by JD Ruskin
WHEN HE entered the warehouse, Logan headed straight for Klass’s office. He’d spent last night in anxious misery. None of the local hospitals would tell him if Caleb was even a patient, let alone how he was doing. His attempts to call Klass and Caleb had gone unanswered. Dabb stopped by just long enough to tuck Logan into bed and tell him to be nicer to his supervisor in the future. Since he was a cryptic bastard, Logan couldn’t tell if his PO believed whatever Foster told him or not. Eventually, he collapsed into a troubled sleep.
Before Logan could get through the doorway, Klass said, “I want to thank you for your help with Caleb, Mr. Sellers.” He sat behind the desk with his hands pressed flat against the wood like he was using it to hold himself upright.
Logan counted to five in his head before he spoke. “Is he doing okay?”
Klass looked like he was debating what to say. “The doctors diagnosed him with a broken wrist, a mild concussion, and dehydration. He’s been treated and is resting at home.”
Home. It wasn’t a home; it was a prison. And Klass might not be Caleb’s warden, but he wasn’t making it any easier for Caleb to escape.
Klass pinched the bridge of his nose, like he was getting a headache. He sat like that for a few long moments before he dropped his hand and spoke. “Caleb will no longer need your services and he has asked me to pay you four weeks’ severance pay. Also, a full-time position will be available next month when Hank Nelson retires, and in light of your efforts on behalf of my nephew, I would like to offer you the position.”
Logan swallowed hard. It was obvious Klass wanted him away from Caleb, and Logan wanted to tell him where to shove his pathetic excuse for a bribe. The smart thing to do would be to just thank the little weasel and walk away. He couldn’t afford to lose his job. Instead he asked, “Are you planning on hiring another ex-con for him?”
Klass pursed his lips. “Not that it’s any of your concern, but Caleb has decided to switch to a courier service and do his shopping at an online grocery.”
Solitary confinement. Logan stared at his boss long and hard, and for a moment, something raw and naked touched Klass’s eyes before it disappeared. Stepping right in front of the desk, Logan said, “You think you’re helping him. You’re not.”
Klass’s shoulders stiffened and his eyes narrowed. “And you think a couple of weeks being his errand boy makes you qualified to know what’s best for my nephew?”
Logan knew the signs all too well. Klass wasn’t angry; he was afraid. So terrified of failing his dead sister he’d rather do nothing than the wrong thing. He wanted to help Caleb, but was doing the opposite. “I know nobody ever got over being afraid of the dark by never turning off the lights.” He turned and walked out before Klass could respond.
Rather than finishing his shift, Logan decided to leave work. Exiting the warehouse, he knew he needed to call his sponsor, Stacy. He didn’t trust himself to keep it together, and he couldn’t help Caleb if he was passed-out drunk.
LOGAN LOOKED up at the sound of the bell as his sponsor entered the cafe. Stacy was wearing a tailored black suit, white shirt open at the neck, revealing enough cleavage to turn heads as she joined him.
After they exchanged greetings, she said, “You sounded frazzled on the phone. What’s going on?”
Just as Logan was about to reply, the waitress appeared with a coffeepot in one hand and menus in the other. “Today’s soup is chicken noodle and our lunch special is a toasted Reuben with fries.” She dropped the menus in front of them. “Coffee?” She held up the pot, and when they both nodded, she filled their crockery mugs and deposited a handful of creamers on the table. “Be back in a jiff.” She spun away to answer the sharp ping of the pick-up bell from the kitchen.
Logan delayed the conversation by swirling cream and sugar into his mug and sipping the hot coffee. “I screwed up and I don’t know how to make it right.”
“Tell me what happened.” She reached across the table and covered his clenched fist with her hand. “Does it involve the guy you told me about? Caleb?”
Logan nodded. He then told her an abbreviated version of what happened to Caleb and his conversation with Klass.
“Are you ready to order, folks?”
Stacy shot Logan an apologetic glance and turned to the menu. “I’d like a bowl of today’s soup and a side salad.”
