Flying Home

by Rachel Ann Nunes

  Austin picked up the laptop. “I think it’s basically the same kind as you were using last night. Perhaps a later model. Thinner.”

  Liana told herself not to get choked up about his noticing what type of laptop she used. Of course he’d noticed. He’s in the business, and it’s a brand he sells.

  “I had one of the guys pull it out of the warehouse in case you wanted to work on our account at home,” he continued. “I didn’t know what software you needed, though. I had them install everything we have a license for.”

  Liana thought of her accounting programs on both her work laptop and her desk computer there. Those were some things she hadn’t been able to copy. But his programs would be just as good. “That’s perfect,” she said.

  They left his office and went to the room they’d been in the night before, now awash in natural light streaming in from the windows. “I had a better chair brought in,” Austin said, setting the laptop down on the round table. “The other was a little stiff.”

  Drawing a flash drive from her purse, she connected it to the computer. “Maybe that was why your accountant quit.”

  Austin looked at her for a second, brows high, and then he laughed. “Hey, that was a joke. Good one.”

  “I do know how to joke.” For some reason his surprise made her defensive.

  He nodded. “I’ll stay until you get started, but I have a conference call I have to make in fifteen minutes.”

  “Just show me how to access the necessary files. Do I need a password?”

  * * *

  After his conference call with managers in three different states, another call came through on Austin’s cell phone. His sister in Wyoming barely waited for him to answer before she began to speak.

  “You’ll never guess what happened, Austin. Old Whittaker died, and Grandma must have gotten through to him because he left his whole estate to HeartReach! I just got off the phone with his lawyer. It’s not as much as one might have thought, given how much land he owned, because apparently some of it was used as collateral for his cousin’s children’s educational loans, which were never paid back. But it’s upwards of four hundred thousand, and that’s twice what we raised for HeartReach last quarter. The cousins are a little disgruntled—or rather the children of the cousins are—because they thought they’d inherit.”

  “Don’t know why—they never even visited.” Austin leaned back in his chair and stretched his feet out under the desk. “I’m sorry the old guy’s gone. He was. . . .” He stopped. Memories of the past rushed into his mind, of the days when he had been on the brink of adolescence and had still hoped to gain, if not his father’s love, then his respect.

  “You ain’t no good—you never been no good. How many times I got to tell you to clean out them stalls right?”

  Austin’s heart sank. He’d been cleaning the stalls all morning, his sweat caking the dust on his face, until the straw and hay penetrated his clothing and made his whole body itch. Until the ripe smell of manure no longer registered on his senses. He’d done a good job—better than his father usually did—and all as a surprise. But his father had come back from a trip to town full of drink and meanness.

  “The cows just mucked them up a bit when I let them in.” Austin tried not to cry; he’d learned that only made his father angrier.

  “Do it again. I swear, I thought havin’ a boy might make life easier someday, but you’re just a lazy brat. Stop starin’ at me, and clean that stall again. I’m goin’ to kick you if you don’t git goin’ right now.”

  Old Whittaker—old even then—poked his head in the door, just in time to witness this latest declaration of love. He cleared his throat. “Walker, I come to see that cow you’re selling.”

  His father’s countenance changed immediately, and he hurried over to shake Old Whittaker’s hand. Austin watched as they haggled over the cow, glad at least it wasn’t Patches, his favorite milk cow. He felt dizzy from a day of hard work with nothing since breakfast but a drink of well water from the pump to sustain him. When his dad went up to the house to arrange a bill of sale, Old Whittaker turned to him.

  “Don’t pay him no mind, boy. Your grandmother tells me you might be the president of the United States one of these days, if you set your mind to it.” He took out a dark bottle from the inside of his jacket, took a swig, and then offered it to Austin.

  Weak from lack of food, Austin reached for it, but Old Whittaker snatched back his hand. “No. Better not. Your father’s got the sickness. You might have it, too. I seen it time and time again. These things run in a family. You want to be president, you got to stay away from firewater.”

