Fringe Benefits
Page 25
The question came out of nowhere. “Do you think it’s hopeless?”
“What?”
“I mean, is it game over? Or do you think you might be able to talk this out?”
“I don’t see how,” I said miserably. “I mean, he made things as final as he could. Except for my car.”
“Your car?”
“The Corolla. It’s still stored in the warehouse, so I’ll have to contact him to get it back somehow. But I don’t see that as exactly the best opening for a discussion as to why I’m the perfect woman for him.”
Alex leaned forward slightly and rested his hands on the table top. “It’s better than nothing. Plus, it’s a legitimate reason for getting in touch, not something you obviously trumped up just so you can talk to him.”
I supposed that was true enough. I gave a cautious nod.
“Is he worth fighting for?”
I didn’t even have to think. “Yes.”
“The best ones always are.” He glanced up again, although this time I noticed his attention was focused on the upstairs, where a lamp burned in a corner window. I thought I could see the faint outline of Joyce’s silhouette through the blinds.
What battles had Alex fought to get Joyce in his life? I might never know. I did know he would probably face more as soon as my mother found out about the situation. I also knew Alex would win that skirmish. He hadn’t backed down about Berkeley, even though my mother had been so upset with him she hadn’t gone with us when my father drove him to the airport that last time.
Despite what he’d done, I realized then I wasn’t ready to give up on Pieter. Maybe I’d get shot down in flames, but I knew I would never forgive myself if I just walked meekly away and didn’t even try. Somehow I’d figure out a way to break through that wall he’d put up around himself.
I wouldn’t let myself think about what might happen if I couldn’t.
Eighteen
An older-model Macbook sat on the side table in the guest room that was my temporary quarters. Alex had told me to go ahead and use the laptop if I needed it; apparently he had the whole house running on an elaborate network. For all I knew he had a computer in every room. I wouldn’t put it past him.
At any rate, I’d been using Web-based email for a while, since it meant I wasn’t tied to an account on my home computer. After I was finished with all my bedtime rituals, I sat down in front of the Macbook, brought up the browser, and logged in to my email. Nothing new, except some spam that had gotten past the filter, but I halfway expected that. The only person with whom I carried on a regular email correspondence was Alex, and since I was staying in his house at the moment, email wasn’t exactly required.
I sent Leslie a quick note to let her know I’d made it to Berkeley just fine. She usually checked her email right before she went to bed, so I knew she’d get it even though by that point it was almost ten o’clock. I didn’t know what else to say to her. Yes, I’d talked to my brother, and yes, I’d decided I wasn’t going to let Pieter go without a fight, but I still had no idea what my eventual strategy was going to be. So far Leslie’s advice really hadn’t done me much good. I figured it was better to say nothing else for now.
Then I opened a new message and hesitated. What to say, exactly? And how to say it? Just the plain facts, I decided. After all, it was true that Pieter still had my car in the warehouse. Of course I had to retrieve it, even though I had no idea what the heck I was going to do with it once it was back in my possession. I only had the one parking space at the apartment complex, and Glendale didn’t allow overnight street parking, probably to keep people from using public streets to store their spare vehicles. No need to go into all that with Pieter, though. I just needed to set up a time to get the Corolla. Very simple.
Simple it was. Only a quick note to pvanrijn@pyramidimports.com.
Pieter, I just realized that my car is stored in your warehouse. We’ll need to make arrangements for me to move it. I’m out of town right now, but I’ll contact you when I’m back in L.A.
A plain “Katherine” as the signature. No best regards, no explanations as to where exactly I was. Let him be curious…or not.
I hit “send” before I lost my nerve, then logged off and closed down the browser. No way I’d let myself sit around and wait to see if he replied. I could check in the morning, after I’d had a nice breakfast and some coffee…if Alex was even the type to drink coffee. I couldn’t remember. If not, I had a feeling there were plenty of coffee houses in Berkeley that would be more than happy to take my business.
Now it was time to sleep. I looked forward to a few hours where I wouldn’t have to think about anything.
No email from Pieter in the morning. I did sort of cheat, though. Alex offered to take me out to breakfast, since his first class wasn’t until ten. So I checked my email account before we left the house, only to find nothing new waiting for me. Then again, I had sent the email to Pieter’s business address since I had no idea what his personal email address might be (if he even had one). Still, there was a good chance he wouldn’t look at the Pyramid Imports account until he was actually in the office.
The café Alex took me to was within walking distance of the house. Fog still shrouded the hillsides, although it had begun to burn off by the time we were seated for breakfast. The place had heavenly coffee, much better than the mass-produced stuff I was used to.
“They grind their own beans,” Alex told me, as he sipped at his tiny cream-colored mug of espresso. “All free-trade coffee from small producers.”
“I had no idea you were a connoisseur.”
He grinned. “Well, it started out as a defense mechanism. I needed coffee to get me through those twenty-unit plus tutoring quarters when I was an undergrad. But then I figured if I was going to drink it I should learn about it, treat it with respect. So here we are.”
