You and Me Baby Page 5

  Aiden looked out over the yard. A pool, of course. A hot tub. A fire pit. An outdoor kitchen, outfitted with an enormous grill. A garden shed, beside a neat and tidy set of sprouting plants. And a garage – yes, another – likely filled with expensive cars.

  “Have a seat,” Travis said, lowering himself into one of the plush chairs situated around a granite-topped table where a couple of books and a pen already sat.

  Aiden did so, glancing over at his friend. “So, you’re rich now, huh?”

  Travis hid his smile behind his coffee cup. “You sound surprised.”

  Well, yeah.

  “Did you even go to college?” Aiden asked. “I mean, I thought most rich people went to college, right? Got a bunch of fancy degrees that helped them earn their fortunes, huh?”

  “I tried to go to college,” Travis said. “Then everything happened. After I figured out the business and things started working out with that, I went back. But things were good before then, so it was more of a preference than a necessity at that point.”

  “Yeah, I can imagine,” Aiden said, looking out over Travis’s property.

  “What about you?” Travis asked. “I know you went off to school in Houston, then… well, then, I never heard from you again. I heard about you, of course. All about your job. Like you should talk about people being rich without college.”

  He’d been lucky, sure. For a little while.

  “What does it even matter?” Aiden asked softly, thinking that all that he’d accomplished not so long ago was all for naught.

  “That’s perhaps the most spiritual thing I’ve ever heard you say,” Travis nodded appreciatively. He leaned forward and tapped his finger on the book. “What does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his very soul?”

  Wow. That was good.

  “Who said that?” Aiden asked. “Ghandi?”

  “No, you idiot,” Travis answered. “Jesus said that.”

  “Oh, which means that,” he pointed to the book, bristling just a little, “is a Bible. And you’re trying to convert me.”

  “Just trying to have a conversation with you,” Travis smiled. “I forgot how irritable you are when you’re hungover.”

  Travis would know.

  “I’m not irritable,” Aiden muttered irritably.

  “Then, what are you?” Travis asked. “Because I get the sense that things aren’t going your way lately.”

  Had he said something last night in his drunken stupor? Or was Travis just very perceptive?

  Eerily perceptive. Like Aiden’s dad always was.

  What would it hurt to tell him more? Maybe he knew something about a job, after all, a place to live…

  “I’m out of a job,” he said.

  There. That wasn’t a lie. That left it up to Travis to connect the dots, without Aiden just coming out and saying, “I got fired. I’m a loser. Whoopie-do.”

  Travis looked out over his backyard, his expression not showing his opinion on this either way.

  “Changes at work, huh?” he noted.

  Aiden nodded. “Yeah, something like that.”

  “And what exactly did you do there?” Travis asked. “Field of expertise and all?”

  “Public relations,” Aiden said. “Some publicity stuff.”

  “Ahh,” Travis nodded thoughtfully.

  “Don’t suppose you need a PR guy for your construction business,” Aiden said, laughing to show that he was joking. Kind of. (He’d take a job in a heartbeat if Travis had one to offer.)

  “The houses are their own PR,” Travis said. “We build these neighborhoods, and the houses sell themselves. Small town, word gets around, so…”

  “Yeah,” Aiden answered, trying to hide his disappointment.

  “Why are you back here?” Travis asked softly. “Surely there are better opportunities in bigger cities.”

  Aiden shrugged. Wasn’t that the question, now that home wasn’t as comforting as he thought it would be? He didn’t even have somewhere to live, given the way his mother had acted, and who wanted to move back home and live with his parents in a small town anyway?

  He looked over at Travis, surprised to see such understanding in his old friend’s eyes.

  “I think,” he said, “that I just wanted to come back somewhere familiar. Somewhere slower. Figure some things out, you know?”

  Travis watched him for a long moment. “So, what’s the plan?”

  Who even knew?

  “Uhh, well… find a place to rent for a while. Find a job. Get a car. Start… start living again, I guess.”

