My secretary stepped in, shuffling his suit in the process. “Mr. Scott is here to speak with you," he said.
He meant one of my brothers. “Which one?”
“Samuel, sir.”
Of course he was. “Let him in.”
He disappeared with a nod, and a few moments later, my brother stepped into the door. He had a smile, accentuated with dimples I swore had been there since he got married over the summer.
The man never had anything to smile about, and then he got married and he was all smiles and bright eyes. It made me sick.
“Hey, Em,” he said. “How’s it going?”
“I’m sure you know how it’s going.” He came in here every time I got reamed by our father.
“Seems like last night was going well. You interested in the Parker girl?”
I crinkled my nose. “No.” Veronica was nice, but we would never work. Neither of us wanted to settle down, nor did our personalities mesh well.
He plopped down in the chair in front of my desk. “You seemed to be pretty interested in her in those photos.” He said it casually, but something in his tone rubbed me the wrong way.
“I can assure you, I’m not.”
He shifted uncomfortably in his seat.
“What? Just spit it out.”
“I’m trying to help you,” he said. “Dad isn’t messing around about this. I heard him talking to the accountant this morning.He’s really going to cut you off if you don’t stop acting like this. Maybe settling down with her will get him off your back.”
My eyes stayed focused on the cube. I had two sides done. The pattern was repetitive and familiar, one I could get lost in.
“I get it, okay? I’ll figure it out. How’s Rachel?”
At the mere mention of her name, he got all doe eyed. “Amazing. We’re talking about adopting a dog.”
“That would be nice.” Though he annoyed me, Samuel was the only person other than my mother who actually gave a shit about me. And while it was gross to see him in love, I was happy for him.
“Thanks for the heads up,” I told him. “I’ll figure something out.”
He nodded, standing to take his leave. “And maybe in the meantime, try to cause a bit less trouble.”
“No promises,” I said with a smirk.
“I did hear you got me out of the Baker’s annual shit show. Thanks for that. Rachel and I were dreading it, so I’m going to surprise her and take her away to London for the weekend.”
I rolled my eyes, finishing the third side of the cube. All the blues falling into place. “Don’t have to rub it in,” I said.
“It could be fun,” he said sarcastically.
“Last year everyone got food poisoning. Why do people keep coming?”
“Because the Bakers may not know how to throw a party, but they do know how to run a very successful private equity firm, which keeps people coming. Including us.”
The fourth side of the cube came together, leaving only the one edge. I flicked the top around, then the bottom. The light clicking of the plastic always soothed me. The rhythmic beat it created centered me.
As a child, I’d always enjoyed the easy way of putting these together. When we were young, I used to follow my brothersaround everywhere. Especially Arthur. He wasn’t always a fan of having his little brother tail him, but had to put up with it or get the wrath of our mother. Who was objectively scarier than our father.
To get me off of his back, he would jumble up a puzzle cube then give it to me to solve. I would spend hours turning it with no solution in sight. I would get one side done, and instantly scramble it trying to accomplish the other. It felt like I could never get the full picture. But still I worked at it for hours.
