Dirty Little Secret

by Wood, Vivian

  “You know what, Mom? Fuck you. You’ve disappointed me for the last fucking time.”

  Whirling, I storm out of her hospital room, so furious I can't even think or see straight. Eve is coming down the hall as I stride down it, a disbelieving look on her face.

  “What happened?” she asks, grabbing at my arm.

  “Our mom’s a whore,” I spit back, evading her grip.

  Her look of perfect surprise is more than I can take. I shake her off and head for the stairs, pushing open the door and taking stairs down two and three at a time.

  I make it down to the parking lot in no time at all. Soon I peel out, burning rubber in my haste just to leave the damn place. I can't even hear the noise of the tires against the pavement over the voices in my head.

  Every single voice angry, every one shouting at full volume inside my head.

  I drive into the night, knowing full well that I’m not going to return, even though she’s only got a day left. Let Eve have her.

  I’m done.

  Chapter Two

  Aiden

  “Get the hell out of my apartment!” she shouts, steaming mad. She’s standing by the tall open windows of her Port Angeles apartment, still buck naked. She looks jiggly and yet somehow statuesque at the same time as she leans out with a bundle of my clothes.

  That’s a moment to remember. But I know I won’t. There have been too many Emmas to count recently. I guess there is a reason she’s a model after all, because she is the very picture of grace even as she hurls my clothes out the window.

  “Emma—” I say, holding my hand up to ward her off.

  The other hand holds a silk bedsheet, covering my junk. Two minutes ago, we were naked and writhing around in her bed.

  Then she asked about brunch tomorrow with her friends and the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. All this, before we actually fucked. It’s too much for anybody, most of all me.

  I made what was obviously in retrospect the huge mistake of being blunt and honest about my needs. After all, I only plan on being here for a few more hours at most.

  I have plans. Stuff I need to do while I’m in town. After this, I’m headed back to base camp to lead a ten-day tour.

  That wasn’t what she wanted to hear, I guess. Thus she’s now dumping my stuff out the window and demanding I leave.

  “Oooohhhh. My name is Emily! Em-uh-lee!” she screams. Her mascara is starting to pool and give her raccoon eyes, but I don’t think that now is the time to say anything.

  She seems more than a little unhinged. It’s common practice in my life for the women that I sleep with to be a little insane. After all, I like them to be tall, blonde, and gorgeous. Usually that comes with a whole side of daddy issues that makes them try very hard in the bedroom.

  “That’s what I meant,” I say calmly. The whole situation is getting a little out of control now, so I start to back toward the apartment door. “I’m on my way out now, so…”

  She picks up a pillow from the floor and flings it in my direction. “Good. Just leave!”

  I get the picture. Grabbing my keys and phone from her kitchen counter as I slink out, I rush down the stairs of her apartment building. As I burst into the cool night air, I shiver. I’m glad it’s summer, I guess. In the winter in northern Washington, this close to the beach, it gets bitterly cold.

  As opposed to now, when the temperature is merely cool. Almost balmy. It a new moon tonight, almost no illumination coming from the sky but the patient stars.

  Gathering my clothes from where they lie strewn across the street, I hobble back to my lifted black Jeep and quickly dress. My wallet is still in my pants, which I’m glad for. Having to replace my wallet for the third time this year is not really on my to-do list. This is far from the first time I’ve been in this exact situation, and it’s probably not the last time either.

  Still, ordering a new set of credit cards and a new ID is a pain in the ass.

  The pleasant buzz I had going on is fading. I get in my Jeep and drive down highway 101, heading back to Whiskey Bend. That’s where the base camp for the National Park Service is, where I’m stationed as a park ranger.

  I crack the windows a little bit and enjoy the cool night air on my drive back through the inky darkness.

  I don’t think about what just happened.

  I don't think about how it feels like my life is ever-so-slightly out of control.

  And I definitely don’t think about the Morgan family as I pass by the turn off to get to their estate. In fact, I speed up, just to avoid having to think about them.

