The Wrong Sister

by Leanne Davis

  “Tracy, meet Xavier. This is Tracy, our new office-girl.”

  Office-girl? Her hackles rose. How dare he call her that? It sounded so condescending. Granted, she was not exactly an impressive career woman, but she didn’t relish being called “office-girl” like she was sixteen and interning for the summer.

  She glared at Donny. He finally glanced at her after she crossed her arms over her chest and kept piercing him with her eyes. He was logging onto the computer and caught her stance and frown, which made him chuckle. “Not office-girl, huh? I meant to say: our administrative assistant/accounts receivable/accounts payable manager.” He smiled at his own exaggerated title to prove his point.

  Tracy turned her back on him and held her hand out to Xavier who shook it. He smiled politely before going back to his office.

  Donny sat down in the chair before the computer, and clicked away as he typed at unbelievable speed. “He’s not real sociable. Lucky for you, he rarely engages in idle chit-chat. He’s worked with me for four years; and I think he has a dog. That’s about all I know about him. So sit, let’s get started.”

  She sat down after rolling up the chair. She learned very quickly that Donny had one speed at work, and that was fast. He didn’t spend more than a second lingering over anything. She had to follow what he said, and did so while taking quick notes. She followed the majority of it, but had to eventually slow him down when he got into the quarterly taxes and federal deposits. “Uh, okay, you’re starting to get over my head. Can you slow down a bit?”

  He glanced up and made a slight cringing face. “Sorry. Why don’t you take your lunch break? Do you think you can find a few things to do with what I’ve shown you?”

  “Yes. Overwhelming amounts.”

  He grinned and ran a hand through his hair, tousling the brown strands about his head. “I know. That’s why I’m hiring you. We’ll start there and add a few things as we go. Does that sound like a plan?”

  She nodded. He stood up, towering over her. “Aren’t you taking lunch?” Tracy asked.

  He glanced back after reaching his office door. “I eat while I work. We’re swamped right now.”

  With that, he turned back to his desk and started to work. He didn’t look up even three times to see what she was doing. She started to breathe easier as she dove into her work. She grabbed the stack of invoices and began to wade through them. They were months behind and it would take weeks of industrious work to get the business even caught up. He wasn’t kidding. But as she started her task, she began to relax and soon found a rhythm. She knew more than she realized. The accounting program was one she worked with extensively at school so she knew how to approach it. Applying that program to real world invoices was easily transferable, more than she ever figured it would be.

  The longer she worked, the less she glanced Donny’s way to see if he was noticing her. She relaxed when she realized he didn’t seem to remember she was even there. He was oblivious to everything and everyone around him as he worked on the computers. Thank God. For one, he didn’t seem to care she was physically there. Or worry about what she was doing, which took the pressure off, and made it much easier for her to accomplish something.

  Thus, her new career started. Donny spent a few hours with her each morning. He was as hurried and brisk as he was on the first day, and didn’t linger over coffee to indulge in any idle chit-chat. Not with her, or Xavier, or any client. He finished one thing and swiftly moved on to the next. She had no idea he was so intense at work. Or so boss-like. But he was. He didn’t act anything at all like he did when he came to her house. Here, he was all business, all the time. But in an abstract, preoccupied kind of way. He treated Xavier exactly the same. He never seemed to have the time or inclination to talk or socialize, or even say hi. He just might have qualified as a certified workaholic.

  It took Tracy a month to get his books up to date and all figured out. He made many mistakes while doing them himself. He incurred late fees for missed bills, and lost checks, as well as client fees. He wasn’t kidding when he said he needed an office girl, and she embraced the title now. She found she liked office managing as much as the bookkeeping. She handled all the phone calls, and made sure the office was supplied with everything they needed. She tended to the office necessities as well as she did to her house and kids for the past dozen years. She was good at multi-tasking. She was also good at taking care of people in contained environments.

