The Food Desert

Chapter 1

"Steve, is that really you?"

I was sitting in a food court at a mall, working on the ever-present laptop, waiting for my son and almost daughter-in-law. Even though I hadn't heard that voice in almost fifteen years, I knew instantly who it was. Looking up, I smiled.

"No Kara, it's someone else. What kind of a dumb statement was that?"

She flinched a little, before she noticed I was smiling, and she grinned back. "Gee, you found a sense of humor since I saw you last. Or did you buy one, moneybags? Lord knows you could afford it now."

"I bought it. Got a good deal, too. I wanted Jimmy Fallon's, but the tight bastard wanted way too much. And yeah, life's been pretty good to me for the last few years."

The smile was still there, and it brought back memories of happier times. Mentally, she shook herself. It had been almost twenty years. She should be over it now.

"Still farming?"

She had often made fun of his little hobby farm, absolutely refusing to help, but not above helping spend the money it brought to them.

"No, farming takes time, and that's something that's in short supply for me lately. What about you? Did the recession hurt you?"

Kara took the conversation to mean she was invited to sit, and she pulled out a chair. Damn, she had always had good legs, and even at forty-one, they still drew your attention. Never missing much, she gave me a smirk, glad she had chosen that particular dress to wear shopping. "Still a leg man, I take it. Yes, it did, a little, but I wasn't exactly into a lot of the stuff that was happening at the time, so I came out all right. I'm doing good business now, got eight agents each in all four of my offices, and they hustle. Everybody wants the American dream, and I try my best to give it to them. What about you? If you're looking to upgrade, I got several really nice properties, or maybe a vacation getaway? If you need a hideout, I have a really, really nice two thousand foot cabin on a hundred acres of mostly woods, with an almost fifty-acre private lake that just hit the market. I haven't shown it yet. If I remember right, you like to fish."

"To answer your first question, yes, and you always had the best pair I'd ever seen, with one exception. To the rest of the questions, no, I like what I got now just fine, although I might take a look at that cabin. Email some pictures to me on my business site, and we'll talk. What are you doing in this city anyway? You're a long way from our old stomping grounds."

She smiled: that "I know something but you don't' smile," the one that used to drive me crazy. "I'm here on business, same as you. In fact..."

That was as far as she got when she stopped, looking at the arms that were hugging me from behind, going up to the very attractive face of a young woman. I saw her watching as the girl gave me a big kiss on the cheek. A young man, Hispanic, very good looking in his own right, stood off to the side, smiling.

"Let him go," he told the woman, her red hair falling over his fathers' face. "You might kill him, just from the heat."

"Oh, I think your Papa can take it. I almost wish I had met him first."

I pulled my future daughter-in-law into my lap, tickling her, as she writhed and screamed in English and Spanish, her long legs flailing, her short skirt riding up. Stopping before she gave the old guys at the food court a heart attack, I introduced her to Kara.

"Kara, let me introduce the only woman in the world that could give you a run for your money in beauty and great legs. This is Ashley, my new daughter-in-law. Well, in five days, anyway. That handsome devil trying to stay out of the way is my son, Miguel, although he prefers to be called Mickey. Kids, this is Kara, sorry, can't remember your last name, real estate mogul and my first wife."

Kara's smile slipped. I knew it had always been one of her dreams to have my child, but we divorced, messily, and the next three husbands just hadn't measured up and she wouldn't even consider it. Then again, I was only thirty nine, so she knew the twenty something man couldn't be my biological child. Besides, he was Hispanic. I could see her wondering, had her old honey married a Latin cutie? She took a quick glance at my hand, and for reasons I couldn't define, seemed glad to see my finger bare.

"It's Johnson now. Has been for eight years. I confess my judgement wasn't the best after we parted, so I had to go through a few losers before I found another keeper. It could have been you, you know, if...."

I was a little sharper than I meant to be when I interrupted her. "Kara! Please, let's not go down that road."

Kara was watching me closely, and she saw it. The pain in my eyes, just a flash, and then gone. Damn, after all these years. I was surprised to see the wetness in her eyes, misty with old emotions and memories.

