“Put that damn thing out,” her father said as he opened the sliding glass door, joining her on the porch. “You wanna be like me when you grow up?”
“Well, yeah, actually . . .” Madison said, tapping the cigarette with her index finger and watching the ashes fall to the concrete.
“Don’t be smart with me, young lady,” he said, crossing his thin arms as he sat down next to her on the swing. She couldn’t help but notice how much weight he had lost. Her throat tightened. “You know damn well what I mean.”
“How was the doctor?” she asked, even though she didn’t really want to know. She’d prefer to pretend that her dad was healthy, that everything would be okay.
He looked at her with heavy eyes. “Same ol’, you know.”
She nodded, accepting the lie. Her dad sipped from his blue plastic tumbler. Anyone who saw it would think he was drinking ice water; anyone who talked to him would know that it was vodka. Her father had promised his family and doctors he’d quit smoking after the lung cancer diagnosis, but there was steel in his eyes when he told them they’d have to pry his vodka soda from his cold dead hands.
After a lengthy pause, he said, “I gotta quit working. Doc says I can’t be offshore anymore. Too risky.”
Madison looked up sharply. Her dad’s job as a crane operator on an oil rig was their family’s main source of income.
“What are we going to do?” she asked, feeling flushed. “Mama doesn’t make enough.” Her mom earned some money cleaning houses for the well-to-do folks in the next town over, but there was no way it would support them.
“We’re gonna need you to help out more,” her dad said, clutching his drink with his rough, pale hands. “You need to get a job.”
Madison glanced down and sighed. “I’m looking, you know that,” she said, smashing her cigarette on the ground with her black Chuck Taylors. Madison had graduated from Toulouse High that spring. Ever since, she had been trying to find a job, applying for every admin position in town, but there wasn’t much out there, and no one seemed to want to hire her.
“You can’t be picky right now,” he said. “We just need a little bit extra to stay afloat, okay? Maybe you can get a job as a maid like your ma.”
Sometimes Madison would go with her mom to help, and she’d sneak away and sift through the women’s closets, touching all the fine fabrics and trying on the expensive jewelry. But she shuddered at the idea of scrubbing soap scum off of rich peoples’ porcelain tubs. The tired and desperate look in her father’s eyes told her this wasn’t the time to be dramatic, though. “I’ll get something this week, Daddy. I promise.”
He put his drink on the concrete below them and leaned over to pat her knee. “Thanks, darlin’,” he said, his voice shaky.
“Who knows . . . maybe I’ll win the lottery,” she said wistfully. She and her dad had scratched off lottery tickets once a week for as long as she could remember. In the promising moments before she put the coin down to paper and revealed her results, they would each say what they’d use the money for if they won. Over the years, all her fantasies had a travel theme—Disney World when she was little, Paris when she started taking French in school, Amsterdam after reading about their “coffee shops” online—but they all remained just that: fantasies. Now her only fantasy was that her dad would get through this. “I’d give every cent to you,” she added.
“Is that before or after you bought all the things you wanted?” he asked, shaking his tumbler, the ice cubes hitting each other in an uneven rhythm.
“After, obviously.” She chuckled. “So, let’s see. If I won twenty-five million dollars, after the vacations, new house, clothes, car, and party—because we’d definitely need to celebrate—you’d have a cool five hundred thousand for sure.”
“Wow, that’s actually higher than I thought it’d be,” he said.
“You raised a very generous girl, Daddy.” Madison flashed him a smile so wide, she revealed the gap between her two front teeth, a view she normally tried to hide. He smiled back.
The mosquitoes were getting bad, swarming the yard. It had rained the night before, and small puddles of water collected on the blue tarp covering their scratched-up fishing boat.
Madison stared out at the boat. “Do you remember that time you tried to reel that catfish in for me, and ended up falling in the water?”
Her dad chuckled. “That sucker wasn’t no catfish. It was ten foot long and mocking me with a mouth full of fangs.”
“Wasn’t it five foot the last time you told the story?”
“Nah, it’s always been fifteen.” They both burst into laughter.
Madison’s mom poked her head out the sliding door, a wan smile on her face. In the months since Allen had gotten sick, gray streaks had shot through her short brown hair and she had stopped wearing makeup. “What’s all the fuss out here?”
“Just reminiscing about our fishing trips,” her dad responded.
Connie turned to Madison. “You’ve got company.”
She jumped off the swing and ran inside the house, making a beeline for the front door. “I don’t know why that boy never comes in . . .” she heard her mom say under her breath.
“Must be scared of us,” her dad replied.
In the driveway, Cash Romero sat on his Boss Hoss motorcycle, revving the engine. His shoulder-length black hair fell into a messy swoop as he removed his helmet. He shook his head, the strands immediately falling where they belonged. Madison’s eyes trailed his tattoos from his wrists to the top of his large biceps, peeking out from his snug black T-shirt. Heat pooled in her stomach.
His dark brown eyes caught hers. “Like what you see?” he called out with a smile.
“I didn’t know you were gonna stop by today,” she said, giving him a kiss. “Why are you here?”
Cash brushed a strand of her hair away from her eyes. “Just wanted to see how my girl was doing. Come to my show tonight,” he said, grabbing her waist. “I want you right up front.” His face was so close to hers, she could feel his warm breath on her lips.
“I’m kinda in a mood right now,” she said, lowering her eyes. “Put me down as a maybe?” She hated to say no, but after the conversation with her father, she knew she couldn’t afford the ten-dollar cover, or the bar tab. Cash would be onstage most of the night, so he couldn’t buy her drinks, which meant she’d need at least forty bucks for the night. Money was too tight for that.