Chasing Charlie

by C. M. Newman

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT: UNINVITED

  “We could have stopped for lunch,” Vince said for the fourth time when Angela walked into the apartment with him, complaining about how she was starving. She carried a plastic container with a large piece of cake from a nearby bakery—another measure taken in the interest of not shirking every tradition.

  “Once we eat this puppy, I’ll be happy,” Angela said, stepping out of her shoes. “How’d that picture turn out, by the way?”

  Vince took out his phone and pulled up the picture he’d taken of them next to a bare tree outside the church. “You look stunning,” he said.

  Angela smiled. “As do you.” She squeezed Vince’s chin between her thumb and finger and pulled him in for a kiss.

  “I can’t believe I didn’t shave,” Vince murmured.

  “I’m glad you didn’t think to.” Angela’s grumbling stomach begged to be fed, sending them both into a fit of laughter. “I can’t believe my stomach growled during our wedding. It was what, five minutes long?”

  “It was kind of funny to see you trying to ignore it. I’ll be remembering that look for a long time.”

  “Yeah, yeah, hilarious. Grab a couple of forks and a plate and I’ll start up the fireplace.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Soon they were nestled up on the couch, their favorite throw covering their legs and feet as they dug into their one piece of wedding cake. Angela held up her first forkful to Vince’s lips, and he held up one finger to signify how many times he would let Angela feed him. “‘S a lotta chocolate,” he said with his mouth still half full.

  “Too much?” Angela asked apprehensively.

  “Too much chocolate? No. Too much cake?” Vince said, eying what they still had to eat. “Possibly.”

  “Well, whatever you don’t finish, I will,” Angela promised. She parted her lips for a bite of cake from Vince and had to lick some leftover frosting off her lips. She then thanked him for not shoving the cake in her face. They were halfway through the rest of the cake, now feeding themselves and in utter bliss, when Vince suddenly set a hand on his stomach.

  “Nauseous?” Angela asked immediately, having seen Vince’s signal of distress. He slowly shut his eyes and nodded. “I’m sorry, this is probably a sugar overload for you. Not the best thing for your stomach. I’ll go get one of your pills.”

  “I’ve got it,” Vince said, but Angela was already halfway down the hall before he could even get up. He surrendered and waited.

  “You’re all out,” Angela said when she came back down the hall with an empty bottle. “I thought you called in for a refill on these,” she said, already putting her shoes back on.

  “I did. I’ve been meaning to go in; I just keep getting distracted. Come sit down. I’ll go get them.”

  “You look like you’re ready to hurl. You really want to drive?”

  “All right, you’ve got a point…thank you.”

  “No need. Love you, be back in a few,” Angela said on her way out the door.

  Vince didn’t last the ten minutes Angela was gone, though. Little bothered him more physically than nausea, so when the urge to do so began to arise, he went to the bathroom and swiftly emptied the contents of his stomach.

  “I come bearing gifts,” Angela called when she returned. Vince was brushing his teeth for the second time in a row and met her halfway down the hallway. Her face drooped when she saw him with his toothbrush hanging out of his mouth. “Didn’t make it?” she asked, touching his shoulder.

  He shrugged dismissively, not wanting to make a big deal out of it. “I’m fine now. Thanks for running,” he said.

  “Of course,” Angela said, suddenly reminded of what she had with her. She tore open the bag from the pharmacy. She grinned at Vince after he popped his pill.

  “What?” he asked.

  “Nothing, I’m just…happy. We’re married,” she said with a shameless giggle.

  “That we are.” Vince found Angela’s left hand and brought it up to his lips. “And we have approximately three hours to ourselves. Jenna has Charlie until dinner. What do you say? Think we’ve waited long enough?”

  —

  Better late than never, Angela thought as she looked at herself in her mirror the next morning. Today was the day. If no one else had caught on already, they were about to have their minds blown.

  But even though it would make her look somewhat like a fool, Angela hoped Marshall and Sophie had already had an unspoken inkling. Perhaps they would have had time to process the idea and their reactions wouldn’t be as dramatic as she had been fearing.

  When she looked back on the day before, she couldn’t bear the thought of leaving the ring behind in a box. She wanted to wear it for as long as she possibly could, as silly as it sounded, so she made a note to herself simply to take it off before she got out of her car. Her plan was to break the news at quitting time.

