Going Home - Chapter 21

I headed home, still thinking about what Orville had originally asked. I really was enjoying being a deputy, but as I dragged myself into my apartment and flopped into bed, I realized there was one part I didn’t like. After a week of constantly shuffling shifts, I was having a hell of a time developing a sleep schedule. I’d talked to Al about it a few days before, and he had a method of taking a nap for a few hours when he got home, then getting up and going about his day, or night depending on what that day’s schedule had been, finally going to bed for good eight or so hours before his next shift. He said the short nap helped him get just enough rest to function for the ten or so hours he’d be up before it was time to go to sleep, while making him tired enough to go to bed and sleep more or less a full night before he had to work.

I’d been trying it, but so far I’d only managed to maintain a fairly uniform level of tiredness. I hoped eventually I’d get used to it, or maybe we’d get the money for a fourth deputy, so we could manage staying on the same shift without working seven days a week. Knowing how strapped the county always was for funds, that seemed doubtful, but I could dream.

My next shift was a day shift, so the upside was I was on Rosita’s schedule, more or less, which meant I got to spend more time with her. I still hadn’t managed the short nap part of the plan, but she worked most of the day anyway, so I could sleep through her lunch hours and show up to hang out with her through the dinner rush and after she got off work. It would mean I’d have a harder time going to sleep that night, but it was also when I got to spend the most time with her.

I showed up around five and was surprised to see Julie there, since it was the middle of the week. Julie rarely worked weekdays, at least since I’d been hanging out. I guessed maybe they had a different schedule during the school year, when lunch got really busy, but I’d only seen Julie a handful of times, and that was always because of some big order, which Rosita hadn’t mentioned when we’d talked the night before.

“Big order tonight?” I asked, looking in Julie’s direction.

“No,” Rosita replied, “Julie asked for extra hours for the next few weeks and I didn’t have the heart to say no.”

“At least not after I pointed out it would give her more time to spend with you,” Julie said.

“Planning a trip or something?” I asked.

Although she hadn’t done it since I’d been back in town, a few weeks before the three of us had been talking and she’d mentioned a trip she and her husband took to upstate New York just before Christmas, and how she’d convinced Rosita to give her extra hours to pay for it.

“Unfortunately, no. Julie’s had enough of me and is getting some extra money to move to Charleston.”

Julie laughed and shook her head at that, so I knew at least the ‘had enough of me’ part was a joke, although I assumed the rest was probably true.

“You’re moving to Charleston?” I asked.

“Yeah. Joe got a job out there that pays way better than the mine, so we decided to give it a shot.”

Joe was Julie’s husband. I’d never met him, but she mentioned him from time to time, and he seemed like a good guy. I hadn’t realized he’d been looking for work, but I couldn’t blame him for wanting to get out of the mines. He was still in his twenties, which meant he probably hadn’t done any irreversible damage to his lungs yet.

“So that means you’re free tonight?” I asked, hopefully.

“It does. Julie even agreed to close up, so I don’t have to come back.”

“Julie, you’re a saint.”

“Sometimes,” she said, giving me a wink.

I’d only recently realized she had a wicked sense of humor. Although it was exciting for them moving on to the next stage of their lives, it was always a little sad when you make friends with someone just in time for them to leave.

It still took a few minutes to get out of the door as Rosita went through all her checklists with Julie. While Julie had covered nights before and even closed a few times, when it came to the restaurant, Rosita was a stickler for making sure everything operated just right, which was probably how she’d managed to be so successful.

I knew better than to try and rush her, so I took a seat and leaned back against a wall. I was still a lot more tired than I realized, because I’d just about dozed off when Rosita jostled my shoulder to wake me up.

“Sorry,” I said, pushing out of the chair.

“It’s okay. I know you worked last night and probably haven’t slept well. We can do this another night if you’re too tired.”

“Not on your life. How many chances do we get to actually have a night away from the restaurant? I’m not giving that up now for a little sleep.”

“Okay. I grabbed some food and I thought maybe we could go back to my place and watch a movie.”

We’d done that date before and I knew it was code for ‘watch half a movie and then make out for the second half,’ which was a date I could get behind.

We headed to her place, since it was both bigger and nicer than mine, and I spread out the food while she went to take a shower and change. I didn’t blame her. Even just hanging out in the back of the restaurant for a few hours I could feel grease clinging to my skin. Actually, standing over the stove or fryer was a hundred times worse, and I’d want to shower after finishing up too.

“Orville asked us to come over for dinner with them on Sunday night, if you’re free,” I said when she came back downstairs.

“Really? I mean, sure, I’m free.”

