CHAPTER 8
THE POLICE SHOWED UP
AND WHAT HAPPENED NEXT WILL
BLOW YOUR MIND!
VANESSA
Can I help you?” I asked, leaning halfway out of Adrian’s apartment.
The officer looked over at me. “I’m looking for a Vanessa Price.”
“I’m Vanessa.”
He glanced at a clipboard. “Do you own a white 2018 Kia Rio?”
Shit.
My heart launched into rapid fire. “Yes, is everything okay?” I swallowed.
Adrian came up behind me and peered out into the hall. “Officer Sanchez,” he said, over my shoulder. “How are you?”
Recognition crossed the cop’s face and he broke into a smile. “Copeland!
You live here?”
“Going on five years,” Adrian said. “How’s the wife?”
He laughed. “Pregnant again. Haven’t seen you at the gym lately.”
“Been busy. In the middle of a jury trial. What seems to be the problem?”
Officer Sanchez looked back at me, still smiling. “Yeah, we found your car wrapped around a tree over by the fairgrounds this morning, Ms. Price.
Nobody in it. Do you know anything about that?”
His posture had gone casual the moment Adrian popped out. There was nothing accusatory about the question. But I could feel my pulse thrumming in my throat anyway. “No,” I said, hoping I sounded normal.
“Did you give the vehicle to anyone to drive?”
Adrian squeezed my elbow discreetly from behind. “Sounds like it was stolen. Probably a joy ride,” he said.
Officer Sanchez looked over my head at Adrian. “The keys were in it. It wasn’t hot-wired.”
Adrian’s breath tickled my ear as he spoke to me. “Didn’t you say you lost your keys, Vanessa?”
He was coaching me. And standing sooo close. Ridiculously close. It was on purpose. He wanted the officer to think we were together.
He was lending me his credibility.
He’d known me less than a week, he knew nothing about what was going on, and he was stepping in to defend me, giving me the benefit of the doubt and protecting me from whatever repercussions there could be from this. I didn’t know why he was doing it, but I couldn’t be more grateful. I was freaking out.
I nodded. “Yeah, actually. I lost the keys a few weeks ago,” I lied. “I’ve been using the spare.”
Officer Sanchez nodded, but his eyes felt like they were studying me all of a sudden. “Where were you last night at around three a.m.?”
Adrian laughed. “Where do you think she was?”
Officer Sanchez looked back and forth between us. Then he chuckled a little. “All right, buddy. I’ll write it up as a stolen vehicle.” He looked back at me. “It’s in the impound. Here’s the info.” He handed me a card.
I cleared my throat. “I’m sorry, um…was there any blood or anything?
Do you think anyone got hurt?”
Officer Sanchez shook his head. “Hard to tell. The airbag deployed, but we canvassed the immediate area. Nobody dead in a ditch. I think they ran off on their own two feet.” He nodded up to Adrian. “Hey, you need to get
back to the gym to spot me.”
Adrian’s laugh practically rumbled against my back. “Will do. Have a good day. And tell Karla I said hi.”
As soon as we stepped back inside the apartment and the door closed behind me, I darted for my phone.
I dialed Dad. It went right to voicemail. Then Annabel. Voicemail too.
Brent would have answered, but he blocked me after I told him he could have my Gucci backpack when he got a job. Arg!
“Shit. Shit shit shit shit shit. I have to go.”
I started grabbing things, shoving wipes and hand sanitizer in the diaper bag, running to the kitchen to get the bottle I’d left drying on his sink. I had to collect Grace and her swing. My fan mail was all over the floor. I was so panicked and flustered I couldn’t organize myself.
Adrian crossed his arms, watching me spin in circles around his apartment. “Who was driving the car?” he asked.
The hospital. I needed to call hospitals.
“My dad. I bought him a car to use. He’s on probation, he probably got
scared.”
“Probation for what?” he asked.
“Health code violations. Stuff in the yard.” I stopped in the middle of the room, panting, the diaper bag swinging off my elbow. “Do you think your friend knew you were lying?”
He shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. There were no injuries, no property damage. Unless he has video footage, he can’t prove anything and he knows it. It’s not worth his time. I relieved you of any liability and saved him the paperwork and a trip to your dad’s house. And I knew it wasn’t you. I could hear you up with the baby at three a.m.”
I nodded, too freaked out to feel bad that Adrian was awake with us in the middle of the night, and I dove past him to grab Grace’s BabyBjörn off his table.
“Hey.” He put his hands on my shoulders to stop me as I whizzed by him. “Breathe for a second.” He dipped his head and looked at me with those deep green eyes. “What do you need?”
I swallowed. “I need…I need you to watch Grace,” I said quickly.
It came out before I even had time to think about it. But I did. I couldn’t take her on my scavenger hunt across hospitals and jail cells. And I
definitely couldn’t take her to Dad’s.
Adrian nodded and took the diaper bag off my arm. “Of course. I got it.
Go do what you need to do.”
“Are you sure?” I asked breathlessly. “You can handle it?”
He looked me in the eye. “I’m very sure. Go. She’ll be fine with me.”
