It was two weeks before he even thought about Becca again, but a "Don't tell Dad, but…" call from his niece changed that in a flash.
Turns out, the blue house had a seafoam green bathroom and shitty pipes. With the landlord out of town, Mandy knew Sig would shit a brick if he saw Becca in those cutoff shorts trying to pull freshly-dyed hair out of a shower drain, and she knew he could fix the clog without any trouble, and between her blood relation and Becca's panic, how on earth could he say no?
But a clogged shower quickly became a much bigger job, and two hours and three conversations with the landlord later, he had a himself a gentleman's agreement to just replace the whole damn tub.
He sat on the front steps, just hanging up with a place where he could get a new fixture, when she came out with a cold Sprite and a sandwich for him.
"I'm sorry to be so much trouble. I thought I just clogged the drain, but when the Drain-o didn't work, Mandy said you'd know what to do."
"You were right to call. For once, this Hansen knows what to do."
She sat down on the step next to him and stretched out her long, tanned legs. "You say that like you're not usually the problem solver."
"Well, y'know, youngest sibling and all that. Our talents get ignored in favor of our boyish charm."
She snorted. "Wouldn't know. It's just me."
"You strike me as the type to have a horde of brothers always picking on you. No siblings?"
"Nope. Hard to have any siblings when Dad leaves when you're too little to remember his face."
"And Mom?"
For as casually as she dismissed her father, mentioning her mother made her squirm. Just a little. Just enough.
"My mom is sick. Has been for a long time."
He didn't miss how flat her voice sounded, and he knew that look. That hard, far-away, keep-it-together stare. And he knew not to push her. Not yet. "Sorry to hear that. Maybe you can talk to me about it sometime, if you ever feel up to it."
She smiled that damn adorable smile again, the one with her tongue between her teeth, the one that grew slowly so he knew she really meant it and really appreciated him and was really going to be the end of him. "I'd like that, Ed. Sometime."
He cracked open his Sprite as she answered some texts. Her hair was different from today's fateful dye – a light aqua on top ombreing into a deep turquoise at mid-back. In those shorts, he could see the tattoo on her thigh, the silhouette of a wolf in the woods howling up at the moon. And he could make out the subtle shine of her silver heart-shaped nose stud from this distance.
They ate in comfortable silence, dealing with their business on their phones and enjoying the summer breeze. She occasionally pulled a little pa out of her pocket to make quick sketches, but he didn't pry to see what they were. Seemed like her business, after all.
"You like art, then? With the hair colors and the tattoos and all?"
She chuckled. "Well, that's two different questions. My body is my business, and I figure I might as well make it mine. And I'm lucky enough to be in a business where all the piercings and crazy hair and tattoos are a plus. As far as doing this for a living, tattooing is the only thing that kept me sane for a long time. Drawing is nice and all, but tattoos, like, they really mean something. It's a whole different breed. And I worked my ass off to impress this super talented dude so he'd give me an apprenticeship, so I learned from the best, and now I'm pretty damn good at this. Which, like, I should be, 'cuz I've been doing it for long enough. I started when I was 18, y'know? And I've never regretted it."
"You really love it, huh?" He didn't really need to ask; it was written all over the glow in her face, which was looking more and more beautiful the longer he saw it. And he knew he was gone for this girl already.
"It's the only thing I could imagine doing. Tattoos are a story. They capture what's important to you at that moment in your life, whether that's the biggest thing of our life or a fun little random whatever. Like, I can be memorializing someone's mother one moment and putting a pizza on some chick's ass the next, and both decisions are just as huge to those people's lives. And how fucking cool is that? Who else can say that about what they do?"
"Is there pizza on your ass?"
She laughed a big hearty laugh, the kind that threw her head back, and she curled in towards him so their shoulders hit. "Oh, Eddy. Wouldn't you like to know."
NWNWNWNWNWNWNWNWNWNWNWNWNWNWNWNWNW
He found out about her mom when the car died. So much for Sig helping her buy a new one.
She was oddly antsy in his passenger seat, shifting around and ignoring her phone and avoiding his gaze. As much as he loved her nerdy phone noises (her text tone was R2-D2's chirping), when she ignored her phone for the umpteenth time in two hours, he couldn't let it slide any longer.
"Someone really wants to reach you."
"Someone can such his own dick for a while," she snapped.
"Well. Remind me not to piss you off," he muttered as he changed lanes around the idiot from Nevada going way too slow.
"Shit, Ed, I'm sorry," she sighed, rubbing her shoulder. "You're being so nice, driving me across creation at the last minute like this. I'm not trying to be a bitch, this is all just super stressful."
"It's fine. Cars never break when it's convenient. I'll take a look at it for you later if you want. I'm not great, but I might be able to diagnose it."
"Oh, God, you want to do more for me? Ed, please, you already fixed my entire bathroom, and you're hauling my ass two hours away. Now you want to fix my car? Don't you have better shit to do?"
"You'll find out, I'm painfully boring when I'm not fishing, actually," he assured her and she laughed that big laugh that threw her head back so the light hit off her Aviators and curled around her wavy hair (still blue) and caught in her smile. "Nah, but really, I don't mind. I don't have that much to do when we're not out fishing. Just promotional stuff, really. I don't mind helping you out, long as I'm not stepping on Sig's toes."
R2-D2 chirped. She ignored it.
"I'm a grown woman, though. I really shouldn't keep bugging you."
"Well, we all need help sometimes. I'm surprise Sig didn't take you, though. He's got a real investment in you, ya' know."
