The Prayers in Rossford

Dancing

“Mom!”Layla shouted, as they were donning their jackets and heading out the door, “We’re going to the mall. To shop for prom.”

“Layla!”a voice called. But it was Simon Davis who slid out of the parlor, not Adele.

“Yes?” she said cautiously.

“Can I talk to you a moment?”

Dena looked at Layla who said, “I’ve been called into the teacher’s office.”

“Ah, yes,” Simon said, steering Layla into the kitchen. “But I might be the one in trouble.”

In the kitchen, Simon said, “I’ve been seeing your mother a while now. And… I think it’s time for something to happen. And… I think I should ask your permission.”

“You want to start sleeping with my mother?”

“Ugh!”

Layla looked at him.

“Not that it’s ugh,” Simon said. “It’s ugh that you would say it because… Actually, it wouldn’t be ugh at all.”

Layla put her hand up. “That’s enough.”

“I just meant…”Simon Davis said. “How does your mind work?”

Layla shrugged. “Apparently like you just heard. But I guess I was wrong.”

“Yes,” Simon said sharply. “Yes. You are quite wrong. I would never… ask that. Not to you.”

Simon reached into his pocket and pulled out a little black box. Before he could even open it, Layla shrieked.

“Layla!”Simon made to put a hand over her mouth.

“Oh… my… Are you serious?” Layla began.

“You haven’t even seen it?”

“I don’t have to. I saw the box. I assume the rock is big. I mean, you wouldn’t get her anything chintzy.”

“Then you’re okay with it?”

“Yes. And even if I wasn’t, I’d be gone in the fall. And the house is too big for just her. Yeah. Or are you all moving? I love this house. Don’t move.”

“Layla, I haven’t even asked her. But,” Simon said, after a while, “You do think it’s a good idea?”

“Yes, I think it’s a great idea.”

Then Layla said, “Simon?”

“Yes?”

“Does that mean you are sleeping with my mother?”

“Layla!”

“Alright, alright!”Layla put her hands in the air and walked out of the kitchen, toward her friends, murmuring, “I mean… we’re all grown ups, right? We can handle some truth.”

“Look, everyone’s going on about prom, and I’m sick of it,” Will said.

“No date?” Bren said.

“Sheridan, get out of my chair,” Will said, removing his brother who pouted, and said, “You don’t own that chair.”

Will ignored him, and sat down indicating seats for Brendan and Milo.

“Well, Milo’s the only one who’s going to be taking a date to prom, anyway,” Brendan said.

“And I’ve got my own problems.”

“Which are?” Brendan said.

Will looked at Milo. Milo looked at Will, and Brendan said, “Com’on, guys. Are you keeping something from me?”

“Nothing…”said Will.

Brendan looked at him.

Milo said, “Nothing big, he means.”

Brendan frowned at him, and then said, “Well, fine then.”

“And you do have a date,” Milo said.

“Who?” Brendan looked at him.

“You’ve got Kenny.”

“Kenny is in college. And… Kenny is a guy.”

“You could bring him.”

“I don’t think they’d even like that at Rossford High. And we don’t go to Rossford High. We go to Saint Barbara’s where boys do not bring their boyfriends, so I’ll be stag.”

“Well now, actually… I was just thinking….”Milo said. “If you and Will went together, that would be something.”

“That’s right!”Will snapped his fingers.

“And then I thought, well then you might as well just bring Kenny.”

Will, who had been cheered for a brief second at the prospect of a date, even if it was Brendan, was instantly upset, but said, as a friend, “That is true. You might as well just bring Kenny.”

“I guess. If he wants it.”

“I bet he will,” Will said, encouragingly.

The sky was indigo set with gold along the horizon when they were leaving Will’s, and as they came down the steps of the hill, leading to Bryant Street, Milo said, “Bren.”

“Yeah?” Brendan screwed his face against the light.

“You got a date. I got a date.”

“I know. I have a date!”

“Will doesn’t have a date.”

Brendan looked at Milo.

“We’re his friends,” said Milo. “We gotta get Will a girl.”

“She hates the dress,”Nell declared, scrubbing the counter harder and harder and wringing out the cloth into the sink. “She… is utterly… disappointed,” she said, scouring. “And she hates it. And she hates me.”

“No she doesn’t,” Adele said. “You don’t know how lucky you are. How lucky we are. This is the age a girl cuts up, and the most trouble you’ve had is Dena doesn’t like her dress.”

“And your troubles with Layla?”

“None,” Adele said. “Cause I have the sense not to buy her clothes and I hold my tongue about what I don’t like. Besides, the last year and half has been hard enough.”

“Finally a divorced woman.”

“Yes,” Adele lifted her bare finger. “And Hoot actually tried to get the ring back.”

“I heard there is this shop where you can sell your wedding ring,” Nell said. “This woman sold hers and with the money went on a trip and met a man she got engaged to. And then they came back and bought a ring from that same place. Someone else’s lost dream to swap for hers.”

“That’s a sweet little story,” Adele said.

“Maybe I should just get up and meet a man. That’s my problem, you know? I need to get up and… just meet someone.”

“You’re still smarting over Bill.”

“I’m not,” she began. Then she looked at the worried dishcloth in her hand and said, “Hell.”

Adele put her hand up. “Hey, it’s okay.”

“No it’s not,” Nell said. “How could it have ever been okay?”

She turned on the hot water and rinsed her hands in the sink. “How could I have ever thought it was okay? How could I have let myself care about him?”

“Love him.”

“Care about him,” Nell insisted, and then said, “Well, whatever. Love him. It doesn’t matter. He’s back with whatever her name is and more power to him.”

