The Tick-Tock Between You and Me

by Kristy Tate

  Nora planted her fists on her hips. “How have you been getting to work?”

  “Riding Nick’s bike.”

  “Nick’s bike?” Nora echoed.

  “He doesn’t need it!” Her whole family seemed to be involved in meaningful, worthy causes—even her sister Sloane, who was into make-up and hair and addicted to the Project Runway reality show, gave makeovers to the underprivileged in search of jobs—while Darby was doing nothing more than enabling a wanna-be actor.

  “And you go to work all sweaty?”

  “It’s not so bad.” Darby didn’t mention the gym.

  “You gotta get your car back,” Nora said with a frown.

  “At first, he said he was too intimidated to drive in L.A., but I guess he got over that since now he says he needs it to get to auditions.”

  Nora planted her fists on her hips. “You need it to get to work!”

  Darby picked up a sweater and tried to rid it off fuzz-balls.

  “What does your family think of him?” Nora pressed.

  “They haven’t met him, yet,” Darby said in a small voice.

  “Oh, sweetie.”

  Darby’s shoulders shook when she said, “He said he doesn’t ‘do parents.’ I don’t even know what that means!”

  Nora pulled herself out of the closet, waded through the mountains of clothes she’d created on the floor, pushed the open suitcases to the other side of the bed and sat down beside Darby and put an arm around her shoulder.

  Darby sagged against her. “I’m so…disappointed.” She gulped back a sob. “And embarrassed. My mom keeps asking about him so I’ve been avoiding her. I can’t keep avoiding my parents—even though, you’re doing a good job of avoiding yours.”

  Nora patted Darby’s shoulder, bounced off the bed, and resumed packing up her things.

  Darby sucked in a deep breath. She was sick of talking about or even thinking of Benjamin. She steered her thoughts back to Nora. It seemed as if her best friend had just barely come back to Shell Beach, and now, just a few months later, here she was packing her bags. “Can I just say, again, that what you’re doing is craziness? Why would you even believe Crystal Menlow?”

  “Why would my mother’s best friend lie to me?” Nora poked her head out of her closet to meet Darby’s gaze.

  Darby picked at a loose thread on the comforter and tried to find the words that would change Nora’s mind about taking the teaching job in Oak Hallow. “Please don’t go. I don’t feel right about it. Crystal’s lying. She’s an ice witch. You know what her son says about her.”

  “It’s just sad that those two don’t get along.” Nora fished through her closet, carefully selecting her wardrobe. “Honor your mother and your father and all that.”

  “Don’t be a hypocrite,” Darby said. “You know this decision of yours is going to put your parents in the hospital.”

  “This isn’t about them.”

  “Blake’s bombshell already broke their hearts.”

  “This isn’t about my ex either!” Nora threw her boots onto the bed more forcefully than she needed to. “They should have told me!”

  “Of course, they should have, but I get why they didn’t if your dad had an affair.”

  “A brother and a birth mother isn’t something you hide from your child,” Nora said through tight lips.

  “I agree, but still, if what Crystal said is true—and that’s a pretty big if—I can see why your parents would hesitate to tell you. So why do you think you haven’t met your ‘supposed’ birth mother, this Irena Rowling?”

  “I told you, she’s been traveling. She’ll be back the week before school starts.” Nora gathered a collection of scarves and dropped them in an empty suitcase.

  “Seriously, I don’t know how you’re going to tell your parents,” Darby said.

  “I’m not sure I will.”

  “They’ll figure it out!”

  Nora thought about this. “I just want to meet her.”

  “So, meet her! You don’t have to move up there and take a job at her school!” Darby froze. “Do you even like kids?”

  “Everyone likes kids. Only monsters don’t like kids.”

  “Have you ever spent any time around kids?”

  “Well, no. But I’m not sure why that matters.”

  Darby rolled her eyes. “You, my friend, are brilliant, but clueless. And gullible. You need to talk to your parents.”

  “Not about this.”

  “This is so dumb,” Darby said, flopping back against the pillows. “And how do you think the birth mother is going to feel when she finds out you had an ulterior motive in taking this job?”

