A Little Too Much

Chapter Two

THERE IS NOTHING quite as effective at throwing all my inadequacies in my face as a trip to my sister’s. She’s the picture of middle-class America: a husband, two point four kids, a white picket fence, and a dog. (Okay, there’s no actual picket fence, or point four of a kid, but there may as well be.) She’s everything I’m not and never could be, even if I wanted to. Which I don’t.

Don’t get me wrong. I owe everything to Mallory and Jeff. They’re the only family I have. But it’s still hard to be around them sometimes, even though I really don’t want that life. I’m not cut out for marriage, or motherhood, or a mortgage, or any kind of commitment at all, for that matter.

And I’m not jealous.

I’m really not.

But, still . . .

I celebrated my fourteenth birthday by getting shipped off to a group home after our mother decided to pull her little stunt and got herself thrown in jail. The law doesn’t look kindly on driving with a 2.1 blood alcohol level and running down an innocent man in the process. But the truth is, everyone had already abandoned me years earlier. By the time Mallory left for college when I was ten, Mom was too wrapped up in the bottle and her boyfriends (even the ones that hit her) to give much of a shit about anything else, so I was just baggage. We never heard from Mallory. I was alone. I started doing things like ripping out hunks of hair or biting my nails until they bled, because physical pain was something I could grasp. It meant I existed. And it was easier to deal with than the loneliness.

After Mom went to jail, the court wouldn’t let Mallory have custody of me until she was twenty-one and employed, even though she wanted me, so I had seven months in the system. That was all I needed to see why kids who come out of foster care nearly always go bad. Mallory was finishing college in Florida, so she wasn’t around until I went to rehab, then she was trying to find a job so they’d let her have me. It was a long seven months.

When I finally came to live with her I was pretty messed up. It couldn’t have been easy to take me in. And on top of it, she and Jeff had only been dating, like, eight months. Me and all my baggage would have been enough to send most guys running for the hills, but Jeff treated me like a princess—like part of the family. Anything I wanted, he got it for me. He got me caught up so I could go back to school for my sophomore year. He’s always felt like the father I never had.

He and Mallory got married four months after I moved in, eighteen days before Henri was born. From there, it was all late-night feedings and burpings and the inevitable spit-up, doctor’s appointments, and poopy diapers. Tons of poopy diapers. But Jeff didn’t shy away from any of it. He was in poop and puke up to his elbows and never once complained.

And he and Mallory are still totally in love. Like I said: the picture of America.

I take the PATH to Jersey City, but my bus connection is delayed, so I’m even later than I’d thought. When I finally step up to their door and ring the bell, their big golden lab, Rufus, starts barking in the backyard. A second later, the door is flung open and I’m looking down at a four-and-a-half-foot person with a mop of sable hair and big gray eyes. Henri.

“Hey, buddy! How’s it going?” I say, ruffling his shaggy hair.

“Auntie! Come see what I made for Dad!” He takes my hand in his sweaty little one and tows me through the door, then waits while I kick off my shoes.

“Hey, Hil! I’m in the kitchen,” Mallory calls when we reach the family room.

“You need help?” I yell back as Henri drags me across the room toward his little brother, who is sprawled on the carpet, propped on his elbows, poking away at a laptop in front of him.

“See!” Henri exclaims, kneeling next to a Lego pirate ship on the coffee table in front of the worn green couch. There’s a big red bow attached to the mainmast.

“Wow, buddy. That’s really amazing. He’s going to love it.” And I’m not just saying that. Jeff and Henri are both Lego geeks. Before the night is through, they’ll have taken this apart and rebuilt it together. I ruffle his hair again and cross to his little brother. I fold my legs and drop onto the carpet next to him cross-legged. “Hey, Max. What ya doing?”

“Shhh!” Max hisses without looking away from the screen.

“Minecraft,” Henri says, coming up behind me and hugging my shoulders.

