by Karin, Anya
Lys giggled. "Yeah, I found a ratted up old copy of Dracula at the second hand shop in town. Figured I may as well do some reading. A well-rounded education can't hurt, after all."
"That's what they say, for sure." He kissed her on the forehead and squeezed her shoulder. "Take notes, there'll be a quiz afterward."
As soon as she was gone up the stairs, Ryan sat down on the couch to open the two pieces of mail he saved.
"Oh good, the bank. Love these guys. Maybe I'll save this one for dessert. Ehh, better not. Face the morning and all that. And anyway, this one might actually be good news." He tore open the second envelope, opened the paper and quickly scanned for the words "loan approved." He didn't find them.
Ryan sighed, dropped the eighth car loan rejection notice he'd gotten in three months from eight different banks on the table and grabbed the other envelope as he stretched out and pushed his boots off with his feet.
"Ha! Two letters from two different banks arrive on the same Saturday. Must be magic." When he stuck his finger inside the envelope and started to rip it, he was interrupted by the phone. It took a minute for him to realize that's what it was. It had been awhile since he had a phone call.
"Hel-hello?"
Through the receiver he heard clanging noises, like a door shutting, and then a cabinet, or possibly a desk drawer. Whatever it was sounded like wood-on-wood. "Hello?"
"Ah, is this Mr. Ryan Barton?" The man on the other end had an old voice with a little rattle hanging off the end.
"Speaking. Who is this? Mr. Webb?" It didn't sound anything like the young man's voice, but that was the only guess he had. "This isn't the bank, is it?"
"No. And you were partially right. This is Preston Webb's assistant, Gadsen Cartwright. How do you do?"
"I'm doing well. How are you, Mr. Cartwright? I wasn't expecting to hear back from you guys so soon. Usually there're a few days between assignments. Happy to help however I can though, if that's what this is about."
"Assignments? Oh, no, not right now. It's actually about your daughter."
"My...which one? Lori?"
His heart skipped a beat. He dropped his two younger off at a friend's house early that morning for a day full of screaming and throwing things at each other in the woods, or, as some parents call it, a birthday party. But there's not much way that Preston Webb's assistant could know about that.
"No, not her." Ryan heard a piece of paper ruffling. "No, Alyssa. You have a daughter called Alyssa, correct?"
"Yes, but, I'm sorry Mr. Cartwright, what's this about again? No one knows that my daughter is back in town."
"I believe you mentioned it to Mr. Webb in a letter?"
"Oh, yes, of course." He thumped his forehead with the heel of his hand. "Of course, I'm sorry. But for the life of me I can't figure out what you'd need her for. She's just in town for a few months to help out-"
"Yes, nothing about that. As it happens, Mr. Webb has carried something of a torch for her. I'm not sure of the particulars, but he'd like to meet her."
Ryan Barton gulped.
"Uh, are you sure? I mean, why?"
"That is beyond me, I'm afraid. Beyond my pay grade, as they say."
"Right, right." Ryan chuckled nervously. "Well, I mean sure. I'll have to ask her, but I don't see why not."
"There's no time to ask her. We'll be around at approximately eight tonight. Please be there. And make the same arrangements you make when Mr. Webb comes to speak to you on business. She won't be permitted to look at him, of course."
"O – Okay, whatever you say. Are you sure I can't ask her first? I feel kinda like I'm forcing her to go on a blind date."
"I'm not exactly asking, Mr. Barton. Although, might I suggest she temper her expectations?"
"How do you mean? What expectations?"
"You know. A pretty young girl, asked to meet the heir to a sizeable oil empire, and all. It can get away from a person. He is a fragile man. Sickly, I mean. And emotionally, he's got a number of hang-ups. I shouldn't be telling you this."
"Well, if he's trying to court my daughter, I think you ought to be."
"I don't know if I'd call it courting, exactly. He's just curious, I believe. Anyway," Gadsen sniffed and the paper from earlier audibly crinkled again. "That will be all. I shouldn't say anything more. Thank you for agreeing to this. It seems very important to Preston for some reason. We'll see you this evening."
