Dreams of Her Own Read online

  He’d discovered classical music when Ruby had played Beethoven’s “Ninth Symphony” for him one day. He’d never heard anything so beautiful in his life.

  At home he’d be more likely to hear the loud bangs and explosions of action movies, to-the-death video games, and real life action on the streets. Or hear his stepfather yelling and cursing, mostly about him. And at him.

  So classical music provided yet another welcome escape.

  He placed two bowls of soup on the kitchen table and called for Ruby. He’d had many a meal at this table with her and Curtis. Sometimes the only decent meal he’d had all day. Not because his mother didn’t cook, but because he didn’t want to go home.

  Ruby shuffled into the kitchen. “Smells good.”

  “Ian’s special tomato soup and grilled cheese.”

  She patted his cheek then slid up a chair. It warmed Ian’s soul when she picked up her spoon without any urging from him and began to eat.

  Ian took a bite of his sandwich. “I’ll take a look at that leaky faucet after dinner.”

  “And then we can watch Miss Marple.”

  Ian mentally cringed. “You got it.”

  Ian had struggled in school from kindergarten through the sixth grade. By the time he’d hit fourth grade, the school had labeled him both a troublemaker and learning deficient.

  His stepfather, Hank, wasn’t surprised. His performance in school only confirmed what he already knew—that Ian was stupid. Not that Hank was a rocket scientist. Still, he had no qualms with throwing stones.

  After some boys in his school called him a moron, Ian had stood up for himself by punching one of them in the stomach, even if he hadn’t stood a snowball’s chance in hell of winning. This grew into an all-out brawl, with Ian getting the worst of it. He’d managed to get away and had ducked into the first building he came to, the Sunset Park Public Library.

  His lip split and his right eye already swelling, he glanced around for the bathroom where he could clean up a little before going home.

  Already a target for his stepfather’s cruel jokes, when he came home looking like he’d lost a fight, he’d never hear the end of it from his stepfather or his asshole stepbrother, Clint. Knowing Hank, he’d likely be disciplined for getting in the fight. Any excuse to use the belt. Or his fist.

  He turned a corner and ran right into an old woman. At least she’d seemed old to him at the time. Glasses framed her face and brown hair salted with gray was pulled back into a tidy ponytail. She took one look at him and gasped.

  “Son, who did this to you?” she asked as she took his chin in her hand.

  He snatched out of her grasp. “No one.” Fisting his hands in frustration, he turned to the bathroom door.

  “Stop right there, young man. Where do you think you’re going?”

  “Bathroom,” he replied, his chin jutting forward in defiance.

  “That’s the ladies’ room.”

  Ian looked up at the door in front of him and felt the heat of shame rise to his face. He scanned the hallway for another door that could be the men’s room.

  “The men’s room is down there.” The woman pointed down a hall.

  Ian didn’t say anything, just walked in the direction she indicated. Closeting himself in the men’s room, he dropped his backpack on the floor before splashing cold water on his face, wincing as it stung the cut on his lip and beneath his eye. His eye already bruised, he knew there’d be no hiding it from Hank. Maybe he could just sleep here tonight. And every night after.

  Wetting a paper towel, he pressed it to his face, and slid down the wall, contemplating what he should do. He must have fallen asleep because the next thing he knew someone was shaking him.

  “Son, wake up. You can’t stay here.”

  He opened his left eye, the right eye now swollen shut, to see the woman he’d run into earlier stooped in front of him.

  “Do you have somewhere to go?”

  Ian struggled to stand but didn’t answer.

  “Here, let me help you.” The woman took his arm and hauled him to his feet. “You’re going to want to have that eye looked at. Can I call your mom?”

  “No.”

  “Then come with me.”

  Great. Just what he needed. She was probably going to call the cops. Or worse, family services. He yanked his arm out of her grasp, picked up his backpack and headed out the door.

  “Young man, stop.”

  He can’t say why he did, but he obeyed.

  “I have a first-aid kit in my office. I can at least put something on that cut before you go home.”