  “Firewater?” asked Austin.

  Old Whittaker nodded, staring at him with his small, close-set eyes and bulbous nose. “It’s what the Indians a long time ago called alcohol. Mark my words, boy. If you don’t want to be like your father, stay away from this.” He waved the bottle. “It’s like a drug to folks like you.”

  Austin believed him. Austin looked like his dad, walked like his dad, and to his grandmother’s dismay, even talked like his dad. “I’d kill myself before I became a drunk,” he vowed.

  Looking back, Austin believed that resolution in the barn, with Old Whittaker looking on, was a big part of why he didn’t join many of his peers in throwing away their lives on the bottle.

  “Austin. Austin! Are you there?”

  “Yeah, sorry. I was thinking about Old Whittaker.”

  “Isn’t it wonderful? That money will buy a lot of supplies for those orphans.”

  “And it means we can get it to them sooner. Do you think you could look into flight arrangements?”

  “Not a chance in the next week or so. We’re swamped here. Wayne’ll be out planting, and Buttercup’s due soon and I’m worried about her. It’s twins at least, and she’s pretty small. Plus all three of the boys have been sick with something that’s been going around the school. I’m sorry, but you’ll have to do it all yourself this time. That reminds me. Where do you want the money? In the same account, or do you have another you’d rather use that gets better interest?”

  “Just use the same one until I figure it out.” He blew out a long sigh. While he was grateful for the windfall, being the president and chief bottle washer for HeartReach was a lot of work, and he wasn’t willing to quit his job to run the charity full time. Taking a salary from the charity would mean fewer orphans they could help, not to mention a severe cut in pay for him.

  He hung up the phone and went to check on Liana. She was busy at work, her dark head bent over the keyboard, brows drawn together in concentration—or was it irritation? Whatever it was, she had worn that look during most of the time they had spent together. She was either perpetually thinking or perpetually angry. Her long hair had a windblown look that was oddly appealing, and he noticed for the first time that her mouth was slightly too wide for the proportions of her face. It was a mouth for smiling and laughing—for kissing.

  “Need anything?” he asked.

  She shook her head.

  “You aren’t hungry? We could take a break and go out for a bite.”

  “No,” she said, coming to her feet. “I think I’d rather just go home, if you don’t mind. I can work better there.”

  “You mean without me interrupting?”

  Her unexpected smile warmed him. “Actually, that’s not what I meant. It’s just that I’m used to working at home. The sounds are different here. Takes more concentration.”

  “Well, call me if you need me.” He jotted a number down on a business card he pulled from his suit pocket and handed it to her. “I’ve added my home number.”

  “Thanks.” She closed the laptop and tucked it under her arm.

  “About last night,” he said as he walked her to the front desk. “I really am sorry if I got you in trouble.” He thought he detected a flash of emotion in her face as he had when he mentioned it earlier.

  “It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.” She adjusted the laptop un
der her arm. “I’ll be in touch when I’m finished, unless I need more information. No news is good news in this case.”

  “Thanks.” He watched her walk out the door.

  CHAPTER 6

  Diary of Karyn Olsen

  Monday, February 14, 1966

  I’m about to get ready for the Valentine’s Dance. Now I know why Clari always spends so much time in front of the mirror. She’s already beautiful, but she wants to look her best for her dates. I wonder if she has ever liked someone as much as I like Travis. He is so gorgeous! I can’t believe he finally asked me out! It’s been over a month since we met, and we’ve eaten lunch together exactly twelve times. When he couldn’t make it last Wednesday, he even let me know so I wouldn’t expect him. We laugh and joke like crazy when we’re together. He’s really fun. (And did I mention gorgeous? j) I think he hasn’t been able to ask me out before because it is his last semester and he’s terribly busy with school. A good thing, too. I’m finding it hard to concentrate in class since I met him. I even got a B on a test in biology—my first B in my whole life. Now I’ll have to work extra hard to pull an A in the class. I’m not going to think about that now—I’m going out with my Prince Charming. I wonder if I’ll get my first kiss tonight? (I don’t count Jeremy in high school. I only let him kiss me because he was moving to Georgia and I felt sorry for him.) Is it too early, I wonder, to think about someday bearing Travis’s children?

