“Do you see what I mean, Charlie?” Ahmed says, balling up his wrapper and tossing it into the trash. “He can’t pull something like this off.”
I keep my head down and concentrate on finishing off my food, feeling both of them stare at me, waiting for me to protest. But I’m not going to. They’re both right—it isn’t the worst idea, nor is it something I’m likely to pull off.
When I stand from my seat, clearing my trash and theirs, I catch Charlie nudging Ahmed’s elbow. No doubt they’re doing their own silent commiseration now—I’m the odd one out, again, as it should be. As much as Charlie and Ahmed rag on each other, there’s genuine affection there, the kind where they know details about each other’s families and occasionally hang out outside of work, and that’s the kind of shit I am still, and probably forever, avoiding. It’s clear that I’m rattled by what happened with Zoe, or else I never would’ve opened my fucking mouth in the first place, a thoughtless response to Ahmed’s endless questions about the camp, about whether I was ready for next weekend.
“I’m going to check the rig,” I say, not looking back at them as I head into the bay. There’s nothing to check, not really—when we came on duty we did all our procedures—but I need some space. I climb into the back of the ambulance, pull the eTablet down from its tray, and open up inventory lists—the kind of mindless task that seems good for me right now. I’m counting syringes, pads of gauze, bags of saline, whatever, losing myself in the work. But I’m not as lost as I want to be, not so distracted that I’m not still thinking of her, and everything that’s brought her into my life. Your family went through something terrible, she’d said, and I’d felt a new wave of frustration at that. As one of the lawyers who’d worked on behalf of Opryxa, she knows it all, the whole terrible story: my brother, an opioid addict since he was twenty, not long after he got prescribed prescription painkillers after a minor car crash. My brother, in and out of rehab since he was twenty-three, long, expensive stays that had bankrupted my parents twice, had prevented me from ever getting to more than a thousand bucks in savings. My brother, prescribed another drug, one that would help him kick the habit.
A drug that killed him at the age of twenty-nine.
I’d read every single correspondence from Willis-Hanawalt. I knew what they’d argued about my brother. I knew the carefully phrased liabilities they’d acknowledged when proposing settlements. I knew the ugly digging they’d done about his past, the way they’d made it seem like Aaron was likely to die anyway, was always an unlikely candidate for success in pharmaceutical treatment of addiction. I knew now how hard they’d worked to settle individual cases, to prevent class action suits. To bury the extent of Opryxa’s risk factors. I knew that my parents had agreed, once they took the settlement, to release them of all liability.
I’d seen her name on all that correspondence, and it gives her a strange, uncomfortable power over me, all she knows about my family. I don’t know whether she’s made the worst, most painful connection between Aaron and me, and I don’t know whether I want to know. But it’s Aaron I have to keep in my mind here, Aaron who’s at the front. Aaron who I’m doing all this for, and I’ll do anything. It’s the attitude I should’ve had when he was still alive, and it’s the attitude that’ll make it possible for me to do what I have to do with Zoe Ferris, to pretend to be in love with her.
And there it is, the alarm letting us know we’ve got a call in, and I can already hear Charlie and Ahmed hustling out to the bay.
I try not to take it as an omen.
Chapter 3
Zoe
At 7:00 a.m. the next Saturday morning, I’m waiting outside my building, my backpack at my feet and a bag of breakfast goodies in one hand, purchased from the same Starbucks where I dished out early-morning abuse as a snippy, work-obsessed caffeine hound. I’m still getting the side-eye from the regular morning barista, a college kid I now know is named Joseph, but ever since I showed up a few days ago, waited patiently in line, and apologized for giving everyone so much hell, it seems like a thaw is in the offing. I don’t even worry that someone’s spitting in my espresso as vengeance.
Now if only I could stop worrying about what I’m waiting out here for. I’ve dressed in what I have determined is camp-appropriate clothing, though I imagine that somewhere in my combination of hiking boots, jeans, and long-sleeved knit top, I’ve managed to get something wrong. No doubt the first of many things I’ll screw up on this initial outing, but judging by Aiden’s brief email—Go ahead and be yourself. Let’s not make this harder—he wouldn’t expect anything else.