  “She doesn’t need to know either.”

  “You’re not going to tell her? Don’t you think she’ll want to know?”

  Nora folded her arms across her chest. “I don’t know how it’s going to go. Maybe we’ll take an instant disliking to each other. But I don’t think that’s likely. It’s just for one school year.” Nora went to the bed, plopped down, tugged her laptop into her lap, and pulled up the Canterbury Academy website. “The school is gorgeous. It’s surrounded by green hills dotted with these ancient oak trees. They have a Four-H program with horses, chickens…”

  “Sounds smelly,” Darby said, looking over Nora’s shoulder at the screen. “Ooh, is that your boss?”

  “That’s my brother.”

  “If I married him, we could be sisters!” Darby sat up and hugged her knees.

  “What about Benji?”

  “Don’t call him that. It makes him sound like a scruffy dog.”

  “Suits him though, right?”

  Darby bumped her shoulder. “But maybe you want this Cole for yourself.”

  “He’s my brother,” Nora repeated.

  “Says who? Crystal?”

  Nora closed the lid of her laptop with a sharp click.

  “You need to talk to your parents,” Darby repeated.

  “You keep saying that, but I can’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “Well, for one thing, they’re sailing the Atlantic and for another, you know they don’t like to talk about stuff like that. They’re not warm and fuzzy like your parents. My dad doesn’t do emotions.”

  “That’s why I can’t believe he had an affair!” Darby pointed her finger in the air, punctuating her words. “And your birth mom supposedly just handed you over?” Darby made a face. “And your real mom took in your father’s love child?” Darby shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

  “I saw the photos myself. My real mom, as you call her, was not pregnant in any of those pictures.”

  “Are you sure of the date?”

  “It was stamped on the back of the pictures.”

  Darby sat up on her knees. “We need to get a copy of your birth certificate.”

  Nora shook her head. “I already tried. I may not be Irena Rowling’s daughter, but I definitely don’t belong to Weatherford and Katheryn Lance.”

  #

  Most of the time, Chad found it easy to avoid his stepmother, but that was because she typically stayed in L.A., tucked away in her Beverly Hills mansion. He found her a lot more difficult to avoid when she was standing in his bedroom.

  Elaine folded her arms and studied him through squinted eyes. “How could you have let this happen?”

  “What makes you think I could have prevented it?”

  Elaine waved her hands in the air. “Oh, come on, you can’t tell me you had nothing to do with this!” She paused for a deep breath. “Did he just drive himself up to Medford?”

  Chad nodded, reluctant to admit even to himself that this, at least, was something he and his stepmother agreed upon. His grandfather shouldn’t be driving.

  “He could have killed himself—or someone else!” Her voice rose to a screech.

  Chad had never liked his stepmother, but he especially disliked her when she was right and he was in the wrong.

  “And where were you when he was hitching up the horse
trailer?”

  “At work,” he said through clenched teeth.

  “At that school?” Her tone made Canterbury sound like a dung pile.

  He didn’t even bother to nod, but gazed back at her with an unflinching glare.

  She huffed, turned on her heel, and stormed from his room. “You need to quit that job!” she tossed over her shoulder.

  Chad sat down on his bed and pushed his fingers through his hair.

  “Evil Elaine’s been at it again.”

  He looked up to see Cecelia leaning against his doorjamb. She smiled at him.

  “It’s not your job to babysit Grandpa,” she said.

  He lifted his shoulder in an attempted shrug. “She’s right. He could have killed someone.”

  Cecelia strolled into the room, sat down in his desk chair, and swiveled to face him. “You know that’s not what she’s mad about.”

  He nodded. “She’s mad about the horse.” He pulled in a long breath. “But I can’t be mad or even disagree with Grandpa. Tyron is a magnificent animal. He’ll make a fine stallion.”

  “If there’s a ranch left by the time he’s old enough to breed.”

  Chad fell back against his pillows and stared up at the wooden beams running across the ceiling.

  “Why do you stay here?” Cecelia asked.

