“You need to talk to Wade.”
“I don’t think it’s necessary.” I sighed deeply, lifted my head, took hold of her hand and squeezed it tight. I would not mention to anyone the many calls, voice mails, texts, and e-mails from Wade I had not answered. I was ducking him, and any day now the message would sink in. “His actions told me everything I needed to know.”
“He didn’t tell you anything because you didn’t give him a chance. You never even exchanged words. You walked in––which was terribly rude, by the way—and––”
“No,” I said firmly. “Between you and my mother—”
“You saw things, Kevin, but no words were exchanged. He told me.”
“Listen—”
“No.” She was adamant, shaking her head. “He was confused about things, but the two of you communicate for crap.”
“I’ll pay you money, cold hard cash, to stop talking about this.”
She plowed on. “He’s not confused anymore. You need to be more patient with him.”
“There’s nothing…. He didn’t do anything wrong.”
“Then why are you punishing him?”
“I’m not!”
“Yes, you are,” she said sharply, pointing at me. “You cut him out of your life, and that’s a horrible thing to do.”
“Fine, I’m an asshole, but I’m not ready to just be friends with your son.”
“Oh, darling.” She huffed. “He has never wanted to be just your friend.”
“Elaine,” I began gently, “he was married for two years.”
“Because he thought that’s what he should do. It was not what he wanted to do.”
“Well, I’m sure Annie is really—”
“He and Anne are still friends, and we all went to her wedding.”
This was news to me. “Annie got remarried?”
“Yes,” Elaine said, smiling. “And she’s expecting a baby. We’re all thrilled for her.”
“When was this?”
“Six months ago.”
“Huh.”
She growled. “Kevin!”
“It doesn’t matter. Wade and I are in different—”
“No, you’re not.”
“We—”
“You don’t get to just remove yourself from people’s lives on a whim!”
“Yeah, but—”
“No! You’re a big shining light, Kevin Chaney, and he needs you.”
“What’re you—”
“Do you even understand how you are?”
“I don’t—what?”
She was disgusted with me; it was all over her face. “You’re like a force of nature. Your mother and I used to talk about it all the time. You walk in with that smile of yours and those dimples and those gorgeous hazel eyes that actually do the twinkling thing and your walk—strut—it’s why other men hate you.”
I was so lost. “Nobody hates me,” I argued.
“Oh, the hell they don’t,” she retorted. “You just kick down doors, and you never listen when someone says no, and you’re like the sun, Kevin, and really, truly, when you go away, when you remove yourself…. Poor Wade.”
“Poor Wade?” I said, letting my exasperation seep out. Was she kidding?
“Yes.”
“Between you and my mom, I’m feeling a little ganged-up on.”
“Good.”
“Can we please stop talking about this?”
She did the harrumph thing along with the furrowed brows but agreed. “Just so you’re aware, the only person he ever wanted to sleep with was—”
“My ears will actually bleed if you don’t stop.”
“You need to forgive Wade,” she pressed. “My son… he wanted… and it got all confused in his head, and the second he saw you there in his home—”
“Elaine—”
“He loves you.”
“Yeah, well.” I leaned back in my chair. “I loved him too.”
“No,” she snapped, “not in the past tense.”
“Dear—”
“You throw endearments around too easily.”
“I do?”
“Yes, you do, and people get excited because they think they’re more important than they really are.”
I glared at her. “You know, I’ve heard that dementia strikes seniors earlier and earlier these days so—”
Second smack on the back of my head.
“Nana!” Alice was aghast, rushing back over to comfort me.
“You’re mean.” I passed judgment on Elaine.
She arched one eyebrow and surveyed me. “You think I’m mean now.”
I coughed so I wouldn’t laugh, and Alice kissed the back of my head before returning to the fish tank full of wonder.
“You should come for dinner this Saturday. Wade’s out of town, you won’t see him. It will just be Alex and me, Georgia and Alice.”
“And Tom?”
“No,” she said quickly. Too quickly.
“What’s going on with Georgia and Tom?”
“None of your business if you’re not coming to dinner,” she said pointedly.
“I—”
“You can’t drop everyone in your life because of a mistake Wade made.”
“But it wasn’t a mistake.” I tried to get her to understand. “Things just got twisted up in my head, is all. Wade’s how he always was.”
“No, he isn’t, not at all.”
“Elaine—”
“Don’t make me get my granddaughter to ask you,” she said menacingly, “because I have no shame.”
I grunted. “Well, we all know that’s true, don’t we?”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“Don’t get me started on what you and my mother did to that poor woman who made the mistake of thinking Mr. Kingman was available.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“And at Georgia’s wedding too.” I tsked. “The shame.”
“She needed to be more observant.”
“You guys were awful.”
“Your mother and I simply needed that woman to understand that hitting on married men is tacky.”
“Oh, I’m sure she learned her lesson,” I said snidely, recalling the lady with a lapful of merlot.
“That’s not important,” she said, tone dry as a bone. “My point is that I need you to call Wade.”