  During her commute, she found herself becoming excited about her friends knowing about the most precious thing in her life. If she was happy and obviously so, how couldn’t her friends be happy for her? And acting thrilled shouldn’t be too difficult a task for today. The euphoria still hadn’t worn off, still hadn’t been replaced by a much more realistic dread. It would be easy to appear happy because she was.

  She didn’t have the chance to break the news on her own terms, however. She had just gotten to her desk and was chatting with Sophie about the latter’s new boots when it happened—when her weeks of secrecy came to a screeching halt.

  “Hold on,” Marshall said, cutting Sophie off in the middle of her recollection of how she’d stumbled upon the new boots in the first place. “Angela, is that…” Marshall reached for Angela’s left hand, and Angela’s heart plummeted like a rock into her now practically heaving stomach. She had forgotten all about her little note-to-self. “Is that an engagement ring or something? You never wear rings…”

  Sophie’s eyes had never been larger. “Whoa, Angela Hawkins, what is that?” She grabbed on to Angela’s hand as well, clearly unsure of what she wanted to look at more—Angela’s stunned face or the ring.

  “It’s not an engagement ring,” Angela uttered through the cottonmouth that nearly choked her.

  “Are you seriously gonna sit here and lie to us? Still?” Marshall asked, more than a bit displeased.

  Angela’s brow furrowed in surprise and she slowly shook her head, snatching her hand back. “I’m not lying.” She swallowed.

  Now. Spit it out.

  “It’s not an engagement ring,” Angela said. “It’s a wedding ring.”

  “A wedding ring?” Marshall and Sophie echoed together.

  Angela twisted the offending object around her finger and nodded down at it. Of all the ways it could’ve happened, it had to happen like this, when she had finally mustered up the nerve to tell them herself. “Yeah.”

  “You got married?” Sophie whispered hysterically. “Who is it? I can’t believe we hadn’t even met him yet and you married him, Angela—”

  “It’s Vince,” Marshall said before Angela could say anything.

  “Vince?” Sophie said. “Nuh-uh. No way. We would’ve known.”

  “I need some air,” Angela said, inhaling and exhaling slowly, deeply.

  “Is it Vince?” Marshall asked. He sounded disappointed when Angela didn’t deny it.

  “Angela, why didn’t…why didn’t you tell anyone you were even seeing him?” Sophie said distantly, and not happily so.

  “I’m sorry, you guys,” Angela managed to say. “I know I should have told you sooner.” She knew she wasn’t answering Sophie’s question, but how could she tell her clearly distressed friends that she hadn’t wanted their opinions?

  “Actually,” Marshall pointed out, “you didn’t tell us at all. You walked into work wearing your wedding ring and we caught you and I guessed. Just sayin’.”

  Angela puffed up her cheeks. “Yeah, I guess I did. But I promise you guys, I came here today planning to tell you. I w
as going to wait until the end of the day so it wouldn’t be distracting from work.”

  “We believe you,” Sophie said, desperate for information. “Holy Moses, you and Vince are married…you’re going have to haul me out of here on a stretcher. How long have you been seeing each other? When did you get married? Where?”

  Angela laughed softly. “Um, five weeks now, I think—that we’ve been together, that is. We just got married yesterday.” We just got married echoed in Angela’s mind. Never in a million years would she have hoped with any realism that she would ever say those words in reference to herself and Vince. “We had the ceremony at his church—well, our church. Just us and the pastor and two ladies from the congregation because we forgot to see if we needed witnesses.”

  “Wait, when was Vince diagnosed?” Sophie inquired.

  “Two months ago,” Marshall answered for Angela.

  None of these numbers sounded right, but Angela wasn’t sure in which way. She felt so close to Vince that, first of all, it seemed impossible that they had only been together for five weeks, regardless of how close of a friendship they had had beforehand. Furthermore, she and Vince were already into such a routine over dealing with his cancer—the chemotherapy; treating the aches and pains and the occasional nausea and lack of appetite; knowing what dates he had treatment without even needing to look at a calendar anymore; and making sure he kept his diabetes in check. Had they really only been dealing with this for two months, and only about half that time as a couple?

