“I don’t think boarding school is like the books,” I say, gently.
Rusty gives me the most patronizing look I’ve ever seen on a child, and I have to fight not to laugh.
“I know Hogwarts isn’t real, Seth,” she says. “I mean a regular one.”
I don’t think Rusty actually wants to leave home and only see her family on holidays and weekends at the tender age of nine. The kid would be homesick like crazy.
I do think she’s read a whole lot of novels about kids at boarding schools, both magical and ordinary, who get to have fun adventures, solve mysteries, and save the day, all without parental interference.
“Rusty,” I say, and put a hand on her shoulder. “It’s a ways away, but you’re gonna love college.”
She sighs again. Do most nine-year-olds sigh this much?
Fifty feet in front of us, a door opens.
Delilah walks out. The world tilts.
“Maybe sleep-away camp this summer,” Rusty’s saying.
Delilah waves to someone inside. Lets the door go.
Looks straight at us.
It’s like a heat lamp. Always.
“Don’t you think that would be educational?”
She stares at me for a moment, face unreadable. There’s a yoga mat in a bag slung over one shoulder, her hair in a high bun, and she’s got leggings and winter boots on. When she sees Rusty, she smiles.
“Hi,” she says, shoving both hands in her coat pockets when we walk up to her. Her face is still slightly flushed, the edges of her hair damp. “Really nice night out, huh?”
No personal questions or comments. No inside jokes.
Just polite small talk.
“It’s very nice,” I say, my voice perfectly neutral. “Have you met my niece Rusty, by the way?”
“It’s been a while, I believe,” Delilah says as Rusty holds out her right hand, very seriously.
“Charmed, I’m sure,” Rusty says with a perfectly straight face.
Delilah grins so big I think her face might crack in half.
“Absolutely,” she says, clearly trying not to laugh. “What a pleasure.”
“Likewise,” says Rusty, and lets Delilah go. She adjusts the strap on her shoulder again, looks me full in the face. The smile fades.
“Yoga?” I ask, nodding at the door she exited.
“Yep,” she says. “And you?”
“Just finished dance class and going for hot chocolate at the Mountain Grind,” I say.
I want to say care to join us? but I shut my mouth before I can.
“Well, I’ll let you get to it,” she says, turning on a bright smile again. The one that doesn’t fully reach her eyes. “Nice seeing you. Rusty, I remain charmed.”
“Later,” I say, and try to catch her eye as she walks away, but I can’t.
“Bye!” Rusty hollers, and that’s it. That’s all. Just nice night and yoga class and hot chocolate.
Not even don’t you think it smells like snow? Or they finally took the Christmas lights off the trees or how have you been?
Rusty and I keep walking, and it’s not until we reach the next crosswalk that I realize she’s giving me a really funny look.
“What’s up, kiddo?” I ask, already dreading the answer.
Rusty doesn’t say anything. She just frowns up at me, like she’s trying to add two and two on a calculator and the answer keeps coming up five.
“Nothing,” she says, uncertainly.
I stand in the middle of the room, cross my arms, and look for the yellow dot.
I don’t see it. The room is filled with kegs — on the floor, stacked two or three high, all jammed into this space — but I don’t see the yellow marker I’m looking for.
I cross my arms a little harder and keep looking. Our inventory clearly states that we’ve got one more remaining keg of Deepwood Loch Scottish Ale, and the sports bar over in Grotonsville just asked if we had any left.
It’s here somewhere. My inventory system doesn’t lie. I just don’t know where.
Footsteps enter, and I turn. Arms still crossed.
“You want to talk about it?” Daniel asks, standing just inside the doorway.
“About the fact that we have a clear, concise keg organizational system that our employees regularly flaunt by putting kegs wherever they’re standing when they get bored of carrying them?” I ask. “Sure. They’re all fired.”
“I meant about the fact that you’ve been a miserable bastard for two weeks and especially for the last two days,” he says, unruffled.
“I’d rather find the last Deepwood Loch and get back to work.”
Daniel pushes the door closed, runs a hand over his face, and turns back to me.
“All right,” he says. “Which color is it?”
“Yellow,” I say. “Probably says DLSA on the side if you see that first.”
For a few minutes, we look in silence, and I’ve got no choice but to either find the keg or wait for whatever Daniel’s got to say.
He speaks up first.
“I don’t hate her, you know,” he says.
It’s not the conversation starter I was expecting. I spent several extra moments examining a keg of Irish Red Ale, just to make triple sure it’s not what I’m looking for.
“Who?” I ask.
“In fact, I strongly suspect that you’ve been just as much of an asshole to her as she’s been to you,” he says, ignoring my question.
“So you didn’t come in here to try and cheer me up.”
“I came in here to see if I could do anything before our entire staff quits because one of their bosses is on the warpath for no apparent reason,” he says, bending over a keg.
After a moment, he looks up and right at me.
And then he waits. And waits.
I’m the one who breaks eye contact.
“After Ava’s wedding I went back to her room,” I admit. “Where I agreed to leave before we got into a fight, and I did.”
Daniel grabs a keg by the top, pulls it away from the others, and sits on it. Leans his elbows on his knees.
“And?” he says.
I pull a keg against the wall, sit on it, lean back.
Then I give Daniel the rest of the truth. He knows most of it, but I tell him about the rules of interaction. About seeing her at the brewery. About saying no to Vera and then later, saying yes.
About proposing friendship only to kiss her in the dark a few hours later, though I keep it G-rated.
I tell him that she told me to leave, that she wanted to go back to those stupid fucking rules, that I agreed to both things because I know she’s right.
“So I left,” I say, lacing my hands together on top of my head. “And I saw her two nights ago, and we talked about the weather, and I hate it. This is what we do, over and over again, and I wish I could stop it and I can’t. Every single time I think it’s the last one and then I see her again and it’s the right time and the right place, and I can’t say no to her.”
I tilt my head back and push the heels of my hands into my eyes.
“I’ve never turned her down,” I confess. “God, not once. This is why I apply for jobs on Alaskan fishing boats and at breweries in Montana.”