Chapter Twenty-Three
Becky was grateful for the silent mode on her phone that let her ignore Foster’s messages, and for her sympathetic boss, who took her story of her impending migraine at face value and let her go home. And she was grateful that Dakota wasn’t home when she got to her house so Becky could cry in the driveway in peace. And she was grateful that when Bullhorn came outside to see what she was doing, he didn’t ask her any questions, just let her inside and gave her a beer and told her Dakota was on her way.
“He did what?” Dakota said when she got home and Becky told her the whole story. She was grateful for Dakota’s righteous indignation on her behalf, too, however misplaced it was.
“He didn’t do anything. He just agreed to what I suggested. That we take a break until things cool off.”
“Because your sister, with whom you have no relationship, is involved in this case he’s working on?”
“Not just that. He’s also dealing with a lot with Maddie—”
“Pfft. Maddie.”
“He told me that he moved back here for two reasons. One was this job at P and G and the other was Maddie. I’m not going to be the one who gets in his way.”
“Yes, because there’s no reason why you should have the person you’re in a relationship with be involved in your personal drama.”
“I don’t want to be involved in his personal drama. I just want a nice, quiet boyfriend who—”
“Wait. No. Uh-uh. I thought we were done with that. No more boring guys for you.”
“I’m on my second beer and it’s barely five o’clock on Monday. I’ll take boring and normal.”
What did Dakota know about her relationship problems? Dakota had no relationship problems. She and Bullhorn sat next to each other on the couch, listening across the coffee table as Becky explained why she should never have listened to Dakota in the first place, looking awfully cozy together. Or as cozy as two people could look in these circumstances.
What the hell was going on with the world?
“I should go,” she told the happy couple. “Sorry, you don’t need to . . . I just needed to let it out . . . I’ll just . . .”
“Beck, stay.” Dakota gently pushed her back into the oversize chair. “I’ll make you tea.”
Becky nodded. She could use some tea. And some whiskey.
Tea first.
She saw the panicked look that crossed Bullhorn’s face. She felt bad for the guy.
“So . . .” he said, slapping his hands on his thighs. “Uh. Wow. Your day sucks, huh?”
Becky gave a watery laugh. “That’s one way to put it.”
“You want I should kick Deke’s ass?”
“That’s the second time you’ve offered to do that.”
“I’m a good friend.”
“I know. Thank you, but no.”
Bullhorn looked relieved. “Good. I’m pretty sure Deke would whip me.”
Becky didn’t agree, at least not out loud.
“I would’ve done it anyway.”
“That’s what you need,” Dakota said, putting a steaming mug in front of Becky.
“For Foster to get his ass kicked?”
“No.”
“For Bullhorn to get his ass kicked?”
“No. But you need someone who’ll offer to fight a much bigger guy who’ll definitely inflict severe bodily pain on him.”
“Thanks, babe.”
“I love you, but it’s true. And I love you for standing up for Becky. Because Foster won’t.”
“It’s not a matter of standing up, Dakota. I’m not going to mess up the two biggest things in his life just so I can have a boyfriend.”
“I thought you said this was just a break.”
“It is. I’m giving him space to deal with his family, and it just happens to coincide with other professional benefits.”
“Benefits for him. What about for you?”
“Dakota.”
“Let me ask you a question. You want a normal relationship, right?”
“Yes! God, that’s all I’ve wanted this whole time!”
“What’s a normal relationship? One where people never fight?”
“No. We’re not fighting anyway.”
“You should be fighting. You shouldn’t be letting him roll over you when he can’t handle his life.”
“That’s just how it is. He’s got a high-pressure job. I shouldn’t have gotten involved with him in the first place. I need a normal guy with a normal family so I can have a normal life.”
“OK, let me try this out. Normal family. That’s mom and dad—”
“Normal doesn’t mean heteronormative.”
“Fair enough. There’s a loving pair of irrelevant gender designation, some kids—”
“Kids are optional to a normal life.”
“OK, maybe there are kids.”
“But if there are kids, they’re showered with love.”
“But not too much love that they think it’s OK to trash an animal shelter when they’re stoned.”
“I don’t think Maddie did that out of an excess of love.”
“Right. Fine. Just the right amount of love. And this nongender-specific pair with or without kids live in a nice house with a white picket fence . . .”
“The fence is just a metaphor. They could live anywhere.”
“They have a dog.”
“Yes, of course there’s a dog.”
“So, basically, a normal family is people who love each other and live anywhere and have a dog.”
Becky thought about it. “Yes. That sounds right.”
“So, basically, just not your family?”