  On Sunday evening Liana drove up to her adoptive parents’ street in Paradise. With a cursory glance at the wide, squat house and yard, which featured elaborate desert plants and decorative rocks separated by small patches of grass, she saw that her siblings had already arrived for the birthday fest. Christian’s BMW was in the cobbled drive, and Bret’s more conservative blue Honda Accord was in front. Liana parked behind him.

  She walked up to the house with familiar reluctance. She had grown up here but still felt she didn’t belong. Yet if she didn’t belong here, where did she belong? Certainly not in India without her parents. She didn’t remember anyone else from that time except, vaguely, a woman named Mamata, who had taken care of her while her parents worked. Even her parents were only shadows in her memory. It might have helped if she had more photographs and memorabilia from her life in India, but she had arrived at the airport with nothing more than a birth certificate, her passport, and the single family picture. She remembered vividly feeling lost without her mother to hold her hand or her favorite doll in her arms. Her mother was buried with her father in India, but where was the doll now?

  Liana stopped to watch the colors splayed across the wispy clouds in the western sky above the house, a myriad of oranges, yellows, and reds. These same colors made up the stucco and rock work of her adoptive parents’ house, as though the bucket of the sky had spilled the colors down upon the house. She had always loved the sunset; it stirred something deep inside, making her somehow want to both cry and laugh.

  “Oh, you’re finally here,” Christian said, meeting her at the door. He had a small piece of meat in his hands, which he popped into his mouth, wiping his fingers on his jeans. Opening his arms, he pulled her into a hug, which she enjoyed but did not return.

  “No thanks to you. I worked all day on your friend’s account. What a messed-up piece of work! I’ll be glad to wash my hands of it.”

  He swallowed his mouthful and grimaced. “Sorry. I honestly had no idea it would be such a problem.”

  “Just don’t be surprised if he pulls the plug on your advertising campaign when he gets my bill.”

  “Too late. It’s already been approved. Oh, yeah. Uh-huh. I am the man.” Christian strutted around, making strongman poses until she laughed.

  “Stop that!”

  Smiling, he drew her down the short entryway, past the small kitchen and into the family room where everyone had gathered on couches that were situated around a brick fireplace.

  Bret saw her first and stood up to greet her, dressed as usual in tan pleated slacks and a matching button-down shirt. Serious and thoughtful to a fault, he was Christian’s complete opposite. His blond hair, blue eyes, oval face, and lighter build were echoes of his mother. Neither startlingly handsome or overtly gregarious, he was good-looking and friendly enough to be popular. He always had sweet girlfriends who had so far waited in vain for a marriage proposal. Liana had never felt as close to Bret as she had to Christian, though he was nearer in age, being only five years older, but she trusted him as she trusted no one else. If he said something, he meant it. Christian might forget, but Bret would not.

  “Liana,” he said, smiling. Like Christian, he hugged her, but the contact was brief, more deliberate than spontaneous.

  Travis and Clarissa Winn were close behind him, offering their hugs. Travis’s was bold, Clarissa’s hesitant, and Liana returned them briefly. “Thank you for coming, Lara,” Clarissa said.

  Liana stiffened, though she had known it was coming. Her adoptive mother was the only person besides the teller at the bank who ever called her by her legal name, Lara Clari Winn. A name she had come to detest. A name that constantly reminded her that Christian and Bret were really her cousins, not her older brothers at all, and that her biological parents had died when she was only four.

  “Happy birthday, Mother,” Liana said, forcing herself to say the word that had always been awkward on her lips.