The woman jotted down Stacy’s order and glanced at Logan.
“Just the coffee.”
Another quick notation, a gathering of menus, and their waitress disappeared.
Stacy took a deep sip of coffee. “I take it Caleb is refusing to speak to you.”
“Yeah, he doesn’t answer when I call.” He shrugged his shoulders. “I’m guessing he’s pissed at me for breaking in and calling his uncle.”
“It’s possible, but I doubt it. If he’s refusing to talk to you, it’s not because you got him the medical treatment he needed.”
“Then why?”
“From what you’ve told me there are a lot of similarities between addiction and anxiety disorders. They both have the potential to control a person’s life and there’s a lot of shame in allowing it to happen.” She took a sip of her coffee. “Shame makes it worse. Making you more likely to sink further.”
Logan rolled his shoulders, tilted his head from side to side to pop his neck and to ease his tension, trying to force himself to relax. He was too familiar with that vicious cycle. “I shouldn’t be bothering you with this and dragging you away from your job.”
“Don’t do that,” she said, loud enough to turn heads. She sighed and continued more quietly. “I told you I went three years on the program before I relapsed, but not what happened. One lousy fight with my then girlfriend and all that work was gone. My sponsor was a crotchety old lady named Gertrude. She came by my place and found me worshiping the porcelain god, reeking of booze and vomit. She looked at me and said, ‘I think it’s time you sponsored someone.’” Stacy grinned as if lost in the memory. “That crazy bat was right. Helping you helps me. I haven’t had a relapse since I started being a sponsor three years ago.”
“I don’t know how to help him, Stacy. And I need to find a way.”
“It sounds like your friend is sinking hard, but you can’t save him. You can try to be his friend if he lets you, but the only way off that boat is for him to take that first step. It’s not easy to talk about personal struggles, but I believe it’s necessary to move beyond them.”
Logan rubbed the back of his neck, realizing they weren’t just talking about Caleb anymore. “I haven’t missed a single AA meeting and I’ve completed more homework in the past month than my senior year of high school.”
The waitress returned, bringing a wilted pile of lettuce and one solitary slice of tomato. Stacy thanked her and proceeded to drown the salad with sharp jabs to a bottle of low-fat Italian dressing. “You attend, but you’re not an active participant. That’s not unusual when you first join a new group, but eventually you need to start sharing.”
“I’m not required to speak or share with the group. I just gotta show up.”
“Bullshit,” she said, smacking the bottle of dressing against the table hard enough to make the dishes rattle. “There are some people who can never say a word at meetings and still see improvements in their lives just by going and listening. You’re not one of them.”
Stacy’s eyes dared him to contradict her. He hadn’t told her about buying the scotch, but she didn’t need the details to spot the pattern. Before AA, she’d spent years carving the design into her own skin with every lie, every evasion, every excuse.
“I haven’t gone back to drinking,” Logan said, half-expecting a neon “YET” to appear above his head. He knew he could tell her about the booze and she’d offer him support and understanding. But he wanted the focus on Caleb and not himself.
“If alcohol was our only problem, then the detox centers would be turning out winners all the time.”
Logan winced. “He needs me to keep my
shit together and I want to be there for him. I can’t remember the last time I felt that. It’s enough to keep me sober for now.”
“What happens after you help him? What are you hoping for with this, Logan?”
Logan delayed answering for a moment, drinking his lukewarm coffee before reaching up to scratch his forehead. Stacy’s soup had appeared at some point, but the murky contents remained untouched. He leaned forward, resting his hands on the table. “I care about what happens to him and hate the idea of him being locked away in that apartment of his.” A prisoner of his fears. It sounded like the tagline to a cheesy Lifetime TV movie, but it was true. His instincts told him he didn’t know what Caleb was really afraid of, and he needed to understand in order to help the man.
“Is that all you want? For him to get the help he needs?” Stacy pushed a stray hair behind her ear. “For both your sakes, you need to be honest with yourself about what you want.”