"Right. Of course, anything to help. Bye, then." Ryan Barton hung up and stared straight ahead. A thousand questions circled in his head, but the most important of them revolved around how Preston Webb could have known anything about his daughter at all, and what he might want with her.
He shook his head to clear his thoughts and then called up to Alyssa.
"Hey, what's up?" She said, sticking her head around the opening of the stairwell. "Did you call me? You look like you saw...er...Dracula."
"Actually, I kinda feel like I did. I hope you don't mind, Lyssie, but I think I just made a date for you."
"You did what? Does anyone know I'm in town besides the people at the school and the gym? Does anyone my age even live around here anymore?" She laughed, thinking about it and realizing no, probably not.
Her dad opened his mouth, and it just hung there.
"Well, not the same age. I think he's a few years older. Five maybe? Ten? I'm not sure, exactly."
"What did you do, daddy?" Lys stepped out of the stairwell into the living room and crossed to the couch where her father lay. "What aren't you telling me?"
"Nothing dear. It was all really sudden."
"Well who is it? Who have you got me blind dating? Last time I did one of these, I ended up with the guy for a year and a half."
"Blind date is actually a pretty apt way to describe it. I don't know how to tell you this Lyssie, but I think I just set you up with Preston Webb."
Her eyes got so big that a doe would say she had Alyssa eyes.
"I...thanks!"
By the time he turned to respond, Alyssa had vanished back up the stairs.
"Is he here? Is that what that noise is outside? Was that the car?" Alyssa was absolutely jiggling with excitement.
When she popped downstairs for the eighteenth time in three hours, her dad was seated on the couch with a beer and a bag of popcorn and had turned his chair to the stairwell.
"What are you doing?"
"This is better than any TV show I've ever seen," he said, grinning.
"Oh shut up!" she tossed one of her rolled up socks at him, which bounced squarely off his head.
"Hey!"
"So was it? Was that his car?"
"No, no, he'll be here at exactly eight. And when I say exactly, I mean it. He's never once been early, never once been late. What are you so excited for? You don't even know the guy."
"I can't really say to be totally honest. But – oh boy this is gonna sound stupid."
"Out with it, woman," he laughed, "I've admitted all manner of horrible things to you over the years. Hell, just last night I wept at you about your letter. There's no need for getting all ashamed of something with me."
"I know. It's just kinda weird to say out loud what's been running through my head."
"Don't feel like you have to say something if you don't want to, just know that if you want, I'll listen to anything."
"That's why you're the best daddy ever," Lys said as she crossed the room and sat down on the couch next to her dad. "Well, okay here goes." She took a deep breath. "I've never been pursued before. A – And I'm really, really lonely. Ever since Bret and I broke it off, it's like there's been this hole in my chest."
"Pursued? Like by a man? You? What about Bret?"
"Nope," she shook her head. "Not even Bret. He was so shy when we got together that I made all the moves. Well most of them anyway. He would barely hold my hand unless I grabbed his first. Then back in high school it was the same thing. I had a couple boyfriends – Drake and Paul – but yeah, I made all the moves."
"Why do you think that is? Do ya scare 'em?" He laughed, but only a little.
"I don't know. Maybe." She looked at her arms, her legs. They were big. Not huge, but still, she was a strong girl and always had been. The first order of business she took up when she moved back was getting set up at the gym. "Do you think that's it? I don't think I'm big enough to be scary or anything."
"You know how boys are, right? Easy to intimidate and everything? If they perceive anything as even the remotest of remote threats, they shut down no matter how much they might like someone or want to go further with someone. They just shut down. I'm here to tell you, we don't change a whole lot when we grow up. It was the same way with your mother. She had to make all the moves at first, because I was a little nervous about making the wrong ones."
She sat back on the couch and pushed her hair behind her ear.
"It's funny that you say that. About mom, I mean. I've just never thought of such a thing. I figured it was just because I wasn't enough of a catch to get anyone worked up. Saying it out loud though sounds a little whiny."
