by Pratt, Lulu
I grumbled, “You’re certainly in a bad mood.”
Chloe slammed her open hands down on the table and rose once more, moving past it to stand in front of me.
“Don’t be a dick,” she said in a low voice, pointing her finger at me. “You’re testing me right now. I’m in a bad mood because you behaved badly.”
She jabbed her finger into my chest and as she went to move it back, I wrapped my hand around it, stopping her mid-motion. I pulled her to me by her finger, her feet stumbling to keep up.
“I’m doing the best I can, Chloe,” I murmured through clenched teeth. “We shouldn’t have slept together, that was our mistake. I’m just trying to clean up after us. Can you please be helpful, and not try to foil me at every turn?”
She shook my hand free and took a step back.
“Fine. If that’s what you want… fine. I’ll be a good girl, I’ll shut my mouth, I’ll aid and abet you. Just don’t expect me to be all cool and chill with Rebecca.”
Chloe sat down behind her desk once more.
“Now, get out,” she spat.
As I unlocked the door and slammed it open, I stole another look back at Chloe, and saw tears welling in her eyes.
Why couldn’t I do anything right?
CHAPTER 9
Chloe
AFTER XAVIER left, I locked the door behind him and let loose the full-throated sob that had been threatening to break free for the last ten minutes.
“Son of a bitch!” I cried out to no one in particular. “Goddamn son of a bitch.”
From the second he strolled back into my life, Xavier had seemed destined to hurt me. Maybe that’s why we’d never made it as a couple. Because we were the kind of people who knotted and tangled ‘round one another, tightening the emotional ropes with every movement we made. Cutting the string was the only way to find peace.
I went home and cried myself to sleep. Had coming back to New York been a huge mistake?
In the morning, I woke up with red eyes and a decidedly upset stomach. I stumbled out of bed and just barely made it to the bathroom before heaving the half-digested contents of my dinner into the toilet bowl.
God, the Xavier situation must have made me even more tense than I’d realized. In my first year of college, I’d sometimes get so nervous before a test that my stomach would do a loop-the-loop and I’d have to haul ass to the nearest ladies’ room to avoid spewing on my fellow classmates. There was something about being at NYU, such an intimidatingly prestigious school, that made me double over with worry. But normally, anxiety wasn’t a very big part of my life, so I suppose in the intervening years since being a freshman, I’d forgotten just how adverse my reaction to be.
I wasn’t thrilled that Xavier had taken me back to such a dark, barf-y place. Even if the sex had been magnificent.
Wiping my mouth, I reached into the shower and turned on the hot water. Steam filled the bathroom, fogging up the mirror and easing the pain in my chest. Much better.
Besides, I didn’t have time to be anxious. Today was the day I was to start on my restoration of Girl with a Wilted Flower, a tricky project that might well determine my career. Barfing would have to wait.
I arrived at work a full half hour early that morning, teeming with excitement. Though I was there so early, Mx. Tok was already at work as well. Does she ever sleep? I wondered. She must have, to maintain such pearlescent skin.
“Oh good,” she commented upon seeing me. “You’ve finally arrived.”
Finally?!
But I tamped my annoyance down. “Yes, and I’m very eager to get started.”
“You’re familiar with all the equipment in the restoration studio. I’ve had maintenance unlock it. Feel free to go downstairs and begin.”
I bobbed a small bow — something I’d begun doing unwittingly, perhaps because she had the countenance of a queen — and gathered my materials to head down.
“See you later,” I replied, barely able to restrain my smile.
This was it, I’d finally get to do what I’d come here to do. Be a professional art restorer. I’d prove my worth and launch my career. It’s all happening, I thought giddily.
I entered the restoration suite with a slight tremor of excitement in my hands, which I knew I’d better eradicate before I handled an extremely rare and priceless work of art. The thought of what might happen if my gleeful jitters caused the slightest damage to the work… I shuddered just to think of it.
Before me was a kind of protective glass box, or cage. It was made of special glass that prevented any damage from overhead lights, and kept the room at a perfect and stable temperature. Inside was a wall of equipment and a table. Upon that table was Girl with a Wilted Flower.
I opened the glass box and stepped inside, immediately snapping on some rubber gloves. If the oils from my hand so much as touched the work, I’d have hell to pay.
Moving closer to the table, I hovered over the art and sighed with contentment.
It was a stunning piece, even in its disrepair. A young woman in a thin, cotton blouse and a draped skirt, her hair wrapped up in a turban, gazed at a wilted daisy in her calloused hands. Her eyes spoke the silent language of yearning which even the youngest child could recognize well. If you looked carefully in the shadowy background of the piece, you could see the back of a man, turned away from the woman.
The painting told the story of an unrequited love. A woman scorned, a man walking out. Even the smallest shadows coalesced into hues of sorrow and mourning. The few falling petals of the flower seemed to drip like tears, descending as though they might escape the frame of the painting and pool on the floor.
Despite my years of training, I had to resist the urge to reach out and touch the girl and reassure her that everything would be all right, that there would be another men. Nothing I could say would help her. She was trapped in another lifetime and on a wall of canvas.
