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“What happens if Beth does start to work here?” I ask, changing the subject.
“No one connected to the club travels alone,” he reminds me.
“I don’t know how Beth will feel about that level of supervision.”
I know she wants independence. It’s one of the reasons she wanted to leave Lindell. She was tired of people always watching her as if she had some sort of trick to perform.
“You’ll need to have a conversation with her,” he urges.
I nod in understanding, but I don’t have a clue how that will work out. It might honestly be enough for her to pull the plug on this entire thing. At the same time, even if she breaks it off with me, she’s still connected. I was adamant that she make her decision when the first plane landed in Albuquerque, but I don’t know that she took me seriously.
“Have you guys decided about your house?”
“My house?” I ask, not even having to pretend to be confused.
“Yeah,” Kincaid says. “All the married couples have a house built. I don’t imagine you want to forfeit that opportunity and move to some place in town. Beth would have to come back to the clubhouse when you head out to work. Might as well make her travel closer.”
“We… umm… haven’t discussed it. I’ll have to get back to you on that,” I tell him.
This whole situation is a lot messier than I thought it could get.
“Just let me know,” he says, his eyes wandering over the neighborhood the entire time we talk.
He might be semi-retired, but the man is still as sharp as a tack.
I’m uncertain if he knows what’s really going on between Beth and me. He hasn’t brought up the fact that I got married so fast, not once. The only conversation we’ve had about Beth besides this one was logistic, about her coming back to New Mexico.
It makes me wonder if he knows something I don’t.
Chapter 20
Beth
“This is our schoolroom,” Victoria says, her voice a whisper as we walk into the area of the home that would normally be used as a den or informal living room.
We started the tour in the front of the house. Victoria welcomed me inside with a smile as she directed me to the massive kitchen, explaining how everyone in the house helps to keep things going in some form or fashion.
Some of the women work outside of the home, but it was explained that a lot of the women have been in abusive relationships since their teen years. They haven’t had many opportunities to work on themselves through education and job training. The majority of them are either in college, or still working on their GED before they can follow through with plans to learn a trade or go to college.
“We had a fundraiser to buy the computers,” Em says with a hint of pride in her voice.
“The community is very lucky to have Cerberus. If it wasn’t for Em and others at the club, we wouldn’t even be here,” Victoria says with true appreciation in her tone.
They share a look between them, and I can tell they are friends. I have many more questions to ask, but I’ll save them for when we get back to the clubhouse. I don’t want anyone around us to think I’m using their lives and hardships as a research project. I know all too well what it’s like for people to speak about you like you aren’t sharing the same air with them. It’s dehumanizing, and I’d never intentionally do it to anyone else.
The far side of the room is in an “L” shape. Along two walls are rows of computers, and I can tell from my recent search a little over a year ago that the ones provided here aren’t bottom of the barrel. Something one might expect in a non-profit organization that has many needs that have to be filled with limited money.
Children ranging from elementary to several that look high school aged sit at the computers, working diligently on different levels of coursework.
A woman I haven’t been introduced to yet shuffles from one raised hand to the next, trying to help all the students. Although she smiles the entire time, I can see that she’s more than a little overwhelmed. I fully understand now the excitement in Em’s voice when she discovered that I’m a teacher.
“Meagan does her best,” Victoria explains. “But she can only help so much.”
Meagan’s frown falters when she looks over her shoulder at us.
“What’s the issue?” Victoria asks her when she makes her way across the room toward us.
“We have a ticket created for help, but it’ll take a day or so for the online program to fill it,” Meagan says, looking back at the student, a teen girl who looks less than impressed with her helper walking away from her.
