Geekspeak: Breadcrumbs

Definition: A list of each successive web page viewed by visitor, typically displayed horizontally under the menu or title bar.

Despite the glow in his belly that hadn’t died since he’d kissed Gideon last night, Alex couldn’t help feeling uneasy the next morning. Something niggled at him during his shower, during his morning contest with his dad.

“Ned, man, time for your walk. Hup hup. Let’s haul our butts around the block before breakfast.”

His father scowled at him. “I already went for a walk.”

“Yeah, but that was yesterday. Can’t sit around being a sofa spud 24-7. It’s bad for you. Come on.”

He shepherded his father out the door into the brisk air while the sun lurked behind the roofs to the east. The air was cold and sharp, tinged with the tang of wood smoke, damp concrete, and fallen leaves no longer crisp enough to crunch underfoot.

Most of their neighbors had already taken down their Halloween decorations, but here and there, a weary jack-o’-lantern still perched on a front porch, its face beginning to pucker like a toothless man who’d forgotten his dentures. Not that his dad seemed to notice. His gaze didn’t focus on anything, while who-the-hell-knew-what played out in his mind.

Alex kept his hand under his father’s elbow, guiding him over the uneven spots where tree roots buckled the sidewalk. As they crossed the final intersection on the homestretch back to their house, his father’s steps quickened, and he stumbled over the uneven edge of the curb. Shit, was his left foot dragging more than it had been yesterday?

“Ned. Hey, man. Look at me. Can you smile?”

His father stopped and scowled at him. “What for?”

“Humor me.”

“Bah.” He shuffled on down the sidewalk.

Alex caught up with him in two giant strides “Then lift your arms.” He demonstrated, raising his hands over his head.

“Foolishness.” Instead of complying, Ned did the opposite—stuffing his hands in his pockets. Jesus, the man got more stubborn every day, and Ned had been the king of mule-headedness his entire life, as Alex knew all too well—he’d been the crown prince himself.

“Come on, man, please?” With his nerves sparking like a downed power line, Alex dogged Ned’s steps all the way home, getting nothing but glares and mumbles in return.

Then, as his dad trudged up the back porch stairs, another jolt of high-voltage fear shot through Alex. Near Ned’s feet, two of the steps were blackened at one end, the charring extending onto the edge of the decking.

Shit. That smell of burnt wood wasn’t only from the neighbors’ chimney smoke, it was here—at his own fucking house.

He hustled his dad inside, got him settled in his chair, and sprinted for the kitchen. His mom was sitting at the table in her old blue scrubs, sipping tea, the paper open in front of her to the crossword puzzle.

“Mom. The back porch. What happened?”

Ruth looked up, but focused on a spot somewhere to the left of Alex’s head. Her cheeks were pale, but then she was always pale these days. “It’s so embarrassing. I didn’t want to bother you.”

“Bother me? Our porch steps are half burned away.”

“It’s not that bad.”

“Mom. What happened?”

She set her pencil down and folded her hands on top of the paper. “It was nothing. I was trying to light a candle—”

He dropped into the chair next to her, his knees suddenly weak. “Candles? You’re kidding. I thought we cleared them all out. We can’t have any in the house with the way Dad—”

“That’s why I took it outside. But I set it down near some cobwebs, I guess. They caught so fast. I—I’d forgotten they were so flammable.”

“What did you do? Did you call the fire department? Did you—”

“Don’t be silly. I hosed it down, and it was fine.” She glanced at him and shrugged. “I know it was stupid. But I found one of those vanilla-scented candles your father gave me for my birthday, and I wanted . . .” She sniffled, and Alex’s spike of annoyance faded into the familiar ache of regret and sorrow.

“Shit, Mom.”

“Alex. Language.”

“Sorry.” He got up and poured himself a cup of coffee. “Hey, what did the doctor say about his leg last time you were there? It seems weaker than it was. Hell, he tripped over nothing on our walk just now.”

“That can happen to anybody.”

“Yeah? Well, I think we should get another opinion. That guy—”

“Is perfectly competent.”

