TIME

by Penny Reid

  He made a weak sound that almost resembled a laugh. “Mona, if you change your mind—”

  “I won’t.” I knew myself. For better or worse, when I committed to an idea or a cause, I was married to it in the old testament biblical sense.

  Abram stared at me quietly, as though searching for some sign of uncertainty or regret. “Tell me something.”

  “What would you like to know?”

  “What were you doing over there? What are you working on?”

  Obviously, he was trying to change the subject. Which made me wonder whether he believed me about wanting to send the photo.

  But since he was sick, I let the issue drop. “I was just sending off some preliminary work to a colleague of mine. Poe is a planetary astrophysicist, and my thesis is moving more in the theoretical physics direction and less planetary. Even so, Poe should be able to give it a glance and help me focus my energy in the right direction or tell me who I can trust to take a look.”

  “Good,” Abram croaked, giving me another miniscule smile, his gaze moving over me with a sluggish, foggy quality betraying how awful he felt. “You seem energized.”

  “I think I made some good headway last night. It’s like, so much of what I do is wandering around in a pitch-black room of indeterminate size, not knowing if I’m going in circles or a straight line or approaching a cliff.”

  “Searching the ocean for your white whale.”

  “That’s right. I only have so much time, you know? I realize time is a faulty construct, which some argue doesn’t even exist, but yet we’ve made it central to everything. I postulated at one point that time was not a single thing—a thread, if you will—but multiple threads, infinite threads and yet also beads, and feathers, etc., all woven together into a thick tapestry. Pulling one thread wouldn’t change the overall structure of the tapestry as we know it, but it would change the reality for the feathers and beads that rely on that thread. Yes, it might allow us to bend space, but lose reality in the process. Generally, we see time as the past, present, and future, but what if it’s both more and less?”

  “How can something be both more and less?”

  “Everything is both more and less. Everything is balance. My chromosomal arrangement is more XX, less XY. You are more musician, less airplane pilot.”

  His lips curved weakly, but a spark lit behind his eye. “I could listen to you talk about this forever.”

  “Then you’re the only one.” I grinned wryly. Seeing the light in his gaze did something wonderful to my stomach, making me feel both full and warm.

  “I doubt that.” Abram brought my hand to his lap, cradling it in both of his.

  Considering, I sat on the scant sliver at the edge of his bed and amended, “Okay, yes. I do have a few colleagues who also enjoy theorizing with me.”

  “You mean philosophizing with you.” He cleared his throat, his head seeming to sink deeper into his pillow.

  “Of course, yes. Theoretical physics is married to philosophy. The nature of things, of reality. Perception.”

  “And art is the product of how humans interpret their reality.”

  That made me smile. “Look at you, smarty-pants. So, what you’re saying is, physics and philosophy are married, and their child is art?”

  “Or, the marriage of physics and philosophy is art.”

  I loved that. My smile deepened, my attention lowering to where he held my hand. He’d moved it to his chest, pressing my palm against his heart.

  “Being with you . . .” he began, drawing my eyes back to his face. His were dazed, unfocused, like he was looking within and without.

  “Being with me?” I prompted after almost a minute, curious, a bubble of something reluctantly hopeful expanding in my chest. So of course, a joke slipped out. “Is as the prophesy foretold?”

  Abram’s gaze sharpened on mine. He smiled, a real smile. His left dimple making its first appearance, stealing my breath before his words could.

  “It’s living artistry, Mona.” Abram’s gaze turned cherishing, earnest. “Being with you is like living in a song.”

  As the sun came up, I read the latest Lisa Kleypas novel to Abram. I’d already read it, but he hadn’t, and I didn’t mind at all. Eventually, he drifted back to sleep. A nurse came in to unobtrusively check his vitals. A doctor stopped by and asked if I was family. I explained that his sister and parents would be arriving soon. The nurse then returned with a food tray—for me—and then left again, informing me that I should call for his breakfast when he awoke.