He had this strong, steady, take-charge thing about him. The air of someone who was used to being depended upon. He was so capable and I wondered offhandedly if this is what other people’s dads were like.
I nodded at him and practically tripped over my feet getting out of the apartment. I ran home to change—but after getting almost all the way to the elevator I realized I didn’t have my purse or car keys and I was in unicorn slippers and a Froot Loops necklace.
I drove the twenty minutes to Eagan. I’d called all the local hospitals on the way. Dad wasn’t at any of them. He also wasn’t in the Ramsey County jail system. I asked about Annabel too, just in case she’d been with him during the crash and she was hurt, but her name didn’t ping either.
By the time I banged on Dad’s door, my panic had moved into anger.
I mean, what the actual fuck? He crashes the car and he doesn’t think I’m going to find out about it? He doesn’t bother to call me and give me a heads-up, tell me he’s okay?
When he answered, the smells of mildewy shower and festering garbage rolled out of the house at me.
“Dad,” I said dryly as he stood there, red-eyed and disheveled. He didn’t look like someone who’d been in a car crash, but who knew.
He squinted at me. “Melanie?”
It hit me like a punch to the gut. I had to take a moment to compose myself to answer. “Dad, it’s Vanessa.”
He blinked at me, and the light faded a little from his eyes. He pulled the door open and let me in, walking stiffly back to the sofa, where he lay down
with a grimace.
I closed the door behind me.
God, the place was gross. Dad had always been a pack rat, but this was bad, even for him.
I wrinkled my nose at a bag of rotting trash by the front door that someone had pulled from the kitchen but never run to the curb. It was leaking from the bottom and sat in a putrid brown puddle. As usual there
were stacks of random stuff everywhere. Shit he saw on the curb destined for the dump that he’d brought home with the grandiose plan of fixing it or using it somehow. It was ridiculous.
Normally I took off my shoes when I came into a house, but I wasn’t walking barefoot in here. “So, I see you’re shooting for a new personal best,” I said, stepping over a dirty, torn dog bed—which was interesting because Dad didn’t have any pets.
He spoke from the sofa like he was in pain. “Vanessa, I’m in an exceptional amount of discomfort. Your sister has relieved me of all my Percocet, and my back is killing me. I didn’t sleep a wink last night. If you’re going to give me a hard time, I’ll thank you to let yourself out.”
He’d injured his back last week tripping over something in the house. I told him to lock up the pills, which of course he didn’t do. I also told him to clean this place up, and he didn’t do that either.
I walked to the sofa and stood over him with my arms crossed. “Are you wondering why I’m here today?” I asked. When he didn’t bother to open his eyes or answer, I went on. “The police stopped by my apartment.
Apparently they found your car wrapped around a tree this morning?
Empty? Do you happen to know anything about that?”
He groaned and put an arm over his face.
“Are you injured?” I asked, irritated. “Do I need to take you to the
hospital?”
“Fit as a fiddle,” he muttered.
“So you what? Just crashed it and ran?”
He didn’t answer me, and I kicked the footboard of the sofa. “Dad!”
He sat up slowly, wincing. “All right, all right. You have my attention.
Happy?”
I glared at him.
“It wasn’t me,” he said. “It was Annabel. I wasn’t even there.”
I dropped my arms. “You lent her the car?” I stood there, my mouth agape. “Why the hell would you give it to her? She was probably high! And her license is suspended!”
“You don’t need that government-issued nonsense to drive,” he said, waving me off. “That’s just Big Brother’s way of making money off us for something a ten-year-old could do. What’s next? Mandatory GPS trackers in our brains that we’ll have the privilege of paying yearly fees for? Human
barcodes? No thank you.”
I stared at him. “Please tell me you’re kidding.”
“Why would I be kidding? And I didn’t give her the car,” he said,
rubbing his lower back. “She took it.”
“Without permission?”
He squinted up at me. “She’s a grown woman, Vanessa. She hardly needs my permission to leave the house—”
I gawked at him. “Wow. Just wow.” I shook my head, incredulous. “You know what? I’m done. You’re getting your shit together, Brent’s getting a job, and she’s going into rehab and not living here anymore until she does, do you understand me?” I jabbed a thumb into my chest. “I pay this mortgage. I make the payments on that car she just crashed. It’s registered under my name. I pay the insurance on it and the maintenance and now the repairs. And I do it so that you can get your life together and maybe Brent can have a way to get to a job if he ever decides to get one, not so Annabel can use it to endanger the general public. If you three think I’m going to enable this…this bullshit by continuing to fund it, you’ve lost your minds.”
I started snatching empty soda bottles off the coffee table and clutching them to my stomach. “She could have killed someone,” I said, fuming, bottles clinking against one another. “You’re lucky all she did was wrap it around a tree.” I stopped and glared at him. “Did she take money? And don’t lie to me.”
He looked indignant. “You cut her off. How else is she supposed to eat?”
“How much?” I demanded.
He waved a dismissive hand around. “Maybe a few twenties. And my phone,” he added. He bobbed his head. “And…”
I waited.
