CHAPTER 39
REID
The bal ’s in her court; I’m better when it’s in mine. I’m used to being in complete control of any relationship with a girl—
whether it’s for an hour or a few weeks. Keeping control is effortless when the outcome is clear or inconsequential.
Neither of these applies to Dori.
It’s been four days. Under normal circumstances, I’d be pissed that I’m counting, more pissed that I care. Where Dori is concerned, there’s no such thing as normal circumstances.
Returning the clothes was her idea, so I should wait for her to contact me. I could contact her first... I have her phone number. And I know where she lives.
I sound like a damned stalker.
***
“You’re up early.” Through careful voice inflection, Dad manages to take statements that should be positive and twist the words to sound accusatory and suspicious. It’s a gift.
It’s also bait, and I’m not rising to it. Without turning, I continue peeling the orange in my hand, separating the continue peeling the orange in my hand, separating the smooth rind from the fruit below by tearing pieces away and dropping them into the sink. “I’m meeting with George in an hour, discussing new project proposals.” I detach a wedge and pop it into my mouth, resisting the impulse to lick the juice from my fingers. I fight the urge to enjoy anything too much in front of him, actual y, and now that I’m aware of that fact, my brain gets hung up on why that is.
“Mmm,” he says, as unconcerned as possible. In my peripheral vision, his brows are almost knit at the center as he stares at the empty mug in his left hand and the coffee pot in his right, as though he’s forgotten how to pour. He doesn’t look at me, and I debate whether to turn and head back to my room or wait until he says actual words. I elect to silently count to five first. I’m up to three when he adds,
“Anything of note?”
Sweeping the bits of orange peel into the disposal and flipping it on, I savor the tangy whiff of citrus almost as much as the motorized droning that purposeful y stal s my reply.
“Yeah, a couple. One has possible critical appeal—
maybe even Oscar-worthiness. The other’s an action flick.
More money, probably.”
“Mmm,” he says again. Strange. Seldom without a blunt opinion of my career, particularly when it comes to financials, this man seems like someone else’s father. A minute later he’s snatched a sheaf of papers from his attaché. My upcoming film choices forgotten, he removes a giant clip and thumbs through the one-inch stack, flagging something in the center of a page.
Dad is a contracts expert. No fraudulent detail can be Dad is a contracts expert. No fraudulent detail can be buried deeply enough that his expertise can’t root it out, for which his clients pay a buttload, as John would say. Too bad the emotional details of life flow by without his notice, which is why everything Mom and I do strikes him as out of the blue. Suddenly that question I typical y dodge pops up: how much am I my father’s son? I’ve become proficient at avoiding emotional entanglement. Funny how my earliest self-protective behavior turned me into the very thing I was protecting myself from.
I leave him to his standard obsession—work—and head to my room, deciding halfway there that if I don’t hear from Dori by the end of the day, I’m cal ing her.
Her text arrives in the middle of the scheduled meeting with George.
Dori: The clothes are back from the dry cleaner. Where should i send them?
Me: I can get them when i pick you up for lunch tomorrow.
Dori: Visiting my sister tomorrow.
Me: Al day?
Me: Nevermind. Tonight, then.
Several minutes go by during which my long-suffering manager repeats the name of the director of one of the proposed films two, three times, and I stil don’t hear him.
“Reid. Let me know when you’re actual y listening rather than setting up booty cal s.” His dry tone belies his annoyance with me, only because I know him so wel .
Dori: Lunch tonight?
Me: Haha, yeah. Lunch tonight.
“I’m listening,” I tel George, seconds ticking by while I wait for her to reply, clicking the phone to make sure it’s stil powered up. Final y, she answers.
Dori: Ok
Me: Pick you up at 7
“Color me unconvinced,” George says, his tone dry as toast, and I give him my almost undivided attention. I’m already planning tonight.
*** *** ***
Dori
Here I am, staring into my closet again, chewing my thumbnail and wondering what one wears to return a borrowed outfit to a celebrity.
