by Brea Brown
“Is it raining?” He cranes his neck to see around me to the end of the hallway, where there’s a large window that’s being power-washed by nature. “Oh. I had no idea…”
“Yeah. It’s thundering and everything. What have you been doing that makes you so oblivious to your surroundings?” I ask more grouchily than the situation calls for.
He gives me a strange look but answers, “I’ve been on the phone.”
“About that… I’ll be out of your way right after lunch.”
“What are you talking about?”
Self-consciously, I run my fingers through my dripping hair and tuck it behind my ears. “Caroline told me that you and she agreed she’d be staying and I’d be leaving and that you were trying to find another place for me to go to finish my manuscript, but that’s silly. I mean, I’ll go back to Gus’s. Or something. I’ll figure something out. Maybe I’ll even go home.”
“Home? As in Indiana?”
“Yeah. That’s where I’m most comfortable, anyway. And since these changes you want are obviously going to take me a while, it makes sense to go back—”
“Wait. Stop. Jayne.” He steps closer to me. “I haven’t had a chance to talk to Caroline yet today, so whatever she told you is a lie.”
“It is?”
“Yes.”
I hate how glad that makes me. Not only because I get to stay here, but because that means Lucas didn’t agree to anything with Caroline that involved kicking me out.
He bites his lower lip. “Well, you’re cold.” Suddenly his eyes widen, and he blushes. “That is… you’re probably cold. I can’t tell if you are or not. But I assume you are. Because you’re wet… your clothes are wet… and you’re standing in an air-conditioned house. So. Um. Yeah.”
“I am a little cold,” I confirm his stumbling hypothesizing. “I’m going to change.”
“Good idea. And I’m going to find Caroline and wring her neck.”
I smile at that before turning and walking the rest of the way to the room where all my stuff is. When I get to the door and turn into it, I glance up the hall and see he’s still standing there, watching me. He jerks into motion, when I smile at him uncertainly, and crosses to the stairs, which he takes at a near-run, shouting, “CAROLINE!” on his way down.
Oh, great. I’ll be eating lunch in the kitchen with Paulette, for sure.
Chapter Fourteen
“I see how he looks at you.”
With undisguised disgust? Because that’s the only way I’ve ever seen him look at me. Except in the hallway. But that was a fluke. And quickly understood when I got into the bedroom and started undressing. My nipples were standing out like pencil erasers through my t-shirt and bra. I think even Paulette would have been flustered by that. I wouldn’t have been able to talk to myself in the mirror with that going on. They were out there. Ka-TOW! He’s lucky he still has both eyes.
I’m going to pretend like that never happened, though. Because it was obviously embarrassing to him, and it’s definitely embarrassing to me, so what’s the point in belaboring it? Anyway, what would I say? “Sorry I almost gave you a permanent disability in the hallway earlier”? Yeah, there’s no classy way to apologize for my inadvertent indecency, so… moving on.
I’m decidedly paranoid, thanks to Carolin-a Liar. What a bitch. I’m beginning to think there’s nothing worth staying here with her much longer. Sure, I’ve written some inspired stuff lately, and it’s great to be in such a beautiful place with someone to wait on me and take care of me, but… when I’m not writing or eating Paulette’s delicious cooking, I can’t get away from the fact that I’m walking on eggshells around the true owner of the house, who’s hell bent on staying here and getting rid of me.
At this point, it doesn’t matter what Lucas wants me to do. It’s time to give Gus an idea of what’s going on and warn him that I may be about to darken his cramped doorstep again.
The text I send him in the middle of the afternoon (Call me as soon as you get a chance) elicits a nearly immediate response. Answering his call, I shut myself in the closest unoccupied room, the dim, fussy library.
“What’s up, Babushka?” he asks right away. “I only have a couple of minutes before Boss Lady realizes I’m gone.”
I fill him in on the highlights, leaving out the most salacious parts (there will be time for that later) and say, “So, can I come back to stay with you for a while? Just ’til I finish these revisions?”
