Riders on the Storm (Waiting for the Sun #2)

by Robin Hill

  “Anabel’s picture,” I choke out. “It was in my jewelry box.” The tears that’d been building spill over. “It fell off the dresser and broke. Her picture was in the lining.”

  Jane’s quiet for a moment, and then I hear a small gasp. “Are you talking about the newspaper clipping?”

  I nod absently. “He’s so angry, Jane.”

  “Oh, honey, you kept that? You told me your dad made you get rid of it.”

  “I didn’t,” I say. “I couldn’t.” I swipe at my wet cheeks with the cuff of my robe. “It was so long ago. I didn’t even remember—”

  “And Darian still doesn’t know anything…”

  No, because I didn’t listen to you.

  “He thinks I lied to him. He thinks…”

  “He’s confused,” Jane says. “He probably doesn’t know what to think.”

  “What have I done, Jane? What am I going to do?”

  “Just give him time, sweetie. Right now, that’s all you can do.”

  Another hour passes with no word from Darian.

  “Where are you?” I mumble to myself as I cover the pot of soup on the stove.

  I cooked, as if dinner will somehow guilt him into talking to me when he comes home.

  If he comes home.

  With nothing else to do, I resume pacing. My gaze volleys between the limestone floor and the clock, ticking so loudly in the quiet house that I begin walking in time to it. After I make several laps around the island, the doorbell rings and I nearly jump out of my skin. It’s an alarming sound to hear so late at night.

  “Frankie!” a voice calls from the forecourt. “It’s Drew. Can you get the door?”

  Drew?

  My feet take off in a sprint. I yank open the door to find Drew leaning against the banister on the front porch…and Darian leaning against Drew.

  “What happened?” I ask, rushing to grab Darian’s arm that’s swinging lifelessly at his side and drape it over my shoulder.

  “Somebody’s been holding out on me,” Darian sings, mimicking the slimy pap from this morning. I shudder.

  “He’s fine,” Drew says as we drag him across the threshold. “Drunk, but fine.”

  “And he doesn’t need your help,” Darian slurs, jerking away from us. He stumbles forward into the small foyer table, knocking his beautiful Delft vase to the floor. It shatters on impact. He laughs and kicks at the broken pieces. “Damn, I’m on a roll today.”

  “Yes, you are,” Drew says, guiding him away from the mess. He stops at the base of the stairs and peers back at me as he hoists Darian up to get a better grip on him. “Just help me get him into bed?”

  A smirk curls Darian’s lips. “Why didn’t you say so?” he says, reaching back for me. “Come on, Penny Lane. Take me to bed.”

  I wince. God knows what he told Drew. Steeling my resolve, I take his hand and wrap my arm around his waist.

  “Did you know I have a groupie?” Darian says to Drew.

  “So I’ve heard.”

  “I think you need a groupie.” His foot catches on a step and he falls forward, landing on his hands and knees. He laughs a little but is otherwise unfazed. “You can hook him up, right, Penny?”

  Drew eyes me over Darian’s back and mouths, Who’s Penny?

  Almost Famous, I mouth back. The movie?

  Ohh…

  With effort, we manage to get Darian to the bed. He sits on the edge, hands tightly clenching the mattress as anger rolls off of him in waves.

  “Can you get some aspirin out of the medicine cabinet?” I ask Drew, kneeling to take off Darian’s shoes.

  Drew leaves and Darian’s gaze turns heated, his smile wanton. “Now we’re talkin’.”

  “Don’t really think you’re up for that,” I say, trying to make light of his lewd comments and derisive tone.

  “You’d be surprised what I’m up for.” He touches his thumb to my bottom lip. “But maybe wait until buzzkill goes home.”

  “Buzzkill isn’t going anywhere,” Drew calls from the bathroom.

  My cheeks burn with embarrassment, and I stand quickly.

  “Take this,” Drew says, returning to the bed with a couple of pills and a glass of water. He sets both on the nightstand. “Or don’t. It’s your fucking hangover. Frankie, I’ll be downstairs. Yell if you need anything.”

