On our way to the beach, Epic decided to stop at home for a few things. I don’t know what I expected; the sort of apartments I’d lived in when I was going to school, I guess. He’d called his place one step above dorm living, but the charm of the fourplex he lived in was unlike anything I was used to.
There were two units in front and two in back—each with its own welcoming little porch. Epic’s porch was covered with potted plants in various stages of wet. Inside his apartment, there were more, along with the usual youthful bric-a-brac—Funko figurines, LEGO Star Wars toys, and beer bottles. The table in the kitchen was covered in computer equipment, and a gaming setup dominated the living room. His bedroom was little more than a place to rest his head. Full-size bed, chest of drawers, and hamper. All cheaply made.
After the vague little tour, I waited on the porch while Epic got what he wanted. He finally came out with a blanket, a beach umbrella, and a couple of kites. As he locked the door, a Lexus pulled up to the curb. When Epic saw the car, he paled.
“Shit.” His shoulders fell. “Buckle up, buttercup.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You will.”
The woman in the passenger seat got out and everything fell into place. She was tall and dark-haired with fair skin and an unhappy expression—a frosty Snow White who let the huntsman take her heart because it was an inconvenience. She wore a stylish knit pantsuit with low-heeled pumps.
“Robert.” She smiled at Epic, but it was a cool thing. The message? Don’t disappoint me.
“Chloe.” Epic took the visit like a punch to the gut. “I wish I’d known you planned on coming down.”
“This is long overdue.”
The driver’s side door opened, and a man I assumed was Epic’s father got out. He wore designer jeans and a billowy sort of shirt with a sweater vest. Though he had a full head of hair, the ponytail he wore made him appear as if he were balding. He wore sunglasses. His smile was bland and magnanimous. Good cop, bad cop. Christ, Epic’s parents were only a few years older than me.
They took their time retrieving three massive suitcases from the trunk of their car. Each of them rolled one up to the porch and his dad went back for the third.
“Where are your manners, Robert?” demanded Chloe. “Introduce us to your friend.”
Epic cleared his throat. “Ryan Winslow, may I present my mother and father, Chloe and Steven Alsop-Gray.”
“Pleasure to meet you.” I shook Steven’s hand. When it came time to exchange a handshake with Chloe, she placed her hand behind her back. Oh, we were off to a solid start.
“So, you’re Robert’s…?” Steven seemed to run out of steam.
Chloe was much more direct. “How do you know our son?”
Biblically. “He recently helped me out of a jam.”
“Is that so?” Chloe asked. “What kind of a jam would you need a twenty-three-year-old waiter to help you out of, I wonder?”
“I went as the plus-one to his ex’s wedding,” Epic answered truthfully. “His original date cancelled at the last minute.”
“Ah. The wedding must be the source of all the pictures from Santa Barbara.”
“Exactly.” Epic locked the door to his place behind him. “As you know, my apartment is very small, and I have a roommate. Where will you be staying?”
“We’re not staying.”
Epic looked pointedly at the suitcases. “You’re a little overpacked for a day trip.”
Chloe narrowed her eyes. “They’re empty, dear. We brought them so you could pack your things.”
“Me? What…?” He blanched.
“I’ll help, of course.”
“No way, Chloe.” Epic’s weary voice indicated long-term frustration. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“I can see you’re headed out right now,” said Steven. “We’ll leave the suitcases and meet back here when you have time. Are you working tonight?”
“At five.” Epic looked at a spot in the distance, not at the man and woman who’d raised him.
“So we’ll have time to talk if we come at three?” Steven pressed.
“I guess.”
Family dynamics box you in young and keep you trapped for a lifetime if you let them. Just like that, the decisive, confident Epic I knew became petulant Master Robert before my eyes. Could Epic break out of the role they’d assigned him? It shouldn't have mattered to me, but it did.
“Where are you headed?” asked Chloe.
Epic glanced at the things he carried—blanket, umbrella, kites—and said, “The British Museum.”