“I need to date,” I countered. “I’m thirty-five already. I’m way past my prime.”
She looked horrified.
“What? I am. I gotta dive into the dating pool and see if anybody wants me.”
“Have you listened to a word I’ve said? I know exactly who wants you.”
“You and my mom just want your sons to get married. I know a setup when I see one.”
She threw up her hands before I got up to go look at the fish with Alice.
“You know,” Alice said as she turned to face me, “Uncle Wade was sad when you went away.”
All the women I knew were trying to mess with my love life.
“Mommy said so.”
I groaned silently.
“You should come and have Sunday dinner with us.”
I was so screwed.
“KEVIN,” MY mom said, glowering at me as she played Tetris with the food in her refrigerator as my father and I washed dishes after Thanksgiving dinner. I had no idea how she was going to fit all the leftovers in there, even with as much as was going home with my brother and his wife, Kate, and with me. “Have you spoken with Wade since you got back?”
Since he was the reason I’d left eight months ago and stayed gone for six… no. “Not yet,” I answered, drying the roasting pan my old man passed me. I cussed silently. I loved my parents, but the grilling was always rough. They wanted the best for me and always asked to find out how close I was to getting it. They often employed techniques that had not been implemented since the Spanish Inquisition. It was grueling, but Fallon and Kate had done it alone for six months, so in all fairness,
it was time for me to shoulder some of the burden and a lot of the judgment.
“You should,” she assured me, eyebrows furrowed. “He misses you.”
Misses me? Was she kidding? “I’m sure he’s fine, Mom.”
“No, he’s really not, and how dare you just dismiss something this serious.”
I turned to her. “This serious?”
“He’s your best friend, Kevin,” she reminded me. “He deserves better than being shut out of your life.”
She was probably right. Wade didn’t know why I had left or why I hadn’t visited him since I returned from Quantico. The thing was, my absence in his life was saving both of us embarrassment and humiliation.
“Hello?” she demanded.
The attitude was new. “Mother, listen to––”
“You need to call him.”
I groaned, turning to my father for support. “You gonna back me up? Tell her it’s my life and I should be allowed to live it without her butting in?”
He cleared his throat. “You should call him.”
He never took my side over hers.
“Dad, I––”
“Remember when you were sixteen and you told us you were gay?”
Oh Lord.
“And Wade came with you, and right after you told us, he passed out all his materials?”
My best friend had compiled everything from factsheets to PFLAG pamphlets and even created a PowerPoint presentation that I still had somewhere because it was hysterical. It had been titled So Your Son Is Gay, What Now? “Yes,” I answered, chuckling just thinking about it.
“I didn’t even have time to tell you I knew already before he was beating on me and your mother to simply accept what we couldn’t change.”
“I know.”
“And it wasn’t like we gave a crap––you are who you are, why do I care who you sleep with?”
“You’re digressing,” I said dryly.
“He’s always been your champion.”
And he had been, it was true. But things had changed. “Dad––”
“This distance,” he huffed. “It makes no sense to me.”
“Or me,” my mother chimed in. “And I know he’s hurting.”
“Mom––”
“You’re breaking his heart.”
“I sincerely doubt that,” I grumbled, drying a saucepan my father handed over.
“And how would you know since you haven’t spoken to him?” She had me pinned with her gaze, with the Mom one, her eyebrow arched like she was waiting for me to say something brilliant.
“I just do.”
“How very scientific of you,” my father said, clearly amused. “They teach you that when you became an agent?”
Sarcasm.
“You should call him,” my mother snipped, sending over the final volley. “That’s all I’m saying.”
My father grunted his agreement.
They never took my side.
III.
TWO WEEKS later, on the way home from work, I was surprised when my phone rang. It wasn’t even six yet.
“Hello?”
“Kevin?” The voice sniffled at me from the other end of the line.
“Elaine?” I jolted to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk.
“I need you.”
“Of course,” I answered without question, crossing the street to the other side, where I saw some cabs stacked up. “I’m coming.”
“Okay,” she said and hung up.
They lived in Potrero Hill, just outside of San Francisco, and as I sat in the back of the cab, I tried to get hold of Georgia, terrified that something had happened to her father, Alex. When that just went to voice mail, I tried my parents. When that, too, went to voice mail, my stomach flipped over.
It was cold in early December in the Bay Area, and as I was dropped in front of the house, it felt even colder. Cars lined the small street, and people were walking up to the porch of the Kingman house, where the light was on and the front door was open. Everyone carried something—dishes of food—and my heart hurt, realizing what I was walking into.
Stepping into the living room, I was startled to see my mother sitting next to Alex on the couch, their hands clasped tight. My father had his arm around Elaine as she leaned against him.
“Kevin!”
I turned to see Alice running down the stairs, getting close to the bottom, and then launching herself through the air at me. I caught her, and she wrapped her arms round my neck, holding on for dear life.
“Honey?”
“Mommy’s dead!” she cried into the side of my neck. “Kevin!”
