And Then There Was You

by Octavia Zane

  Theo sighed.

  “What’s wrong?” Riley asked.

  “Triumph.”

  Riley stared at him before his brain made the connection between Gigi’s face-paint and Koala’s older brother. “Aren’t you glad I told you that story?”

  Theo snickered. “No, not really. And, thankfully, you forgot to ask him the names of his missing siblings when we got back to the bakery that day. The ones I know are bad enough.”

  “Now you’ve reminded me. I won’t forget a second time.” Riley checked around for Jesse, who was nowhere to be seen. Poking his head into the bounce house, he said, “Have you seen your brother, Gigi?”

  “No!” Gigi yelled, jumping in a giggling cluster of her small girlfriends. “You can’t be in here, Uncle Riley! This is the girls’ bounce house!”

  He checked in the other bounce houses, but didn’t find his nephew. Perturbed, he pulled Sherlock away from sniffing the discarded shoes. The deal was for the kids to stay in the games area, and he’d made them repeat back the rule twice.

  It never occurred to him that Jesse wouldn’t obey. Neither of the children were wanderers, and they knew not to talk to strangers. “Do you see him anywhere, Theo?”

  They turned in a full circle.

  The face-painting booth was bustling, yet Jesse wasn’t among the kids inside when Riley looked in. Nor was he in the mobile photo booths, Theo lifting the curtains to peek. They searched the handfuls of kids at the board games, asking if anyone had seen Jesse. A dark-haired boy with glasses said, “He played Volcano with me a few minutes ago.”

  “How many minutes ago?” Riley asked.

  The kid shrugged. “I don’t know. Ten minutes?”

  Where had Jesse gone after that? If he went home to play with a friend, without even bothering to ask for permission, then he was in huge trouble once Rivers got hold of him. Actually, he was in just as much trouble when Riley got hold of him. Jesse was usually a responsible kid, or Riley and Rivers never would have let him hang out here without supervision. He knew better than this.

  Theo was speaking to the woman monitoring the board games. “She just saw him here,” he called to Riley. “Five to ten minutes ago.”

  “A big group of kids left the games after that,” the woman volunteered. “I don’t know if he was among them, but one of the boys yelled that they were going to the playgrounds.”

  Riley strode immediately to the nearest playground, which was only fifty feet away. It was the same one that he and Theo sat near on their earlier trip to the park.

  There were a few busy heads digging in the sand, but that playground was for kids much younger than Jesse. His agitation increasing when his nephew wasn’t among them, Riley shoved the leash on Theo. “Take the dog.”

  Then he took off at a jog. The big kids’ playground was clear across the park. Let him be there. Please let him be there. His jog turned into a run. Swerving around clots of people, he neared the playground within the minute.

  “No, I can’t!” a boy cried as Riley dashed over the winding path through the trees.

  It was Jesse’s voice. Angry but relieved, Riley came around the last turn only to have his relief evaporate like a puddle on a hot summer day.

  Jesse had indeed gone with a clutch of kids to the playground. On the tallest climbing structure, literally balanced on it, his arms were out for balance as he stood ten to fifteen feet off the ground on two curved metal pipes.

  A scream bulged out Riley’s throat. He sealed his lips shut and forced it down, afraid if he let it loose that he would startle Jesse into slipping off. A ring of boys sat on the bars much lower down, clapping and calling up that now Jesse had to lift one foot into the air. “’Fraidy cat!” one jeered.

  Jesse hesitated. The kids egged him on.

  His foot began to lift.

  “Jesse, be careful!” Riley shouted, bolting off the path to the playground. All of the kids on the bars went to the same elementary school. Their faces were very familiar, but Riley didn’t know their names. They were a grade or two ahead of Jesse. One was likely an Enzmen, judging from that tell-tale golden hair.

  Their eyes widening with shock, the kids panicked to see Riley coming. “Let’s get out of here!” one shouted. Swiveling their legs out of the climbing structure, they slid down to the sand and darted away.

  Riley jumped over the log to the sand and came to the bars. “What are you doing up there?” he cried upwards.