“Your mother’s wedding ring.”
Fucking fucking UGH!
I threw up my arm and stomped to the kitchen. I wanted to destroy something. Break a plate. Take a baseball bat to this whole fucking disgusting house.
He followed me as I dumped the bottles in the trash. “You know, it wouldn’t hurt you to have a little compassion for your sister,” he said to my back. “Addiction is a disease. And a mother deserves to see her child.”
I whirled on him. “I have compassion. That’s why I’m doing everything
in my power to get her into treatment. And if you loved her, you’d be helping. She needs boundaries, Dad. There have to be consequences. And if you don’t give them to her, then you’re part of the problem.”
His scruffy jaw set.
I gave him my back and started to rage-wash dishes. “You know, just once I want to be the one to fall apart. I’m so tired of cleaning up everyone else’s mess.”
The garage door off the kitchen opened. Brent came in.
He lived with his boyfriend, Joel, and his family in the house across the street. He probably saw my car in the driveway and he needed something, as usual. God knows neither of us ever came to this hellhole just because.
“So, the princess has returned,” he quipped.
I shot him a look. “You’re on thin ice, Brent. Do not test me. And you have a lot of nerve blocking me from a phone I pay for, by the way.”
He scowled around the kitchen and balled a sweater-covered hand over his nose. “Ugh, this place smells so bad. Anyway, I wanted to talk to you —”
I scoffed. “Of course you do. What pyramid scheme do you want money for this time?”
He made an indignant huffing noise. “First of all, it is not a pyramid scheme. It’s an actual business and I get to be my own boss. I just need an initial investment to build my inventory.”
“Great. Another MLM. Even better.” I slammed a plate into the drying rack. “I’m not giving you a dime, Brent. You have a business degree. Get.
A. JOB. A real one.”
“I am not cut out for the traditional workforce, Vanessa, you know this! I hate everyone, food service is gross, and I’m not built for manual labor,” he whined.
Dad stood somewhere behind me. “Your brother is a budding entrepreneur, and all he’s asking for is a little start-up money.”
“Oh yeah? Then you give it to him.”
“This family takes care of each other,” Dad said, going on unfazed. “It’s what we do. I took care of you and your sister when your mother died.
Annabel and you took care of Melanie, and now you’re taking care of us.
It’s the Price way. If we don’t have each other, what else do we have?”
“You took care of us?” I laughed indignantly. “Is that what you call it?”
“Look at you. You turned out great!” he bellowed from behind me.
I slammed another plate angrily into the drying rack. “How dare you call your ‘fend for yourself’ parenting anything other than what it was. No money, our clothes smelling like mildew so we got bullied at school, nothing but expired food in the pantry. You bringing home some moldy sofa you found on the curb so we got bedbugs in the house and we got to spend Easter at Joel’s parents’ while you fumigated—”
Brent looked at his nails. “That sofa was pretty gross…”
“That was almost fifteen years ago,” Dad said. “How long are you two going to bring up that sofa—which was a gorgeous Victorian that just needed a little reupholstering, if you want to know. And expiration dates are myths. They just want you buying food you don’t need.”
“Who’s ‘they’? Big Grocery?” Brent said sarcastically.
I snorted.
“I taught you resourcefulness,” Dad continued. “It’s an indispensable life skill, and you’re welcome for that, by the way. You owe everything you have to the way I raised you and you have me driving around in a used Kia.
It’s an insult. And frankly it makes you look bad. The father of a famous Internet personality should be in something distinguished. Maybe a Lexus.
Or that new C-Class…”
I scoffed. “The car is done. You can Uber where you need to go from now on. And you clean this house and change the locks, or I’m done paying the bills. You can figure it out on your own.”
And then my chin started to quiver because how the hell was this family going to go on when I was gone?
I was the duct tape. The only thing that held this shitty piece-of-crap unit together.
If I went, Dad would have to step up and take care of Grace, and I had only the barest faith that he would come through for that baby. I wouldn’t even bring her over here to visit, let alone live. He was such a mess he’d probably die under a garbage avalanche in the den, and they wouldn’t find his body until the neighbors complained about the smell. Annabel would end up overdosing trying to chase her high, and she’d never come back for Grace at all, and Brent would spend his inheritance on some get-rich-quick scheme and be broke and starving before my body was cold.
I figured I had about a year. One more year if my hand meant what I
thought it meant. And then I’d be gone and buried, and this shit show would continue without me with no one to curb it and they would all suffer horribly until the day they died.
A sob burst from my mouth and I turned and slid down the dishwasher until I was sitting on the filthy floor, crying into my hands. And the worst part of all was I couldn’t feel the tips of my fingers as I was doing it.
I could hear Dad coming to console me because the linoleum was so sticky his shoes were making Scotch tape noises as he stepped, and it just made me cry harder.
It was like the whole Price family was headed for extinction. Faulty genes, predisposed conditions, and Murphy’s fucking Law.
And poor Grace. An addict mother, a narcissistic granddad, a deluded uncle, and a dying guardian.