"No, that's not whiny, but it's also not true. What is there about you for a guy not to like?"
Alyssa sat silently for a moment and then told her dad that she didn't know, with a shrug.
"Right," he said. "If you can't think of any good reason for someone to not like you, then it probably isn't worth worrying about."
"Yeah, you're probably right. Still though, when I can't figure something out, I always assume I'm missing some vital piece of evidence. But then, maybe not. Maybe I just need to let things be the way they are."
Ryan Barton stood up, stretched his back with his fists planted on his hips, and laughed. "Yeah. It took me fifty something years to figure that out, but I promise it makes everything easier."
"You got half an hour to finish getting all prettied up for the oil man. I'll warn you though, you're probably not gonna see much of him."
"That's okay," Lys said running back upstairs, "I think I've seen him before. It was a few years ago, and he was a good bit away, but I'm pretty sure it was him."
The rustling sounds and drawers pulling out and pushing resumed, as did Alyssa's slightly off-key singing. Her dad took a long swig and set his empty on the table with a sigh that turned into a chuckle. His eyes fell on the small stack of ledger books piled on his desk. All of them already meticulously entered into files that had never been sent.
Again he checked his watch in a way that had become almost habit when waiting for Preston Webb to show up for a meeting. Something about the perfect timing the man always displayed was a little curious, and sometimes disarming. After a long run in a high school classroom though, it was something to be treasured.
"I donno what you want, Preston," he said as he sat back down and awaited either his daughter's next nervous traipse downstairs, or the arrival of the strange man who refused to be seen. "But you better treat her well. I know that much."
He laughed, nervously. "Of course, if you don't, I'm not sure there's much I can do about it."
Chapter Eight
"I don't know, I don't think they're that big," Alyssa flexed one of her arms in the mirror, then the other. "But maybe I'm a bad judge."
What her dad said struck a nerve.
"I'm not scary, or too big, or weird looking," she said. "Am I?"
She had on a button down with a low-cut neck and short sleeves. Looking over at her closet, Alyssa eyed a long sleeved number with a big, high neck and then returned to the mirror and watched herself laugh. She balled up a fist and kneaded the place on her side where a little soreness from her funny way of sleeping had settled.
"I'm not."
"Right?"
She turned left, then right, and pulled her top tight against her belly. Sucking in her cheeks, sticking her head forward, doing all the things she read in a magazine once about how to look as thin as humanly possible in pictures, she held a pose for a moment.
Then just started laughing.
"Stop being so silly, Lys," she said. "Stop trying to make yourself nervous. This guy, whoever he really is, underneath all the money and power and whatever else, is probably just as nervous as you are. Hell, he won't even let dad see his face."
Even as she talked, she turned to view herself in full profile and sucked in her little paunch. Then she exhaled and stuck it out as far as she possibly could and puffed out her cheeks.
"See? It could always be worse."
Alyssa lifted her shirt halfway off when a momentary panic shook her.
"What if he does look though? What if he's really thin and svelte and wants someone like that? What if – what if he isn't coming here for you at all? What if it's just a job offer or something. Won't you feel like a jackass, getting all gussied up?"
She turned back to the mirror and smoothed her shirt down on the front of her thighs, then down the sides.
"You just said 'gussied', Alyssa," she couldn't help but laugh, "are you Granny Barton now?"
Across the room she opened the baggie in which she kept her necklaces and selected one she'd always thought was interesting, but hadn't worn much, a big thing with a large, tear-drop shaped tiger's eye for a pendant. At least she thought it was a tiger's eye. She never was too sure about that.
The stone's fat bottom hung an inch above her cleavage and when she pushed her breasts together, she laughed at herself again. "If nothing else, Alyssa, you got these to be proud of." She grinned. "Bret always liked 'em. Even if he never got to see 'em."
She was done. Everything in place, as much self-doubt as possible buried. Alyssa looked herself up and down, trying to find things to criticize.
"Hair sucks."