  On the grimmer side, Angela realized that two months passing by since Vince’s diagnosis meant that his six to eight months was now four to six. The thought that she would get to be with him half a year more, at best, had her sick to her stomach.

  “So you…started seeing each other after he was diagnosed?” Sophie asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “With all due respect, because you know I love you to pieces, I think you’re absolutely crazy,” Sophie said gently, perching herself on the edge of Angela’s desk. “Why on earth would you volunteer for that? How are you dealing?”

  Angela shrugged. “Every day is a little bit different. But I’m happy, so I really hope no one worries about me.”

  “Is that why you kept it a secret?” Marshall asked, turning his chair toward Angela’s desk.

  How fine was the line between not wanting her friend’s advice and not wanting them to worry? Angela wondered. She decided Marshall had gotten close enough. “Yeah. I knew you guys would worry. But…losing him would hurt either way, and we both wanted this, so…I can understand if you guys are upset that I hid it from you, but know that that wasn’t what Vince wanted, it was my plan. So be mad at me for that if you need to be, but please don’t be mad at Vince about it and definitely don’t worry about me.”

  “How can we not worry?” Sophie asked in disbelief. “Sorry to be frank, but we already dread the day he passes away, and it’s going to be worse for you. You married him and you presumably see him all the time.”

  “I know it’s going to hurt,” Angela replied calmly, “but it was my choice. I don’t want anyone’s pity. Support, sure, that would be great. But no pity. No concern. No special treatment.”

  “I still can’t believe you hid it all this time,” Sophie said with widened eyes. “You’re married…and…to Vince…and here I bought that you were single…”

  “I’m sorry, I really am,” Angela said in a renewed panic. “I changed my mind about you guys knowing a while ago, but I couldn’t work up the nerve to tell you. I know if one of you hid something like that from me, I’d feel put out. I know none of us has a right to know everything that goes on in everyone else’s lives, but a relationship with a mutual friend is a big deal. I should’ve said something. If you want to be mad at me, please, go ahead.”

  “It stinks that you didn’t feel like you could tell us, but it’s your relationship, not ours, and I can’t even imagine what you’re going through without having to worry about what people think,” Sophie said. “My feelings aren’t as hurt as they should be. The pain is overshadowed by the glee of a twelve-year-old girl at a boy band concert.”

  Angela gazed at one of her best friends, wondering just how much she should believe her. They could all be good actors when they needed to be and when they set their minds to it. Angela just hadn’t tried hard enough over the weeks. Her mental resources had been directed elsewhere. She knew now that she owed her friends an apology for that. “I still feel awful. Maybe if I’d managed my emotions a little better and hadn’t worried you all so much, then I wouldn’t feel like such an awful friend for keeping it a secret. I wish I could’ve kept it together more. I hated that I was worrying you guys and then lying to you when you tried to help.”

  “Okay, enough,” Sophie said. “I need some details. Do you guys live together?”

  “No, we don’t live together. I’m there usually until Vince goes to bed, though.”

  “Is that going to change now that you’re married?” Sophie wondered while Marshall remained quiet. “I mean, how do you…you know…consummate a marriage if you’re not living together? I won’t ask questions on that level of personal detail right here in front of Marshall as long as you promise to tell me later.”

  Angela shot Sophie a half-grin. “We haven’t told Charlie yet, and Vince doesn’t want him thinking he’s got a live-in girlfriend, so for now, nothing’s really different. We’re telling him soon, though. Marshall, you’re so quiet over there. What do you think? Are we okay?”

  “We’re fine,” Marshall said plainly with a forced grin, crossing his menacingly muscular arms in front of him. His face was irritatingly impossible to interpret. Angry, disappointed, or simply processing—Angela wasn’t sure.

  Sophie let out a petite cough after a painfully awkward silence and reached for Angela’s hand. “Marshall, I think this might be the part where we congratulate Angela. So let’s do that. Wait, where’s Fitz?”

  “He knows,” Angela said, hoping this revelation wouldn’t hurt Marshall’s or Sophie’s feelings further. “I told him about the relationship a few weeks ago, and I couldn’t keep asking for time off without a reason, so I told him about the wedding when I asked for yesterday afternoon off. That’s why he planned the party tomorrow. It’s supposed to be a reception for us, I guess. And I have no legitimate excuse for not telling you guys at the same time I told him. It was selfish of me.”

