“Not exactly.”
“You’re seeing Owen today?” Daniel barks, interrupting our conversation. “In that case, I have something for you to give him. Come to my office.”
I roll my eyes at Amber who makes an unsavory face. Then I follow Daniel and pick up an envelope of what he calls “boring forms” for Nate. As my hand grips the envelope, Daniel tugs it toward him. “Be careful. Men like Owen want one thing, Vivian.”
“Sex?” I guess.
“Power,” he answers, his face turning red. “Don’t get caught up with him like some people do.”
“Like you did?” He can’t look me in the eye. The truth hurts. I get it. “I can take care of myself. You don’t have to worry about me, Dad.”
I turn and walk away. It’s been a long time since I called anyone “Dad” and though I was being facetious, the word embeds itself into my skin like a stubborn splinter.
Halfway back to my cubicle, my cell phone rings on my desk. Walt’s name lights the screen. It’s a video call. I debate going outside, decide that’s the best plan, and duck out the front door as I answer.
I’m on the sidewalk between the pizza place and a coffee shop when my brother’s gaunt face fills the screen. It’s not a new look for him. Walt’s never held a lot of weight. Since rehab his color’s better, but his slimness remains.
“Hey, sis.”
“Everything okay?” It’s my first question whenever he calls. He’s usually in trouble. I don’t see cop car lights or a police station in the background though, so maybe we’re okay.
“Thirty days today,” he tells me with a grin.
“Really?” He means thirty days sober. Hope blooms to life in my chest. And here I believed that hope had died with Mom.
“Yeah.” He lifts a cigarette to his mouth, then holds the butt up to the screen. “My last vice. How’s Dad?”
“Trapped in an urn.” I take a perfunctory look around even though no one could possibly know Walt and I are talking about the one and only Walter Steele.
“Serves him right.” My brother takes another drag. “I’m in the area.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. Pretty close, actually.” His voice takes on a tinny, echo-y quality a moment before I notice a man on the crosswalk who looks a lot like my brother. Identical, in fact.
He stomps out his cigarette underfoot and I bounce over to him, heedless of who’s watching. He catches me in a bony hug and I hold on to him for a long, long while.
“You ass!” I let go and swat him in the arm. He laughs, and the sound is heavenly. I missed him like crazy. Since he’s rarely sober and himself, I’ve missed him for a long time. I hold on to moments like this one with both hands. “You look well.”
He releases me and reaches into his pocket, dropping a bronze coin into my hand a moment later. I turn the coin over, running my thumb over the words “To Thine Own Self Be True.”
“Whoa. Heavy.”
“In every sense of the word,” he assures me. “Are you doing anything right now? I thought we’d grab lunch. Or late breakfast. Or coffee. I’m not picky.”
“Well…” His eyes go over my head to my place of employment. The Clear Ridge Bureau of Inspection. “I have a lunch break but otherwise I’m chained to my desk.”
“Oh, how the mighty have fallen.” He tucks my hair behind my ear and gives me a sad smile. I’m not sure if he’s talking about him or me.
“Wait, shoot.” I just remembered I have lunch with Nate today.
“What is it?”
“You know what? Nothing. It’s nothing. How about there?” I point at the pizza place. “They have amazing calzones.”
“That works. What time are you free?”
“Noon.” I mentally make a note to call Nate and break our date.
After all, a thirty-day-sober Walt is a rare artifact.
Chapter Thirteen
Nate
I’m at Grand Marin, scowling while Beck updates me on the final touches for the units on Mulberry Street. Our live-work community is filled with fruity, herby street names. Mulberry, Juniper, Persimmon. The grassy area where there are sprinklers for the kids in the summer is Strawberry Fields.
“Are we on time?” I interrupt, distractedly squinting into the distance. I’m standing in front of the unit I’m using as an office while watching the cars on the road.
“We’re on time,” he tells me. He knows my values. Being late is unacceptable. William Owen taught me that. If your project is late, then your client is pissed. If your client is pissed, then you might not be rehired. If you’re not rehired, then it’s back to doing the hard part, which is convincing the client to take you on in the first place.
I took to excellence like a fish to water. Back when I was a kid, everything was acceptable. Lateness, stealing from my piggy bank, not having food in the cabinets… Chaos. I don’t like chaos.
Vivian is late for our lunch appointment.
Very late.
I told myself I wasn’t waiting for her, wasn’t watching for her, but then both happened simultaneously. Not that she’s chaos, but these circumstances tend to lead to it. I can’t decide if my pride’s been stepped on or if this is a premonition of Things to Come.
“You okay, Nate?”
“No. Someone was supposed to meet me here a while ago.” I check my watch even though I don’t need to. I’ve been checking the time every three minutes for the last forty-five of them. No, wait. Forty-six.
Beck whistles long and low. He knows I don’t like to be late or stood up. I wonder which one my “date” has done. Time to pay Vivian a visit.
Across the street from CRBI, I park and feed a meter. At the crosswalk, I freeze when I spot her embracing some guy.
My fists ball at my sides as a flicker of the old rage I used to feel daily sparks to life. It’s unhealthy, that rage. I need to move the needle from rage to disappointment if I have any hope of not losing my temper.
Is he the guy who ripped her off? She told me he was dead, but people say lots of things to escape or cover for their past. I know someone, intimately, who encouraged their own mother to sign over her parental rights to the Owen family. And then told everyone she died.
We do what we have to do, is what I’m saying.
The light changes and I do a neat jog to cross the street. When she sees me, her eyes widen with alarm and she drops the man’s hand.
I stalk toward her, upset and borderline betrayed. The guy she’s with is tall, rangy, no match for me. Especially when I’m this pissed off. If he hurt her, so help me, God, I’ll—
“Nate.” Her voice holds more than one note of surprise. Did she think I’d let her stand me up and not check on her? Did this guy do the same to her in the past?
“Who the hell are you?” I ask him. No sense in wasting my anger on her.
He smiles, zero caution in his eyes. Zero fear too. He strikes me as someone who’s accustomed to being on the wrong end of situations. I immediately reassess when he offers his hand.
“Walt St—”
“My brother, Walt,” Vivian interrupts. Unlike her brother’s, her smile is a touch disingenuous. “Walt, this is Nathaniel Owen, he’s a builder in the area. We do a lot of work with the Owens at CRBI.”