I wailed, completely losing it, and Dad put an arm around me. “Why are you crying, pumpkin? Life is good! Annabel will be fine, and Grace has you
to take care of her.”
I wailed louder.
I couldn’t tell him about my hand. I couldn’t tell any of them. Dad would completely unravel—if only to make it about himself. Brent would go full drama mode and who knows what it would do to my sister.
God. Somebody should just adopt Grace. Closed adoption and run away with her. A nice couple who would spoil her silly, put her in fun sleepaway camps, and buy her a pony, and she’d grow up never knowing the dumpster fire of a family that she sprang from because none of this was ever going to change.
Brent stage-whispered over from where he still stood by the garage door.
“Okay, so, like, you know I want to comfort you, right? But I am not sitting
on that floor.”
I did a laugh-cry.
I wiped my eyes on the sleeve of my shirt, drawing in a shuddering breath, willing myself to calm down. As usual I couldn’t afford the luxury of a proper breakdown.
I would probably benefit from some therapy. Maybe another online support group at the very least. But what was the point in trying to fix myself when I probably wouldn’t even exist in twelve months?
“So where do you think she is?” I muttered, putting my palms to my
eyelids.
“She texted me this morning,” Brent said like it annoyed him. “She’s fine.”
“You know Annabel,” Dad said dismissively. “She always lands on her feet.”
Brent scoffed. “She’s more like a cockroach than a cat,” he mumbled.
I felt Dad turn to look at him. “That is your sister, young man.”
“What? I’m not being mean! I’m just saying she’s indestructible. A nuclear bomb could go off and there’d be Annabel, scurrying around in the ruins unscathed, still wearing the Burberry scarf she stole from me, while insisting that she hasn’t seen it.” He crossed his arms. “I miss that scarf,” he added.
I let out a long, tired sigh. “I reported the car stolen. Lucky for me, I happened to be hanging out with a criminal defense attorney when the cops showed up.” I wiped at my eyes with my palm. “You know, this stuff is public record, Dad. It can hurt my image. You have to be more careful.”
“Is that the hot guy from the hallway?” Brent asked.
I nodded wearily.
“Good-looking guy,” Dad said. “Good job too. Lawyers make money,” he added. “It would be nice to have a lawyer in the family.”
I snorted quietly. How convenient.
Dad and I didn’t have the kind of relationship where his opinion of the men I dated mattered one ounce to me. Not that I was dating Adrian or ever would. That man wanted nothing to do with my hot mess. And that just made me want to cry too.
I liked him. He was sooo my type. If things were different, if he was even remotely interested and I wasn’t staring down my expiration date, I’d jump on that body like a trampoline.
The very idea of what Adrian probably thought of all this made me cringe. It was like every single day something humiliating had to happen to me in front of him, just because the universe needed a good chuckle. I did another choking laugh-cry and put my forehead to my knees.
I had to get this family independent. I had to. I couldn’t enable any more of this irresponsibility. Soon I wouldn’t be here to help them clean it up. But I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t help Annabel unless she wanted to help herself. Brent was dead set on chasing rainbows. And Dad…
I’d hoped the city’s intervention would have been a wake-up call. He was fined and placed on six months’ probation for the cluttered state of the yard. I know he was humiliated by it. But he wouldn’t stop collecting things. It had moved on from some sort of deep frugality to something else.
He was saving trash. Some of the stuff he hung on to was literally garbage.
And he was bringing it in faster than I could take it out.
I sniffed and put my forehead into my hand. “Go take a shower. We’re going to a Nar-Anon meeting. Brent, you too.”
They didn’t argue. Probably because they knew if they wanted me to keep paying for things they’d have to at least appear to be cooperating.
I followed Dad to the living room and gave him two Aleve from my purse. We’d have to get another prescription—and a safe to put it in. He’d need a new phone too.
When the water in the shower started, I did a quick clean of the house.
Made Brent run the vacuum while I mopped. Threw a load of laundry into the washer. It wasn’t even one-hundredth of what needed to be done, but it was a start.
A half hour later, Dad got out of the shower and came down the hallway dressed and clean as I was turning on the dishwasher.
“Can we go to Perkins for lunch?” he asked, pushing up the sleeves of his sweater.
I sighed. Dad was a good-looking man. He wore a white button-down shirt under his V-neck vest and he’d shaved. He had his glasses on. He looked like the kind of guy who lounged in a leather chair by a fire, thumbing through a novel. He looked like an educated, sophisticated gentleman who was ridiculously smart and too charming for his own good —which in reality, he was.
Sometimes I thought Dad’s intelligence was why he was the way he was.
He was too smart to be blissfully ignorant, hyperaware of everything around him, absorbing the world like a sponge. He could have been anything. A doctor. A scientist. An accountant, like he used to be.
Instead he was this.
I couldn’t think of anywhere I’d rather eat at less than Perkins.
And I took him there anyway.
* * *
I was gone for almost five hours. It was 2:00 when I got back. I’d checked in on Grace half a dozen times while I was out. Adrian kept assuring me he was fine and not to rush. When I finally got back to his apartment, I knocked on the door, and Adrian called from inside for me to come in.
