Beneath These Fields

by Ward Maia

  Pedro snorted, and Ellis heard the sound of him shuffling papers around. “Well, you’re a farmer now! I was just trying to help you get acquainted with your new lifestyle.”

  “Fuck you,” Ellis said without any heat as he flopped on his back on the bed.

  “Yes, daddy, please! Not sure how Angela would feel about it, though.”

  It was Ellis’s turn to snort as he pictured Pedro and his wife. Pedro had been Ellis’s assistant since the day he made junior associate and had been with his wife since high school. They were one of those disgustingly sweet couples, devoted to each other. Seeing them together gave Ellis a toothache.

  “She’d probably kick my ass.” Ellis rubbed his face.

  “Yes, my baby is a tough chick.” There was a brief pause where Ellis just lay there with his eyes closed. “You sound tired.”

  “How could you possibly know that? You’re just sitting there listening to my breathing.”

  “Okay, a, I’m not sitting; I’m standing in the file room rummaging through your archaic files. And b, I know what your normal breathing sounds like. Actually, I can peg your mood just by listening to you breathing.”

  “I’m officially creeped out.”

  “Heh. Tell me about it.”

  “Why are you in the file room? Shouldn’t you be at your desk running my empire? Or at the very least trying to skim money off my paycheck again, hoping I won’t notice?”

  “You were buying me a gift!” Pedro huffed out in mock indignation, and Ellis heard the familiar and unmistakable sound of folders clattering to the floor.

  “Shouldn’t I have been the one to choose and buy your gift?” Ellis asked.

  “Yes, Angie and I were very touched by the romantic weekend you so selflessly purchased for our anniversary. And I’m in the file room looking for the da Silva settlement documents.”

  “I thought we were giving them a few more weeks to cool off so his lawyer could go over the terms,” Ellis said, rubbing his face again.

  “Yes, that was the plan. But the soon-to-be-ex Mrs. da Silva is paranoid her soon-to-be-ex boy toy has been trying to sneak clauses past you.”

  Ellis snorted. “She could at least question my competency to my face.”

  “Yes, well, while she attempts to find her backbone and dignity, could you tell me where they are?”

  They talked a bit more about their least favorite couple, until Ellis fell silent, listening to Pedro complain about the new espresso machine that apparently was more complicated to work than an airplane.

  “Helloooo? Are you still there, boss man?” Pedro asked in a singsong voice, and Ellis opened his eyes, startled to realize he’d almost fallen asleep.

  “Yeah, sorry. It’s been a long morning.” Ellis cleared his throat and sat up, realizing he had never put on clothes and the damp towel was still tied around his waist.

  “As sweet as you falling asleep listening to my melodious voice is, tell me how things really are over there?” Pedro asked, taking on a serious tone.

  “The estate lawyer is trying to stonewall me by saying some bullshit about not having the documents for the farm he’s been in charge of for over ten years.” Ellis sighed and rubbed his temple. “He’s just trying to stall. Knows I want to sell this dump and go back to Rio as soon as possible.”

  “Can’t you pressure him? I mean, she left you the farm in her will. No one can question that.”

  “Yeah, maybe. I’ll go back tomorrow and light a fire under his ass.”

  “Maybe your aunt kept physical copies of the documents you need there at the farm? It could be worth looking for them,” Pedro suggested.

  “I’ll do that.”

  They said their goodbyes, and Pedro made Ellis promise to call him back to let him know how things went.

  Ellis sat there, staring at his phone’s blank screen. His reflection stared back at him. Even with the colors dulled by the dark screen, he could make out the strawberry-blond color of his hair and steel-gray eyes and freckles that looked back at him.

  So similar to the woman in that picture Rudá’s grandmother had shown him. His stomach knotted at the thought, and he gripped his phone tighter, his knuckles whitening.

