The Spires

by Moretti, Kate

  At first Jaime’s texts to her were all about Brett. They started out light. Don’t you ever let your husband out of the dungeon? Then took on a more serious, concerned tone. Is he okay? What’s going on? She found herself confiding in Jaime, convinced they both had Brett’s best interests at heart. Slowly, somehow without realizing, she went from talking about Brett with a concerned friend to talking about her feelings about Brett. Jaime felt more like her friend than Brett’s friend.

  Then one night, back in September, right after school was back in, about six months after Brett was laid off, Penelope invited Jaime over for dinner. She clipped her hair up, dark and glossy with ringlets around her face. She wore a black tank top and jeans—casually sexy. She swiped on mascara, some bronzer, a light pink lip gloss. Brett came home from the gym, sweaty and spent, and took one look at her, the whole plump chicken browning in the oven and went ballistic, stomping up the steps to their bedroom like a child.

  “I don’t understand,” Penelope protested, following him into their bedroom. “We used to do this all the time. Why can’t we have a friend for dinner anymore? What has changed?”

  “You just do whatever you want. No one asks me what I want, or what I think! I don’t want company for dinner. I don’t want to come home after a long day and have to entertain someone.”

  “A long day doing what?” Penelope shot back. “Getting a hot stone massage? Lifting weights? Maybe spending a few hours in a sauna? How is this a hardship?”

  “That’s what you think I do?” Brett’s voice had been low, menacing. She’d never seen him so angry at her in their whole lives together.

  “How would I know? You don’t tell me. We don’t talk. I talk at you. You nod, pretend to be interested, or grunt if you’re in a bad mood.”

  “So you want me to talk? About how I applied for over two hundred positions in the past year, some of which would move me halfway across the country? I got phone calls back about half of them, but the bottom line is, I’m old. Technology changes quickly in finance—new programs to use that I’m unfamiliar with the longer I sit out. We don’t have young kids. I can’t even say I helped raise them. You did all that. While working. What, exactly, do you think that feels like?” Brett came close, his nose inches from hers. He jabbed a finger into her chest, hard. He’d never come close to touching her in anger before. “Why do you think I do all these things? Why do I lift weights?”

  “I don’t know!” Penelope finally burst out. “I have no fucking clue why you leave us home alone constantly, where you go, or who you’re with!” And then, realizing, “Why would you apply to jobs that would move us out of state without talking to me?”

  Brett’s face registered all the things he couldn’t say.

  “Unless you didn’t want us to go?” Penelope finished softly. Oh, God. She pressed her fingertips to her lips. His eyes looked dead, flat and emotionless, and Penelope backed up, felt the doorknob in her back. She reached behind her and opened the bedroom door. She ran down the hall and outside to the front porch.

  Behind the potted plant in the corner, she had stashed a pack of Marlboro Lights. She fumbled with the lighter and took a deep inhale. She imagined Brett knew she’d been sneaking cigarettes, but they didn’t talk about it. She used mints or brushed her teeth. With his newfound attitude toward health, he had to find it disgusting. Was he actually repulsed by her?

  She was on her third cigarette in a row, her hands shaky, her lungs a dull ache, when Jaime came strolling up the walk. Sasha and Tara had gone to the mall together and would be back by dinner, so Jaime had come alone. He sat next to her on the step, picked up the pack, and instead of crumpling it in his fist, which is what she expected him to do (to admonish her, tell her that smoking was bad for her, or some other platitude), he extracted a cigarette and lit it, blowing the smoke away from her.

  “Want to talk about it?” He asked her, holding her gaze. She thought it was strange that she hadn’t cried yet. How did Jaime know she was upset? She’d barely said a word. Her makeup still intact, her mascara still fresh.

  His eyes were a deep brown; his hair thick, black, and wavy with streaks of gray; his beard salt and pepper. She noticed his hands—long fingers, big knuckles. His forearms—the muscled ridge that disappeared under a rolled-up shirtsleeve, a smear of blue paint on his arm. She knew he painted sometimes. He’d told her once—when, she couldn’t remember—that art was an outlet for him. That smear of paint went right through her, seemed sexier than anything she’d ever seen in her life. She noticed everything, seemingly for the first time. But then, maybe not. Who had the lip gloss been for?