“Well, it’s kind of my fault. He was asking how I liked being a deputy and we started talking about the differences between living in New York City and a small town, and I mentioned the biggest challenge was everyone treating new people, or even people who moved away and came back like I did, as outsiders. That led to talking about you and how you were treated by people, and he said he realized that, although the two of you talked from time to time, he’d never tried to be friends like he was with a lot of the other people in town.”

“I hope he doesn’t think I was complaining.”

“No, not at all. I was just giving my observations, both from being someone who was from here and someone who came back and got a small piece of that kind of reception. I made it clear that, generally, you weren’t treated badly, just that people didn’t go out of their way to make new people feel welcome.”

“Well, I wouldn’t say that, but I appreciate the invitation. Sure, I’d love to go.”

She picked the movie, which meant some love story which was always her go-to choice. They weren’t bad, I guess, but they rarely held my attention, which was fine since my attention was on Rosita the whole time anyway. I liked watching her watch the movie. She was so expressive I could see the whole movie playing out on her face. Of course, she knew I was watching her and not the movie, since we’d gone through this every time we’d watched a movie, to the point where it almost became a dance between us.

She’d tell me to watch the movie or push my face back towards the TV and after a few minutes, I’d look back at her. This would devolve into her cuddling closer to me, so her head was against my shoulder or chest, making it impossible for me to look at her instead of the movie, and I’d put my arm around her. After a little, while I’d feel her looking up at me, instead of the movie, and we’d switch places, with me telling her to watch the movie.

This went on, back and forth, for the first half of the movie, like always. Even though we’d done this every time I’d come over to watch a movie with her since the first time we’d kissed, I still enjoyed the game of it. Eventually, she was pushed up hard against me, and we looked at each other at the same time, her face turned up towards mine.

We’d both been waiting for it, and as I leaned down to kiss her she pushed herself up to meet me halfway. The movie kept playing, although neither of us was even pretending to pay attention to it anymore. Eventually, she moved onto my lap so she could put her arms around me. I could tell she was getting as worked up as I was, since she started grinding against me, both of us making small sounds as the passion mounted.

Finally, I broke off the kiss, keeping my hands on her shoulders so I could keep her from leaning forward and starting again. We were starting to get to the point where everything went kind of fuzzy as our hormones took control, and she’d made it clear she had a line she didn’t want to cross, which meant stopping it before I started pushing for more.

“We need to slow down for a minute,” I said.

We’d been here before, several times, and I thought she’d nod and slide off my lap like she usually did.

This time, however, she got a look of concentration on her face and, after a second, she said, “Maybe we should go upstairs.”

I froze in place, unsure I’d heard her right and not wanting to spook her if I had.

“Are you sure? I thought …”

“I know, and I appreciate you respecting my boundaries. I said I just needed time to get comfortable. I’m comfortable.”

“Really?”

“Yes. Now take me upstairs.”

She didn’t have to tell me twice. Okay, she did, but she didn’t have to tell me a third time. Even though she was in good shape, Rosita wasn’t very heavy. She was still on my lap, so instead of sliding her off and walking with her hand-in-hand up the stairs, I opted to take her command literally, scooping her up in my arms.

“Oooh,” she squeaked as I lifted her and stood up from the couch.

She hadn’t expected the move, but she grinned as she put her arms around my neck, so I was pretty sure she liked it. That was confirmed as she leaned forward and started kissing and nibbling on my neck as I carried her upstairs. Between the narrowness of the stairs and what her kisses were doing to me, it was a little hard to concentrate enough to keep from sending us both tumbling down the stairs, but I managed.

I hadn’t been in her bedroom before, although I knew which room it was. Like the rest of her house, it was neat and tidy, with the bed made and just enough decorations to make it feel homey without being cluttered.

Setting her on the bed, we resumed kissing as both of us tried to undress the other. It was frantic and passionate, a culmination of weeks of desire being built up and then put on hold as we both waited for her to be ready.

The reward was worth the wait. Her body was a thing of beauty, something to be worshiped. She was muscular and soft at the same time, her skin color seeming even darker against mine.

That night was like something out of my wildest fantasies. Terri and I had been adventuresome at times and were very physical with each other. We’d gone on raw hormones, using each other for pleasure, but until my first night with Rosita, I hadn’t realized how hollow it had been.

The next morning came way too early. Both of us had clearly been building to something amazing, because we kept at it like teenagers until well into the early hours of the morning. Thankfully, Rosita managed to keep her head better than I did, because she’d remembered to set an alarm to get me up in time to go to work.

