“Four years isn’t a big deal if you’re, say, thirty, and he’s thirty-four… ” Her stepfather was clearly trying to salvage his argument. “But there’s a big difference when you’re eighteen and he’s twenty-two.”
“Really?” Lindsey rolled her eyes, tossing the can into the recycling bin. “Is that the new math? Did I miss that day in school?”
“Honey… ” Her mother sighed again, folding her hands on the marred surface of the table. It was the one piece of furniture they’d had since she was a baby, and she suddenly had a memory of her father-her real father-sitting her on the edge of that table, putting a band-aid on her knee after she’d fallen down and skinned it. That can’t be a real memory. I was too young. I must have seen a picture of it or something… But she knew it was. She had only a few memories of him at all, but that was one.
“Wait!” Lindsey held up her hand. She’d heard Zach’s Camaro pull up in the driveway. “Let me save you some breath. You’re worried about me… concerned about my welfare, that’s all. You wouldn’t even be having this conversation with me if you didn’t love me so much. Right?”
“I don’t appreciate your sarcasm.” Her stepfather’s jaw was working in that way it did before he really got mad, and she was glad she was minutes from heading out the door.
“And I don’t appreciate you trying to tell me who I can or can’t see.” Lindsey heard Zach’s footsteps on the stairs. “I’m not going to tell this guy to come back in the year 2020 because you’re afraid of the age difference. That’s just wack!”
The doorbell rang. That was her cue. “So tell me, mom… which do you hate most? The fact that he’s black? Or the fact that he’s twenty-two?”
“Which attracts you most?” her stepfather asked, leaning against the doorframe, his arms crossed.
Her mother shook her head, waving her hand in dismissal. “It doesn’t matter. Just go, Lindsey. You’re going to do whatever you want to do. You always have, and you always will.”
“You got that one right.” She edged by her stepfather, heading for the front door and the promise of another night with Zach.
“Lindsey!” Her stepfather’s voice was a warning, but she didn’t stop. When she opened the door, there was Zach, waiting in the dusky light, whistling some tune. He smiled when he saw her, glancing down at her long, flowing skirt, his eyes widening in surprise.
“You look nice.”
She snorted, taking his hand and pulling him down the porch steps. “I’m changing in the car.”
He laughed, shaking his head as he opened the passenger door for her. “Don’t tell me-you’re wearing the ‘come-fuck-me-shorts’ under there?”
“How did you guess?” She was already wiggling the elastic waist of the skirt down over her hips when he slid in, putting the key into the ignition. “Thought I’d give you a great big hint.”
“Damn, girl.” Zach glanced over as she slid the skirt down her slim thighs, kicking it into a ball on the floor next to her sandals and putting her now-bare feet up on the dash. Her toes were painted pink. “You sure do make it hard to say no.”
“I hope so.” She grinned over at him, pushing the button to roll down the window and putting her face up to the breeze. “So where are we going tonight?”
“It’s not far.” He smiled over at her as she turned up the radio, leaning her seat back a little and dangling her arm out the window. Her hand danced in the breeze.
“You’re big on surprises, aren’t you?” The air was warm, even though it was near dark already and she twisted to put her feet out the window, too.
“Do you want me to tell you?”
She contemplated this, chewing her gum. “No.”
“I think you like surprises.” Zach steered the car around a corner.
“Good ones, sure.” Lindsey gave a half-snort, half-laugh. “It’s the bad ones that get me.”
“Like what?” It sounded like a casual question, but she knew better. She could feel herself closing, something in her snapping tight. Telling people about what went on inside Lindsey wasn’t ever part of the deal. The good thing was, it was pretty easy to get most guys to talk about themselves.
“Oh, you know, the usual stuff.” She flipped the radio station. “So have you been overseas yet in this war thing?”
Zach was quiet and for a moment she thought her tactic hadn’t worked. “I’ve been on two tours in Iraq, yes.”
“How was it?”
“Lonely.” He shrugged, and she saw his eyes moving over her thighs. She slid down a little further in her seat. “I spent six months in a submarine, five hundred meters under the surface of the Indian Ocean.”
“Six months?” She stared at him, incredulous.
“Actually, eight months on the second tour.”
“But you never saw any action?” She snapped her gum, changing the station again.
Zach reached over and turned off the radio. “I’ll talk about it if you really want me to, but don’t use it to just try and change the subject, okay?”
She flushed, glad for the coming darkness. The next words that came out of her mouth surprised them both. “My father was killed in Iraq.”
“I’m sorry, Lindsey.”
“I was very little.” She shrugged, shocked at herself. There wasn’t one other person in the world she could remember ever speaking those words out loud to. “I don’t remember much about him.”
“It was Desert Storm?”
She nodded, pulling her feet into the car and sitting up. “He was in the army. I guess he got lured in by that whole college education and a free ride spiel.” Zach didn’t say anything, he just drove, but she knew he was listening. “You know, that whole travel to exotic, foreign lands, meet new and interesting people… and kill them?”
“I’m familiar with the concept.”
“Except he was the one who got killed.”
Zach shook his head. “There were only about two hundred total U.S. casualties in Desert Storm.”
“Yeah.” She gave him a wry smile. “Talk about bad surprises. But that’s my luck for you… I inherited it from my mother.”
“So it’s been just you and your mom since?”
“My stepdad came into the picture when I was about five or six.”
“You don’t like him very much.”
She turned her face out toward the window. “So, you never said, did you see any action?”
“I was on a fast-attack sub. We had a few hunter-killer missions. That’s what we were there to do.” He glanced over and she felt his eyes on her. “I take it you don’t like talking about your stepfather?”
“Hey, look at that, we’re here.” She leaned forward as he pulled into a parking lot. “Where’s here?”
“Okay, I can take a hint.” Zach opened his door.
She rolled her eyes as she got out, turning her bottom toward him and rubbing the satin seat of her shorts. “Promises, promises.”
“Come on, sexy.” He smacked her behind on the way past, popping the trunk. “Let’s see if I can top front row seats at Kenny Wayne Shepard followed by an orgasm under the flight pattern of an F-16.”
She raised her eyebrows as he took a guitar case out. “Why… are you planning two orgasms?”
“Could be.” He grinned, slipping his arm around her waist as he led her toward a darkly lit building. She heard music already, a low, steady beat.
She showed her fake I.D. at the door and they went into a little blues bar, smoky and dark inside and packed with people. Zach ordered himself a beer and Lindsey a Coke and she rolled her eyes at that, but drank it thirstily as they searched for a seat near the front of the stage. The band was playing a cover of Stevie Ray Vaughan’s Double Trouble and Zach left his guitar on the edge of the stage, giving a nod to the lead singer.
They gave up on looking for a place to sit and Lindsey wrinkled her nose at Zach as she led him out onto the dance floor, but it was too loud for her to ask what was up. Besides, the music made her want to take her clothes off, and if she couldn’t do that, at the very least, she wanted to be pressed between the sea of bodies, as close to Zach as she could get.