  Other than a few DNA strands that manifested in the same hair and skin color, nothing connected him to Meredith Campos. She was his aunt in name only after running away when Ellis was four. Not even that, since his father rarely spoke of his sister, and on the few occasions she had come up, it had been mocking words, spoken with disdain.

  Why did she leave Ellis the farm? Why not someone else? What could she possibly hope to accomplish by dragging him to another state and upending his life like this?

  Why? Why? Why?

  The questions ricocheted around his brain until he could hardly breathe. He threw his phone on the bed, stood up, and started pacing the room, too antsy to sit still.

  Maybe Pedro was right. Maybe she kept physical copies of the documents here on the farm. It would make sense from a legal point of view. He’d find them, settle everything, sell the farm, and go back to his city and his life. Leave all this unwanted mess behind.

  Ellis had no idea where to even start looking, but the thought of just sitting there with a towel wrapped around his waist, waiting for someone to call him for lunch, made him feel like pulling his hair out.

  So he got dressed and stormed out of his room. He was going to find her office, then find those documents. Even if he had to search every room in this godforsaken place.

  Chapter 6

  THE MIDDLE of the afternoon found Ellis sitting amidst a pile of papers and folders, with dust motes floating around him.

  Finding Meredith’s office was harder than he’d anticipated. Ellis opened dozens of doors and searched through countless rooms before he’d finally stumbled on the double carved wooden doors. They were closed but not locked.

  It would’ve been easier to ask someone, but then he risked being shown the wrong office by “accident.” With that in mind, he did his best to skirt the people working inside the house. It hadn’t been too difficult, considering there didn’t seem to be that many people around. There were a couple of close calls where Ellis had to duck into a room or around a corner before being spotted. Hiding left him feeling ridiculous and paranoid because he was trying to be stealthy while moving around his own property.

  He eventually stumbled upon Meredith’s office and, after making sure it was hers, started searching the shelves filled with documents and books. It turned out Meredith was quite the eclectic reader, and some of the titles, crammed in between ledgers and old receipts, he recognized from his own personal collection.

  His stomach protested loudly the absence of food, but Ellis was used to pulling long hours without any nourishment. The ache in his lower back was a little harder to ignore.

  He stretched his arms above his head while scanning the multitude of documents spread out in front of him. Sweat beads rolled down his back, and he sighed, lowering his arms.

  The air around him was oppressively still, but Ellis wasn’t inclined to open the windows. There was something unsettling about the almost reverent silence in the room. Almost as if the crinkly and faded pages of the books were holding their breath. Waiting for the right hands to touch them and turn their pages.

  It made the documents and ledgers he riffled through heavier than any sheet of paper had the right to be. Because Ellis wasn’t the right hands. It made him feel like an intruder.

  His insecurities and feelings of inadequacy had made him their bitch in the past. He managed to work his way through them—or at least most of them—and he’d be damned if he let them take up any more real estate in his brain.

  “Fuck it,” he muttered, rising from his cloistered position on the floor, surrounded by the old papers. He strode toward the windows and pushed them open.

  A gust of wind carrying the scents of earth and all things green blew through the room, ruffling the pages of the ledgers spread out on the floor and scatter
ing the loose documents around the room.

  The sound of people talking and going about what he imagined were their daily activities filtered through the open windows, making Ellis cringe at the disturbance of the sepulchral room.

  Even though his fingers spasmed and he wanted to close the windows and bolt out of the room, he forced himself to stand still and let the breeze cool his skin.

  The sound of something falling drew his attention from the outside world and back toward the big wooden desk that stood in front of the windows. One of the picture frames he only glanced over, and had otherwise pointedly ignored, toppled over and was now lying at an awkward angle, facedown on top of more books and ledgers that littered the desk.

  Ellis took the two steps toward the desk and picked up the picture frame, wiping the bit of dust that had gathered over the glass surface with his fingers. The picture was of a boy, maybe fifteen or sixteen, with a familiar dimpled smile, his lanky arms wrapped around the waist of a red-haired, blue-eyed, freckled woman who was unmistakably his aunt.