  “Let’s just forget about that,” Sophie said. She was never one for conflict. “Did you change your name?”

  “Uh, yeah,” Angela said, finally permitting herself to get giddy about it again. “I did. I know it sounds crazy, but…when this is all over, I don’t want it to feel like it was just a passing phase of my life, I guess…Marshall, seriously, are you okay?” Angela asked when she still couldn’t place his expression.

  “I’m fine. Congratulations, Hawkins.” No one corrected him on the surname. “I’ve gotta run downstairs, get some things. Busy day. See you around.” He was out the doors before anyone could stop him.

  “Do you think I should be worried?” Angela asked Sophie.

  “I don’t think I’ve ever seen that look before, to be honest,” Sophie said in defeat. “Maybe something else is bothering him.”

  Angela leaned forward and hung her head in shame. “I know you say you’re just glad I’m okay and that you’re not too angry with me, but I think that’s what I really deserve. Whatever it was that Marshall just did. You should be shunning me right now.”

  “As satisfying as that might be even for ten seconds, that’s not what friends do,” Sophie said. “Can you promise me one thing, though?” she asked.

  “Anything,” Angela said in grave despair. “What is it?”

  “Just…talk to me,” Sophie said. “Just because we all don’t talk about Vince very much doesn’t mean we’re not heartbroken. We’re just…dealing with it differently. But this is different for you, and I’m guessing you had feelings for each other long before
this all happened, and now I’m seeing so many scenes in my head that make so much more sense now that I know you’re so in love with him…Anyway, you’ve obviously been spending a lot of time with him, so you’ll probably feel a different sort of pain…where was I going with this? We just want to be there for you. All three of us.”

  “Even though I’m a schmuck who doesn’t deserve your friendship, I’ll take it,” Angela said. Sophie beckoned her out of her chair for a hug. “Thank you for not being half as ticked as I thought you would be. And for…for not telling me that I’m insane. That was my original fear.”

  “Of course you’re insane,” Sophie said without apology, “but that means you guys get to be happy, so…oh well.”

  “You can stop being nice to me any time now,” Angela muttered in good humor.

  They heard Harry’s office door open. “Can you do lunch?” Sophie asked Angela quickly. “We do need to be proper girls about this.”

  “Yeah, I can do lunch,” Angela said with a smile.

  “Workin’ hard or hardly workin’?” Harry asked.

  “I’m allowed my five minutes of glee,” Sophie said firmly. “I just found out.”

  “Oh, you got rings, even? Congratulations, Agent Glasser. At least, that’s the word on the street. Anyway, I wouldn’t count on it staying a secret for too long. If there’s anyone else who should hear it from you, I’d get a move on,” Harry said.

  “Yeah, I know,” Angela said darkly. She swallowed at the thought of telling Hanson. Harry shot her a wink and walked back into his office.

  “I’m still not over it,” Sophie declared, eliciting nervous laughter from Angela.

  “Neither am I,” Angela said, laughing.

  “So you’re really gonna tell Hanson?” Sophie said.

  “Yeah, I’d better. Fitz is right, she can’t find out secondhand.” Hanson had truthfully been the least of Angela’s worries. Her friends’ reactions were far more important to her. “Plus Fitz was being all cryptic yesterday about how I’d have rights of some sort once Vince and I got married. I’m assuming that whatever they are, it’ll be a little easier if I tell Hanson myself.”

  “Do you think he was talking about FMLA?”

  To say it dawned on Angela would be overly generous—Sophie had had to spell it out for her. “Wow, I can’t believe I never thought of that. I mean, I knew I’d want to take time off to take care of him…when the time comes, you know, but I never thought of our marriage in a legal sense like that. Here I was thinking I’d have to use vacation days to stay home and take care of him. FMLA gives me what, a few months?”

  Sophie nodded. “You don’t think he had that in mind, do you?”

  “I might be a little suspicious of his motives if it weren’t for the fact that I pretty much proposed to him.”

  “You what?”

