A Writer's Fairytale

Mary: The family

I limped out of the diner and made my way to the book store and tool store. It was a weird combination. When my dad decided to combine with my brother to make one store I had to laugh. I thought that it was an absurd concept. 

“That seems silly,” I had once told them, standing in the middle of their store, watching them slowly get everything together. It was near the end of the remodeling to combine the stories. 

 “Why?” my brother responded. “It makes perfect sense to us. The husbands can go look at tools while their wives look at the books,” my brother said, looking around. “Not saying that men can’t look at books and women couldn’t look at tools,” he had said addressing his wife. She was the fix it person in their relationship, and my brother knew that, everybody knew it, but it seemed to work for them. 

He had a point though, and it seemed to be doing well for how long it was open. I opened the door still sporting my fedora and trench coat. My brother was the first to see me. “Hey, Bill it’s great to see ya.” 

“Mary. How did the meeting go?” The smile was all he needed to answer his question. “I’m so proud of you. When do you leave?”

“4 tomorrow. I came to say I got it and then I have to go to my apartment and pack. Is dad around? I thought that I could also invite the whole family to have dinner together at Rebecca and I’s apartment.” 

“4 tomorrow, so soon?” my brother responded putting a book on the counter. 

“Yeah I’m pretty sure that the prince doesn’t want to be here any longer than he has to be. Is dad around?”  Just then I saw him emerge from the back room. “Daddy!” I shouted. I ran over to hug him.

“Good to see you sweetie. I know you got the job, so the only question I have is when do you leave.” 

“I leave at 4 tomorrow,” I said, letting my father go. 

“4, tomorrow?” he asked looking at me with his big eyes.

I laughed. “Like I told Bill I’m pretty sure the prince doesn’t want to be here any longer than he has to. Besides it’s not like I didn’t already know that I was going to get the job. We had already done most of the discussions. I think they were just doubling checking to make sure that everything is ok.” 

“Well, I’m glad you stopped by to say that you got it. Your grandmother and I were talking we want to send you off correctly and I thought that a farewell dinner would be the perfect way,” he said with a smile.

“I would never not stop to say I got it. I think that is a great idea, I was going to say the same thing, and I would offer to help get things ready for it, but I really have to be going. I haven’t even started to pack.

 “Procrastinator to the end,” Bill said, laughing. 

“No idea where I got that from.” I punched Bill in the arm.

 “Nope none.” He punched me back.

  “Is Jessica upstairs?” I asked, looking at my brother. 

“Yeah. I think she just put the baby down,” he said walking behind the counter. 

“I think I will go tell her that I got it, but then I really must be going,” I said, walking up the stairs. My brother and his wife lived above the two stores in an apartment. Jessica, his wife, was on maternity leave with her first child, my little nephew, Jeremy. He was 2 weeks old, and he was adorable. There really wasn’t much maternity leave for her. She worked with my brother, but mostly my father, running the stores.

I walked to the door. I opened the door and walked in. “Hey,” Jessica said with a smile.

“Hey, how are you?” I asked, sitting down on the couch beside her. She looked exhausted, but very pretty. She was always pretty. She had light green eyes, and brown hair, her brown hair was pulled up into a tight bun. She was wearing a light brown shirt and a pair of jeans. I could see the bags under her eyes. I felt bad for her, it must have been hard on her. Having a kid up half the night, and hearing noises from the store the other half, I was exhausted just looking at her.

“Tired,” she said with a weak smile.

“I can understand that. I hear that is what babies do to a person.” I laughed; I remembered looking at one of the books that my brother had taken from the book store about babies. The very first line in that book was “Babies are tiring, but worth it.” I always thought that line was funny. It never made sense to me. I felt like that first line was something that should have been implied, but what did I know. I wasn’t a mother, and never really planned on being one. You would need to date a guy first, and that was never going to happen to me.

“What about you?” she said with an odd smile. A smile that said she knew something. She gave me that smile more often then I liked. She seemed to always know something that I didn’t, and she wasn’t afraid to show me that fact. She actually liked the fact that I didn’t know everything. She liked that I couldn’t write everything. That every story wasn’t already known to me.

“I got the job if that is what you were asking.” I smiled at her crossing my legs.

“That is great, but I already expected that one.” She was one of my biggest supporters. She was the reason that I was a writer, soon to be an author in the first place.

………………..

I had just got out of high school and wasn’t sure what I was going to do with my life. My father, my brother, and my grandmother were all offering me positions to come and work for them, but none of that felt right. I loved my family, but something was missing. I felt like working for them I wouldn’t be my own person. I would be following the footsteps of someone else. Then one day Jessica heard about a contest that our newspaper was having. It was for people to submit their stories to the newspaper. She submitted one of my stories in, and it won. I didn’t even know until she came up to me one day.

“Hey have you looked at the newspaper today?” she asked, running over to me with a newspaper in hand.

“No,” I told her coldly. I don’t know why I was in such a bad mood that day, but I was. I can’t remember. I just remember being closed off. I didn’t want to talk to anyone. I just wanted to run and hide somewhere.