  Jesse’s chest heaved and a full-body tremble passed through him. “I can’t . . .” he gasped, tears rolling down his cheeks, “I . . . I can’t get down.”

  “Just bend down and get hold of the bars.”

  Jesse’s knees wobbled, and then stiffened. He closed his eyes tightly as a sob wracked him. “I can’t. My shoes are all slippery.”

  “Then I’ll come up there to you.” Riley grasped the bars, which were slick from the recent rainfall. Slowly, he scaled the structure.

  Jesse sniffled. “I’m sorry.”

  “This is so dangerous! Why did you go up there?”

  “They said I could be part of their club if I passed the trials of bravery. They said I could do the trials super-fast and get back to the games.”

  Riley swallowed down on his temper just like he’d swallowed down on that scream. Getting into some silly little boys’ club didn’t matter if Jesse broke his neck along the way, but that was a conversation for later.

  Riley’s sneaker slipped on a bar and he gasped, his fists holding him up as his right foot shot out into space. These bars weren’t just wet! They were greasy in places from God only knew what, hand lotion or something else. It had a faint smell of oranges.

  He got his footing back and continued up the side, stopping now and then to wipe off his hands on his jeans. “You stay steady,” he called.

  “What if I fall?” Jesse asked, distraught.

  “You’re not going to fall.” Riley came eye level with Jesse’s feet.

  How in the hell were they going to do this? Stepping up one more rung, he said, “Okay. Crouch down a bit and put your arms around my neck. We’re going to maneuver you around to my back and then I’ll climb down.”

  “I can’t I can’t I can’t I can’t-”

  “You have to,” Riley said sternly. In truth, he was as freaked out as Jesse. “I can’t do this part for you and I can’t climb any higher. Crouch down and take hold of me.”

  His severity pierced through the boy’s panic. Knees bending, Jesse gasped and dug his fists into Riley’s shirt. Riley held on tightly to the top bar with his left hand. With his right, he wound his arm around Jesse’s waist.

  With one smooth jerk, he pulled Jesse off the top and locked their bodies together. “Monkey man,” he said. “Remember the monkey man game? Scoot yourself onto my back with your arms and legs.”

  Jesse’s breaths were raspy with fear, but he did it. Moments later, his legs clenched around Riley’s waist and his arms wound around Riley’s neck. “Okay.”

  “All right. We’re going to start down. You just be still back there, totally still.”

  Riley took a cautious step down, his heart pounding as his sneaker slid a little on the bar. He grumbled something, unaware that he was even doing it.

  “It’s oil,” Jesse whispered miserably. “It’s part of the challenge. Jamie rubbed his mom’s essential oil on the bars to make it harder.”

  Great. Just then, Riley’s hand came down in a very oily patch. He paused to wipe it off on his jeans before continuing to creep downwards.

  Another handhold, another pause to wipe off, another step, each foot brought them closer to the sand. A worried woman’s face swam into view below and he barked at her to get someone from Park Maintenance to clean the oil off the bars. Then she was gone and he risked another step. His shoe met a frictionless surface and he gripped the bars in a deathly throttle as he tried not to slip off.

  “No! Sherlock, no!” someone cried.

  Riley looked over his shoulder.


  Theo was racing over the grass past the playground, shouting as the dog ran in a chocolate streak towards the sidewalk. With music spilling out of the open windows, a station wagon came down the road going miles above the speed limit.

  Sherlock exploded into the street, leash trailing along behind him as he barked. The driver stomped on the brakes and the station wagon lurched to a stop, Sherlock racing in front of it. Jesse cried out in horror, his weight shifting suddenly, and then they were falling as the oily bars slipped out of Riley’s fingers.

  In that slow-motion fall, Riley twisted onto his side just in time to see Sherlock make it to the opposite sidewalk. Then the sand flew up and he landed hard on his right arm with Jesse behind him. The impact sent pain lancing through Riley’s body. It took his breath away. Stunned, he just lay there until he heard Jesse cry.

