by Jack Kinsley
"Nope."
"Really? Is that your final answer?"
The Adderall was now pumping in Travis's veins; he felt like he'd just snorted a kilometer of cocaine. He wanted to strangle Devon with his bare hands.
"Okay, then." Travis calmed himself. "Let's play your way. Can you explain what these were doing on your desk?" He held out the three Ambiens within an inch of Devon's face. "Recognize these?" Devon's eyes flicked to the sheets of paper on the desk, now lying completely flat. "Stocking up are we? Maybe take them all at once on a beautiful afternoon? Keep yourself awake and have yourself a hallucination heyday?"
"Okay, I fucked her!" he finally confessed.
"How many times?"
"Three times."
"How did you get past the personal assistant at night?"
Devon immediately went back to taking the fifth.
"Tell you what, Devon. I'm going to give these pills back to you if you tell me. It'll be our little secret. Now, how did you get past the personal assistant?"
"It was Lucy. She always falls asleep on the couch."
Goddamn it, Lucy!
"Thank you, Devon. Thank you for your cooperation. Now I suggest you clean up this pigsty and take a shower. No dinner until this place is tidy."
"But I don't want to."
"I don't care."
"What about my pills?"
"Are you kidding me? Now get this place cleaned up." Travis walked out with the pills in his pocket.
Travis was grateful Jordan's bedroom door was now shut, and he kept a steady pace toward the office. Crossing the living room, he softened his steps to avoid any vet questions from Nathalie and Dani, who were on the couch watching Fried Green Tomatoes — Dani's choice, of course.
Inside the office, Sarah was at her desk filling out some forms. He assumed it was the necessary paperwork for Jordan's discharge. She was using the custom engraved pen he had given her last Christmas with the inscription For My Junkyard Dog along the length of it.
She ignored him completely, never lifted an eye to acknowledge his presence; obviously still sour with him. Between the mixture of Valium, Adderall, and her temporary disgust for him, he was suffocating. He eyed the glass dome paperweight on her desk and felt it had grown to the size of the room, swallowing Sarah inside it and leaving him on the outside.
At least he had some news that could possibly appease her. He approached her desk and could see in fact it was Jordan's exit that she was working on. On her desk next to the forms was a small stack of company tri-folds. The top brochure was flipped and revealed a picture of Travis on the back. The glass paperweight sat on part of it, catching a piece of his face and distorting it inside the glass. He was completely unrecognizable.
"I still hate that picture," he said.
No response; she was trapped inside the paperweight.
"You will need to fill out two sets of those forms," he tried again.
This time she heard him. "What do you mean?" But she didn't look at him.
"Devon will also be leaving tomorrow."
She stopped writing and looked up. "Really? On what grounds? I thought there was no proof?"
"Well, no proof about killing Little Jack. Nothing that would hold up in court, anyway."
"So, you're discharging him anyway?"
"Well, not for that reason. He just admitted to me that he had sex with Nathalie on multiple occasions."
"He told you?"
"Yes, after some negotiation that he thought might benefit him."
"And his father?" She leaned back and folded her arms.
"It's irrefutable. Devon Cunningham confessed to the owner of Crystal Heights that he engaged in sexual intercourse with another client. He compromised the safety of that client and jeopardized their recovery. He's in direct violation of our signed contract, Article 29. It warrants legal eviction from the program. No if, ands, or buts." The glass dome suddenly shrank back to its rightful proportions and Sarah gave him her full attention.
"You don't think his father is going to fight this one? Find some loophole?"
"He can't. It's watertight. Please make the call to his father this evening and ask what his arrangements will be. Jordan and Devon can share a cab if they wish." He rubbed his dry, burning eyes with his two fists.
"You look like shit," she said.
"Thank you. How did it go with Jordan?"
"Terribly, of course. He was obviously still drunk, but he understood he was leaving. He even cried a little."
He could sense her trying to read him for the real reason Jordan was leaving. He felt terrible and relieved at the same time. But at least Jordan was getting his money back, and had only paid for his services rendered. It was fair. And a fleeting thought entered his mind that his life would find some normality again. The thought drew a faint smile.
Sarah caught it. "Don't be so happy with yourself. You just lost about two hundred grand in revenue."
Chapter 4 / On A Jet Plane
When Travis pulled up, Bella was waiting for him just behind the safety of the white picket gate. She bounced her Mickey Mouse suitcase off the front of her knees and chomped away on some gum. It was seven-thirty sharp and Ana stood watching from the porch, her black hair swept out around the front of her neck.
Travis didn't even open the gate, but picked her and her suitcase up over it, much to her surprise. She squealed in excitement and grabbed his right ear firmly.
"Hey, I'm going to need that ear," he told her, and tried to nibble one of hers.
"Why?" she asked with genuine interest.
"What do you mean, why? To hear stupid things better. What do you think?"
"You're silly, Daddy." She gave her mother a last wave goodbye. Ana blew her a kiss and said something, but it didn't register with Travis.
"I want to sit in the front seat," she said.
