“I’ll get the drinks,” Alex said. “Sam Adams all around?”
“Sure,” Bradley said, handing her a twenty. “But it’s on me.”
“I’ll just have water,” I said.
“Three Sam Adams coming up,” Alex said, heading for the bar.
I rolled my eyes at her, then twisted around so I could look at Bradley. He was wearing jeans and a polo shirt with the sleeves pushed up. He looked casual and relaxed and—and great.
“So,” I said.
“So,” he said, smiling.
I tried to quash my nervousness; this was Bradley.
“What were you working on today?” I asked. Bradley’s passion for photography was contagious; he was one of the few people I knew who adored his job.
“A portrait of this artist who lives in Takoma Park,” Bradley said. “He’s an amazing guy. Paralyzed in a car accident ten years ago. He paints by holding the brush between his teeth.”
“That’s incredible,” I said.
“I know. I couldn’t believe it when I walked in his house,” Bradley said. “The entire place is filled with paintings. They’re stacked three deep against the walls. He told me painting saved his life. The funny thing is, he’d never picked up a brush before his accident.”
“How’d you shoot him?” I asked.
“It was tough. I wanted to emphasize his work, not his wheelchair, but it’s so big that it was hard to keep it out of the frame. I also wanted people to get a sense of what he feels like when he’s painting—his emotions. I finally stacked a few of his paintings in the background of the shot, then I centered him in front of a fresh canvas,” Bradley said. “He’s got the paintbrush gripped in his teeth, and he’s just putting on the first stroke of color.”
“So it’s like anything is possible,” I said. “His imagination can take him anywhere.”
“Exactly,” Bradley said, smiling at me.
Alex came back to the table, carrying the beers by their necks. She tossed the twenty back at Bradley.
“I wanted to treat,” he protested.
“They were free,” Alex said. “The bartender recognized me from my show.”
“Nice,” Bradley said. “Remind me to take you to bars and buy you drinks more often.”
I laughed merrily. Like hell.
“So where’s Gary tonight?” Bradley asked. Excellent question, I silently commended him. Let’s continue with that train of thought.
“In L.A.,” Alex said. “His company’s developing an apartment building out there.”
“Does he travel a lot?” Bradley asked.
“Mmm, a few nights a week,” Alex said. “Usually L.A. or New York.”
“Do you ever go with him?” Bradley asked.
“Sometimes. I did at first. But it got a little old,” Alex said, grinning. “You’ve raided one minibar . . .”
Out of the corner of my eye, I could see two guys talking and sneaking looks at Alex. Maybe one of them would come over and ask her to dance. Maybe one of them would happen to spill a sticky drink all over Alex, and she’d have to run home to shower. And if the drink just happened to be radioactive . . . I tuned Alex out as she prattled on. I wanted another five minutes of this fantasy, my consolation prize for letting my sister take away Bradley. Well, technically not take away. It wasn’t like Bradley was forcibly yanked away from me as he belted out “And I Am Telling You I’m Not Going” like Jennifer Hudson.
“. . . New York?” Bradley was asking.
“Sorry,” I said. “Didn’t hear you over the music.”
“I was just saying, do you miss New York at all?”
Yes, I thought suddenly, surprising myself. I missed my friend Matt. I missed my apartment. I missed the sense I had of waking up every morning and knowing exactly where I was supposed to be and what I was supposed to be doing. But . . . I didn’t miss my job. Not even a little bit.
“Sometimes,” I said honestly. I took a sip of beer and looked at Bradley. “But it’s good to be home, too.”
Just then Fergie’s celebration of her lady lumps came to an end and the DJ spoke into his microphone: “All right, now we’ve got a dedication going out. This one is for the lady in black. From a secret admirer.”
Bradley and I both looked at Alex, sitting there in her black bustier, her thick hair loose and wavy around her shoulders, as James Blunt began to croon “You’re Beautiful.”
Oh, Jesus, it was like something from a sappy movie. Was the guy going to come over next with a red rose and a Phantom of the Opera mask and ask Alex to slow-dance?