  Okay, maybe I just wonder about them a little. About my mother, too. I imagine my mother — now deceased — when she was much younger, exploring their estate. That was before I was born. Right before she met my bastard of a father, who brutalized and bullied her until her dying breath.

  I haven’t been able to bring myself to tell anyone but Grayson about her passing. Not yet.

  Maybe not ever.

  It’s too painful a subject. Especially when I start thinking about what she confessed to me as she was dying.

  Was she just on so many drugs that her addled mind invented an affair?

  Or was she just trying to right a wrong that took place thirty years ago?

  The fact that I still don't know is just fucking with my head.

  I look out the window and try to think of something else. Soon I pull my Jeep around the last bumpy turn, and Whiskey Bend spills out before me. Above me as I climb out of my vehicle, I can't see the sky. There is a dense canopy of tree leaves over the camp site. The familiar wood cabin style buildings in the forefront welcome me. In the distance, there is a huge ropes course built, intertwining with the trees.

  A familiar figure stands on the porch of the largest cabin that doubles as a mess hall, waiting. As I get closer, I can make out my boss Nate. He wears his usual khaki shorts and a Whiskey Bend tee shirt, his feet clad in sandals. His arms are crossed as he leans against the outside of the mess hall. His bald head gleams in the feeble light.

  I stride forward, taking the steps to the mess hall two at a time. It’s only when I’m close that I realize that Nate is extremely pissed off at me. I slow down as I catch the hostility in his stare.

  Nate is usually pretty easygoing, so his mood is unexpected.

  “Hey,” I say, climbing the last step. That brings us eye to eye, or at least it would if he wasn’t almost a foot shorter than me. At 6’3, I am taller and broader than most men.

  “Hey.” His tone is curt. His expression says that he’s about to tell me something bad.

  “How is Grayson?” I ask. My longtime best friend has been on rocky ground himself recently, trying to cope with heavy PTSD and his ex-girlfriend showing up here. Yeah, maybe it’s a good topic to shift focus off myself, but I do genuinely want to know.

  “Grayson is… well, he’s still pretty unhappy that I just saddled him with his assignment… it’s only the beginning of the summer and he’s already bent out of shape. He seemed upset about how he and Rachel have quite a history, I gather.”

  My lips tip upward. “Yeah, something tells me that he’s going to have a long summer as Rachel’s babysitter. Any word from either of them since they left base camp yesterday morning?”

  “No. And I don't expect to hear anything either. I’ve made it clear to him what his choices are. He can complain about his assignment, or he can work here,” Nate replies evenly. “Grayson will be fine. But I’m afraid we have a bigger problem, Aiden.”

  “Ah.” I rub the back of my neck. This can't be good. “What’s that?”

  “One of the travel agencies called and lodged a complaint against you. Again. I guess you had sex with someone that works for them this time and she was apparently inconsolable afterward. Something about how she’d been saving herself for true love?”

  I scrunch my face up. “That… could sound familiar.”

  Nate gets angry. “God damn it, Aiden! We’ve talked about this!”
r />   I roll my eyes a little bit. I can't help it. “No, you said that you don't want me charming women that work here—”

  “Stop. Talking. Right. Now.” He pushes off the wall, narrowing his eyes and pointing a finger in my face. “You are out of control, man. And you’re obviously not even sorry about it. How can I trust you to take any tour groups out?”

  Now I’m getting a little hot under the collar. “That woman knew exactly who I was and what I wanted before she chose to climb into bed with me. It’s not my fault she got high hopes for the future or whatever. I didn’t give her any reason to have them.”

  Nate makes a frustrated sound. “You have a problem, Aiden. Seriously. I don’t know who or what you are lashing out against, but it’s not happening here anymore.”

  I still. “What, are you firing me?”

  He gives me a look. “No, but I am placing you on unpaid leave. You can come and go from base camp as you wish, but until you get your head screwed on right, I’m not giving you any more tour groups or any park-related jobs.”