  Darian snickers. “You hear yelling, you might want to knock first.”

  Drew leaves, and I brace myself for more of Darian’s vitriol, but instead, I get his silence. Two excruciating minutes pass before I end it. “You should take those,” I say, gesturing to the aspirin.

  He does without argument, without so much as a word, and then he turns his gaze to the dresser where the remnants of my jewelry box lie. His eyes shine in the mirror and my heart breaks to see the pain in them.

  “Darian…”

  “Don’t.”

  “If you’d just let me explain…”

  He pulls off his T-shirt, then stands shakily and steps out of his shorts, revealing my favorite smiling taco boxers. Our eyes lock for what feels like an eternity before he tears his gaze away and lies down beneath the covers with his back to me.

  “Darian, please…” My voice breaks as tears spill over my lashes. “Talk to me.”

  “Goodnight, Francesca.”

  I find Drew in the foyer sweeping up the broken vase.

  “You didn’t have to do that,” I say, stepping over a pile to get to the dustpan. I squat to collect the pieces.

  “I don’t mind. You’ve got enough to deal with as it is.” He holds open a garbage bag and I dump the remnants inside. “I think I got it all, but you might want to run a vacuum tomorrow to be sure.”

  “I will, thanks.” I take the bag from him and set it by the door. “Hungry?”

  “Starving.”

  In the kitchen, Drew sits at the island, and I serve him a bowl of chicken noodle soup. I pop open a couple of beers and take a long pull of one as I hand him the other.

  “Thanks. I needed this.” He taps the neck of his bottle to mine and takes a swig. “And thanks for dinner. I can’t remember the last time I had a home-cooked meal.”

  “You should come around more often. The trashcan gets a home-cooked meal about once a week.”

  “I take it things have been pretty crazy at the label?”

  I nod. “But what those things are is anyone’s guess. Where was he tonight?” I ask, holding my bottle to my chest as I lean back against the sink. “I assumed that’s where he went.”

  “He was at my place,” Drew says. “By the time I got there, he was almost a bottle in. I tried to get him to stay, but he wasn’t having it.”

  “He actually wanted to come home?”

  “He demanded it.” Drew smiles. “He loves you, Frankie. I don’t know what’s going on with you two, but whatever it is, it’s temporary. His feelings for you are permanent.”

  I take a sip of my beer. “I’m not so sure about that.”

  “Look at this place,” he says and inhales deeply. “God, just smell it. It’s always been a nice house, but with you here, it’s a home. I know what that means to him.”

  “I hope so,” I say. “I’m trying, but…”

  “But?”

  “I’m worried about him. He’s been under a lot of stress, and it’s almost impossible to get him to talk about it.”

  “That’s Darian for you. Always been that way.” He chuckles. “He did the same thing with Julia. Used to make her crazy.”

  A slow smile spreads on my lips. “That actually makes me feel better. I was beginning to think it was me.”

  “It’s definitely not you.” He picks up his beer, then sets it down again. “You said he’s been stressed. Do you have any idea why? I mean…this is probably going to sound weird, but has he said anything to you about a TV show?”

  “A TV show? No. What did he say to you?”

  “Not much. He was vague. He wen
t back and forth between cursing some TV show and calling you…”

  “His groupie?” I laugh, even though my eyes water. The moniker hurts.

  “Yeah. What’s that about?”

  “I know he loves me”—or loved me—“but right now, I don’t think he likes me very much.”

  Drew lifts the bottle to his lips and takes a swallow. “I’ll let you in on a little secret. Just after the crash, when everything was still so new, Darian used to call me Judas.”

  “Judas? What on earth for?”

  “He had many reasons, I’m sure, but I believe the main one was my refusal to let him wither away.”

  “Wither away?” I bring my hand to my neck. “Was he…”

  “Oh, no. Nothing that severe,” Drew says quickly. “That was the silver lining of his guilt. He was determined to suffer for what he thought he’d done, and he had to be alive to do it.” He pushes his bowl to the side and leans forward, resting his folded arms on the bar. “Only, his version of living was barely surviving, and I think, had he gotten his way, he would have killed himself without even meaning to.”

