Until the Day I Die

by Carpenter, Emily

  Sabine and I pledged a sorority together, we attended football and baseball games, and she introduced me to her high school friends, Perry and Ben. My life was forever changed because of her friendship, and I want to make sure my daughter gets the same chance. So, sue me. I took matters into my own hands.

  “I love your name,” Dele says to Shorie. “Mine’s from an old soap opera my grandma used to watch. Adelia Kent, The Lighthouse.”

  “I used to watch that show,” I say, but Dele doesn’t look at me.

  Shorie takes a deep breath. “Shorie was my mom’s mother’s name. She was Margaret Shore, but everybody called her Shorie.”

  I smile encouragingly at Shorie.

  “Shorie Shore,” Dele crows. “I love it. You know, my grandma from Eclectic, Alabama, had a friend named Poo-Poo. Poo-Poo Buchanan, I kid you not. And nobody even cracked a smile when they said it. Poo-Poo, you got a cup of sugar I can borrow to make this peach cobbler? Poo-Poo, do you take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband? His name was Lumper, by the way, the husband. Loony southerners. Just one step away from tripping and falling out of their Faulkner novels.”

  Dele then segues into a story about how even though she’s not an engineering student (she received a journalism scholarship), she managed to personally strong-arm the housing department into letting her move into Amelia Boynton, where the atmosphere will supposedly be more studious. Her move-in time isn’t technically until five, so her parents won’t be here for another couple of hours. She then asks Shorie if she wants to go to a party at the Lambda Chi house with her that night. When Shorie actually agrees, I literally have to smother a yelp of joy.

  Presently, Ben shows up loaded down with a hodgepodge of backpacks and old Trader Joe’s bags stuffed with HDMI cords, back issues of Perry’s Journal of Mathematics and the Arts magazines, and God knows what other useless odds and ends. After a whole new round of introductions, Ben leaves again, and Shorie and Dele sort through the bags. I can see my daughter has way underpacked. There are no picture frames or corkboards, only the twinkle lights that I packed at the last minute and have already hung and the Kristin Kontrol poster from her bedroom that she tacks up over her desk.

  “You like the Dum Dum Girls too?” Dele asks her.

  “Yeah, but Kristin’s solo stuff is more eighties. Different.”

  “Cool.”

  I reach over, snag Shorie’s phone, and hold it out for her to type in her passcode. “A few final motherly instructions, that’s all.”

  She frowns but complies. I take back the phone and start swiping. “Don’t forget to do everything through Jax, so we can keep up with what you’re spending and keep it in your profile.”

  “Okay,” Dele says. “I’m just going to go ahead and say it right now. I know Jax is your family business, and I just have to tell you, I’m a total fangirl.” She lets out a whoosh of breath, her eyes shining. “I mean, how totally amazing is that? You created something millions of people love. I mean, that must feel incredible, you know . . .” She throws up her hands, awestruck apparently.

  “It’s covered, Mom,” Shorie says.

  “I love Jax,” Dele goes on. “I use it all the time.” She looks at me. “Maybe I could interview you for one of my classes. Is that weird, that I just asked you? You probably talk to, like, Forbes or whatever.” For the first time, she looks abashed.

  “I’d be happy to give you an interview.” I put the phone down, and I can feel Shorie stiffening across the room, waves of unhappiness rolling off her. We’re almost finished unpacking, and the resistance has become palpable, a living force, a psychic, full-body no emanating from her very pores. Such wasted determination. Think what my daughter could do if she focused this energy into something really useful.

  Dele doesn’t seem to notice. “Oh, Shorie. I’m supposed to meet my friend Rayanne. I’ll bring her by later and y’all can meet, if you want.”

  “Okay,” Shorie says.

  When she’s gone I turn to Shorie. “I just want to say one more—”

  She interrupts. “There’s nothing left for you to say.”

  She heads into the bathroom, shutting the door behind her, and I hear the water running. I sit on the newly made bed, sensing the vortex in the air above me. It’s about to descend again.