As I was tilting over the painting to get a better look at the narrow street in the background, the door behind me opened.
It was Mx. Tok, already wearing plastic gloves and eyeballing me like prey.
“What do you think of her?” she asked, nodding to the central figure in the piece.
I decided to answer truthfully. “I think she’s very lonely.”
Mx. Tok’s lips pressed together. “Yes, I rather think you’re right.”
We both stared at her for a moment, dwelling on this notion.
Mx. Tok broke the silence first, saying, “Anyhow, I’ve just come down to supervise you. I’m taking a bit of risk with your hire, but since Alexandra’s recommended you so highly, I figured we ought to give it a go. I’d like to watch you at work, see how you handle the painting and the minutiae of restoration.”
I swallowed. “So you’re going to sit here and… observe me?”
“Is that a problem?”
“No, no of course not.” It totally is, I thought. “You’re welcome to. In fact, it’d be nice to have company.”
There, that should cover up my clear displeasure at her presence. I’d known to expect scrutiny, but wasn’t this a little much?
It’s all about the endgame, I reminded myself. At the end of this treachery-laden yellow brick road was the potential for a great career.
So I settled in with Mx. Tok and the Girl with a Wilted Flower, and began my work.
CHAPTER 10
Xavier
“GODDAMNIT, where did I put my reading glasses?”
My father patted his suit jacket with those large hands that I’d studied so carefully as a child. They were massive, carved out with lines on both sides, and the left boasted a slightly misshapen pinky from a skiing accident years ago.
I sighed and pointed. “On your head, Dad.”
He felt atop his bald skull and located them at once.
“Ah, right, of course.”
“They’re always on your head.”
He harrumphed. “Don’t make fun of me. I’m an old man, and us old men are pro
ne to forget little things like that.”
“Oh please, you’re in better shape than most guys my age.”
Leaning back into his armchair, my dad tapped the leather thoughtfully. “I’m not sure that’s true, but it’s very kind of you to say.”
It was, in fact, absolutely true.
My dad had both the will and the money to take excellent care of himself, and did so. He was seventy, but doctors frequently marveled at his perfect immune system, clear skin and wonderful faculties. He skied in Aspen every year — when he wasn’t busy sailing in the Mediterranean. When his hair had gone white, some decade before I was born, he’d promptly shaved it all off. Looking at him now, a stranger might reckon he was no more than a spry fifty-five.
“Now, down to business,” he said in that signature gruff voice which so many reporters had noted over the course of a hundred profiles. “How are preparations for the gala going?”
“Fine. Nothing out of the ordinary. Last I heard from the event planners, they’ve got the catering company booked, some sort of famous DJ, or singer, something or another. Whoever he is, all the kids are crazy for him.”
My dad let out a braying laugh. “You sound older than I am.”
I ignored him and continued, “We’ve got a security team on board. The rest is just decoration details.”
Neither of us were much for ‘decoration details,’ so my dad nodded and didn’t press it.
“Good, good. Glad to hear it’s going smoothly. Not that I would expect anything less.” He ran a hand over his lips, and added innocently, “And how are the plans for the proposal developing?”
Oh, great. This was clearly what he’d been building up to. I should’ve realized earlier that he didn’t care a fig for something as trivial as event logistics. My dad had an uncanny ability to talk people into a corner, getting to the point with such finesse that you didn’t even mind how prying the ultimate question was.
Unless, of course, you were me, and you tired of the prying.
But, I reminded myself, he’s my father. He was well within his right to ask about something as major as an impending engagement. It was my own reticence that was the trouble. What did I have to hide?
“I don’t have any ideas yet,” I admitted, “as it regards the actual proposal.”
“Fine, but remember not to slack on it. Women like big proposals, flashy stuff. Fireworks, jet planes, skywriting. That sort of thing.”
“So, basically anything in the air,” I asked, my sarcasm barely veiled.
“Exactly. I think it makes them feel like your love is so big, it could fill the stratosphere.”
And what if my love was about big enough to fill, say, a coffee shop? Was that an okay kind of love? Friendship wasn’t ‘in the sky’ love. It was on the ground, it was small, it was cozy. But it wasn’t stratospheric.
That familiar guilt bit into my abdomen, but I quickly reminded myself that love could be taught. I loved Rebecca as a friend, or even a sister. I could learn to love her as a wife.
“There’s something else,” my father continued. There was always something else with him. “I thought it only right to let you know, Adam and I are… receiving certain pressure from the board. They’re encouraging us to split Eureka into two. These young fellows say it’ll help us grow with the times.”
He broke off and stared at me with the probing calm that only a father could muster.
“Split the company?” I repeated, baffled by this turn of events. “I don’t understand.”
“Neither did I, at first. Changing Eureka’s structure, after decades of massive success… I balked. But then I realized that they weren’t objecting to our structure — they were just trying to figure out how to transition the company before Adam and I kicked our respective cans.”
“Dad!”
“Oh, come on now, Xavier, I’m seventy. I know when I’m getting phased out.”
“Dad—”
“Enough. Anyhow, Adam and I aren’t bitter about it. We’re old farts now, we get it. But it doesn’t matter, because we have another solution.”
