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opened. "Big Beans! I showed Mom the magic cup trick
and she said I was good!"
"She's right, Little Beans," he called back. "You are
good. Have a good day at school, okay?"
"Uh-huh. Is Dad gone?"
"Yeah, honey. I'm going now -- have to get to work.
You have his cell phone number, though, right? You can
phone him after school."
"Yup." She nodded with enthusiasm. "Sometimes
Mom brings me to his work. He gives me stickers for all
By the Numbers - 150
the kids and then they want me to sit by them at lunch."
This was clearly the highlight of having a father who
was a firefighter. "Maybe she'll bring me today."
"Maybe." Deuce doubted it. "You ask real nice later,
but if she's busy you just phone, okay? Don't give your
mom a hard time."
Lacey shook her head, and her hair, so like Holly's,
fell in strands around her face. "I never do," she
informed him. That was likely untrue, but Deuce let it
go.
"Okay." He went to his car and opened the door.
"Hey, you can call me, too, if you want. You know the
number at the house."
A thoughtful look stole over her. "Can I talk to Q?"
"Of course." He laughed. "She'd love that. I have to
go, Little Beans. Have fun today."
"We're making atlases," she reminded him. "Bye."
And with that, she shut the door.
"I wish life had an atlas." Deuce sighed and got in his
car. He hoped Trey wasn't too mad at him, though he
deserved it. Honestly, would it have been so hard to
keep his mouth shut and himself out of the middle of
things?
But he was in the middle, and Lacey and Holly were
somehow a part of his life now. He'd have to come up
with coping skills, pronto.
Annoyed with himself, worried about Trey, Deuce
went to work, not looking back at the little yellow
house.
By the Numbers - 151
Twelve
It couldn't have gone worse, in Trey's opinion.
He stewed about his and Deuce's morning until lunch
time. Trey kept mostly to himself except when it was
unavoidable. Their engine had two calls; one was a
small kitchen fire that was out by the time they arrived,
and the other was an elderly patient who had fallen in
her driveway and needed several stitches in her
forehead. Trey did his job mechanically and didn't make
an effort to laugh or joke with anyone.
He stayed in his dorm at lunch time and ate a
sandwich on his bunk. Lunch wasn't a formal affair
anyway; the rest of his crew would either eat in front of
the television or out back at the picnic table. It was
during dinner that they gathered at the big table in the
kitchen like family.
And they were family, Trey supposed. He'd worked
with the same crew for several years and they knew each
other well. Including Chance, of course, who Trey had a
sneaking suspicion knew more than he let on.
So when Chance appeared in the doorway of Trey's
room, it was not a shock. "You all right?" he asked, with
his usual no-bullshit attitude.
"Yeah. I guess." If he could just make the whole
morning go away, Trey would be all right.
"Shake it off." It was more of a command than a
suggestion. Chance had a job to do and part of it was
dependent on Trey.
"Oh, really? Shake it off?" Trey snorted and lay back
on his bunk. Despite knowing Chance was just doing his
job, Trey was unable to keep his sarcasm in check. He
liked his captain, but Chance occasionally had a rep for
being a dick because of his impassive nature and
By the Numbers - 152
unwillingness to bend rules. Trey supposed that was
what made him a good captain, though.
Chance appeared to consider things, then stepped into
Trey's dorm and leaned on the small row of lockers that
Trey shared with the men on the other shifts. "That guy.
The one you live with. It's something with him?"
It would be too much for Trey to go into details,
especially since he was still feeling torn up about the
morning. "Kind of. Him and my ex-wife."
"Rough. Is there something you need me to do?"
Trey shook his head ruefully. "No. I'll snap out of it. I
might call him and have him come to dinner, though."
Chance shrugged. "Sure, fine by me." He paused, as
if thinking carefully about his next words. "I know what
it's like to try and block out relationship crap while
you're here. But try."
"Yessir," Trey mumbled. Chance was right. His job
was too important to let anything distract him, even
Deuce and Holly.
"Thank you." Chance pushed off the lockers and
looked as if he was about to say something else, but a
soft buzzing noise interrupted him. Trey looked over in
time to see him take his phone out of his pocket and
study the text message on the screen.
When a corner of Chance's mouth curved up in a soft
smile, Trey raised a brow. He would bet his left nut that
he knew who'd sent it. "Tell Tucker I said hi." Block out
relationship crap, indeed.
"Okay." Chance smiled again before blinking and
looking up at Trey. The smile vanished from his face
and he looked slightly abashed. "Just call your guy," he
said sharply, and then left, presumably to answer his
text.
By the Numbers - 153
Trey rolled his eyes. Seemed as if no one was that
successful in blocking out relationship crap, even
Chance.
Might as well follow orders, though. Trey dug his
phone out of his pocket and called Deuce's office line.
"Good afternoon, G2G Systems. This is Nathaniel."
Deuce sounded ever so slightly distracted, but possibly
only Trey would notice. "How can I help you?"
"Yeah, I have a problem with some code you guys
helped me install last week." Trey hoped that sounded
close enough to what Deuce actually did at work.
"That's not good. What project is that, sir?" Deuce
sounded like he was suddenly paying attention. "Was it
something to do with idiot boyfriends who don't know
when to shut up?"
"More like idiot boyfriends who expose their partners
to bitchy ex-wives." Trey looked at the ceiling of his
dorm and played with a belt loop on his uniform pants.
"I'm sorry. She was awful to you."
"That's hardly your fault." Deuce sighed. "For some
reason I keep expecting her to act like a rational adult,
despite all the evidence to the contrary. I should have
just let her spit venom -- it's not like I actually care what
she thinks about me. Although, to be honest, if she's
going to tell Lacey that kind of anti-gay bile, you're
going to have to do something. That's just not cool."
Trey went over the conversation from that morning in
his head. He remembered Holly saying something about
telling Lacey that Daddy liked to kiss boys, but Lacey
had already been told that when Holly had said he was
gay. "She's not anti-gay," he said slowly. "She's just
anti-me. She'd behave the same way if I told her I was a
communist or a lumberjack or a white collar criminal."
There was a long pause before Deuce replied. "This
morning she made it about telling Lacey that you like to
By the Numbers - 154
kiss and hug me instead of her, and that Daddy likes
boys. Then she said that she will tell Lacey what she
thinks and feels. Given the high feelings and the level of
her disdain, it sounded and felt very anti-gay to me."
Trey considered how to answer. There were so many
variables and details that Deuce didn't know, and that
wasn't his fault. Now was probably not the time to get
into them, though. "I know what she said," Trey finally
replied. "She's unhappy I'm gay. That doesn't mean she's
homophobic. She's already told Lacey that Daddy likes
boys instead of girls, and judging from how calm Lace
was about that when she and I talked, Holly didn't make
it into something disgusting or wrong. I can't defend
Holly on much, but she's a decent parent and she loves
Lacey. She knows Lacey loves me, and she won't do
anything to jeopardize our relationship. I won't
jeopardize theirs, either. It's in writing." God, that court
and custody battle had sucked so much.
"I can only tell you what I heard and how I heard it,
Trey." Deuce sounded tired. "I'm not going to yell at her
again or anything -- in fact I'll just do my best to never
even see her. But that's what it felt like to me. I'm not
used to feeling like a bug under someone's shoe. All of [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]