Travis had let her sit there last week for a three-block ride from the park, and had regretted it ever since. She had beaten the preemie warnings of possible learning disabilities, but she was still a little underweight compared to other girls her age and needed to be in a car seat. They had just passed a new California law requiring kids to be in car seats up to the age of eight or until they were 4'9". Bella would almost certainly be in a seat until she was eight.
"Oh no, because then you won't get your surprise waiting for you in the backseat," he told her. This usually did the trick to defuse the debate.
Bella kicked off his hip and raced to the backseat. She pulled out an art box from the deep pocket behind the passenger seat. It contained a rainbow of watercolors and a handful of paintbrushes, and there was an art pad on the cushion next to her child seat. She had a natural talent for drawing and painting. Travis considered this a fact, and not some parental delusion. She already demonstrated a keen, inherent sense of perspective in her sketches.
"Can I open it now?" Bella asked.
"Oh, no pumpkin. We need a cup of water and a large open space with nothing else around you before we start that project." He made a large gesture as if she needed to be in the middle of some vast desert, and then pinched the tiny bit of fat on the back of her arm.
"You're so silly, Daddy," she told him again and laughed.
"Silly is as silly does," he told her and strapped her in.
The first few times he'd brought Bella to his new place, she cried and wanted to go back to the Victorian house, but now it was part of her routine. Sometimes, she'd even cry when he drove her back to her mother's now. After Travis had been evicted from his own home, he pretty much jumped into whatever dwelling was decent, close to work, and available at the time. He ended up in a conservative two-bedroom condo, partially furnished, with just the bare necessities for him and a visiting five-year-old. It took him five months to paint Bella's room her favorite pink and hammer up a few shelves for her stuffed animals. He'd never intended on being away from his Victorian home for so long.
The condo was at the bottom of a hill, without any real view,
and the declining standard of living couldn't be mistaken every time he drove from Crystal Heights to the Victorian home and then to his average condo. He was a refugee cast from a Malibu mountainside to a bland grid filled with cookie-cutter dwellings.
His current home reminded him of his early beginnings when he'd struggled and failed at several businesses, communicating with Ana at a great distance. Now they were only miles apart, but emotionally she couldn't be further away. Travis wanted to believe it was only that one stupid night when he lost his temper that ruined them, but he knew he warranted the slow and steady hatred Ana had formed for him.
Within a mile of driving to his condo, Travis noticed Bella in the rearview mirror squirming in her car seat.
"Everything okay back there?" he asked.
"Goddamn, it's hot in here!" she told him as if it was normal conversation for a five-year-old.
He barely held back his laughter. "That's a bad word. We don't say those words. Okay? I don't want to hear that word again," he told her, giving her the most serious glare he could muster. He even pointed a stern finger at her in the mirror for emphasis. In his mind, that was the final word on the subject.
After a few minutes, they pulled into the driveway. He exited the vehicle and had to walk around the car to get her out, leaving her briefly inside by herself.
When he opened her car door, she quickly informed him, "I said it again!"
Before a second reprimand could be given, Bella jumped out of her seat and ran to the front door with the paint and paper. He couldn't think of a time when he'd loved her more.
She burst into the condo before Travis could even retrieve the key from the front doorknob. She tossed the drawing pad down on the Pergo floor and began to tear at the plastic on the art box. Travis set her suitcase on the couch and pushed the coffee table away to help clear her path. It was fascinating to watch her slip into her own little world; his little monkey on a mission. He could only wonder and imagine the images that might be flashing in her mind and what picture she would paint him next.
"Are you hungry, pumpkin?"
Bella was still in a frenzy, setting up her work space and aligning the new paintbrushes that had spilled out of the box. She opened the art pad, flipping the blank pages, almost as if she could see which painting would go on which page. She chose a sheet in the middle and then looked to her daddy for the last item necessary.
"I need water, Daddy," she said. It was less a statement and more of a demand, like, Hey stupid, why are you just standing there? You have a job too, you know.
"One kiss and you can have anything you want," he told her. She huffed and gave him a smack on the cheek. "Are you hungry?" he asked again.
"Water, please. Hellllooooooo..." she sang and stared down at her blank canvas. Bella would have these new sayings and mannerisms all the time; occasionally he was able to name the movie or program where they had come from, but not today.
Bella began steadily working on her masterpiece, which worked out perfectly for Travis, who needed a little couch time. Even though they had hadn't spoken more than a few words, he was content to simply have her in his presence and watched in amusement at her ever-changing expressions: tongue sticking out with a long stroke of her brush, or her brow pinched in a moment of frustration. He attempted an early viewing of the painting, but in typical artist fashion, she refused and repositioned herself where he couldn't get a clear shot. Twenty minutes into her first painting she abruptly scrapped it, ripping it from the pad, and crumpled it into a loose ball (probably uttering goddamn it secretly to herself). She threw it a good ten feet across the room and immediately went to work on a new one, undeterred.
Travis received a few texts from Sarah, telling him she had informed Devon of his departure from Crystal Heights. Apparently, he wept like a baby and had begged Sarah to let him talk to Travis. No chance in hell; but Travis did wonder how long until his daddy would be calling.
Another hour went by.
"Are you almost finished?" he asked Bella, bobbing his head for a clean look between her arms.