  When Ben comes up with the last load of plastic crates, I ask stiffly for his keys. In the parking lot, I climb in his hot truck and finally allow myself to burst into tears.

  7

  SHORIE

  After Mom leaves, Ben offers to set up my extra monitor, speakers, and printer, even though he knows I’m perfectly capable. He tries to make conversation—“What classes are you taking?” “Dele seems nice.” “How many girls do you have to share that bathroom with?”—but I freeze him out with one-word answers. After he’s finished tightening up the wobbly legs on my bed, he stands by the desk, flipping the wrench around his thumb and staring through the window’s janky plastic blinds.

  “You know your mom loves you.”

  I roll my eyes. “Thanks. Had you not told me, I would’ve never realized.” I know I’m being a huge brat, and yet I can’t stop myself. I’m so miserable and filled with rage, I can’t form a civil sentence.

  He goes on. “And I know this is hard.”

  I bite my lip fiercely to keep from crying. I’d rather die than cry, yet again, in front of Ben.

  “Your dad—”

  “Don’t,” I say. “Do not. Dare. Say another word. I should not be here.”

  “I know.”

  I can’t help it; my eyebrows shoot up practically to my hairline.

  He glances at the open door, like maybe Mom is lurking out in the hall, eavesdropping on our conversation. “But she’s afraid if you don’t do this now, take the scholarship, you may never come back. She thinks you’ll regret it . . .”

  Dele comes back in the room, a new girl in tow—she’s tall like Dele but with a blonde pixie cut. Dele introduces her as Rayanne, and the two head to Dele’s bed, where they start giggling and rummaging through some of her stuff. Ben and I go quiet, busying ourselves with other tasks. On their way out, Dele looks hard at me, like she’s expecting a distress signal.

  “You okay?” she asks.

  I nod vigorously. “Fine.”

  “You want to grab pizza later, before the party?”

  I’ve been thinking I’m going to bail on the party, but I probably should just bite the bullet and go. At least pretend to take part in the college experience.

  “Great,” I say. And with that, the two girls are gone.

  I fold my arms and address Ben in a low voice. “What I’ll regret is not being allowed to work at my parents’ company before it’s sold to some giant conglomerate. I want to be home. I want to be doing what Dad used to do. Finishing my father’s work.” My voice cracks on the word father’s.

  To my surprise Ben lets out a sympathetic laugh. “Believe me, I have said those exact words to your mother, more than once.”

  I can’t hide my surprise. “You have?”

  He shuffles his feet. Drops his hands deep in his jeans pockets. “I told her you should take a gap year. That the school would probably hold the scholarship for you, under the circumstances, if that was what you wanted. I told her that you could stay home and work at Jax. That she could travel or just hang out with you.”

  I don’t know what to say to all this. Ben Fleming being on my side is not a situation I’ve anticipated. Then, before I can process the strange turn of events, he smiles at me. A slow-growing half smile that lights up his face and makes him look kind of . . . I don’t know, trustworthy. And then I remember how he acted with my mother in the car.

  “Shorie?” he says. “I’m going to take care of your mom. Because your father asked me to, and I swore to it. I know what you’ve been thinking about me—I can see it in your eyes. But that’s not how it is. It’s not why I’m here right now.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  “Becaus
e your dad wouldn’t have missed this day for the world, and I know I’m not him, but I hope I’m somewhere in the vicinity of the next best thing. I care about you, Shorie. But . . .” He nods, like he’s trying to convince himself to go on. “I’m worried about your mom. She promised me and Sabine and your grandparents that she would take a break, but she hasn’t. She just keeps going and going. Showing up every day, working until late like the early days.”

  I don’t reply.

  “She’s slipping, Shorie. You see it, I know you do. She’s scattered. Whenever anybody talks to her, she misses half the conversation. Our Monday meetings are a mess. She zones out, messes up numbers, lets important stuff slip through the cracks.”

  I think about the constant napping. Her awkward speech at my party. Maybe whatever is wrong with my mother is much bigger than I thought.