  Meredith’s lips were slightly curved upward, in a much more contained smile than the boy clinging to her. Ellis settled the picture back on the desk and glanced at the smaller one next to it. It was of the same smiling dimpled boy, but he looked older in this picture. It was visible by the more pronounced jawline and by the way his more muscled frame filled out his clothes. In this picture he was hugging a young girl who had features very similar to his own, right down to the one stray dimple on her left cheek.

  Rudá’s young self had one arm around the girl’s shoulder, and the other hung limply at his side. The girl, who Ellis assumed was his sister, or maybe a cousin, was clinging to his waist and smiling broadly, with a cascade of luscious black hair floating around them.

  The sad realization that Ellis’s sister never hugged him like that made a wave of sorrow and longing wash over him. Other than polite pats and cool air kisses on the cheek, his sister was never outwardly affectionate toward him. Not that Ellis ever gave her reason to be.

  He let himself be molded by the idea both his parents had of who he should be.

  Thinking about the fake shitshow his family was made Ellis feel unworthy of touching the picture of Rudá and who he assumed was his sister. He set the picture frame down next to the other one and dug through the books and ledgers on the table to distract himself from the depressing thoughts that usually accompanied his family.

  His fingers brushed over ledgers that spanned years, covered with the same thin coat of dust that had been over the pictures. Ellis piled all the ledgers that were on the desk and carried them back to his spot on the floor. Sitting on the chair would’ve been more comfortable, but it didn’t feel right. And his priority was trying to find the documents he needed, and not unpacking the feelings that came with invading Meredith Campos’s personal space and trying to make sense of them.

  The ledgers he found on the desk went back five years, with the years they referred to taped on the front covers. Ellis flipped through the oldest one more out of curiosity than necessity. The documents he needed wouldn’t be there. They probably wouldn’t even be mentioned in it. He found himself wondering about the farm and the records of its day-to-day activities. Maybe to try to understand why a member of the prominent Campos family would just up and run away to a different state, buy a coffee farm, and then leave said coffee farm to an estranged nephew.

  The ledgers smelled of smoke and tobacco. There were detailed registers of farm equipment that was ordered, services that were paid or were still being paid for. It seemed Meredith Campos was obsessed with keeping detailed accounts of everything that went on at the farm.

  It made him feel a little guilty for the mess he was making of her invoices and ledgers, but not enough to stop looking. He continued flipping through the pages until he came upon a date with a note scrawled beside it that made his heart rate pick up.

  The date was March 11. His birthday. And right next to it, in a chicken scrawl that was almost as bad as his:

  Called MC. Didn’t let me talk to E again.

  Ellis read the seemingly insignificant note again and again, gripping the ledger so tightly one of the pages started to tear. The sound of the cellulose tearing under stress made him ease his grip and suck in big gulping breaths.

  It could mean nothing. Or something else entirely different from what he was imagining. Except MC were his father’s—Meredith’s brother’s—initials. And E was, well, his initial. And the note had been left on a very significant date to him. With shaking fingers, Ellis clumsily flipped the pages of the ledger. The scent of tobacco and coffee that seemed to permeate everything in Meredith’s office wafted up to him, giving him an empty feeling of nostalgia. Empty because he ached for something elusive he couldn’t quite name.

  When he reached the date he’d been looking for, he paused and let out a stuttering breath. Sure enough, there it was right next to March 11. The same note.

  Called MC. Didn’t let me speak to E.

  He went through the other three ledgers, only to find the same or similar notes scribbled next to his birthday. He could believe that a single occurrence going back five years was a coincidence. But to see it that many times and as recent as the previous year was something he couldn’t ignore.

  It could only mean Meredith tried to contact his father at least once a year, on his birthday. Why had his father never told him? And why had she tried to contact Ellis through him? Why not just call him directly? The firm’s website listed his business number. And why had she tried to contact only him?

