Chapter 3

I waited a week, then I used the brass knocker a couple of times on the Simpsons’ front door.

“Hi, Charlie, what brings you here this time of night?”

“I remembered what you said, Marjorie. You said ‘anything’. If there was ‘anything’ you could do for me, anything at all, I just had to name it. I’m here to collect. I want to take Princess Lori out for dinner and maybe a movie if there is something she’d like to see and feels up to it. You need to tell her she has to go, and tell Bob I am allowed to take her, then you have to say yes. You promised. ‘Anything.’ I specifically remember you using that word.”

Lori was sitting on the couch, wrapped in a blanket. Bob was in an easy chair listening, having been interrupted from whatever he was watching on TV. Marjorie started laughing. Lori giggled and once again winced in pain. It had only been about five weeks, and she was still on the mend.

“Yes, I remember that conversation. You are a cad and a numbskull. You should have saved that one for later. I’ll bet if you would have asked her yourself, she might have said yes, and you could have saved your one wish for later. Your loss.”

“Wait, Marjorie. Now, you never said there was only one!” I grinned toward Lori as Bob broke out laughing.

“Don’t push your luck, Sheriff. I’m married to a lawyer.” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “Mind your manners, or you might be married to one, too.” She started laughing. “Lori, go upstairs and put on something decent. That blanket doesn’t go well with those pajamas, and those slippers don’t go with anything. Not in public anyways.”

Lori came to me and put her arms around me gently. She looked up and smiled a very small smile and the most forlorn puppy dog eyes as if to ask for some other means of torture.

“No, Lori. Please, just super casual, shorts and a t-shirt with sandals, but you need to get out for a bit. I promise to take good care of you.”

She nodded, turned, then blanket and all, went down the hallway. The large bandages were gone, but the covered stitches, red streaks, bruising, partially super short hair, and scarred flesh were not. I have to be honest, though. I didn’t see them. All I saw was the beautiful girl I knew as Lori Simpson.

We stopped at a nicer eating establishment in Liberty City, hoping to have some time to just talk and have a bite. She was still partial to softer foods but was able to choose some items a la carte that would work for her.

She explained that her ex-boyfriend had tried to contact her, more than once, but when a friend of hers showed him pictures of her, up close, both from the hospital and from home, wounds, scars and all, he ... Well, suffice to say he hasn’t called for a while. They were arguing about, naturally, her not putting out, and when she went to leave, he grabbed her arm and slapped her. When she fought back, he hit her, once on her cheek and once on the arm. Any bruises that he may have caused were covered by injuries from the accident.

She has since let him know that she doesn’t want him around, there will be no getting back together, and that he wasn’t welcome in her home or her life.

“I’m sorry to lay that on you, Charlie, but I thought you needed to know. He wasn’t a very nice person, but I thought he was having a rough time with something. I now think that he’s always like that and I want nothing to do with him. Now, that’s that, and the subject is over with.”

“Good. Now, why did you make such a point of making sure I came to see you, young lady?”

“I wanted ... I want to get to know you better. After you held me like you did, I got to thinking. I’ve always had a crush on you, but when I was just turning old enough to date, you were in your early to mid-thirties. Not all that cool, in most peoples’ eyes. In addition to that issue, you were running around playing GI Joe. Now, I’m almost thirty and you are the Sheriff. I just want to get to know you.”

“Thank you for that. I just wanted an explanation of why the most beautiful woman in the county wanted anything to do with little old me.” I chuckled.

She giggled a bit, then said, “Was, maybe, but even then, I doubt it. I’m not going to win any more beauty pageants like this.” She framed her face. “No more Miss Missouri sashes for this girl, that’s for sure.”

“Lori, you have no idea. I won’t sit here and blow smoke up your butt, but if you want to be seen with me, I’d love to be the guy you’re seen with. Just wondering, but am I the only guy in this town, besides your father and older brother, that have seen you naked?”

“What?”

“Lori, I was just teasing your mother a few weeks ago. I was going to start asking for more money to babysit you kids because you were more than a little late in finishing up your potty training.”

She immediately put her head in her hands and looked down into her lap, laughing, crying, and shaking her head. “Oh. My. God. I don’t believe this. I never even considered that. Never even thought about it. How embarrassing! Well, I’ve changed a lot. Mostly.”

“Stop. No details. Lori, again, I’m honored. If you want to grace me with your companionship, friendship, whatever you want to call it, I’m honored. I’m hoping we can spend time together, too.”

The rest of the night went like that, except during the movie when she held my arm. The movie was a crime thriller with a bit of romance and a lot of suspense ending in quickly exploding action. It was fun to be the recipient of such emotion she showed as the movie unfolded.