to the bar that I couldn’t even cheer with him.

  Andrew leaned down and rested his forehead on mine. “I really want to kiss you,” he said, scrunching his nose in the most adorable way imaginable. I smiled, waiting for that kiss that I really wanted too, feeling my heart racing to the beat of “Get Low” blaring out of the karaoke machine. But then he pulled away.

  “I’m not telling our kids that our first kiss was in Hook, Line, and Sinker. Not happening.”