R2-D2 chirped. She shifted away, turning towards the window.
"Sig likes to be around when it works for him. And I appreciate his attention and all but…" She raked a hand through his hair. "I don't know. Whatever. He can be so commanding sometimes."
"Yeeeah, that's Sig. Trust me, he's like that with all of us. Don't take it personally."
"Let's just not talk about it, ok? I've got enough going on."
Well, he wasn't about to push her, not when she so clearly didn't want to talk. "Ok. Can I ask where we're going, then?"
"You're taking this right at the fence. We're visiting my mom."
Mom waited in what the nurse told him was the Common Room, sat in a bay window overlooking a garden that was mostly poorly maintained hedges. Someone sat at a piano with a lid that would not open. Two older men played chess in the corner. A few read, some sat talking to other visitors, a few watched Say Yes to the Dress in the corner.
One small woman, no older than Becca, sat on the floor in the middle o the room with her hands over her eyes while everyone went about their business around her.
"That's Mom," Becca murmured, as if speaking too loudly would break the calm spell over the room. She gestured to the thin woman in the window, much to his relief. They looked nearly identical – same ski-slope nose, same long limbs, same pointed chins and round cheeks. "Come meet her."
And he wasn't too proud of it, but he didn't really want to meet the mother that lived in St. Dymphna's Home for Severe and Persistent Mental Illness. But Becca took his hand and led him over, so he couldn't exactly say no. Becca stopped to say hello to the woman sitting on the floor, and the smile that brightened her face at being acknowledged could have inspired a thousand artists. Edgar wondered if anyone else had even spoken to her that day, or if Becca was the only person that took the time.
"Do you know her?" he whispered.
"No. But she's there all the time, and I figure everyone deserves to be acknowledged, right? She's a person." Just like that. Like it was the most obvious thing in the world. And Edgar wasn't too big to admit that he would have walked right by her, too, but here was someone who wouldn't. Becca was better than that, and he wondered what exactly his heart was getting him into.
And they sat in the window and talked like nothing was wrong. Becca told her mom about how business was really picking up at the shop and how she was invited to some convention in California in a few months. Edgar told them about fishing. Mom talked about painting and wanting to learn to crochet. Becca promised to see if she could bring her yarn. But when her mother tapped Becca's knee like conspirators and insisted to be told about this blossoming romance, Becca's cheeks flushed bright red.
"No, Mom, Edgar's not my boyfriend. He just gave me a ride today."
It seemed like an honest mistake to him, and he didn't really mind the mix-up. But it struck him as odd that her mother looked so confused. "Oh, but I thought… this isn't the one you-"
"No. He's not. I'll explain some other time, ok?"
And something in Becca's tone told him that there was more to this, but he didn't want to cause a scene in the Common Room of St. Dymphna's, so he did what he did best and tried to lighten the mood. "Hey, hey, Becs. You got a boyfriend you haven't told me about?" And he nudged her with his elbow and gave mom a big wink. And, ok, maybe the thought bothered him a little, but he barely knew the girl, so he ignored that pit in his stomach.
"No, I – oh my God, you two, stop it!" She giggled. "I'm never talking to either of you again!"
And they laughed and moved on. Her mother gave him a hug goodbye that was as warm as if he was her own child. Becca exchanged words with some nurses or maybe doctors, and they got in the car and started to drive back. It was nearly an hour before she spoke, but he wasn't about to rush her.
"What do you want to know about all this?"
He shrugged. "Whatever you think you want to say."
"She's sick, my mom. Today was a good day and it didn't look like it, but there are days that…She almost killed herself once. It's these voices she hears, y'know? They, uh, they overwhelm her sometimes. So, as good as she looks, know that she's not. She's really fighting."
"She's always been like this?"
"Like, when I was growing up? Yeah. I spent a lot of my childhood thinking it was normal for moms to talk to people that weren't there and lock up in the rooms for days on end and all that. It wasn't easy, but, hey, here we are. And she's lucky, she's in a really good place now."
"And she's got you."
"Well," she rolled her eyes, "I'm no prize."
"You're everything, Becca."
They pulled into the driveway singing Fleetwood Mac with open windows and big smiles, bellies full of McDonald's drive-thru. But the fun all stopped when Sig came stomping off of the porch.
"Where the hell have you been? I've been trying to – Ed? What the hell is this?"
And something in her wide, frantic eyes told Edgar all he needed to know. Sig, the man that helped her unpack and cut her grass and helped her buy cars (although not very well), did not know about her mom. She wanted it that way. But for whatever reason, she trusted Edgar with this. That meant something to him, and he felt something hot and heavy and protective well up in his chest. So you best believe that he was out of that car and ready to go at his brother, even if his hands stayed in his pockets so Sig thought this was all just casual.
"Her car was smoking, Sig, so we went to actually look at replacements, see if I could help her more than you did."
Sig backed up a step. "O-oh. And did you, uh, did you find something?"
And he knew it was odd how quickly Sig backed off, but all that mattered was that grateful smile from Becca as she got out of the car to stand by his side.
"Do you see a new car?" she quipped. "No? Okay, obviously I didn't find something. Now, look, I'm sorry I ignored you. There was a lot going on. But if you promise to behave, I"ll let you take me car shopping tomorrow, and I promise not to bite even a little bit."
"Sounds like a good deal, Sig. Get her a good deal with your captain powers."
"C'mon, Sig. What d'you say? Forgiven?"
Sig stared long and hard before growling out his frustration. "Yeah, you know damn well you're forgiven. And you can even bite a little bit if you want."