“You know you’re always welcome, girlfriend, but…”
I hold my breath while I wait to see if his reservation is a dealbreaker or simply a minor inconvenience that I’d be willing to work around.
“…some filthy tenant in the building who recently got evicted had a major roach infestation, and they have to bomb the whole building. As it is, I was counting on staying out there with you this weekend. And then during the week, I’ll be staying at a friend’s until I can go back to my own apartment.”
My first reaction is, “You have other friends?”
“Of course, I do! You are so silly sometimes. But if you can stick it out a week, you’re welcome to come back to my place, Sugar Booger.”
I sigh. “Hmm. I think I’m going to go back to Indy.”
“What?! No!”
“Why not? We have the technology. There’s no reason I have to be geographically close to the publishing company to accomplish what needs to be done.” I run my fingers along the spines of the books on the eye-level shelf as I pace back and forth. “This is stupid. If I weren’t writing like a fiend here, I would have been gone a long time ago.”
“What does Luke-ASS say?”
“He wants me to stay, for some reason. I wish you had more time, Gus. I’d tell you all about the messed-up shit going on between him and his wife. As it is, I mostly feel like I’m a pawn he’s using to annoy her. Quite successfully, I might add.”
“Good gravy! And they say that homosexuals are a threat to the sanctity of marriage? As if! These two prove that you straight folks are ruining the institution just fine on your own. Buh-jiggity!”
I giggle at him. “As usual, you have a good point. I wish you were here to keep this all in perspective and make me laugh about it. But it’s not very funny usually.”
“Well, you were there first! I say, as long as you’re still able to write as well as you have been, and Luke-ASS is okay with your staying, you avoid this Caroline creature—sounds like a big enough house that it’s possible—and stick to your guns. Hell! Invite me out there this weekend, as planned, and I’ll have Caroline out the door in five seconds flat. I have two days to plot how to make it happen. I love a challenge.”
Picturing Gus in the mix makes me laugh and groan at the same time. “I think this is messed up enough. Thanks for the offer, though.”
“Oh, sister-friend, I gotta go! I heard Boss Lady ask the receptionist where I am.”
“Where are you?”
“In the supplies closet.”
“Oh, now, you haven’t been in the closet for years, Gus.”
“Right? I forgot how claustro-frickin-phobic it is in here. Smooches! Let me know what you decide, whatever it is, but my vote is for you to stay put. Indy is so boring!”
“It definitely is, compared to this place,” I grumble.
“Keep writing. Then when you’ve knocked his socks off, you can go wherever you want.”
We say goodbye, and I sink to the floor, where I trace the pattern of the Oriental rug and despair at how the phone call I had hoped would give me all the answers I needed has only made things more confusing. Before I called Gus, my plan was to stay with him or go back home. But he’s reminded me that the very last thing I want to do is to go home to my solitary life. He’s right; it’s a big house. There’s no reason I have to be in the presence of Caroline… or Lucas. And at least here I have Paulette to keep me company when I feel the need for some human interaction. At home, I’ve often resorted to going to the nearest grocery store and buying
things I didn’t need, simply so I could talk to someone, usually the checker.
I don’t want to be that sad person again.
*****
“She’ll be gone by the weekend,” he murmurs to me in the corridor outside the library when I finally emerge, still not sure what I’m going to do.
My tummy jumps. At the news, of course, not at the fact that he’s standing so close to me that I can smell him. And he smells good. I mean, he’s still Luke-Ass.
“Okay,” I reply, trying to be cool, when I really want to jump up and down and say, “Yes!” and possibly even hug him. Maybe. “That’s good news.”
He inches even closer. “She has a family thing to go to this weekend at her parents’ place. And then I told her she can stay at my—our—apartment in the city.”
My guts go cold. “Oh. I see.”
He smirks. “Yeah. I’m making a big sacrifice for you here, Greer, so you’d better deliver. I mean, no pressure.” Still, he gets closer. My shoulder’s against his chest now.