  “I told her that she was in no shape to make the decision to sell,” Ben goes on. “But your mother is . . . it seems like she’s not in a place where she can take advice. From any of us. We’ve been talking. Me, Sabine, Layton, and your grandparents. Discussing the possibility of getting your mom to go somewhere. For a rest.”

  I stare at him. Hearing him say it out loud, directly to my face, is a whole other deal from eavesdropping. I feel shaky just thinking that my mom might be unwell in some way I haven’t fully considered.

  “Do you love her?” I say.

  Ben’s face flushes. Even the whites of his eyes seem to redden. I’m shocked the words just came out of my mouth, that I actually went there. But I’m not exactly sorry.

  He plants his hands on his hips. “We’ve known each other a long time, your mom and I.” He stares at me, and his face looks so guilty, I almost wish I hadn’t said anything.

  “You can’t even lie to me about it.”

  He raises his arms. “I don’t see the point in lying to you, Shorie. You’re like a human polygraph. I do love your mom, yes, but in a different way than I love my wife. And I promise you, I’m not going to do anything shady.” He scratches his head. “Here’s a secret about being an adult, okay? Relationships are work. There are times when you may feel like there’s a wall between you and your spouse. Or that you’re not close the way you want to be, the way you used to be. But you don’t just give up. You don’t look for an out. You take responsibility. You look at yourself and say, What can I do better? How can I make this marriage better?”

  I can’t think of what to say.

  “What matters is your mom is safe with me, okay? Because I care about her as a friend. And if I think she’s in trouble and needs my help, then I’m going to be there for her. I’m going to do what’s best for your mom, no matter what.” His eyes seem really tired. Sad and tired. They are green, burning like neon in the slash of light from the blinds.

  “Like an intervention, you mean?” I ask. I can’t believe I’m saying this out loud too.

  He blinks at me. “Maybe something like that, if the situation calls for it. Just her friends and family asking her to take care of herself. Nothing dramatic.”

  “Whatever you do, I want to be included. I want to be there when it happens.”

  “Of course. Of course you’ll be included.”

  We stare at each other.

  “But hopefully we won’t have to do anything like that. Look, Shor, I’ll talk to her, okay? Maybe you can come in over the winter break and work at Jax. And definitely over the summer, if we haven’t sold by then.”

  It wasn’t the answer I wanted to hear. “Okay.”

  He holds my gaze. “You’re a good daughter, Shorie. A good, lovely person.”

  I grimace. I’m not a good, lovely person—I’m a human dumpster fire, and I’ve acted like a monumental shit today—but I don’t argue with him. The truth is, even though I don’t fully understand how he feels about Mom, I’m grateful that he’s here and that he’s looking out for her. I hadn’t realized how heavily it had been weighing on me until just now.

  Before he goes, he hugs me and tells me that he’ll check in on Foxy Cat from time to time. I’m suddenly surrounded by his manly scent. It reminds me so much of Dad that I have the urge to leap backward out of his arms.

  Grief, loneliness, confusion . . .

  When he’s finally gone, I grab my laptop, settle on my narrow twin bed, and pop on my headphones. I let the music blank me out, and while I wait for my email to load, I take a deep breath, hold it, and look at my phone. Gingerly, I touch the top right corner of my home screen. The app with the mustard-yellow icon featuring half a white j.

  Jax: get the jump on your taxes.

  “Hi,” I say to the home page, like it’s an actual person. But that’s what Jax kind of is to me—an old friend with whom I’ve shared most of my life. And I feel things when I see that familiar mustard yellow page. So many things.

  Sorrow, comfort, delight . . .

  Or maybe the feelings are because of the single message in my unread private message queue. The last message Dad sent me before he died. The message I’ve never had the courage to open.

  8

  ERIN

  Perry, Ben, Sabine, and I dreamed up Jax one Christmas almost four years ago.

  For the first time in our friendship, the four of us had found ourselves restless at the same time: Perry and Ben had spent a couple of decades working at various app development companies but had grown weary of making other people’s ideas happen. Sabine was treading water, managing a chain of successful yoga studios for a company out of Atlanta.

