by Jenna Barton
Walt looked away from Lu, blinking hard. “As much as he loved that game, he sucked at it. Worst aim ever.” The loss of their best friend—their brother—fell hard, out of nowhere. Another stage of their lives without Brady. He knew better, and recognized the heaviness of it for what it was, but the guilt still ground at him. It was the right thing to do, leaving cadets. But he would never stop regretting leaving Brady on his own in the A
rmy.
“Your bad aim was what got you out of that brute squad and released from the Army. Thank goodness for it. Stop with the guilt trip you just started in your head.”
“Was a fucking back-assed way to luck out of a war.”
“Oh, Wally—” Claire reached for his hand.
“Thank goodness for that too. Don’t stir up that survivor’s guilt crap again. It would piss Brady off. Besides—” Lu wrapped her hand over Claire’s, both of them holding his once-broken one, and lifted her chin with the haughty air of the debutante she’d been “—I needed you more. You couldn’t have gone anyway.”
“Me too,” Claire said quietly.
Something about the catch in Lu’s throat and the shine over her eyes caught Walt’s attention and wouldn’t let him get back to the conversation in play. This wasn’t just Lucy riding his ass about a risk he was taking with Erin. He turned his hand over, palm up, and caught both their hands in his.
“Hey,” he said. “I’m not going anywhere now either.”
Lu paled a little and pulled away. “Of course you’re not. Except jail if Erin bolts and somebody calls you in for public indecency.”
“Lu, you know what I mean.” Walt grasped at her hand again, urging her attention back to him. “Things with Erin. It doesn’t change you and me. Won’t change any of us.”
Claire shook her head. “No, it won’t. Of course it won’t.”
“Well, of course it does,” Lucy said, rolling her eyes. “Or it should, if you’re serious about her. And, that is just fine with me. In fact, I’ll break your other arm if it doesn’t. This is your only and forever one. Like Brady and Hailey.”
“C’mon…it’s not—”
“Stop being such a stupid boy, Wanda. You’re in love with her.”
They sat for a stretch of seconds, one eyeing the other, impasse reached.
“I think that’s wonderful,” Claire finally said, hardly louder than Miss Ernie’s voice thundering behind the closed kitchen doors. Now her eyes were welling up, and damned if he hadn’t made two women cry in one afternoon. “You’re turning into such a good Sir, Wally. This is the right decision for your girl.”
Hearing Claire go fuzzy and romantic about kink was uncomfortable to witness. But what was happening in her dynamic wasn’t theirs to dissect. Right? Nobody offered unsolicited opinions on someone else’s relationship.
Lu shunted her jaw, widening her eyes at him, and reached for her tea, obviously on purpose. “You have a contingency plan?”
“Nope. We can’t go any further if she can’t get past this.”
“So, if she can’t? It’s over? Seriously? Your whole relationship is over? I’ve seen her look at you, you know.”
“No, if she really can’t get past it, we’ll pull out of the lifestyle. Together.”
“I don’t get this at all. You’ll shut yourself down for her? And she’ll do the same for you, too.” Lucy snorted, sitting the empty glass aside. “What did you just say about taking it on the chin, like a man, and shutting up? That’s a setup for a real healthy marriage.”
“Oh, don’t bring up marriage, Lucy. You’ll scare him to death.”
“Look, we can talk this around in circles all afternoon, but I’m still doing it. I’d like your help so I do the woman things right. Y’all in or not?”
“I need to call Sir and ask—”
Lucy rolled her eyes for what was the sixth or seventh time over their lunch. “Dear Lord. Give me your phone, I’ll talk to Paul. We have to go to Charlotte, and I’m driving.” She stood, tossed three twenties on the table for Miss Ernie, and slung her bag over her shoulder. “Woman things. Jesus, Wanda, you’re such a caveman. And don’t try and tell me I didn’t warn you, dipshit.”
Lucy’s voice trailed behind her as she sauntered toward the door, turning her attentions to Claire’s phone.
“Promise me you’ll choose what I pick out for Erin?” Claire tucked her arm through his.