  She added a bit of personality and warmth to Donny’s business. Clients came in and her smiling face was the first they saw, as she chatted in warm, engaging small talk. She was especially adept at making people feel welcome when they were around her. Donny also noticed that. She was surprised when he first insisted she sit in on a new client meeting to help him sell his company. He got so technical in his details, which he could whiz through, that he sometimes forgot most people didn’t understand him. Tracy was good at dumbing it down and making it seem like interesting material.

  After she helped land the local branch of a manufacturing firm contract, he beamed at her. “You are a damn natural at this.”

  She shrugged. “I was Micah’s arm-candy at many business dinners and parties. I had to learn to schmooze with the best of them.”

  “I truly would have never guessed you could do it so well.”

  “I should have more modesty than to admit this, but I was always an asset to Micah work-wise. I can make small talk with anyone.”

  “So I see.”

  “That’s not supposed to be the thing nowadays. I should stand on my own feet and be proud of my career, but I was busy at home with the kids. It was easy for me to be charming and engaging for Micah’s work. I never really cared if I were a cliché or a stereotype.”

  He looked at her oddly. “That wasn’t being arm-candy. You could sell snow to an Eskimo. I’m not kidding. You’re so gracious and warm, they instantly respond to you, and believe you. I think, Tracy McKinley, you have severely underestimated your career potential. As have I. For now, I need you, but eventually, you should maybe try something in sales. You would be really good at it.”

  She scoffed. Yeah, right. As if she could just go hire on at a corporation because she formerly used to dress up and charm people her husband wanted to impress. Sure. She could do that.

  Still, she was working. She soon decided working was good. She got better and grew more confident by the day. Donny spent less time explaining things, or fixing her mistakes. He was nice, friendly and polite. He was Donny, her brother-in-law, again. Her relief was almost tangible, it became so evident. She could not handle the guilt that previously accompanied their strange slip-up. No. This was better. So much better.

  Her mom picked up the girls after school and took them to Vickie’s, so she got her kids from Donny’s house. He never left the office before seven so she never saw him at home. Everything was almost normal. Or perhaps, a new version of normal. The longer they worked together, the less awkward, and intense were the moments when they spoke only through their eyes, or felt things more than they should have.

  It seemed like Donny was too busy to decide whether he liked his wife or not. He seemed back to the Donny she knew before, but didn’t really comment about Vickie and his personal life. He mentioned Julia still, but the strange intimacy that they developed seem to slowly erode the longer they worked together and Vickie was home.

  It became something Tracy nearly got on her knees in grateful prayer almost daily about. She was no longer in danger of betraying her sister and ruining her life more than it already was. Vickie often came into the office to say hi, and spent half an hour or so in Donny’s office around lunchtime. She was usually on her way home from her classes when she did, so she didn’t have Julia with her. She sometimes even brought Donny lunch. They sometimes shut the blinds to Donny’s office, but Tracy never asked why. She usually chose those times to leave and go next door to get her own sandwich and coffee.

  ****

  Donny did ever
ything in his power to become, once again, a generic, distant, polite brother-in-law. He never let his gaze linger too long on Tracy. He never spoke to her about anything beyond work or the family. He quit asking personal questions. He pretended he never really got to know her, like he had no knowledge of her or her true personality.

  However, when she started to charm and schmooze his current and future clients, he began to take more notice. She was a surprise to him, since he’d never seen her like that. She was warm and kind and engaging as he often witnessed, but also different. She became strangely self-confident, likeable, and interesting. The men, in particular, responded positively to her. But it wasn’t in a totally sexual way. It was like she could have been the woman they would have dated if they weren’t married or involved… she flirted, but not really. He didn’t know how to describe it, other than whatever she did worked. Every client gushed about her, and Donny felt sure she was instrumental in luring several who came in there simply to inquire about his services.

