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I keep the candles going, it feels more relaxed that way, but despite all my chores and setting things right for his return, I can’t help the gnawing feeling in my gut.
Something’s wrong. I just know it is.
Trying to push it to the back of my mind, I remake the bed Parker and I just made love in, even finding the linen press and figuring out how to work his washing machine.
I’m that determined not to just sit alone and worry.
When I finally hear the ancient phone in the hall ring, I almost trip over myself trying to answer it fast enough.
“Parker?” I gasp, gripping the handset and twirling the antiquated cotton bound cord.
“This is Mrs. Parker, yes.” A frail but curt voice replies from the other end.
“Oh, I thought it was… Parker,” I hear myself murmur.
“I am Mrs. Parker,” The voice says again sharply. “Who the hell is this?”
“I’m Naomi,” I hear myself reply meekly. Feeling like I’m being told off by a schoolmistress from another century.
“The dog groomer,” I add quickly, justifying my answering the home phone.
The old woman, who I know in a second is Parker’s mom makes a huffing sound.
“Little late for dog grooming, isn’t it?” she snaps. “I’d like to speak with my son if that’s alright?” she says just as sharply, sighing a short breath as if I’m the biggest insult she’s experienced in years.
“I’m afraid Mr. Parker is out. On call for work,” I stammer, trying to hide the tremor in my voice and failing badly.
“Oh god…” The old woman moans. “I tell him and I beg him… Get out of that damned job,” she continues, her voice sounding more shook up than mine all of a sudden.
I tell her that the beeper went off and he and Moose had to leave within a few minutes.
“I just knew something would happen. I knew he should have stayed here with me, with his family,” she says, her voice dropping, taking on a foreboding tone.
“What do you mean?” I retort, not liking how this old woman is freaking me out.
I was having a bad enough feeling before she called.
Maybe Parker was right about me not meeting his mom until he’d buttered her up. She sounds like a real witch.
“Young lady, I’m old, not stupid. I know when my son packs up and takes off without a word that he has something more than that damned dog waiting for him… Tell me about yourself, Naomi,” she croons, suddenly sounding friendly.
Interested.
“I… I’m really just the dog groomer, ma’am,” I tell her, lying.
Still feeling Parker inside me and tasting him on my own breath.
“Uh huh,” she says wistfully.
“I’ll tell him that you-” I try to start to say, but it’s clear she’s already made her mind up about a lot of things.
“I’ll tell you this, Naomi. A cop husband is a bad thing. Never knowing when they’ll be going out and certainly never knowing when he’ll be coming home,” she drawls on.
That Brooklyn accent Parker mentioned? He wasn’t exaggerating.
“His dad, my husband Percy. Rest his soul. They were partners, see? Detectives. Humph!”
I feel my heart freeze, listening to this old woman is like a warning. Preparing me for something bad I know is about to happen tonight.
That’s what it feels like anyway, no matter what I try and tell myself.
“Has he told you yet?” she asks me point blank, making me wonder if Parker forgot to mention she was completely off her rocker, or maybe he just forgot to mention something else.
“Uh… Told me what. Ma’am?” I ask politely.
“I didn’t think so,” she says, a definite edge to her voice.
“It was just before Percy retired from the force. I’d told him to quit for years. God knows we had enough money… But he just wanted to be with his son. He was so proud a father as I’d ever seen.” She announces triumphantly.
My eyes scan the hallway walls again.
The portraits of Parker and his dad, all their achievements. It’s something I can only imagine being a part of.
I can’t see her, but I can feel the tears in his mother’s eyes as she relays her story.
“My boy… That night. He put himself between the death of my husband, his father… He took a bullet for that man. He took a bullet for all of us!” she sniffs.
I feel my own heart shrink, remembering my tiny fingers tracing the huge scar over Parker’s shoulder.
Feeling him, but not knowing anything at all.
“He was shot, twice. But he kept going once he knew his dad was safe and alive he brought down the bastard who did it. He cuffed him, read him his rights and he followed every rule he’d been taught. All the while his strong arm hanging like a chicken wing from gettin’ shot like that,” she gasps.
“That’s the quality of the man my son, and his father. Well. He had to learn it all from somewhere, didn’t he?” she asks me accusingly.