“Ouch. But yes.”
Dakota pulled her into a tight hug that threatened the contents of her mug. “You deserve love, Beck. You deserve all of it.”
“Just not with a lawyer or a genius—”
“Nope. Doesn’t matter about that. That stuff, that’s just the window dressing. Your problem is that you’re too worried about the window dressing: the job, the house, the boringness. As your best friend and surrogate sister, I should have steered you right.”
“You tried. And you were right when Foster was just a lumberjack.”
“I was. God, I thought I was never wrong about love.”
“I’m disappointing people all over today.”
Dakota sat back and took Becky’s face in her hands. “I’m going to allow this pity party for twenty-four hours only. Starting twelve hours ago. Then Bullhorn’s going to get us drunk and we’re going to brainstorm ideas for a fundraiser for the shelter.”
“To pay for the damage?”
“No, Maddie’s parents paid for the damage she did. But the whole thing did make it apparent that I can’t put off certain improvements any longer, so I need money.”
“God, I’m sorry. I’m sitting here crying over my sad love life . . .”
“Nope. No apologizing. You have half a day yet to wallow.”
Becky sighed and leaned against Dakota’s shoulder. “Thanks.”
“Good. Let’s drink.”
* * *
“Madison, open the door.”
“I hate you.”
Foster sighed. That was the sixth time she’d said that. Being an older brother was so fun.
He didn’t want to do it, but he really needed to talk to his kid sister. “I have Starr with me.”
There was a pause. She didn’t open the door, but she didn’t say she hated him.
“Prove it.”
“Starr, give us a little bark, baby.” Starr stared at him from her perch on his shoulder. “Starr, attack!” She blinked. “You’re just going to have to trust me,” he told the door.
“Yeah right. Like I’m ever trusting you again.”
“That’s not fair . . .” he started, but he didn’t want to have this conversation through a closed door, especially not when his mother was hovering at the end of the hallway. He put Starr down. She jumped up and pawed at his knees. He ignored her. She pawed some more. He didn’t pick her up. She barked.
The door opened.
“Hi, Starr, my baby!” Madison scooped a delighted Starr into her arms and snuffled her face into her fur. Foster got a boot in the door before she could slam it in his face. That was all he needed, for her to take the dog hostage.
“Sit down,” he said, pointing to the bed. He shut the door behind her and pulled out her desk chair.
“Are you gonna give me a lecture, too, about what a disappointment I am?”
“Madison, you got stoned and destroyed an animal shelter. I’m not disappointed. I’m pissed. What the hell were you thinking?”
“Nothing! I didn’t mean to make such a mess. And it’s not destroyed. God. You’re so dramatic.”
Foster dropped his head into his hands to keep himself from launching across the room and wringing her neck. He didn’t want to traumatize his dog with physical violence. “Madison,” he said to the carpet. “Are you listening to yourself?”
She didn’t say anything. He looked up and she had her head buried in Starr’s back. Starr looked like she was about to fall asleep.
“Madison. Look at me.”
“Why? So you can yell at me?” She looked up, though, and she had tears streaming down her face.
“Madison, knock it off. You’re not going to cry your way out of this.”
She sniffled. He didn’t look away. “You’re an asshole.”
“Language.”
“You know what, fuck you. Fuck you and your stupid language and your coming in here and telling me what to do like you’re the boss of me. You don’t know me. You moved to New York with your big fancy life and you think you can just come back here when it’s convenient for you and save the day? You’re the perfect son, you win all the trophies, and now you’re even going to get down on my level to save me from my own shit. And fuck you, I can curse if I want to!”
Foster was pretty sure she was crying for real this time. Her face was ugly and red and there were tears but also snot. He hadn’t seen her cry like this since she was a baby. It scared him then, that a little thing could freak out so badly. It was easier to avoid her than it was to keep her from feeling such hurt.
Huh. Insight.
He sat down next to her on the bed and put his arms around her and Starr. She pushed him away at first, but he was stronger, and soon she melted into him, covering his shirt with her real angry, frustrated, confused tears. “I love you, kid,” he said into her hair.
“No, you don’t.” She didn’t sound like she wanted to argue about it. She just sounded sad.
“Hey.” He tilted her head back and went to wipe her tears away. Then he had second thoughts about that and reached over to her nightstand for a tissue. “I do love you.”
“But you wish I was better. Quiet, like Mom, or smarter, like you.”
“No. I wish you would think about things before you did them, but I wouldn’t change you. Not for a million mes.”
“Shut up,” she said, but he was pretty sure he saw a smile in there.