I reflected then that I’d missed out on a large chunk of my brother’s life. Sure, we’d kept in sporadic touch through email and the even more occasional phone call, but it wasn’t the same as sitting down and sharing a cup of coffee and actually talking to one another. If I hadn’t come up here, when would I have even found out about Joyce? When they sent out the wedding announcements?
An odd sense of disconnection came over me, a realization that I could never really know what was going on in another person’s life if he didn’t want to share it with me. Certainly that held true for Pieter. I had no idea what he was doing now—whether he was alone, or whether he’d already moved on and was advertising for a new assistant.
The thought made the breath catch in my throat. I picked up my cappuccino and took a bigger gulp than I probably should have. I coughed.
“Everything all right?” Alex inquired.
“Fine,” I wheezed, and reached for my water glass.
He shot me a questioning glance but apparently decided to take my word for it. “So what’s your next step?”
“Just trying to get a chance to talk to him. I sent an email last night, but I haven’t heard anything.”
“And if that doesn’t work?”
I lifted my shoulders in what I hoped was a negligent shrug. “Stalemate? I mean, it’s not as if I really want the Corolla back. But since Pieter seems to be all about doing things by the book, I’m pretty sure he’ll want it off his property.”
“So did you leave the car there on purpose?”
“No,” I said at once. I suppose I could see why Alex might think that, but it really had been a simple oversight. “Just a mistake. I wasn’t really thinking clearly when I left the building.”
“I can imagine.”
On someone else’s lips that remark might have come across as snotty. But Alex sounded sympathetic and a little rueful.
I went on, “Anyway, I just have to hope that he responds to my email. If not—” I paused. What the hell would I do if Pieter just blew me off? “Then I guess I’ll just show up on his doorstep. It’s not like I don’t know where he lives and works.”
“No place to hide, huh?”
“Exactly.”
The conversation drifted to other things after that—our sister Ellen’s impending bundle of joy, the early retirement our father was contemplating. Anything except the tangle that was my personal life. The whole time, however, I couldn’t help wondering how I’d adjust my strategy if Pieter completely froze me out. Full frontal assault wasn’t really my style, but I’d never been this desperate before. I could only hope that he wouldn’t force me to do something spectacularly stupid.
Alex and I parted ways after breakfast, since he had to get to his ten o’clock class. It felt a little strange to be alone in my brother’s house, but after all, he had given me a spare key and told me to make myself at home. I practically ran up the steps to the guest room and powered up the little Macbook, all the while telling myself I shouldn’t be too hopeful of a reply.
But there it was, sitting innocuously in my inbox. I clicked on the email at once and tried to ignore the irrational pounding of my heart.
I had forgotten about your car. My apologies. Do feel free to call the office when you are back in town. We can make arrangements to move your car then. I hope you are enjoying your trip.
And that was it. He hadn’t even signed his name. Polite as ever, of course, but not even a question as to where I was. Then again, he probably thought it was none of his business.
Maybe it wasn’t. I didn’t know what to think anymore.
Instead, I sent a quick reply saying of course I’d call him when I was back in L.A. No comment as to when that would actually be.
I didn’t know myself how long I’d need to stay away.
I ended up staying in Berkeley for three days. Benjamin Franklin’s comment about fish and visitors hovered uneasily in my thoughts, and besides, I couldn’t exactly take up permanent residence in Alex’s guest room. He and Joyce had a life together. They didn’t need me underfoot. And I knew I needed to come to some sort of a resolution with Pieter. I couldn’t leave things hanging forever. But those three days gave me some time to think, time for me to try to formulate my arguments. Of course, all those arguments hinged on the proposition that he really did care for me deep down and had only pushed me away to avoid getting hurt again. I had no idea what I’d do if it turned out that he simply didn’t reciprocate my feelings.
It was a gray, foggy Thursday morning when I set out for Los Angeles. Alex saw me off and then immediately headed over for his ten o’clock class. Joyce of course had been long gone by then—her day started at eight sharp.
I wished it were clear. The mist coming in off the San Francisco Bay reminded me a little too much of the morning Pieter had fired me. It had been foggy, then, too, although not as dense as this. In a way it was good—I had to keep focused on the road since visibility was so bad. I couldn’t let my mind wander. The world condensed itself to a few lanes of blacktop and the white lines that separated them. Easy. Stay inside the lines, and you won’t get hurt.
Maybe that was Pieter’s philosophy of life. Keep everything neat and compartmentalized. Don’t let anyone get too close. For a few seconds I felt a wash of blazing hatred toward the unknown woman who had walked away from him all those years ago. Whoever she was, she’d certainly done a number on him. Had she ever realized what damage she’d left in her wake?
Did that even matter? I couldn’t change what she had done. All I could do was try to figure out some way to convince Pieter that I was different.
Instead of breaking his heart, I wanted to heal it.
Even after just a three-day absence L.A. felt somehow foreign: too hot, too crowded. I got into town at the beginning of rush hour, and although I was going the opposite direction of the main traffic flow, it still took me forever to slog my way through the Valley and on into Glendale. When I finally pulled into my parking stall behind the apartment, it was almost four-thirty. That gave me barely enough time to catch Pieter in the office. I didn’t know if I would have been brave enough to call him on his cell phone after hours, since his instructions had been for me to contact him at the office.
