“Lunch!”
I wasn’t ready to stop. I hadn’t gotten rid of all of it, but I had to let everyone else break.
“Can we talk?” Carter asked from behind me.
I walked toward my bags. “I don’t know. Can we?”
He dropped his voice. “Last night.” He cleared his throat. “If you’re my principal, that can’t happen again.”
“Fine.” There was no venom in my voice, just exhaustion. Everything in my life was mitigated. I had to look where I went, watch what I said, make sure I was alone even if I was desperately lonely. Of course I couldn’t be attracted to a decent man who found me interesting. Of course a perfectly nice kiss had to be renegotiated the next morning.
I pulled a towel off the back of a chair and walked past him without making eye contact, heading for the bathroom, slapping the black door open with the heel of my hand.
I did my business and washed my hands, looking at the sink instead of my face in the mirror.
I regretted being short with him before I even shook the water off my hands.
Darlene came in, pulling the door closed.
“Okay, listen,” she started.
I didn’t let her finish. “I love you. But I need you to back off.”
“I’ll back off.”
She’d never given up a fight that easily in her life.
I snapped towels out of the dispenser. “Really?”
“Just let Carter watch you and I’ll stop getting in your face.”
I tossed the ball of brown paper in the trash.
“I already feel like I live in a prison.”
“I know.”
“I don’t go out unless I’m with you. I don’t date because I’m afraid someone I like’s going to get a crowbar in the face. I’d love to have a cat, you know? A fucking cat. And now you want a guy to follow me around? Thanks, but no thanks.”
“He told me.”
I had to lean on the counter with my whole body bowed. There was no pretending Darlene meant anything but the kiss.
“And?” I said to the floor.
“He is really hot, Emily. He’s one of the finest men I—”
I shot up. “Why are you saying it like it’s a bad thing?”
“Because I trust him to watch you. Look, this is Los Angeles. I can find another choreographer, but I can’t find another best friend. I can’t trust anyone else, and I know I’m making it about me again. I’ve never been as scared as I was when you were with Vince. I felt like I was losing you.”
“I was right here the whole time.”
“Not like that. When he didn’t want you to travel, or be onstage, or let anyone hear your voice, I thought it was only going to get worse. That’s how these assholes start. When he hit you . . . I know that was the end of it. But you’re lucky. Most women who get involved with a guy like that get hit a lot more often before they leave. So now, I keep waiting for you to go back and finish the job with him.”
“You know this has nothing to do with me. This is about your mother.”
“Goddamn it is, and you know it. And I know it. So, girl, let me sleep at night. Let me give you Carter.”
“There are four other guys you can assign me.”
She shrugged. “The other guys are fine, but he’s the best.”
I looked back into the mirror and twisted my hair up into a high bun.
“And I have to keep my hands off him?”
“He’s really clear he can’t protect someone he’s involved with.”
“You’re really sadistic, you know that?”
“If you want to start dating again, girl, I can get you dates. Lotta dates. You know my agent?”
“Gene? With the pink-gold watch?”
“He thinks you’re hot. Told me so. He’ll be at the party tonight.”
Party? Was there a party? I went deer-in-headlights.
“Tonight? Is it Wednesday?”
Darlene opened the door. Music wafted in over the clatter of the caterer packing lunch away.
“Yup. What are you wearing?”
“A dress and a bodyguard, apparently. Except the dress part. I don’t have a dress. I can’t—”
“Simon!” Darlene called out his name midsentence. He came to us, every step a dance. He had the strength of a man and the grace of a woman, with dark-brown skin and supershort hair he dyed white.
“You rang?”
“Emily needs a dress.”
He eyed me from head to toe without a bit of sexual interest, as if taking inventory of possibilities. Resistance was futile. I held out my arms.
“I was thinking something black,” I said. “So I can hide.”
“I don’t think so.” He wagged his finger at me. “We’ll meet right after work. I’m going to get you some attention.”
CHAPTER 13
CARTER
I had the afternoon off. I got Phin from school. He threw his bag in the back seat and hurled himself in the car.
“Hey, Dad. Size of my heart.” We fist-bumped.
“Size of mine. Did you shower this morning?”
“I forgot.”
He forgot a lot of things. If we didn’t remind him to brush his teeth and hair, put on matching socks, close the damn door, none of it got done. I understood this was normal for kids his age, but I also knew that after a certain point he might not improve. For an orderly man, a child with ADHD could challenge every fiber of patience.
“When we go home, then. Before I leave for work tonight.”
He used to get upset when I worked nights. Not anymore. Either he’d accepted it as his reality or he stopped caring. I got onto Olympic, right into a knot of traffic.
“I have homework,” he said, turning the radio to a station he liked. “I need you to help with it.”
“If it’s precalc, we can call Sean.”
Sean was his tutor. We called him only for math emergencies.
“It’s humanities.” He shut off the radio. That was weird. If we hadn’t been at a full stop, I would have pulled over. “I have to do a family tree.”
Ah.
Don’t make a big deal about it.
“All right.”
“I need to know about my mother’s family.”
“I’ll tell you what I know.”
The light turned green.
Look forward. Pressure off pedal.
“I need at least three generations to get an A, and I’m so close, this close to getting a perfect score in this class.”
His eyes were open a little wider, his body thrust toward me a few inches. His mouth was tense. He wanted that score. He could taste it. He wanted to prove them all wrong. He was smart; he just needed to be taught differently.
“I can’t tell you what I don’t know.”
“Please, Dad. I know you know. You just have to do what you always tell me to do. Focus and pay attention. Put in a little effort.” He said the last sentence in a singsong to lessen the force of my words coming back at me.
“When is it due?”
Translation: How long can I stall?
“The twenty-fifth.”
“That’s plenty of time.”
“Maybe we can do some research?”
“Google it?” I felt safe with Google, as long as Phin stuck to the information I’d given him.
“Sharon says birth records are at city hall.”
I almost slammed into the car in front of me.
“No,” I said, once I knew I’d avoided an accident. “I think you have enough without going to the county registrar.”
“I have to show you the thing I made in animation class.” He’d moved to the next subject fluidly and quickly. For once, I was grateful.