  Ian turned. “You’re not calling the cops?”

  “Why would I do that?” She lifted her brow. “Unless you have something you’d like to confess.”

  “No.”

  “All right, then.”

  The woman introduced herself as Ruby Sinclair, head librarian, and asked his name. After dabbing on some ointment and covering the cut below his eye with a Band-Aid, she gave him a cup of hot chocolate and some cookies she had in her desk drawer.

  It was the nicest thing anyone had done for him in a long time. Before she met and married Hank, his mother would have kissed away his pain. After marrying Hank, she kept her distance and let him handle everything, while alcohol became her preferred form of escape from a marriage she clearly regretted.

  “Now, why don’t you tell me what happened?” Mrs. Sinclair asked.

  Ian gazed into her kind, warm eyes and felt his own fill with tears. Ashamed, he buried his face in the crook of his arm.

  “Nothing wrong with crying, son. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.” She put her arm around his shoulders and gathered him to her, rocking him like a little baby. This made him cry harder. He should be a man. He should refuse her coddling, as Hank called it. But, God, how he’d missed the warmth of a hug. The compassion in the gesture. The motherliness of the touch.

  Her kindness that day had affected him so deeply that every chance he got, he’d detour to the Sunset Park Public Library to see the woman who would not only uncover his dyslexia, but would teach him coping mechanisms and strategies that would open up a world of learning. And whose influence would change his life. For the better.

  “Caleb? Ian. I’m going after the RFP,” Ian said into his phone as he paced around his desk at home.

  “Awesome! Anything I can do just let me know.”

  “First, you can meet me at the Mansion for the first walk through. Wednesday, two o’clock.”

  “I’ll be there, man. Glad you decided to give it a go.”

  “See you Wednesday. Tell Jillie hi for me.”

  After his conversation with Ruby, and remembering the phrase tattooed across his stomach, he’d made up his mind to go for it.

  Ruby would help, as she always did.

  “How’s my god-granddaughter?” Gloria asked Darcy as soon as she stepped into the foyer, her glass-in-a-blender voice harsh on the ears. Forty years of smoking did that to a person.

  “Or god-grandson,” Darcy replied. “Fine and dandy.” Darcy took Gloria’s hand and placed it on her belly. “He, or she, is happy to see you.”

  Gloria’s craggy face softened and her sharp eyes became dreamy, then she harrumphed. “Tell me again why you don’t want to know what you’re having?”

  “Josh and I want it to be a surprise.” Darcy made a circular motion over her belly, as if soothing the child.

  Millie observed the exchange as she took Gloria’s coat and hung it in the closet.

  “How’s Ian coming along?” Gloria asked, looking up the stairs where the whine of a saw commenced.

  “It’s going great,” Darcy replied. “I can’t thank you enough for your gift. It’s beyond generous.”

  “Pfft
. What are godmothers for?” Gloria tucked her cashmere gloves into the cavernous tote bag she always carried.

  “And Ian is wonderful,” Darcy continued.

  “He did some work in my townhome a few years ago. I wouldn’t let anyone else do it. And he’s not bad on the eyes either, aye, Millie?”

  Millie felt Gloria’s eyes on her and she glanced up in confusion. “I hadn’t noticed,” she muttered.

  Gloria snorted. “Girlie, you’d have to be dead not to notice.”

  “Millie thinks Ian is a thug,” Darcy divulged.

  Heat rose in Millie’s cheeks. “He’s just . . .”

  “All man, is what he is. And he’s great with his hands. I bet he knows his way around a woman’s body. Could probably teach her a thing or two. Great inspiration for a romantic hero, too. And did you see the size of his feet?” Gloria waggled her thin brows.

  “Actually, there’s no correlation between a man’s shoe size and his penis size. The average Caucasian penis is five point one inches long when erect.”

  This factoid was met with stunned silence, deepening Millie’s flush. “I’ll just go serve lunch,” she muttered as she headed for the kitchen and her escape route. She pressed cool hands to her heated cheeks. Just shut up with your random facts, Miss Know-it-All.