Max is madly poking at keys and staring at the screen as if we aren’t even here. He’s always been the serious kid. Though he looks like his dad, he’s just like his mom—totally focused and self-sufficient. Six going on sixty, Mallory likes to joke. That kid was dressing himself at eleven months and he potty trained himself by two. If you try to cuddle him, he’ll struggle out of your arms, and if you don’t let go, he’ll hit you. They say he’s high-spectrum autistic, but I don’t put much stock in labels.

God knows I’ve got a few that are bullshit.

Henri, on the other hand, has always been the cuddlebug. He’s just about the happiest kid I’ve ever seen, and even at seven, he loves to snuggle. Mallory calls him her “big ball of love.” When he was little and I still lived here, he used to crawl into my lap and cuddle against my shoulder, wrapping a strand of my kinky hair around his hand and sucking it with his thumb. The feeling of his little body burrowed into me tugged at my heart in a way nothing else ever could.

But I’m not cut out for kids. There are some people that were just never meant to be parents. The biggest favor they can do the world is to recognize it before it’s too late. So kudos for me.

Mallory comes to the door and props herself in the door frame between the family room and the kitchen. “I think I have things mostly under control, but if you and the boys could do the streamers in the dining room, that would really help. Jeff should be here in about fifteen, and I haven’t had a chance to do it yet.”

She doesn’t say, “You promised you’d help. Where were you?” but it’s in the twist to her mouth and the crinkled edges of her gaze.

“I got hung up at an audition and then the bus was running late,” I tell her, answering the question she didn’t really ask.

She spins back to the kitchen. “How did it go?”

“Shi—” I catch myself, but Henri giggles anyway. That kid doesn’t miss much. He’s always been one of the most observant people I know. I think he’s at the age where kids start thinking cussing is funny. I give him a look and press my finger to my lips to shush him before Mallory gives me shit. “Pretty bad.”

“Bummer,” she calls from deeper in the kitchen.

Tell me about it.

I stand and grab Henri’s hand, tugging him up. “Let’s go decorate for your dad.”

He grins at me and charges into the dining room.

Mallory is a neat freak and the place is always spotless, despite the havoc of two young boys. I liked living here. It was a good place to heal. But a year after graduating high school, I moved to the city. Mallory was pretty upset that I didn’t apply to college, but even that felt like too much of a commitment. And by that time I’d decided to chase my dream of stage acting for a living anyway. Idol auditions were coming up and I was sure I’d turn my success there into a Broadway career.

Three and a half years later, I’m still tending bar.

“Do you want to help, Max?” I ask, stooping next to him.

“In a minute.” He still doesn’t look up from his game.

He shakes my hand off when I ruffle his strawberry-blond waves, so I stand and follow Henri into the dining room. When I get there I find he already has the streamers open and has unwound most of the roll, which is lying in a mound at his feet. I look around the room at the antique dining-room set and chandelier. “So how do you want to do this?”

A grin lights up his whole little face. “I want to decorate Dad.”

I laugh. “That would be interesting.”

He picks up the pile of streamers. “I’m going to tie him to his chair with these.”

“Maybe you should ask your mom about that.” I think it sounds fun, but I’m pretty sure that’s not what Mallory had in mind.

“Mom!” Henri wails, running toward the kitchen just as Rufus starts barking again. A second later, the front door swings open and Jeff steps through. Henri abruptly changes course and launches into him. “Dad!”

Jeff slips off his shoes then stoops down to hug him. “Hey, champ. How’s tricks?”

Henri climbs on his dad’s back as Jeff stands. “I’m going to tie you to your chair!”

“Really . . . ?” Jeff says with a grin. He gives me a wave as he piggybacks his son past me into the kitchen. “Hey, Hilary.”

“Happy birthday,” I tell him.

There’s a tug on my jeans and when I look down, Max has finally pulled himself away from the computer. I take his hand and we follow Jeff and Henri.

“Happy birthday, Daddy,” Max says quietly as we catch up to them in the kitchen.

Jeff has set Henri on the counter, where he’s happily swinging his legs and banging his heels into the cabinet below. He stoops down and waits for his youngest son to come to him. Max slowly makes his way the few steps between him and his dad, and Jeff folds him into his arms, hugging him tightly. But a second later, Max is backing out of his grasp and Jeff lets him go. It’s like Jeff craves his son, but knows Max can only handle so much. He’s willing to play by Max’s rules, greedily taking whatever affection Max will offer, but never pushing for more.

