“I don’t hate you, Felix. Although I’ll admit, I had miscast you as the archvillain when you’re actually more of the antihero. That’s a huge difference.”
“Really? Nothing personal, but I’ve never trusted you. And after tonight, I certainly never will. Now where are my bloody car keys?”
“I’m sorry. Please, can we not do this?”
He glowered at her. “Have you seen my car keys?”
“You can’t go, Felix. Ella insisted you stay here with Harry. She made me promise. Nothing can ruin his birthday party—she was adamant.”
Felix collapsed back into the chair. “Ella’s mother died on her birthday.”
“Exactly. She’s fine, Felix. I wouldn’t have left otherwise. And the nurses have my cell number. You need to stay here and supervise the boys. You need to honor Ella’s wishes and make sure Harry suspects nothing until after the sleepover. I promised, and I don’t break my promises.”
So they shared something after all.
“Listen,” Katherine continued. “I’m going to forget this little spat. But for Ella’s sake, you and I have to start trusting each other. Are you with me?”
It was Felix’s turn to nod.
“I’m returning to the hospital. I’ll call when I get there, even if there’s nothing to report.”
“Is she . . . in the CCU?”
“Yeah.” Katherine pulled back her hair, twisted it into a ponytail, and let it bounce free. “I thought she was having another heart attack, and I could tell the staff was worried. I mean, that part of her heart’s already taken a hit. But they sucked out the clot and put in a second stent, and they’re adding another blood thinner. Dr. Beaubridge says she could be in for two more weeks while they get all the medications adjusted. Now they move to medical therapy and watching and waiting.”
“Waiting for what?”
“I don’t know.” Katherine threw out a brief smile. “I got the impression he’ll know more by Monday. He wants to meet with both of you then.”
Were there two repelling magnets inside of him? How did a person split himself in half to be a supportive parent and a supportive spouse? He needed to be in the hospital with Ella, and he needed to be here with Harry. And in front of him, making it impossible to move forward, was the mammoth concrete wall labeled “The Truth.” He couldn’t do this alone, could he? He needed Katherine, a person he wanted to hate for taking his place by Ella’s side.
“That ruddy cardiologist.” Felix wrapped his arms over his head and began rocking back and forth. “I knew he was an incompetent imbecile. I knew he was too good-looking to be a serious doctor. First thing Monday, I’m getting him fired.”
“For what? Being arrogant? I checked his credentials, and he’s some sort of cardio superstar. Besides, he’s not that good-looking.”
“He is. He’s bloody gorgeous.”
“Seriously? Don’t you ever notice women watch you walk into a room, Mr. Colin Firth clone? Does anyone ever accuse you of being too gorgeous to do your job?”
Felix wasn’t sure what to say, but it appeared that Katherine had given him a compliment. The dope must still be in his system. “When you call from the hospital, please don’t use the landline in case you wake up the boys.”
Katherine raised her eyebrows. “You expect them to sleep?”
Felix glanced at the door. “They won’t?”
“Didn’t you ever have sleepovers?”
Felix shook his head. “I stayed with a friend during the summer holidays to avoid going home. It was a somewhat large house. He slept in one wing, I slept in another.”
“A word of advice. If you have Benadryl or anything that might knock you out, take it. Sleepovers get noisy.”
Felix gulped. Although noise levels hardly seemed important. He shook off the image of Ella alone in her hospital bed, reconnected to all those tubes. Would there be another sandbag on her groin?
Katherine stifled a yawn.
“Can I make you a thermos of coffee to go?”
She shook her head. “What time are the kids leaving tomorrow?”
“Noon. I have to feed them pancakes and bacon.” Felix visualized the pancake mix on the counter. All three boxes. Waiting.
“Then I’ll tell Ella you’ll be over at one. How does that sound?” Katherine picked up her bag.
“Thank you.”
“You still don’t get it, do you?” She flicked back her hair, a gesture that yelled, I am peeved. Or maybe, You are exasperating. Either way, he’d screwed up again.
“Get what?”
“You don’t have to keep thanking me. Ella’s my friend. I’d take a bullet for her.”