“You gotta knock it off with the drinking.”
“It was just one stupid night. I won’t get that crazy again.”
“It wasn’t one stupid night. You got arrested; that was your stupid night. This was your second stupid night—that I know of. How many other stupid nights are there where you didn’t get caught?”
She didn’t say anything.
“Do I really have to explain to you how bad it was Saturday night? You or one of your friends could have been seriously hurt.”
“Not all shelter dogs are dangerous—”
“No, but when you’ve got a bunch of crazy people acting erratic around them . . . you probably freaked them out. You were really lucky that one of them didn’t react badly. Come on, Madison, you know more about dogs than I do. You knew it was dangerous.”
She closed her eyes. “I knew.”
“Why did you do it?”
“I don’t know.” Tears started streaming down her cheeks again. He let her cry. “I just . . . we had a few drinks and we wanted a place to smoke up, and Dylan had been giving me shit for spending so much time at the shelter even when my community service was up, so I wanted to show her what a cool place it was. Jesus, I know it was dumb. You don’t have to keep telling me!” She launched herself off the bed, Starr in tow, and started pacing in front of him.
“I don’t know why I did it, okay? It didn’t even seem like a very good idea at the time. I just couldn’t stop myself from saying it, and then I couldn’t stop Dylan and all of them from going. And once I was there and we smoked, it was fun, so I thought it wasn’t so terrible because we were having fun.”
She sat down on her desk chair. “I couldn’t help it.”
He wanted to absolve her. He wanted to reassure her that all of this was just part of growing up, making mistakes and learning from them. But this felt like more than that.
“Maddie, I love you.”
“I know.”
“I can’t help you.”
She sighed. “I know.”
“You gotta talk this out with someone who can.”
“Like therapy? No, thanks.”
“Well, it’s gotta be someone who’s smarter than me. And someone who’s not our parents.”
She didn’t say anything for a while, just scratched a rhythmic path on Starr’s belly. “Fine,” she eventually said quietly.
“C’mere,” he said, and he stood up and pulled her into his arms. “I’m proud of you.”
“I’m not,” she said into his chest. “God, I screwed up. Dakota must hate me.”
“She might. But she’s not going to press charges.”
“She should.”
“I know she should. But she refuses to.”
“Becky must think I’m a total screwup.”
“That’s possible.”
“Can you . . . will you apologize to her for me?”
“Sure . . .” If Becky would ever speak to him again.
“Oh no; she didn’t break up with you because of me, did she?”
“No, no, we didn’t break up.” He didn’t think. “We’re just . . . she’s giving me space.”
“Why?”
Because he’d called her emotionally incompetent. “We just . . . are.”
She stepped out of his hug. “What did you do?”
“I didn’t do anything!” Sort of. “She wants some space, and because we have to work together, I’m going to give it to her.”
“What? You’re breaking up with her because of work?”
“We’re not breaking up!”
“Then why are you letting her get away?”
“I’m not letting her do anything. She’s a grownup; she decided she needed space. Besides, her sister is involved in that big case I’m working on, so it’s better if we don’t spend much time together.”
Madison’s face twisted in disgust. “You broke up with her because of the case?”
“Again, not broken up. And it’s not because of the case. Librarians aren’t directly involved in litigation, so it wouldn’t technically be a conflict of interest for us to continue to see each other, but I just think it won’t look great, so this is for the best.”
“Oh my God.”
Foster felt the back of his neck to see if he had sprouted a second head. Nope, Madison was just looking at him as if he had.
“You’re Dad.”
“What? What? No.” A second head would be preferable.
“All you care about is your damn case.”
“That’s not true. I care about Becky; I’m just respecting her wishes. The fact that it coincides with what’s best for the case is convenient, yes, but it’s not the reason I’m giving her the space she asked for.”
“You really believe that, don’t you?”
“Madison, I hardly think you’re in a position to lecture me—”
“You know what? Fuck you all over again. You are just like Dad. Blah, blah, work blinders. At least all Dad does is make sure rich people’s money goes to the right places when they die. What does your work even do for humanity?”
“Not everything has to do with humanity.”
“No, it has to do with whether you’re being challenged and whether you can win. It’s not a victory if it’s not a fight, right? God, you are so Dad.”
He pulled at his collar. He had an uncomfortable feeling Madison was starting to make sense.
“What’s your point, Foster? What’s the point of winning just to win? I never got that. What are you even winning?”
“First of all—”
“No. Uh-uh. I’m not going to sit here and listen to a list of all the reasons you’ve come up with to justify your shittiness.”
“I am not shitty.”