  Peeking at the food on the tray, I was surprised—but not really—to discover the fancy nature of my meal. Two poached eggs on avocado toast, a kale and rocket salad, a berry compote, freshly made yogurt, and cinnamon granola. The coffee came in a French press and the orange juice was pulpy, freshly squeezed.

  Ah, Los Angeles VIP treatment. It was truly another world.

  Marie and Abram’s parents arrived just as I finished breakfast and was setting the tray outside the room. To my surprise, Leo was with them. My brother didn’t seem at all surprised to see me. Confused, but not surprised.

  We didn’t hug. He made no move to do so and neither did I, a fact that hadn’t struck me as strange in Aspen or at any point in the past prior to right this minute. But now, after being embraced by the Harris family, and seeing how they greeted each other, how genuinely they seemed to look forward to and enjoy each other’s presence, I felt the lack of greeting between my own brother and me.

  Almost immediately—as soon as we exchanged our tepid, polite hellos, and the Harris family was no longer within ear shot—he steered me a little further down the hall, away from Abram’s room, and pulled out his phone.

  “I thought you should know, you were photographed last night, coming in with Abram’s parents. But they assumed you were Lisa. Let me show you the pictures.”

  Studying my brother’s profile as he stared at the phone, and despite the unresolved tension between us since our conversation in Aspen, I had the sudden urge to hug him. Therefore, I did.

  I gently pushed his phone out of the way, slipped my arms around his torso, and tried to mimic Marie’s hug from last night. I wanted to hug Leo like I meant it. He didn’t respond at first, and his body tensed like this might be an assault rather than an embrace. But as I continued to hold on, my big brother’s arms encircled me, held me with an equivalent tightness ratio, and he pressed a kiss to my temple.

  “Hey,” he said against my hair. “Are you okay?”

  “Yes.” I tried to relax, turning my head against his shoulder and resting it there. “How are you?”

  “I’m good.” The tension left him by degrees until his big arms held me comfortably. “What’s going on, Mona? Do you want to talk?”

  “We should hug, I think. When we see each other, and just sometimes for no reason, because I love you, Leo. And I think I haven’t been so great at knowing how to show you in a way that you understand.”

  I felt his cheek curve with a small smile. “I’m sorry.”

  “For what?”

  “For being a dick.”

  Leaning my head back, I expected to find him smiling—since his voice held a smile—but he wasn’t. He looked remorseful, serious.

  “In Aspen?”

  “Yeah. In Aspen. But also, I guess, for a long time. Lisa and I, we—uh—talked last week.” He readjusted his hands at my back, I felt him lock them more completely together, and his eyes grew dark, heated with anger. “And she told me about what happened to you at school.”

  Oh.

  Oh God.

  Lisa told Leo?

  Yes. Of course she did. She’s worried about you.

  I forgave my sister immediately, but wished she’d warned me. I wasn’t prepared to discuss this with my brother.

  Therefore, I tried to say, Nothing happened, but the words wouldn’t form. I tried to draw a complete breath but couldn’t. I stared at Leo, helpless to the rising anxiety. However, when it came, when the cold swea
t broke out over my skin and panic reached eyeball level, it rose no further.

  “I haven’t been a good brother to you,” he continued, sounding angry, solemn. “I’ve been pretty fucking blind about you, not taking the time to think about what you might need. I’ve replaced you, and Mom and Dad, and Lisa to an extent, with friendships, building my family elsewhere. Because Mona, I need family.” Leo lifted a hand to my head and gently returned my cheek to his shoulder.

  “I need people. I need a network, a community. I thought maybe you didn’t. I thought you weren’t built that way. But what I think now is that it doesn’t fucking matter how you’re built. You’re my sister.” His voice now a harsh whisper, I could feel the restlessness in his body, the frustration. “You should’ve come to me, you should’ve told me when it happened. But that means I should’ve been—before that, way before that—someone you trusted. Someone you never doubted would help. Someone who put you above his friends. I should’ve been checking on you, letting you know I was interested, making it clear you mattered. That’s all on me.”

