And this was a big deal, a really big deal. The reunion was part of an ad campaign for a national pizza chain, complete with soft drink company tie-in. There was a huge contest component, and the grand prize was to meet the Firebirds—all of starters, at least—from the 2010 championship team.
“You kidding me, Delray? How’d that happen?”
My boss, a lean six footer who’d played some basketball himself, grimaced. Maybe he couldpretendto be Ezekiel Angelo. Nah, they didn’t look alike at all other than the basics: tall, shaved head, wiry frame, prone to trash talking during any pick up game…
“I don’t know, but if I find out who leaked it, their ass is grass. In the meantime, you find whatever it is that has Angelo shook. And fix it.”
I ran a hand through my hair—still thick, shouldn’t that have counted for something with Deidre?—and picked up the contract once more. Angelo was known for being eccentric. Kinda like if Jeff Goldblum and Charles Barkley had a love child with Lady Gaga tendencies.
Candy Cane Underwear. Just a hint of a round bottom.
I stood calmly and walked past several cubicles to the stairwell. Then I climbed the stairs until I reached the flat roof of our office building. A quick check verified that no one was there.
Then I yelled in frustration, causing a few pigeons to scatter.
I liked to think of it as like Walt Whitman’s barbaric yawp that I could sound over the roofs of the world. I’d picked up this habit from my father, an English professor who specialized in midnineteenth century American poetry. Talk over the supper table was always fun in the Frost household.
And by fun, I meant not even the least bit interesting for a child. I don’t think my father or stepmother meant to be cold toward me, but neither knew how to relate to a kid. They often got so caught up in their own work that they forgot I was there. Unless, of course, I did something that created a mess. Then I got lectured about logical consequences while I cleaned up my own mess.
Sometimes people asked how I could remain so calm. Pretty sure it had everything to do with screaming on the rooftop where no one could hear me because we were close enough to the traffic on the Loop and the noise of cars. Even better, a train approached on the tracks beside the building.
I yawped one last time as the train hurtled past, its horn melding with my voice.
That accomplished, I went back down the stairs, walked down the hallway at a reasonable pace, and sat back down to study Ezekiel Angelo’s contract.
About eight hours later,my stomach rumbled to a degree I could no longer ignore.
My phone dinged. It was a text from Delray that simply said,Frost. Go home.
Taking a break might help. I gathered my laptop and all of my papers in the satchel that Deidre had gotten me the Christmas before.
Then I sat back down.
What good would it do for me to go home? Aubrey would be there, listening to music that she’d somehow managed to turn up to an eleven. Or she would be banging around while working on an art project in the basement. Or, even worse, trying to teach herself violin.
At this point, it was past time we set some ground rules. But I was paying rent into an account that she and her brother jointly owned, so the least she could do would be to find something quiet to do until I managed to get this contract conundrum sorted out.
I’d bribe her if I had to.
But I needn’t have worried. When I got home, she was sitting on the couch watching a movie—at a normal volume. I thought about asking her who she was and what the aliens had done with Aubrey, but she also didn’t look over and say hello so I knew she was still mad about the mall incident.
I would’ve thought flipping me off would’ve been enough, but apparently not.
And maybe I had overreacted a little bit, but I just…
You didn’t want anyone else to see her Candy Cane underwear. Admit it.
True. Neither Zach nor I had been able to protect her from her most recent loser boyfriend, but I sure didn’t want pictures of her panties going out into the world.
My eyes caught the box of Kleenex on the coffee table, the pile of wadded up tissues beside it. Surely, she wasn’tthatupset with me. I’d guessed she would’ve been angry more than sad. I didn’t have time to make up with Aubrey, but I found myself putting my satchel in a seat by the table and walking over to where she was watchingThe Mummy.
No wonder the volume was low. She could’ve recited the entire movie if she’d wanted to. Heck, I could recite most ofThe Mummyby now. It was the movie she played when she was sad, when she was mad, when she was happy, and when she was bored. She would watch it in the rain or on a train or in a boat or with a goat.
But the tissues said sad and I got a pang in my chest, an invisible knife of pain. “Aubrey, are you okay?”
She shook her head no.
“Wanna talk about it?”