“Huh-huh. Right. Well, you don’t have to do all that for me.”
Intensely, he counters, “It’s the least I can do. I feel horrible for inviting you here only to have you stuck in the middle of this ridiculous long-term feud between the two of us. She brings out the absolute worst in me. It wasn’t always like that, though. I guess the memories of how it used to be are still strong enough to make me hope for that happiness again someday. Not with her, though.”
When I squirm and shift my weight from foot to foot, he says, “Sorry. I know, you don’t want to know. And… I don’t know why I’m telling you all this.” Finally, he backs off.
I duck around him. “I don’t know, either. Has it stopped raining yet? I’d like to do some more writing today.”
“I thought that’s what you were doing in there.” He nods to the library. “That’s why I didn’t interrupt you sooner to tell you about Caroline.”
I try not to feel or appear guilty when I say, “No. I called my friend, Gus, to ask if I could come back to his place. But his place is being bug bombed thanks to an unhygienic neighbor.”
Drawing his head back, he says, “Wait. What? I thought you said you’d give me a few days to figure out what to do with Caroline.”
“I did, but it’s so uncomfortable here, Lucas,” I whine. “I can’t concentrate!”
“I told her to leave you alone.”
“Yes, the whole house heard you. I think they heard you down on the beach, too.”
“The only way to get through to her sometimes is to shout. I’m not proud of my bad temper, but… she drives me insane.”
“Okay, fine. But don’t you think it puts me in an awkward position to know that you two are arguing so loudly about me? And it’s all so pointless. I don’t have to be here.”
“Yes, you do.”
Without touching me at all, he steers me into the previously-locked room and closes the double doors behind us. I perch on the edge of a roll-top desk that’s open and has quite a few papers scattered on its surface. The papers are littered with aggressive red editor’s marks. So this is what goes on in here. To find out it’s his plain Jane office-away-from-the-office (and not some sacrosanct sex closet) is mildly disappointing. Unless there are secret compartments, storing kinky sex equipment…
“You’re a damn good writer,” he pulls my attention back to him by telling me what every teacher I’ve had since the sixth grade has told me (although they may not have used those exact words). “But the writing you’ve done here… It’s on a whole other plane. As a matter of fact, it’s so markedly different that we’re going to have to do some considerable blending to make it match the rest of the book.” When he sees my face sag, he quickly says, “But that’s not a problem at all, and I’m sure it won’t take long, and I don’t want you to worry about that right now.” He sits in the desk chair, steeples his fingers, and swivels. “What I’m saying is… you’re writing out of your mind. Here. And it’s not that I don’t think you’re capable of doing the same thing elsewhere, but… why take the chance? You’re here. It works.”
I absently rub at a tiny patch of fine stubble on my knee that I missed while shaving this morning. Reluctantly, I tell him, “I know. You’re right. I’ve never written like this before. Ever.” I hazard a glance up at him. “I feel like… my mind is opening up to creative avenues that I didn’t even realize existed before.”
My attempt to be vague makes me sound flaky, but what I can’t tell him in so many words is that I wrote an entire sequence this morning that had nothing at all to do with anything that happened in my real life. It was entirely made up. Telling him that would probably confuse the hell out of him, though. Actually, he’d likely jump to the conclusion that I’ve plagiarized the rest of the book. I definitely don’t want him to suspect that. But I also don’t want him to know how non-fiction my fiction novel is.
For one thing, I don’t want to explain how real it is. “What about this part? And this part?” “Yeah. It all happened.” Or “No, I changed that to make it more believable.” Then, I don’t want to see the, “Oh, shit, you poor thing,” look that will inevitably take up residence on his face every time he sees me. Even if it’s for only a split second, it’ll be there. No, it’s better that he thinks I’m a fiction writer who’s too unimaginative to come up with a better demise for her protagonist’s family than a tired, old fire.
The point is… I’m willing for the first time to legitimately make whole sections of the book fiction. That’s something I’ve never considered before. For the most part, I’ve been faithful to history to a fault, possibly to the detriment of the book.
