James: I’ll be over at your place around noon tomorrow. I’ll drive us to the attorney’s office.
Andrew: Thank you.
As much as I wanted him to go, I also worried that something might come up that would prevent him from coming along. Something out of his control. I opened up my weather app and took as deep of a breath as I could without sending pain to my lungs and lower back. The weather forecast was calling for a ninety percent chance of rain tomorrow. A sense of dread washed over me. I had a feeling rain was in the forecast because I could feel the humidity in the air tonight when we’d left the restaurant.
I knew how Brandon was during storms.
And I knew how James was because of Brandon.
I didn’t want James to feel obligated to come along with me. Brandon’s situation and need would be much greater than mine would be.
Andrew: If something comes up tomorrow, please don’t feel obligated to come with me.
James: Are you referring to the possible storm?
Andrew: Yes. I know how Brandon is affected by storms and rain. I don’t want you to leave him to come with me.
James: Don’t you think I might have that all under control? I’ve already spoken to Joshua. He’s going to bring some lunch over and spend the afternoon with Brandon. As you can see, I’ve already taken proper precautions, and everything is in place. I will be over to your house around noon.
I grinned at his response. Of course he had thought of the possible storm and had made arrangements to see to it that Brandon was taken care of.
Andrew: Thank you, James.
James: Try to get some sleep. I’ll see you tomorrow.
I set my phone on the nightstand and closed my eyes. As much as I tried, I couldn’t fall asleep. All I could think about were possible worst-case scenarios surrounding the situation with Elise. I ran through everything from her getting out of this without even a slap on her wrist to having to serve time through community service. I wondered if she was going to be the type who would continue to make my life a living hell by attempting to wreck the coffee house business my dad and I had built. Would she come to some of the locations just to cause a scene?
While I tried to tell myself that she wouldn’t drive all the way up from Riverside to L.A. with the purpose of maliciously causing trouble, I reminded myself that this was Elise. She was unpredictable.
Very unpredictable.
By three o’clock in the morning, my eyelids were finally heavy enough to stay closed.
* * *
I hadevery intention to get up and stop in at the new coffee shop location in downtown L.A. for a few hours before needing to be at the attorney’s office. I managed to sleep until almost eight thirty, and when I opened my eyes, I hadn’t thought it was that late already. The bedroom was darker than it usually was for this time of morning. As I laid there slowly getting my bearings and rubbing my aching lower back, I heard a rumble of thunder in the distance.
The storm was coming, as predicted. I hoped Brandon was doing okay.
I got up and lazily moved around the house. I could feel myself dragging due to a lack of sleep and food. I was looking forward to the day being over.
Throbbing pain radiated around the area of one of the stab wounds in my lower back that Elise had inflicted. I chuckled to myself as I found mild humor in the fact that there had been multiple knife wounds. The pain pills were harsh on my stomach when I actually had food in it. Taking one right now would be a mistake, and I couldn’t be sick or out of it for the meeting with the attorney this afternoon. The pain in my lower back was bad enough that it was going to force me to eat something so I could take the pill to make the pain go away.
I made two pieces of toast and a stack of pancakes in Josh’s fancy kitchen. As I slowly worked through the food, I decided to take it easy the rest of the morning. The appointment wasn’t until one in the afternoon, and James wouldn’t be here until noon. After I ate, I took the pain pill and then sat on the couch. I tried scrolling around on my phone, reading news and checking Brandon’s Instagram account. Without fail, that kid posted a picture of socks every day. Every. Damn. Day. Right at the top of my feed was #brandonccooper and a picture of black socks with green dinosaurs on them. His caption read “Rawrrr!” I burst out laughing and felt the pain from the sudden laugh all the way in my lower back. I always left him a comment, as did most of our mutual friends. Ali’s comment was the most recent and read “Very scary, Bran.” I could almost hear her saying that deadpan to him with her arms folded across her chest, rolling her eyes.
I said my comment out loud as I typed it in the space under Ali’s. It was simple and short, but given the circumstances of today, it was about all I could muster. “Nice socks, Bran.”
I read through an amusing exchange of comments between Josh and Brandon about an hour earlier. Josh asked if it was Brandon’s pet dinosaur and then the two of them went back and forth discussing the name of the dinosaur on the socks. In the end, it was determined that the dinosaur’s name was Pedro. Someone else asked him why it was Pedro, and Brandon replied with a lengthy paragraph explaining that the dinosaur would have been expected to have a rough name like Spike or Biff, and that Pedro was unassuming; therefore, he wouldn’t be judged by his name. Brandon went on to share an unknown fact about Pedro the dinosaur. He said Pedro was a cartoonist, which given his short T-Rex arms, was nothing short of a miracle.
“Where the hell does he get this stuff?” I wondered out loud.
I set the phone down and dozed off for about an hour, and when I woke up it was time for me to start getting ready for the meeting. Showering still took me a little longer than it used to because I had to be extra careful washing the wounds and my ribs were sore. As I buttoned the white dress shirt, I thought about what Ali had said about looking like I should be carrying Bibles door to door. I laughed out loud, though, as I recalled her comment about wearing one of the velvet track suits with the jacket zipped part way to expose my necklace. Sam had his hands full with her.
The rain was falling lightly by the time James pulled up in front of the house. I had been watching for him so he wouldn’t have to get out of the car. This was already an inconvenience for him, especially since I thought he had an agitated pup at home.
“Hey,” I said as soon as I opened the car door.
“How are you doing, Andrew?” he asked. He was looking at me and waited for my answer before pulling away from the curb.
