Wolf in the Shadows - Marcia Muller [47]
“How could I forget them? But why are they here? I thought she gave those to you when you got married and Karen kept them.”
He tried to step around me, couldn’t find footing, and finally lifted me and set me on a stool in front of the breakfast bar. “She did. This is Karen’s stuff. I’m storing it for her.”
“Why?”
“She’s getting married again and going off to Italy with the guy while he’s on a year’s sabbatical. He’s some kind of professor at State. She sold her house, he gave up his apartment, and when they get back they’re going to buy a new place, so in the meantime I’m stuck with everything.” John went behind the bar and held up the coffee pot, raising an eyebrow in question.
I nodded yes. “How do you feel about that?” I asked, then realized I sounded ridiculously like a therapist.
“Being stuck with the stuff? It’s a pain in the ass. Her getting married? I think it’s great.” He poured a mug of coffee and set it in front of me. “My spousal support payments stop, and I get the boys for a whole year while she’s over there. Plus he’s a nice guy, the kids like him, and Karen’s so happy she’s practically turned into a human being.”
“Well, you’ve come a long way since the days when you wouldn’t call her anything but ‘that bitch.’ ” I raised the mug in a toast.
“Yeah, I guess I have.” He looked away from me, gaze turned inward, but he glanced back just in time to see me gag on the strong coffee. “Shar, you don’t look so good. And what’re you doing here at seven-thirty in the morning, anyway?”
I set the mug down, pushed it away. “I don’t look good because I haven’t had any sleep in forty-eight hours. And the reason I’m here is a long story.”
He waited. When I didn’t go on, he said, “So you want to tell me about it?”
“Yes, and to ask a favor. But don’t you have to go to work soon?”
“I am at work.” He drew himself up with mock dignity. “You’re looking at a white-collar type. I turned the on-site supervision over to my foremen, and now I stay home and run the business end.”
“But I thought you liked being out on the job sites.”
“I do, and I’ll probably go back to it after Karen returns from Italy and we’re sharing custody again. But in two weeks I’ll be a full-time papa, and I need to be here for the boys.”
My big brother was certainly a transformed man. If it hadn’t been for the general disorder in the house and the loudspeaker in the trees, I’d have sworn that an alien had taken up residence in his body.
“So what’s going on?” he asked. “You in trouble?”
“Not exactly.”
“Well, you’re looking worse by the minute. Let me get you some breakfast.”
“I don’t want—”
“Just a glass of milk and some toast.” When I started to protest some more, he made a shooing gesture. “Go on, the sun’s burned off the fog now; we’ll talk on the patio. I’ll be with you in about three minutes.”
I slid off the stool, picked my way through the cartons to the patio door, and stepped out into the warming morning. A small tiled Jacuzzi took up one corner of the patio; I approached it cautiously, alert for alligators. At Christmastime it had contained a primordial stew that promised either to give rise to a strange new species or to effect a cure for any number of previously untreatable diseases. There was no telling what might live there now. But surprise—the water was clear and smelled faintly of chlorine.
So why did that depress me? I wondered as I flopped on a lounge chair. My brother’s life was on track, and it depressed me? Too much evidence of change in too few hours, I supposed. I hadn’t been prepared for it, so now I was resisting.
Then my spirits took a further downhill slide as I remembered other changes, and that I’d promised to give All Souls an answer about the promotion by close of business today. No way I could cope with that—not in my present state. Maybe I should call Rae and ask her to pass on a message that as a result of my alleged illness I required more time….
John delivered the milk and toast, sat on the edge of the Jacuzzi, and watched me like a prison guard until I’d drunk every drop, polished off every