You'll Know When You Have Kids of Your Own

Chapter 12

What Might Have Been

Bob Coleman smiled as he slowly made his way to the kitchen door. Opening it, he saw Rusty along with two other girls her age and a boy, who was pushing a hand truck loaded down with some equipment.

"Rusty," he said fondly, "Good to see you. I was afraid you'd forgotten about me."

"No way, BC," the girl laughed. "These are my friends, Ani, Emily and Jake," she grinned. "They were dumb enough to help me out."

A moment later, an older man and another teen boy appeared, with a folding pushcart, laden down with five gallon pails and painter's dropcloths. He smiled, and stepped up to offer Bob a hand.

"I'm Ani and Jake's uncle," he explained. "Name's Matt Robertson, and that's my son Nicky. I'm just hauling this stuff for them and getting them started. Can't stay long, got another job waiting."

Bob felt a firm grip and hands not a stranger to physical work. "I'm still not getting what's going on," he admitted.

"My Dad said you were talking about painting the place," Rusty explained. "He sent me money to buy paint for you, and we're the slave labor."

"Wait a minute, Les didn't have to-"

"He's got the money, BC. He's doing good on the road. He and I both appreciate what you've done for us, so we wanted to say thanks this way." She indicated the teens behind her struggling into painter's coveralls. "They're kinda collateral damage."

"I'll say," laughed Emily. "It's a lot of work being your friend, Michaelson."

Matt pointed at the pails of paint. "That stuff is spec grade, the kind they use on schools and commercial properties. It'll last twice as long as regular house paint, and it didn't cost Rusty's dad extra. I bought it for him off a friend of mine who's a commercial builder when a client changed their mind about the color on a project. I had it tinted to match your existing house color, since Rusty said you'd be okay with that."

"I had Mister Robertson drive by to check out the color," Rusty admitted. "Kind of wanted it to be a surprise."

"The kids will power wash, caulk and tape today," Matt explained. "Nicky will handle the power painter tomorrow morning. Today they're doing all the time consuming stuff. Once the surface is prepped, and the windows taped, the actual painting will take only a few hours."

"The windows are pretty new, Dad," Nicky reported, uncoiling the pressure washer hoses. "Only need to be masked off."

"Had them put in a few years back, when the utility company was offering a rebate for double-paned windows," Bob explained.

"Okay, that makes things a lot simpler," Matt nodded. "Jake, let's get you and Nicky started with the washer. The girls can move stuff out of the way, and apply the spot cleaners with those spray bottles. By the time you boys all get around the house and break for lunch, it'll be dry enough for you guys to start caulking the gaps you find, and masking and taping the windows, light fixtures, and all that." He handed his niece a screwdriver. "Ani, take the house numbers off and put them somewhere they won't get lost. When you have a chance, wirebrush them off and spray them with that can of satin black paint. They'll be dry by tomorrow, so we can put them back on after the house paint dries."

"Nicky, first thing I want you to do after the power wash is to spray paint the exterior light fixtures. Take off what comes off, mask the glass and paint. Tomorrow, I want you to tape and mask the fixtures before we shoot the house paint."

"I really appreciate you kids doing this," Bob smiled as he paid the pizza delivery girl.

"Not at all," laughed Ani. "It's going pretty fast with Nicky bossing us around."

"Hey, Nicky's the only one here that knows how this stuff works," Emily defended, earning a grin around a mouthful of pizza from Nicky.

"Jeez, don't get all bent about it," Ani shot back. "Just giving my cuz a hard time." She wrinkled her nose. "Hey, guys, you're supposed to breath air, not pizza."

"Hungry," grunted Jake.

"Oink," nodded Rusty, giving him a playful poke in the belly.

Bob handed Rusty her camera. "Nice shot of a good bunch of kids," he smiled, before turning to go back inside. He'd missed his usual nap, helping out where he could.

Rusty studied the image on the screen. It hadn't been that long ago that these kids were just faces that she kind of recognized in school, and now she could call them her friends without hesitation. Not that long ago she would have been reluctant to have them know where she lived, sharing a little cottage with her father in the back of some old guy's run down house. Especially these kids, who lived in a much nicer neighborhood and had way nicer stuff than she did.

The parents of her friends were pretty cool. They didn't make her feel like a poor person. Ani and Jake's mom had pulled her aside one night after dinner and had come out and told her that she honestly admired her, that she thought she had remarkable strength of character for such a young woman. Daria Lane, the famous writer, had made it clear to Rusty that she had her respect.

Sitting on the porch of the tiny cottage, after a long day of work, she looked around. Yeah. She didn't have anything to be ashamed of. She had her self-respect, and despite the ups and downs of her life so far, she had her honor. Her friends weren't superficial; she had thought that it was just Jake that gave her more credit than she felt she was due, but it turned out they all did. She might be poor compared to her friends, but they liked her for who she was and not what she owned.

She had friends that wouldn't take no for an answer. She was ready to paint BC's house by herself, even if it took a month of whatever spare time she had. Instead, they had thrown their lot in with her. Ani and Emily declared that there was no way she was getting out of practice that easy, and Jake had gotten on her case about her even thinking that he might be too busy to help. Rusty had a feeling that Nicky would have been willing without Emily dragooning him into it.