  God, no, she didn’t want to talk.

  She felt the zing right down her legs. Something she hadn’t felt for Brett in months, maybe years. They stared at each other, and the toes inside her high-heeled boots curled, and his mouth parted slightly, like he was going to say something, and she knew right that instant that he felt it too. He wanted her. It was so instant and powerful and irresistible, with Brett upstairs stomping around like another angry teenager, unable or unwilling to explain any of it to her. With his thoughts of leaving them bouncing around his head and never even talking about it. Had things gotten that bad? She hadn’t thought so.

  But then there she was: concocting an elaborate fantasy where she pulled Jaime to her, right now, and kissed him. She could almost feel the rough denim of his jeans, the smooth leather of his belt beneath her palms. The silky, smoky taste of his lips. Did he paint shirtless, like in the movies? She imagined his bare torso, a tiny swell of belly brushed with orange, yellow, greens, and blues.

  She stood up, stamped out the butt with the toe of her boot.

  “I don’t think tonight is going to work out,” she finally said, her voice throaty and dry. He nodded and turned to leave. He was halfway down the steps before he turned back to her.

  “Are you okay?” he asked her, and it was almost the thing that undid her. The sound of his voice, the concern for her well-being. The simple care. How Brett had not asked her if she was okay in as long as she could remember. How she was always asking him, the kids, Are you okay? Is everything okay? Can I do anything to help you? And she hadn’t realized until that moment, with yes, a little self-pity, how wearing it was to spend all your time thinking about someone who never seemed to think of you. And here was Jaime, with his speckled beard and his hooded eyes, simply caring. It made her want to kiss him fiercely.

  But she didn’t. Instead, she said yes, as firmly as she could muster and left him on the steps. Instead, she let herself back inside her own home, with its familiar shoes in the entry and its smell of laundry and baking chicken, leaned her back against the front door, and finally, finally, she cried.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Then: Moving Day

  The day they moved into the Church House was teeming with rain and fifty degrees. It was late May, three days after graduation. Jack had fled the city before graduation—to set up, he said. Set up what? Everyone asked, but he never answered. He was just gone, a week before everyone else. Ostensibly living in a big empty church alone.

  “Don’t you want to walk?” Penelope had asked about graduation, horrified that anyone would skip their own degree conferral, and Jack had snorted.

  “For who? Myself? Nah. Shithead? No. No worries, Pen.” Jack always said no worries, sounding faintly British or maybe Australian. It always calmed Penelope, the ease with which he’d let it slip out, as if trying to talk them all down from a cliff. A balm to her soul, which seemed overrun with worries on a regular basis.

  They’d been in Jack’s room—unusually alone. Jack on the floor, his feet kicked up on the side of the bed, Penelope stretched out above him, her hair falling around her face as she watched him toss a foam basketball in the air. Willa had an afternoon class, and Penelope had become dependent on these two hours every Tuesday and Thursday. But soon she’d be living with Jack.

  Sharing a house.

  A bathroom.

  She co
uld scarcely breathe if she thought about it, so she avoided the whole idea. Had she wasted her entire four years of college pining for a man who might or might not feel anything for her? Possibly, yes.

  When Jack proposed the group gap year that day in the park (his handprint still pulsing on her ankle), nothing would have kept her from saying yes. Still, she dithered around, pretending to be unsure for at least a week before Jack cornered her, literally, his hands braced on either side of her head, against Willa’s refrigerator, his breath warm on her neck, tickling her ear, his back arched into her. Pen-elllll-ope, what are you waiting for? Her back pressed against the metal door, the thin faux-wood handle digging into her spine, and the room spun around her.

  “Interrupting something?” Willa had appeared from the bathroom, eyebrows arched.

  “No. I mean yes. I’ll do it. I’ll do the gap year thing.” Penelope ducked under his arm, into the open space of the kitchen. Her face had been on fire, burning with the desire to touch his cheek—so close to hers—run a fingertip down his sharp jawline, the stubble soft under her nails.