  “I’m so glad he had you,” I say and add with a small smile, “but I’m sorry you had to be Judas.”

  Drew shrugs. “He was hurting and he was angry—mostly with himself—which gutted me to watch. If my being his Judas directed some of that anger away from him, well, small price to pay and all that.” He clears his throat. “What about you? How did you become Penny Lane?”

  I set my bottle on the counter beside me and slide my hands in my pockets. “Did he tell you what happened today? With Anabel’s picture?”

  “I think he tried,” he says, “but he wasn’t making much sense.”

  I worry my bottom lip between my teeth. “Where to begin…”

  Drew straightens and pushes the corner barstool toward me with his foot. “The beginning is as good a place as any.” He smiles warmly at me. “Come sit.”

  I take the seat beside him, and with my shoulders squared and my fingers steepled on the granite, I tell him the story—the one I’ve been telling myself for the past ten years. That I was a little girl, barely twelve years old, and that I’d seen a scary news report on TV that had given me nightmares. That I was so frightened by them, I developed a fear of flying. That I was so sad for the child who died that I got out a pair of scissors and clipped her picture from the newspaper.

  Drew doesn’t interrupt, and aside from a twitch of his lips, he doesn’t even react. He sits patiently with his arms crossed—like he’s waiting for me to finish. As if he knows there’s more.

  And there is more, isn’t there?

  Mom…

  The thought comes unbidden, knocking the wind out of me.

  “I’d just lost my mother,” I whisper brokenly, and then the words spill from me in a rush, as if they’ve been waiting all this time to come out. “I was so angry with her. Her death was senseless and selfish, and I felt cheated, and when I saw the story on the news…

  “They showed footage of the three of them together on the beach, and I…I don’t know. It struck a chord. That used to be us before my mother…changed. And that’s when it hit me that she was really gone, and we’d never be together like that again.”

  Drew passes me his napkin and I accept it gratefully, blotting my tear-filled eyes. “I didn’t want to miss her. And I refused to grieve for her, so I grieved for Anabel instead. I know how insane that sounds. It is insane. But I was so young and confused, and I had all these emotions inside of me that I didn’t know what to do with, so I bottled them up until”—a sob tears out of me—“until I couldn’t take it anymore.”

  The legs of Drew’s barstool squeal against the tile floor as he pushes out of it. Without a word, he retrieves a stack of napkins from the pantry and sets them in front of me. Then he gives my shoulder a squeeze and returns to his chair.

  I dry my cheeks with a fresh napkin and crumble it in my fist before setting my hands in my lap. “Thank you.”

  The kitchen falls silent except for the ever-ticking clock that seems to get louder and louder as the minutes pass. I make a mental note to replace it. Clocks should be soundless, I muse, then wonder if I’ll be around long enough to do it. My chest tightens.

  “It isn’t insane,” Drew says finally. “Remember what I do for a living, so believe me when I say it isn’t insane, okay?”

  I nod.

  “Now, the rest of it? Crossing paths the way you did? That’s insane.” A slight smile flits across his face, but he’s quick to shake it off. “And you should have told him.”

  “I know. I just didn’t know how. I had no idea who he was—not until I googled him.” I sink low in my chair. “And at that point, there was no point. We were going our separate ways.”

  “But you didn’t.”

  “Everything happened so fast after that. It never felt like the right time.”

  “I get that, Frankie,” Drew says gently, “but you have to get why he jumped to the conclusion he did. Not having anything to draw from but his own imagination.” He swallows. “Seeing her picture like that…”

  “I do get it,” I say, reaching for another napkin. “And I want to fix it, but what if it’s too late? I can’t even get him to talk to me, and even if I could, why would he believe me?”

  “Because he wants to,” Drew says. “More than anything, he wants to.”

  When Drew leaves, I put the uneaten pot of soup in the refrigerator and head upstairs. I check on Darian, then slip quietly across the landing to my office and curl up on the couch.