“Looks like you’ve got a fan,” Bradley said. Funny, there must’ve been a half dozen women wearing black at the bar. But we both knew exactly who the DJ was talking about.
I should’ve been used to this stuff by now. I was used to it. So why did I feel like I was physically shrinking against the back of the booth, fading into invisibility, while Alex grew brighter and brighter? Why did I feel like Alex was sucking all the attention from the room, leaving me more diminished than ever?
What Alex did next shocked me more completely than if she’d stripped off her bustier and thrown it to her admirer. Maybe even more; Alex has always been a bit of an exhibitionist.
“So, Linds, tell me about work,” she said.
I stared at her in surprise, waiting for her to scream “Gotcha!” I’d never had Alex turn the conversation to me before. What was going on? Did she sense I had a crush on Bradley? Or could she possibly be trying to be kind by sharing the spotlight with me?
“It’s going well,” I said. “Really well.”
“When do you think the D.C. office will open?” Alex asked.
“Um, not for a while,” I said.
“It’s amazing how well you’ve done,” Bradley said.
I took a gulp of beer to hide my discomfort. If he only knew.
“Thanks,” I said.
“No, seriously,” Bradley said. “I mean, the campaigns you’ve created. I see the one for Dell all the time. It always makes me laugh.”
“Thanks,” I said again, this time meaning it. That had been a bitch of a campaign; I’d had to rewrite my storyboard thirty-eight times while the client agonized over whether he wanted the ad set inside a computer store or inside a twenty-something customer’s home. Finally, he’d settled on my very first storyboard—which was set inside a cybercafe.
Bradley’s praise took some of the sting off the DJ’s dedication; I sat up a little straighter.
“Cheers,” Alex said, raising her beer. “To my sister, brilliant creator of the Dell campaign, and to Bradley, brilliant inventor of honey on popcorn. How’d you come up with that anyway?”
Bradley shook his head. “It was at the end of senior year in high school. Dad and I were on our own then, and we’d never cooked much. One night we were watching TV and the only things we had in the house were popcorn and take-out menus.”
“I’ve heard take-out menus aren’t bad if you deep-fry them,” Alex said.
Bradley laughed and took another sip of Sam Adams. “I was so sick of pizza by then. I made the popcorn, but we didn’t have any butter. It was either honey or Tabasco sauce—that’s all we had in the house.”
“I think you made the right call,” Alex said. She leaned forward in the booth and began teasing the label off her bottle of beer. “You know, there’s something I’ve never told you,” she said.
I mentally wrote her next line: I’m struggling with flatulence. And losing the battle.
“Your mom helped me out once.”
“Really?” Bradley said. “What happened?”
“There was this guy I was seeing sophomore year in high school,” Alex began. “God, it was so long ago, but it seemed so important then.”
“David?” I asked.
“No, someone else,” Alex said.
“Jon? Steve?” I asked, before stopping myself. It might be quicker if I eliminated the names of guys she hadn’t dated.
“You never met him,”
Alex said. She pulled the label off and plastered it against the scarred wooden table, smoothing out its edges as carefully as if she was ironing it. “He was a sophomore, too. But in college. Dad would’ve freaked. Anyway, he came to pick me up one day at school—I was cutting class to meet him—and the jerk broke up with me, right there, with me standing on the street corner. He didn’t even bother to get out of his car. We’d only been dating for a month or two, but it was a complete shock.”
I’ll bet, I thought sarcastically. Probably the first time anyone had ever broken up with Alex.
“He drove away, and I didn’t know what in the hell to do,” Alex said. “I couldn’t sneak back into school because I couldn’t stop crying.”
She shook her head and looked down at her beer, as though needing a moment to compose herself, even after all these years. “You’re beautiful, it’s true,” warbled James Blunt consolingly.
Alex, crying over some guy? Now that shocked me. She had a million guys panting after her in high school. Why would she get so upset over one measly breakup?