  And now it was move-in day.

  Willa and Jack. Bree and her best friend, Flynn.

  Flynn was straitlaced, almost formal in his speech and mannerisms, in khaki pants and button-up shirts when they’d drink at Jack’s apartment. The rest of them would be in Penn T-shirts and leggings, shorts, but Flynn would have on a dark oxford shirt, tucked into trousers like he was going to church. Handsome, Black, athletic. She remembered seeing him at the gym, his shoulders wide and muscly in ways she didn’t know existed, a dewdrop of sweat trickling down his tricep.

  With two closed cardboard boxes stacked in those thick arms, he smiled at her now, teeth white and cheeks dimpled.

  “Penelope.” He leaned forward and kissed her cheek, and he smelled like soap and cedar.

  Bree stood on the steps, holding a brass floor lamp like a scepter, the sun shining behind her, haloing her flyaway red hair. She laughed wildly and called to them. “This place is crazy amazing!” she yelled. Bree had a tendency to shout excitedly about almost anything—The co-op had shelled pistachios today!—while waving her long white arms around like some kind of flame-haired Aphrodite.

  The house was immense. White on the outside, paint chipped and peeling, the only shining thing was the bright-red door, newly glossed. A single reaching steeple graced the roof with a rusted bell housed inside. The cross on top seemed to go up forever, a pointed, piercing spire.

  Penelope didn’t dare say so, but her first impression was that the house was a dump. Not only was the paint peeling, but the concrete steps out front were crumbling, the wooden gables above the windows were splintered, even the stained glass was cracked along the lead came outline.

  The inside smelled strongly of oiled wood and incense. Thankfully, the house had been half converted prior to Jack’s cousin Parker’s purchase. The kitchen sat at the back of the house, where Penelope assumed the altar used to be, raised up two steps. The appliances were high end, gleaming under the bright recessed lights. What had been the main worship room was now an empty space—on a television show, it might be called open concept. Waiting to be filled with their mismatched furniture, Ikea end tables, thrift store prints thumbtacked to the walls. To the right of the kitchen was a gorgeous wooden, carved spiral staircase, breathtaking but dangerous. The wood gleamed gold in the mote-filled sun. Penelope could imagine Willa, drunk and tumbling, her blonde hair caught in the spindles. Above them, an enormous balcony where she imagined the organ used to be, now a wide-open loft space. Jack leaned casually over the loft railing on his elbows, watching their reactions, grinning, his hands laced in front of him.

  “Where are the bedrooms?” asked Willa from behind her, breathlessly.

  “Four in the basement. I’ll sleep up here. I’m the night owl anyway,” said Jack.

  “This is the craziest house!” Bree had dropped the lamp where she stood and threw her hands up, twirling in a circle, her white dress spinning around her, her flip-flops smacking the wood floor.

  “Who wears a dress to move?” Flynn hip checked her, and she stumbled. She shoved him back, and he laughed, slid next to Penelope, still holding the boxes he’d walked in with. “See, Penelope, I knew I liked you. You’re sensible.” He nodded to her shorts and T-shirt, and Penelope thought maybe he just meant boring. She was routinely regarded as sensible. Logical. Down to earth. Categorically, unequivocally the world’s most uninteresting compliments. And yet, Penelope felt herself flush, pleased anyway.

  Willa flung her arm around Penelope’s neck. “You can’t have her, Flynnie—she’s my best friend.”

  Flynn laughed and disappeared down the basement steps. Penelope ducked under Willa’s arm, escaping the hug. Willa was always free with her affection, and Penelope couldn’t help the way her shoulders tensed up when she hugged her. It just wasn’t how she was raised. Willa never seemed to notice—or care. But perhaps subtle indications of others’ comfort levels were beyond Willa’s comprehension.

  Penelope hugged her own duffel bag closer (it contained only her immediate needs—pajamas, face cleanser, toothbrush, and a book; the rest would come later on the moving truck), and her breath hitched as Jack caught her eye. He smiled broadly, a grin meant just for her, and she felt something pop in her chest—a spring of hope. She wondered if now, after all this time, now that they would be together all the time, might he realize? She could almost, if she let herself, imagine the story she might tell her children: We were friends first. Always be friends first! Took us four years to become more than that. To fall in love. Even when she knew she was being ridiculous, she couldn’t stop.