I told her she could stay in bed, but she insisted on getting ready with me, although her idea of joining me in the shower almost made me late, since I still had to go back to my apartment for clothes. I hadn’t actually expected to spend the night, so I wasn’t prepared for it at all.

I managed to walk into the station only five minutes after I should have been there, although the look that Sarah gave me as I pushed past the front counter suggested she might have an idea of why I was late. I know Rosita wouldn’t have said anything, but women were always better at picking up subtle clues about that kind of thing. Or maybe I was just strutting like an asshole after my year-long dry spell.

I did a quick rundown with Al, which only took a few minutes, since as usual, it had been pretty quiet except for the normal two am drunks not wanting to go home.

Walking out of the sheriff’s office, I was surprised to find Rosita standing outside next to my cruiser, waiting for me.

“Hey, what are you doing here? I would have thought you’d go back to bed and get some more sleep.”

“Nope, I’m feeling wide awake. I know you walk main street at the start of your shift, and I thought I could walk with you. I promise I won’t distract you from your patrol. I just want to spend some more time together before you have anything come up or I have to go to work.”

I thought about it for a second, which was probably not what she’d want me to do, but I was taking this job seriously, and didn’t want to let my personal life get in the way of doing it. In New York City, this kind of thing would have been a huge no-no, but the way things went around here were a lot different. I got my answer when I looked back towards the police station only to see Al, through the window, standing behind Sarah, both of them grinning at me like idiots.

“Sure,” I said, taking her hand.

I didn’t have the heart to tell her I didn’t normally do the main street foot patrol at the start of morning shifts, mostly because she was in such a great mood and I really did want to spend some more time with her.

As expected, there weren’t actually a lot of places open yet at seven-thirty in the morning, which is why I usually only did it at the beginning of my night shift or the end of my day shift, because most of the point of it was to make contact with the public.

The only three places open at the moment were the only coffee place left in town, the gas station, and the hardware store, which opened at six am, since sometimes the mine needed something they couldn’t wait to order, and that’s when the first shift started.

The streets were mostly empty, since the first shift at the mine had already started and most other sane people didn’t get out of the house this early, but I figured that would just make this easy and give me time to talk to Rosita.

“Sooo, last night was pretty great,” I said after my stop at the gas station, which was pretty close to the sheriff’s office.

“Yeah, it really was. Thanks for not pushing me to do anything sooner. You have no idea how much that meant to me.”

“I get it. We all need time. Besides, it’s better for both of us if we’re both into it,” I said, which caused her to let go of my hand and put an arm around my waist, squeezing me into her.

It made it a little hard to walk, especially with my gun belt and all the paraphernalia on it, but I wasn’t going to tell her no. We kept walking, chatting about nothing important and just enjoying each other’s company. I didn’t end up going in the coffee shop, because it was empty and the owner was leaning with her arms on the counter, propping her head up in her hands, looking incredibly bored. She gave me a half-hearted wave, so I assumed everything was all right, and waved back.

I decided not to go in because she was very chatty, and being bored meant she’d probably hold me hostage in a conversation for a while, and I didn’t want to use up my morning with Rosita hearing about how slow business was, how lazy her son was, or the kids that kept messing with her garbage out back. It did go against my goal of getting to know the people and becoming a regular sight for them, and I’d have to make it up at the end of my shift when I did my walk-through for real, but I just didn’t feel up to it right now. On my last day shift, I’d stopped in to check on her, and even though there had been some customers in line, she still talked my ear off for almost twenty minutes before I could get myself out of there.

Even though I was enjoying our walk, I decided I did want to go into the hardware store. Because he opened so early, he also closed pretty early, so I hadn’t actually been able to stop in and talk to him yet. I left Rosita outside, since this was more or less official business, and it would be weird for my first conversation with him to be with my girlfriend hanging off my arm.

He’d run this place since I was a kid so I vaguely knew him, but only in the way I knew anyone else in a small town that I didn’t interact with on a regular basis. I wasn’t into working on houses or cars or anything else that would need tools and for anything around the house my parents already had whatever we needed, so it wasn’t like I’d ever needed to shop there when I’d lived in town before.

He knew my dad, however, so that was a starting place for the conversation. I’m not sure why my expectation had been for him to be gruff and distant, but he was actually incredibly friendly and chatty, although not in a bad way like the woman who ran the coffee shop. We only spoke for a few minutes, since he didn’t really have any complaints or anything he needed help with, although he pointed out Orville stopped in from time to time, so he usually mentioned any problems he had to Orville. That worked out for me, so after a few more minutes and a promise to tell my dad hello, I showed myself out.