The teens were relaxing, having all they needed to do prior to painting tomorrow; Nicky's dad would be by to pick them up after installing whatever it was he and Nicky's mom had been making for that new building downtown.

She looked over at Jake. He was looking over her dad's old guitar, sighting down its neck, tapping on the top. She knew what he was thinking, and smiled. The guitar would be coming back to Jake's workbench with them, and there was nothing she could do about him spending more time on it than it was worth.

The knot inside that had kept telling her to be real was beginning to loosen just a bit. He'd been careful not to push; they were taking it very slow. She knew that they were young, probably too young to be in a serious relationship. He'd only turned fifteen in the fall, and she'd had her sixteenth birthday not much later than that. Still, he wasn't like any other guy she'd met.

It was confusing to her. She'd be lying to herself if she didn't admit that Jake was her best friend. He just got her, and she herself could pretty much finish his sentences in her head, most of the time. Sometimes he surprised her, but he rarely disappointed her.

She lay down on the porch, more than pleased with the day's work they'd just put in. Nicky said that the actual painting would go much faster than cleaning up would, thanks to the commercial power painting rig that his dad had borrowed from one of his contractor friends. He'd be the one running the paint gun, and the rest of the crew would be making sure the paint would go on the house and not on the lawn and the shrubbery around the front. The girls had spent a couple of hour pruning the plants so that they were clear of the walls.

"Hey, our ride's here," Ani called out. "Get up, you two."

Rusty opened her eyes. When did I take hold of his hand?

Robert Coleman was tired, but sleep eluded him. He hadn't realized how much he'd missed having Rusty around. It was outright lonely around here, what with Les on the road touring with that band, and Rusty temporarily moved in with Les' boss's family.

She was a good girl. Took care of her father, and, truth be told, him as well. The girl checked up on him, cut his lawn, changed his light bulbs, and a million other things without his asking.

Good kid.

Wonder how Mike and…Elaine… and…

He sighed. They were better off without him.

He had no excuse for what had happened. Carla had every right to take off with the kids before he'd done any more damage. It would have been better if he had died in 'Nam, would have been so much simpler.

It didn't matter. He was dead to them. The urge to wonder what might have been rose like bile in the back of his throat, and he forced it down. He had not let himself tear up in mourning for more than forty –five years and he was not about to start now. He had cleaved away his right to be a part of their lives. That was the way it was then, and nothing had changed.

God, he needed a drink. Maybe something stronger.

But no, his damn liver couldn't take any more abuse. The Doc made that crystal clear.

He got out of bed and shuffled to the bathroom. Wrestling off the cap, he shook the last two Ambien tablets out of the bottle and dry swallowed them.

Forcing the thoughts of his own ruined life away, he lay back on his bed and remembered watching Rusty and her friend- what was his name? Jacob?

That had made him smile. Teenagers, still too young to have made a mess of things, with plenty of opportunities for that later. Hopefully, much later, when they would have the experience and wisdom to make better choices than he ever did.

Clearly the boy could see what a treasure Rusty was. He better, although Bob doubted that he could do much in the way of defending the girl. She was a scrapper, that one. She took care of herself.

Jake shut off the paint pump and lifted it up onto the cart. It was amazing how quickly this was going; Nicky was already halfway around the house.

Rusty met him with the heavy extension cord and helped him move the machine onto level ground. Ani and Emily were carefully pulling off the cloth off the shrubs, taking care not to let the fabric touch the freshly painted wall.

Nicky waited impatiently, paint wand at the ready. Jake lowered the hose into the new bucket of paint and turned the pump on. Emily had already gotten into position with the overspray shield on the pole, keeping the paint from hitting the edge of the roof.

"Jeez, it's hard keeping up with him," Rusty laughed.

"Paint's his thing," Jake grinned. "Usually not on this scale, though."

By the time they took a break for lunch, the paint was on the house, and Nicky had already flushed and cleaned the painting rig. The only big thing left was to strip the masking and tape off, which had to wait until the paint had begun to set.

Emily and Ani were discovering just how quickly that happened and were busy trying to brush flecks of dried paint out of their hair. Rusty had more sense than that; she'd figured out what the hoods on the coveralls were for. By the time she'd caught up with the other two girls, Emily's black hair looked like she had a terminal case of dandruff.

Jake felt good about helping Rusty. Not just because she was more than his best friend, but simply because it seemed like a good thing to be doing. The old man didn't seem like he had a lot of money stashed away; the house was in decent basic shape, what with the newer windows and what looked like a good roof. Still, when they had gone inside for lunch, it was clear that he lived frugally. The place was clean, but the furnishings had seen better times.

Bob had a computer, even older than the one Walt had in his workshop. Jake had seen what looked like a phone line running to it- he had heard of dial-up connections, and maybe that was what it was. It even had an old style monitor, one of those humongous things that you'd sometimes see in old movies. His TV wasn't much newer, and he even had one of those old VCR things with the flashing 12:00 sitting next to it.

The weird thing was that there was almost nothing on the walls. No artwork, no photos, nothing. There were a few small photos on the mantelpiece, and a few snapshots of Rusty and her dad stuck to the refrigerator.

It wasn't anything like he'd seen before.

It was a lonely place. He couldn't imagine living there.

As they finished cleaning and putting things away, it seemed as though just having them around had cheered him up, even if just a little.