“Yeah.” Admittedly, Lu would have picked out some hot little scraps of nothing for Erin, but for the first time, it might be overboard. “Probably shouldn’t blow her doors off, right?”
“I think that’s already happened.” The sweet, hopeful smile on Claire’s face made him consider it. Maybe it could be a good thing, being the guy who could blow Erin’s doors away.
In addition to being a talented artist, fabulous baker, and someone who seemingly bore no ill will to any other person or thing, Claire had powers of persuasion rivaling a televangelist. The week after I returned from Los Altos, she convinced me to do something out of character for me. It had become, apparently, a regular task of hers.
The request even surprised my boss, the data center director, Steve.
“This is it?” He glanced at me over his laptop. “You had to talk to me in person about taking the afternoon off?”
“I can make up the—”
“Make up? Nope.” He pushed his desk chair away from his desk and glided toward a monitor behind him. At the bottom utilization: 79% flashed in perfect, grayscale letters. “Erin, take the whole day.”
“But—”
“No buts. You worked at least seventy hours the week we were at Main. Go do something mindless. Go have a pedicure or something. Have you ever had one? Amazing.”
“Um…well, actually…”
“Perfect. Have a massage too.” He rolled back to his desk. “Brian raves about Greenleaf Body in Callahan. Have a facial while you’re there. They do something with Ayurvedic acupressure and oil. Clary sage, I think. Maybe lavender. Anyway, go. Please. You’re getting that stress wrinkle between your eyes again.”
Stress? Walt had been in Tennessee for the past three days at his grandfather’s nursing home, attending to some healthcare business. But missing him wouldn’t cause that. “Wrinkle?”
“When you’re stressing, you wrinkle. Right between the eyes.” He peered at me again. When Steve paused and really took someone in, the cessation of his constant movement was unsettling. Being on the receiving end of that stare was like being under anelectron microscope. He gestured to the sofa opposite him and instead of walking over, simply rolled his custom ergonomic chair around the perimeter of his desk to join. “Stress. See, I know my managers. How’s that admin of yours?”
How and why did I allow Claire to persuade me to do this?
“I have him scheduled for another week of direct observation and then we’ll try a weekend on the census project again.”
“You know, he’s got chutzpah.” Steve laughed to himself as though we were discussing a wayward puppy. “The insubordination is not ideal, but I do like an admin who’s willing to stick his ass out there to get noticed.”
“I would prefer someone who does that within the parameters of appropriate conduct.” Especially when Alan’s parameters of appropriate included calling me a fucking cunt, which I hadn’t relayed to Steve.
“No, and he’s vulgar, which I can’t bear.” He looked at me again, and my stomach churned. “Where are your glasses?”
“I’m trying lenses.”
“Have Lasik. Best thing I ever did. Glasses are tiresome.”
“Steve, I can come in on Saturday to make up the afternoon.”
“If I see you’ve swiped yourself into the building, I’ll action plan you.” He waved his hand at me and glanced over his shoulder at the center monitor. “Take the day. I’ll watch your admin’s console.”
I stood, smoothing over my skirt and in tandem, Steve pushed himself back to his desk. “Okay. I apprecia—”
�
�Nonsense.” He was back at his laptop, answering an instant message. Before I could skim past his door, he looked up again. “You’re happy here, right?”
“Happy?” No one ever asked a Miner if they were happy. Who wouldn’t be happy with the stock options and catered lunches and nature trails and on-site daycare? “At the Mine?”
“No, Callahan.”
“Oh,” I said and immediately thought of all Callahan meant to me. Most of it had very little to do with the ThinkMine campus, and the smile all of those things called up was too instantaneous to hide. “Yeah. I am.”
“Thought so. Good. I need you happy, Erin. I need someone here who’s happy.” His shoulders dropped, and the sharp, high-alert expression he always wore fell away. Steve, it seemed, was not happy. I closed the door and came back to his desk.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. My center’s up and running. You’re going to have my capacity doubled by October with the virtualization project. I don’t have to sit on the 5 for two hours every night to get home. I’ve quit sleeping in my office to avoid sitting on the 5 for two hours every night.” He clicked around his laptop screen, swallowing heavily.