Felix looked at the carpet and glanced back up. “I don’t have many friends.”
“That’s because all you do is work, same as me.” She put her head to one side and scrutinized him. “Most of my friends are up in New York. I never really had time to make new ones down here. But thank God I went to book club that night and met your wife. I figure you and I both hit the jackpot with Ella.”
“She’s the only person who understands me. I don’t know what I’d do if—”
Katherine held up her hand. “She’s stable, and she has excellent care. I’ll call in half an hour. And we’re good—about tonight. No one else will know.” Katherine walked to the door and stopped with her back to him. “Try and get some sleep.”
She closed the door quietly, and Felix stared at his empty bed.
TWELVE
Harry tore out of a nightmare he couldn’t quite remember and fell back on his bed, heart racing. Man—he scratched through his hair—he was starving. Must’ve been out cold for three hours.
Post-sleepover coma!
Dusk already. It would be dark soon. Dark like it could only get in the forest. He shivered and burrowed under the duvet. The house was silent. Silent as a cemetery, which meant Dad wasn’t back. Harry curled into a tight ball. Being alone was the worst state of existence. Being home alone was creepy as shit. Mom never left him home alone at night. She knew he was terrified of the dark. ’Course, Max said anyone with half a brain should be.
Dad would call him a spineless wonder.
Yup, a wimp and proud of it!
Harry poked out his head. There was some weird scratching noise in the wall, as if something was trapped in there. Threatening to explode through the drywall in a bloody mess like the creature in Alien. Not that he’d actually seen that bit, since he’d been cowering behind his Darth Vader cushion. He’d meant to hide it before Sammie came over, but turned out she was a Star Wars fan. A hot girl who liked sci-fi. Was that not the best?
Dumb, dumb to let Max pick the first of last night’s movies. So dumb. Max made horrible decisions for himself. Why on earth had Harry thought his decision for the group would be any better? None of them had really wanted to see Alien. None of them really liked guts and gore.
Spineless wonders of the world, unite!
Harry snatched his phone off the nightstand, pulled it under the duvet, texted Max:
DUDE! dad still not back house scary as shit walls are alive!!!!!!!!!
Max didn’t reply. He was probably asleep.
Okay, so staying under the duvet and reliving horror movies, when there was probably some perfectly rational explanation for the—gulp!—noises in the wall, was lame. Mice!
There you go, Harry. Rodents. Curse you all, rodents!
Hopefully, mice weren’t nesting in the walls because he’d been sneaking cookies into his room in the middle of the night. But really, Mom’s friends had brought by some bizarro meals on wheels. Crap—now he sounded as ungrateful as Dad, who’d thrown the last offering in the kitchen trash, muttering, “Why would an American willingly cook shepherd’s pie for a Brit?”
Harry sat up, listened. Nothing.
Was that a note shoved under his door? Harry jumped out of bed and grabbed the index card. Clean your room before I get home. Dad. Dad never tacked on kisses. A kiss would’ve been nice, though. A
bit of father-son camaraderie. What earned an xox from Dad? What made Dad happy—work, fixing up the house, anything that didn’t involve Harry?
When would Mom be home? Not tomorrow, not for his actual birthday. Mom was devastated—so Dad said. Harry had texted her that it was fine, all fine. Tomorrow was just another day, and they’d have plenty more birthdays together! But truthfully? He wanted her home so bad it hurt worse than when he’d had his appendix out. The house had no soul without Mom; there was no laughter. Dad didn’t find much in life that was funny. On Christmas Eve, when they’d watched National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, he and Mom had cracked up while Dad had muttered the occasional “banal.”
Harry glanced at the index card in his hand. Dad had offered to give him the lowdown on Mom this evening, so it wouldn’t be wise to upset him. Whatever Dad wanted would be done. Clean room? On it!
“Make it so!” Harry said in his most theatrical voice.