I didn’t even bother with my luggage. Instead, I ran upstairs and used the restroom, then washed my hands and headed straight to the phone. For some strange reason I had the sensation of a clock ticking away somewhere, as if I only had a finite amount of time to correct the situation between us. That was ridiculous, of course, but I couldn’t shake the feeling. So I picked up my phone and dialed the Pyramid Imports number.
It rang three times, and for a few painful seconds I wondered if the call was just going to roll over to voicemail. It was close to the end of the business day. For all I knew, Pieter could have closed up early and gone home.
But then I heard his voice. Pleasant, calm, as if he hadn’t just kicked me to the curb four days earlier. “Katherine.”
I tried to make my tone mimic his. Cool. Dispassionate. “Hi, Pieter. I’m back in town and figured we should take care of the car situation as soon as possible. Are you busy?”
A slight hesitation, so small I probably wouldn’t have even noticed it if I hadn’t been on guard for any trace of reticence. “No, I’m not busy at the moment. If you’re not too tired from your drive.” He ended the sentence on a small upward inflection, as if somehow trying to discover where I’d been.
“Oh, I just drove down from the Bay Area,” I replied. “It really wasn’t that bad. I’ll try to get to the office as quickly as I can.”
Again a small pause. “Of course.”
I tried not to read anything into his hesitation. “I’m going to take a cab over there, so it may be a little past five—”
“That is no problem,” he said at once. “Ring when you’re here.”
He hung up. All right, so he wasn’t exactly rolling out the welcome mat, but neither had he told me I couldn’t come.
Calling the taxi company and arranging for the cab to come pick me up helped to distract me a little. They said they’d have someone over in about ten minutes.
There wasn’t time for me to wash my face and reapply all my makeup, but I paused long enough to brush my teeth, dust some powder on my nose, and freshen my lip color. Stupid, really. I had a feeling it would take more than shiny lips to soften Pieter’s heart.
I thought I looked a little tired, so I put on a bit more blush, then brushed my hair one more time. The evening was getting cool, which gave me an excuse to throw a black blazer over my jeans and T-shirt. Maybe a little casual for Pieter’s tastes, but I doubted he would expect to see me in a skirt and heels after driving four hundred miles.
I wanted to laugh at myself. There I was, worrying about my appearance, when most likely I’d be in his presence just long enough to go into the warehouse and extricate my car from its exile in a forgotten corner. No sense trying to delude myself that this meeting would be anything more than that. Just business.
Then I went down to wait for the cab. All I could do was hope that I hadn’t made an enormous mistake.
Pieter’s Maserati was the sole vehicle in the parking lot. Evidently he hadn’t yet gotten my replacement. I felt just the tiniest twinge of hope at that realization, then told myself not to get too excited.
The cab driver gave the almost-empty parking lot a dubious glance. “You want me to wait for you?”
“No,” I replied. “It’s fine. I’m picking up a car here.”
“You’re sure?”
Good question. But I would look like an idiot if I made the cab driver wait. Worse come to worst, I could just call the cab company back if I hit any complications. I nodded.
“All right. But you can call the dispatch and ask for Jaime if you need to. Okay?”
“Okay,” I said. The tension along the back of my neck seemed to ease the tiniest bit. Amazing what a bit of unlooked-for concern from a stranger could do for a girl. “Thank you, Jaime.”
He nodded, then rolled up the window and began to turn the cab around. I noticed he was taking his time, though.
Then Pieter, blue eyes cold and his mouth set. He stared down at me for a few seconds. “Katherine.”
“Hi, Pieter,” I returned. Actually, I was sort of impressed with myself. I had somehow managed to sound breezy and unconcerned, as if I did this sort of thing every day. “Thanks for staying around. I’m not too late, am I?”
Loaded question, but luckily he seemed to take it at face value. “Not at all. It’s barely past five.” An almost questioning look on his face, as if he wasn’t quite sure what to make of me. “Do come in.”
I stepped inside. Nothing in the front office seemed to have changed, but then again, why would it? I did note that the big cinema display at my old workstation was dark, the leather office chair tucked up right against the desk. It didn’t seem as if it had been touched since I’d left the building four days earlier.
“The car?” I ventured, since Pieter stood a few feet away from me, not moving. Not that I really wanted to hurry this along, but a complete lack of forward motion would have looked strange.
“Of course,” he said at once.
He turned away and walked down the hallway, then unlocked the door that led to the warehouse. Although it was still bright daylight outside, the cavernous space was dark, somehow ominous. The dim light made shapeless monsters of the piles of packing crates.
But then Pieter reached over to his right to flick on the lights. Bright industrial fluorescents blared on overhead, leaching what little color there was to his hair. God knows what the lighting made me look like.
“The far corner,” he said.
I’d had a vague recollection of where I parked the car, but it had been a while, and the arrangement of crates and boxes had shifted since then. It was good that I had Pieter to guide me to that corner, which still felt dim and neglected despite the harsh lights above us.