“You’re a shitty boyfriend.”
“She offered me space! I took it!”
Madison just rolled her eyes at him. “You don’t deserve this dog.”
“You’re not keeping Starr.”
“What about when you go back to New York, huh? Wasn’t that the plan, to win your big case and move on? What was it you said to Dad? Leverage?”
He scratched Starr’s ears. “New York. I don’t know about that anymore.”
“Really?”
“Don’t get excited. I’m just . . . keeping my options open.” Becky wasn’t in New York. He didn’t think she’d want to be either. He’d ask her, though. When they were done with their space.
“If you go to New York, you’re going to turn into Dad.”
“I thought you said I already was.”
“There’s still hope. I can see it. You just have to get your head out of your ass long enough to realize that you let a great woman go so you could win a case.”
“I didn’t let her go. It’s just a break! And it was her idea!”
“God, you’re stupid.”
“Explain it to me, then, if you’re so smart.”
“You’re putting your client first. A gigantic, evil corporation named Goliath, which is, like, not even pretending not to be evil.”
“First of all, they aren’t evil. Secondly, you’re oversimplifying it.”
“You and Becky are on a break so you can finish your dumb case. Is that it?”
He thought about it. “Aside from the dumb part, yes.”
Madison smacked him on the shoulder.
“What was that for?”
“Because it’s just like I said. You’re putting your job first! That is such a Dad thing! When I was upset that he missed my recitals and games because of work, didn’t you tell me not to take it personally, that it was his messed-up logic?”
He did remember saying that to her. But she’d get so upset and he had to make her feel better. The only way he could think to do it was to acknowledge that, yes, their father was a workaholic, but that didn’t mean he didn’t love her. It just meant that his priorities were whack.
Oh. Now he got it.
Damn, he didn’t like being wrong.
“What do you like about Becky?”
Foster sighed. “Madison, this isn’t a matter of whether I like her—”
“Indulge me. I’m damaged.”
He took a deep breath. Yup, he was getting into this with his kid sister.
“She’s . . . she’s Becky, you know? You like her, too.”
“Yes, but I’m fairly confident I like her for different reasons than you do. Unless you don’t, in which case, you need to work on your game, big brother.”
“No, we’re . . . we’re compatible. In that way.”
“In a sex way?”
“Jesus, Madison.”
“Well! If you’re not going to tell me, I’ll make it up. It’s because she’s hot and blond . . .”
“No, I don’t care about that. I did,” he said when he saw Madison’s eyebrows hit the ceiling. “I mean, I enjoy that about her, but that’s not why I like her.”
“Good. Go on.”
“It’s . . . I don’t know, she’s just great. She makes me laugh and she gets me and she makes me feel . . .”
He trailed off. He didn’t really want to get into all that with anyone, let alone his kid sister.
“Everything you just said has to do with how she makes you feel. What do you like about her?”
“Since when did you become a relationship expert?”
“When I’m grounded, I read a lot. Sue me.”
“Maybe I will.”
“Shut up. What do you like about her?”
He closed his eyes. It was the only way he’d be able to say this stuff, by pretending he was alone in the room. That wasn’t weird, was it? “I like her because she has the biggest heart of anyone I’ve ever met. She looks at the world in a way that’s not naïve—she’s not dumb or anything—but that’s just . . . I don’t know, optimistic? Like she doesn’t think the world is out to get her, that everything’s a competition.”
“So she’s nothing like you.”
“I also like her because she’s funny and because she can see the joy in things. And because she’s curious. She wants to get at the heart of people, find out what makes them tick. She has this ability to see underneath all the layers. All my layers. And . . . a bunch of stuff I’m not going to tell you about.”
“Thank you. What else?”
“I don’t know what else. Everything else. I just know that when she walks into a room, my heart . . .” He put his hand over his heart. He could feel it. It was doing it now, that thing that it did when he saw Becky. “I love her.”
He sat there for a minute and let that sink in. He felt his heart beating hard against his hand, and he remembered that last time when he woke up in the middle of the night—before all the crap went down at the shelter—and Becky was listening to his heart because she said it soothed her when she couldn’t sleep. And why shouldn’t she listen to it? It was hers.
Then he heard sniffling. He opened his eyes and Madison was crying. “Are you crying?” he asked.
“No, shut up,” she said and threw another pillow at him. “So now what are you going to do?”
“You’re the relationship expert. What should I do?”
“Hmm. Something big, something that shows how much you care.”
“She doesn’t like being the center of attention.”
“She doesn’t have to be. Wait, hold on. I’ve got it.”