“I think you should,” she said, shoving it in my face.

I grabbed it from her. “Why?” I said, barely glancing at the paper.

“Look at it,” she said with a smile.

I looked down at the paper. That’s when I saw Mr. M Charles. “What about this Mr. M Charles? Do I know him? Should I know him?”

“Did you see what he wrote?” she asked practically bursting at the seams. She was a child with a secret that she couldn’t wait to share.

“No. Should I have?” I asked, throwing the paper on to the counter in front of me.

“Yes.” She picked the paper back up and placed it into my hands.

I looked down at the paper again. I read the title. I didn’t recognize it. I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to, but I didn’t. I read through the first few sentences, when it hit me.  “Wait. That’s my story,” I said looking down at the paper and rereading the first few sentences. “How did this guy get my story?”

She gave me a crooked smile. “He had connections.” Her eyes were sparkling with every word.

I stared at her for a few moments. “You gave him my story. Why would you give him my story?”

“I only gave the newspaper your story,” she replied, taking the newspaper from my hand.

“Then how did this Mr. M Charles.” I stopped. M Charles, why did that name sound familiar? M Charles. I got it. I tuned to Jessica with the same devilish smile that she had given me. “That’s me, isn’t it?”

She smiled, and then nodded. “I didn’t know if you wanted your name in there or not, so I decided to use something that if you decided that you actually wanted your name, I could say that it was miss wrote on the letter that I handed in with the story.”

“That is brilliant!” I exclaimed. “Why didn’t…” The phone rang before I could finish my sentence.

Jessica walked over to it and answered it. “Hello.” There was a moment of pause before I heard her say. “I will have to talk to Mr. M. Charles, but something might be able to be arranged.” There was another pause. “Of course, I understand.” “I will be sure to tell him that.” “You too. Goodbye.” With that she hung up the phone.

“Who was that?” I asked, looking at her.

“That was the newspaper, they want to see if Mr. M Charles would be willing to write another story for them. They apparently sold a lot more papers today than they have in a long time.”

“And they think that is because of me?” I asked, looking at her.

“They do. They really want you to write another story.”

I smiled. “I think I can do that.” I laughed. “I mean I think that Mr. M Charles can do that.” And that was that. That is how I became who I am. That is how I got my job, because of my sister-in-law, and that is how the world met Mr. M Charles.

………………..

“I am not talking about that.”  She gave me a smile. 

I looked at her for a moment. “What are you talking about?”

“What happened with that guy?” she said, putting her hand on my shoulder.

I looked at her. How did she know? She couldn’t have known. There was no way that she could have known about anything that happened last night. I didn’t tell anyone, and I don’t think that the man was from around here, which means he couldn’t have told anyone, because he didn’t know anyone here. The only other person that I thought who knew was Rebecca. Of course, she probably told Jessica. Rebecca would do something like this too. She probably wanted see if my sister-in-law would have better look than she had had. “What guy?” I asked her. I was going to play it as coy as I could for as long as I could, I wanted to see if it really was Rebecca who had told her, or if Jessica was just grasping at thin air, trying to see if there was something that I wasn’t telling her.

“You know what guy. It’s the same guy that caused your new limp,” she said with a coy smile. 

“How did you know?” I asked and then realized that I still wanted to play it cool and the only way I was going to be able to do that is if I pretended that she was wrong, or at least pretended that I had no idea what she was talking about. “If that is the truth, which I am not saying that it is.” 

She looked at me and ignored the last comment. “About the limp or the guy?” she asked, titling her head with a knowing glance. 

“Both,” I said, looking down at my hands. I wasn’t going to be able to play this coy anymore. I was stuck. She was forcing me into a corner.

She laughed. “They are both interconnected,” she said, looking at me. “Grandmother called me.” When she said grandmother, she meant my grandmother. Her grandparents died years ago, before she ever met my brother. When she started dating my brother my family and I did everything we could to make sure that she felt like part of the family, and she did. She loved us, and we loved her. She was like the sister that I always wanted.

“She did, did she?” I said, leaning back in the couch. “This puts a wrench into my story,” I thought. I am pretty sure that Rebecca is the one that called her, or maybe Rebecca called my grandma and told her. If this is all true I am going to be yelling at Rebecca for days. “And how did she know about what happened?” I asked, crossing my arms. 

“He went into her flower shop,” Jessica said, laughing.

I looked at her for a second. I couldn’t tell if what she was saying was true or not. I couldn’t tell if she was just covering for Rebecca. I was sure that Jessica would do something like that. “What was he doing there?” 

“He was buying flowers for you my dear,” she said with a giant smile. She knew everything that had happened. My brother had told her before she met me, so that she could prepare herself. She had never treated me like the girl that some others did, the glass doll that might break at any point, because of what had happened. That was nice of her. This was one of those times, Rebecca might have backed off a little, but not Jessica, she refused to back off. 

“Why would he do that?” I asked more to myself than to her. I knew what happened last night. If I was him, I would want nothing to do with me. I would want to completely ignore the fact that I exist or ever existed for that matter. 