  “I know a place,” Travis said, pulling the Bible towards him.

  Oh, great…

  “If church is your answer,” Aiden said, “I retract everything I’ve shared with you.”

  “You haven’t changed a bit, Aiden,” Travis murmured with a smile, reaching into his Bible and pulling out a piece of paper, scrawling an address onto it before sliding it over to him. “This place. Built it as a rental property a few years ago, and the renters very nearly trashed it. I’d like to rent it out again, but I haven’t had the time to fix it up. Too much else going on, and that place has been like a thorn in my side. You could stay there and work for your rent, while you’re sending out resumes and trying to find a PR job.”

  Fixing up a house. Aiden could do that. He’d had a knack for fixing things back in his younger days, particularly the clunkers of cars that he and his friends had driven. How much more difficult could a house be?

  Still, though, why was Travis being so gracious to offer so much like this?

  “For real?” Aiden asked. “Why would you do that?”

  “You’ll be doing me a favor,” Travis said. “If you’re still as handy as you were back in high school, you’ll have that place livable in a few months. Then I can kick your butt out, get some renters in, and start making some money off of your hard work.”

  “Is it not livable now?” Aiden said focusing on that.

  “Can you afford to be picky?” Travis countered.

  Well… no. If he wasn’t paying rent, he could live longer on his savings, so the stress wouldn’t be so high on the job front, at least.

  “But,” Travis grimaced, “this means you’ll be on my crew, technically. I mean, there are legalities with you working on one of my properties. You’ll need to get a physical for health clearance.”

  “Done,” Aiden said, thinking that maybe this would work out okay after all. “I can do it today. Drive into Odessa and –”

  “There’s a clinic here in town,” Travis smiled, glancing at his watch. “Downtown in the old auto parts building. Which is weird, I know, but they do great physicals. Cheap, too. Should be open about now. And you can walk there from here. Only half a mile.”

  “You wouldn’t give me a ride over there?” Aiden asked.

  “I’m giving you a place to live and a job, Aiden,” Travis grinned. “Surely you can walk half a mile on your own.”

  “Seems like the nice thing to do would be to offer me a ride,” Aiden said. “I mean, if you’re all holy now and everything.”

  “You need the exercise,” Travis laughed, kicking his feet up on the table. “And I’m still enjoying my coffee.”

  Fair enough.

  “Well, okay,” Aiden said, standing up, knowing that if he was going to get a chance this early on, he’d take it. “I’ll go get it done, then.”

  Travis nodded at this. “You get that done, go get your stuff from your parents’ place, and meet me at the rent house. We’ll sign some papers and get you to work. Oh, and the keys to your car are on the kitchen table. Laurie left them with me.”

  Maybe things were going to work out after all.

  “Thanks, man,” Aiden said, holding the paper with the address to his future in his hands. Well, the temporary future that was going to sustain him until his real future started.

  “Hey, Aiden?” Travis asked, just as Aiden turned to go.

  “Yeah?” he asked, looking up expectantly.

  Travis just grinned. “Tell the doctor I said hello.”

  A downtown medical clinic. Their small town was looking more and more impressive all the time.

  Except not. The old auto parts store was, in a word, old. Dilapidated, ancient, hazardous, and condemned were all words that would probably fit as well. Aiden surveyed the building with a little trepidation, trusting Travis that this was a good idea, coming here for medical clearance and all, even if he had his doubts just on the building alone.

  Business was hopping, though. There were cars lined up all along the sidewalk and down the street, all just for the medical clinic. Aiden parked the rental car and made his way in, sniffing his shirt along the way, making a mental note to change into a clean pair of clothes at his parents’ house. Surely his mother would allow him five minutes to do that.

  He stepped into the clinic and immediately noted that the inside matched the outside. What a dump. He was about to turn and leave, when the receptionist thrust a clipboard his way.

  “Sign in,” she said.

  “Uh… okay,” he answered. “Do I need to write down my reason for visiting?”

  “No, just tell me,” the receptionist told him, looking bored as she entered data onto the computer.

