The Naked Man — Chapter 12

Katerina sat at the table, her mind reeling. Her father, William Mills, the father who had carried her on his shoulders, taught her to ride a bicycle, and taken her to pick out her mother’s birthday and Christmas presents, sat across the table explaining why he left her mother for a bleached blond, thirty-four D bimbo named Lulu. As he talked, Lulu wandered the apartment, her eyes a vast, vacant lot of boredom.

“You see, honey,” her father was saying, “having cancer has taught me a valuable lesson.”

“You can never have too much peroxide?” Katerina blurted, fascinated by the immoveable helmet of brassy hair sitting atop Lulu’s head.

“Now kitten, don’t be ugly. I want you and Lulu to be friends.”

Kat stared in response, trying to remember if her father had fallen and hit his head during one of his hospital stays.

Katerina and Lulu exchanged cold, hard glances. Oh yeah, wicked stepmother, the feeling’s mutual.

“Daddy,” Kat said, speaking slowly as if he were a traumatic brain injury patient and not a cancer survivor. “Where’s Mom?”

Her father leaned back in the chair, patting his hand against his leg in a rapid, tapping motion, his eyes darting around the room. “She’s packing up her few things. By the way, Katerina, change brings downsizing. That includes everything you left in your room. It’s all gone to Goodwill.”

Kat was on her feet. “Wait a minute. You SOLD the house? You gave away my stuff? For what? For this? For her?”

“Kitten — ”

“Don’t kitten me! What’s gotten into you? Did you take everything? What about Mom? Didn’t you give her any money?”

“Don’t upset your father,” Lulu said.

“Cork it, Rent-A-Slut!”

Lulu’s face flushed crimson. With her hands out, she rushed toward Katerina.

“Now, now, girls,” her father soothed, jumping up and catching her arm, “let’s calm down.”

Whispering in Lulu’s ear, he handed her a few bills. With an icy glance at Kat, Lulu sashayed out of the apartment.

“Does she have enough singles?”

“Don’t be fresh, Katerina. Is this how we raised you to be a young lady? New York City has changed you, that’s for sure, and I don’t think for the better. Maybe I was wrong to encourage you to come here.”

“Daddy, what about your job? Twenty years of your life dedicated to the company. When they transferred you, you set up the plant, you hired everyone personally. Richie can’t do what you do. He can’t run that business.”

William Mills laughed but the sound had no joy. “He thinks he can,” he said. “Yeah, my number two…he’s his own man…well…life is about change,” he said, and gave another short, mirthless chuckle.

What the hell does that mean? “Have you talked to Kevin? Does he know about this?”

“He’s still off in the wilds of Costa Rica living in a tree house. We get an email every few months when he gets back to base camp. I tell you Katerina, your brother is a shining example. He’s been an inspiration to me.”

Inspiration? In what way? Why underwear is not a necessity? Bathing — the pros and cons? Katerina struggled to process the fact that her father had lost his mind.

She stared at the stranger before her, finally taking a long breath and taking her father’s hands in her own. “Daddy,” she said. “I don’t know where you met this woman — ”

“Lulu.”

“Yes, she is.”

“She’s a nail technician.”

“Uh-hunh. Daddy, you and Mom have had thirty wonderful years together. You two went on romantic cruises. You took her to California, to Yellowstone Park. You had date nights. You’re in love with Mom.”

He squeezed her hands. “Honey . . . sweetheart,” he said, patting her hand. “Your mother is a lovely woman.”

Uh-oh.

“Katerina, if cancer has taught me anything, it’s that there’s more to life than pleasant trips to Yellowstone Park with a lovely woman.”

He sat down and Katerina took her place by his side.

“Daddy, when men survive cancer, they buy a motorcycle or a sports car or a boat. They don’t dump the woman who nursed them through their life threatening illness.”

He patted her hand, the telltale sign that he was preaching to the congregation, but they had neither eyes to see nor ears to hear. “I’ve been given a second chance, kitten. I need more.”

Kat jumped to her feet. “Apparently, you need it all. How is Mom going to live? What is she going to do?”

“Listen to me Katerina,” he said, pulling her back down. “This is important. You play the hand you’ve been dealt, bet and bluff to make the best deal possible, and then cash out when it’s time to go. Remember that.”

“Mom is not a stake in a poker game,” she said, a surge of anger shooting through her. “This is your wife, not a hand of Texas Hold ‘Em.”

He shrugged.

She forced herself to search for something to say that wouldn’t end with her telling him exactly how she felt about him at the moment. “Daddy, are you staying in town for a few days?” she asked through clenched teeth.

“No, kitten, Lulu and I are headed — west. Which reminds me . . . I’m in a transitional phase, Katerina. As I contemplate where this new path will take me, I won’t be able to pay your tuition anymore or help you with rent or expenses.”

Kat’s mouth dropped open.

“I know, kitten, but look at it this way. You’re in the big city. Shouldn’t you be spreading your wings and flying solo?”

William Mills gave his daughter a light chuck under the chin and a wink.

Katerina remembered to close her mouth.