He was at the sink in the kitchen, running the water. He had his briefcase open on the kitchen table and some paperwork strewn about like he was trying to get some work done. I felt even worse now for stealing half his day off with my bullshit. He probably had things to do.
“Hey,” I said, closing the door behind me. “How was she?” I glanced at Grace’s swing, but it was empty.
“Good, until about twenty minutes ago,” he said, looking down at whatever he was washing. “She had a pretty bad diaper.”
I came around the kitchen counter and saw that he had Grace in the sink.
He was giving her a bath.
My heart melted.
He had a rolled-up towel in the sink to support her and a wet washcloth was balled up on the counter. He was rinsing her with a cup. He’d taken the travel-size baby shampoo from the diaper bag, and it was half empty.
He wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. “It went right up her back. It was even in her hair. I didn’t know they could do that. I almost threw the whole baby away and started over.”
A laugh burst from my mouth, and I covered it with my hand. “I’m sorry, it’s not funny. I shouldn’t be laughing.”
He smiled over the sink. “It’s okay. You did promise me adventure and excitement today.” He nodded at a trash bag on the floor. “Her dirty pajamas are in there. I was going to wash them.”
I moved next to him and rolled my sleeves up. “Let me help you. She can be really slippery when she’s wet.” My arm pressed into his as I leaned
over the sink with him.
He smelled good. Really good.
I thought about how he’d stood so close to me earlier in front of Officer Sanchez and my heart fluttered a little.
It had been way too long since I’d had sex. I didn’t date, but I didn’t object to the occasional one-night stand now and then. But as I got more famous, that got harder for me to do. I’d meet men and they’d know who I was and then it just made things weird. I was afraid they’d tell some torrid
sex story about me online or take pictures of me while I was sleeping and sell them. Nothing sucks the romance out of a situation like an NDA.
My fame was isolating. It was almost as isolating as my own reasons for being alone.
And then it occurred to me that maybe the last time I’d had sex was the last time I’d have sex.
I let out a puff of air as this realization washed over me. If I was really sick, a lot of the things I was doing, I might be doing for the last time.
Maybe I’d just had my last Thanksgiving. This would be my last Christmas.
Then my last New Year’s. This might even be the last time I stood shoulder to shoulder with an attractive man.
I forced myself to stop thinking about it. To do what I always did—find gratitude in what I’d gotten instead of dwelling on what I’d lost.
Adrian had distracted me and helped me when I needed it. He’d given me that one video, content for my channel so I could keep earning money for ALS research. And now I had the chance to know him, something I never imagined I’d ever get to do. A few days ago we’d been strangers. All things I could be thankful for.
But I felt myself sinking deeper anyway.
Maybe it was everything hitting me at once and I just couldn’t rebound from it like I usually did. My hand acting up and what it probably meant.
Dad, Brent, Annabel. Exhaustion, Mom’s ring.
There was something terrifying in thinking that I might be losing my resiliency. That I might finally be hitting my limit on how much tragedy and despair I could handle.
Rebounding quickly was my coping mechanism. I recovered in record time from devastation. I was a glass-half-full optimist. An inherently positive person. It was my thing. I lived life to the fullest, lived every day like it was my last.
But today? Today took something from me. And the weird thing was I think it had more to do with Adrian than anything else.
I was used to Annabel’s instability and Dad’s and Brent’s bullshit. I was even used to the idea that I’d be dead by thirty. But I wasn’t used to this.
Him.
Adrian was one of those milestones I’d never reach. Maybe not him exactly. He was uninterested and unavailable. But the idea of him. A man I
could fall in love with.
I’d never have a husband. I’d never have a family of my own. Hell, I’d never even have a boyfriend again.
ALS took this from me, like it had taken so many other things. It was more than just a thief of life. It stole hope. Dignity. Dreams. And it would
take until there was nothing left.
Not even me.
My breath came out shaky. “For someone who’s never washed a baby before, you did it right,” I said, trying to push down the dark feeling I got being so close to him.
“I had to call my mom. I didn’t even know where to begin.”
I laughed again, but it didn’t reach my eyes.
He poured a final cup of water over Grace’s shoulders, and I lifted her out with the towel.
He pulled the plug out of the drain as I snuggled my wet baby, kissing her cheek. A surge of protectiveness washed over me. Because for all intents and purposes, right now she really was my baby.
Kids had never been in my plan. I’d had my tubes tied a few years ago.
Since they didn’t know what gene caused ALS in my family, I couldn’t do selective IVF to rule it out. And while I was very glad I’d been born, even with my risks, and many people in my situation chose to have children anyway, I refused to play gene Russian roulette with my own kids on principle.
I wouldn’t give ALS one more victim. It had taken enough from the Price family. I didn’t need to lay another possible sacrifice at its feet.
There were other options. An egg donor or adoption. But I’d never considered those because I couldn’t be sure I’d be there to raise a child. And that was the same situation I was facing now. I couldn’t raise Grace either.
Even if I wanted to.
I wanted to believe that everything would be okay. That Annabel would get clean, like she got clean once before. That she’d come back for her daughter. But I didn’t have time for faith. Not anymore. I couldn’t afford to bet on this and lose.