"Sorry. Look, would you like to have dinner tonight? Not to reopen old wounds, I promise. I'd just like to hear firsthand the story of how you ended up where you are from the source and not magazine articles."

I was surprised to find myself even considering it, but before I could speak, Ashley broke in. "Papa, why not invite her to the wedding? Then you wouldn't be alone, and you guys seem to be on cordial terms."

"Ash, I won't be alone. I'll have the whole wedding party. Besides, it's short notice. I'm sure Mrs. Johnson wouldn't be able..."

"I'd love to! I haven't been to a good wedding in years." She suddenly looked at me, noticing my face. "That is, if it wouldn't be a bother. I'd hate to intrude on a family moment."

Looking inwards, I found calm. It was a long time ago. "Please come, and bring your husband. We can tell each other dirty little secrets about you."

A small, pensive look appeared and vanished so fast no one but Ashley saw it. "I"m afraid he isn't with me this trip. It would just be me, if you'll have me. But, Steve, aren't you timing things awfully close? Don't you have to attend a business function the next day?"

Wondering how she knew that, I nodded in agreement. "I'm going to be at the wedding, Kara; I'm not going on the honeymoon with them. I'll be able to make the dinner with no problem. How did you know about that?"

Determining to keep her secret, she just grinned. "Oh, I read a lot, and it's been in the papers recently."

She looked at her watch, frowning. "Speaking of business, I have to go do some. Network, network, network, the life blood of real estate. Here's my card, Steve. If you're serious about letting me attend the wedding, call me. Ashley, Mickey, a pleasure. Your father is a good man."

Taking a chance, she bent down and gave me a soft kiss on my cheek, the first physical contact we had in over twenty years, and walked away. I discovered later, she went to the nearest ladies room, went in, locked the stall door, leaned against it, and tried to control her breathing. Seeing her ex, the one that got away, the one she had hurt so deeply, moved her unexpectedly.

She told Ashley later that it didn't help that I looked so damn good. No, I wasn't ripped, and she spent enough time in gyms to know what that meant, but I was more toned than I had been back then, I had a new stylish hairstyle, still had all I started with and the dusting of grey made me look like the distinguished successful businessman I was. I was a far cry from the young man in overalls and work boots she remembered.

Chapter 2

I sat there, watching those hips sway as she walked away, remembering. Mickey brought me out of my reflections. "So, that was your first wife. Damn, was she a child bride?"

"Don't let the clothes fool you. She's actually two years older than I am, forty-one now. She's just a very well kept forty-one. Appearance was always important to her."

"This is the first I knew about you being married before Maria and Sandy. What happened?" Ashley realized she made a mistake when she saw my face, bringing up all my wives at the same time. She was trying to find a way to back up when I spoke.

"Short version, she traded up. Found someone higher up on the food-chain who made her a better offer and she was off like a shot. They married, divorced seven months later, because she caught him screwing around. Like that wasn't part of his history. Met two more losers, neither of them lasting more than two years. She's been married for a long time to the guy she has now. Maybe she finally found what she was looking for."

Mickey was adding it up as he talked. "So she's been married five times?"

"As far as I know. Maybe more. I don't really keep up with her, but my cousin keeps me informed when I visit. One of the many reasons I don't visit much."

Ashley apologized. "Sorry, Papa. You seemed to be getting along fine, and she is a good looking woman. I thought it might be fun."

I reached over and took her hands. "You see the good in everyone, Angel. I think it's one of the biggest reasons my son fell in love with you. Me too, as far as that goes. I doubt she will show up, but if she does, she does. I'll be in such a good mood I don't think anything could possible screw it up. Now, let's talk about more pleasant subjects. Come to your senses yet, and decide to dump Mickey for me?"

She laughed and Mickey grinned. "Not yet. If he's not trainable, though, I might reconsider. Older guys tend to already be housebroken."

Then they started talking about the wedding, and all thoughts of my ex left my mind. Mickey had met Ashley in college, and it was love at first sight. She moved into his apartment at the start of their junior year, and hadn't left his side since.