  “What the fuck, dude? Because I messed up a couple of times? I’ve seen you with Grayson, you’re like the most patient person on earth for fuckups.”

  He crosses his arms again. “First off, you were warned repeatedly not to dip your pen in the company ink. And second of all, Grayson fucks up because he has bad PTSD from his time in the Navy. You know that as well as I do.”

  I fold my arms across my chest, mirroring Nate. “I was in the Navy too, you know.”

  “That is not the point!” Nate explodes. “I’m tired of babysitting you and Grayson. And now, because you pissed me off, you can say goodbye to being scheduled on any shifts for two months.”

  “Are you fucking serious?” I ask, my teeth gritted.

  Nate holds out his hand, effectively shooing me off the mess hall porch. “Serious as sin. Go find Jesus or a therapist or something. Do an ultramarathon for all I care. Just get yourself straight. I don't know why you’ve been so aggressive since you got back from your vacation, but… You’ve got to find some way of channeling whatever is going on with you into something productive.”

  My fists clench. My vacation, as Nate called it, involved going back home to New Jersey and watching my mom die. Not only that, but she told me a big secret, something she had been keeping inside since the moment of my conception.

  And yeah, maybe in the three months since then I’ve been a little badly behaved. It would help if I had told anybody about my mom’s death, I guess. Or about her deathbed confession.

  I can feel myself superheating, getting ready to punch Nate right in his stupid face while yelling things that will probably get me fired. So I turn and stomp down the stairs, trying to stifle all the rage I have building in my chest.

  I can't help but hear echoes of what I’ve heard my whole life in what Nate said.

  I’m bad.

  I’m in trouble.

  I have it coming for what I did.

  My jaw is clenched so hard and my fists are squeezed so tight that my head is about to pop. I can't stop picturing my father looming over my eight-year-old self, slowly taking his belt off.

  You know what’s going to happen now, he would say. Get ready, you sack of shit.

  I shake my head stiffly, shaking the image until it’s gone too.

  Fuck that. And fuck Nate too. As a matter of fact, fuck the whole entire National Park Service for ever hiring such a prick to be my supervisor in the first place.

  Nate is just doing his job. A small part of me realizes that. And that part of me is the only thing that keeps me from wailing on him. Instead my fury just washes through my body, growing more and more concentrated each time I think about it.

  As I head to my cabin, I’m half blinded by my anger. I need a drink. Actually, I need a fuck, a really fantastic piece of ass to wash away the bitter bile I’m tasting right now.

  Stopping still, I reverse my course. I can come back for my stuff later. Right now, whatever I’m seeking isn’t going to be found in Whiskey Bend. I storm over to my Jeep and get in, peeling out into the night.

  Chapter Three

  Olivia

  “Ugh!” I groan.

  I toss my phone on the seat of my beat up, borrowed sedan with a disgusted sigh and peer out the windshield. My map on my phone doesn’t work if I have no service, and apparently being a whole hour and a half outside Seattle is far enough for that.

  It’s pouring with rain way out here in Belway Point. Now that I have actually made it out here, the lush greenery surrounding my car on both sides mixes with the white patter of the rain, making the entire world look like an abstract impressionist painting. Just two turns back I was looking out at the deep blue sea over a bluff, and now I am deep in the jungle somehow.

  The pacific northwest is so confusing to a girl from New Jersey.

  I’m supposed to be driving out to the Morgan estate, in the desperate hope that they will hire me as an archivist. Old documents and family records are what I’m the most interested in; but without going to school for my master’s degree, I’ve sort of hit a dead end in the archiving business.

  That is, assuming that this doesn’t pan out.

  Starting the car again, I creep forward on the unpaved road. I’m afraid I will hit something or someone if I go any faster in this downpour. Looking at the clock on the dashboard, I start to sweat.

  I’m supposed to be at my meeting in fifteen minutes. I arrived here with plenty of time to spare, but now I’m caught up on this last step. I look out the window, hoping against hope for a sign that will point me toward the house.

  “Come on,” I mutter. “Where are you, Morgan estate?”

