The entire drive home from Raker Penitentiary, I can’t stop thinking about Shane. I had truly believed I would never see him ever again after his sentencing went through. I certainly never thought I’d be inches away from his face again.
After the visit, Hunt brought me Shane’s chart. This time I had permission to look through it without guilt. It was fairly slim, which made sense given that Shane is still young and in good health. Most of the notes were from injuries, likely sustained at the hands of other inmates.
The last note was written by my predecessor, Elise. Shane had come to her complaining of abdominal pain. She had prescribed him medication for acid reflux, but then at the bottom of the page, she wrote, “Manipulative, drug-seeking.” And she had underlined the word “manipulative.”
I’m not sure if I would agree with that assessment. I even offered Shane pain medication and he wouldn’t take it. But seeing those words written in his chart made me uneasy.
Just as I’m pulling into my driveway, my phone buzzes in my purse. A text message came while I was driving. I sift through a surprising number of loose tissues in my purse—you can never have too many tissues when you have a young son—before I retrieve my phone.
Hey, it’s Tim Reese. I got your number from the parent directory.
Hope that’s not too creepy.
Despite everything, I have to smile. Tim is a lot of things, but he’s not creepy. But if he looked me up in the parent directory, he must have figured out that Josh is not a kindergartener. And inexplicably, he still wants to talk to me.
Only slightly creepy.
He writes back almost instantly:
So I was just thinking, coffee in the evening is just going to keep us up. How about getting a drink one night this week?
A drink. That’s a bit more serious than coffee. That’s a very date-y kind of get-together. Do I want that?
I have no idea. But I do know that if there’s one guy I can trust to back off if I need him to, it’s Tim. And I haven’t socialized outside of work in far too long. Maybe I should just let myself have a little fun for once. Don’t I deserve it?
Let me check with the babysitter and I’ll get back to you.
Any negative feelings from work today and the shock of seeing Shane after so many years (and knowing I’ll have to see him again in a week to take out the sutures) fade away as I contemplate a night out with Tim. It will be nice to hang out with him again. Growing up, Tim was always my favorite person in the whole world.
I feel bad that I shut him out for nearly eleven years. But it wasn’t like I had a choice.
I get into the house, and this time Josh doesn’t come running when I call his name. I take it as a good sign though. If he were clingy, that would be worse. But he’s got a few days of school under his belt now, and he seems more confident.
I reach the kitchen, where Margie is pulling another of her delicious concoctions out of the oven. It looks like some sort of lasagna. It’s bubbling hot when she lays it down on the kitchen counter.
“Hey, Margie,” I say. “That looks great. You don’t have to cook every night though.”
“Oh, I like it!” she says. “When my kids were growing up, I had a home-cooked meal for them every night. Home cooking prevents cancer, you know.”
I’m not so sure about that, but I’m not going to say anything else to dissuade her from cooking for us. I am obscenely grateful that she does it.
“Listen,” I say, “do you think you could watch Josh one night this week? I was going to go out for a drink with a friend. It shouldn’t be long.”
Margie’s eyes light up. “A friend or a man?”
Oh God. I had a feeling when I hired this woman that she was going to be a bit of a yenta. “Just a friend.”
“A male friend?” “Yes…”
“So it’s a date!” She claps her hands together. “That’s wonderful, Brooke! A young single woman like you should be dating.”
“It’s not a date,” I say through my teeth. “He’s a friend. An old friend.” “Whatever you say.”
I don’t like the knowing look on Margie’s round face. “It’s not a date.” “Well, why not?” She blinks at me. “Is he ugly? Ugly men are good in
bed, you know.”
Oh God. “Margie…”
“I’m just saying,” she says, “there’s nothing wrong with going on a date. You don’t have to feel bad about it.”
Weirdly enough, she has hit the nail on the head. I already feel like I am spread thin, between work and motherhood. “It just doesn’t feel like it’s fair to Josh for me to be dating.”
“Don’t think that way,” she says. “That boy could use a father.”
I bristle at her comment—she touched a nerve. I have always tried to be enough for Josh. Mother and father. But I see this longing in his eyes when we’re at the park and we spot a little boy playing with his dad.
“Is tomorrow okay?” I ask Margie.
“Absolutely,” she says. “And stay out as late as you want. Josh and I will make chocolate chip cookies.”
There’s a part of me that sort of wants to blow off Tim and instead stay home to make chocolate chip cookies with Margie and Josh. But Margie is right. I deserve to have a night out to have fun. So as soon as Margie takes off, I shoot off a text message:
