I want to call Kit to see if she wants to come over and have a look. But I know her brother is in town for the weekend, and I got the sense she’d planned a full agenda for them. And while we’ve spent a lot of time together over the last week, I’ve tried to make sure she comes to me first. I don’t want to crowd her. Or, I do—but it’s bad enough I don’t have my head in the game lately. Jasper called me on Thursday night, right as I was leaving her place, checking on whether I’d made any progress, and it had taken me a second to realize that I’d spent three hours with her and not brought up Beaumont once.
My dad limps in, looking a little pale as he lowers himself into the chair across from where River sits. His eyes scan the felt, and I feel my muscles tense infinitesimally. I’m hoping he doesn’t say anything about whatever nonsense system River has going here, because I want the kid to figure it out on his own. I think he might break when he opens his mouth, but then he just as quickly closes it again, looking up at me with a faint smile.
“Dad, you ought to go home. You look tired.”
“I am tired. I’m old,” he says, and River snorts. My dad nudges him with his good foot.“Something funny, Smalls?”
To my surprise, River doesn’t even blink at the nickname now. In fact, I’m pretty sure he’s trying to hold back a smile. Even though I was frustrated with my dad for taking on River, especially right now, when he’s still struggling to get better, I can’t deny how good he is at this, how calm he is around River, how easy it is for him to make teasing feel the same as a compliment.
“I’m serious,” I say.“Get Sharon to take you home so you can rest. I can be here until close.”
My dad leans forward and scans River’s tray, picking up what I’m guessing is a column from an oil lamp.“Aha,” he says, like he knows exactly where that goes. The stupid thing is, he probably does.“Just needed to take a load off. Sharon’s out there talking to some idiot about trying to match a stain. I couldn’t listen to another second. This guy, first of all, he puts his cold beer right down on his mother’s Eastlake side table. A real one too, Smalls, you hear? I’d say 1880, maybe. Now this mother, I doubt she’s operating at full capacity, keeping a piece that rare right out in her living space, but I don’t judge.”
River slides his eyes over to me, and I stifle a grin. The only thing my dad does judge people about is how they treat their furniture.
“So this genius looks online at how to get this water stain out, and you know what he finds?” He pauses dramatically, but River only shrugs. Still, he’s listening, I can tell.“Toothpaste,” Dad says, throwing his hands in the air dramatically.“Toothpaste!” He huffs another exasperated breath.“Now the thing about toothpaste is, sometimes it’ll work on water staining, but we’re only talking the real old-fashioned kind of toothpaste here, not this fancy shit they sell these days, you hear?”
I go over to the fridge in the corner and pull out Dad’s lunch, unwrapping his sandwich and pickle and putting it on one of the plates he keeps on top of the fridge. He’s still going on about water stains when I set it in front of him, his color back, and he barely notices me.“Eat,” I say, and snag the tray from River, setting it aside.“You bring lunch?”
“Yeah,” he says, and digs into his backpack, coming up with a crumpled brown paper bag that he unpacks in front of him on the workbench. Can of Coke, smashed PB&J, a bag of what I think are Doritos in broken, jagged pieces, though I probably haven’t seen a Dorito since college, so what do I know. I take an apple and a bottle of water from the fridge and set them in front of him before turning back to my chandelier.“So it’s got to be repainted?” River asks, his mouth full.
“Repainted!” Dad shouts.“Ben, he said repainted! What are youteachinghim back here?” I don’t even bother answering, because Dad barrels on, talking to River about wood stain. The next half hour goes this way, and I suspect River is being purposefully ignorant about some things, just to see my dad get riled up. It’s good for both of them, and it’s good for me too, their soundtrack a nice accompaniment to my work. I’m hanging the pear-shaped prisms I’ve got for the chandelier on a length of fishing line I’ve strung up over the workbench, which has the best light for me to check for small cracks or dings in the glass. It feels nice to move my eyes across the facets, to not look at a screen all morning, to not have a phone tucked against my ear.
As though it’s heard my thoughts, my phone rings from the pocket of my jeans, and I close my eyes briefly, thinking of ignoring it. If it’s Jasper, I don’t want to hear it, but it’s bad enough I’m dealing with work from here these last few weeks, so I answer, not even bothering to check who’s calling.
“Ben Tucker,” I say, waving a hand at my dad to quiet down. I think I hear him call me“Mr. Fancypants”to River.
“Hi.” It’s Kit’s voice, and I’m more happy than I should be to hear from her. But even in that one syllable, I hear something I don’t like, a stuffy, wet quality to the way she sounds. My body goes from relaxed to alert, and I turn my back to the rest of the room.
“What’s wrong?” When she doesn’t answer right away, I get even more tense.“Kit?”
There’s a big sigh on the other end of the phone before she speaks again.“Yeah—I probably shouldn’t have called. But something’s gone wrong in the house, and I’m not sure—”
“Is it anything dangerous? Anything electrical? Do you smell gas?” I don’t know why my mind is going to this kind of shit; I sound neurotic. But I hate the way she sounds.
“No, no. It’s—this is really dumb. But I think I maybe—made a mistake with something? And now there’s a mess, and I’m not sure if I should keep going, or…listen, I’m sorry. I’m sorry to call you on a Saturday.”
“I’ll come over. Give me twenty minutes.”
She pauses, and I hear something on the other end of the line, a repetitive metallic, scraping sound, followed by what might be a muffled curse from her. I haven’t known Kit long, but I know I can’t just go over, not unless she says it’s okay. She likes handling herself, and she probably waited until things were really bad to make this call anyway.
“Okay,” she says, after a little more silence, and I didn’t even realize I was holding my breath.
“Don’t touch anything else,” I say, which is ridiculous, because I don’t even know what she’s been doing.
I disconnect and turn back to where my dad and River sit. My dad’s watching me with interest, but River’s still making his way through the tray.“You’ve got your young lady calling you,” Dad says. I don’t even bother correcting him about this. I’m too focused on getting out of here.
“I can come back to take you home.”
He waves a hand.“Go. Sharon’ll take me. She’s on ’til we close.” I nod, and look toward River. My dad jumps in.“Smalls. You’re with me the rest of the day. This moron hasn’t taught you anything.”
“Cool,” River says, and I’m out the door, headed to Kit.
* * * *
I barely hear her say“Come in,” when I knock fifteen minutes later after a too-fast drive. When I walk in, there’s a funny smell of dust and chemicals throughout the house, but I don’t see anything out of order right away.
“Kit?” I call out, shutting and locking the door behind me. She shouldn’t be in here with it open, no matter what time of day it is. This neighborhood is spotty, but I’ll talk to her about that later.
