The Difference Between You and Me(52)
“Not really. No.” Jesse keeps her voice light and disengaged. “I told you, I’m not thinking about that at all. I have, like, real problems to deal with.”
Arthur raises his eyebrows. “I see. Well, that’s fine. We don’t have to talk about this right now.”
He gets up and goes to leave the room. When he’s almost at the door, Jesse calls after him. “I just don’t want to live in a cave, okay?”
Arthur stops and turns to look at her.
“What do you mean, ‘live in a cave’?”
“I mean, I don’t want to live in the dark with, like, piles of junk and garbage everywhere. No matter what happens I just want you to always get dressed in the mornings. And sleep in your own bed.”
Arthur considers his response, as always. “I don’t know exactly what you’re referring to,” he says carefully, “but I hear that you’re worried that something might happen that would cause me to neglect our daily routines. And you don’t want that.”
“No I don’t!”
“You want me to keep taking care of myself, and you, even if something happens to disrupt our life.”
“Yes.”
Arthur crosses the living room to sit down on the couch beside his daughter. Jesse pulls her legs up close to her chest to make room for him, and he puts his arm around her bent knees.
“You know, I’ve had the funniest feeling lately, like I want to try to build something with my hands. You know how terrible I am with power tools, so nothing big, just something small for the yard. Like a birdhouse, maybe. I don’t see clients until four forty-five. You want to come with me to the hardware store and get some supplies? And then maybe we can work together on a little building project?”
“Okay.” Jesse leans down and puts her cheek on her father’s arm. She feels him bend to kiss the back of her head.
“Something tangible,” he says, into her too-long hair. “Something solid, that won’t go away.”
***
Arthur holds the door to Murray and Sons Hardware open for Jesse, and it tinkles nostalgically as it falls closed behind them. The store is dark and smells like paint, tar, and chalk.
“Somewhere in here I know they’ve got birdhouse kits,” Arthur says thoughtfully, more to himself than to Jesse. He disappears down the Plumbing and Electrics aisle, and Jesse wanders down Screws and Brackets, letting her fingertips dip into and get nipped by each box of sharp metal barbs.
“Help you, dude?” Jesse turns and looks up into the baseball-cap-shaded face of Mike McDade. When he sees her he takes a step back and begins to stammer. “Oh, sorry, I mean, sorry, I just—”
“It’s cool,” Jesse says automatically.
“I just, I thought you were a guy from behind.” Mike is obviously flustered; he’s also obviously never heard of quitting while he’s ahead.
“Yeah,” Jesse says. “I get it. It’s cool.”
Mike nods. They stand there, waiting to see what will happen next. Jesse’s mind is racing. She thinks, I’ve kissed her a hundred times. You’ve never even heard of me. Her tongue was in my mouth only days ago. You don’t know anything about me. You get to kiss her today and tomorrow and probably for the rest of your life. I’ll never touch her again. You don’t even know my name.
“Jesse, right?” Mike says experimentally, pointing a little finger gun at Jesse’s chest.
Surprised, Jesse nods.
“From Vander.”
She nods again.
“Are you, like, one of the ones doing the whole anti-StarMart thing?” Jesse’s mouth falls open in surprise. “I don’t know, maybe that’s not you, I don’t know.”
Mike swallows hard. He’s more awkward than Jesse would have imagined, only having ever watched him operate from a distance. He always looked so relaxed and confident from afar. But he has a certain nerdiness to him, a certain hesitancy. It throws her off.
“Yeah,” she says, “I am. I mean, I was.”
“Oh, you quit?”
“I didn’t—I sort of—no. No. I’m still doing it.” Jesse makes a mental note to call Esther tonight and pick up where they left off.
“So it was you who put those flyers up?” Jesse nods. “Cool. Cool. I was just wondering, like, is there some way I could get involved in that?”
Jesse pauses, squints up at Mike. “You want to help fight StarMart?”
“Yeah, it’s just…” Mike moves in a few inches toward Jesse and lowers his voice confidentially. “You know, this place has been here, like, sixty years.”
“This place? Murray’s?”