  The gravity of the day catches up with me, and my whole body aches with it. It’s like lying beneath a sheet of lead. It hurts to breathe. It even hurts to swallow.

  What have I done?

  I should’ve listened to Jane. I know that now. But God, if it weren’t for that picture…

  Hiding the newspaper clipping in my jewelry box was a rash decision. It’s not that I wanted to keep it; it’s that I couldn’t bring myself to throw it away. So the location wasn’t important. And the truth is, if I’d been asked to produce it, I don’t think it would’ve occurred to me to look there.

  “It doesn’t matter now,” I whisper into the soft chenille of the throw pillow I’m lying on.

  I close my eyes, eventually drifting off, and the next morning, I wake blissfully unaware—until I remember where I am and why I’m there. The ache I fell asleep with slowly creeps in, and I burrow deeper into the blanket—the blanket I didn’t have last night.

  The gesture gives me hope.

  I spend the first part of the day pacing, the second part staring at my phone. But Darian never calls, and after the whole blanket thing this morning, I kind of thought he would. At the very least, I expected to find a note.

  This sucks.

  At midafternoon, I venture downstairs to put last night’s soup on the stove to warm and heat up a loaf of bread. Within an hour, the kitchen fills with the aroma of roasted chicken and sourdough.

  It smells homey, I think, remembering Drew’s comment from last night.

  Good job, Frankie! Darian will smell your leftover soup, and all will be forgiven.

  But my misguided optimism plummets at the sound of Darian’s loud, angry voice as he comes in from the garage.

  “Because it’s my goddamn company, Amanda!”

  The door closes with enough force to make me flinch. I glance up at the clock from my place at the island where I’ve been stationed the last couple of hours, waiting.

  Waiting for nothing, apparently.

  “I’m not disagreeing with you, but I don’t need this shit right now. Dammit, Amanda, can you please just work with me on this?”

  He stops when he sees me, stares at me from the edge of the family room. He’s dressed in light gray pants and a white button-down, a matching coat stuffed in the crook of his arm.

  Must’ve had a meeting, I muse, taking in the ensemble. One that clearly
didn’t go his way.

  “I know, I know. You’re right, but that doesn’t change anything,” he says, his tone softer now. “We have to move forward. Are you still at the office? … I had something I had to take care of. … Don’t worry about it. … Give me an hour. And send everyone home; the last thing we need is an audience—look, Cline’s beeping in. … Okay, I’ll see you soon.”

  So much for our talk.

  I hop off the barstool and stand behind it. Darian’s eyes stay locked on me as he takes the new call.

  “Cline, what’ve you got?” he says and then tears his gaze away as he walks through the kitchen and down the hall.

  Against my better judgment, I follow him.

  “Offer whatever it takes.” We’re halfway up the stairs when Darian stops abruptly and pounds the wall with his fist. “I don’t care about the money!”

  The few framed photos I’ve hung rattle on their hooks, but thankfully, nothing falls. Darian continues on to the bedroom, and I slip inside my office, thinking maybe I should sit this one out.

  “Jesus! Fuck, Cline! Just make it go away!”

  The door to the master slams shut, and I plop down on the couch, pulling the blanket over me like a shield. Twenty tension-filled minutes pass before Darian comes out again. Our eyes catch briefly, and then he turns and goes back into the room. I take it as an invitation.

  “Did you need something?” he says calmly but icily when I enter.

  I sit on the edge of the bed and watch him in the mirror as he trades out his watch. He’s changed in to a pair of jeans and the Metallica T-shirt I hate, and I wonder if it’s intentional.

  “I need—we need—to talk.” My gaze sweeps over the pieces of my jewelry box still on the dresser and stops on the picture of Anabel. “I want to explain.”

  Darian picks up the clipping and stares at it until his eyes dampen. “Here’s what I need explained, Francesca,” he says, lifting his gaze to mine. He sets the picture down and taps it lightly. “This is an actual piece of newspaper, not a printout from the internet. So either you went out of your way to get it after we met, or you’ve had it all these years. From the looks of it, I’m guessing the latter.”