“Steve, fine isn’t always okay.” I pulled a chair to the side of his desk.
“Brian’s not okay.” He checked over his shoulder again. Utilization: 79% capacity. Humming along. “Brian’s really not okay. I think he might divorce me.”
“Oh,” I said, muted. Afraid to ask for details of my boss’s marital problems, I made a few empathetic sounds. A personal trainer and massage therapist, Steve’s husband Brian was as much a stereotypical Northern California product as Danielle. “I’m sorry.”
“He still hasn’t found a job. He could stay home, you know. Money—we’re fine. And he did, you know? He did. For a while.” Steve took a deep breath. “Our friends at home think he’s insane. They don’t understand what it’s like here, how hard it is for us. Especially Brian. He won’t try to pass, and no one at home understands why that’s even something he should consider.”
I looked past his shoulder at the CentreView monitor, acclimated to his mental rhythm already. It was so similar to the one I usually moved to, but something felt a half step too fast. Maybe I didn’t move to that beat anymore.
“He shouldn’t. That’s ridiculous, there’s no reason to hide who—” Steve’s expression stopped me cold. How would I know? “Have you met anyone here? I moved a lot when I was young, and the new places always were easier to handle once I had a routine and a friend or two.” God, I sounded like my ever-chipper mother, each time we unpacked a U-Haul trailer.
Steve sighed and shook his head. “This is a very small town. In a very conservative state.” He left the conclusions to me. “So Brian feels very isolated here. And when Brian’s not happy…Well.”
Lucy. If I could introduce Steve to Lucy, maybe she would help. But she would tell Brian every florid, cane-striped detail of her life. I could easily see them pitted in a lifestyle challenge, and I didn’t know Steve and Brian’s tolerance for kink. Unlike what Claire had done for me, I couldn’t take the risk of exposure. I wasn’t ready to.
“Try Charlotte,” I offered instead.
“We should, I suppose.” He sighed and turned away for a moment to answer another chime from his in-house private messenger. “I’m sorry I unloaded on you, Erin. I just needed to talk to someone who knew me there and knows me here. Does that make sense?”
“It does.” I nodded, smiling. “It makes more sense than you know.”
“Pedicure.” He gestured toward his office door. Like most of us who had matured in ThinkMine culture, once a topic was finished, you moved to the next one without summation. “And massage. Don’t worry about the facial. Honestly, I’ve never see you looking so alive, Erin.”
I wanted to tell him I’d never felt that way either. But how to explain—to a mentor, a boss, and a man—it was because I’d met a man. I was the worst corporate cliché, a career-obsessed woman who was happier because of a man who brought regular—and very intense—sex coupled with lazy, comfortable evenings at home to my life. I wasn’t supposed to be this easy.
I was, though. Walt made it that way.
I chose the coral pink Claire suggested for my pedicure. No massage, though Claire could have used one.
“I’m finished with your notebook,” I told her over the sound of vibrating chairs and foot whirlpools. “Are there more chapters?”
“More?” She looked up at me, a little dazed. “Oh…I don’t remember. I think I started the next lesson after I gave you the book. I’ll print it off and bring it to you.” She took her phone from her purse and swiped open a scheduling app.
“You can email it to me, that’s fine. Oh, that’s the new ProjectMe, isn’t it?” I leaned toward her phone. “How do you like it?”
She sighed, swiping at pages as her brows knitted together. “I don’t know, it’s a Tessa thing. She’s convinced Sir we all need to have a household calendar to manage when we’re available for him, and she has all of their appointments and contacts mapped out, and I still can’t figure out how to set the date.”
At Claire’s feet, the pedicurist’s eyes rose slowly but bounced back to Claire’s partially polished toes as she spoke to her coworker in hushed Vietnamese. I offered a weak smile to the woman stationed over my own toes, which was coolly ignored.
“Do you want me to show you?”
“Well…Sir wants me to figure it out.” She shrugged. “I can do it. I just need some time with it.”