  —

  It certainly wasn’t the best wedding photograph in the world, but it went well with the theme of the day—a little low on forethought but still perfect. Vince had managed to put his arm out far enough to the side when he’d taken the picture so that it didn’t scream self-portrait. And though it was a bit blurry, having come from a camera phone, it looked just fine when one didn’t inspect it too closely.

  Although he wasn’t a fan of the way he looked in the picture—pale, overly thin, bald, and a little too scruffy—Angela’s radiance more than made up for what he felt he’d failed to bring. The smile lighting her face gave no hint that she stood cheek-to-cheek with a man she knew she was losing a little more every day. She had let herself rejoice without any sort of disclaimer or footnote. That was why he found himself staring at the newly framed photograph for quite a while before a knock at the door had him jumping from his skin.

  When he saw Marshall through the peephole, he immediately wondered what might be wrong. “What’s going on?” he asked as soon as he opened up. He poked his head out the door to look up and down the hall, expecting to see Angela there as well. “Is everything okay?”

  “Everything’s fine,” Marshall said plainly. “Mind if I come in?”

  Brow still crinkled, Vince nodded and opened the door the rest of the way. “What brings you by?” he asked, wondering if he should pray for forgiveness as he set the frame face-down on the kitchen counter.

  “Angela had some big news today,” Marshall said mysteriously.

  “She did?”

  “If you’re gonna play dumb, you should lose the ring,” Marshall said, cocking his head downward, where Vince’s left hand, wedding ring plain as day, sat on his hip. Vince silently cursed himself but didn’t give Marshall the satisfaction of appearing annoyed with his own stupidity. Vince didn’t know why he was already on the defensive so quickly—Marshall hadn’t really said anything worrisome yet. Vince supposed it was the vagueness in Marshall’s tone that had him concerned. “Well?” Marshall asked.

  Vince crossed his arms loosely. “Well what?”

  Marshall let out a cocky laugh. “Well what? Come on, Vince. You know exactly what I mean. What’s wrong with you?”

  Vince hadn’t expected squeals of delight and kisses on the cheek, but he hadn’t seen this coming, either. “Care to elaborate?” was all he could think to say.

  “How could you even date her let alone marry her?”

  Vince sucked in his lips and decided to let Marshall say what he pleased.

  “You of all people should know what it’s like to lose a loved one, Vince. It doesn’t matter if you were already divorced—losing Kate was like losing a limb, wasn’t it?”

  Vince stood his ground, letting Marshall’s sharp eyes pierce through his as he went on.

  “How do you think Angela’s gonna feel, Vince? Huh?” Marshall asked, raising his voice,. “She’s already a mess. All of us see it every day. Maybe she puts on a happy face for you, but guess what, Vince. She’s not okay. She’s nowhere near okay. So you tell me how you think this is a good idea. Tell me how she’s gonna function after this is over.” Marshall got no answer, just an icy cold stare with which he was rather familiar.

  “You’re not answering because you have absolutely no idea what this does to her. She was never late to work before this, and now she’s late more often than not and she leaves early half the time, too. She doesn’t care about her job anymore, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Her temper’s shortened to nearly nothing, she takes lunch out in her car for a few minutes sometimes just to cry in private, and she’ll even go a whole hour staring at the same piece of paper when she thinks she doesn’t have an audience. Every morning, she looks like she’s gotten about three hours of sleep at best. And you know what? I don’t remember the last time I heard her laugh. She’ll plaster on a smile when she absolutely needs to, but she can’t fake a laugh, and you know what? She hasn’t even tried to.”

  “So what do you suggest I do?” Vince asked. His answering a rhetorical question with another seemed to annoy Marshall to no end.

  “Well, you sure can’t walk away now, can you?” Marshall said. “Maybe that was your plan all along. Get her to marry you and you know she won’t leave, because who on earth would divorce a dying man?” Marshall’s fists furled and unfurled at his sides. “I get it, man. Your days are numbered and you wanna go for those things you’ve always wanted. I get that. I wish just as much as anyone else that you didn’t have to live your life with that mentality. But do you think this is worth it? Are you really willing to crush her—because you know that’s exactly what this is gonna do to her—just so you can spend a few months making this seem like—like a movie? Or maybe you think this is actually good for her.” Marshall laughed again when Vince still provided no rebuttal. “Please don’t tell me you actually believe that, Vince.”

