Eric by Jody Kaye (uplifting novels .TXT) 📕

I don’t ease my pace until I’m up the front granite steps and in the cool house. Maintaining an enigma is hard work. I’ve been up since six and ran the two miles up the county road to Kingsbrier’s stable to see Daveigh. There’s no point being deceitful if no one can provide me an alibi.

Despite being fit, I nearly passed out from the humidity and have been parched since the half-way point on the way back. Yes, runners carry water bottles. But I am not a runner. I’m a gymnast who pretends to run to provide cover for cat burglar-like activities. It’s all about consistency. What if someone questions why some days I hydrate and others I don’t? What if one of my siblings gets smart to Drew showing up on days I “run”?  The less I have to lie about, the better the half-truths I’m able to pass off.

I slow at the kitchen cabinet, reaching for a glass, and fill it to the brim with tap water before taking big gulps. All the while, telling myself to slow down so I don’t double over with a cramp.

The pool cleaning company is outside and I’m considering jumping straight in fully dressed to cool off.

An arm comes from behind me, grabbing my waist. Images from self-defense class pass through my head, searching for the best way to attack an intruder. Choking, we’re lucky the glass doesn’t shatter as it drops to the sink.

“Relax, it’s just me and no one is awake yet.”

Drew’s voice tickles my ear and my mind calms immediately. I shrug my shoulders and shimmy away. Hopping onto the island counter and swinging my legs back-and-forth like a little girl acting innocent, I wink. “I told you, tonight.”

“It’s like I can’t see you unless it’s two am.”

“That’s not true. You are here all the time. You’re here now.”

Drew has spent most nights since graduation camped out with Adam in one room or another. I heckled him the night he crashed in Adam’s bed, right next to my brother, dead drunk. They both gave me twenty bucks cash they’d earned working this summer to delete the picture of them spooning together from my phone and made me promise not to post it to social media. Little do they know, I have a back-up copy on my laptop.

“I’m thinking about moving in at Kingsbrier like Ginny.” Drew refills my glass and sips.

I roll my eyes.

Ginny, D, and I spent the first two weeks after graduating as indentured laborers. Momma forced us to help clean out the old apartments by the stable. Daddy has hired some guy from California to tend to the ranch. He needs a place to stay. Eric and Gin have already moved out there.

The former servant quarters predating when my old-coot Grandaddy purchased this land were a fun place to explore when you were six. However, twelve years of us quints not using the building as a fort, and twenty years unoccupied by farmhands left dust and mold, and lots of petrified vermin stuck to ancient mousetraps. It was disgusting.

Once our regular chores and shifts for summer jobs were fit in, it seemed as if we worked from dawn till dusk. And it was so gosh darn humid in there we dripped with sweat. Wilting on the hottest day, Momma insisted there was no way Daddy could lease the larger of the apartments to his new ranch manager as a job perk without installing air conditioning, let alone allow Eric and Ginny to live in the smaller one.

The four of us swept, scrubbed, and painted till our limbs ached. The two apartments are now spanking clean and, once again, ready to be occupied by human inhabitants. Seeing the difference a little elbow grease made, I almost kicked myself for not tidying one up sooner. Drew and I could have used it. Grass stains are a bitch to get out of silk.

When we hung the lace curtains in the front window of the one-bedroom Eric and Ginny moved into, I had to admit the process was worthwhile. As June drew to a close, Daveigh’s animosity towards Ginny waned and she started asking more questions. We started talking about if Gin thought the baby might be a boy or a girl and it made everything a little more real, instead of this phantom-like quandary Eric and Ginny have found themselves in.

At first, I only cared the primary focus was off of me and Ginny and Daveigh were getting along because I need them in my corner. But I’m looking forward to the impending event—though, not eagerly as I am to leave for Texas State come August.

I’m also curious if cleaning the apartments was a con job on Momma’s part to get us to depend on one another again. A girl doesn’t grow up hearing “you think she’s bad, you should’ve seen her mother” without taking notice. I doubt Momma was as horrible as the stories make her out to be, or else there’s no way Drew’s mother, Miss Lily Anne, would be her lifelong best friend. People don’t stick around if they don’t like you.

In any event, I was in the barnyard early yesterday morning, dropping off Daveigh and picking up Ginny for an early shift we were both scheduled for at the Super Target. Daveigh got out of the car right away and headed straight for the stable. I honked the horn, but it was taking Ginny extra long, so I went in the unlocked door to investigate.

In the main room a comforter was piled in a heap on the couch. They have a camp-style kitchen to the side with a tiny four-burner stove and enough counter space for a toaster. The refrigerator holds no more than a case of beer. It’s a good thing Eric lives off of energy drinks so they don’t have to waste the space on a coffee pot. It’s also a far cry from the grand kitchen up at the main house.

“That you, Brier?”

“Of course, it is. Who else would it be?” My skin prickled. “Have you considered not securing the doors, even on a private ranch, is pretty darn stupid?”

“I’ll be right out.” Gin ignored my flippant remark. She understands I’d bang down a locked door.

I strode into the bedroom. There’s not much floor space. The bed takes up most of it. The blankets are only turned down on one side, making it obvious Eric’s the one sleeping on the couch. Given Colton’s snide comment while they were still living under our parents’ roof that Ginny couldn’t get any more pregnant—so it made little sense to him why she stayed on the pull-out in the den—not sharing a bed seems strange to me. 

Ginny’s sleek dirty-blonde ponytail reached down her back. She held the button and buttonhole of her khaki pants apart.

“These fit yesterday. Now I can hardly get them zipped up.” The teeth veed apart and Ginny’s polka dot panties peeked through.

With some quick thinking, I took one of Ginny’s hair elastics, looped it through the hole, and over the button. “Leave your shirt untucked. We’ll look on the clearance rack at break time and see what they have.”

“With what money? Eric paid your daddy the first month’s rent. Trying to budget for food, when I can’t stop eating, is killer. On my next day off, I need to borrow the car and sign up for the county’s nutrition program.”

I guess I never realized how expensive babies are. Eric works forty hours a week at Cavanaugh Construction. Ginny works twenty at Target and another ten on the weekends scooping at the local ice cream stand—a job she’s hesitant to give up. It’s unfathomable there isn’t enough money to go around.

Mid-morning, Gin and I had side-by-side registers. It was during a slow point in the day when the mothers and children had come and gone, but the workers hadn’t snuck out early for lunch when a familiar face appeared in Ginny’s lane. Diana Adair paid for the items in her cart. Then she chose a baby carriage gift card from the stacks near the gum and candy bars, noting she wanted fifty dollars added to it.

“Are you feeling okay?” Diana asked, settling her debt.

Ginny nodded, acting like her mother was any other customer needing to be rung through. She gave her momma a receipt with the loaded gift card, told her to have a nice day, and moved to the next customer’s items on the conveyor belt.

“I want you to have this.” Diana handed back the gift card in a white envelope.

“I don’t want anything from you, let alone your money.” Ginny didn’t bother to look at her mother. The scanner beeped over and over as she loaded groceries into the white sacks, making sure nothing got crushed.

Diana frowned and walked over to me holding out her peace offering, “Give this to your momma, please?”

“Yes, ma’am.” I tucked it into my back pocket.

Later on, I gave it to Eric instead. “Are y’all okay? Do you need anything?”

“Yeah, we need to not be having a baby,” Eric responded, rubbing his forehead as if he had a headache. He knew they’d need the money eventually,