Page 17

King

“You’re late!” Gabby exclaims, as she walks out the door. I’ve barely pulled up into the driveway. I have my door open and one leg out when she comes barreling out. I lift my legs back in and close my door as she connects her seatbelt.

“In a hurry, Sunshine?”

She scrunches up her face. “I told you to quit calling me that.”

“And I told you I wasn’t going to. It fits you,” I reiterate, and it’s the God’s truth. Even the cab of this damn truck is brighter with her in it.

Today she has all the natural curls out of her hair.

It’s straight as a board. The ice-blonde hair is pulled up on top of her head in a ponytail.

She has some light makeup on, subtle and understated.

Her ears have these cute little diamond studs in them.

My eyes go down to her nails and something about my conversation with Nicole brings my mind back to the time when I used to see her having lunch with Jazz.

Her clothes cost a mint back then. I’m a guy and I don’t pay much attention to that shit, but Gabby’s clothes were such that you could see the money just from staring at them.

She’d have makeup on—too much, by my count.

She’d be dripping in jewelry, her hair colored and curled to perfection.

Then her fingernails. They were always professionally manicured, with different patterns and sometimes little rhinestones.

Every single time I laid eyes on her, they were different.

That means she had to go every day or every two days to one of those pricey salons.

Back then, Gabby screamed high-maintenance pussy.

She wouldn’t have been caught dead in a small hole-in-the-wall shop.

The girl had champagne tastes and was used to getting them met.

My gaze lingers on her neatly trimmed nails that are covered in a pale pink, and I smile. Another change that I like a lot.

“Can’t you find another name besides Sunshine?” she practically begs.

“What about pain in my ass?” I suggest with a grin.

She huffs out an annoyed breath and I’m treated with anger warming her eyes. Beautiful. “I have a name. You could just call me Gabby. It’s not something unheard of, you know.”

“I prefer Sunshine. Now, are we going to bicker back and forth all day, or are we going to go grab some food and then go shopping?”

“Food?”

“Yeah, sustenance which I need to put up with going to stores that men with big dicks should never enter.”

She gasps, then sputters out a laugh. “Did you really just inform me you have a big dick?”

“No, I merely stated the truth, which you heard,” I respond mildly.

“Then, maybe you shouldn’t go,” she says, staring at me.

“I’m going.”

“I’ve heard that Home Emporium in town has been known to make men’s dicks shrivel and hide for years. Could be a problem for you.”

“My dick isn’t afraid of shit.”

“He’s told you that, has he?”

“We talk daily. So, yeah, we’re pretty tight. I know his biggest fear and I do my best to steer him away from that.”

“What’s his biggest fear?” she asks in between a giggle.

“Hairy bushes.”

“Pardon?” she squeaks.

“Pussies that are covered in so much hair that it looks like there are two hairy squirrels fighting in there. Then she pulls her panties back, and it’s like Cher’s afro from 2012 jumping out at you.”

“Oh my God,” she cries, looking torn between laughter and shock.

“It’s worse if she’s a redhead. My dick is big, but even he can’t take Carrot Top jumping out at him, ready to suck him into hell.”

At that, she loses it. Gabby laughs so hard she bends over, holding her stomach as it rolls through her. Somehow, the sound warms me clean through. I have to pay attention to the road, but I smile over at her now and then, just to get a glance and drink her joy in.

“Have you seen many um … of those?” she asks.

“Hairy bushes?” I ask, looking over just long enough to see the heat color her cheeks.

“Um … either that or fighting chinchillas.”

“I said squirrels, but I think I like your analogy better,” I reply, making her roll her eyes. I pull my attention back to the road with a smile—actually it’s a smile that’s stayed on my face since Gabby came running out her door.

“Well, have you?” she insists.

“A few. Although, most of those were in bad seventies porn movies where the pizza delivery guy shows up.”

“You don’t seem like a guy who has to resort to watching porn to get off, King.”

“I was a horny kid. What can I say?”

She laughs. “My brothers were like that. Diego used to use his damn sock to hide the evidence. My mother would bitch like crazy every time she did his laundry. Dad finally told him to throw the damn socks away if he was going to use them. Mom went off on him, then. Said the family would go broke if he kept throwing his socks away whenever he took care of himself.”