“You didn’t intend it,” Adele said. “And he didn’t intend it either. You were lonely because for fifteen years you haven’t had a man to love and for the same amount of time he’s had a woman he can’t. And… who the hell knows who’s the less lonely now? Give yourself a break. Especially about this whole Dena hating you. Where the hell did that come from?”

“Not hate,” Nell said, “so much as despise.”

Adele raised an eyebrow.

“She must.I wanted to be like my mother. Her life was so exciting. She’d done so much. She still does so much. I wanted to be her. And then, after Kevin was gone, after I was living here, and I had the house I felt like I had let her down. By being this boring daughter. This daughter who couldn’t even make something as drab as a marriage work.

“I felt too tired to try to make it work again. Or make much of anything work. And now… I can’t imagine–I can’t believe that Dena would ever want to be like me, would look at me and say anything else but, please don’t let me turn out like this sad old woman.”

Adele wanted to say something like, “I’m sure that’s not true.”For the majority of Dena and Layla’s lives, Kevin had been gone and Nell had been alone, not making so much as an effort to change her life. Adele never thought about this. But the moment Hoot left was the moment Adele made every effort to build a new life for herself, and now she couldn’t help comparing herself to Nell. She would never have given the time of day to a married man. She would never have kept company with Bill Affren. She found it amazing that Nell had been gullible enough to do both, and knowing Dena, her own goddaughter, who had a drive and a fire unlike either of her parents, Adele was not entirely sure the girl didn’t feel exactly the same.

“That’s a crazy idea,”

“I don’t know why,” Milo said.

“Because it is,” said Layla. “This is not the 1700’s. Or the Third World. You can’t just find someone a girl.”

“Look, Layla, we’re not trying to make an arranged marriage,” Brendan said.

“We’re just trying to find a date for Will.”

“Did you find a date for yourself?”

“I’m taking Kenny?”

“Are you serious?”

Brendan bawked at her.

“Why shouldn’t I be serious?” he demanded, folding his arms across his chest.

Layla put her hands up in the air and said, “Fine. Forget I said anything. But, I don’t know what you want me to do about Will and his date.”

“Help us find a girl,” Milo said.

“You think I know some girls you don’t?”

“I think you’d have more influence,” Brendan said.

“And besides,” Milo added. “We thought you’d have an interest in it since… You know?”

Layla looked at him.

“Well, he would have had someone if… you had’ve stayed with him.”

Layla looked at Milo and said, “So when I learned that Will was likely to leave me as soon as he went off to college, I should have stayed with his ass just so he could have a date to prom?”

“That’s not exactly what I meant.”

“But you did mean that it was sort of my fault he was single, so I might want to help him find someone. Right?”

“When you put it that way…”Milo began.

“Actually,” Brendan said, “I think that’s exactly what we meant. It was stupid of us.”

“Yes it was,” Layla said. “Considering the things I could lay at your door, Mr. Miller.”

Brendan colored and frowned, more in embarrassment than anger.

“I shouldn’t have said that,” Layla realized.

She sat still for a moment, then sighed.

“We’re all friends, right? Well, I guess I can help you all. I’ll see what I can do. Still, I don’t see why he can’t get his own girl.”

“You never had to do it, though, Layla,” Brendan said. “Will came to you. And then Aidan came to you. They just fell into your lap.”

Layla reflected on this.

“I am one sexy bitch,” she said. Then she shrugged.

“Well, I guess we’ll just have to find someone to fall into Will’s lap.”

“You know what.. Bren?” Layla said when Milo was gone.

“I knew I liked you when you were the little quiet kid who would just hang by himself. Back at day care. I said, I’m going to go up and be that boy’s friend.”

Brendan nodded appreciatively.

“You haven’t changed.”

“I think I’ve changed a little,” Brendan said in his quiet way.

“Well, yes. But only a little.”

Brendan smiled. “You were… so… I remember you just sort of threw yourself on me and decided we would be friends. You introduced me to Dena. I half way think you threw us together.”

“I don’t remember you complaining.”

Brendan chuckled.

“I was a bossy little bitch.”

“Yes,” Brendan said. “Yes you were.

“But we never complained. You always had this…. You always knew what you wanted and you jumped right for it. You didn’t think twice. You just… you always just say things and sometimes they’re brutal, Layla. But they’re usually true.”

“And you always feel things and keep them inside and make me pry them out of you.”

“Is this leading somewhere?” Brendan said.

“What’s going on?”

And then Brendan swiveled around and just said, “Milo and Will are keeping something from me and I think it’s about Milo and Dena having sex.”

“Is she fucking him, too? Damn!”

“No, Layla,” Brendan said, embarrassed. “She’s not. But… a while ago she talked about it. She talked about how she thought it was time because… she needed to get me out of her system or something.”

“What, she still likes you?”

“No, Lay, but we were…”

“Sleeping together.”

“Yes.”

“I’m a big girl, Bren.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not always a big boy and I have a hard time saying certain things. And I don’t like stuff being kept from me. Because I want to know why it’s being kept from me.”

“You don’t even know,” Layla said. “And if that were happening.. well, you know more about sex than any of us.”

Brendan tilted his head and frowned at her.

“I just mean…”Layla began. “Well, you know what I mean.”

“I guess,” Bren said.

“So, you and Milo are scheming behind Will’s back to get him a date for prom. And Will and Milo are—”

“Talking about something and leaving me out. I think Milo resents me.”

“That’s nuts. Milo doesn’t resent anyone. Why would he resent you?”

“Uh, because I used to screw his girlfriend.”

“Well, shit, Bren, when you put it like that…”

“Would you check for me?”

“Bren!”

“Layla, we’re best friends. You just said it. Couldn’t you check for me?”

“Shit, shit shit!”Layla reached for a rolled up sock and threw it at Brendan.

“All right, already, Bren,” she said. “But for us all being best friends, we sure do sneak around each other’s backs a lot.”