  Well, it was a good thing he wasn’t coming in here with an STD or anything. Hi, there! I have genital herpes! Because that would be appropriate, wouldn’t it?

  “I need a physical for work,” he said.

  “Company?” she asked.

  “Collins Construction,” he answered, still amazed by Travis and all of his success… and just a little befuddled that this would be his temporary reality. Working for his idiot friend from high school. What a world.

  “Okay,” the receptionist gl
anced over at him. “You’ll need to fill out a few forms.”

  Before he could answer her, she handed him another clipboard with about ten thousand forms on it, give or take a few. He sat down and began filling them all out, his toe tapping to the elevator music they were playing in this place, and his mind already on how he’d find himself another vehicle, turn the rental in, and be all set up to start looking for permanent work.

  Things were going his way.

  He felt that point even further proven when his name was called out fairly quickly, and he was ushered back to an exam room. A shoddy, horrible looking exam room, but he couldn’t be picky, after all.

  “A physical,” the nurse said, looking through his file. “Okay, well, then, you’re going to want to get undressed before the doctor gets here.”

  “Well, we just met, and you already want to get me naked,” Aiden said, attempting to flirt with the nurse… and failing spectacularly as she gave him a pointed look, then deliberately raised her left hand to brush a strand of her hair out of her eyes.

  A wedding ring. Of course.

  “My apologies, ma’am,” he said, meaning that entirely. “So, I need to get undressed and wait on the doctor, huh?”

  “That’s right,” she said, closing his file with a tight grin, then leaving the room and shutting the door after her.

  “Well done, Aiden,” he muttered to himself, pulling his shirt off. “Because it’s smart to irritate a nurse who could poke you with any number of syringes and all.”

  He hummed a little tune to himself as he continued undressing, wondering how long this would take and if he’d be over at his parents’ house at lunchtime. Could he get some leftovers, at least? He was down to his boxer shorts and leaning against the exam table, thinking through the different foods he’d enjoyed yesterday (turkey, dressing, and that carrot cake), and considering the odds that Adam had already eaten all of the leftovers by himself (pretty good, unfortunately), when the door opened.

  And in walked Laurie Roberts, holding his file.

  He stood taller, suddenly feeling very underdressed.

  “Mr. Pearson,” she said, not smiling, not looking up at him, and clearly unaffected by the sight of him in his unmentionables. “Here for a physical, I see?”

  What was she doing here?

  “Uhh…”

  She glanced up at him, irritation already in her eyes. “I’ll take that as a yes. And you’re still dressed.”

  He looked down. No, he was not dressed. And she was just standing here, looking at him.

  “Laurie, right?” he said. “Physicals don’t include being totally naked.”

  “How else am I going to be able to assess anything when I tell you to turn your head and cough if you’ve still got those on?” Just for clarification, she turned her own head, coughed, and then, pointed very deliberately to his crotch, raising her eyebrows as she did so.

  Maybe he was hallucinating again. This was far worse than cupcakes and goddesses, though.

  “You’re not a doctor,” he said, crossing his arms over his bare chest and feeling very self-conscious, even with the clinical way she was looking at him.

  “I actually am,” she said.

  “You’re a waitress,” he said. “I remember last night.”

  “Good for you,” she said, checking something on his file. “And I’m only a waitress part of the time, when my dad needs the help. I’m a doctor the rest of the time.” She looked back up at him. “Alright, lose the boxers.”

  No way.

  “Yeah, I don’t think so,” he said.

  “You need the physical to get clearance for work, right?” she asked, heaving a great sigh of boredom.

  Or maybe frustration. Aiden couldn’t rightly tell.

  “Well, yeah,” he said.

  “I’m the only doctor within fifty miles,” she said. “You can drive all the way out to Odessa if you must, but honestly, I can get a gander at your goods just as easy as the next guy, write you clearance, and get you that job with Travis so that you can... I don’t know. Do whatever it is you do.” She looked at his boxers again, pointedly. “Well?”