  A sudden thought popped into his head, and he scrambled through the most recent ledger until he found the date he was looking for.

  “Just what the hell do you think you’re doing?”

  Ellis snapped his head up to find Rudá standing in the doorway with his arms crossed over his chest and glaring at him.

  He stood with his strong thighs apart and breathing hard, anger radiating from him in waves.

  “Looking for something,” Ellis answered dumbly.

  Rudá tore his eyes from Ellis and looked around the office, his distaste for what Ellis had done to the documents clear in the deepening of his scowl and the tightening of his grip around his biceps.

  “I guess organization doesn’t run in the family.” Rudá stepped into the room and started picking up documents that the wind blew over.

  He stopped next to Ellis, clutching the documents. From this position he towered over Ellis, even if standing up he was a few inches shorter than him.

  Ellis forced his attention away from the ridiculously fuckable guy standing over him and stared at the date the ledger was open to.

  Sure enough, right there, next to September 7, his sister’s birthday, there was a note, in the same handwriting as the others.

  Called MC. Didn’t let me speak to J.

  J could only stand for Julia, his sister. Ellis closed the ledger and set it aside. He reached for the one going back two years, but a warm hand wrapping around his wrist stopped him.

  Ellis’s eyes snapped away from the ledger, and he found himself face-to-face with Rudá, who set aside the documents and crouched next to him.

  Displeasure still etched his features. But there was also something else there. Something that looked a lot like concern. It made Ellis uncomfortable, so he pulled his wrist away from Rudá’s grip but kept eye contact. Even with the combination of his pursed lips and concerned eyes, his face was still handsome. From this distance there were details Ellis hadn’t noticed before.

  Like the thin scar on his chin that disappeared down his neck and his crooked bottom teeth. All of these little details made Ellis want to explore his skin and take stock of whatever else might not be visible.

  “I’ll clean up when I’m done,” Ellis said, his voice scratchy from the knot of emotions threatening to choke him.

  There was a long pause where they just stared at each other. Ellis felt the inexplicable desire to reach out to the oth
er man while his concerned gaze continued to search Ellis’s face. As if his presence beside Ellis wasn’t enough. As if physical touch was necessary to ground him.

  Ellis shook his head, tearing his gaze away from Rudá, and focused back on the ledgers. No matter how confusing Meredith’s actions, the feelings it stirred inside of him were ones he could name in his head. Even if he didn’t understand them.

  “Have you eaten?” Rudá asked, not moving from his crouched position.

  Ellis shook his head, rubbing his hands convulsively on his pants. The question made him feel uncomfortable, and for some reason it felt invasive. Which was ridiculous.

  Pedro asked if he’d eaten all the time, knowing Ellis’s propensity to skip meals when his head got too stuck on working out a problem. The question, coming from Rudá, coupled with the lingering concern in his eyes, made Ellis uneasy.

  “What do you want?” Ellis snapped, climbing none too elegantly to his feet.

  “You skipped lunch.”

  “I was busy.”

  “Yeah, I can see that.” Rudá rose to his feet much more gracefully than Ellis and scanned the office, the disapproving frown returning to his face. “By trashing your aunt’s office.”

  “I wasn’t trashing anything,” Ellis said defensively, stacking up the ledgers and cradling them in his arms “I was looking for—” He cut himself off before he finished the sentence, not knowing how prudent it would be, disclosing what he was looking for to the other man. “Something,” he finished lamely.

  “What were you looking for?” Rudá picked up the other stacks of documents scattered around the room and placed them on the desk. “I can help you find it.”

  Ellis had to fight his instinct to scoff. Even if Rudá had done nothing but try to help him since his arrival the previous day, there was still something about him Ellis didn’t trust.

  “Just looking for something to… help me understand her,” Ellis said and was surprised to find out it wasn’t a complete lie, even if he said it wanting to misdirect Rudá from what he was really looking for.