I rubbed the creases out of my forehead. “To get a time machine and go back to being thirty?”
“Better yet — to inject real, young blood into the company.”
“Like those vampire facials models get?”
He laughed, “No, nothing quite so macabre. We’re gonna make you and Rebecca co-CEOs.”
There was a tingling that started somewhere in my fingertips and spread slowly up my arms like a legion of glowworms, wriggling and setting my nerves on fire.
I swallowed.
“You want me… to take over Eureka?”
“Well, you and Rebecca, yes. What do you think? It’s what I’ve prepared you for my whole life, and sure, you’re a little younger than I would’ve anticipated, but hell… I think you’re ready.”
This shouldn’t have come as a surprise. Dad was right. I’d been raised, like some small princeling, to one day assume the throne. But as he said, I’d never imagined it would come so soon. I was scared, not even at the responsibilities of being co-CEO or even CEO, but at the implications of my father stepping down.
“Are you sure this isn’t some kind of cover?” I asked my dad, suspicious of his motives. “You’re not sick, are you?”
He stood up and unbuttoned the bottom four buttons of his dress shirt, revealing a chest of downy white hair, and beneath that, an almost discernible six pack.
“Does this look like the stomach of an ailing man?” he queried.
“Come on, Dad, be serious.”
“I am,” he replied evenly, buttoning his shirt once more and sitting back down. “I’m just trying to lighten the mood. You look so pale. I thought you’d be excited.”
I subtly pinched my cheeks, trying to bring the color back into them. It wouldn’t do to look afraid.
“If you’re really in good health, then…” I paused, and considered what my father had told me. “Then this is awesome. I can’t wait.”
“I knew you’d see it my way.” My father stood and moved around the desk to slap me on the back. He grew earnest and said, “You’re a good kid, Xavier. There are so many pitfalls that come with being raised in the environment you were. I was ready for drugs, for prostitutes, for any number of embarrassments. But you’ve been nothing but wonderful.”
“You’re getting sentimental in your old age.”
“Don’t feel too proud of yourself. You’re only so great because I raised you well.”
I grinned. “There it is. I knew I was getting altogether too many compliments.”
We laughed together, in the guileless way that only a parent and child can. At last, our laughter subsided and my dad wiped at the crows’ feet around his eyes, flicking away some moisture.
“I can’t wait to see what you do next, kid.”
CHAPTER 11
Xavier
I LEFT MY father’s office in the highest of spirits.
I’m going to take over Eureka, I thought to myself, running it through my mind as though sheer repetition would make it seem more real.
Well, Rebecca and I were going to, anyway.
And that was fine. No, great, even. This was what we’d trained our whole lives for. We’d be engaged, and then married and then business partners. Eventually, we’d start a family. It would all be so perfect, exactly as everyone had planned.
Right?
Just as I was working on putting these questions as far from my brain as possible, my phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Hey Xavier,” Rebecca said, her voice distant. Or was that just the phone? “I’m not going to be able to make our date tonight.”
“Oh. Really?” I’d booked us a special table at the new fancy restaurant in town, some kind of fusion between two disparate cultures, probably manned by a white chef. “I thought you were looking forward to it.”
An unwelcome thought occurred to me. Was Rebecca cancelling our date because she knew some
thing was up with me? Had my connection with Chloe been so electric that she had felt it just standing in the room with us? That familiar guilt encircled my throat and squeezed tight.
More than anything, I didn’t want to hurt her. We were going to be partners, after all, in every sense of the word. Rebecca was kind. She didn’t deserve to get the blowback of my dastardly ways.
“Yeah, I was.” She sounded… not upset, what was the word I was looking for? For once in my life, I couldn’t read Rebecca like a picture book. “Something came up. I’m really sorry, Xavier. Rain check?”
I breathed a small sigh of relief. That, at least, was somewhat reassuring.
“Of course, no worries at all. Just text me when we should reschedule.”
“Thanks, Xavier, you’re the best.”
She clicked off, and I tucked my phone away. Ambling down the courtyard of my father’s office building, I stared into the verdant plants that lined the walkway.
Despite Rebecca’s insistence that she’d just gotten busy — she was busy a lot these days — I felt a lingering sense that something was not right at all. I’d done my best to hide the attraction — and the slip up — between Chloe and me, but I was no Juilliard actor. Had Rebecca known? They say women have an intuition for these sorts of things.
I wasn’t one to make generalizations about the sexes, but at least it must be said, Rebecca knew me better than most anyone. Perhaps it wasn’t her womanly intuition, but her familiarity as a friend, that led her to suspect my sexual escapade.
Or was this just all in my head?
Spotting a bench, I flopped down and stretched out my legs, my knees cracking as I took a rest.
My future, which had been predetermined since pretty much the day I was born, had begun to look rather murky. Things that were supposed to be simple and straightforward had been bent to and fro by the vacillations of the universe, warping them.
And, most terrifying of all… what if a carefully inked future wasn’t what I wanted? What if I actually desired the freedom of making my own decisions, and with that, my own mistakes? Was I happy with the life that had been inscribed for me? And if not, was it too late to change it?