The Newcomer (Thunder Point #2)(10)

None of it came naturally, however. Cooper bought himself a new laptop with a decent accounting spreadsheet program and was still figuring it out. Rawley wasn’t able to help him out with this part of the business. It was during his weekday midmorning downtime that he sat at his own bar and was plugging numbers from bills and receipts into his spreadsheet that the door opened and Mac McCain walked in. With relief, he closed the laptop. “Hey,” he said. “Aren’t you usually at the diner about now?”

“Usually,” Mac said. “Gina’s daughter stayed home from school. She went home to check on her and I didn’t feel like having coffee with the cook. Stu just isn’t as pretty no matter which way you cut it.”

“I noticed that. How’s everything else?”

“Same,” he said. Mac went right behind the bar and helped himself to a cup of coffee. “You? Business shaping up?”

“Aw, I don’t know. I mean, business is good. There are people in here all the time. But I’m not real clear on the accounting and that sort of thing. Kind of makes me wonder how Ben managed. He was a genius with a wrench but he didn’t seem to take to paperwork and numbers.”

“Everyone wondered that same thing,” Mac said, sipping his coffee.

“It’s tedious, that’s for sure. Say, something’s been weighing on my mind a little bit. Been a long time since I had a girlfriend, you know? You ever wonder what the hell’s going on in Gina’s head?”

Mac broke into a huge grin. “You’re kidding me, right?”

“So that’s a no? Because Sarah—she’s got a lot on her mind, I know that. But man, she’s on another planet sometimes. Makes me wonder if anything is wrong. But then she’s back and I wonder why I wondered....”

“Coop, you remember how many women I live with, right? There’s Lou, Eve and Dee Dee at home, but then there’s Gina and all her women—her mother and her daughter, who at the moment is a mess over some boyfriend issue. Half the time I don’t have any idea what’s going on in any of their heads!”

“Oh,” he said. “That’s a no?”

“That’s a no.”

“How do you handle that?”

“Do you see me handling anything? I pretty much just duck.”

“Oh, you’re a big help....”

“Sorry, man. I just do as I’m told most of the time,” Mac said.

Cooper just stared at him. “Why aren’t you completely bald?”

“It’s a wonder, isn’t it? Lou says there’s something in the male hormone that prevents me from getting it. She’s probably right.”

* * *

Gina went home during the midmorning slow time at the diner to check on Ashley, as she’d done the two previous days. This was her third day of grieving and Ashley just lay in her bed, clutching her phone. Gina had tried prying it out of her fingers once but her daughter tearfully whimpered, “But what if he calls me?”

“It would probably be best if you just turned the phone off,” Gina said. “If he calls you, let him find you’re over him!”

“I’m so not over him,” she said.

“This can’t go on, Ash,” she said. “You have to get a grip. You have to get up, get cleaned up, go to school.”

“You have no idea what you’re saying,” she cried.

“Don’t I? Ashley, my boyfriend left me pregnant at fifteen. When I told him, he ran far and fast and never looked back! Ashley, I know how this hurts, believe me.”

She rolled over, her red hair everywhere, and tearfully said, “I wouldn’t mind that, you know. At least you still had a part of him to live for. What do I have?”

Gina wanted to shake her. “Your dignity! He cheated on you—you should kick him to the curb, not suffer in rejection. Get mad! I hope the sorry bastard gets a disease!”

“Mama,” she cried, fresh tears spilling all over her face. “Don’t say that, Mama. You love Downy. And my heart hurts....”

She didn’t love Downy anymore. How could he take her little girl’s innocence and then dismiss her so cruelly? Describe her as “the girl I dated back home” like she was history? He should be brutally punished. How could he?

Because he’s an eighteen-year-old boy, her wiser self said. He did what most eighteen-year-old boys do. And Ash is just a sixteen-year-old girl, doing what comes naturally—grieving her loss. It could just as easily have gone the other way—Ashley could have become bored with her absent boyfriend and found someone new at school, some current popular jock who had time to date, to take her to the dances and games. This could be Downy wallowing in depression because his girlfriend had dumped him.

Why couldn’t it be that way, huh? she asked herself. She didn’t want her daughter to be mean and insensitive, but she also didn’t want this—this sobbing, broken mess who wouldn’t get out of bed.

“I’m going back to work,” she said. “When I get home later I want you up. I want you showered, doing your best to get on with life because you can’t fix this, Ashley. I’m not going to let you shrivel up and waste away just because Downy was an unfaithful ass. Do you hear me? Tomorrow you go to school, no excuses.”

She rolled over and looked at her through wet eyes. “I loved him,” she whispered. “I loved him so much.”