  The panic slowly receded, with each breath I exhaled bits and pieces of the memory, of the strangling fear, until it simmered in my stomach instead of suffocating my lungs.

  And my brother continued to hold me, petting my hair and making a suspiciously watery clearing-of-the-throat sound that—for some reason—made me smile.

  “Mona baby,” he said suddenly, breaking the moment, and I couldn’t stop my laugh, because that’s what he used to call me when we were little. “You need to see someone, to help you work through this.”

  Now I tensed. A second later, I removed myself from his grip. He let me go, but I could feel his eyes on me as I paced away.

  “Uh, I don’t think that’s necessary.” The last thing I wanted to do was talk about it. To anyone.

  “Mona, I’m not letting this go. I have a list of good psychologists who you can do phone sessions with from Geneva.”

  I glanced at him. He’d withdrawn a piece of paper from his jacket pocket. Abruptly, the expansive hallway felt too small.

  “I don’t think I need—”

  “Yes. You do. You’re doing this.” He reached for my hand and placed the paper in my palm. I didn’t flinch. “I already made you an appointment with the first person on the list.”

  “But how will I pay for it?” I asked, using the easiest, most obvious excuse, and crumpling the list. “Insurance only covers so much. I can’t afford—”

  “You can.” Leo reclaimed my hand and, using both of his, straightened the paper out. “You have your monthly allowance account—from Mom and Dad—and the money is all in your name. I bet it’s just sitting there. I bet you’ve never touched it.”

  I scowled, because he was right. In addition to the travel account, our parents had set up accounts for each of us when we hit eighteen, depositing the maximum tax-free gift amount yearly as a fun money fund. It was one of their ways of demonstrating how much they supported us, in addition to all the other bank accounts.

  Because money was how they supported us. Money. Just money.

  “It must have over a hundred thousand dollars in it by now. Use that.”

  “I don’t want their money,” I whispered between clenched teeth, not knowing I was going to hurl the words at my brother until they were already out. The fervor in my whisper surprised both of us. I swallowed, trying to figure out why my heart was beating so fast, and why my mouth tasted like persimmons.

  Meanwhile, Leo’s eyes had widened, concern replacing the self-recrimination from moments prior. “Mona—”

  “No. No. I don’t want it. I don’t want money from them.” I stuffed the list of psychologists in my pocket, next to the poem Abram had written me in Aspen, mostly to get it out of my sight.

  My brother’s gaze softened, and he stepped closer, commiseration etched into his features. “I get it, okay? I mean, I really do. It feels like a payoff, right? Like, to them, the money replaces all the things they didn’t give us, or couldn’t.”

  Staring at him, I admitted nothing, working to tuck away these untidy emotions.

  Abram inspired emotions? Yes. I was ready for those, I wanted them all, even the untidy ones.

  My parents? No. I didn’t want any of the untidy emotions or second-guessing they inspired. I loved them. They did their best. I understood that. No one was perfect. I wasn’t perfect. They had responsibilities beyond their children. I understood that too. See? Look how reasonable I was. See how tidy and rational?

  And yet, just the thought of taking money from “Mona’s fun fund” made me want to throw a chair through a window just to hear the glass break.

  Leo frowned, clearly frustrated. “Then let me pay for it.”

  “Leo, I don’t need—”

  “You do.” He advanced, stopping abruptly when he seemed to realize that he’d backed me up until I was against the wall. Taking two steps away, he cursed under his breath. the line of his jaw was stern, but his gaze appeared apologetic. “You do. I wish this never happened to you. I wish it didn’t take hearing about it to wake me up to how I’ve been a shitty brother. So, yeah, I’m going to hound you about this until you do it. And Lisa will, and Gabby too. Good luck avoiding this. Good luck dodging Gabby. You know she’ll fly out to Geneva, and so will I. We’re not letting this go. And if you don’t do it, I’ll tell Abram. I know him a lot better than you do, and he’ll—”

  Unthinkingly, I covered Leo’s mouth with my hand, rocks in my throat. “You wouldn’t.”

