Electro [hs]

Four

 Four ♂

When I get back, dad's car is parked in the driveway again and joined by another bland Ford. There's this rich cooking smell erupting from the kitchen; a thick gravy, meat and biscuits kind of thing that would be comforting during the winter in Minnesota after trekking home from school in the snow but just comes across as cloying and stifling in the heat and sunshine out here.

Since Ben's idea of cooking is either heating up the grill or nuking something in a plastic container, I'm immediately on edge the moment I step into the hall. It doesn't help that there's a gentle humming coming from inside.

The human equivalent of a cupcake is standing in my father's house. My senses are assaulted by pastel shades and bready smells, this blonde puff of hair piled up on top of her head like piped buttercream frosting. I see her backside first; it's kinda hard to miss, gargantuan underneath her pink cotton dress.

At the sound of me entering she whirls around and I see her round, shiny pink face erupt into a smile. "Is that Charlotte?!" I wince and she squeals like we're old friends. Arms out, she comes at me and before I know it I'm being pressed into a hug that smells like floral perfume and pie crust.

"It's so nice to finally meet you, puddin'!" she gives me a final squeeze and pulls away. "Well aren't you just...uh...the spitting image of your daddy."

"It's Charlie," I correct flatly. "Where's my dad?"

"Oh he's just freshening up in the bathroom. Benny was kind enough to fix up my toaster the other day so I thought I'd bring y'all some dinner to say thank you."

She gestures to the source of the smells, a giant casserole dish loaded with stew and essentially an industrial sized vat of macaroni sitting on the table which is now conspicuously absent of any machine parts"I always cook like I'm feeding the five thousand," she prattles on in her girlish southern accent. "Too much for us to get through at home so I like to bring Benny a little somethin' from time to time."

I start to wonder if my father is fucking this woman. All of a sudden I get images of her massive, trembling thighs parting and hear the sound of flesh slapping against flesh as she squeals 'harder, oh, oh, harder,"

The sound of the toilet flushing pulls me out of this mental image and I turn around, almost guiltily, to find my dad standing in the doorway.

His appearance doesn't do much to dispute my suspicions about where he's been sticking it; he's dressed like a frigging mormon with his hair combed and parted, wearing a short-sleeved button up shirt and khaki coloured dress pants when I've only seen him slouch around the house in sport's t-shirts and long shorts. This is, I see now, Church Born-Again-Ben. And it's just like how, after he and my mom got divorced he shed all of the jeans my mom bought him, shaved off the beard she liked and stopped pretending to like world cuisine.

This guy probably likes good old fashioned home cooking, fishing and the fourth of July, thinks anyone who had an abortion is going to burn in hell. God bless the USA and all the rest. I wrinkle up my nose because he has to be fucking this cake-woman.

"Ah Charlie, you've met Pam-Pam?"

I wince.

"Pam-Pam?"

"Pamela Palmer, but I've been Pam-Pam since I was knee high to a grasshopper," she explains. It's probably a nickname that should never have left the third grade.

"We're gonna be fast friends, I know it already. I was just telling Charlotte-"

"Charlie," I mutter under my breath.

"-how I've been feeding you up. I think someone else needs my help too, she's wasting away, Benny!" she moves to poke my stomach and I duck away quickly as if she'd been coming at me with a stick covered in dog poop. Part of it is just me, just my reaction to basically all human contact but the other part is mostly because it's her. Pam seems unconcerned and just smiles at me with a playful flap of her hands. "You girls these days! When everybody knows a real man likes a little somethin' to hold onto."