My phone pings with a text from Greer, sent to both Kit and me, part of a long strand of a group text we keep constantly going to check in with each other. Are you nervous? she asks. I think about sending a bunch of those emoji faces with the clenched teeth, because I am nervous, but good thing I don’t, because Kit’s reply comes before mine, all caps: YOU SHOULD CALL THIS OFF. When I’d finally worked up the courage to tell them about this, the Sunday after I’d gone to see Aiden, Kit had nearly exploded with shock. “You can’t go out into the wilderness with some guy who basically hates you,” she’d said, her voice rising with each word. “This is a ridiculous idea! This isn’t adventure, Zoe. It’s self-immolation.”
“Kit,” I’d said, calmly, trying to keep the volume down. “You are really ratcheting up the drama.”
“I think she means,” Greer had said, “that we thought you might do something a little more—of your own choosing?”
“I do a lot of things of my own choosing,” I’d said. “Maybe that’s the problem.”
I hadn’t told my friends about my late-night guilt jar making, hadn’t told them that my lottery-night wish for adventure wasn’t really my heart’s desire. But everyone knows you can’t buy forgiveness. Everyone knows you have to work for it, and this thing I’m doing with Aiden? This is working for it.
All this week, I’ve been preparing. I got a camping wardrobe, sure, but I’d mostly been mentally preparing. Aiden may have told me to be myself, but I think the trick is I need to be a better version of myself. Friendlier. More flexible. Warm and polite. I almost tailed Greer to her classes to see how she manages it, but I figured that’d be crossing a line. The bag o’ breakfast stuff is a good start, a peace offering for Aiden, but I also need to remember to smile more, to lay off the snark. Also it would be good if I stay upright this time around.
I close my eyes, thinking again of that awful attempted apology, the moment I’d fainted, and the unfamiliar, shuddery feeling I got when he looked right at me. I think of him walking to my car, after we’d settled the details, the way he’d watched every step I took, and the way he’d scanned my face before I drove off. He made me feel like I was transparent, like he could see straight through every one of my finely polished pretenses. At least this first weekend is a short one, Saturday morning to Sunday noon; after this we’ll be heading to Stanton Valley on Fridays.
My phone pings again, Kit a second time. Why aren’t you answering?! I smile down at the phone, appreciating her concern, however neurotic. I’m fine, I type out. Remember, he checked out. You have all the contact numbers. Once I’d gotten Aiden’s number, and the numbers associated with the camp, I’d given them all to both Greer and Kit. And it was true that Aiden had checked out, though that was probably an understatement—my investigator turned up a squeaky clean record, but he’d also been two grades ahead of Aiden in school, and knew him and the family, had said everyone knew Aiden O’Leary as a stand-up guy, one of the best. There’d only been a few short pages to the report, showing that Aiden had been a licensed paramedic for eight years, that he had one speeding ticket, that he’d lived in Wisconsin, and then Colorado, before moving back here a little over six months ago.
I take a deep breath, send another text. I’ll be okay. Not nervous. I add a thumbs-up emoji, which is probably suspicious; I don’t think I’ve ever used a thumbs-up emoji, but oh well.
Right then, an older-model, d
ark green SUV pulls up alongside the curb. I tuck my phone into my back pocket and reach down for my bag, hearing a door slam. Here goes, I think, and arrange what I hope is a smile on my face when I look up at him. He is…not returning the gesture, instead wearing that same forbidding, stern expression he had before. “Why don’t you let me take that,” he says, gesturing to my bag, not really a question, and I’ve got to remind myself: Try to get along. Six weekends will be six thousand times worse if this guy quietly hates you the whole time.
“Sure, thanks,” I say, handing it over.