  And speaking of know-it-alls, how did Gloria know things? Almost as if she could read your mind.

  She had no doubt that Ian could teach her a thing or two. In bed and out. He could provide her with the knowledge and experience she needed to finish her novel. And he served as perfect inspiration for Hugh, her rake-turned-hero.

  But of course, just like Kevin Hardy, Ian would never give her a second thought. Which didn’t matter, because not even for the sake of her Get a Life List, would she ever open herself up to that kind of humiliation again.

  Chapter 7

  Millie had been a sophomore in high school when Kevin Hardy, a junior transfer, sauntered into her life . . . and into her lonely teenager’s heart. He’d come from Southern California, and had the blond surfer hair to prove it. A star quarterback on his former high school football team, he’d come in and taken over for the ailing varsity team.

  Tall, muscular, with the beach-boy hair and blue eyes, Kevin caught the eye of every female in the school, and possibly Anthony Rigatelli’s eye. Even Millie, who didn’t pay much attention to boys, wasn’t immune to his smile.

  But, awkward at best, she had had no hope of him noticing her, unless being an object of ridicule counted. But two weeks after he’d arrived, he passed her in the cafeteria and smiled at her. And the angels sang.

  Then one day, Cassie Olivier of the long blond hair, dazzling teeth, and swimsuit model’s body, and one of the most popular girls in school, sat next to Millie in the library and said, “I have a secret.”

  Unclear why Cassie would share a secret with her, Millie simply said, “That’s nice.”

  “Don’t you want to know what it is?”

  “Well, if it’s a secret should you be telling me?”

  “Oh, but this kind of secret needs to be shared.”

  Sighing, Millie set aside the copy of Wuthering Heights she’d been reading and gave Cassie her full attention.

  “Kevin Hardy, like, asked about you.” She flipped her long blond hair over her shoulder with a flourish.

  “Oh.” Millie’s heart fluttered cautiously in her chest.

  “Come on. Aren’t you dying to know what he said?”

  Did Marie Curie win two Nobel Prizes? But she kept her you-can’t-hurt-me-no-matter-what-you-say mask in place. “If you want to tell me.” She thought the shoulder shrug was a nice touch.

  “He, like, asked who you were, and was all, like, you looked really brainy, and that like, he really dug brainy girls.”

  In the midst of counting ‘likes’ Millie’s brain skidded to a halt. Wait. What? Could this be true? Could Kevin Hardy be the one to see past her unappealing exterior to the real Millie inside?

  Cassie picked up a lock of Millie’s hair. “You know, you could be, like, really pretty. A little makeup, some cool clothes. He’d, like, totally go for you.” She stood up and glanced in the direction of her friends. “Give it a try. Come to school on Monday ready to impress Kevin, and I’ll set it up.”

  “I don’t know . . .” Millie’s hopeful heart wanted to trust Cassie, but the survivalist in her remained cautious. “Why would you help me?”

  Cassie shook her hair behind her back. “Call me a matchmaker.”

  Millie hesitated.

  “Come on, Millie. Don’t you want Kevin to like you?” Cassie prodded.

  Suddenly she wanted that more than anything.

  Cassie leaned over, grasped Millie’s shoulders and looked her in the eye. “You can do it. I’ll see you Monday. The cafeteria. At eight, before the first bell.”

  Millie watched as Cassie sauntered back to her friends, closely examined the way she walked, how she carried herself, her shiny, bouncy hair, and her clothes. Millie sighed. The Book of Matthew was wrong. The meek don’t inherit the earth. The beautiful do.

  I can do this, she thought. How hard could it be? After all, she had an IQ of one thirty-five.

  She used her hard-earned allowance to purchase the latest fashion magazines and took them home, read them cover-to-cover, studied them like she studied chemistry or philosophy, then began searching through her closet and her mother’s for something, anything, she could piece together. Giving up, she hit the thrift store. After that, using a photo of Sarah Michelle Geller–whoever she was–as a guide, she concentrated on makeup, using more of her money at the local Duane Read.