I needed a long-term plan for this little girl, and I needed to execute it now, while I still could.
“Do you know of a good lawyer who specializes in adoptions?” I asked.
Adrian leaned on the kitchen counter, drying his hands on a towel. “I know someone. Are you thinking of adopting her?”
I couldn’t tell him the truth. He didn’t need to know it. I didn’t even want to know it, that I was going to have to give her up, find her a different family. The pain in my heart bubbled up and I swallowed it. “I just think she needs stability, you know?”
“Will your sister sign over her rights?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know.”
Adrian dropped the towel on the counter. “If she won’t sign over her rights, you could always throw money at it. Offer her an incentive. That usually works.” He crossed his arms. “Did you get everything straightened out with your family?”
I let out a long breath. “Sort of. Annabel crashed the car. Stole it, so good news, you didn’t perjure yourself to the police. She stole my dad’s phone and money and my mom’s wedding rin—” I choked on the last word. I couldn’t help it. I didn’t see it coming and I couldn’t hold it back. I bit my lip and turned for the living room. “I’m sorry,” I managed. “It’s still setting in.”
I had a rule. I didn’t dwell on things. It wasn’t allowed, no matter what it was. Life was too short. But this one hurt.
Mom’s ring was one of the few family heirlooms I cared about. I had so
little of my mother left.
And now that was gone too.
“Did you file a police report?” he asked from behind me.
I nodded, laying Grace down on the sofa to put a diaper on her. I swallowed hard before speaking. I didn’t want to cry in front of him. “I did, but the diamond is small. The whole thing comes to less than a thousand dollars. They won’t look very hard. It’s got a kismet inscription, so I guess it’s not totally impossible, but they’ll probably never find it.” I sniffed. “It is what it is. It’s fine. It was just sentimental is all.”
He came up behind me and handed me the little outfit he had picked for Grace. I took it without looking at him.
“Did you lose your mom?”
I nodded. “Yes. When I was six. Car accident.” I slipped the pajamas over Grace’s head.
“Your sister’s nine years younger than you. A half sister?”
“With my dad’s second wife. That’s Brent’s mom too.”
“And where is she?”
I finished buttoning the outfit and picked up Grace. “As far away from us as humanly possible. And I don’t even blame her,” I mumbled. I turned to him and wiped at my eyes. “I’m sorry I took so much of your day.
Thanks for watching her. I’ll be out of your hair in a minute.”
“Do you want to join me for dinner?”
The question took me so by surprise I had to stop and stare at him. He was sitting on a chair. He had his elbows on his knees, hands clasped, gazing at me.
“You want to have dinner with me?” I asked, blinking at him.
“Yes.”
“You’re not sick of my shit yet? Or her shit?” I nodded at Grace.
He chuckled. “No, I am not.”
He wasn’t hitting on me. This was totally platonic. But I liked him and letting myself spend more time with someone I could develop feelings for wasn’t in my best interest—or his. He had no idea what he was getting himself into. My life was like a warehouse with one of those THIS MANY DAYS SINCE THE LAST ACCIDENT signs, and the number was always at zero.
I licked my lips. “Getting close to somebody right now isn’t a good idea
for me.”
“Why?” he asked.
I let out a sigh. “Adrian, my life is a mess. It’s a mess. You have no idea.
My whole world is like a muddy hill of shit, and if you get too close, you’ll be sliding down it with me.”
“Because you have family problems? There’s no such thing as a perfect family. There are just families that do better PR than yours.”
The corner of my lip twitched.
“I like hanging out with you,” he said. “And I need to watch more of The Office. I’m still not hitting on you, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
Well, at least there was that. God.
My fucking life. Imagine the hot, smart, incredible guy not hitting on
you being the preferred scenario.
“I’ll make lamb shanks,” he said.
I wrinkled my forehead. “I thought you said you don’t cook.”
“I may have misstated that a bit. I don’t like to cook just for myself. It’s not worth it. But I do very much enjoy cooking for someone else.
Especially someone who will appreciate it.”
I bit my lip. “I don’t know. I have to do laundry, and if I eat with you, I won’t get to it until tonight. The laundry room is crowded after eight.”
He shrugged. “Do it here. I have a washer and dryer.”
I arched an eyebrow. “You do? Really?”
“My apartment’s a lot bigger than yours, remember? Do as many loads
as you want.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
I smiled. “You’re making this very hard to say no.”
“That’s what she said.”
I snorted. “Ha! Office humor. I’ve already changed you for the better. All right. Let me go take a shower. I just cleaned a house that should have been condemned,” I said, looking down at my clothes.
He stood and reached for Grace. “I’ll take her.”
I tilted my head. “Really?”
He smiled at Grace in a way that made my heart hurt. “Yeah, I don’t mind. I’ll leave the door unlocked. Let yourself back in when you’re ready.”