Suddenly, a long-ago memory snapped into place: That was the guy. I’d been searching Alex’s purse for some of my babysitting money that had gone missing. At first I’d thought the packet of pills was a new kind of vitamin; then I’d realized what I was holding. I’d dropped the clamshell packet back in her purse, shocked by how little I knew about my sister’s life, how different we’d become. I’d only kissed a few guys by that point (fine, technically one, if you don’t count passing the peace in church). Who were the pills for? I’d wondered back then.
Now I wondered if the guy had dumped her after she slept with him.
I looked at her and felt a twinge of sympathy. Alex and I weren’t close, but she was my sister. I didn’t want her to be hurt, especially not in that way. I just hadn’t ever considered before that she could be hurt. Alex was the one who broke hearts, not the one who stood on street corners, crying as a guy sped away from her.
“So I start walking home, and it’s freezing out, and I’d left my coat at school because I’d snuck out,” Alex said. “Then all of a sudden I see your mom coming down the street. She’d just finished showing a house to some clients and she was heading for her car. She recognized me and she stopped.”
Alex looked off into the distance, remembering. “She was wearing these great black leather boots. I remember thinking how much cooler she looked than any other mom I knew. I made up some excuse for why I wasn’t in school, but I didn’t fool her. She knew something was wrong.”
“Did she take you back to school?” I asked.
Alex shook her head. “No. She took me home.” She looked at Bradley. “To your house. Your dad was still at work, so it was just the two of us. She poured me a Coke and we sat in the kitchen and she talked to me. Really talked to me. And then, when it would’ve been time for school to let out, I walked home.”
“She never said a word,” Bradley said.
“She promised me she wouldn’t,” Alex said. “I trusted her. I told her everything about the guy. Stuff I didn’t even tell my friends. She was . . . amazing.”
Bradley nodded, his eyes sad. “Yeah.”
I wanted to say something—to agree that Bradley’s mom had been wonderful, which was the truth—but I couldn’t. Their conversation had its own intimate rhythm; whatever I said would jar it and draw even more attention to the fact that, right now, I was the outsider.
“It sucks that you lost her,” Alex said.
Bradley nodded again, his eyes wistful. “Yeah.”
We all sat there for a moment, then Alex said, “Can I make another confession?”
“Sure,” Bradley said.
Alex took a deep breath and whispered, “I really hate this song.”
Bradley looked at her for a second, then he started laughing, a true, rich belly laugh.
And in that moment, I knew. The thing I’d feared most was happening. Bradley was falling under Alex’s spell.
The worst part was, I couldn’t even blame him.
Sixteen
I HAD ABSOLUTELY NO idea why I was doing this.
Maybe it was because I had to do something, anything, to get my mind off my night with Alex and Bradley. I’d been reliving it for two days now, and the memories hadn’t gotten less painful with time. Or maybe it was because there was another image still clinging to a corner of my mind, despite my best effort to shoo it away: May with a smudge of chocolate on her cheek, telling me, “Maybe it would help you, too . . . Maybe you could use a little bit of time to figure out what you really want to do.”
I stepped out of my car and double-checked the address I’d written down on the top of my yellow legal pad. This was the right house. It was a small bungalow with a grassy lawn that held a tricycle, a miniature plastic slide, and a couple of big plastic balls in bright colors. I climbed the front steps and rang the bell, and a tiny person opened the door and peered at me through the screen door.
“Is your mommy home?” I asked, kneeling down to look her in the eye and giving her my friendliest smile. I’ve got a way with kids, if I do say so myself.
“Stranger!” the kid bellowed.
“No, no, honey—” I protested.
“Stranger! Stranger! Stranger!”
I never knew kids that small could be so loud; she was like a miniature DEFCOM siren.
“Katie, what have I told you about opening the door?” a woman said, walking up behind her. She scooped her daughter up in one arm and opened the screen door with the other.
“You must be Lindsey,” she said. “Come on in.”
Jane looked like she was barely twenty-eight, but May had told me she was a decade older. Her bright red hair was swept up into a careless ponytail, and she wasn’t wearing any makeup. A sprinkling of freckles danced across her small, upturned nose, and her smile was genuine. I liked her on sight.