  He wasn’t a prude. And she wouldn’t be the first woman to…

  She raised one eyebrow at him.

  Nope. Nope, nope, nope.

  He wasn’t going to let her clinically assess anything, thankyouverymuch.

  “Fifty miles, you say?” he asked, reaching for his jeans, his shirt. “Nearest clinic?”

  “Seriously?”

  “Oh, yeah,” he said, pulling his clothes on. “You say you’re a doctor and all, but I don’t know that I want you to, and I quote, take a gander at my goods.”

  “You don’t have anything I haven’t seen before,” she said. “I mean, I’m a geriatrics specialist, but I do general health care exams, too. All the time.”

  Okay, well that made him less likely to do this thing, if she was going to be comparing his bits to geriatric patients’ bits and –

  “Yeah, I’m not doing this,” he said.

  “Suit yourself,” she said, looking back at his file. “Do you want a referral? Without it, your insurance will probably come back and balk at the fact that you didn’t hit up the only healthcare provider in your network in this zip code, given how you’ve moved back here, and I’m… well, I’m the only one.”

  “Yeah,” he muttered, zipping up his jeans. “I got that. But joke’s on you. I don’t have insurance. Ha, ha!”

  She glanced back up at him. “Joke’s on me?”

  “Yeah,” he said triumphantly. Then, as she tilted her head and looked at him thoughtfully, he reconsidered.

  Joke was on him. How much would it cost him to go to the city and get checked out? He wasn’t even sure what it would cost here…

  She saw the subtle change in his demeanor, in his pride, and the irritation in her eyes relented, just a little.

  “I do reduced costs on physicals,” she said. “Well, for the high school, for all their athletes.”

  His eyes widened at this.

  “I let them keep their pants on, Aiden,” she sighed. “Regulations for high school football don’t require such… um, extensive examinations.”

  “Well, good for all those seventeen year old boys you parade through here, I guess,” he said.

  She shrugged. “I can give you the same one I give them. Reduced cost and all. But there’s a good chance it won’t be enough for the legalities in Travis’s group.”

  It was worth a shot, at least.

  “Fine, let’s do it,” he said. Then, rethinking his words as he started taking his pants off again, he clarified. “Not it. You and I aren’t going to do it. At least not right now.”

  “No kidding,” Laurie said, pulling her stethoscope from around her neck. “Hop up on that table for me.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said, doing as she’d asked. “Hey, you’re not going to take blood or anything, are you? Because I’ve been known to pass out at the sight of it. Or the mention of it. I’m actually feeling kind of queasy just thinking about it.”

  She shot him a silencing look.

  “Or whatever,” he said. “Okay, I’ll shut up.”

  And he did, as he watched her as she came over and began to listen to his heart. She was wearing scrubs today, but her hair was still down and she… she smelled so good as she stood close to him.

  Suddenly, he had no more biting words for each and every one of her veiled insults. He could feel himself shift into a different gear.

  Smoooooth Aiden.

  “You smell great,” he said appreciatively.

  “Shut up,” she murmured, still listening to his chest. “Breathe for me.”

  He took a dramatic breath. “There. That good?”

  “You really can’t shut up, can you?” she asked. “Breathe again.”

  Another exaggerated breath. “Nope. I like talking to you.”

  He liked talking to anyone, but he liked talking to her more than most. Because talking to her meant looking at her, and she was fun to look at –

  “What?” she asked, scowling at him, as she began to check his blood pressure.

  “Nothing,” he said, smiling. “So, Dr. Roberts… your last name is still Roberts, right? Didn’t get married, did you?”

  “I didn’t,” she said as the blood pressure cuff tightened on his arm.

  “Oww, that kind of hurts,” he said.

  “Sorry,” she said, with absolutely no genuine apology in her voice.

  “So, anyway,” Aiden continued on, ignoring this, “if you’re single, you and I should go out sometime, huh? I mean, I’m going to be here for a while, at least, and I’d love to get reacquainted.”