One & Two
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“ It’ s her fault. She’ s the one who got me all worked up and it’ s not like she didn’ t have a good time.” The kitchen seemed to close in on him when he smelled something burning. Smoke rose from the cast iron skillet. Eddie ran to the stove and turned off the burner. The hash browns were hash blacks as he grabbed a flowered, pot holder. He carried the burnt potatoes to the sink and turned on the water, forgetting he wore only sweat pants. Sizzling droplets popped and scalded his bare chest. He dropped the heavy skillet into the sink, denting the stainless steel surface, and backed away.“ Shit! Shit! Shit!” he yelled, dancing about brushing at his chest as steam rose from sink.
Nicole walked through the front door and wrinkled her nose.“ What’ s burning?” she yelled from the entryway. At fifteen-years-old, she was a young, carbon copy of her mom, beautiful and brilliant. Two years ago Eddie made the mistake of asking if she needed help with her homework. The geometry was a foreign language to him and the proofs she tried to explain caused her pain as she watched her father’ s eyes glaze over.“ You really have to study geometry from the beginning or it doesn’ t make any sense at all,” she finally said. She loved her father and saw how much it hurt him that his education had taken second place to his partying. Many of her male classmates seemed to have the same attitude. Most of the time Nicole saw her father on the same level as her brother, Justin, who was thirteen.
Father and son got along great. The“ boys” would play video games and rough-house until something was broken. Mom would yell at the pair and Nicole would carry the smug look of,“ I told you so,” but she also knew her father loved her and would, probably, kill anyone who tried to hurt her or her brother. The weekends were usually capped off with the two guys conspiring to scare Nicole. Sundays always put her on a high alert status, but this weekend she did not have to be on guard. Justin was off with Ryan’ s family on a camping excursion and would not be home until late Sunday.
Smoke billowed above the sink, as she entered the room, tossed the novel, she finished last night, on the center island, and watched her father beating his chest like a crazed gorilla.“ It’ s under control,” he said.“ I can see that,” she replied, only in the manner a teenager is capable. Her eyes rolled and her smirk said,“ I believe you. Yeah right.” Red spots dotted Eddie’ s chest and arms. A few marks made it as far up as his cleft chin.“ What are you cooking, or should I say, trying to extinguish?” she asked.“ Your mom started breakfast and ran upstairs without turning off the stove,” he answered.
“ Tell her why,” Tanya said, stepping into the room. Eddie’ s face flushed.“ Because I made her angry. You don’ t need to know any more than that,” he said, taking on the role of man-ofthe-house and picking up his coffee. He headed toward the family room, turned on the big screen television and began surfing the sport channels.