The pony tail holder flew across the room and she grabbed a brush, furiously working to remove the kink where the rubber band squeezed. Carefully crafting locks of hair to fall on either side of her face and frame it, she pulled the rest back. Even in her present, half-panicked state, Alyssa couldn't find anything else to obsess over.
Checking her watch, she saw that eight o clock was creeping up quick. Only three minutes left, maybe four. It was hard to tell.
She sat down on the end of her bed, for the first time in about four hours, and let out a long, excited exhale.
"What the hell are you so worked up for?" She said, not able to help the grin that was plastered across her face. Just smiling like that made her feel good. "He might just be here to offer you an odd job, thinking you need the money like dad does."
Somehow, she doubted it.
Her thoughts drifted back to those days in the forest, and the old man who taught her about mushrooms. Even though she knew now who he was, back then she had no idea. Every so often, she and Libby or another of her friends went out to that little patch of forest, and rarely – maybe once every ten or twenty trips – they'd see him. He'd always smile really big, wander over and give them each a few of the mushrooms he'd collected and check all of theirs to make sure they never made any dangerous mistakes.
"Gotta be careful about these things," he said. "Even though they're fun...guys!" And then he laughed at his own joke. Every time was the same, he told the same joke. Strange thing about that old man, thinking back on it, he never said his name, and never seemed dirty or anything. She shrugged it off with a smirk and let her thoughts turn back to Preston.
When she looked up at that window each time she got brave enough to come out of the forest and sneak a peek at the mansion, she hoped he'd be there. A time or two, he actually was. Tall, slender, she imagined him to be beautiful – if that was actually Preston at all.
"It had to be him," she told herself, "it just had to be. Who else could it have been? Who else would stand in a window like that except a bored guy hoping to see something exciting? And it must be boring to live in a place like that. After a while anyway, if the stuff my dad says is true about him never leaving the place. I just don't know though. Maybe it wasn't."
She sighed, and scrunched her nose, a
nd looked at the clock on the nightstand.
Seven fifty-nine.
Alyssa took a deep breath and looked down to see her hands shaking a little.
"You are a mess!" She laughed. "Everything's going to be just fine. Really. Worst thing that happens is a guy doesn't like you. Who cares? The end of the world, it ain't."
"Alyssa! Someone's here to see you!"
She looked back at the clock on her way out the door.
Seven fifty-nine.
As she poked her head around the opening into the living room, Alyssa saw her dad sitting in his chair, but not reclined. Next to him was a hawk-like old man, stiffly seated on the edge of the couch, with his shoulders consciously pushed back and his chest out much farther than could have been natural. A short tuft of hair ringed his head, and his most prominent feature – his nose – was hooked at the end.
Pulling her eyes off the man's nose, Alyssa stuck out her hand, which he held with his fingertips and gingerly shook.
"So nice to meet you," she said, glancing down at the gloved hand in hers a little confused. "I know you don't remember me, but I saw you a long time ago, I think. You're Mr. Webb, right?"
"I doubt that, young lady." His voice was cold stone with a trickle of ice water running over the surface. "And I see that you're confused. Mr. Webb is waiting outside. I'm Gadsen Cartwright, Mr. Webb's...ah...assistant."
"Oh," Alyssa swallowed in relief. "I see, well, sorry for the over eagerness, in that case."
"Don't worry about it. I know this is all very sudden. It is for me, too. As I was telling your father, Preston wanted to meet you, although I'm not entirely sure why. Please don't take that the wrong way."
"No, of course not, that's okay."
"It's just that I'm not entirely sure how he came to know you in the first place. He's been rather a sheltered person, you see."
Alyssa's eyes moved off of the curious old man and to a shadow on the front door. Staring through the wooden slats, she was able to make out the lines of a very tall man's body, but he seemed to be facing away. All she saw was black cloth, which seemed like the back of a suit. On the ends of his arms, white cuffs poked out from the black confirming her suspicions. One of his hands, she saw, was rhythmically clenching and relaxing. The other, with its long, slender fingers that matched the man, was hanging open.