Her parents weren't keen to see her with a minority partner, but when they found out he was my son, they thawed pretty quickly. It made me not trust them. I got Mickey when he was nine, when I married his mother. His mother was long gone, we didn't last four years, but I had adopted Mickey in our second year, and he wanted to stay with me. I didn't have the money then I did later, but it was starting to come in when she had run back to Costa Rica to be with her lover. I filed, citing abandonment, and got sole custody of Mickey until she could be found. That took a year and a half. By then the divorce had gone through, and I got full custody. She didn't even get visitation rights.

Mickey took it hard. He had just turned eleven, and for a long time it had just been him and his mother. It took a couple of years of therapy to get him back, and when he was finally happy she showed up again, wanting him to move to Costa Rica and live with her. I really didn't realize how big a vocabulary he had until then, and a lot of what he said wasn't in any dictionary.

She got a lawyer and went nowhere, fast. When he was eighteen, he went to see her. The visit was supposed to last two weeks, and he was back in four days.

"You wouldn't recognize her, Dad. She looks fifty, now. They have a little farm and just barely make a living. They have no electricity; leave the doors open and the damn goats spend as much time inside the house as they do outside. Her husband tried to go all macho on me, and it made me really glad you put me in martial arts. I whipped his ass, and he told me I had to go. I just feel really bad for my little sisters. Then, when I got to the airport, Mom asked me if I had any money. I gave her everything you had given me for the trip, just for the little girls."

I was really surprised. The woman I remembered was high maintenance, we even had a cleaning woman and she had quit working after we got married. She was a beautiful woman, with long reddish hair, smoky eyes, cute little nose, and lips that really, really needed kissing. Tall, at five-eight, she was not small, and her proportions matched her height. She had the full features of the classic Hispanic beauty, thirty-eight D, twenty-six inch waist, and a forty inch bottom.

And she was really, really, really good in bed.

We met when she applied for a job. I didn't have anything, and she looked desperate, so I helped her, getting a friend to take her on. Maria repaid me by cooking dinner for me, spicy dishes I loved but couldn't pronounce, and it just took off from there.

I didn't even know she had a son for four months, and when I found out I was kind of pissed. Not pissed that she had a child, but pissed that she thought I might be shallow enough to stop seeing her over it. After that, I insisted he be with us on every other date, He was a really quiet little boy, and it took him a long time to warm up to me.

Our shared love of baseball broke the ice. I sponsored a team and made sure he got to play. I was the one who took him to practice, and made sure we were at all of his games. He turned into a good enough shortstop to get offers from colleges, and he played college ball on my dime. I couldn't see taking a scholarship away from someone who needed it when I could afford to pay. He even got two offers from major league teams, but he was smart enough to know his chance of playing in the majors were small, and AA ball didn't interest him at all. Besides, he wanted to get his MBA, knowing when I retired he would get the business, and he wanted to be ready.

Ashley stopped after four years, took her degree, and went to work for me in the family business. She probably knew as much about it as I did. My business had gotten really big really fast, and it almost outgrew me.

My business? I owned a chain of very successful grocery stores, specializing in high risk areas that most chains wouldn't enter.

Chapter 3

I had a good job, as a receiving foreman in a large factory. I also had a small farm, just a few acres, but it had always been my passion, and I was a pretty good farmer, optimizing yield while improving the land.

I married a girl from the factory. I got a lot of ribbing from the guys about how lucky I was, and I agreed.

She worked in the office, her hair was always perfect, her makeup nice but understated, and even though she didn't have to, she always wore a dress or skirt. If I had her legs, I would too. Her hemline was always a little higher than business proper, but none of the managers complained.

We met over paperwork issues. One of the other girls warned me she was a little mercenary, a little too materialistic, but I put it down to misplaced jealousy, wooing her until she accepted my ring.

The marriage was small but nice. We honeymooned in Florida, and her tiny bikinis always caused a stir when we hit the beach. I wasn't bothered, because at the end of the day, all they could do was look, while I'd be the one to peel those little wisps of fabric off her.

I loved Kara with all my soul, and I really believed she loved me. The first three years were wonderful; we seemed so in sync, even started thinking about a family.