I arrive downstairs in jeans and a white button-up shirt with three-quarter length sleeves. The last time I wore this shirt to school, Aimee said, “Jeez, Dori, you look like my mom.” Her pity smirk said this wasn’t a compliment. But what she hates about it is what I like. This shirt says I’m not trying to be enticing—not 18-year-old girl enticing, anyway.
Mom’s on second shift at the hospital and Dad’s been in his study most of the afternoon. I dread looking in on him.
Too often, he’s staring out the window, or worse, at some invisible thing in his mind’s eye, and when I interrupt his reverie he looks—for a beat or two—as though he’s never seen me before in his life.
I stop in the doorway. “Hey, Dad.”
I’m relieved when he peers over the top of his glasses at me, his hands never leaving the keyboard. This is good.
He’s working. Writing sermons has been grueling for him the past few weeks. He’s always grumbled good-naturedly about striving to hear God speak; when I was little he’d step into the hal way and tel me semi-sternly that he couldn’t hear God while I practiced cartwheels in the living room, or when Esther and I roughhoused on my bed, her playful barks mingling with my laughter. Now, I suspect that the impediment to hearing God comes from a different source.
“I’m going out. I won’t be late.”
He nods, looks back to the screen. “Tel Kayla and Aimee hel o.”
For a moment, I don’t correct him, and then I shake myself internal y. There’s no reason to omit the truth of what I’m doing. “Actual y, I’m seeing Reid.”
His eyes snap up and he frowns—not angry, but baffled.
“Reid Alexander?”
I rarely mention Reid to anyone, but when I do, his surname is always tacked on in return, as though he can’t ever just be Reid. He’s something bigger and more sensational than that, not to be described on a first name basis like some guy from school. “He’s the only Reid I know, Dad.”
His head tilts to the side. “Why are you seeing him?” He doesn’t know I saw Reid last weekend, of course. (I let Kayla and Aimee believe I left the club with a stranger, for which they lectured me severely… and then pumped me for details due to the Versace top, Coach flip-flops and opaque-windowed, chauffeur-driven Mercedes.) I scramble for a sensible answer. “I think he’s, uh, investigating charity organizations for possible contributions and wanted my input.” This could be true. “You know how people with money are.”
“Not real y,” he says.
The doorbel rings and Esther takes up her post at the door, barking. “Me neither, I guess.” I laugh nervously as I turn to go, my guilt-ridden brain summoning the stunning house and the uniformed maids and the overpriced flip-flops in my closet and the neatly folded designer clothes stowing away in my Mary Poppins bag.
The last time I saw Reid on my front porch, I hadn’t yet made my third trip to Quito. Deb was about to get engaged.
I was on the cusp of starting col ege. And I thought I’d never see him again after that night.
He’s wearing jeans and a button-down shirt the color of dark plums, the kind I eat with salt—a habit Deb instil ed in me when I was young and mirrored anything she did. His sleeves are rol ed to his elbows, the shirt is pressed but untucked. His dark blue eyes sweep over me once, quickly, moving to Esther, who growls. “Esther,” I admonish her, but not harshly, and not without stroking a hand over the back of her head. We’ve been too close for too long for me to reprimand her protective behavior.
Reid squats down eye-to-eye with Esther and offers the back of his hand. She looks to me for reassurance that he’s not dangerous and I place a hand on his shoulder to prove it. “It’s okay, Esther. He won’t hurt me.” She sniffs his hand lightly and then raises her nose with a sort of haughty air, eyeing him with lingering suspicion as a hazy memory emerges from my subconscious—Reid carrying me up the staircase in his house, whispering something my brain refuses to translate now.
When he glances up, I’m staring at him. I’m sure my puzzled expression is odd; he’s accustomed to wistful expressions directed his way from most women, and irked expressions from me. I turn and grab the Mary Poppins from the coatrack, severing the connection.
“That is one ginormous bag,” he says. “Are we shoplifting? Heading to the Hamptons? Hiding a body?” I elbow him lightly in the side (holy Moses, I forgot he’s solid everywhere) and precede him out the front door after scratching Esther behind the ears and tel ing her I’l be back.
