The best part was Linda’s Miss America Pageant bio. Nothing about living in the ’hood with her rapist pedophile husband. Callie smiled at the selective editing—
Linda Tenant graduated from the Georgia Baptist College of Nursing with a Bachelor of Science in nursing. She worked for several years at Southern Regional Medical Center before joining the family business. She volunteers with the American Red Cross and continues to lend her medical/managerial expertise to the City of Atlanta’s Covid-19 advisory panel.
Callie studied the photograph. Linda’s face hadn’t changed much, except the way that everyone’s face had changed in the last twenty-three years, which was to say that the important stuff had slid a bit lower. The most overriding emotion Callie felt when she looked at Linda was love. She had worshipped the woman. Linda was kind and caring and she had always made it clear that her number one priority was her son. Not for the first or last time, Callie wondered how different her life would’ve been if Linda Waleski had been her mother.
Roger snorted underneath the table. Callie dropped a tiny piece of bacon on the floor. Then another piece because New Dog snorted, too.
She found a map on the site, then navigated to the Mercedes dealership in Buckhead. She clicked on Meet Our Sales Team!
Callie sat back in the chair. There were eight photos in two rows of four, all but one a man. At first, she didn’t read the names. She studied each man’s headshot, looking for signs of Linda or Buddy. Her eyes went back and forth, row by row, drawing a blank. Finally, she relented and identified Andrew Tenant in the second photo from the top. His Miss America Pageant bio was even better than Linda’s.
Andrew loves animals and hiking in the great outdoors. He volunteers most of his weekends at DeKalb’s no-kill shelter. An avid reader, Andrew enjoys the fantasy novels of Ursula K. Le Guin and the feminist essays of Mary Wollstonecraft.
Callie gave him little credit for the thick layer of bullshit. He should’ve mentioned Hamlet, because shethinks the rapist doth protest too much.
If there was none of Linda or Buddy in Andrew’s face, she saw absolutely no sign of Trevor, either. In fact, Andrew was wholly unremarkable compared to his fellow frat-boy-attractive car dealers. Strong jawline, neatly combed hair, closely shaved face. His dark blue suit was the only thing that gave him away. Callie could tell by the stitching around the lapels that an actual human being had sewn it. His shirt looked equally expensive—light blue with stripes just a shade darker. The tie set it off, a vivid royal blue that brought out the color of his eyes.
His sandy hair was the only attribute he shared with his father. Andrew had the same thinning at the temples, half-scoops taken out of his hairline. Callie could remember how embarrassed Buddy had been about losing his hair. I’m just an old man little dolly why do you want anything to do with me what do you see in me come on tell me I really wanna know.
Safety.
Buddy had never sucker-punched her at the kitchen table. At least not until the end.
So.
They had argued a lot, mostly about Callie wanting to spend more time with him. Which was crazy because, almost from the beginning, she had hated spending time with him. And yet there she was, telling him she was going to quit school and he was going to leave Linda and happily-ever-after blah-blah-blah. Buddy would laugh and give her money and then eventually, sometimes, he would take her to hotels. Nice ones at first, before everything turned seedy. They ordered room service, which was Callie’s favorite part. Then, he would get down on his knees and take his time pleasing her. Buddy was so much bigger than Callie that everything else he did hurt.
And toward the end, the everything else was all that he had wanted to do, and he always wanted to do it on the couch. Stop crying I’m almost there Jesus Christ you feel so good I can’t stop baby girl please don’t make me stop.
The bathroom door banged open. Phil hacked out a wet hairball of a cough. Her Doc Martens clomped up the hallway. Callie closed Andrew’s bio page. She was back in her chair when Phil returned to the kitchen.
“What’ve you been up to?” Phil demanded. She’d plastered on her war paint, a goth version of Mrs. Danvers if Mrs. Danvers favored spiked dog collars and had a nose piercing and instead of loving Rebecca had scuttled the uppity bitch’s boat during an alcohol-fueled bender.
Callie asked, “ What is anybody ever up to?”
“Jesus, you’re so fucking squirrelly.”
Callie wondered if her mother’s Sid Vicious T-shirt was meant to be a celebration of a suicidal heroin addict or if she just liked the anarchy symbol in the background. “Awesome shirt, Mom.”