* * *
I got ready. I got more ready than he’d ever seen me. Not because this was a date, obviously, but because having somewhere to go and getting dressed up was a luxury I hadn’t been afforded in weeks. I was usually just different versions of rolling out of bed these days. Plus, my personal presentation had to be equal to the dish. The man was making lamb shanks.
I put on a slouchy pink sweater and jeans, curled my hair, and did my makeup. When I let myself into his apartment an hour later, classical music was playing. Harry Puppins was curled up in his diaper, sleeping on his dog bed by the sofa. Grace was sitting in her swing at the mouth of the kitchen, where Adrian could see her.
Adrian had a fire going and he stood in the kitchen with a spatula over a copper frying pan, a black kitchen towel draped over his shoulder. He was wearing jeans, a white apron, and a burgundy sweater with the sleeves
rolled up. The whole thing looked like a page in a damn Williams-Sonoma catalog.
There had to be an imbalance in the universe. Some poor guy probably got shorted so Adrian Copeland could get his disproportionate share of good looks.
“Hey,” I said, bringing in a basket of laundry and a bottle of wine.
All my fan mail was by the door, carefully organized and in banker’s boxes.
“I had Becky take the donations to the Salvation Army for you,” Adrian said over his shoulder. “I hope you’re hungry.”
“Starving.”
The place smelled amazing.
He nodded to the hallway. “The laundry room’s the second door on the left.”
“Thanks,” I said. “Can I help you with anything first?”
He looked up at me for the first time since I’d walked in and paused a second. “No. I’ve got it.” His eyes lingered another moment and then he went back to his cooking.
I smiled to myself. He just checked me out.
It was nice to know maybe the attraction wasn’t one-sided. Not for any practical purposes, of course. Nothing was going to happen between us. But it did wonders for my self-esteem.
I stopped and checked on Grace. She was watching Adrian cook with her pacifier in her mouth, eyes wide. I tucked her blanket around her, then took my basket and wandered down the hall.
The apartment was a three-bedroom. The master was to the right of the living room where it shared my wall. That door was closed.
Then there was the kitchen, a nice open dining room in the middle with a table that seated six, and the hallway I was wandering down to the left. I peeked into rooms as I went.
One spare room was a lawyerly-looking office with a floor-to-ceiling cherrywood bookshelf behind the desk. He’d turned the other room into an impressive home gym. There was a full bathroom between them, and then finally a decent-size laundry room.
The whole apartment was immaculate. Nothing was out of place. He was meticulous. Even the laundry room was organized and spotless. All his
detergents and fabric softener were lined up in a perfect row on top of the washer.
The walls in the apartment were cool grays with white trim. He had dark hardwood floors, except for in the bathroom. That was some sort of slate- type stone. It was all very cold and masculine.
He needed plants and candles.
I started a load and came back into the kitchen. “God, your apartment is palatial.”
I peeked over his arm to look at what he was cooking. He was braising potatoes with some rosemary in a pan. It smelled so good my stomach growled.
“Why not get a bigger unit?” he asked. “Seems like you could afford it.
You’re obviously very successful.”
I put my back to the counter next to the stove and leaned. “I donate most of my money. That’s why I live small. I keep only what I need—plus a little so I can have fun. And wine,” I added.
He poured a splash of merlot over his pan with a sizzle. “Right, I read that on your Wikipedia. You donate to ALS research.”
So he’d been looking into me.
Which meant he knew.
He could watch any one of my videos and get the general gist of what I was about. I talked openly about all of it: my 50 percent chance of having the mutated genes that cause ALS. My inability to test for them. My desire not to seek treatment if I was sick. It was all in there. Maybe not dumped into a single episode, but sprinkled pretty generously around. Not to mention all the articles about me and my Wikipedia page. If he did even the barest of lawyerly due diligence, which it sounds like he had, he’d get a crystal-clear picture of what my life was.
And now I could see where this conversation was going, and I needed it to stop. I didn’t want to get into a casual discussion about my possible terminal diagnosis. I wanted to enjoy this dinner.
I wanted to forget the death creeping into my hand.
I tucked my hair behind my ear. “Can I ask you a favor?”
He gazed over at me. Warm, green gorgeous eyes.
“I don’t want to talk about…anything that you learned on my channel.
Ever. It’s just…being around you feels like a break. Like, you’re not my
crazy family, and you’re not part of the YouTuber world or ALS side of my life either, and I like that.”
He held my eyes a moment. “Sure,” he said. “This has been a bit of an escape from reality for me too. I get it.” He did an impressive flip of his potatoes. “So what wine did you bring?” he asked.
I smiled and got the bottle and held it out for him to see.
“Nice,” he said, grinning at the label. “Were you saving it? That’s a great year.”
“I never save anything,” I said, grabbing the bottle opener on the counter. “I enjoy things as soon as possible. I burn the expensive candle, I use the fancy rose-shaped soap, and I drink the wine, even if the only thing I’m celebrating is the fact that it’s Tuesday.”
He turned down his burner. “Well, I’m glad for my sake that you do that.
I’ll definitely appreciate it. Here, let me.” He took the bottle opener from me, which I was fumbling, and opened the wine. Then he took two glasses from a cabinet, poured, and handed me one.