“Maybe. But he’s as old as Dad. We need a younger guy. Someone who’s up on all the latest treatments.” Alex abandoned his coffee and grabbed the handset of their old wall phone. He had the clinic’s phone number memorized. “He needs to refer us to someone better.”

“Alex.” His mother tugged the receiver out of his hand and put it back in its cradle. “Dr. Corey is perfectly competent, and vascular dementia is his specialty.”

“How do we know he doesn’t suffer from it himself? He’s the same age as Dad.”

“Alexander Matthew Henning.” The tone that accompanied the triple-barreled name was too familiar—he’d heard it at least twice a day during his out-of-control teenage years. “Assuming I agreed with your assessment—which I don’t, and as a nurse—”

“Retired.” Jesus, he sounded as sulky as a kindergartner.

His mother raised one eyebrow. She obviously recognized his tone from back in the day as well. “As a nurse, I hold myself a better judge of medical personnel than you or your sister. You know perfectly well that your father would never accept a new doctor. He doesn’t trust strangers.”

“He learned to trust Toshiko with no problem.”

“Yes, but we’ve both agreed that she’s a special case.” She pressed her lips together, an extra wrinkle folding the skin between her brows. “We can’t count on that happening with anybody else, especially a new medical provider.”

“But—”

“End of discussion.”

Alex sighed. “Got it.” He retrieved his coffee and sat down next to her. “I’ll fix the porch this weekend.”

“No! It’s not a big deal. Only cosmetic damage. It can wait.”

“Mom—”

“Alex.” She mimicked his warning tone. “Don’t worry about it. I mean it. When the weekend arrives, I want you to relax when you can, not deal with my foolishness. Promise me.”

“But—”

“I’m pulling rank on you, son. You are not to touch those steps, and if you have a chance for a little fun, take it. Understand?”

His mouth twisted into a lopsided smile. “Yes, ma’am.”

Gideon wasted zero time putting his plan into action. As soon as it was late enough, with the sun well above the trees, he called the Henning house. Alex’s mother picked up the phone, and he launched into his patented peppy song and dance.

“Mrs. Henning. Hi. It’s Gideon Wallace. We met the other day, and I was so incredibly rude that I ran away.”

“That’s all right.” Her voice sounded tired. Gideon wondered when she’d last gotten a good night’s sleep.

“No, it most certainly is not. Now don’t be mad at your son, but he’s told me a little bit about what you’re going through.”

“I see.” Oooh. That tone did not bode well for Alex.

“I’d like to help.”

“Thank you, but Ned . . . my husband doesn’t really do well with strangers.” Her voice broke on the last word. Poor baby. You’re a stranger now too, aren’t you?

“I know. But the person I’d like to help is Y-O-U. Is there anyone who can stay with your husband today? Because if you don’t mind my saying so, you need a break.”

“Me?”

“Yes, indeedy.” Gideon dialed up his cajoling tone. “How long has it been since you’ve had some good old-fashioned me time?”

She chuckled. “I don’t remember.”

“Then we sooo need to fix that. I’ve made a mani-pedi appointment for you at the salon where I go—I’m in dire need of a haircut and touch-up. We’ll hit the salon, do a little lunch, a bit of retail therapy—”

“I don’t need anything.”

“Fine, we’ll take shopping off the agenda. But you ask Lindsay about my mad spa-day skills. She’ll tell you I know how to do it right.”

“I don’t need to.” He heard the smile in her voice. Score. “She told me about how you took care of her after Will left.”

“So, is it a date?”

“I do have someone coming by today who’s willing to sit with Ned for a few hours. So yes. Thank you. I’d love it.”

On his way to Westmoreland that afternoon, Gideon took a little detour. If Mrs. Henning—Ruth—didn’t want to shop, she most definitely needed the boost that only something new and unnecessary could give a person, and he intended to deliver. When he parked his MINI in front of the Hennings’ house, Alex’s Charger was in the driveway.

Uh-oh. Would he be okay with this? Gideon had wanted a chance to break the news of his plan in person. He’d learned the hard way that the Henning family did not like surprises any more than he did himself, no matter what Alex said when he was trying to wind Gideon up. But when he knocked on the front door, it wasn’t Ruth or even Alex who opened it.