Unfortunately, that’s the point where things stopped moving so smoothly. Although I’d been inside less than ten minutes, that had apparently been enough time for Evan and one of his friends to find Rosita outside by herself and start harassing her.

“… going to regret saying no,” he was saying, his finger in her face, as I came outside.

To Rosita’s credit, she didn’t move an inch and didn’t seem concerned in any way, other than to look annoyed.

“Is everything all right?” I asked, coming up to stand next to her.

“Evan was just throwing a little tantrum, but I think he has it all out of his system,” Rosita said.

Evan balled up a fist, but a side glance at me with my hand resting lightly but noticeably on my sidearm was enough for him to decide to take a step back.

“I thought you were going to talk to her,” he said to me instead.

“No, what I said was that if Rosita didn’t want to sell her property to you, then you’d better be fine with that answer. I guess I should have added that if you decided to not take ‘no’ as an answer and continued harassing her, you and I were going to have a problem.”

“Ohh, so you go and work for fucking Orville and now you feel like you’re better than me?”

“I don’t feel like I’m better than you, I know I’m better than you. Hell, the kid who helps sweep up around the gas station is better than you. I also know that sixty-one two nine A of the West Virginia legal code says that any person who harasses or repeatedly makes credible threats against another is guilty of a misdemeanor which is punishable by up to six months in jail and a thousand dollar fine. Of course, you wouldn’t be dumb enough to have said anything on a voicemail, said anything in front of witnesses, or put anything into writing, would you?”

I hadn’t actually talked to Rosita about this yet, since I’d been distracted first with the whole food bank thing and second with our night together, but I was nearly positive Evan was just the right amount of stupid to leave threats on voicemails, write them down, or say them in front of other people.

Evan clenched his fists tighter, which only confirmed to me that he had, in fact, incriminated himself.

“Fuck you and your spic girlfriend,” he said, glaring and brushing past me.

If I was being really petty, I guess I could have called that assault on a peace officer, but that wouldn’t hold up and if I really did need to deal with him, he could use a bullshit charge like that as evidence of prejudice against him. Better to let him go and keep an eye on him.

Of course, deciding patience was the best policy didn’t mean I couldn’t twig him a little more, just for fun.

“And a good day to you too,” I said, grinning to give my voice that extra cheerful sound, which got him to mumble a few more insults as he made his way towards the mine.

I knew he’d been moved to the day shift, so I found it interesting he was out here harassing people instead of working. Although I’d bet good money his being out here harassing people was part of his job description. I didn’t know if Orville had any pull to get the company to pull their attack dog back, but I made a mental note to talk to him about it. This was something that barging into their offices and making threats wouldn’t fix. Dixon wasn’t a big company, but they were big enough to have an army of lawyers to make our lives uncomfortable if they wanted to. Hopefully, Orville would know someone in the DA’s office who might be able to help get them to back off.

“I could have handled him,” Rosita said, glaring at him and sounding unhappy.

“I have no doubt, but I know Evan. He may be an idiot, but you need to be careful about underestimating him. He’s petty, mean, and has a complete lack of any kind of conscience, which makes him dangerous.”

“Does him thinking I need my boyfriend to protect me make it any better?” she asked, making it clear she was a little pissed at me too.

“No, but he’s always been just smart enough to avoid going to jail. His being worried about going to jail might be one of the few things that will get him to back down. I wish you would have said something about him harassing you.”

She just shrugged, so I added, “I’m serious, Rosita. You were just talking about how important it was for us to trust each other, and how that was one of the things you liked about our relationship. I agree, but it goes both ways. We’re in this together. I can’t have your back if I don’t know what’s coming at you.”

I think giving her own words back to her was enough to get her to back off being angry.

She shrugged again, but this time without the attitude, and said, “You’re right. I guess when we first started talking, I knew you two knew each other, so I decided to keep it to myself. I knew you weren’t like him, since we’d already talked a few times before I found out you two used to go to school together, but I didn’t want to cause you any problems if you were still trying to be his friend. I guess after that, it was just easier to continue not saying anything.”

“Fair enough, but from now on, say something. Okay?”

“Okay.”

The run-in with Evan over and our sort of first fight, even if it wasn’t really a fight, out of the way, we continued on with our walk down main street. Evan had already disrupted our morning, so neither of us was in the great mood that we’d been in before the stop at the hardware store, and I think we just wanted to be near each other a little longer for reassurance.

By the time we got back to the station, most of the tension was gone. I gave her a kiss and promised to come by after my shift, then watched her get in her car and drive away.

As soon as she was out of sight, my mood dropped again. Evan was a problem, even if Rosita didn’t want to see it. I knew he wasn’t going to let this drop, regardless of any threat from me.