  “I believe that Angela’s a grown woman who knows how to make her own decisions,” Vince said carefully. “I also believe that she would regret not doing this far more than she would regret doing it.” His own words sounded empty to him. Five minutes ago, he would have believe
d them, but Marshall had raised nothing but good points.

  “That’s easy for you to say, Vince. You’re not the one who has to learn how to breathe again after all this is over. That’s us. That’s Angela. Are you seriously gonna tell me with a straight face that she’s gonna be okay?”

  “It would have hurt either way. But she’s resilient.”

  Marshall shook his head. “I really can’t believe you. I’m sorry this is happening to you, and I’m angry for you. I’ve had some pretty fierce conversations with the big man about why this is happening to you. But this—this isn’t okay, Vince. Whether or not you two were already seeing each other, you don’t ask someone to become a widow. You just don’t.”

  “Is there anything else you’d like to say?” Vince asked calmly.

  “I think I’ve said it all,” Marshall said. “And since it’s not like you can undo this even if you wanted to, I guess congratulations are in order.” He didn’t look Vince in the eye as he said this; he simply turned on his heel and let himself out of the apartment, leaving Vince wondering whether he should be furious or seriously doubtful of himself.

  —

  “Come in.” Jean Hanson looked up from her computer monitor and gave Angela a neutral look. “Agent Hawkins. What can I do for you?”

  “Ma’am, I was wondering if I could have a moment of your time,” Angela said meekly.

  “Of course. Have a seat.”

  Angela nodded graciously and sat in front of Hanson’s desk. “There’s some news I need to share with you,” Angela prefaced, tapping her toes on the carpeting.

  “I’m listening.” Hanson faced squarely forward and took her glasses off.

  “Vince and I…” Angela tucked her lips in, sucking on them. “We’ve been…seeing each other for a little over a month now. I guess I don’t see the use in lying, so I should tell you that there were inklings of something a few days before he left here, but nothing more than inklings. No relationship, nothing that negatively affected our work.”

  “I take it you’re here to tell me something more earth-shattering than the fact that you’re dating a former superior or to make vague allusions to something that did or didn’t happen while he was still under employment here,” Hanson said.

  Angela nodded. “We got married yesterday.” Her eyes widened a bit at her own confession. She couldn’t remember the last time Hanson’s mere presence had rattled her like this. She had never found her warm and cozy, but she’d typically felt confident in her presence.

  It took Hanson a while to process this information. Angela decided not to mimic Vince with Jenna and assume she had an objection. She simply waited. “I see,” Hanson finally said. “I suppose congratulations are in order,” she said with a warm partial smile that was as genuine as her smiles got.

  Angela repaid the smile and said, “Thank you. I thought it best to let you know because, even though this isn’t a workplace relationship, it will affect my job. I do plan to take leave from work.”

  “Of course. That’s understandable. Do you have any idea when?”

  “Well, that’s…where it gets fuzzy. If his original prognosis was correct,” Angela said, finding it eerily easy to speak so directly with Hanson, “then he has four to six months left. FMLA would allow me roughly three months. His, uh, last scans showed that his tumors weren’t growing quite as quickly as his oncologist had expected, so he might have more time than originally thought, but his oncologist didn’t change his prognosis. So I really don’t know when I’ll need to go. For now, he’s functioning well enough on his own, and he has Charlie’s aunt to help out if he needs it…but once he’s unable to take care of Charlie on his own at home, then I guess that’s when I’d need to step away. I just don’t know when that’s going to be. It could be next week, or it could be three months from now.”

  “There’s no way of telling right now. I understand. I haven’t checked your records, but if I recall, you haven’t taken a lot of vacation time since you started here.”

  “No, ma’am. I’ve been using a day here and there just recently, but I have quite a bit of it stockpiled.”

  “Well, then, I don’t see why you should have any problem staying with the team. Between your paid vacation, your leave, and your bereavement time—my apologies for being so blunt—I don’t see a reason to worry about your position here, if that’s your concern.”

  Was Angela dreaming? She hadn’t expected Hanson to fire her, but the firm support was throwing her for a loop. “Yes, it was. Thank you, very much.”

  “Of course. Let me know if there’s anything else I can do.”

  Angela nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”