  Vickie showed up quite a bit to visit Tracy, and then came into his office to talk. He kept the sigh of annoyance to himself. He had no extra time, and certainly wouldn’t have wanted to spend it chatting with Vickie during the day when he could do it at night for free. But still… he was trying. So he pushed his work away, along with all the pressing deadlines and impatient clients who needed things from him. Then he would listen with rapt attention to Vickie’s day at rehab classes. He didn’t know what else to call them. He listened to her insignificant chatter. He really tried to be encouraging and kind and interested.

  The first time Vickie made it clear they should have sex was three weeks after she got home from rehab. It was, by far, the longest stretch of celibacy they endured since the first night they met, except for the time she was physically away at rehab. That was fine. He didn’t refuse it. But he didn’t really think about it beyond that moment. He wasn’t into her at all. He was sure she noticed. Their relationship was primarily based on sex, and now, he couldn’t care less. The effort he put into pleasing her was lame, to say the least. It was just hard to get really turned on to the woman he blamed for half ruining his life, weighing him down, and eventually, he foresaw would hurt his daughter. It was, to say the least, the last straw that finally made all of Vickie’s draw and allure completely disappear.

  He certainly scared the living shit out of Vickie with his last ultimatum. She did her best to obey everything he demanded. Tracy was right, however, and he needed to honor her effort. She was not drinking, and did everything to avoid it. She came by work to see him and talk with him and be with him maybe because it was her way of trying to build a relationship outside of the bedroom. Something they never did before.

  The thing was: his waning interest about sex with her silenced him and pretty soon, he didn’t have anything to say to her. They were nothing alike. They didn’t see the world the same from work to child-rearing. There wasn’t an ounce of humor or chemistry that connected them beyond sexual gratification. Yes, they still had that, and he hated himself for it. But that remained. Love? He couldn’t say he felt that for her. Not even a little bit. She didn’t get his jokes. She didn’t look up and meet his gaze, or share a secret smile over something sweet or cute that Julia did. They didn’t argue and feel invigorated afterwards. Instead, he usually just found himself rolling his eyes in annoyance at her.

  Tracy made him feel all those things now. Despite how distant and remote as they had to interact now, under the watchful eyes of her mother, Vickie and Xavier, they were rarely alone; and even so, he could glance at Tracy, and accidentally catch her eye and read exactly what she was thinking or feeling by just her reaction or smile.

  He knew Tracy always left the office when Vickie shut the shades. He knew she tried extra hard to talk to Vickie and visit her at home with Julia. He knew she avoided coming within five feet of him, and was physically relieved when he didn’t talk or look at her. He knew why too, because Tracy felt what he felt.

  He just wished he could stop wanting it that way between them.

  That made it as convoluted as the entire situation. Why did he ask her to work for him? It was something he contemplated for days and weeks. After mentioning it to Vickie, she all but ordered him to hire Tracy. That resulted in a bad case of heartburn. How could he not feel like shit, when his fresh-out-of-rehab wife got so excited to learn he would hire her sister? The sister he spent so much time with. Way too much time with. Still, how did he manage to work with Tracy every day?

  As it turned out, by doing the same thing he did when he dropped Julia off with her. He pretended nothing changed between them.

  It turned out he was a better actor than a husband.

  ****

  It was April and Donny glanced up from configuring a local manufacturer’s website when he noticed Tracy looking down. It seemed as if she were in a trance at seeing something on her desk. He waited for her to return to her work, but she didn’t. She stared at it for five minutes. Ten. Twenty. Finally, after an hour of her sitting there almost catatonic, he got up.

  “Tracy? What is it?” He leaned his shoulder against his office door and nodded towards her desk.

  She lifted her face to his, and her expression was tragic. Stricken. Her freckles stood out against her stark pallor. He fisted his hands at his sides to restrain himself from walking forward to put his arms around her. “I’m… divorced. Turns out, if a person is missing, he can still get divorced. All I had to do was prove due diligence to locate him, which I did. I put all this into motion. I physically took the steps to make this happen, so why am I so shocked now that it did? Oh my God, I divorced Micah.” She uttered the last so quietly, it was almost to herself. She bent forward and dropped her forehead onto her desk. Then, her shoulders both shook as she tried to restrain her tears.