Our lunch-dinner consists of sandwiches from a tiny hole-in-the-wal place where they slice the roast beef thick, toast the hard rol , add whatever you’d like, wrap it in butcher paper, and send you on your way, because there’s no space for tables or standing around. Across the street, we find a semi-secluded park bench and talk about filming in Vancouver and my col ege deferral until we finish eating, and then we strol around an upscale row of shops where a pair of socks would be at the upper limit of my budget.
“Uh-oh,” Reid murmurs. I fol ow his line of sight to a guy hiding not-so-discreetly behind a mailbox, an unmistakable camera lens trained on the two of us. “Just ignore him. They usual y don’t approach if they’re alone.” Taking my elbow, he turns to pretend interest in a store window, pul ing out his phone and cal ing Luis, who picks us up on the next corner two minutes later.
***
It’s Sunday before the photos are posted and speculations begin. There’d been no PDA, nothing that could be misconstrued by a sane person. But I’m learning how tabloids work. Scandal sel s. The hand on my elbow is taken out of context, along with the way I seem to lean close while laughing at something he said while we were eating.
That photographer had been watching us long before we saw him.
It didn’t take long for someone to match the girl spending a Thursday evening with Reid Alexander to the girl from Habitat who fel on top of him in the back yard last summer.
I suppose it was a simple task to get my name at that point and even easier to begin the conjecture about the length and intensity of our hidden romance and/or friends-with-benefits relationship, because of course it must be one of these.
I get cal s and texts from Kayla and Aimee, as wel as various other people I barely know or don’t know at al .
Reporters and photographers are camping out in front of our house and fol owing me anywhere I go.
Reid cal s to apologize, but I wave it off. “I’l live. At least Reid cal s to apologize, but I wave it off. “I’l live. At least there aren’t any photos of me tackling you this time.” He laughs. “In that case, what about doing something this weekend? We could see what’s playing at the revival theatre, if you’re interested. I think they’re showing The Dead. Have you seen it?”
“John Huston? I love it.” I don’t tel him that this film adaptation of an amazing James Joyce story is one of Nick’s and my favorites.
“Yeah? Me, too.” He sounds like he’s smiling.
***
“We don’t want you spending any more time with him.” I stare at my parents, Mom across from me, Dad adjacent at our smal kitchen table. They sit watching my reaction, each of us exhausted from propel ing ourselves into work and volunteer efforts until there are no moments to spare in which we might have to think about Deb or ponder why God left her alive but al owed her identity, her personality, to be stripped from her.
“I don’t understand,” I say final y. “Nothing happened.
Nothing wil . We just hung out and talked. We’re friends, I guess.”
Dad stares at his hands, clenched on the table like he’s praying. Or begging. “We’re only saying we don’t trust him.
This is not an appropriate connection for you, Dori. You must know it can’t go anywhere that’s… suitable. And as long as you’re living here—”
I gasp. “Dad, really? ‘As long as you’re under my roof’?
Mom?”
“Dori, there’s no reason to be difficult over this if he’s as unimportant to you as you say.” Her voice is logical, which I’m used to, and clipped, which is whol y unfamiliar and sounds wrong coming from the woman who’s loved and cared for me my whole life.
My face runs hot and I feel and hear the blood pounding in my ears. My parents have been unreasonable so few times in my life that I can almost recal them al . Making me to floss nightly seemed unreasonable when I was nine. SPF
45 sunscreen seemed unreasonable at eleven. Not al owing me to see movies with even hypothetical sex or cursing seemed unreasonable at thirteen. I wonder if there wil be some future point when I’l look back at this discussion and realize that what they were asking was sensible. That it was me who was being irrational.
“I don’t recal saying he was unimportant,” I say, quietly.
“Dori,” Dad begins, and I open my mouth to argue my point but Mom cuts both of us off.
“We’re not discussing this further.” She scoots her chair back and stands, the decisive scrape across the floor jarring. “You wil stop seeing him, Dori. He’s not part of our world.”
I look up at her, incredulous. “What world is that?” She turns and leaves the room without answering, motioning for Dad to fol ow. Just when I didn’t think my life could get any more bizarre, I’m wrong again.