Logan sighed. “He smiles at me and it’s all I can do not to tear his clothes off, but it’s more than that. I think we could have something more.”
“Well, if he won’t answer the phone, you could always send him a letter, but—” She looked at her sculpted nails. “You need to consider whether being in a relationship with Caleb, given the struggles he’s going through, is the best decision for you, considering you’re still in the early stages of recovering.”
Logan slumped in his chair. He wanted Caleb. Plain and simple. For the first time in his life, he had a reason to get his shit together beyond keeping his ass out of prison. At the very least, he knew he couldn’t walk away without knowing Caleb would be okay. But Stacy was right. He needed to think about whether he could handle getting everything he wanted.
LOGAN EYED his boss as he drifted through the warehouse, looking distracted and exhausted. He hadn’t spoken to Klass since Klass had pried him away from his nephew. He couldn’t help wondering how much influence Klass had on Caleb’s decision. Shopping online for groceries wasn’t the same as having Min hand-select items for him. Hell, Meng’s would probably be willing to deliver the groceries for a lot less money than Caleb had been paying to have Logan deliver them.
He’d spent the last week doing what Stacy told him to do, thinking about what he wanted. He hadn’t had much choice. Michael refused to give him any more details about what he’d found out about Foster, claiming he couldn’t talk about an ongoing investigation, which was Michael code for “I’m going to protect you whether you like it or not.” Logan would have argued with him if he hadn’t been so damn grateful for the help. Swallowing his pride was a hell of a lot easier when it meant potentially protecting Caleb from that bitch.
Logan entered Klass’s office without knocking. “I get why you wouldn’t be thrilled with someone with my background… uh… dating your nephew, but I don’t want more from Caleb than he’s willing to give. I’d be lucky to have him as a friend.”
Klass seemed almost as though he had been waiting for Logan. “I won’t pretend to be thrilled about my nephew… dating someone with a violent and criminal past. But he trusts you and he doesn’t trust easily.”
“Then why make me break my promise to help him get to the hospital?”
“The doctors had him so doped up he could barely remember his own name let alone notice you weren’t there.”
“That’s not the point and you know it.” Logan took a breath, trying to calm down. Pissing off his boss wouldn’t get him any closer to Caleb. He needed a new approach if he wanted to get Klass on his side. “Did Caleb tell you that we’ve been going out?”
Klass’s jaw dropped. “Out of the apartment?”
Logan nodded. “He made it all the way to Meng’s Market without panicking.”
“He never said anything,” Klass said, his body sagging like a blown tire on the freeway.
Logan wasn’t surprised. “You have me ask him those questions about how he’s doing, but you don’t ever ask me what he said. How come you don’t want to know the answers?”
His eyes focused on the far wall, Klass said, “Caleb thinks he killed his mother. It’s the reason he stopped going out.”
Logan frowned, confused by the change in topic. “I thought she had a bad heart.”
“She did. I invited them over to celebrate her fiftieth birthday. I knew Caleb was pushing to make a deadline at work, but I expected him to rearrange his life to accommodate her, like he always had. Sarah had suggested we wait until the weekend, but I didn’t listen….”
Klass began to speak as if he were the only person in the room, his description so vivid Logan felt as if he were actually there.
Harrison had joined Sarah on the couch, handing her a mug of peppermint tea. She had unclasped her hands and accepted the beverage.
“Thank you, Harry,” she said, falling back on the childhood nickname he had always despised. Her eyes drifted to the mantel clock that had been their grandfather’s pride and joy. “Did Caleb call and say he’d be late?”
The urge to lie crept in as it always did when faced with her growing unease, but he suppressed it. She would see right through the attempt and become all the more fearful because of it. “I’m sure he’s just stuck in traffic.”
Her eyes widened, and he noticed new lines on her face, making her look closer to his own sixty years than fifty. “What if he was in an accident?”