Instinctively I clutched her tight, and only then did I see Tom Conway, her father, stagger into the room clutching Wade Kingman, my old best friend. Both men saw me at the same time. Wade’s eyes got huge and round, and Tom’s eyes, brimming with tears, overflowed.
“Take good care of her, Kevin,” Tom said before he collapsed.
I didn’t let Alice see her father hit the floor; instead I carried her past the couch, grabbing a blanket on the way, and out to the patio. She was crying so hard.
I was thankful for my mother bringing me out a box of Kleenex after a few minutes. “Who told her?” I asked, cuddling the little girl clad in pajamas, a fleece robe, and bunny slippers against my chest.
She shook her head, stroked her hand through my short hair. “Tom did. He wanted to confess.”
I had no idea what that meant.
“It will be all over the news tomorrow. It’s going to be a mess.”
I would wait to hear the explanation. Alice needed me now. She was clutching at my shirt, wanting to be as close as she could.
Once the door closed, I sat the six-year-old up and had her blow her nose for me before her head clunked back down on my collarbone.
“Sing one of Mommy’s songs.”
And so, off-key, without even thinking about it, I launched into “Sour Girl” by the Stone Temple Pilots. It was bad. I couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket, but I knew all the words, as many times as Georgia had played the album.
“Yeah, that’s good,” she sighed, nuzzling under my chin.
Once she was asleep, covered up with the blanket, I texted my boss and let him know I had a death in the family. I didn’t sleep; I had to keep vigil.
FALLON, WHO had a key to my place, was sent there by my mother to get me clothes for the next morning. Being him, he brought a really old pair of jeans, a pale blue Henley, a pair of Converse, and a fleece hoodie. I hugged him when he showed up, even though I would have preferred a suit. I felt more protected in a suit the same way, stupidly, I felt better under a blanket than without one when I was sleeping. It made no sense. But I nearly broke him with the bear hug.
“I’m not dying on you,” he promised.
“Yeah” was all I said before I shoved him out the front door.
When I went to take a shower, Alice sat outside the bathroom door and waited for me, and nothing and no one could make her move. Once I was out, I knelt down in front of her, and she wrapped her little arms around me and buried her face in the side of my neck.
“You smell good,” she assured me. “Like soap.”
I kissed and hugged her, and then we went to get her into clean clothes. Once we were both downstairs, Elaine was there to hug me, and then Alex did as well.
“Where’s Tom?” I asked.
“He’s with his folks in Marin,” Elaine told me, looking about twenty years older than she really was. “He had to be sedated last night.”
“When will he be here?”
“He won’t.”
Her answer made no sense, and I wanted to ask what had happened, but Alice was sticking to me like a second skin. Her hand was in mine, and she was not letting go.
“Hi, Ali bird,” a woman behind me said.
Turning, I faced a woman who was the spitting image of Tom. It took me a second. “Margo, right?”
“Yes,” she said, forcing a smile for me. “My m
other wanted Alice to come out to the house, if that would be all right.”
“No,” Elaine said bitterly, “it’s not all right.”
“Listen, I know what you must be—”
“Do not say that to me!” Elaine almost shrieked, and Alice suddenly pressed her face against my stomach.
Lifting her up, I pivoted and walked to the front door and outside on the porch as fast as I could.
“Whew,” I said loudly. “That was close, huh?”
“I want frozen yogurt,” she told me.
Lifting her, I put her up on my shoulders, her legs curled under my armpits as we started down the steps. At the front gate, Margo called out to us.
I waited and realized, even as I was, that the porch was crowding with people.
“Alice,” she said shakily, her voice cracking. “Honey, your nana says that you can come out to Grammy and Grampy’s house and see your daddy if you want to. Do you want to?”
“I’m getting yogurt,” she told her aunt, her hands in my hair, clutching tight.
Margo’s gaze flicked to mine before returning to Alice. “I know you haven’t seen much of your daddy this past year because you were living here with your grandparents and your daddy was living at home.”
“He’s been gone a long time,” she informed her aunt. “He used to work super late, and I only saw him on Sundays.”
Margo was biting her bottom lip.
“This is Kevin.”
She nodded.
“He used to see me every Sunday, but then he had to go away. But when he was gone, we saw each other on the computer all the time.”
“I see.”
I was glad now that I’d made the time to Skype with Georgia and keep up on her life and Alice’s. It wasn’t as often as I should have, and obviously I’d missed some things, like Georgia and Tom being separated, but sadly it had been more than Tom had seen his own daughter.
“Kevin always plays with me.”
And the silent part of that was that her daddy didn’t, which brought tears to Margo’s eyes.
“Do you want yogurt, Aunt Margo?”
“Actually, I have to go back to your daddy, sweetie.”
“Okay,” Alice agreed, and I felt her hands slide under my jaw so she could tilt my head back and look into my face. “I want vanilla-and-chocolate swirl like Mommy eats.”
Grand Adventures Page 23