His mother gave a long-suffering sigh as we passed them on our way to the sidewalk. For my part, I vacillated between whether to say something more or leave things at that. I could think of nothing besides apologizing for my presence in Epic’s life, defending myself, or promising to go away and never come back, so I stayed silent.
We got a little way down the street before we heard the Lexus’s doors open and close. The engine started. The car slid slowly past us with his parents staring straight ahead inside it.
“Awkward doesn’t begin to cover that,” Epic said. “I’m so sorry.”
“Are your parents really planning to force you to leave?”
“Pretty much.”
A sudden thought occurred to me. Aghast, I asked, “Were you lying when you said you were twenty-three?”
His eyes widened. “No, it’s nothing like that. You heard my mom say it.”
Relieved, I asked, “Then how can your parents make you move against your will?”
Epic chewed his lip. “They can’t really, but it’s complicated.”
“They obviously think they can, though. Is it money? Did they pay for your tuition, and now they feel like they have a say with regard to your future?”
“Actually, no. I have student loans, but they’re small compared to some of my friends’.”
“So how can your parents control you?” Wind raked through my hair while I reminded myself I wasn’t there to solve Epic’s problems. I sighed. “It’s none of my business, and I’m sorry if my presence made things more difficult.”
“I’m the one who should be sorry. Chloe cast you in the role of defiler of innocents the minute she saw you.”
“Right?” At least he didn’t try to deny it. “That was a new experience.”
He pouted. “This doesn’t feel like a happy, kite-flying kind of day anymore.”
“I’m sorry.” I wrapped my arm around him as best I could, given we both carried bulky gear. “I can take you out someplace if you’d rather. Shopping?”
“What I really want to do is mope.”
“Moping isn’t likely to help,” I said carefully. “And given what I know about you, it doesn’t feel like a thing you do.”
“That’s why it’s so…irritating. My parents and I are oil and water. No matter what I try, we just don’t mix.”
“You need mustard.”
He came to a halt. “Come again?”
“To form an emulsion. What you need is an emulsifying agent like mustard.”
He smiled ruefully. “Grandma usually fills that role, I guess.”
“Where is she?” I asked. “Can you call her to intercede on your behalf?”
“Maybe.”
We’d arrived at a crossroads. We had to turn left if we were still heading for the beach or right if we wanted to go to my rental. Epic chose right, and I followed.
“Grandma and I talked about that the last time my parents got high-handed. We decided that if I didn’t handle them myself, I’d never learn how.”
“I’m sure even your grandmother didn’t expect your folks to show up on your doorstep with empty suitcases.”
“I like how you say folks. Do you have folks? I have Parents, capital P.”
“I have ‘folks.’ My family is close-knit even though I don’t have a lot of time for them.”
“You should change that if you can.” We entered my rental and dropped the beach things in the foyer. “Can we get in the hot tub?”
“Sure, if that’s what you’d like to do.”
“Do we have to wear clothes?” He waggled his eyebrows at me.
I shrugged. “I don’t live here. Let’s shock the neighbors.”
He whipped off his shirt. “First one in gets a shoulder massage.”
I let him win.
Ten minutes later, Epic leaned both arms on the side of the hot tub while I worked the knots out of his back and shoulders. He sighed happily.
“Three o’clock today,” I reminded him.
“Hm?”
“That’s high noon as it were. At three o’clock today, you’re going to have to talk to your parents. Any idea what you plan to say?”
“What can I say?”
“Start from the beginning. Why are they here now?”
He dropped his head to rest on his arms. “We had a big fight after I got my master’s. I wanted to live in St. Nacho’s. Mom and Dad sent a blizzard of my CVs to all their business contacts here and abroad. Several companies would have offered me a job on the spot—midlevel finance stuff with an eye toward moving up in the world of fund management. In this economy, getting a job at all right out of school is huge, but I wanted time. We made a deal.”
“Let me guess the rest. It’s midnight, you’re Cinderella, and now you have to leave the ball.”
“Right. They called it a belated gap year. Gave me twelve months to ‘get it out of my system.’”
“Did you give them your word you’d go home after a year?”