  He didn’t know what to do. He glanced back and saw Xavier wasn’t sitting in his office. He came around her desk and touched a hand to her shoulder in a soft, platonic “I’m here for you,” kind of way.

  “Isn’t this what you wanted?”

  Her body shook harder and a sound came out. It was muffled from where she buried her face on her desk. “I know… on with the tears again.”

  He sighed. He flung that barb at her rudely before. “Come on. It’s okay to cry over the desertion of your dozen odd years of marriage. I’m sorry I said that.”

  “He’s just still gone. I got on with my life and stopped being catatonic or crying. I take care of my kids and myself now. I work even. I do the errands, and most of the stuff he used to handle, I now handle. I’m getting almost functional as a single, working mother. But then it all hits me as fresh as the first moment you read me that note. He really left me. I still just don’t know how that happened to me. That wasn’t supposed to be my life. We were supposed to grow old together, and watch our girls graduate from high school. And suffer when they left for college or moved out for jobs. We were supposed to go through the empty nest stuff together. We were supposed to get years and years to discover a new ‘us’ without young kids. And then he was supposed to retire while we were still young and healthy, so we could travel to all the places we didn’t while raising our girls. That was supposed to be my life. Not… this. He’s a crook, who left me.”

  Ignoring all the responsible boundaries he erected during the last few months, Donny also ignored the best advice and best plans. He set his hands on her shoulders and nearly physically lifted her onto her feet and brought her to his chest. Her head rested well below his chin. She was stiff at first and kept her hands at her side. He simply hugged her and she finally leaned into him. Her body seemed to sag and bow, conforming to his. He felt her hands eventually touching his lower back and creeping up to grip it in a suddenly needy manner. Her body shook as she cried.

  He lowered his mouth to just above her ear and tried to soothe her. He didn’t even really say anything, but kind of murmured nonsensically. He had no idea what to say to a woman who was abandoned by her husba
nd. Or what to say to the woman he wanted to hold like this, but had no right to. Or what to do with the tight knot of grief that lodged in his throat or the feelings of pain that encircled his heart. What hurt so much? Was it just sympathy for Tracy? Or because he wanted to be holding her? Or because he might have feelings for the one woman he could never be with? What would cause his own feelings to lodge like a chunk of bread in his throat? Of late, he felt nothing. He’d been doing a good job of staying neutral towards Vickie. He encouraged her. He was polite and kind to her. He tried not to watch her like a parent ready for her to screw up. He tried to give her time and space, all while being supportive. He’d been trying as hard as he could to feel like he should.

  The problem was, feeling the touch of Tracy’s small hand on his back set his entire body on high alert. It was like a loaded gun was suddenly aimed at his head. But in a good way, even though it should not have felt good. Every inch of his skin and sensitive nerve endings seemed to heighten and stir at Tracy’s contact. Her effect on him was physical, mental and emotional.

  He hated himself far worse than anyone else ever could. He did nothing more, however. He didn’t touch his lips to her temple like he was only a hair’s breadth away from doing. He didn’t push her back and press his lips over hers like his entire body seemed ready to do.

  Instead, he just held her and soothed her and let her cry, trying to ignore how she was ripping him apart.

  The storefront doorbell jingled. He stiffened and lifted his head from hers. He expected Jo Ryland, a client he scheduled an afternoon appointment with. But shit. No. It was Vickie.

  “What happened?” Vickie immediately crossed around Tracy’s desk and nearly pushed Donny out of the way as she wrapped Tracy in her embrace. He didn’t know what to feel: annoyed as hell that his wife just shoved him; or amazed that Vickie was totally unfazed to find him holding her sister? It felt right and good and natural. Why would Vickie care? He did nothing wrong. It was all innocent, and should’ve been observed as innocent. Of course, Vickie didn’t care.