Then I snapped, “I don’t sleep with Shift. Gross! Are you crazy?”
He sat back and stared at me again. Then he dropped his fork, grabbed his cup of coffee and stared at me while he took a sip. Then he kept staring at me as he put his coffee cup back.
I was over the staring so I told him, “This conversation is bizarre. Maybe you might want to say what’s on your mind or ask what you want to know, like, straight out and try not to annoy me seeing as I’m not a prostitute, junkie, bookie or sleeping with Shift or anyone like him but instead I’m a buyer at a mid-to-upscale department store.”
“All right,” he agreed immediately. “What the f**k are you doin’ here?”
“Shift asked me to do him a favor.”
“And how does a buyer for a department store know Shift?”
“We had a mutual acquaintance. That acquaintance died,” I replied, just as immediately. “Unfortunately, the relationship didn’t die with that acquaintance because Shift’s an ass**le. He sometimes invades my life and asks me to do stuff. It’s healthier and less of a pain in the ass to agree. So, he asked me to do this, he’s footing the bill and I’m here.”
“No marker?” he asked.
“As in, Shift calling in one?” I asked back.
“Or you givin’ him one,” he replied.
I shook my head. “I don’t want anything from Shift so, no, I’ve never asked and there will never be a time when I’ll need to call on Shift to do anything for me. There’s no marker involved.”
“But you’re still here.”
I was sitting across from him so I didn’t think that merited a response.
“People don’t do somethin’ for nothin’, ‘specially bitches like you,” he noted.
I ignored him calling me a bitch, something Shift and his crew did frequently. I also didn’t get into what kind of “bitch” he thought I was.
Instead, I stated, “You obviously know Shift.”
“Unfortunately,” he answered and this surprised me. First, it indicated we had something in common. Second, it was a five syllable word. Third, Shift acted like this guy was important to him in some way. It occurred to me only then that when he phoned Shift, they didn’t have a heartfelt conversation about his joy at his newfound freedom. In fact, except for Shift (probably) greeting him, he’d said two words to him.
I found this intriguing.
I also didn’t get into that.
As far as I was concerned, I was going to drop this guy off wherever he wanted to go (and I hoped that wasn’t northern Canada) or, more to the point, let him drive himself wherever he wanted to go then I was going to go back to my apartment, my job and my frequent musings about pulling up stakes and getting far, far away from Duane “Shift” Martinez.
What I did do was take a chance.
And the chance I took was sharing, openly and honestly.
So I leaned forward and said quietly, “We’re connected, Shift and me, not by my choice. I do not want him in my life but he wants to be there and he stays there. He can make things difficult for me just being Shift. I know this. I avoid this. And the way I avoid this is, when he calls me and asks me to do something, I do it. He knows where my boundaries are and, so far, he’s respected them. I’m not stupid, I know he’ll push those boundaries and I know I have to get out from under this before he does but it takes a lot of shit to start a new life and I only have half of that shit, the half being me wanting to start it. The money, the job, the destination, all that I don’t have. So, until then, he calls, he asks, I do and he stays in the shadows of my life instead of taking center stage and f**king everything up. Hence,” I threw out a hand, “I’m here. Simple as that.”
His beautiful eyes held mine.
Then he grunted, “Phone.”
I blinked.
Then I turned to my purse, dug in, pulled out my phone and handed it to him.
He took it and slid out of the booth, saying, “You finish, pay the bill. Meet you at the car.”
Then he walked out of the diner.
* * * * *