Page 16 of Stone Blind

“One, you’re not buying me any underwear,” Apple said. “I could use more socks, but no, on the underwear.”

“I really had no intention of doing so, but duly noted,” she said, smiling. “Anything else?”

“No fast food for lunch,” he said. “This body is a chiseled machine.”

“A chiseled machine that eats pizza?”

“The pizza was for the kids,” he said, trying to hide the cold slice in his hand from last night’s dinner behind his back. “Do you want me to drive since you’ve been driving every day?”

“No, today you get to take a breather on being in charge,” she told him, looking into the kitchen at Oscar, and speaking to the boy. “We should be back around two at the latest. Do you have questions?”

“No, Jeffrey is okay. He will watch out for me,” Oscar said.

“Good,” she said, looking up at Jeffrey. “He can have snacks mid-morning and mid-afternoon, I would prefer it to be fruit, but there are chips if he wants some. It’s Saturday, so after whatever chores you have, some afternoon TV is okay.”

“Yes, Ma’am,” Jeffrey said, looking at Oscar. “Come on and get you some breakfast. I think Stephen is making waffles.”

To make sure no one escaped having a word with Ms. Helen, she looked at Stephen. “You don’t need to cook anything for lunch today. Chips and dogs are fine for a midday meal. Take it easy today and work on your bedroom, getting things laid out. Are you good?”

Stephen blinked twice, looking at her. “Yes, thanks for asking.”

“Be back soon,” she told them all, looking at Ricky. “Sir, don’t let them bowl over you to get their way with extra snacks and TV time before they have finished the chores.”

Ricky saluted, sheepishly asking. “Ms. Helen, is tomorrow my day with you?”

“Sure thing,” she told him, looking back at the ragtag family. “Be back soon. No strangers in the house, and no forks in the electrical sockets. I don’t know the insurance situation, and we don’t need any medical bills.”

They all smiled at her, including Ricky. Apple only scowled. Helen also scowled as the man took up all the oxygen in the vehicle and much of the space. He didn’t seem that tall or that big, or that muscly, but in the front seat of her Subaru, the space didn’t appear to accommodate his mass.

“You’re good with the kids. You learn all that stuff in foster care?” he asked her, as she pulled out of the drive.

“I didn’t grow up in foster care, thank you very much,” she told him.

“Sorry, I assumed you and The Cherry on Top found each other in foster care and connected,” he said.

“Not true in the least,” she said.

He shifted his tactic, “Are your parents dead, leaving you and Cherry had to make your way in the world?”

“No, my mother is very much alive and living in Chicago with a man named Waldo, with uneven front teeth. He’s covered with an equally uneven gold-plated grill,” she said, “and he greets everyone with aiiii!”

Apple chuckled. “And your father?’

“He lives in New York, and before you ask, he sent an Easter, birthday, and Christmas card to me with appropriate amounts of legal tender until I was 18. He even attended my high school graduation. I moved out from Mom’s and got my own place, but he still calls on birthdays and Christmas, checking to see if I made him a grandad,” she answered. “Don’t have the heart to tell him that will never happen.”

“You can’t or don’t want to?”

“Can’t and don’t want to,” she replied.

“Interesting, so I figured you all wrong,” he said.

“Why figure when you can simply ask?” she asked. “Am I free to inquire about you?”

“I guess,” he said. “I assume you’re going to get personal. To clear up matters, no, to me and Ricky. No to me and young boys. I am a protector, not a predator.”

“Never assumed you to be,” she said. “Are you an only child? I am for both my parents. My father never had any more, or at least if he did, he never told me.”

Apple sat for a moment, mentally cataloguing what he wanted to tell her and facts which seemed pertinent to their current situation. She had intentionally avoided the conversation section about her and Cherry. He wanted her to understand the why of his current lifestyle and the reason for being employed by The Company. It wasn’t his long-term goal to stay in the business of ending lives, but if a child creeper needed to die, he was okay to handle the matter.

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