It was Toshiko.

“Gideon.” The slight upward inflection at the end of his name was as close as Tosh ever got to a greeting. “This is unexpected.”

“No. No, it’s completely expected. I called ahead and everything. Got a little date.” Toshiko’s eyebrows inched up a fraction, the equivalent of anyone else shouting What the effing hell? “With Ruth. You know, spa day. Lunch.” He flourished the bag in his hand. “Prezzies.” God, what was wrong with him? Why did he feel the need to justify himself to Toshiko for visiting the family of his roommate? Get real. You justify yourself to her every time you see her—for pretty much everything.

Toshiko regarded him solemnly, and he wondered for the billionth time whether her brainpower extended to mind reading.

Alex came down the stairs, tucking his Carter Construction shirt into his Levi’s. He hesitated when their gazes caught, but then his eyes lit up and Gideon had a perfectly sappy my hero reaction, complete with sigh and insuppressible smile. Toshiko’s left eyebrow climbed another quarter inch. Gah!

Without acknowledging Gideon further, Alex grabbed his jacket from the coatrack next to the door and dug his keys out of the pocket. “Sorry I’ve got to run.” Is he talking to me? Does he blame me for being here? “Thanks for hanging with Dad today, Tosh.”

Gideon’s chest constricted, trapping his breath. Guess that’s a big fat no. Alex and apparently his whole family trusted Toshiko, of all people, with their fragile Ned, while Gideon qualified as stranger-danger. On the other hand, Gideon hadn’t exactly proven reliable in that department on his previous visit.

“Thanks aren’t necessary.”

Alex’s grin widened, as if he were intimately familiar with Toshiko’s communication style. How long had she been in the Circle of Trust anyway? The itch of hurt feelings threatened to turn into a full-body rash.

Alex still didn’t make a move to touch Gideon or even greet him, which ratcheted the hurt a little higher. What, were they a secret? Had he changed his mind since last night?

Alex bisected the space between Gideon and Toshiko as if to say, Move along, folks. Nothing to see here. “Later.” But as he passed by, his gaze flicked down to Gideon’s crotch and he murmured, “One,” out of the side of his mouth.

Gah! Construction site blowjob. Window sex handjob. Pavlov’s dogs had nothing on Gideon’s dick; its response was instantaneous. He waved at Alex’s retreating back and directed a pained smile at Toshiko.

She was staring at his crotch.

He covered the front of his too-tight pants with the bag. “Tosh. Remember right after we met, when you asked me to tell you when you were doing socially unacceptable things?” He gestured from her eyes to his hips. “That’s one of them.”

She raised her gaze to his face. “Penises must be extremely inconvenient.”

“Tosh—”

“They make it impossible to prevaricate.”

“Listen.” He lowered his voice and glanced around, checking for witnesses. “What are you doing? Conducting some—some field experiment? You can’t do that to this family.”

“Why do you assume the worst?”

“What else am I supposed to think? You don’t do warm and fuzzy. You’re like . . . like . . .”

Toshiko tilted her head, but she’d resumed her default neutral expression. “A brain on a stick?”

Gideon gawped at her. “I—”

“You haven’t been subtle in your opinions, Gideon. Do you also believe that all Japanese are reserved and motivated only by ambition?”

“No—that is, I thought some of your personality had to be driven by culture. Everyone’s is, whether we like it or not, but—”

“My father was Japanese, a concert violinist. My mother, who is of Irish descent, is a physicist. She taught me very early that for women who hope to succeed in science, emotionalism is a career disadvantage. You may credit her with my behavior patterns.”

“I’m sorry. I never meant to hurt you.”

“Hurt is irrelevant, however, you should occasionally challenge your assumptions.”

“Challenge assumptions. Check.” God, you’d think I’d have learned that by now. “So what are you doing here?”

“Perhaps to remember I have a heart as well as a brain.”

He groaned, fist clenching around the bag. “God, Tosh—”

“Ned is not an experiment. He’s a reason.”

“A reason?”