  When Monday morning arrived, Millie examined her reflection in the bathroom mirror. She’d brushed her long wavy brown hair and secured it with a headband. After nearly putting out an eye with the mascara wand, she’d managed to get more on her eyelids than her actual lashes. She blinked constantly, feeling as if she’d glued on bristles from her hairbrush, and her lashes scraped against the lenses in her glasses. She’d slathered on sticky, gooey pink lip-gloss, and smeared blush across her cheeks.

  Wearing a short denim skirt and a cropped sweater in bubblegum pink, she’d pulled on tights as an afterthought, uncomfortable with showing so much bare leg. She thought the multi-colored striped tights matched the pink in her sweater. On her feet, she wore a pair of Doc Martens-type boots in bright red. At least her feet wouldn’t hurt.

  Gnawing on her lip, she wondered if Kevin would like what he saw.

  Cassie stood with her friends waving to Millie when she entered the cafeteria. Three of the girls spoke behind their hands and then snickered.

  “Millie!” Cassie hauled her to the center of the room. Some of the students were staring at her. “You look awesome! Kevin is going to, like, fall over himself when he sees you. He should be here any minute. Now, stand up straight and smile.”

  Cassie’s Barbie Doll friends, Alicia, Nicole, Megan, and Amber—a.k.a. The Mean Girls—stood off to the side whispering and giggling. A bad feeling settled in her stomach.

  “Oh! There he is!” Cassie said. “Kevin! Over here, I have someone who wants to meet you.”

  Confusion skittered across Kevin’s face, but he made his way over to where Millie stood, her knees practically knocking in fear.

  “What’s up, Cassie?”

  By now, Millie had become the center of attention. Her face flamed, the makeup itched, and she fought not to fidget.

  Cassie’s eyes gleamed. “Kevin, this is Millie Stephens. She’s been dying to meet you. Doesn’t she look amazing?”

  “Yeah, if you like clowns!” one of the other Mean Girls shouted.

  Cassie and her friends burst out laughing, along with some of the other kids in the cafeteria. Others just looked away, embarrassed for her.


  Millie’s stomach knotted as tears filled her eyes, and she bit down on her lip until she tasted blood to hold the sob in.

  To his credit, Kevin didn’t laugh. In fact, he glowered at Cassie and said, “Cassie, you are such a bitch.”

  He turned back to Millie with pity in his eyes, but before he could say anything, Millie spun around and ran out the closest door and she didn’t stop until she’d hit Yellowstone Park, where she slid down behind a tree and sobbed with all the pain and heartache of a young girl who just didn’t fit in. And the truth was, she never would.

  Millie didn’t know what was worse. Cassie’s cruelty, or Kevin’s pity.

  She vowed she’d never do anything to attract attention to herself again. From that day forward, she’d become the invisible Millie Stephens.

  The next day, Ian dashed down Darcy’s stairs pulling on his jacket as he went. Damn drill. The last thing he wanted was to go out into the freezing rain for a drill bit.

  “Oh, Ian,” Darcy called after him.

  Stopping in his tracks, he turned around, “Yes?”

  “How about a hot bowl of soup?”

  He glanced to the back of the house and out the window at the misty rain swirling around in the icy wind. He hated that kind of rain. The kind that floated through the air finding its way into every gap and crevice between you and your clothes, chilling you to the bone.

  “Soup, huh?”

  “Yeah, homemade lasagna soup.” Darcy flashed him a cheerful grin. She knew she had him, and she’d be right. In fact, she’d had him at soup.

  The drill bit could wait. “Smells amazing.” Removing his jacket he followed Darcy into the cozy kitchen.

  “Have a seat,” Darcy said as she chatted away. “I had a burst of energy and a craving for carbs, meat, and cheese. Homemade lasagna soup fit the bill.” She ladled heaping spoonfuls of curly lasagna noodles and ground beef in a rich tomato broth into a bowl, making his mouth water and his stomach growl. Then she topped it off with a healthy dose of shredded mozzarella cheese.