He shrugged. “I gave them my word I’d consider it if I didn’t have a better option.”
I wanted to laugh. It might be entertaining to watch Epic wiggle his way out of his parents’ plans, although they looked pretty formidable. “You’ll need to come up with that ‘better option’ fairly quickly then.”
“Well, I was thinking about that when we were talking about your work this morning.”
“Were you?” A cooling breeze blew across my neck.
“You have a foreign service and security background, but you’re making an unconventional use of it. Just because I have a finance degree, doesn’t mean I have to go into finance.”
“Go on.” I sat back, and he turned and floated to the bench facing mine. The spa jets made it harder to hear him.
“The thing is”—he raised his voice—“I’m a math geek. I’ve interned as an actuary in hospitals. I could pursue that route. But when I was a kid, I always wanted to be Charlie Epps from NUMB3RS. His character used math to solve crimes.”
“I remember that show. I can see that being something you’d like.”
“The women you talked about, the missing ones? There’s definitely a way to model disappearances in the same geographical area to see if the cases are part of a larger picture.”
“I know. That’s what I do.”
“But I could help you. Two heads are better than one, right? I could write an algorithm that tracks certain values like criminal associates and excludes others like prior runaway behavior”—he frowned—“although that could falsely exclude a lot of marginalized people, so—”
“So you plan to tell your parents what?”
He glanced up sharply. “That I want a consulting job with your NGO.”
Shit. I blew out a breath. “Okay. Listen. You probably have skills we could use, but you get that it’s a nonprofit, right? Nobody there makes a lot of money. And it’s in Canada. I live and work there on a permit. You might be able to get a job there, but—”
“What I’d want is a consulting job where I could work remotely. I need to stay in St. Nacho’s.”
That got my attention. “You need to?”
“I’d prefer to.” He caught his lip between his teeth. “Strong preference.”
I opened a water bottle and took a sip. “Why St. Nacho’s?”
“You probably don’t need a lot of background to know my parents are perfectionists. It’s virtually impossible to get their approval, so I grew up feeling judged every minute of every single day.”
“I’m sorry, Epic. I know that must have hurt you very much.”
“I had my grandmother. She made up for a lot of the bad things”
“I'm glad.” I took his hands in mine.
He wrinkled his nose. “I have happy memories from childhood too. Despite our current conflict, I love my parents. But I love it in St Nacho's too. The minute I smell the ocean, I’ve come home. All my problems drop off my shoulders. I can be exactly who I am. Nobody judges me. Nobody tries to change me. What I do matters—whether I wait tables or invent the next iPhone—whatever my job is, only being my best self matters here.”
“I understand.” It would be awfully tempting to stay.
“The people here make me want to do everything better, but there’s no pressure. Does that even make sense?”
“Yes.” I’d felt the weight fall off my shoulders when I’d arrived in St. Nacho’s too, though I had attributed it to having my first vacation in years.
What if it wasn’t about the time off but the place?
What if I could finally find balance here?
“Will you go with me when I talk to my parents?” he asked.
“That seems like a bad idea.” I couldn’t imagine anything more awful. “Isn't it something you need to do on your own?”
“But I need them to understand what you do. I want them to meet you because then they can’t say the job I want doesn’t exist, or I can’t make a living, or—”
“Epic, taking me with you to talk to your parents is the very worst thing you could do. It negates the argument that you’re independent.”
“I know, I know. But hear me out—”
“What would your grandmother say?” I stood, took the steps out of the water, and picked up my towel.
“She’d say, yes, it might make them think I’m taking guidance from you, and yes, that might seem like I’m not thinking independently. But she might also say that if I were going to talk about my future, I should consider making my case alongside people I want to be in that future.”
I turned, heart pounding hard. “What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean.” Epic came out of the water like some sculpture, all chiseled planes and taut muscles. He jutted his jaw at me belligerently. “You’ve become really important to me.”
“I—”
“And I’m important to you. Don’t try to deny it. I won’t believe you.”
“Even if that were true—”
“Oh, it’s so true.” He wagged a finger at me. “You think I’m adorable.”