I wish I had a dad like Jeff.

I look at them together. Jeff is on the short side with a stocky build. His eyes are dark brown and his face is strong. Max is his spitting image except for his strawberry-blond waves. Jeff’s hair is sandy brown and bone straight.

“Happy birthday, Mr. LaForte,” Mallory says, stirring something simmering in a cast-iron skillet and smiling down at them.

“Why, thank you, Mrs. LaForte,” Jeff says with a grin. He stands and moves to Mallory at the stove, planting a kiss on her lips so tenderly that I have to look away. It feels too personal. “So what’s this about tying me to my chair?” he asks her as their lips part.

Mallory shoots me a look.

“I’m going to tie Daddy up!” Henri announces, banging both heels hard into the cabinet to punctuate his point.

Jeff’s gaze shifts to him, then back to me.

“With the streamers,” I clarify. “He wants to decorate you.”

Mallory rolls her eyes and turns back to the stove, stirring the pot. “You’re early,” she tells Jeff. “Dinner won’t be ready for another fifteen minutes.”

Jeff tugs at the collar of his button-down shirt. “Good. Then I have time to change.” He swings Henri off the counter on his way past, and his oldest follows him to the bedroom as Max goes back to the computer.

I lean into the counter. “So if you’re okay with the whole bondage thing, I guess I don’t need to put up any streamers.”

Mallory shoots a look over her shoulder. “Then make yourself useful and fill that pot with water and put it on to boil,” she says, tipping her head at a pot on the back burner.

I take it to the sink and start the water.

“What’s Brett doing tonight? Thought we might see him.”

“Rehearsal,” I lie. I’ve explained our deal to her over and over, but she doesn’t like it. She keeps thinking we’re going to fall madly in love, move into a house in Jersey with a picket fence, and have two point four kids and a dog, just like she did.

It’s not gonna happen.

I put the pot on and crank the burner just as Jeff comes back in wearing a green Heineken T-shirt and baggy black sweats.

“Is that any way to dress for your birthday dinner?” Mallory asks, waving a hand at him, exasperated.

He steps up behind her and pulls her into the curve of his body. “Are you saying you’d prefer me in my birthday suit?” he mutters in her ear.

She blushes and glances at me as if I’m still fourteen. “Jeff,” she says, slapping his wandering hand off her ass.

But she’s smiling.

I have the definite feeling that Mallory and Jeff still have a lot of sex. I remember hearing them when I was a teenager—the creak of bedsprings and their muffled moans.

I’d had sex before and it sounded nothing like that. I’d never moaned anyone’s name or said, “oh, God,” and I’d never giggled. So one night when they were doing it, I snuck down the hall to their door and pushed it open a crack. Henri was a baby, probably three months old or so, and he was asleep in a basket at Mallory’s side of the bed. The sheets were pooled on the floor on Jeff’s side and he and Mallory were naked on the mattress. Jeff was moving so slowly between Mallory’s legs that it looked like a dance. She was making these soft moaning sounds deep in her chest, and one at a time, she wrapped her legs around him, crossing them at the ankles and pulling him closer.

Jeff moaned as he sank himself into her and whispered, “I love you so much, baby.”

And a minute later, when I heard Mallory sniffle and saw Jeff reach up and wipe her cheek with his fingertips, I realized she was crying. But Jeff couldn’t be hurting her. He was being so gentle.

I backed away from the door and went back to my room thinking there must be something wrong with me, because that’s not what sex looked like when I did it.

Now I know there is.

Jeff grins and lets Mallory go. “I’ll pour the wine. You want a Coke or something, Hilary?” he asks, turning to me, and suddenly I feel like I’ve been caught watching, the voyeur I was all those years ago.

“Um . . . sure. Coke.” I’m twenty-two, but they won’t offer me wine . . . which is sort of ridiculous considering I work at a bar. We’ve never talked about it, but I think it’s because of rehab. Mallory’s afraid I’ll “slip.” I don’t tell them I was never an addict . . . that it was all just a big screwup. Because then I’d have to tell them the truth, and that’s much worse.