  “I like it.” By staying in the old bunkhouse, Chad could pretend he had his own life, his own world. Besides, it made it so that when his parents—or anyone else—visited, he didn’t have to see them.

  “I didn’t mean the bunkhouse,” Cecelia said. “I get that, sort of. It gives you a buffer from the parentals. I meant, why do you stay here?”

  He sat up and frowned at her.

  “You can’t save the ranch. You know that, right?” She plucked up a pencil and used it to tap on his desk. “We both know that as soon as Grandpa goes Dad and Elaine are going to convert this place into a hotel.”

  Chad pushed himself to his feet and began to pace.

  “I heard Elaine mention something about a spa,” Cecelia said.

  “Pardon, Mr. Chad,” Maria, his grandfather’s longtime housekeeper and cook, stood in the doorway. “Mister Bernie sent me for you.”

  Cecelia pressed her lips together and followed Chad from the room. Behind him, her sandals slapped the Mexican pavers as they passed through a courtyard that separated the bunkhouse from the main house. The scent of citrus blossoms from the orchard wafted on a slight breeze.

  Inside, the house was chilly and the smell of Maria’s seafood enchiladas hung in the air. Chad didn’t have to ask where to find his dad; he followed the raised voices to his grandfather’s study.

  Grandpa rounded on Chad. “Tell him!” He pointed a quivering finger at his son. “Tell your dad that this horse is going to turn things around for us!” His grandfather’s face was a frightening shade of red. His fingers and shoulders shook with pent up rage. If he had been a wine bottle, his cork would be seconds from popping.

  Chad strode into the room, determined to ease the tension between his grandfather and dad. This was a role he’d been practicing his entire life but had yet to perfect.

  “Tyron’s a fine horse. He’ll make an incredible stallion,” Chad said to his father in his teacher-knows-best voice.

  Bernie harrumphed. “When?”

  Chad nodded and rested his butt against the side of his grandfather’s desk. “It’ll be a few years.”

  “He doesn’t have a few years,” Elaine muttered from her perch on the sofa. She swung her leg and admired the Kate Spade sandal hanging on her foot. “This place will go to hell in a handbasket if we don’t step in and do something in a hurry.”

  “Harry Hanford said—” Grandpa began.

  “Dad,” Bernie began.

  “Grandpa,” Chad interrupted in a calm voice, “remember, Harry passed away a few months ago.”

  Cecelia stepped forward and rubbed her grandfather’s arm. “You remember, don’t you, Grandpa? You and Chad attended his memorial?”

  Grandpa sagged onto the sofa, his fight gone. He cleared his throat. “We’ll need a new accountant.”

  Bernie paced across the room. “What’s wrong with Miller Cooper?”

  “That’s your accountant!” Grandpa snorted.

  “So?” Bernie stopped pacing and faced his father.

  Grandpa audibly exhaled. “He’ll have your interests at heart.”

  “My interests are your interests,” Bernie said in an almost believable voice.

  “I know an accountant!” Cecelia chirped.

  “You know an accountant?” Elaine asked.

  Grandpa Bern and Bernie both gave her shocked looks.

  Cecelia bristled and stood up a little straighter. “I know people!”

  “Excuse me, dear, but while you’ve been in Paris painting for the last three years, the rest of us have been trying to preserve this family home,” Elaine purred.

  Chad tried not to roll his eyes.

  “We can at least call her and check out her…credentials…or whatever,” Cecelia pressed. “I have her card!” She bolted from the room.

  An awkward silence fell. Chad scrambled for something to say that would prevent his dad and grandfather from falling back into their tired arguments. “Dad, why don’t you come with me and Grandpa to see his new horse?”

  While frustration flashed across Bernie’s face, Elaine rose from the sofa. “Count me out. I’m not going to muck up my shoes just to see a pony.”

