Chương 10
Travis looked toward the street.
“I need you there.”
It was the first vulnerable thing Adrian had heard him say in years.
He leaned against the doorframe.
“For what?”
“The company.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“It’s the answer I have.”
“No. You need operations covered.”
“I can hire operations.”
“Then do that.”
Travis’s jaw worked.
“Everybody thinks I’m good at this because I can talk to people.”
“You are good at it.”
“I’m good in a room. Dad knew everything else. Then you knew everything else.”
Adrian stared at him.
Travis laughed bitterly.
“Don’t look so touched. I’m not saying you’re a genius.”
“Thank God.”
“I’m saying if you leave, Mom and I are going to spend six months pretending we know why a retaining wall costs what it costs.”
“That I would pay to see.”
“Adrian.”
He sighed.
“What do you want me to do?”
“Stay.”
“And sign?”
Travis looked away.
There it was again.
Adrian nodded.
“So you need me there as long as Lila costs me nothing.”
“That is not fair.”
“Neither is the agreement.”
“We can change the valuation.”
Adrian went still.
“What?”
Travis exhaled.
“I talked to the attorney yesterday.”
“You did?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I looked at the draft again.”
Adrian waited.
Travis looked embarrassed.
“The section you’ve been complaining about could hit my kids too depending on how the estate is structured.”
Adrian blinked.
“I told you that in September.”
“I know.”
“And October.”
“I know.”
“And November.”
“You get boring when you’re right.”
Adrian laughed despite himself.
Travis shook his head.
“We can change it.”
“Mom know?”
“No.”
“So this is now business?”
“This part is.”
“And Christmas?”
Travis looked toward the kitchen again.
“No.”
It was not a good apology.
It was not enough.
But it was the first honest division Adrian had heard anyone in his family make.
Work was work.
Christmas was not.
Adrian stepped onto the porch and pulled the door mostly closed behind him.
“She needs more than ‘I was pissed at your dad.’”
“I know.”
“She may not want to see you.”
“I know.”
“She gets to decide later.”
“I know.”
Travis nodded toward the door.
“Is the reindeer okay?”
“Physically, yes.”
“That’s more than I can say.”
“You did not have a mark.”
“My pride was bruised.”
“Tragic.”
Travis smiled faintly.
Then the smile disappeared.
“Mom wants everyone at her house tonight.”
“No.”
“She says she wants to apologize.”
“To Lila?”
“Yes.”
Adrian considered it.
Every instinct said no.
Some of those instincts were protective.
Some were vindictive.
He had difficulty telling which was which.
“What exactly did she say?”
“That she wants the family together before the year ends.”
“That isn’t an apology.”
“I know.”
“Did she say Lila?”
“Yes.”
“Did she say she was wrong?”
Travis hesitated.
Adrian opened the door.
“Happy New Year.”
“Wait.”
“No.”
“I’ll talk to her.”
“That worked well last time.”
Travis winced.
Adrian stopped.
His brother looked genuinely ashamed.
It was small.
Not redemption.
Not transformation.
Just one man finally unable to avoid the shape of his own behavior.
Adrian said, “If she wants to apologize, she can come here.”
Travis glanced at the house.
“She’ll hate that.”
“I know.”
“That’s why you picked it.”
“Partly.”
“At least you admit it.”
“I’m working on myself.”
Travis laughed again.
Then he went home.
Evelyn arrived at three twenty-seven that afternoon.
She was twenty-seven minutes late.
Adrian had expected nothing else.
Lila was upstairs.
That had been her choice after Adrian explained Grandma wanted to visit.
“Do I have to?”
“No.”
“Can I listen first?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
She solved the problem by sitting on the stairs behind the wall where she could hear the living room without being seen.
Adrian disliked the arrangement.
Lila called it “detective style.”
Evelyn entered carrying no gifts.
That counted in her favor.
Barely.
She wore a black wool coat and held her purse with both hands.
Her eyes moved around the room.
She had not been inside Adrian’s house since Nora’s funeral reception.
At the time, thirty people had filled the rooms with casseroles and soft voices. Evelyn had reorganized the refrigerator without asking and thrown away a container of soup Nora’s friend had made because “nobody needs four soups.”
Adrian still remembered the friend finding out.
Grief made certain nonsense permanent.
“Coffee?” he asked.
Evelyn looked surprised.
“No.”
“Okay.”
They sat.
Not comfortably.
Adrian chose the armchair.
Evelyn took the sofa.
For a moment, neither spoke.
The refrigerator hummed in the kitchen.
A truck passed outside.
Evelyn looked at a framed photograph of Nora on the mantel.
“She always hated that picture.”
“She hated every picture.”
“She was very photogenic.”
“She thought her left eyebrow looked surprised.”
“It did.”
Adrian looked at his mother.
Evelyn almost smiled.
Then both of them seemed to remember why she was there.
“Is Lila here?”
“Yes.”
“Will she come down?”
“That depends.”
“On what?”
“You.”
Evelyn’s shoulders stiffened.
Adrian said nothing.
He had learned something during the last week.
His mother was most powerful when other people hurried to fill her silences.
So he waited.
Finally she said, “I behaved badly on Christmas.”
Adrian remained still.
“I was angry with you.”
He waited.
“I had no right to take that anger out on Lila.”
Upstairs, the floor creaked.
Evelyn heard it.
Her face changed.
She stared toward the staircase.
Adrian said quietly, “Keep going.”
Evelyn looked back at him.
“I should not have taken her toy.”
Another creak.
“And?”
Her jaw tightened.
Adrian almost lost patience.
Then he remembered Kendra saying anger could be true without needing to drive.
Evelyn looked down at her hands.
“I should not have told her about her biological father.”
“That isn’t exactly what you told her.”
“I told her you weren’t her real father.”
“Yes.”
She swallowed.
“I was wrong.”
The words seemed to cost her.
Adrian did not rescue her from the cost.
She continued.
“You are her father.”
May you like
From the stairs came a small voice.
“Then why did you say not real?”