I STAY TO help put Henri and Max to bed, then head back to the city. There’s a sad-looking guy with long, stringy, gray hair sitting cross-legged at the base of the stairs as I make my way out of the subway. He’s playing his sax—a sad, slow song that I don’t recognize.

It’s beautiful.

I just stand here listening for a really long time, the music wrapping around me like a warm blanket, sending shivers down my spine.

He’s so good it scares me a little. I mean, why are there some guys sitting in pits on Broadway, or onstage at Lincoln Center with the Philharmonic, and this guy, who’s so damn good that just listening to him makes me want to cry, is sitting here with a beat-up sax on the cold cement floor of the subway?

What if I’m not good enough? What if I’ll never be good enough?

I root through my bag for a five and toss it in the open case with the filthy, torn red velvet lining, then slide down the yellow tiled wall to sit next to him. He doesn’t look up. He just keeps playing. I wrap my jacket tightly around myself and close my eyes. Like my butterflies, the music is free. I picture all the notes fluttering in the air like wings, then floating away on the breeze.

But that only makes me sadder.

Finally, after five or six songs, I drag myself off the ground, sift through the bottom of my bag, and come out with my last three crumpled dollars. I toss them in the case, then head up the stairs into the cold drizzle.

I stop at the bar for my paycheck on the way home. When I open the door, a wave of warm, humid air, full of the smell of stale beer and moldy things, hits me in the face. I applied for this job two and a half years ago, while I was basking in my fifteen minutes of American Idol fame. That and my rockin’ bod are the only reasons I got the job. I’d never bartended in my life, but Jerry looked me over and decided I had “potential.” He handed me a fistful of tiny white T-shirts with the bar logo—a curly Filthy McDermott’s across the chest—and asked if I had any ass shorts. Said if he gives the guys something to look at they stay longer and drink more. He also told me not to wear a bra, at which point I told him to go fuck himself. As much grabbing as goes on in this place, you better believe I’m keeping the girls strapped in.

Jerry keeps the place dimly lit, just in case the occasional cockroach makes its appearance. Between that, the dark wood paneling, the mahogany behemoth of a bar in the back of the room, and the perpetual scent of sweat and rotting things, the place has a distinct caveman appeal.

There are a few regulars swaying on their barstools at the end of the bar, and a group of loud college kids playing quarters in a booth near the back. Not bad for a Thursday night. The stereo is on Jerry’s favorite eighties rock station, but the TV over the bar is also blaring some ESPN sports recap show, so between that and the yelling kids, it all just blends into a lot of white noise.

“Hilary! Baby!” Jerry bellows when the bells over the door jingle. It makes me feel like that Norm guy on that old Cheers show. “How’s it hanging?” Despite the fact that he clearly knows I’m a girl, he always asks that.

“Low, Jerry. It’s hanging really fucking low.” As I move deeper into the room I catch the distinct smell of burnt cheese and know Jerry must have forgotten a batch of nachos under the broiler again.

“Sorry to hear that, sweet pea. You here to drink your sorrows away?” He’s always trying to get me to put my paycheck back into the till.

I lean up against the bar. “Nah. It’s the fifteenth. Just stopped in for my check.”

Half his face pinches, like he’s only half sorry for what he’s about to say. “I ain’t quite got it ready for you. Hang around and have a drink and I’ll get it.”

“On the house?” I ask, already knowing the answer.

He blows a laugh out his mouth, spraying down the bar with enough spit that he has to wipe it with the dirty rag in his hand. And that’s all the answer I get.

Jerry has never touched me, but given the opportunity, I have no doubt he would. Overall, he’s a pretty decent guy, but I think he must be kind of fuzzy on sexual harassment law. Pretty much any night he’s here after shift, he throws out the loose suggestion that we could “catch a drink” or “try out some new rum recipes.” I think he’s still harboring the illusion that getting me drunk is the key to getting into my pants–a strategy that generally works fairly well for him when he’s not using it on me.

