Page 80 of Clara Knows Best

“Y’all have the night you deserve.”

They paused outside the sliding doors so Clara could return the cart. When he lifted the groceries out of the basket, she made no objection. “What was all that about?” he asked.

She opened her umbrella again. “She was one of my best friends until she made out with my prom date. At prom.”

“Oh, yeah? Who was he?”

“Joe Del Amo. Pair of skanks deserved each other.”

“You have been on some bad dates.”

“Right? It was humiliating!”

“What were her felony charges?”

“Drogas. What else? She claims to be clean now, if you want to shoot your shot.”

He may not understand what made Clara tick, but he knew enough about women to let that one go by. “Love when you whip out the Spanish.”

“How’s my accent?”

“Meh.”

She laughed—confident.

He put the groceries into the trunk while she got into the car, and before he closed the hatch stood for a moment in the cold, misty dark imagining that parallel universe where he and Clara were eating chilaquiles by candlelight. The grass was always greener in a parallel universe, he reminded himself. But he knew just how her warm brown eyes would look across the table. He could see her smiling at him. He could smell the dang chilaquiles.

“Think maybe I do have a concussion,” he said as he got into the car.

“I’m tellin’ ya,” she replied supportively.

28

“The man can’t hold his tramadol,” Clara observed early the next morning. Jesse was passed out on the couch where Beck had been five days before. His arm rested in the sling across his chest and his mouth was open. He had fallen asleep immediately after dinner with a new dose of painkillers in his system, and after staying there all night should have looked haggard and terrible, but he looked ready to grace the cover of some sleep-related periodical. Men were always lucky in that way.

“He shouldn’t have gone to work yesterday,” Dr. Wilder replied from the kitchen table.

“He said he’s going today, too.”

Clara had not woken up looking like a model, but she had already applied her makeup in the style that men considered “natural,” her hair was blown out and gleaming, and she was wearing adorable pajamas: matching shorts and a short-sleeved, collared shirt adorned with tiny cherries and Ms. Pac-Mans. Her toes peeped out of furry slippers.

“Jesse, it’s time to wake up.”

He groaned and shifted.

“Wake up. It’s morning. It’s Wednesday.”

He sat up wearily, rubbed his face with his hand, and his eyes traveled, as she had intended, from her feet, up her long, bare legs, past the stone fruit on her clothes to her subtly accentuated lips and eyes.

“Clara,” he sighed, his voice gravelly.

“Good morning,” she said pleasantly. “Are you going to work today?”

“Yeah.”

“Looks like we’re carpooling again. I’m leaving in thirty minutes.”

He blinked up at her a few times. “Uh, okay.”

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