Trouble started when I was offered a manager's position and I turned it down so I could focus on my farm. Kara did not like me farming, couldn't stand to see me dirty, and she absolutely refused to help me. She was really pissed when I turned down the job and we had our first serious argument since we married.

"Take the job! You wouldn't have to get dirty, could wear nice clothes every day, and best of all, we could spend more time together. Think of the doors it could open. We could join the country-club, move up in society."

"I could care less about the country-club people. Besides, I would still make more at my regular job and the farm."

We fought, and in the end, I chose the farm over the country-club. Kara didn't. At first, I didn't notice, she told me she had started stopping for a drink with the girls on Fridays but was always home by eight or nine. It seemed to make her happy and I was busy with the farm, so it wasn't like it was taking time away from us.

Then one of her friends took them to the country-club, using her father's membership to get them in. That led to some Saturdays by the pool. I was at the farmer's market until three, and she was home shortly after. I didn't know for a long time she would pack a conservative suit, but change into one of her tiny bikinis at the club.

Of course, that got the attention of the sharks, and they started circling. Conversations morphed to flirting, flirting led to touching, touching led to sex and the end of our marriage.

The guy was an asshole, all flashy clothes and Daddy's money. He had a job, working for his father, an office where he usually did useless things while the managers ran the business. He had the perfect suits, money to burn, and drove an expensive foreign car. Sadly, it didn't take long for her to fall for the glitter.

I found out, as usual, by accident. Accident or not, it didn't make it less true. I followed them to a romantic restaurant and confronted them. He got stupid, or macho, or both, and swung at me. I worked a physically demanding job, and farming, if you did it right, didn't make you soft. I only hit him once, but it broke his cheekbone and detached a retina. I would have been in deep, deep shit if it hadn't been for the security cameras.

Even with the evidence, Daddy's money made it uncomfortable for me for a little while, until a friend in the local paper took an interest, wondering why he was out on a romantic date with a married woman. Seeing the truth might hurt his business, Daddy shut the whole thing down. I got a divorce, Kara got an upgrade. We met for the final time when we signed the papers. She tried to fight it for a few months, apologizing over and over, literally begging me for another chance. The trust was gone, though, and the hurt was still too raw. Oddly, even as she tried to get me back she still hung out with her friend at the club, and once she understood I was never going to take her back, her pragmatic side surfaced, and she worked the guy until he proposed.

She started to apologize again just before we signed, and I stopped her cold. "Not a word, Kara. Nothing you could say would justify what you did. I hope you like the trade up, but you need to bear in mind how you got together. He was engaged, wasn't he? And you were married. Free advice here; don't sign a prenuptial if you're actually stupid enough to marry the asshole. Remember how you got him, and realize you might have a use-by date. I figure you have a year, tops."

She was still crying when I left. Eight months later they had a big society wedding. The reception was held at the country-club, of course, and they got a rather rude surprise at the end of it. The country-club revoked his membership, and she had already been barred. Seems the wives didn't appreciate young women using the club as a hunting ground for rich husbands, especially ones that were already spoken for. The woman he jilted had a father who just happened to head the membership committee. His dad couldn't do much about it.

I heard they joined another, less prestigious club, and just months later she caught him in bed with one of the bridesmaids. She had followed my advice, didn't sign anything, and raped him in the divorce. He'd been in court before, as a respondent in a few divorce cases where he was the other man, and the judge, a woman, had a long memory. She may have tacked a little more on there at the end, sort of a cosmic payback.

She surprised the shit out of me by showing up at my door two months later.

"What do you want, Kara?"

"Can we talk?"

"No."

I think she was really surprised when I refused to let her in.

"Don't you want to gloat? Tell me I told you so? I'll take it if you do. I deserve it."

"Think I give a fuck what you deserve? I deserved a faithful wife. How did that work for me? I don't know what you want, but if you're looking for forgiveness and another chance you've wasted a trip. I'm seeing someone, and it may get serious. The last thing I need is an ex hanging around to complicate things. So take your blood money, join another country-club, hook another sucker, enjoy the lifestyle, and don't come back."