Beni threw a set of keys at Adil. “Go to my place, get showered and changed. Bring some pjs over for the three of us.”
“Help Suki to her room,” Phineas commanded. “Adil, meet us back in
Juniper’s bedroom. I need to get the puke out of her hair.”
“You can’t put her in the shower,” Suki protested. “I said no sex when she’s drunk.”
“We’re not going to have sex with her, Suki.” Phineas rolled his eyes at the woman who was looking greener by the passing seconds. “We’re going to clean her up as efficiently and respectfully as possible.”
“I puked Suki!” Juniper exclaimed suddenly. “All over Adil and Beni’s car.”
“I employ a very good PA who will take my car for a detailing,” Beni reassured her as Phineas swung Juniper up in his arms. “You can trust us Suki. We don’t want to hurt her. We will never do anything to intentionally cause her harm. Phineas is going to help her shower because he’s really good at compartmentalizing. He’ll be able to get her in and out of there rather quickly. Then we’re going to tuck her in and make sure she doesn’t suffer bad dreams or tears from the altercation with Kyst.”
“You promise, Beni,” Suki threw herself at him and cupped his cheeks and looked into his eyes. “She is my best friend, and I love her. Do you know she once sat with me beside my mom’s hospital bed when my dad gave her a concussion? My mom was in a coma and Juni stayed with me. I don’t even remember her taking a pee break. She just sat there with me, holding my hand while I sat there terrified my mom was going to die. She didn’t die you know but she stupidly went back home with the miserable bastard. I haven’t spoken to him since, but Juni comes to dinner with me when I go. She’s the only person I have in this world, Beni, who loves me unconditionally. I will always protect her.”
“We appreciate you will always protect her,” Beni smiled at the girl.
“I love you too, Suki!” Juniper called out drunkenly as she was carried away down
“No, sweetheart. I’m disappointed in myself. I knew the last drink was likely to put you too far over. It hit you harder in the car once we got away from Kyst.”
“I think it was the movement of the car, she stared into his eyes. “Your eyes are so blue, but the irises are rimmed with black. Its as if someone took a Sharpie and traced them.” She wiggled her finger in front of his eye in a circular motion. “I bet you were beautiful as a baby.”
“I was absolutely breathtaking, according to my mother. Adil was cuter though. You should see our baby photos. He was all big brown eyes. I swear his eyes took up half his face like an alien’s. When we were little I cried to my mom I wanted big eyes like Adil’s.”
“He is very handsome.”
“Do you think so?”
“I do.” Juniper nodded and then gasped when her zipper was quickly undone and her dress started to fall to the floor, “what are you doing Phineas?”
He lifted a strand of her hair, thick with chunks of putridness. “We need to get you cleaned up, beautiful. Tell me about how you and Suki met.”
“We were in the same kindergarten class. We sat at the same table on the first day of school. I knew she was going to be my best friend forever. Then that day we got to sing a song, and the teacher taught it to us, and we were trying to sing louder than each other and there was another girl, her name was Raquel, and we hated her. She kept trying to sing louder than me and Suki and we weren’t having it. Suki sang the loudest. The teacher told us it wasn’t about singing loudest but we thought she was wrong.” She was blabbering away before she realized she was completely naked, and Phineas was wearing nothing but a pair of briefs. Her eyes immediately homed in on his torso. “Wow!”
He rubbed his chest with pride and smirked, “you like, sweetheart?”
“You have tattoos. How come I never noticed them before?”
He was edging her backwards into the shower and she eyeballing the ink on his chest. “Does that say Mama?”
“It does. I got it when my parents were going through a rough spot to show my support for her.” He stared at Juniper, “I hope you don’t ever take Kyst back.”
She shook her head, “are you kidding? My mama would kick my ass from here to Mexico and back. It’s a long way to
Mexico from here.”
He chuckled, “it sure is.” He turned the water on and when it was warm enough stood her under the spray. “How is your tummy now?”
“Empty.”
“Are you hungry?”
“No. I mean, there used to be a baby in there, but it’s gone now. It’s empty. I think Kyst must have been jerking off all his good sperm and I was getting the leftovers.”
“I’m sorry you are sad, sweetheart,” he pressed a kiss to her forehead as he reached for shampoo to wash her hair.
She closed her eyes as his long fingers worked vigilantly to get the mess out of her hair.
“Don’t fall asleep on me in here,” Phineas’ commanding voice was low and soft as he rinsed her hair.
“It feels good.” She whispered as he washed it a second time. “Do you think I’m a bad person?”
“Why would I ever think such a thing?”
“Because I’m really sad I am not having a baby, but I don’t know if I’m sad about Kyst.”
“You’re not sad about Kyst?”
“Beni told me your dad cheated on your mom.”
Phineas nodded, “he did, and it took me a very long time to forgive him. I went to therapy for a long time to address the fact the man I worshipped as a hero was fallible. He made terrible choices and he’s really fucking lucky my mother is a saint. He put in the work though. He went to therapy too. He did individual, couples, and family therapy. He spent years working on himself and trying to figure out why he was so consumed with the fear of getting older.”
“Do you fear of getting older?” she asked as she felt him reaching past her for her bodywash.
“Nope. I want to grow old someday. I want to have gray hair though. I really don’t want to go bald. Beni would look good bald. Not me. I think I’d look like Dr. Evil.”
She giggled. “You want to grow old with gray hair?”
“I do. I want to get wrinkly and old with grandchildren I can spoil. I want a big family I can sit down to Thanksgiving dinner with and know that when I die, someday, in the far future, I’ve built a good life with a good woman and a good family.”
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.