Good Girl Bad (35)
He carries her into the lounge room and places her gently on the couch. “Gen, honey? How are you? You wanna talk to me?” Nate kneels down in front of her, but Gen leans backward into the couch, her eyes closed.
“I just want everything to go back to normal,” she says softly, not opening her eyes. Nate rubs her legs gently.
What was normal, in this family?
“Leroy was just trying to help her, you know.” Genevieve keeps her eyes firmly closed, and Nat stops the motion of his hand on her legs.
“How so?” he asks softly.
“You know,” she replies, still refusing to look at him. Nate’s heart skips a beat.
“Rebecca?” he asks, and Genevieve nods, imperceptible.
“Fighting?” Nate is watching her carefully. He doesn’t look at Cheryl.
“Does fighting apply to it, Dad?” Genevieve sounds tired and frustrated. Disappointed, even. Like Nate should know better.
He should know better. He should have done better.
“She fought with Tabby like she fought with me?” His voice is very soft, searching Genevieve’s face. Cheryl is forgotten. All Nate can see is how he’s let his children down.
Gen gives a tiny nod, and Nate leans forward into her, his arms coming around her fiercely. “Why didn’t you tell me?” he whispers, but immediately wants to take it back. “It’s not your job. I should have known. I should have asked. I’m sorry, Gen. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
“What do you mean? What’s going on?” Cheryl’s voice is shrill, panicked, intruding into this quiet space where Nate just wants to hold his daughter, find a way to tell her how sorry he is. But Genevieve sits up and looks at them both with a defeated look on her face, like she’s thirty-four, not fourteen.
Like she’s lived a long, hard life.
“Mom’s just really mean sometimes, Grandma. She’s so mean to Tabby it makes me want to die.”
Nate rocks back on his heels, staring at Gen. He and Cheryl are so shocked the silence is absolute. For a moment nobody moves, then Gen whispers, “I just wanted it to stop.”
Nate can hear his own heartbeat thudding in his ears.
“What happened, Gen?” he says, his voice urgent, but Gen starts to sob, and Nate can’t make out her words through the great wracking sobs tearing through her. He bites his lip, hard, and tastes blood, trying not to shake his daughter, some unspecified terror filling him, wanting to look after her, comfort her, but needing to know, right now, what she is talking about.
“You’ve got to tell me, Gen,” he whispers. “What happened? What did you do?”
29
One Month Earlier
“Would you run away with me if my mother kicked me out?”
Tabby is lying naked, her long legs thrown casually over her lover’s stomach. They’re in a cheap hotel on a Saturday afternoon. Tabby misses her work at Miss Ambrosia, but it was the only time her lover could meet her safely, so it was a price she was willing to pay.
She really wants to go out for lunch, or see a movie, and to be honest she’s getting sick of just meeting in hotel rooms and making love, but she doesn’t doubt that the rest will come, sooner or later.
Hopefully sooner.
“Of course,” he tells her, smiling. “Just try not to get kicked out yet. There’re a few things I need to finalize before we can be together.”
“In public. Like a proper couple.”
“Yep,” he says, reaching over and stroking a breast. His eyes wander down the length of her to her crotch, and something about it irritates Tabby.
She brushes his hand away. They’ve already had sex twice today. She wants to talk about their future.
“Will we get our own place?”
He hesitates, dragging his eyes back up to hers. “We’ll get our own place. It would be weird, otherwise, don’t you think? Moving in to the marital bed?”
“Yeah.” Tabby smiles sleepily. “I just can’t wait, you know. I know you want me to finish school, but I can do that wherever I’m living. In fact I’ll probably do better if it’s just you and me. Without my mother around ruining everything.” Darkness flits across her face, and across his, too.
“There’s no rush, is there? We get to spend every Saturday together, like this.” He squeezes a breast again, and Tabby can see he’s hard again already. “Plus, the other times, which just make it more exciting. When we see each other, but can’t be together. It drives me crazy.”
“I’m sick of waiting,” Tabby says, petulant. “What does it matter if it’s now or later? Can’t you just sort everything out now?”
“Not if you want to have a nice house, honey. I have to work out the money. I have to do all that before we go public, or it might make things difficult.”
“I don’t care about money! We could live in a caravan for all I care.”
“I know, I know. If I had you, it would nearly be enough.” His voice is soothing, pulling Tabby against him, kissing her forehead, her cheek, slowly making his way down to a nipple. “But I’ve worked a long time to get where I am. I don’t want to start again with nothing. You’ll have to trust me, Tab. Just give it a little more time.”