Page 8 of Penny For Your Thoughts
I drummed my hands on the steering wheel as I drove us to Tallus’s parents’ house. The naked trees along the street stretched their branches toward a miserable gray sky. Night encroached, and the setting sun turned the pollution-hazed city monochrome.
We arrived before I was ready.
I parked in the driveway and killed the engine. The forward tip of the fedora cast a comforting shadow across my face, providing a childlike place to hide from the world. I didn’t want to move into the light, shed its protection, expose myself, and venture inside where I would be the focus of too much attention, no matter how well-meant it might be.
In my pre-Tallus days, I’d lived an ogre’s life, certain everyone’s eyes were on me at all times, convinced I heard whispered admonishments whenever I ventured from the house. I didn’t feel so much like a cave-dwelling monster anymore, but it didn’t mean I was comfortable around strangers or people I barely knew. Tallus was my buffer. With him, I’d found a modicum of self-confidence, of purpose. He taught me to be brave and trust myself. He brought me out into the world and showed me I wasn’t at risk.
When I didn’t move, Tallus squeezed my thigh. Echo, seated in the back, poked her head through the seats and licked my ear,woofing encouragingly.
My two pillars. My bookends. Without them, I might fall apart.
“I’m fine,” I lied.
“You’re making it worse in your head.”
“I know. Let’s go before I change my mind.”
Tallus’s mom answered the door, her excitement bubbling over uncontained. She clutched a dish towel and wore a beaming smile reminiscent of her son’s. Same eyes. Same slight frame. Same auburn hair, untouched by age. Maybe she colored it. I couldn’t tell. How old was she?
“You made it. Oh, I’m so happy. Heath,” she called into the house. “Heath, they’re here. Come in. Come in.” She gestured with the dish towel.
“Hello, Mother dearest.” Tallus stepped into the house, accepting a crushing hug and peck on the cheek. He whispered something in his mother’s ear, and she swatted him.
Tallus shouted down the hall. “Hello, Heath.”
In the distance, “Hey, son. Did your man show his face?”
Tallus caught my gaze and winked. “He came.”
I hadn’t left the front stoop and couldn’t seem to convince my legs to move until Echo nudged me with her snout as though telling me to step inside already. I wondered sometimes how much she understood. For a four-legged canine, her intelligence was astounding. She read me as well, if not better than Tallus.
I entered, consciously aware of how much space my oversized frame took up in the congested hallway. How I towered over Tallus’s mother, who was several inches shorter than her son. Echo pushed ahead, always eager to greet new people.
Tallus’s mother held her hand to Echo, letting the dog sniff her fingers before scratching her ear. Echo squinted, making her happy puppy face. “Aren’t you adorable,” she said.
Standing upright, she offered me a warm smile. “It’s good to see you again, Diem. I’m glad you came.”
“T-thank you for inviting me, Mrs. Domingo. Ma’am.”
“Call me Bernice.”
I shifted my weight, glanced at Tallus, who nodded, then amended, “Thank you for inviting me, Bernice.” Her name didn’t sit right on my tongue, and I almost added anotherma’amfor good measure, but caught myself before it passed my lips.
“You’re always welcome. I hope you brought your appetite. I made far too much food.”
My stomach was too twisted to think about eating, but Tallus said, “No such thing. I’m staking claim on all the leftovers. I’m a growing boy.”
Bernice rolled her eyes, another gesture that was pure Tallus. “How utterly unexpected.” To me, she said, “Can I take your coat and hat, hun?”
No, I wanted to say, feeling naked and vulnerable enough with them still on.
“S-sure.” I needed to stop stuttering. What the fuck was wrong with me? “Thank you.”
I fumbled with the buttons on the trench coat, finally got it off, and removed the hat, placing them in Bernice’s outstretched arms.
She took me in—all six-and-a-half feet of me—and smiled with the same mischievous edge Tallus often had before turning to hang my outdoor wear. In a different environment, where my focus wasn’t entirely on Tallus in a hospital bed, their similarities shone. How had I missed them before?
When Tallus hit me with his trademark smirk, it made sense, but why had his mother looked at me like that?