God help me, he had me there. “Even so, I live in Canada. I work a sixty-hour week when I’m slacking off. I travel for business about a third of the year. I’m not looking for a partner.”
“But we’re good together, Ryan.” He held himself rigid. “Don’t make it seem like we’re friends with benefits. We’re more than that, and you know it.”
I did not want to have this conversation.
Not now. Not yet. Maybe not ever. But certainly not while his parents were giving him three hours to make good on a deal he’d made last year.
“Oh, Epic. I’m so sorry. This”—I gestured between us—“is a holiday. We had a fantasy weekend in a wildly expensive resort with fabulous food, alcohol, and great sex.”
“Go on.” He sounded smaller somehow. Deflated.
“I never meant for you to think that we could…that I was looking for more than that. I hope you can forgive me someday.”
“Don’t lie to yourself and don’t lie to me.”
“I probably have lied to you,” I admitted. “I’m probably lying to myself right now. But things are what they are. Trying to make this thing between us last would only lead to unhappiness and regret later on.”
“Fine.” He swallowed hard. “I’ll go to my parents without your support then.”
“I think that’s for the best.”
“And I have work after. I’m closing late. I’ll be exhausted between my parents and work, and…I might just want to sleep at my place tonight.”
“That’s fine.” My heart sank because Epic saw what I was trying to hide. He had grown on me. I liked him. I wanted him—wanted to see where this would go between us. But the panic that had flared inside me when I was face to face with his parents… The guilt I experienced when his mother had asked what I needed from a twenty-three-year old caught me in all the raw places left behind from my work with exploited people, and I just couldn't give him this.
This was it. I knew it. If I didn’t make an effort, meet him halfway, tell him I would try to make things work between us, I would not see Epic again.
“Call me and let me know what you want to do in the next couple days.”
“Sure.” He didn’t sound as if he meant it.
“I’ll be here until Friday around noon.”
“Good.” He squared his shoulders. “I’ll just go get dressed.”
* * *
I gave Epic a ride because he had all the beach things to take with him. It didn’t escape my notice that he took his clothes and toiletries and pool float too.
“Taking everything?” I wanted him to say it.
“Nothing’s clean. I need to do laundry.” He refused to meet my gaze.
The bittersweet kiss he gave me after he finally got everything out of the car broke my heart. He imbued it with everything that made him Epic—all the emotion, all the joy, all the nurture, and empathy, and kindness he had to give.
He made all the right noises when he left. Smiled cheerfully. Tried not to make me feel like a monster. But our sorrow had a flavor—the metallic taste of my fear mixed in with sick-making salty tears neither one of us acknowledged.
Everything had gone wrong. I shouldn't have walked away, and I knew it, but I couldn’t stop myself—couldn’t make myself choose Epic when I knew the consequences could harm us both.
“I had the best time.” Epic kissed my cheek. “Thank you for everything.”
“Thank you.” I love you. Love you, love you, love you.
I was a fool to think I could walk away from Epic undamaged.
Like always, my heart tore itself into pieces because I wanted impossible things.
* * *
I worked through dinner, which was not unusual for me. Later, I walked to a corner market for cup noodles and booze. I eyed the cigarettes for a minute. Had I really decided to quit smoking? Epic wouldn’t be around to give me a hard time about it if I didn’t…
Two things decided me. First, they didn’t have Luis’s expensive European brand—of course they didn’t. Second, I was over everything Luis. Epic was right about why I’d started smoking in the first place. It had been a way to hold on to Luis after he left. An invisible kiss.
“Give me some nicotine gum as well, please,” I told the cashier.
She showed me a couple brands, and I picked one at random.
I took my bag back to the rental where I ate salty noodles, drank whiskey, and got my nicotine fix.
Seems like old times.
I texted Epic at bedtime.
Me: How’d it go with your parents? Did you buy more time?”
But my text went unanswered.
Lying in bed with the spins later that night, I tried texting Epic again.
Me: What’s the verdict? Are you going to stay in St. Nacho’s?
That text went unanswered too.