  He turned his head slightly to the side, lifting an eyebrow as though to say, You wanna bet?

  I gritted my teeth, because I was angry. So angry.

  He gently encircled my wrist, pulling it from his mouth and holding it. “Your hands are shaking.”

  “Because I’m angry,” I seethed.

  “Why?”

  “You’re bullying me into this.”

  Leo’s mouth curved into a sad smile. “I love you, Mona baby. So, yeah. Whatever it takes. Because that’s what family does. Because that’s what love looks like.”

  10

  The Theory of Special Relativity

  *Abram*

  “What are you thinking about?”

  I blinked, struggling to focus, looking for Marie and finding her leaning against the doorframe. “What was that?”

  Marie’s smile was soft. “I asked, what are you thinking about?”

  My answering smile was flat. “Missed opportunities.”

  She chuckled, walking further into the hotel bedroom and taking the armchair next to the bed. “So, Mona?”

  I grinned and glanced at my hands. “Yeah.”

  Mona had left eight days ago, keeping her promise to stay just twenty-four hours. Mona called every day since to check in, even if it was just for five minutes while she hid in a bathroom, stealing the time from her projects and work.

  “You look better. Do you feel up to talking?”

  “I do feel better. Yeah, sure, I could talk.” My label cancelled the rest of my commitments for the week—interviews, appearances—so I could recover, and my fever finally broke last night. I still had a little cough. My throat wasn’t bothering me much, thanks to Melena and her tea.

  “So, let’s talk. Abram.”

  “Marie.”

  “You look better, but you also look frustrated.”

  Inhaling deeply, because I finally could without coughing, I nodded. “I guess I am.”

  I was better, but I was unsettled. Restless. Dissatisfied. I knew Mona couldn’t and shouldn’t stay. But that didn’t stop me from wishing things were different.

  “What is this?” Marie pointed at my face, waving her index finger around. “Is this melancholy? Or ennui? Please tell me it’s not ennui. Ennui is for dissolute dukes, not dissolute rock stars.”

  That made me smirk. “Maybe it’s melancholy. Maybe it’s Maybelline.”

  She laughed, which had been my goal, and rested her elbow on the arm of the chair, tuck
ing her hand beneath her chin. “I’m glad you told me the whole story—with you and Mona—when you got back from Aspen last month. I was pretty confused over the summer, after seeing her on C-SPAN and CNN, thinking I was going nuts.”

  “Yeah.” I know how you feel. “Thanks for your help trying to track down her number when Leo wouldn’t give it to me. I appreciate your secrecy about everything, crazy as it is.” I hadn’t told her the whole story. Just enough to make sense of my desperate request.

  “It is crazy,” my sister agreed readily. “Thanks for trusting me with it, but how you and Mona met might be the craziest love story I’ve ever heard. And you know how wacky my friends are.”

  We shared a look and I grinned, thinking about her wacky friends.

  “Anyway, sorry I couldn’t help you uncover the number. Quinn and Alex were very impressed with Exotica and DJ Tang’s security measures. They went to great lengths to hide their children’s contact information. If we’d had more time, Alex might’ve been able to narrow down some potential options.”

  “But it makes sense, right?” I readjusted the pillow behind me. “They’re just trying to keep their kids safe.”

  Marie made a face. “Eh, I don’t think that’s it. From what I know of Exotica and DJ Tang, I think it’s more that they want to be able to text and call their kids without fearing their own privacy will be violated. They’re extremely fastidious about public image. Speaking of which.” She gave me a pointed look.

  “What?”

  “You should let Alex do the same for you. The last thing you need is your phone getting hacked.”

  Oh shit.

  Staring at my sister, I was gripped with a sudden suspicion. “You looked at my photos.”

  Immediately, she shook her head. “I did not look through your photos. If you recall, I texted Mona from your phone that morning in the hospital, asking her to call me at your number. You gave me the phone, you unlocked it, you asked me to send the message. And that means the last photo she sent to you before I texted her—the one of her looking stellar in a bikini—was already in the chat window when you gave it to me.”