  Years earlier I’d quit my job at the management consulting company to focus on restructuring and filling Shorie’s time, something her elementary school didn’t seem capable of doing. But then, in middle school, she signed up for a string of advanced classes, joined the lacrosse team, and didn’t seem to need me in the same way. I was okay with it, honestly. I was itching to get back to the world of adults.

  That Christmas night, after all the wrapping paper and ribbon had been cleared away, Ben and Sabine dropped by. The five of us gathered around the tree that Perry and Shorie had decorated with purple-striped candy canes and silver spray-painted pine cones, drinking whiskey (Shorie, hot cocoa) and throwing out ideas for a new app. Some of them were okay; some were completely off-the-wall. But it was Perry’s idea that made us all go silent.

  An app that would keep people on the financial straight and narrow.

  It would do everything for even the most budget impaired: deposit and allocate every paycheck into the proper categories, then, for the remainder of the month, tell customers what they could and couldn’t spend.

  And here was the clincher: Perry had figured out a new way to connect merchants, banks, and credit card companies with our system to pull all the necessary data on the fly—something no one had been able to do up to that point.

  After the fire burned down and Shorie wandered upstairs to try out her new watercolors, we continued to brainstorm. There was a growing feeling of giddiness in the room. A kind of premonition of something so big and transformative just around the corner. We all knew what was happening without even saying the words aloud. This was going to be it. The idea that would change our lives.

  We had two to build (Perry and Ben) and two to manage and sell (me and Sabine), and we agreed to split the ownership of the company equally between us four. Perry called his father, Arch, who had owned a trio of successful shopping centers out in Texas since the eighties. Over the phone, he agreed to kick in $650,000 to get things off the ground. A loan with no fixed repayment schedule, and he didn’t even want ownership. I wasn’t so sure I wanted us to be indebted to my father-in-law, especially with the uneasy relationship Gigi and I already shared, but Perry insisted we’d be able to pay him back within the first few years.

  Then Perry had suggested the pact.

  “This is our brainchild,” he told us. “We build it together, and when we sell, we sell together. None of this splitting-up, edging-each-other-out stuff. For this thing to work it’s got to be all of u
s or none of us. Agreed?”

  Everyone agreed. We’d seen enough friendships shredded by a failed venture that we were wary. That was not going to happen to us—or our company. I had to admit, the whole pledge thing got me a little teary. When Perry and I finally collapsed into bed that night, I told him that our promise made me feel as if I were in one of those kids’ books where the gang makes a blood pact to always stick together. I’d never felt a stronger feeling of belonging. He smothered me in a hug, and we fell asleep.

  It was like a dream, how Jax just worked, right from the start. Our business model might’ve looked slapdash on paper compared to a flashier Silicon Valley outfit, but the four of us were strong on substance, not optics. With Ben’s GPS experience and Perry handling his proprietary middleware stuff, we only had to pull in a database person, server administrator, and a few testers for extra support. I was CEO, raising additional capital and mapping long-term strategies. Sabine was COO, handling day-to-day details, staffing our cadre of paid interns, and generally running the office.

  When Shorie wasn’t at lacrosse practice or hanging out with Daisy, she’d tag along with us to the office and do her homework or play Ping-Pong with whoever needed to take a break. She even used to bake pumpkin muffins and zucchini bread for us in the tiny office kitchenette.

  Perry, Ben, Sabine, and I worked twenty-four seven, including holidays. We ate all our meals in the office and slept there so many nights I lost count. Even Shorie moved in a cot to help out at the end. And finally, at the end of two crazy months, we had a lean “minimum viable product”—a version of Jax ready to launch. Our salaries were just enough to get by on, but after one year, we were able to pay Arch back in full.

  Three years later, we had expanded the features, had over 1.3 million users with an 80 percent retention rate, and had been valued at close to six million dollars. Which, to be clear, isn’t the same thing as getting six million actual dollars, just a guesstimate of worth. We weren’t rich, not yet, because we hadn’t monetized the app. But if everything went as planned, there was a chance we could hit the jackpot.