“A reason for my research. How does information get stored and passed in the human brain? What if we could emulate that synthetically? What if those synthetics could be passed back, repair the damage in the organic host?” Her disconcerting gaze transferred from Gideon to the doorway next to the fireplace. “I sit with him to remind myself it’s not theoretical. It could matter to people like Ned, who lose who they are. To people like the Hennings, who have to watch someone they love become a stranger.”

She turned away, dismissing him in her usual fashion as no longer pertinent. Well, shit. Does everyone in the world other than me have unsuspected hidden depths?

Ruth emerged from the hallway, dressed in a pair of gray wool slacks and a slate-blue twinset that brought out the color of her eyes. She appeared ten years younger than when Gideon had seen her last, perhaps because she was smiling.

To Gideon’s intense astonishment, Ruth hugged Toshiko and Toshiko, oh my god, hugged her back, closing her eyes as joy and yearning flitted across her face.

“He’s already eaten, but he doesn’t seem interested in TV.”

“Don’t worry. We’ll be fine.” Toshiko vanished down the hallway.

“Wow. I didn’t realize you and Tosh were such good friends.” Oops. Not the way to start the day—his tone was a skosh too accusatory.

“We only met her recently, but I’m so glad Lindsay brought her over. I don’t know what we would do without her.”

The hideous specter of inadequacy that had haunted him since he’d failed to convince Mark to accompany him to the ER loomed large in the virtual corners of Gideon’s mind. Damn it, not now! He’d built his whole adult persona on being superlative. Indispensable. To dodge the creeping fear of not being enough, he held out the bag. “Even though shopping isn’t on today’s dance card, I brought you something anyway.”

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“It was my pleasure.” His anemic bank balance would recover as soon as he billed the Luddite. “Go on. Look inside.”

Ruth opened the bag and pulled out the new scrub top. “How did you . . .”

“Alex told me. And darling, plain blue is positively criminal these days. See?” He pointed to the pattern on the fabric. “Smiley lightbulbs. I thought your husband might enjoy that, considering he was an electrician for so long.”

She held the shirt to her chest and bestowed a brilliant, though watery, smile on him. “Thank you.”

Such a small thing, to make her so happy. Gideon felt like a total poser. Shopping, sharing lunch and salon TLC—he loved this stuff, so taking Ruth out for the day was easy for him. Surely if Tosh could reveal the heart behind her big, giant brain, Gideon could put himself out a little too.

What would really prove that he was a deep and serious guy—if not to Alex and Lindsay, then at least to himself—would be to do something he found truly difficult. Something he loathed. Only one thing was big enough, scary enough to qualify, and the notion that he might actually face it by choice kept him buzzing with flight-response adrenaline, even during a day spent with a spectacularly nice woman.

All through their afternoon, as he kept up his trademark glittery persiflage, he wrestled with the Big Bad—his uncharacteristic superstition that the only way to make it through October-the-sequel and the dreaded count-your-blessings-asshole holiday unscathed, was total avoidance. After all, that plan had worked for him perfectly since he was eighteen.

But when he walked Ruth to the door, he knew it was time to make soufflé or get out of the kitchen.

“So, Ruthie. Big holiday coming up next Thursday. What are your plans?”

She stopped admiring her French manicure, and her face, which had relaxed during their salon time and lunch, seemed to age in front of his eyes, like a time-lapse YouTube video. “Oh. Nothing special.”

“I . . .” His throat closed before the offer could escape; sweat dotted his forehead under his freshly styled bangs. For pity’s sake, G, pull up your big-boy briefs and say it. “Well— If you—” Gah! He swallowed a surge of nausea and surrendered, forcing himself to smile. “Whatever you do, your nails will be fabulous, right?” Coward-coward-coward. “I adored our afternoon. Another one soon?”

“That would be lovely.” She mustered up a smile of her own and gave him a hug that he sooo didn’t deserve. “I’m so happy Lindsay has a friend like you,” she whispered.

Lindsay. Not Alex. So the two of them weren’t on the family’s radar yet. “Ruthie, trust me, when it comes to friendship with your family, the pleasure is entirely mine.”

But unless he could get over himself, friendship might be the only thing on the books. And for some reason, that wasn’t enough anymore.