Although he didn’t give a flying fuck about the state of his room. After all—his space, his choice. Three cheers for the liberation of “My Way” (the Sid Vicious version). Mom had a nasty habit of sneaking into his room and tidying up when he was in school. Not that she snooped, but she was always moving his stuff around. Putting it where she thought it should go. Suppose the mess made sense to him? He would never go into his parents’ bedroom and start meddling. And really, did it matter if he threw his dirty clothes on the floor? At some point, the piles always made it into the laundry hamper.
If only Sammie were here. Or Max. Or anyone. If only he wasn’t alone.
He texted Dad: where are you?
Normally he would type U instead of you, but abbreviations annoyed Dad.
I’ll be home in one hour. Mom sends her love.
His head jerked with the new sideways tic, his fingers strummed, his left foot tapped. Then his body stilled. Enjoy the calm while you can, Harry. He picked up his phone again. No texts from Sammie? He’d thought, hoped . . . But she had a truckload of family shit to deal with. Worse than he did, since his mom wasn’t terminal.
hey how’s your saturday
Instant reply! Want to get together tomorrow?
hell yeah!!!!!!!
Call me later.
Unlike Dad, Sammie added kisses. A whole row of kisses.
They’d kissed last night when Dad was shut away with his migraine. And the best part—no tics! The moment he’d put his hand around her waist and pulled her close, everything had gone still. Except for the fireworks in his brain. He wanted to spend the rest of his life kissing Sammie. And maybe doing a few other things. But only if she wanted to. He wasn’t going to be one of those creeps who wanted to get inside her panties. Besides, the idea of sex was as terrifying as monsters in the walls. Suppose he ticced through the whole thing?
Harry texted back four rows of kisses. And four hearts, because one wasn’t enough. One of anything would never be enough for Sammie Owen.
Max would say, “For fuck’s sake, dude, play hard to get.” But why? If Sammie was going to love him back, she had to love him all the way. Love him for who he was. Hiding shit wasn’t working out so well for Dad, who pushed everyone away rather than admit he needed help. Harry wasn’t falling down that manhole.
He should check the living room and kitchen. Make sure everything was cleared up from the party, even though it’d all looked “fine and dandy, dandy and fine”—to quote the elf in Santa Claus: The Movie—when they’d eaten the rubbery pancakes. Harry had briefed the guys ahead of time: “Even if breakfast is disgusting, eat everything and tell Dad it’s fantastic.” Everyone had thanked Dad tons. Maybe too much, since he’d given Harry that skeptical look, like he’d known it wasn’t spontaneous. Couldn’t Dad just accept that someone was trying to do something nice for him? Mom was right; Dad made life way too hard. For himself and others.
Harry shuffled into the living room. Dad had vacuumed, cleaned off the coffee table, even puffed the sofa pillows. A most excellent sign. If Dad had been worried about Mom, he wouldn’t have taken the time for a thorough cleaning job. Nor would he have cooked pancakes and bacon for six starving teens. Something poked out from under the sofa. Harry dropped to his knees. Max had a habit of squirreling away candy as if he were storing nuts for the winter. Yup. There was Max’s Starburst stash.
His phone made the clown noise. Another text from Dad.
I’m going to stay with Mom a bit longer. I’ll pick up Mexican on the way home.
Dad hated Mexican. Complained that it was too heavy, that it sat in his stomach like concrete and gave him heartburn. Harry patted his stomach. Was he getting fat? Hadn’t told anyone he was worrying about getting fat. Mom would be upset if she thought he was fussing about how he looked. She was always telling him horror stories about her high school friend whose kid had body dysmorphic disorder. “See, Harry? There are worse things than Tourette syndrome and a little ADHD.” Had a lot of new worries since Mom went into the hospital. Seemed like his head was jangling with anxiety. Was he getting fat? A little voice told him he was.
Wait.
Anal-cleanup Dad had missed the Starburst wrappers, and now he was offering to pick up Mexican. Harry tore off a hangnail with his teeth. Had something bad happened, and Dad didn’t want to tell him? What if it was just him and Dad all the time, and he had to deal with Dad all the time, and Dad had to deal with him all the time, and it was just two of them all the time, and . . .
mom, he texted. i’m super anxious
Dad here. Mom’s indisposed. Deal with it, Harry. We’ll talk later.