“To apologize for your knee is what he claims, along with asking you out,” she said, putting her arms around me. 

“Ask me out?” I asked, leaning forward. Already something was off. Something was wrong. There was no way that he would want to ask me after all of the s**t that I had done to him the night before.

She let me go. “Yes. You apparently left quite an impression on him,” she said, following my lead and leaning forward.  

“That doesn’t make sense,” I said again to myself more than to her. I couldn’t figure it out. Why would he care? Why was he trying? 

“Why not?” she said, lifting my chin making me look at her. 

“I was a complete b***h to him,” I said bluntly. There was no use using filler words or adding fluff. I just spoke the truth. There was no fluff that could be added.

“Now why would you do that?” she asked, putting her arm around my shoulders. 

I thought about it for a second before I answered. “Because I didn’t want his help. I never asked for his help. I never thought that I needed his help. I wasn’t about to reward him for his help, help that I didn’t ask for. Help that I frankly didn’t want. I could have done it myself.”

She rolled her eyes. “Independent as ever. Please tell me that you at least are going to go to the date, to apologize for your behavior, if nothing else. You should do that. It is not nice to be a b***h to someone. No one ever likes a bitch.” She was right. I had no reason to be a b***h to him. I never thought that I was going to see him again though, so what did it really matter. Why should I care what this one man thought of me? I had no plans on ever seeing him again.

“When is it?” I asked, though I had no real intentions on going. I had far too much to do to go on a date with the sole purpose of apologizing and giving back his coat, which is something that I still had. 

“Grandmother didn’t say. Don’t you know?” she asked, looking at me with big eyes.

“No. I haven’t been to my apartment since before the meeting, so I haven’t seen these so called flowers.” I didn’t know if I believed her. This all sounded like a giant ploy, a ploy that Rebecca would set up, a ploy to get me to open up. It wasn’t going to work, but that didn’t mean that she wasn’t going to try. 

“They exist, if that is what you are questioning.” She smiled; it was almost like she knew what I was thinking. She had a way of reading my mind, a way of knowing exactly what I was thinking. 

“I am not questioning that,” I said, though that is exactly what I was questioning. I felt like there was more to the story, something more than what she was trying to tell me, a bit of foreshadowing that I was unaware of what was being foreshadowed. “I will see them when I get to my apartment. That reminds me can we keep this between us?

“Of course. I know how protective Bill and your father can get,” she said with a smile. She was really like a sister protecting me about stuff like this. I truly love her.

“Thank you,” I said. I paused for a moment before getting off of the couch. “I really should be going.”

  She laughed. “You haven’t started packing yet, have you?”

  “No,” I said with a smile. “You know me so well.”

  “You are just like your brother,” she said, laughing.

 “I know. Goodbye Jessica,” I said with a smile and a sigh.

  “Goodbye,” she replied. 

I was about to leave when I stopped. “We are having dinner, with all of the family and Rebecca, if you want to come.” 

 “Of course, I am coming. Grandmother has me roped into helping.”

“Of course, she does,” I said, laughing. “I’ll see you tonight then.”

“See you tonight.” She called to me.

I stopped when I got to the door knob. “Where is it going to be?” I asked her, turning around.

“At grandmothers,” she replied. “I believe that Rebecca already knows about it. I think grandmother has her doing something.”

“Alright thanks. See you.” I paused for a moment. I was waiting for her to see goodbye again. I turned around when she didn’t say anything. She was looking at me. “What?”

“I just wanted to make sure that there wasn’t anything else,” she said, laughing. “I will see you tonight.”

“See you.”

“Make sure that you look at my checklist I made for you while you are packing,”  she called to me as I went down the stairs. “If you don’t you will forget something.” 

“Did you have a nice conversation?” my brother asked, seeing me walk down the stairs. He liked the fact that I liked his wife. He once told me that if I hadn’t approved of her, he wasn’t sure if he could have married her. My brother and I were that close, but I would have approved of anyone that could make my brother happy. He deserved to be happy, no matter what that happiness was, and I know that Jessica made him happy.

“Of course, I did,” I said with a smile. “We always do.”

 “That’s good,” he said with a smile.

“Yeah. I have to get going I have to pack,” I said, slowly walking toward the door.

 “I wish you could stay for a while,” my dad spoke, walking in between Bill and I. 

“I do too daddy, but I have to go.” I hugged them both. Then I began to walk away, actually I began to limp away, but I didn’t notice. 

“Stop.” I heard my dad say.

“What? Really, I have to go,” I said, looking at him with an impatient grin.

 “Why are you limping?” he asked, walking up to me.

 I laughed. I should never have tried to get away with just walking and hoping that he would never notice. Of course, he would notice, a volunteer paramedic would notice a limp. “I tripped last night, cut my knee pretty bad.” 

“Do you want me to look at it?” he said, taking my hand. 

“No daddy. It will be fine. I cleaned and dressed it, just like you taught me. I’ll be fine. I must get going I’ll see you tonight. I love you.” 

I heard him say, “I love you too.” And with that I left.