Fucking hell.
He pictured it all too well, and it snapped so much into place. The consistent way she analyzed their interactions. The laying bare of every perceived flaw in herself and her world. The guardian friends.
And who enters her orbit and refuses to be set aside? A man who hired her ex, who looks a bit like her ex, who’s a non-custodial parent like her ex. It almost was enough to make him laugh, or hang his head in defeat. Or slip away.
Except Rachel opted to tell him everything, and the only reason to do that was because she’d stopped seeing him as a version of her ex. That was a gift worth sticking around to receive. He brought her hand to his lips and kissed the knuckles. “You’re no princess, Rachel.”
It made her shoulders shake, and he lifted his head enough to check she wasn’t crying. “You say the most romantic things.”
“Believe me, you want romance, I’ll go big. But not because I...” How to categorize the difference between him and Sergei? “Not because I am keeping a tally to throw in your face later. Or so you have to come up to any kind of standard. You’re great already. I’m not trying to change you or keep score.”
Whatever incoherent nonsense it sounded to him, she relaxed more into the crook of his arm. So maybe he wasn’t messing up.
“I know you’re not.” She sounded more calm than sad.
“Thanks. I mean, good. That’s great. I don’t mind if you question me, if you get worried about anything. About my reactions or whatever. I’ll try to stay open with you. But tell me if I’m messing up.”
She nudged an elbow to his ribs. “Free rein, huh?”
“Ha. Don’t make too much of it; I’m as apt to screw up as the next man.”
And that statement sure loaded the atmosphere with grim fog. Like he couldn’t wait one single morning to prove his point about screwing up. May as well plunge them back to the topic that kicked off the whole talk.
He cleared his throat again. “Not apt to take after Sergei, though.”
She nodded.
“But...”
With that, she straightened away from him, letting the cool creep between them. “But you’re working with him every day, and we’re not hiding that we’re dating, and it’s like to be wiser to mention it up front to him than for him to speculate and feel upper-handed about it.”
“Yeah.”
She retrieved the coffee pot. Gave them both refills. Accepted his light kiss. “I don’t want to talk to him.”
“Easy enough,” he said. “I’ll do it. Tell me what you want me to say, and when.”
“Just like that?”
“Well. Probably not.” He and Sergei got along, at least so far. Most of the time, Ron liked him, and Ron could be testy. The division of labor worked, give or take Sergei’s aversion to sitting at the desk. Were they friends? Not in the same way he and Ron were friends, but friendly, sure. Hard to imagine them getting closer, now he knew more about Rachel’s marriage.
“What are all those thoughts tumbling around your skull?”
He tried for lightness. “Oh, nothing big.”
“Wow. Here I thought we were still new to each other, but already I can tell when you’re lying to me. I don’t know if I’m pleased or pissed.”
Her eyes twinkled. He wanted her to tease him forever, so he could keep seeing those sparks. Instead he figured he was about to extinguish them. “Fine. It’s something I have to figure out on my own. Or with Ron, I mean. About the future of Elixir, and how we feel about someone who’d do all that being in such a key position. Whether we need to act to protect employees or customers. Sorry.”
“Sorry, for...?”
“You look like you want to glue my lips closed.”
The half-smile she gave him kept her own teeth out of sight. “Can’t really tell you what to do about that. Selfishly, I’m hoping he keeps his job, cause I’m still waiting on arrears.” She gestured to a drawing on her fridge.
“What’s that?”
Cute blush. “It’s silly. I mean, it’s utterly vital, but it’s also silly. I keep track of the amount he owes by coloring in parts of that garden.”
He went to examine it. She had a dozen or more pictures held by colorful magnets—thumbprint ladybirds, a series of traced triangles, something that could have been an exploding sun—but only one with flowers that stayed inside the lines. Some of the petals were shaded with crayons, some with marker, some with pen. But close to forty percent still needed some kind of color. “Each one represents an amount?”
“Hundred bucks per petal. Another six months and I’ll be able to trade in my car for one with proper air conditioning.”
“How is he so far behind?” Why did he buy that flashy SUV instead of paying up?
She read all the questions behind the one he asked. “When he was freelance before he started with you, he managed to jump from place to place faster than the Attorney General could serve the papers. Mostly. So the arrears built up. I know it’s a bigger decision for you than what he owes, but it’s been nice having him in one place so I don’t have the wait while the system figures out where to garnish.”
“That only explains the arrears if he was job-hopping on purpose and not remitting support on his own.” He turned at her dry laugh, and grimaced.
“You’re a smart one, Theo.”
He lifted a box of cereal off the top of the fridge and carried it to the table. Smart? Maybe. But obtuse, too. He was reassessing every time he’d given Sergei the benefit of the doubt.
Well. Whatever else, if he kept Sergei on while he paid Rachel off, or if he and Ron looked for a replacement, he knew now to keep doubt in place. It didn’t resolve much, but it might stop him from making more mistakes.
Once she and Hannah were unpacked and settled down, they called her parents. Dad answered, all smiles and wearing an Uncle Sam hat.
“Getting ready for the fourth?”
“There was a festival this afternoon, we went with Blythe and Jason.”
Of course they did. Nothing against people who got on with their extended families, but it seemed sometimes like these monthly video calls were nothing but a chance for her parents to mention all the varied and fulfilling hours they spent with her sister and brother-in-law. “How’s Blythe doing? Everything with the pregnancy good?”
“You should see her,” Mom said. She was in a star-spangled shirt and a red-and-white striped scarf. “That baby does nothing but squirm around inside her. Jason’s already talking about padding out the basement and building a toddler-sized gym.”