He’s got to be forty-something, but even so, he’s not hard on the eyes—a dark buzz cut, strong, square face, and incredible blue eyes. He’s ex-military and still takes decent care of himself. Despite the staggering volume of beer he consumes (all on the house, of course), he doesn’t have a beer gut yet. He catches his share of the clientele and he’s got a few regulars who come here to flirt with him. What he doesn’t seem to have figured out yet is, I’m not going to be one of them.

I walk around the bar and pour myself a glass of water, then plunk down on a bar stool. “I’ll wait.”

He gives me a cocky, sideways grin and disappears into the office in back. “Hold down the fort.”

“Hilary!” one of the guys down the bar shouts with a wide grin, like we’re old friends. He’s probably sixty, with graying hair and a bad comb-over. Every Tuesday and Friday night since I’ve worked here he’s come in—something about his wife having book club or Bunco or something on those nights—but I can never remember if his name is Bob or Bill. “Can I get another?” he asks, lifting his empty mug.

I’m off the clock, so I have no intention of holding down anything. I jerk my head at the tap. “Help yourself.”

He grins wider and slides his fat ass off the stool. “This going on my tab?” he mutters as he waddles past me.

“Not if you haul your sorry ass,” I say with a deliberate glance at the office door.

He hurries around the bar and pours his beer, then pats my butt and winks on the way back to his seat. “I knew I liked you.”

He grins at me again a few minutes later when Jerry comes back, waving a check in my face. “I counted your last shift as full even though you clocked out fifteen minutes early.”

I snag the check out of his hand and stuff it in my bag. “Thanks, Jerry. I owe you.”

He wiggles his eyebrows and grins. “And don’t forget it.”

I roll my eyes and slip off the bar stool. “See you tomorrow.”

“You’re closing, don’t forget.”

“I’m closing,” I reassure him. “See you at five.”

I stop at the ATM and deposit my check, then head home. The drizzle has picked up and by the time I get there, I’m pretty soaked, but I don’t really mind. I like walking in the rain. It’s one of the few things that I find really calming. Puddles are starting to form on the sidewalk and I walk right through them, splashing up as much water as I can without full-out stomping like a four-year-old. I’m actually smiling when I get to the door of our apartment and look up.

And then I’m not smiling anymore.

There’s a guy standing in my doorway. A tall guy in black cargo pants, army boots, and a dark blue hoodie. A gorgeous guy. And he’s staring at me with wide eyes.

“Hilary?” he asks, and he’s got a light accent that I can’t identify with just that one word. Something European, maybe?

“It depends,” I say backing off a step. He looks familiar, but he also looks a little dangerous. He’s tense, his hands twitching at his sides, and there’s something dark in his intense gaze.

I feel like I should know him, but I can’t place him. He’s got shortish wavy black hair that’s combed back from his forehead, and dark eyes set in one of the most beautiful man-faces I’ve ever seen. His skin is olive, no darker than mine, but a totally different shade. He’s got to be an actor or something. Maybe I know him from an audition? “Who’s asking?”

“It’s me, Hilary. Alessandro.”

His face blurs and the streetlights above my head spin. I feel myself wobble on my feet before I brace my hand on the building and get my bearings again. “Alessandro?” I’ve only known one person with that name.

His face scrunches a little. “Alessandro Moretti . . . from the group home?”

The next thing I know I’m on my ass in a puddle, my legs having turned to Jell-O, and Alessandro has my arm. It’s like the last eight years vanish. We’re in the rec room and an invisible fist is crushing my heart.

We’re leaving.

It takes me a second to find my breath and I look up at his pinched face. “What are you doing here?”

He helps me off the sidewalk but stops short of brushing off my ass. “I . . .” He shakes his head. “I just found your address. I only meant to see how you were.”

My stomach plummets to my toes and I think for a second that I should have stayed down. Does he know? How could he have found out?

I lean back against the wall for support. “Where’s Lorenzo?” All of a sudden I’m desperate to know if he’s coming for me too.

His lips press into a hard line and his charcoal eyes darken. He closes them and hauls a deep breath before opening them again. “Lorenzo has been dead for two years.”