“Don’t mind the mess.” Jane laughed, kicking a plastic wheelbarrow out of my path as she led me to the living room. “I swear I cleaned up before you came over, but I’ve got two miniature tornadoes living here.”
“You’ve got a great house,” I said, and it was true. Even though it was obvious Jane didn’t have much money, the warmth of her personality had infused her home. A blue crocheted afghan was draped across the sofa, and kids’ artwork decorated the walls. A small wooden bookshelf was stuffed with books, and next to it was a battered, oversize chair with cozy-looking pillows. The yummy scent of baked apples and cinnamon lingered in the air.
“Thanks,” Jane said. “We love it here.”
She looked around the room. “Chris, where are you?”
She peered under the afghan, and I could see her kids had covered the sofa with tic-tac-toe games written in permanent marker. Bright red marker.
“Uh-oh,” she said. “He’s hiding again. Could you do me a favor? He always hides when we have visitors. If you could make a production out of searching for him, you’d make his day.”
I cleared my throat. “Don’t worry, Jane, I’m the best little-boy finder in all of Maryland. I even have a trophy from the mayor. I’ll find Chris.”
I walked through the house, past a chair that had two little-boy legs sticking out from under it, and began talking loudly: “Where could Chris be? He’s not in the living room, he’s not in the trash can, he’s not in his bedroom . . . This kid is the best hider in the world!”
The legs quivered, and I pretended to trip over them.
“Oops! That chair tripped me, Jane. Now that chair is giggling! You’ve got a crazy giggling chair!”
“It’s me!” Chris erupted from underneath the chair, his face flushed. “Am I really the best hider?”
“The best I’ve ever seen,” I promised him.
“I think the world’s best hider and his sister deserve a treat,” Jane said. “You guys can pick one show to watch.”
The kids took off upstairs like they’d been shot out of a cannon, and Jane gestured for me to sit down.
/> “Can I get you some coffee or tea? We’re guaranteed a half hour of peace,” she said. “They don’t get to watch TV very often.”
“I’m fine, thanks. And they’re great kids,” I said, pulling out my notebook.
“Thank you,” Jane said, looking pleased. “I think so, too. When my husband and I split up, I vowed I’d do everything I could to make their lives happy.”
“What happened between you and your husband?” I asked. I had to dive right in if we only had half an hour. May had told me to get as many details as I could; that way, if Jane had broken up with her husband because he was a workaholic, we’d know not to set her up with another one.
Jane sighed. “Oh, you don’t want to know. Have you ever met a walking cliché?” She couldn’t quite pull off the lighthearted tone she was aiming for, in part because her lower lip was trembling. “I’d love to be able to say that we grew apart, but the truth is I messed up,” she continued. “I married the wrong man.”
I nodded sympathetically. Ouch. What an awful realization, especially when there were kids involved.
“One day I went to his office to surprise him,” Jane said. “It was his birthday and he had to work late, so I decided to bring him a piece of the white chocolate cheesecake I’d baked for him. That was his favorite.”
She took a deep breath. “That’s how I found out he was having an affair.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“I didn’t walk in on him or anything,” she said. “But his secretary told me he’d left early. It didn’t take long to figure it out, once I’d waited up for him and he’d come home pretending he’d had a long day at work. Anyway, I’ve gotten over it for myself, but it kills me that the kids will be affected by this for the rest of their lives. So I only say good things about Daddy to my kids. But between you and me, I burned all our wedding pictures.”
She shook her head. “I didn’t mean to lay all that on you. You’re a good listener.”
“I’m glad you told me,” I said. “I need to know all about you if I’m going to pick the right man for you.”
“My husband—I mean my ex-husband—is getting remarried next month,” Jane said, so softly it was almost as though she was speaking to herself. “For some reason I couldn’t resist treating myself to something special. It doesn’t make any sense, and God knows I can’t afford it—I’m a schoolteacher, and you know how well that pays—but I’d love to meet someone. I’d love just one more chance to pick the right guy.”
The Opposite of Me Page 19