  After another minute of driving along very slowly, I see a wrought iron sign with the family name on it.

  “Yes!” I squeal. Turning slowly down an overgrown lane, I bump my way down for a few minutes until I reach a large clearing with the house in it.

  The rain slows down enough for me to make out details of the house a little bit better. It is three stories high, painted a dull gray color, and extremely old-fashioned looking. It is missing most of the shutters and the paint is peeling. And either I’m crazy, or the whole entire house is leaning distinctly left.

  Still, it’s definitely worth looking at. I didn’t expect it to be so big, even though it is referred to as an estate. Looking at the dash, I realize that I’m almost late. So I straighten my dress, lift my shoulder bag onto my shoulder, and then make the mad dash from the car up to the porch.

  I make it to the porch fine, but my dress doesn’t. Long and made of white linen with a skinny little leather belt, it looks like a hot mess when I examine it. That’s not even considering my hair, which I’m sure hangs like a heap of wet rags. Before I can do anything though, a very squeaky door opens.

  A little old lady comes out, using her walker as a support. If she were less than ninety years old, I would be shocked. She’s dressed in a head to toe black crepe dress and looks like something out of the turn of the century. She smiles anxiously at me.

  “Are you Olivia, dear?” she says, rather loudly.

  I tuck my hair behind my ear and nod. My cheeks heat. “Yes. I’m supposed to be here about the archivist position.”

  The woman grimaces. “You’ll have to speak up, my dear. I’m afraid I’ve gone a bit deaf in the last few years.”

  Unsure how loud to be, I lean closer to her and raise my voice. “I’m Olivia. I am here to be your archivist. It is nice to meet you!”

  She closes her eyes, nods, and smiles. “I’m Margaret Morgan. It is a pleasure! If you’ll come inside, please, I’ve laid out tea for us.”

  She seems very polished and polite, very starched too. As I follow her inside the house, I look with wide eyes at the grand foyer with a huge decorative staircase. Everything in here gleams, though the wood floors are a bit careworn and the brass staircase a bit tarnished. The inside of the house is still spotless, despite what I might have guessed from the ou
tside.

  Margaret heads to the right, through a set of heavy doors that have been propped open. Here I do a double take. Several very finely appointed couches and a couple of end tables are clustered around the fireplace. As promised, it looks as though tea has been set up for us.

  Margaret hobbles over to one of the couches and sits down, gesturing for me to do the same. “Please, please. Take a seat.”

  I sit down on the sofa closest to me, ignoring the plume of dust that rises from the couch. Margaret serves me finger sandwiches and some petit fours before relaxing with her own plate.

  “Tell me about yourself!” she declares. “Have you a family, my dear?”

  Coloring, I clear my throat. I’ll have to remember to speak up, which is sort of foreign for me. At least with strangers. Margaret does make me feel a little more comfortable than I would normally be in a job interview, though. “Just my brother, ma’am. I just graduated from Kean University and I would like to start work as an archivist…”

  “Why should that be?” Margaret asks, biting into a petit four.

  I have to think about that one. “Because I love old books and files, I guess. They are less demanding than most people I know…”

  “You are quite right about that, Olivia.” The older lady chuckles into her teacup. “You know, I checked your references out and heard nothing but glowing positive reviews from your college.”

  My cheeks color. She must’ve called the librarians at Kean University, then. I don’t want to say that they all thought I walked on water, but I will say that the ladies there did dote on me. “It’s nice to know that I was appreciated.” I pause, trying to think of an interview-appropriate question. “What are you looking for from an archivist, specifically?”

  “What’s that?” she says, cupping a hand around her ear.

  “I asked what you are looking for from an archivist!” I half-shout.

  She sighs. “I’m afraid that the Morgan family has declined a great deal since we were at our height in the early 1930s. We don’t have much to offer in the way of salary, but I can offer room and board and a small stipend. Two hundred dollars a week, we will say. Plus, you’ll be getting firsthand experience archiving our records.”