  Then later, after the moving truck had come and gone, their once-large open space was filled with plaids and beige and microfiber overstuffed upholstery of all kinds, merging their styles and budgets into one hodgepodge of coziness, and they nearly all pissed themselves laughing that the only furniture Bree showed up with was a beanbag chair, which was just so quintessentially college, until Willa lay down on it, kicked off her sneakers, red-painted toenails stretched toward the ceiling, tan calves flexing, and declared it fucking heavenly comfort, bitches, and Jack appeared with two bottles of Veuve Clicquot, and Willa, who could get away with saying such things, asked how the hell the son of a Brooklyn handyman got his mitts on two five-hundred-dollar bottles of champagne, and Jack popped the cork at her, narrowly missing her eye, and she tackled him right there on the gleaming heart pine floor, and Flynn grabbed the bottle out of Jack’s hand before it could spill (five hundred dollars!) and put the bottle straight to his lips, his eyes closed.

  “Look, we’re growing up,” Jack said. “And you called me Peter Pan.” He shot a pointed look at Willa, who stuck up her middle finger in response.

  Penelope spent most of her life feeling like she watched life happen around her, a floating sense of detachment so common she hardly noticed it anymore. Except now, with the shouting echoing in her ears, the champagne bubbling on her lips, the fabric of Flynn’s favorite recliner scratching against her thighs, the warmth of Willa’s hand in her own, she felt blessedly, and unusually, present. She felt part of something huge and wild and different and unexpected, perched on the edge of a black chasm and unafraid for the first time in a long time and ready to jump. Penelope studied the faces around her, wondering who else was bursting with indescribable happiness.

  Then, even later, as they all stumbled off to claim their rooms, Penelope remembered her own bag with her practical toiletries where she had dropped it above them in the common room, so she crept back upstairs to see Jack lying with his head on Bree’s lap, casually playing with a lock of her hair, her face dispassionate, even bored—a stark contrast to Jack’s rapture.

  She looked up and noticed Flynn paused at the foot of the spiral staircase, Bree’s lamp in one hand as he watched them silently. Jack whispered something to Bree, and she smiled, close mouthed and polite, and Penelope watched Flynn’s whole face contort with pai
n, and he seemed to hunch over, like being physically punched. When Bree saw them, she stood suddenly, crossed the room to Penelope and linked their arms, leading Penelope to the basement stairs, away from the boys, and down to their new rooms.

  Penelope glanced back once over her shoulder and watched Flynn with interest. His mouth opened briefly to speak, then he seemed to think better of it and clamped it shut. The sudden realization hit Penelope like the force of a thousand fists. It must be what she looked like all the time—flushed and moonfaced.

  He was a man in unrequited love.

  Except it wasn’t Bree he watched, his eyebrows knitted and mouth twisted in pain.

  It was Jack.

  CHAPTER NINE

  February 14, 2020

  Save for the errant text that morning, Penelope would have forgotten it was Valentine’s Day altogether. The moment she arrived at work, she was pummeled with information. The FDA was on site.

  Penelope hadn’t been late to work, but she’d been on time, and that was bad enough. She’d spent longer than she’d planned trying to find a gold bracelet that Brett had given her for Valentine’s Day the year they got engaged. It was a simple chain link, clasped with a ruby heart. She’d worn it every Valentine’s Day since, and he always noticed. He’d notice if it was missing. She looked everywhere: her jewelry boxes, under the bed, under the bureau, her nightstand. It had just vanished into thin air. She’d been forced to go without or risk being actually late.

  Penelope worked for Rusker Pharmaceuticals, a small company whose single blockbuster drug, a cholinesterase inhibitor, lessened the symptoms of Alzheimer’s by blocking the breakdown of acetylcholine, a chemical messenger for memory and connections between brain cells. Penelope graduated Penn with a biochemistry degree, intent on pursuing a medical career, but needing the break. Then the Church House, then the fire. Then Brett.