Harry stared at the phone. Deal with it? Like, for real? He was alone! Who was going to help him deal with it when he was freaking out and alone? Should he send Max a Code SpongeBob text, which meant super urgent emergency, come over right now?
And Mom was indisposed. And Dad was running interference.
Maybe Mom was the one who couldn’t deal. Deal with him. Before she went to Florida, she’d gotten frustrated with him—she never got angry, just quiet and tense and her voice dropped a notch—and said, “Harry, you’ve got to stop dumping on me and start dealing with these things by yourself. What are you going to do when you’re at college?” He’d grinned and said, “Text you?” But she’d just given him a sad look.
Was it his fault that she was sick? Was he too needy? She made his life easy—maybe a bit too easy—but he let her. He never said, “Please stop acting like my maid and minder.” Why had he never learned to deal with shit by himself?
Alrighty, then. Time to flip this whole thing around. Rise to the challenge and prove to his parents that he could take charge of his life. Harry strutted back to his room to start the big tidy up.
He plugged his iPod into the speaker dock to blast out My Chemical Romance. Why not? He was alone; he could blare his music. And tonight? They were going to have nachos and fajitas. Yum.
Harry started to spin, to dance, to sing, to “get up and go,” as the lyrics said. Dad would come home expecting chaos, and Harry would bowl him over with order. And when Mom came out of the hospital, she would be impressed at how independent he’d become, how organized, how neat and tidy . . .
Yes, he was lord of his universe—a guy who could deal with it by himself!
THIRTEEN
Felix sat cross-legged on the bathroom floor with Ella’s green T-shirt in his lap. Did it belong in the light or the dark pile? He held it to his face and inhaled her scent, then created a third pile of clothes he wouldn’t wash—just in case. Eleven o’clock on a Saturday night, and he was sorting laundry, tackling a mindless task that made more sense than Ella handing over her phone chock-full of unanswered texts from Harry.
“Take it home with you,” she’d said.
When he’d asked how Harry would text her, her answer had made less sense than the laundry instructions: “For once, Felix, can we do something my way?”
Then she’d extended the embargo on Harry’s visits. “He’s not to see me like this, Felix. Promise.”
He was handing out a lot of promises these days.
Harry had accepted these developments with quiet stoicism. Felix had even broken his own house rule and allowed TV with dinner—some moronic cartoon called Family Guy. An IQ off the charts, and his son still watched rubbish.
“Dad?” Harry’s voice, hesitant and childlike, came from the master bedroom.
“I’m in here. Sorting laundry.” Felix got up and stretched. “Be out in a sec.”
“Does Mom really not want to see me for the next two weeks?”
Felix walked into the bedroom and stared. Harry was wearing slouch pants and a ridiculously small T-shirt with some demonic-eyed little pony on the front. The T-shirt didn’t look familiar, but had he shrunk it in the wash and not realized?
“And why won’t she let me text her? It’s like she’s punishing me. I want to go see her, Dad.”
“Come. Sit.” Felix patted the bed.
Harry slumped down and heaved a sigh of dejection.
“I know it’s hard, Harry, but you and I have to figure this out. Getting home to you is all that matters to Mom. But she’s pretty sick, thanks to the blood clot, and we need her to concentrate on taking care of herself so she can come home in two weeks.” Felix took a deep breath. Two weeks, two more weeks.
“You mean I’m high maintenance and I distract her?”
“I mean she loves you so much that worrying about you can sidetrack her. We need her focused.”
“Was this your idea—to sever communications with me?”
“No.” Felix frowned. Why was he always cast as the bad guy? “This affects me, too, Hazza. We can still call her room anytime, but I think she wants to make phone contact a little less convenient, to encourage us to go to each other, not her.”
“So we can do this for real if she dies?” Harry sniffed.
“Your mother is not dying. This is merely a setback.”
Harry leaped up and bounced on the balls of his feet like a ballerina. Could he not stop moving for two seconds? Even a dog knew when to sit and stay. And there, right there, was the thought that made Felix Fitzwilliam a monster.
The Perfect Son Page 12