Once we’re both strapped in, pulling away from the curb, it becomes painfully clear that we’ve not managed to say any additional words to each other. Aiden is staring straight ahead, way too much focus given the fact that there are very few cars out and about, and as for me—well, I’m pressed so far against the passenger door that I sort of feel like I should offer to buy it dinner. I inhale quietly, gathering courage, and shift so that I’m less awkwardly arranged, then reach down to where I put the white paper bag.
“I brought a couple of donuts,” I say, my voice sounding unnaturally loud in the quiet car. “But I didn’t know if you’d like those, so I brought a muffin, too. And a bagel.”
“I already ate.”
Warm and polite, I think, like a mantra. “Well, maybe you’ll want some later,” I say. “Take it from me, right? You don’t want to get woozy on the road.”
No response.
I set the bag down by my feet, ridiculously disappointed. Both because I wanted that to work, and also I sort of wanted a donut. My stomach, traitorously, growls.
“You can eat,” he says.
“Maybe in a bit.”
I think he might—I don’t know what. Grunt? This drive is going to take forever.
“So,” I venture again, “your email mentioned that I should—you know. Be myself?” I hate the way I’ve done that, the way I’ve hitched my voice up into a question. I used to counsel first years at my firm about that—Be declarative. It projects confidence. I clear my throat, make another attempt. “But it may be easier if myself—well, if myself knows yourself a little better. For the purposes of this thing we’re doing.”
If myself knows yourself? Less a projection of confidence than of complete idiocy.
“You had your background check done?” he asks.
“Yes, but—”
“Then you know the basics.”
Well!
“But if this is going to be convincing, we should know some things that couples know. Favorite foods, TV shows, that kind of thing.”
He adjusts his hand on the steering wheel, grips it a little tighter before loosening his fingers again. “I don’t think we’ll get around to talking about stuff like that. We’ll be busy.”
“Okay, but if we show up and it’s this awkward—”
“Fine. You can tell me your basics. Where you’re from, that kind of thing. You know more about me than I know about you.”
That’s a painful truth between us—I not only know what I know from the background check, but I also know too much about what has to be the worst tragedy of his life.
“I’m originally from Pasadena,” I say, trying to keep my voice light. “My mother still lives there.” Stick to the basics, I remind myself. “I went to USC for undergrad. UVA for law school, and moved here right after. I worked at Willis-Hanawalt until—well, you know. But probably you don’t want to mention anything about where I worked. You can say—I guess you can just say I’m a lawyer, if it comes up.”
“But you’re not a lawyer now.”
“I’m still a lawyer. I’m just not practicing,” I say, surprisingly defensive. Aside from a little informal work I’ve done for Greer over the past few months, I haven’t really thought of myself as a lawyer, not since I quit the firm. But once, being a lawyer was so much of my identity that I had hardly any room for anything else.
“What do you do all day, anyway?”
There it is again, the most incisive question he could have asked. I entirely ignore it.
“The two most important people in my life are my best friends, Kit and Greer. I met them when I first moved here and they’re like my family. They both have your number. Kit’s a research scientist, and Greer’s recently gone back to college. I’m missing six of our weekly Sunday brunches for this,” I add, uselessly. It’s not because I’m trying to complain, though I realize now that’s how it sounds. It’s struck me, suddenly—I miss them already. They’re my anchors, more so now than before the jackpot, and I feel more than a little at sea driving away from them.
“What a shame,” he deadpans. “Missing brunch.”
I fold my hands tightly in my lap, clamp my mouth shut and feel my molars grind together. I can’t imagine the next two hours like this, let alone the next six weeks.
After a while, I get up the courage not to initiate conversation but at least to manage the crushing silence. “Should we put on some music?”
“Doesn’t matter,” he says, and just because he is being so recalcitrant, so sullen and walled off when that is entirely counterproductive to our mission, I feel a streak of belligerence. I feel the opposite of warm and friendly. I lean over and turn the knob, tune to the most irritating station I know, the one with the guffawing morning show hosts and the same ten pop songs in constant rotation.