"Almost," was her delayed response. She put her forearm out in front to obscure it.
Another text came in from Sarah: Are you sure about discharging Jordan?
Travis didn't respond to this one, knowing his silence would speak louder than a text.
Ten minutes later Sarah sent another message: Prick.
"Done, Daddy! You can look now," Bella said. She was covered in paint — her hands and arms were a rainbow of color and there was a spot of yellow sunshine on the tip of her nose.
"Alright, let's see it, Ms. Bella Martin." He sat up on the couch and looked at it as she held it proudly out in front of him. Her arms were stretched to their maximum wingspan and her smiling head poked above it as she waited for his critique.
"Wow! I love it. This one is frame worthy for sure, Bella. Beautiful!" His first thought was how talented she really was. There was a three-dimensional quality about her work, rare for a child her age — normally something learned, and Bella had no formal training whatsoever.
His second thought was of a more selfish nature. He was missing from the picture, and Bella normally drew her daddy somewhere in her paintings. Today, there were only females. They were holding hands with big smiles, red lips, and wearing triangle dresses; a few blades of grass shot up near their chicken feet, and the belly of a blue cloud touched the edge of a bright yellow sun — similar in color to the one shining on her nose. He recognized Ana and Bella, but couldn't identify the third person, who was holding a pink cubic handbag with a bow on it.
"I love your colors. It's really good, Bella. Now tell me about it. If I know my little girl, I know there's a story."
The painting was too big for her to hold and tell, so she put it on the floor and sat next to him. "That's me, that's Mommy, and that's Grandma Nica."
"Oh, of course, Grandma Nica. You changed her hair color."
"Grandma Nica has brown hair now."
Her Grandma had visited from Romania last year, and stayed with them for two months at their Victorian home when they were still living as a family. Travis hadn't put so many hours in at Crystal Heights since the first year of its launch.
"And what's this?" Travis pointed at the pink cube.
"That's my present," Bella said.
"She mailed you a present? Wow. What was it?"
"No, it's a surprise. It's at her house." Travis kept looking at the painting, trying to see if there were any other revealing details.
"In Romania?"
"Yep."
"Is your Grandma Nica coming to California again?"
"Nope," she said, and started noticing all the paint on her arms. She picked a little color off her hand and then tried twisting her arm to have a look at her elbow. "We're going there."
His mind had already been racing at the possibility; now his heart pounded in his chest. He immediately wondered where his little black box was, and patted his pockets. They were empty.
"Really?" he said, staring at Grandma Nica in the painting. Panic set in. Then he remembered the first painting she had discarded. It was in a ball near the TV.
"What happened with that one?" He stood and walked over to it. "I bet this one is just as good."
Bella was becoming obsessed with picking the paint off her and didn't answer.
Travis delicately opened the crumpled ball of paper. There were still areas of wet paint, and red smudges quickly covered the tips of some of his fingers. He accidentally tore the watercolor-soaked paper, but he managed to get it flat again and put the pieces together. Most of the colors had run, but in the confused mess of paint he could make out an airplane. In the large windows of the plane were two people: a little girl and a woman with long black hair — undoubtedly Bella's mother. He almost spotted a third person, male-ish, in one of the windows, but then realized it was a random blob of paint that had transferred from the paper being balled up.
"This was a good one too," he told her.
"It's too bad you crumpled this one."
"No, that one was crappy," she said, and worked some paint off her kneecap.
Travis almost corrected her. "So when are you guys going to see Grandma Nica?"
"I don't know. But she said it was going to be my favorite present...ever!"
Damn Grandma Nica and her dangling carrot! He didn't know what the hell was brewing, but going to Romania in the winter was no holiday.
Travis went over to Bella, squatted in front of her, and took her arms in his hands. "Let's get you cleaned up. It's getting late and it's almost time for bed. Did you have a big dinner with Mommy? Are you still hungry?"
"A little."
"Okay, come on, let's get you soaking in a bath and I'll put some chicken nuggets in the oven for you."
"Yeah! Nuggets!"
— — —
After the cleaning and feeding, and scrubbing the massacre of paint off the Pergo floor, Travis tucked her in for the bedtime stories. His favorite way of ending his day: her little precious hand holding his, listening intently until she slipped away into a tale of her own.
No matter how many times he reread the same stories, he never lost the initial shock of how downright sick and twisted most bedtime fairy tales were: Hansel and Gretel captured and fattened up for the witch's dinner, Snow White to be murdered and her heart delivered to the evil Queen, and the Little Mermaid given a knife to kill the prince, only to kill herself instead. Tonight, Bella's choice was Little Red Riding Hood, and Travis couldn't find it more appropriate: a story of a wolf who eats her grandma. Bella fell asleep before he read the scene, but he kept reading away — until: "He ate her up in one big bite."
Travis swept the bangs off her sleeping face. She would sleep like a stone until seven in the morning, out like a light for the entire night, and he only wished he shared the luxury. His night would consist of the usual tossing and turning, tedious details of his day and his future playing constantly in his head.
Leaving Bella's room, he heard his cell phone rattling out on the glass coffee table. It was Sarah with the regular end-of-the-night texts.