  “Sixty-five.” Travis grinned, a hand on his wife’s shoulder. “But she doesn’t look a day over fifty.” He was a tall, large man who had gained too much weight in the past years, so much so that he now wore his dress pants well below his natural waist. His temperament was much like Bret’s—serious, dependable, solid. His full head of hair was salt-and-pepper gray, and his white brows made a nearly solid line above his eyes. There were creases in his square, ruddy face, small rolls, actually, that would have looked more like wrinkles had he been a thinner man.

  “Nonsense,” Clarissa said, but she looked pleased. She stepped back to survey Liana. “How are you?” Worry creased her brow in fine lines that matched the tiny lines etched into her otherwise smooth skin around her eyes and mouth. Her blonde hair—she was still blonde, though whether the blonde now came from a bottle Liana didn’t know—came to her shoulders, gently curling under. She was fairly trim from her daily stint at the local gym, and she generally wore clothing that would be more appropriate in a nice restaurant than in the high school classroom where she spent most of her time teaching calculus to teenagers. Today she wore a shiny brown skirt that swept the floor and an off-white blouse that glittered with gold embroidery.

  “I’m fine,” Liana said.

  “You look a little tired.”

  “I’ve been up late.”

  “Oh?” Clarissa raised her eyebrows, plucked into a thin arch and accentuated by brown pencil. Liana knew what was behind the probe. Clarissa wanted grandchildren, and she hoped Liana’s late-night adventures might somehow be related to dating.

  “Just work.”

  “How’s the accounting business, anyway?” Bret had resettled himself on the couch and was fingering something in his wallet.

  Liana swallowed hard. “Fine. And how’s the bridge building?” Bret had followed in his father’s footsteps to become a civil engineer, something that had made Travis very happy.

  “Stretching out,” Christian answered for him. “Get it? Bridge building—stretching out. Oh, whatever. It’s there. It’s boring. Isn’t there something else to talk about?”

  Silence fell heavily over them. Liana was riveted to the scene, feeling as she so often had growing up that she was an understudy, watching the real actors play their parts.

  “I’ve met a girl,” Bret said into the awkward silence. “I’m getting married.”

  “You’re what?” Travis and Clarissa said together.

  “About time.” Christian sat carelessly on the couch next to Bret. “You’ll be thirty-five next month, won’t you?”

  “Look who’s talking. Last I heard, you turned f
orty.”

  Christian flashed a wide grin. “Yeah, but I’m an artist. That excuses everything.”

  Bret rolled his eyes.

  “Are you really getting married?” Clarissa’s pale face flushed with eager excitement. “When do we get to meet her?”

  “Well, she would have come today, but she had an out-of-town job. She’s a model. Here, I have her picture.” Bret removed a photograph from his wallet.

  Liana had drawn off to the side to observe them, but now her curiosity propelled her forward with the rest of the family. She expected to see a young, sweet-faced girl in a snapshot, but instead a blonde vision of made-up perfection stared at her from a professional photograph. The youth was there, and the expression mimicked innocence, but wide brown eyes told a different story. This was a young woman who knew exactly what she wanted and would do anything to get it.

  Christian whistled. “Now that’s some woman. Congratulations, brother!” He slapped Bret heartily on the back.

  “She is very pretty,” Clarissa said. “What’s her name?”

  “Britanni. With an i on the end. Britanni Medford.”

  “Whatever happened to that other girl you were seeing?” Travis asked. “The one from Alabama. I liked her accent.”

  “Went back to Alabama, hopefully,” Christian said. “Good thing, too. She’d have Bret married with a half dozen children by now if he’d let her.”

  Clarissa glared at him. “And what’s wrong with that? I could use a few grandchildren.”

  “Don’t get me wrong, Mom,” Christian said hastily. “She was a cute little thing in her way, but this girl”—he pointed to the photograph—“is worthy of bearing the next generation of Winns.”