“Thanks.” I swirled the liquid and put my nose into the glass and breathed in. “If you like wine so much, you should visit Tuscany. Have you ever been?” I looked around his apartment for frames. “Where are your vacation photos? Are they on your laptop or something?” I put a thumb over my shoulder. “Because if you have a backup photo album, I’m gonna need to see it to look for dick pics.”
He snorted. “I don’t have a backup album. I don’t take vacations.”
I blinked at him. “Ever?”
“I drove out to L.A. for a week a few years ago, but I was there for a
work conference.”
“So that’s all you do? Work?”
“Pretty much.”
I stared at him a moment. “Why?”
He shrugged, leaning against the counter. “It’s not easy for me to take time off. The firm needs me. I’m a partner. And I don’t mind the work. The
money’s good.”
“Do you need it?” I asked.
“What?”
“The money. Do you need it. Like, is there some goal you’re working toward? Pay off your student loans, get out of debt? Saving up for
something big?”
He shook his head. “No. I don’t have any loans. Mom paid for my college. And the income from this building is decent. I just work to work, I guess.”
There was something a little tight about the way he said it.
“What?” I asked.
He looked away from me. “I don’t know…”
“What? Tell me.”
His eyes came back to mine. “I like what I do. It’s fulfilling. And rewarding. It’s just not…” He shook his head and pressed his lips into a line. “I just can’t shake the feeling that something is missing. Maybe because I just broke up with someone.” He rubbed his forehead. “It’s probably that.”
I tipped my wineglass at him. “You suffer from One Day Syndrome.”
He wrinkled his brows. “What?”
“One Day Syndrome. You live your life like there’ll always be one day to do all the things you put off. One day you’ll take the trip. One day you’ll have the family. One day you’ll try the thing. You’re all work and not enough play. Money can’t make you happy unless you know what you want, Adrian. So what do you want?”
He shook his head at me like he’d never considered the question before.
“I don’t know.”
“You should try to figure it out. You know, you’re really lucky. Most people don’t have the means to live differently, or to make drastic changes in their lifestyle, pack up and take six months off work and still be able to pay their bills. But you do.” I shrugged. “So do it.”
He looked amused. “Just do it? Just pack up and go.”
“Or stay. But make time for other things that aren’t work. Find balance.
Find joy. You are the kind of man who can’t see the shapes in the clouds.
And it’s not because you lack imagination. It’s because you’re too busy to look up.”
He blinked at me a moment. Something I couldn’t read moved across his face. Then he cleared his throat and pushed off the counter. “Well, Italy might be a stretch,” he said, reaching for the potatoes. “I don’t fly, remember?”
Grace started to fuss and I unclipped her from the swing and picked her
up. “You’re really serious about that no-flying thing, huh?” I said, bouncing her.
He slid the contents of his frying pan into a waiting dish. “I get panic attacks.”
I frowned. “Well that sucks. Have you tried Xanax?”
He put the pan in the sink and ran water over it with a sizzle. “I’ve tried
everything.”
“Therapy?”
He shook his head. “I get enough psychoanalysis from my mom. She thinks it’s because I’m not in control of the situation. I’d probably be fine if I was the one flying the plane.” He took the towel from his shoulder and dried his hands. “She says I have abandonment issues.” He looked amused.
“My dad left us when I was young. She says this grew into a deep-seated
need to always be in control.”
“Huh. Is your mom a psychologist?”
He chuckled. “No. Though she’s probably been to enough of them to know.”
“So how do your abandonment issues mess with your relationships?” I asked, putting Grace’s pacifier in her mouth.
He opened the oven and peeked in. “What do you mean?”
“Your childhood damage always messes with your relationships. I think it’s a rule.”
I knew this rule because I was completely bound by it. And in my case, it meant I didn’t have relationships.
I was taught early on that love was always needy. It was a responsibility.
An obligation. Love bleeds you dry and takes advantage of you. Asks you for money, crashes your car, drops a baby on your doorstep.
It leaves you.
It dies.
I didn’t want to do that to anyone else. I didn’t want anyone to fall in love with me only for them to watch me waste away and then leave them behind. And anyway, I wasn’t worth all that. Not at this point. The payout was too small. I probably had too little time left.
He lowered the temperature on the oven. “Other than making it hard to get to Seattle to see her, I don’t think my issues had any bearing on Rachel.”
“So did you have any serious relationships before her?” I asked.
Adrian folded his kitchen towel into a perfect square and set it on the counter. “A few. I dated someone in college for a couple of years. Dated people on and off. My job makes it hard to make time. She was the first girlfriend I had in…three years?”
I pulled my face back. “Wow. She must have been pretty special.”
He blew a breath out, but he didn’t answer.
I felt my face go soft. “Are you okay? Finding out someone’s married is a really shitty way to break up.”
He nodded. “I’m okay. Or I will be. Eventually. Having someone to hang out with helps.”
I smiled and kissed the top of Grace’s head. “We should toast.” I picked up my wineglass and raised it. “To just friends.”
He gave me a crooked smile. “To just friends.”
We clinked our glasses.