“Oh, listen to this,” I say, dramatically, when the electronic beat fills the car. “This is a song, I believe, about a young man who doesn’t mind a woman with small breasts, so long as she has a larger than average posterior. What a delight! Already I feel so encouraged by this song, which is obviously a femin—”
He leans over and shuts it off.
I pause, letting the moment stretch. “Is it because you do not share a fondness for a large—”
“Zoe,” he says, and I clamp my mouth shut. That is definitely the first time he has said my name. It sounds like a different name the way he says it—a gruff exhalation. “Is this you being yourself?” For a flash, nothing more than a second or two, he slides his eyes my way, then snaps them back to the road. “Because I remember you being a little more—reserved.”
I shrug, reaching over to turn on the radio again, though not quite as loud this time. “I’m a woman of many contradictions, Aiden,” I say, trying for levity. “Much like our friend the pop star here.”
He doesn’t even blink in reaction.
It’s going to be a long six weeks.
For the rest of the drive, we’re mostly quiet. I offer something from the goody bag again when I finally give in and go for a donut, and Aiden takes the other. This alone feels like an Olympic-size victory, like maybe it’ll crack open some reservoir of conversation, but nope. The next time Aiden speaks, it’s to point out to me that we’re in a small town called Coleville, only about fifteen minutes outside Stanton Valley.
“There’s a drugstore and a small grocery,” he says. “You need to stop for anything before we head on?”
I do kind of want to stop—Coleville looks lovely, a half-mile main street dotted with small, quaint shops, the sidewalk liberally dotted with elaborate planters full of blooming chrysanthemums and trailing ivy. It’d be a nice place to stroll around, get some small town flavor. But since my companion doesn’t much seem like a stroller, I pass.
And then it’s straight on to Stanton Valley, the road becoming more wooded, more narrow as we approach. When we’re about two miles away, I notice the signs—old, painted wood with Stanton Valley Campground carved into them, arrows pointing the way. When we reach a tall, wide wooden arch, Welcome Home carved across the top, I brace myself, thinking we’ll pull in and be there, but it’s another mile of bumpy terrain, dust and gravel kicking up all around us. Aiden, if it’s possible, seems even more tense than before, the kind of tense that you can feel radiating off a person. I sneak a look over at him, notice the clench of his jaw, the corded muscle of his forearm as he again tightens then loosens his grip on the wheel.
&nb
sp; We pull into a dusty lot where there’s only two other cars, both pickup trucks. Through the windshield, I can see a large, two-story lodge, paneled with rounded, honey-colored wood, like the whole thing has been built with perfectly halved tree trunks. There’s a porch running the length of it, the railings bulky and rustic, including those that line the big stone stairway rising up to the lodge’s front door.
“This is really—” I begin, ducking a little for a better look, but I’m startled by Aiden’s arm reaching over to pop open the glove box in front of me. I shift, so there’s more room between my knees and the panel, and he grumbles out an apology before reaching in and grabbing something he encloses in his fist, popping the door closed again with the side of it.
He clears his throat and sets his hand down on the bench seat between us. When he lifts it, there’s a small box there, old, faded blue velvet.
A ring box.
Oh, no, I think, my stomach turning over. This is too much. There is not one single thing that would make me want to bolt more than this moment.
“It’s not a diamond or anything,” he says. “But you should have a ring for this.”
“Right,” I say, perfectly calm. I wipe my hands on my jeans, steadying them, before reaching one over to pick up the box. He cannot know how awful a moment like this would be for me, and he never will, so I keep my face as placid as I can as I open it.
It’s a thin, yellow gold band, a plain setting for a small, ivory pearl. It’s beautifully simple, nothing fussy about it. I want to ask him where he got it, why he didn’t spring for some cheap CZ at the department store. This looks like an heirloom, far too personal for what we’re doing here. “Thank you,” is all I manage, and he waits quietly while I take it out and slide it onto my finger, an almost perfect fit. I feel as if I’ve been collared. Brought to heel.
Luck of the Draw Page 4