  He rolled over. His nephew’s leg was bent up underneath him at an awkward angle. “Ow, it hurts, Uncle Riley, it hurts . . .”

  “Let me see.” Riley got up. He rubbed his sandy hands furiously on his shirt and looked for blood.

  No blood, and no bones poking out anywhere. Very slowly, he straightened Jesse’s leg. “Can you flex it?”

  Jesse flexed his knee but winced.

  “Do you need me to call an ambulance?” Theo crossed over the log, his voice breathless and his eyes wild as he rushed over the sand to the climbing structure.

  All of the restrained anger and fear burst out of Riley. “What in the hell happened with the dog? Why did you let him go?”

  “I didn’t let him go! He saw a squirrel across the street and jerked his leash right out of my hand,” Theo said. “Are you two ok-”

  “Did the car hit him? Did the car hit Sherlock?” Jesse wailed.

  “No, he didn’t get hit,” Theo said.

  “Didn’t you have the leash around your wrist?” Riley demanded, trying to see through the parked cars at the curb to the far side of the street. All he made out was a patch of grass in front of a church. Grass, and no dog on it.

  The color had faded from Theo’s cheeks at his tone. “No. I was holding it.”

  “You’re a vet, aren’t you? You should know better than that!” Riley snapped.

  He barely recognized the rage-filled voice as his own. The last time he’d heard that tone burst from his throat, it was when the cell phone representative was trying to upsell Ari’s plan after he died.

  Theo backed away, his face closing off.

  That shuttering of expression pissed off Riley even more. Theo had no right to be angry with Riley in return when the vet was the one to let the dog get away! “Are you going to look for him or not?” Riley spat. “What are you doing over here?”

  Blankness, total blankness, like an erased chalkboard. Theo’s emotionless tone matched his lack of expression. “I saw you two fall off the bars from up high. If neither of you need an ambulance, then I’ll go after the dog.”

  Riley felt himself sealing off in response, that blank face triggering his own. “We don’t need anything.”

  “Fine.” Theo went away.

  Riley picked Jesse up. He was eight years old and so insubstantial in weight, just a scrap of a kid despite his healthy appetite. Sand sifted down from their clothing and even though Riley had wiped off several times, more sand coated his fingers and itched in the spaces between.

  Clutching at him, Jesse said, “We have to find Sherlock! We have to help Doctor Theo find him!”

  “We need to have your leg looked at first,” Riley said. He would drop off Jesse with Rivers and backtrack to search for Sherlock himself.

  Stiff-backed, Theo crossed the street. Riley carried Jesse the other way.

  Chapter Twelve

  Riley

  “Because he was married,” Riley said furiously as he ripped off a piece of tape and handed it to his sister.

  Instead of putting up more of Sherlock’s FOUND posters, now they were putting up his LOST posters. On some of the lampposts, they were taping them right over the barely-weathered FOUND flyers.

  “Yup,” Rivers said.

  “Married and had a kid!” Riley cried, still astonished about that little discovery after all of these years. “I met him one night dancing in a swimsuit in a gay club in West Hollywood, but he was married to a chick and had a toddler at home! And when I found that out months after we started dating and confronted him, he had the nerve to double down. Well, of course he was married and had a baby. Why hadn’t I just assumed so? He was a grown man and those were things that grown men had to do. But that wasn’t any reason for us to break up, he said! As long as he made token appearances at home between all of his imaginary business trips, he and I could be happy. It worked out perfectly fine in his head.”

  “Yup,” Rivers repeated to his diatribe, holding out her hand for more tape.

  He barely heard her as he ripped off another piece. “I told him what I thought about that. How was his wife going to feel when she found out what he was doing on the side? How was his kid going to feel always being on daddy’s back-burner? And how was I supposed to feel, hiding out in the closet forever while he played happy family at his other home? The only one winning in all of this was him. Then I packed up whatever I was keeping at his secret apartment and walked out the door. And then I saw him at that same club a week before I moved to Portland. Topless and dancing up on some other guy.”

  The flyer flapped in the wind, but it was well taped down. They moved on down the sidewalk.