“Cute. Can’t wait to see it.” At her pettiest, she hoped that Blythe and Jason had a wonderful, healthy, happy baby who set about destroying every single one of their preconceived notions about parenting. It wasn’t such a mean wish. She’d yet to meet a parent whose offspring hadn’t spun every controlled thing about their life out of alignment. The parents had to adjust, but tended to not mind all that much.
Hannah leaned into the screen to poke at Dad’s image, and they all spent a few minutes focused on her. Mom and Dad asked the right questions, remembered the names of her school friends, spoke with age-appropriate words.
Not for the first time, she wondered if they updated a cheat sheet after each month’s call.
“So your sister is trying to get me to move back home,” she told Dad, once Hannah wandered off.
Mom looked around her own living room, like Aunt Johnston might be lurking. “Here?”
“No. I mean, Plainview.”
“Be nice, having you closer,” Dad said.
“Plainview is not your home.” Mom’s narrowed gaze moved between Dad and the screen.
“I know. I told her I wasn’t interested. This jerk guy from high school is running Brookside; remember where I used to work in summers? He wants me to take over as Director of Recreation.” She didn’t know why she was telling them. She’d turned down the job within seconds of getting Brent’s email, giving him no room for ambiguity.
Okay, she did know. She wanted a damn gold star. She wanted them to hear how people from across the state were recruiting her. She wanted them to see she wasn’t some pitiful less-than, never as accomplished or valued as her brilliant doctor sister.
Thin a veil as she’d draped over her request for praise, her parents didn’t see it. “I don’t know why you call her place ‘home,’ Rachel. You only lived there for high school.”
“Mom, I don’t. I call Houston home.” Eighth grade through graduation, and she’d only been an hour away during community college. And lived with Aunt every summer even once she started at University of Texas. But Mom never wanted those reminders.
“This hat is making my scalp itch,” Dad announced. “I’m going to go shower. Talk to you next month, love?”
“Talk to you and see you,” she reminded him. “We’ll be there the twelfth or thirteenth, depending on how the drive goes.”
Mom didn’t even watch her husband’s retreat. “I suppose you’re staying with her on the way?”
“For a night or two, of course. And we’ll stay a bit longer on the way back. I haven’t taken Hannah on this long a road trip since before she was walking. I can only guess what our schedule will be like.”
“You went to stay with her last summer.”
It wasn’t like it had been some teen rebellion, her running off to live with Aunt Johnston. Her parents organized it all, then told her the day before the ‘For Sale’ sign went up in her childhood home’s front yard. Well, mostly Mom told her. Dad managed to stay in the room, but didn’t contribute much.
Despite all that, Rachel couldn’t remember her mother saying Aunt Johnston’s actual name once since then. It was always ‘her’ or ‘your aunt.’ As if Aunt was a pariah for taking her in when no one else would make room for her. As if she’d done something egregious by guiding Rachel to high school graduation. As if her success required Aunt’s head on a chopping block.
She sighed. “I had my friend with me then, remember? It’s different, being the only adult in the car. Anyway, we’re excited about seeing you all in person. And I get to take in the reality of Blythe, pregnant. I don’t think the photos do it justice. I want to watch her abdomen ripple. And see her stand up from a too-deep chair.”
Mom let herself laugh and be diverted, talking about the nitrates in the hot dogs at the Fourth of July festival and Jason’s paternity leave negotiation until everything else had sunk down and the surface of their chat was nothing but calm.
“Sergei, step in here if you’re free.”
“What’s up?” He started to lean as usual against the doorframe, but whatever was on Theo’s face spurred him to his desk chair instead. He swiveled to close the door, and then rotated back to face Theo. “I didn’t want to bring up the Ron and Lonnie thing again, but I guess he came complaining to you? I get that he’s also the boss, but everything I do to keep the front of house staff happy, I can’t ignore the rules because it’s him.”
Theo pinched the bridge of his nose, in no mood to switch gears and deal with the tension between Sergei and Ron. “No, he didn’t come complaining to me. I didn’t know Lonnie came by again.”
Sergei shrugged. “Twice more since we talked about it before. I don’t know what his fight with his uncle is about, but this last time I intercepted him in the foyer and told him to take it round to the dock.”
Theo eased into the back of his chair. “Okay, that’s fine. If he gives you a problem let me know.”
“Good stuff.” Sergei slapped his hands to his thighs, and then halted his forward momentum. “Hey, okay, so what did you want to talk over, then?”
“Rachel.”
He hoped they weren’t true mirrors of each other, or if so, that he’d never worn such a sneer on his own face. Sergei slicked his hair back and asked, “What’d she do now? Is she going after my paycheck again?”
“That money’s for your kid, Sergei. You know what it costs to dress and feed a child, much less send her to a decent daycare? Your business is your business, but that brand-new SUV in your parking space retails for like seven times your arrears, man. How’d you tell yourself it’s okay to buy that and not make sure your daughter’s taken care of?”
He cut himself off. They’d both stood, stances tense across Theo’s desk.
“You’re saying a lot of words about something that’s not your business.”
It took effort, but he nodded twice. “Yeah. I shouldn’t have.” He could concede, but he couldn’t quite apologize.
“So that’s what she’s done? Recruited you to her side, in all those little chats you two’ve been having when she drops my child off? I didn’t figure you to be a sucker for those faux-innocent baby blues of hers.”
“Jesus, Sergei, listen to yourself. No one’s taking sides. There aren’t sides here, just court ordered support and being adult enough to take responsibility.”
Sergei snorted, and Theo couldn’t even blame him for it. His denial of side-taking was as transparent as his phyllo dough.
He sat again. Sergei didn’t, but Theo opted out of the body language wars. He said straight out what he needed to say. “Rachel and I are dating.”
Sergei left the office, which was, all in all, an eloquent response.