The door buzzer saved Harrison from answering. He leaped from the couch and made his way down the hallway and opened the door far enough to berate his nephew. “Your mother has spent the last twenty minutes convinced you were dead in a fiery crash.”
“I’m sorry. The meeting ran late and I still needed to go home and get the cake.”
“Harry, is it Caleb?”
“Yes, Mom.” He moved past Harrison and made his way into the living room to greet his mother.
“Looking back on that night, I can remember how thin Caleb looked, how ragged. I can see the dark circles under his eyes that looked like bruises and the fine sheen of sweat across his brow. I can remember all those things, but I can’t remember acknowledging them back then. He was crumbling before me. Why wasn’t I able to see it?”
Caleb stumbled to his feet, knocking the dining room chair to the floor. “I’m sorry, I have to….” He swayed, and Harrison rose and gripped his forearm. Leaning in close to his nephew’s ear he whispered, “Get a hold of yourself, boy, before you send your mother into a panic.”
Panic. Caleb moved as if his body had been waiting for the word to be voiced. He tripped over the chair, tumbling to the ground. In the next moment, he was across the room with his back pressed against the wall and his hand clutching his chest.
“Oh, God. His heart, Harry.” Sarah rose from her seat and made to go to Caleb.
“Shhh, his heart is fine.” Harrison wrapped his arms around her shoulders and ushered her into the living room. “The doctors said it’s just a case of nerves,” he said, encouraging her to sit on the couch.
When he tried to stand, she grabbed the front of his shirt. Her voice sounded high and thin, on the verge of hysteria. “The doctors can be wrong.”
She was a walking testament to how wrong they could be. The doctors had said it would be a miracle if she lived to her first birthday. It was why he insisted on celebrating every birthday for the miracle it was. He pried her fingers from his shirt and squeezed them gently. “They’re not wrong about this. He’s just having a bit of trouble adjusting to the new job. I’ll help him find a new one.”
“Harry, I don’t feel so good,” she said, pressing a hand to her chest. She slumped forward, and Harrison barely caught her before she hit the hardwood floor. He gathered her small body in his arms and laid her on the couch. “Sarah, Sarah, open your eyes.” He lightly tapped her cheek and then moved to take her pulse. Fast. Much too fast. “Caleb, you’ve driven your mother into a heart attack. Now get in here and help me with her!”
Sarah touched his face. “Don’t say that, Harry.”
Ha
rrison shook his head. “You’re right. I’m sorry.”
“Tell… him.”
Caleb ran into the living room clutching a cordless phone. When he spoke, it sounded like he had been gargling glass. “Ambulance is on the way.” He turned his attention to his uncle. “Did you give her the medication?”
Harrison stared at him. “No, I….” He couldn’t even say the words. How could he forget?
Caleb left and returned with the bottle of pills and a glass of water.
“Are you okay, honey?” Sarah asked.
Caleb nodded. “Now I need you to take your pills.”
“Love you,” she murmured before closing her eyes. They would never open again.
“I blamed Caleb for his mother’s death because I didn’t want to deal with my own guilt.”
Logan looked at his feet, not sure how to respond to Klass’s story. A part of him wanted to rail at his boss for riding Caleb so hard only to turn around and blame him for his mother’s heart attack when he crashed. It wasn’t right, and he didn’t intend to pretend it was, in spite of how broken Klass looked. Focusing on the present, he asked, “Did you tell Caleb not to return my calls?”
Klass shook his head. “My sister was plagued by fears, but never for herself. Caleb is the same way. More than anything, he’s afraid of becoming a burden to those he loves and of them being hurt because he can’t control his fears. If he’s refusing to talk to you, that’s likely the reason.” Klass’s jaw twitched as if holding the raw emotion in place. “I tried to do what was right, but now I know I’ve failed them both. I found a behavioral therapist who makes house calls, but I haven’t been able to convince Caleb to see him. Tell me what to do and I’ll do it.”
“Tell me about the courier service you hired for Caleb.”