  The kids were in school, Jesse with a bandage around his knee. It was just a sprain from landing wrong. Riley ached all over from his own landing, especially his shoulder and hip, but the bruises would vanish in a few days and he’d be fine. They were already fading, the brilliant, peacock blues and purples turning black and shrinking.

  “So that was Harry,” he spat.

  “I know,” Rivers said mildly. “You’ve told me about him before.”

  “I couldn’t believe how little his wife and kid meant to him. They were like long-term chores he had to tend to begrudgingly, and he totally planned to have one more kid to make him look completely normal to the world. A wife, a son, and hopefully a daughter next. They were a deflector shield he hid behind because he didn’t want to deal with coming out. I bet he’s still doing that today, if his wife hasn’t figured it out and left him by now. And then I met Jeremy.”

  Rivers nodded. They stopped at a telephone pole.

  He pulled a flyer out from the stack pinned in his armpit. As she pressed it up to the pole, he tore off tape. “I’ll admit it: I could have been better with him. I thought I could break him out of his ridiculous routines. He was missing out on his life for forty reps of counter balance box squats and a grass-fed ketogenic protein shake. But I pushed him too hard. I read some of our old texts last night and-”

  “Why did you read those?” Rivers asked.

  Riley had no answer for that. “Don’t interrupt. So last night I could see where I went wrong in those texts. He would break his routines just a little, but I kept badgering and badgering for more. It was actually sort of hard to read them. He knew he was over the top and he was ready to make a few changes, to loosen up a bit . . .”

  Giving over tape, Riley made a face. At the time, it felt like Jeremy was dating his routines over Riley, who felt so left out that he overreacted. “It was just so hard to be on his schedule, even if it was ninety percent of the time instead of one hundred percent. I couldn’t stand having every single minute regimented the way he could! Breaking up was the right thing to do for both of us, but I could have been better in those months.”

  Rivers just nodded again as she taped the flyer over one for a garage sale from last July.

  Sherlock’s face stared out with condemnation from the picture. Just gone from their lives, as abruptly as he arrived. When Theo came back to the bakery booth without him, Riley didn’t know what to say. He was too mad. Not that he could have made himself heard over Gigi’s hysterical wails for t
he dog.

  “And then Dreyer,” he said in disgust, not wanting to think about the miserable finish to the festival. “You know what I realized towards the end? Instead of our parents fighting over us, he and I were fighting over you and the kids. And I’d learned from Jeremy about not pressing so hard, but Dreyer was just as rigid in a different way. It had to be all about him one hundred percent of the time, or else I didn’t love him, I was neglecting him, I needed to reconsider my priorities. He threw a huge snit-fit on Jesse’s birthday that I was going to be at his little party instead of attending Dreyer’s poetry reading. He did poetry readings all the damn time!”

  “Yup.”

  “He had readings every week! How many times did I sit through ‘Ode to the Wings of Darkness’ about his damn insomnia, and clap for ‘Irreverent Iridescence’ and I never figured out what that one was even about? All those five-dollar words. He tried to explain it to me so many times.” That poem never did make a lick of sense; the more Dreyer explained it, the more confusing it became.

  Riley and Rivers headed down the sidewalk for a streetlamp.

  “I didn’t need to be at that particular reading, but it was like the world was ending to him!” Riley exclaimed. “He wouldn’t have pressed half as hard if I missed it because I had a cold or my car broke down. He was pissed only because I was choosing someone over him.” And just like Dreyer never sufficiently explained that poem to Riley, Riley was never able to sufficiently explain that it was not a competition between Dreyer and a little kid. On that afternoon in question, Jesse needed Riley a lot more than Dreyer did.

  They put up another flyer and retreated for home, intending to drive downtown. Riley wanted to blanket the area around their house in case Sherlock was on his way back all on his own, but they also needed to get the area around the park and church where he got lost.

  He grumbled internally. If Theo had just gone straight across the street, he wouldn’t have lost sight of the dog, the kids wouldn’t be so upset, and Riley wouldn’t be out here putting up posters!