The email had been sitting unopened in his inbox for two days. This one from her personal account, not her business one. He stared at the little box for a few minutes before he succumbed to curiosity and clicked to open it, feeling slightly ill as her words filled the screen. What did they call it? A vulnerability hangover? Well, that was exactly what it felt like. A hangover.
He read what she had written:
We work together, so we can’t avoid each other forever. If you want to pretend it never happened, then fine. We will pretend it never happened. I know you might have regrets, but I don’t.
No wonder she’d sent it from her personal account. If someone else saw that email, they might think they’d slept together. In actuality what they’d done had been far worse. The words bared his soul floated through his brain, the nausea intensifying at the thought. Stupid. He’d been so stupid and now he couldn’t take it back, nor could he figure out a way to fix it. And, as Nicole had just pointed out, avoidance wasn’t a long-term solution.
Thaddeus clicked the little X to close his email inbox just as his cell phone rang. He looked at his BlackBerry, a device his family teased him about mercilessly—how important he thought himself now with his fancy phone, Mr. In-Demand Author. He needed the phone to communicate with author escorts in cities all over the country, navigate his constant travels, and connect with producers of the various morning and news-magazine shows he’d appeared on since the book’s rise up the bestseller lists. (Even his mother had seemed impressed that he’d been on Good Morning America.) But it wasn’t true that he thought himself important. No matter what his family thought.
A familiar number filled the screen, the word above it stating that Home was calling, even though it had not been his home in many, many years. Funny that he named it that in his contacts, perhaps in a fit of nostalgia. Was home always home? Did it ever get replaced, another house coming to mind at the mention of the word? He supposed if he was married with children and a mortgage, then a new house would become home, more by default than choice. It was the proper order of things. If one’s life was going in the proper order, that is.
He silenced the call. He wasn’t in the mood to hear from home.
He pushed away from the hotel room desk, turning his thoughts to the piece he was supposed to be writing for The Pacific magazine about how the reception of the book had changed his life. He wondered how much he could expound on the theme “I get laid a lot more than I ever did before.” He grinned, letting himself forget the email from Nicole for a moment.
The phone rang again, making his grin turn to a grimace. He picked up the phone to see who was calling this time. Home again. Gripping the phone, he said aloud to no one, “Can’t you people see I’m working?” He closed his eyes, thinking of his parents, who, after all, weren’t getting any younger.
He answered, bracing himself as he did.
“Thaddeus?” his mother asked. He was grateful for the effort she made to use the name he preferred. No more TJ, as he had once been known. TJ was a child’s name. He was a man now. Or at least he pretended to be one.
“Yes?” he asked, knowing she could hear the alarm in his voice. Before she could speak again, he asked, “Is it Dad?”
“What?” She gave a panicky little laugh. “No, no. It’s not Dad. And I wouldn’t be calling about him anyway. I’ve heard he’s got a girlfriend now. So I guess she’d be calling you. If there was a reason.” She paused and swallowed. Then, “It’s Davy.”
Thaddeus had felt this moment coming for such a long time, an out-of-control 18-wheeler barreling toward them all, building speed and momentum with every day that passed. Two shameful thoughts occurred at once: (1) he hoped Davy wasn’t alive, a damaged stranger returned to them, and (2) now he could write that second memoir his editor had been clamoring for.
A third thought followed the other two, this one even worse: If there was news about Davy, did his book make it happen somehow? Was he responsible for dredging up answers that had eluded them for two decades? If so, would that make him a hero?
It took his mother less than a minute to dispel that fantasy. A property owner walking his newly acquired land had found Davy’s jacket. The discovery was not due to a tip from a reader; there was no confession from the perpetrator because he’d read Thaddeus’s memoir. Instead, it was happenstance. Now the authorities were searching the property extensively, looking for more evidence and possibly, finally, Davy.
Thaddeus reached into his pocket but felt nothing there. He scanned the room and found what he was looking for on the dresser, where he’d left it the night before.
“So they haven’t actually found him?” Thaddeus clarified.
“The sheriff says they’re closer than they’ve ever been. He thinks . . .” She didn’t continue, unable or unwilling to utter what came next.
“He thinks they’re going to find him,” Thaddeus said.
“Yes,” his mother said, and he heard the tears threatening at the edges of her voice. If she started to cry, he knew she might not stop. She would be stalwart through this, just as she always had. She would get through this discovery and all that came with it and fall apart later, alone. It was the family way.
“I’d like you to come home,” she said. “I think you should be here when . . .”
The if they’d lived with for so long had become a when?
“Mom, I can’t. Not now. I’m in St. Louis, and I leave tomorrow morning for Seattle. Then I have to go to New York for some pretty important meetings. But I could come after that?” The question was a placation, even though by then he’d have thought up another excuse, and they both knew it.
“Thaddeus, your family needs you. And I doubt they’ll be able to handle your book events once this news breaks. It won’t be safe for you to make any public appearances. You know this kind of thing brings out the crazies.” She’d slipped into her mom voice, one he was very familiar with, yet had almost forgotten. Even now he felt himself tense, the reaction Pavlovian. Or Freudian. He didn’t know which.
“That’s a discussion for me to have with my publisher. Not my mom,” he said, sounding—and feeling—like a sullen teenager as he said it.
She wasn’t having a debate. That was what she used to say when he was a kid and tried to argue with her.
“You need to come home, Thaddeus. Start checking flights and let me know what you arrange. Or have your fancy publicist do it for you. I don’t care.” She went silent, waiting, he supposed, for him to respond.
When he didn’t, she added one more thing. “You’ve spent the last year profiting off your brother. Now it’s time to come home for him.” He heard a click and she was gone.
Thaddeus sat still for a moment, listening to the hum of the air conditioner, processing what he’d just learned. Already he wished to go back to ten minutes ago, when his biggest problem was oversharing with a woman he both worked with and had a crush on. That was nothing compared to this.
They’d found Davy’s jacket after all these years. How was that possible?
He sat alone in his hotel room and wished for someone to talk to, someone he could call. But he could think of no one. Then it dawned on him: what he really wanted in that moment was a brother. He wanted a brother who knew their mother, who knew their history, someone he could truly share this with, who didn’t have to pretend to understand.
What Thaddeus wanted most was to call Davy, to tell him his jacket had just been found.