That being said, the tornado idea has grown on me since I’ve arrived here at the beach house. I’m willing to at least try to write it that way—in a separate document—and see if it still works. He’s right that it would be less cliché, as long as I can write it in a non-Wizard of Oz way.
“Well, I’m glad your friend’s place is unavailable, then,” he interrupts my impromptu brainstorm about tornado imagery. “Unfortunately, that means two more days under the same roof with Caroline, but I think she finally got the message about staying away from you.”
He leans forward and straightens some of the papers on his desk.
I look over his shoulder out the window and see with dismay that it’s still raining. And it looks like one of those storms that takes its sweet time passing through, too. Before I can stifle it, a sigh escapes my chest and rattles my lips.
Bemused, he watches me hop down from the desk and go to the window, where I gaze wistfully toward the gazebo, which is barely visible through the downpour.
“What is it now?” he asks with a slight edge to his tone.
“I like to write out there,” I say simply.
“Then take a break while it rains. Read a book.” He thrusts a messy handful of papers at me. “Read this book. Please. So I don’t have to.”
I feel sorry for the author who worked so hard to write that, only to have it become someone else’s chore. Glancing at the pages, I say, “It’d be difficult to read after what you did to it.”
He shrugs. “It’s shit. What can I say? Even the bestsellers lay an egg now and then.”
My eyes widen. “That’s a bestseller’s work?”
“I wouldn’t call it ‘work.’ I’d call it, ‘I think I’m a publishing god, and I’d rather spend my time on the beach in Cabo than fulfill this five-book deal that made it possible for me to afford this one-month vacation, so here’s something I slapped together; now, make it work.’ That’s what I’d call it.”
“Oh.”
He rolls his eyes. “Makes me wish I were in Cabo.”
“Well, I want to write. I don’t want to take a break. I have some good ideas that I want to get down before I forget them.”
He stares at me as if I’m mentally deficient. “Then write, Jayne. What do you want me to tell you?”
“Where, though?” I nearly moan, st
aring longingly at the soggy gazebo again.
“Wherever you want, for fuck’s sake! I’m sure you can find somewhere in this house that’s quiet and has the correct feng shui to suit your delicate constitution.” He scoots closer to the desk. “In my case, it’s this room. And I have a lot of work to do. Negotiations with Caroline have set me way back. Not to mention that telecommuting is not ideal for me. I’d rather be in my office in the city. But we can’t always have what we want, right?” With that, he hunches over the thick stack of paper on his desk, uncaps his red pen, and appears to get back to work.
Since he hasn’t explicitly told me to get out, I linger for a while, looking around the large room. It’s large and airy, with high, punched-tin ceilings, a fireplace, and plenty of windows. Facing the back and side yards, those windows yield a marginal view of the ocean. The walls are a light brown, reminiscent of coffee with heavy cream. The dark wood accents contrast nicely to give it a masculine but cozy feel. In addition to the roll-top desk and Lucas’s mesh office chair, there’s a grouping of butter yellow chairs and a sofa around a low, square coffee table, centered in front of the fireplace. It’s a calming room.
“Jayne…”
His warning tone lets me know I’ve overstayed my welcome. “Sorry. I’ll be leaving now. Good luck with your editing.”
I have my hand on the curved door lever when he half-turns toward me and says, “You’re welcome to work in here until the rain stops. Caroline definitely won’t bother you in here. And as long as you don’t do anything odd like talk out loud to yourself when you write…?”
I shake my head vigorously. “No. I’m quiet.”
“Then be my guest.”
It’s worth a try. I can sit on the couch and still get a glimpse of the ocean now and then, when I look up from my laptop. And if Caroline never comes in here, that’s another huge factor in the room’s favor.
“That would be nice,” I say. “Thanks, Lucas.”
He nods and goes back to his papers. “But just one thing.”
I tense. “Yes…?”
“Please, stop calling me Lucas. She’s the only one who insists on calling me that. I hate it.”