Free Sue and Tom by Buffy Andrews Page B

11
     
    Sue
     
    I jumped in the shower after I got off the phone with Gina. As much as I hated to admit it, she made some good points. If I really stopped and thought about it rationally, Tom inviting Rachel over knowing that I’d be waiting for him didn’t make any sense, unless he was a mean-spirited son of a bitch, and I knew in my heart that he wasn’t.
    Truth was, it was probably just damn coincidence that Rachel was there when I showed up. She probably didn’t even know Tom was out of town. How could she? She probably checked the house, discovered he wasn’t home , and set her plan in motion. Maybe she expected just him to come home. Or maybe she thought we’d come home to find her. My guess is that she never imagined I’d be coming to Tom’s alone. I’m sure she felt like she won the door prize when I showed up with Klondike.
    I no sooner had gotten dressed when Mom called.
    “Suzy, it’s Mom.”
    Mom still calls me Suzy and when she calls she always identifies herself. Kind of cracks me up. Like I don’t know from her voice who’s calling. “Hi, Mom.”
    “You didn’t call me yesterday,” Mom said.
    I sat down on the edge of my bed. “Was I supposed to?”
    “No, but you usually do. But you didn’t so I was worried. Everything okay, Suzie Q?”
    “Yes, Mom, everything’s okay.”
    “Still seeing that nice boy? What’s his name? Tim?”
    “Tom, Mom. His name’s Tom.”
    “Tim, Tom, it’s the same except one letter. Maybe I should just call him T. That way it won’t matter if I can’t remember if it’s an ‘i’ or an ‘o.’”
    I loved the way Mom thought. Sometimes her perspective of life made me laugh out loud.
    “Anyway,” Mom said. “I wanted to check to see if you were coming for Sunday dinner. Your sister is coming and she’s bringing her new boyfriend. I thought maybe John and T …”
    “Her boyfriend’s name is Jack, Mom. Not John.”
    “Whatever,” she said. “Jack is a nickname for John, don’t you know? Like people called John Kennedy Jack.” She paused as if she was figuring out an easy way to remember Jack’s name. “I thought it might be nice for J and T to meet,” she finally said.
    “I don’t know, Mom.”
    “What do you mean, you don’t know? You like this Tim, right?”
    “Tom , Mom, it’s Tom. And yes, I like him. But we sort of kind of had a fight.”
    “Oh for the love of God, girl. About what?”
    I told Mom the vanilla version of finding Rachel at Tom’s, which means I didn’t go into details about Rachel’s nipple covers with tassels.
    “Sounds to me like that girl needs a good talkin’ to,” Mom said. “But I don’t get why you’re mad at T. What did he do?”
    “It’s more like what he didn’t do,” I explained. “Like he never got the key back.”
    “Good Lord, girl,” Mom said. “You’re the Queen of Forgetfulness. What about the time you kept forgetting to put lunch money in Chloe’s school account and the poor girl couldn’t get lunch ?”
    “Did you have to bring that up, Mom, and make me feel like Lousy Mother of the Year all over again?”
    “All I’m saying is that people forget things. Important things. Like putting lunch money in their daughter’s account so the poor thing can eat and doesn’t have to starve. So, what about dinner?”
    “Chloe and I will be there. But I’m not sure about Tom. I thought maybe I ’d talk to him tonight, try to clear things up.”
    “I know you rarely listen to me, Suzy, but I think that’s a good idea. I didn’t raise you to let some little floozy get the best of you. You should have sucker punched her.”
    “Mom!”
    I finally got off the phone with Mom after listening to her tell me about the time she sucker punched a “floozy” at a school dance and gave her a bloody nose.
    I figured I would grab something to eat then go over to Tom’s. I had thought about calling, but I wanted to talk face to face.
     
    ***
     
    Tom
     
    I took Klondike home and decided to