  His life's seconds numbering,

  (tick, tock, tick, tock)

  CHAPTER 4

  Darby parked Nick’s bike in the garage and stood for a moment collecting the courage she needed to brave the rain. Again. Whoever heard of rain in Southern California in August? What happened to the drought? It seemed the rain had started as soon as Benjamin descended into L.A.X. And while she knew it wasn’t fair to blame him for the weather, she could blame him for her having to bike to and from work, for the muddy splatters up her legs, and for the clump of damp leaves she found in her hair. It wasn’t as if he had made that SUV drive into the gutter and shower her with muck, but if she had been in her own car instead of on her brother’s bike, she would be cleaner, drier, and happier.

  Tugging her sweater—an article of clothing woefully unsuitable for repelling rain—a little closer around her, she darted from the garage to the porch, carefully maneuvering around puddles. Wheezer, an ancient part-poodle and part-something else dog greeted her at the back door. In the mudroom, she sank onto the bench to remove her filthy shoes.

  Voices from the kitchen floated toward her.

  “Don’t you think it’s weird we haven’t met Benjamin?” Meg asked.

  Mom murmured something inaudible in reply.

  Meg snorted. “She told me she wanted to marry this guy and have his babies. Doesn’t that sound like someone we should get to know?”

  Another muffled reply.

  Blood pounded in Darby cheeks and tears welled in her eyes. It had been such an awful day already. She didn’t need this. What she needed was a place of her own. But she couldn’t afford anything in Shell Beach. The only reason her parents were able to live here was because they had moved in with Grandma Betty as newlyweds and had never left. And it looked as if her sister Meg—minus her husband—had the same idea.

  “Did it ever occur to you nitwits that maybe your sister isn’t afraid of what you’ll think of him, but of what he’ll think of the lot of you?” Grandma Betty barked.

  Stunned silence followed.

  Wheezer grunted beside Darby, and she hushed him.

  “Maybe,” Grandma Betty said, “she’s smart enough to know you’ll embarrass her!”

  “Now, Mom,” Darby’s mother began, for once audible.

  The sound of Grandma Betty’s cane thumped across the kitchen’s wooden floor. “Don’t shush me. I’m just pointing out that maybe if I had some posh hottie coming to visit me, I’d hesitate before bringing him into this chicken coop, too
.”

  When the thumping drew dangerously close to the mudroom, Darby stood, sniffed, and wiped her nose with the back of her hand. She had to get out of here. For good.

  As quietly as she could, Darby opened and closed the back door and dashed back out to the garage. She scrounged through her bag, pulled out her phone, and called Benjamin. It went straight to voicemail. Maybe he was in an audition. Or he was avoiding her calls.

  She thought for a moment, considered the bike, then called an Uber.

  #

  Darby spent a long time waiting on Tommy’s porch. So long, in fact, that the rain stopped drizzling, the sun came out, and then the early stars. Sometime between the sun and the moon she had fallen asleep. She woke, curled on the stoop of Tommy’s apartment. She pushed the curls off her face and licked her gritty teeth. Anyone coming upon her would probably think she was homeless. Rolling her shoulders and stretching her legs, she considered knocking on Tommy’s door again. A thought struck her. On a whim, she reached into her pocket, pulled out her spare set of keys, and pushed the fob. Somewhere close by, her car beeped.

  The sound sent a happy thrill through her.

  She didn’t owe Benjamin an explanation. In fact, if anything, he owed her. Nine hundred dollars for the flight, plus the two hundred for the extra baggage fees, and a hundred dollars for the use of her car, plus gas. Standing, she limped on her bike-weary legs to find her car and the rest of her life.

  #

  The next morning, Donna, Mr. Hopper’s secretary, poked her head into Darby’s cube and flashed an apologetic smile. “Darby, Frogger would like to see you in his office.”

  Darby pulled herself away from her computer screen. “Do you know what this is about?”

  Donna shook her head. “Nope, sorry.”

  Darby glanced at her phone. It lay silent, dark, and harmless on her desk. Glen Hopper had strict company policies about taking personal calls at work but turning off her phone completely wasn’t really an option, since she had to be available to her clients. Unfortunately, ever since she’d retrieved her car, Benjamin’s nonstop calls had zoomed from friendly-quizzical to angry to pleading. The one thing they had all been was annoying. Finally, she’d set her phone to silent.