“I don’t mind,” I said. She’d done so much for me and returning the favor—helping her not feel so self-punitive when she wasn’t able to anticipate Paul’s every expectation—seemed important. I nudged at her arm lightly. “C’mon, let me help. You’re more comfortable with your pottery mud than my tech, Claire. It’s no trouble.”
“That’s so kind. But I have to figure it out.” She smiled gently and replaced her phone in her bag.
“Okay.” For some reason, I couldn’t let it go. “But don’t forget, I’m here to help if you need me.”
I let myself in the front door, feeling like a truant. It was four on a Friday afternoon, and I was at home. I looked down at my smoothed, polished pink toes and wiggled them up to myself, giggling.
“These people are turning me into Marie Antoinette,” I said to my house.
A sheet of paper waited in the center of my otherwise bare coffee table, almost my house’s answer to my queenly indulgence. I left my bags in their usual place on the painted-wood hall chair and walked across the living room, the soft slap of the salon’s disposable flip-flops echoing in my ears.
It was a note from Walt.
I slid the little shoes off and padded toward my bedroom, reading. His handwriting was direct, in blocky capitals. He’d left a quantity of it on the single sheet of white paper: instructions I was to follow—if I chose. There was an address, the old Callahan Paper Mill’s company store, which had been converted into a large bar and music hall.
“Not an expectation,” he wrote. Twice. And made it clear I had the right of refusal at any time, at home or after I’d arrived at the bar. I wouldn’t need to call red, I could simply say I wanted it to end.
“A request.”
Laid in three neat stacks were clothes, shoes—black, in suede with a little sliver of a cutout to show my pedicure. There was a bra. There was a toiletry bag. None of what he’d left out was mine.
I lifted the clothes first. There wasn’t enough of anything to cover most of me, certainly not enough to wear to a place called Merle Travis’s Taproom. Setting the tiny pile of sheer fabric aside, I turned to the underwear. There was a bra made in taupe satin, covered in black net with pinpoints of tiny black dots, and a lace edge. Nothing more. The toiletry bag was equally Spartan. Black mascara and liner. Powder similar to my own. Glossy lipstick the color of a persimmon.
“This is not an expectation, it’s a request. I want you to see yourself differe
ntly. I want you to see something in yourself that I see, and that you don’t. The choice is yours.”
For a long while, I sat in silence. At the edge of my bed. At the edge of what Walt had left there for me. I watched the dappled sunlight from my bedroom window trickle shadows and light across it all and listened to a lawn mower start, a distant dog’s barking.
Walt’s vision of me was something I couldn’t ignore, and he was worth the risk I sensed around my own dim corners. Of course he was. I’d do anything he asked. He made me brave.
Chapter Seventeen
AFTER TWELVE MINUTES alone in Merle Travis’s Taproom, a man approached me.
He wasn’t leering or twisting an imaginary villain’s mustache. I tried to return his smile and lifted my drink to my mouth.
“Hey there,” he said. He smiled again, showing off dimples and a pair of honeyed-brown eyes. His pressed khaki shorts and summer blond hair completed the non-threatening picture. A nice guy. Based on his country-clubber-at-ease wardrobe and genial Southern accent, he could have easily been a distant cousin of Lucy’s. “Finished? I’ll get you another one.”
“Oh, I’m—” Seeing something different: that was my assignment—at least in its motivation. So I answered accordingly. “Okay. It’s coconut rum and diet.”
“I’m Justin.” Justin drank beer. He had a pint, stout I judged, from the color of it, in his hand.
“Erin.” I forced another smile instead of wincing at the flare of worry. Should I have told him my name? Should I have another drink? Justin still smiled, waiting, while I tumbled past steps and scenarios in my head of how people just did this. “Hi.”
Justin sat across from me, leaning on his elbows. “You’re not from around here, are you?”
Newbie, again? Still?
“Not originally,” I said, pushing the last ice cubes around the bottom of my glass, which must have been a bar signal of some sort. Justin waved across the room at a bartender and pointed to my drink, then his beer.
“Me neither. I’m from outside Asheville, but I hung around after I graduated from CNCU.”