“What’d your dad say then?” I ask, liking that she’s talking about her family with a smile on her face. Things aren’t good there, but maybe good memories will help see her through.

“Oh, I still remember that. I can see him standing there, hands on his hips and his lips twitching.” She lowers her voice to imitate her father’s and adds in an accent, which gets my attention. “Mi Cielo, which would you rather do? Clean your hijo’s jizz or buy socks?”

“What was her reply?”

“She voted an absolute neither. So, Dad looked at Diego, told him to go out to the clubhouse and find one of the girls to see to his issue. Diego thought he won the lottery. Mom lost her mind. Started throwing shit and said her son was not going to go get laid because he was too damn young and for my dad to even suggest that meant he wasn’t going to get laid anytime soon either. ”

“Damn. How old was your brother?”

“Twelve.”

“Hm …”

“How old were you when, well, you know …”

“Had sex? Or fooled around and got off?”

“There’s a difference?” she asks, sounding surprised.

Suddenly, I’m confronted with the fact that Gabby may have had sex in the past, but no one took the time to truly initiate her into how good that could be, or the forms it can take. Somehow, that makes the evil of her rape even worse.

“Yeah, Sunshine. There’s a big difference. To answer your question, though, I was ten.”

“Oh my God.”

“I didn’t know what I was doing. Didn’t particularly want it, but my babysitter did. I was curious. So, it happened.”

“That’s sad.”

“It was, but the seal was broken and from there it got much, much better.”

“Hm …”

I can hear it in her voice, but when I glance in her direction, I see the darkness is trying to hide the light in her eyes again. Time to change the subject. “What does mi cielo mean?”

“My sky. Dad’s always called Mom that. It’s kind of beautiful.”

“It is beautiful,” I admit, reaching over and squeezing her hand. “What would you like for breakfast?”

“I had some toast. You don’t need to get me anything. I don’t eat a lot in the morning. I don’t get the severe morning sickness any longer, but I still get queasy. Nothing much has eased that.”

“Have you tried peppermints?”

“Like the candy?” she asks, and I nod yes. “Food in general is a no. I can’t imagine candy would help it.”

“We’ll pick up some of the melt-a-way peppermints. I bet it would help.”

“How would you know that?”

“T had to keep them at the club for Lyla,” I tell her. Then, when I realize who I’m talking about, I freeze, stealing a glance her way. Unfortunately, she catches me. This time, she’s the one squeezing my hand.

“Hey, it’s okay to talk about your family. It doesn’t bother me other than sometimes it reminds me of how off the wall I went. Shame can kind of smother a person,” she warns me.

“Don’t let it smother you. I’d miss that light you shine on me,” I tell her with a frank honesty that I don’t think she understands.

“You’re silly,” she laughs, confirming that she doesn’t believe what I’m saying. “What if we go by Frank’s for breakfast?”

“The doughnut place?” I say after frowning. I remember Crusher and Dani talking about it at the cookout.

“Yep. I do like cream filled doughnuts. Did you know they have banana cream ones?”

“I’m sensing you have a thing for all things banana,” I taunt.

“Just since the pregnancy, actually. When I was like four months, the cravings were horrible. I used to cut up whole bananas and toss them in a container of Cool Whip and eat the whole thing at once. It was both disgusting and delicious,” she confesses with a grin.

“Well, jellybean has to be a girl. Men don’t like bananas. That’s a sissy fruit.”

“You know this for a fact?”

“I’m a man. So, yeah, I got it on good authority.”

“I think you’re a nut,” she snaps back.

“You’re getting too sassy. Let’s get you to Frank’s.”

“That’d be good. They have breakfast sandwiches too, if you’re not a doughnut guy, King.”

“Oh, I like doughnuts. That’s clearly man territory.”

“Men and pregnant women?” she giggles.

“I think everyone likes doughnuts unless they’re aliens sent to live among us and survive solely on water and human brains,” I counter.

“Fighting squirrels, seventies porn, pre-teen sex, doughnuts, and now aliens. You know, King, conversation with you is never boring.”

“Right back at you, Sunshine. Right back at you,” I tell her, meaning every word. Time with Gabby never bores me. Today, like every day, it gives me peace.