CHAPTER TWELVE
One proverbial fire after another required extinguishing on the courthouse project over the next two weeks—a problem with one of the material suppliers, a problem with the concrete crew, a problem when an unseasonable heavy rainstorm cost a few days of progress. Somehow in the midst of all the hectic day-to-day activity, Jason and I had settled into a comfortable routine. He hadn’t once mentioned our night of sexual abandon. I had little doubt that to observers we appeared nothing but professional. Helen still badgered me with claims about her “sexth sense,” but I always changed the subject and hoped she’d get the message.
The Friday before Easter, William surprised me by calling and asking if he could take me to lunch. He also mentioned he’d love to see the courthouse site up close, which made sense since he was a county judge. I offered to meet him somewhere, but he said he was just down the street and would be right over. The second the call ended I began feverishly tidying up my desk, even though it was already quite neat and I highly doubted William would care if a few things were out of order anyway.
“Hot lunch date?” Jason asked from across the room, smirking as he watched me stuff some loose papers in my desk.
I rolled my eyes, because even though Jason and I were not at each other’s throats, he still managed to get on my nerves now and then. “Very funny. And no, it’s just my brother.”
“The great William is coming here?”
“I don’t think I’ve told you very much about William.”
“I make it my business to find things out. He’s a judge, right?”
My desk phone buzzed and I pressed the speaker.
“You have a visitor,” chirped Marnie, the receptionist up front. I could tell by her voice that she found the visitor in question quite intriguing.
“Thank you, I’ll be right up,” I told her, trying not to picture the free-spirited Marnie engaged in her typical greeting of attractive male guests. It involved lunging forward over her desk to give the observer a nice view of her ample cleavage. So far no warnings from Human Resources have tempted her to change. Normally I didn’t give a damn if Marnie wanted to show her boobs to the world, but I felt a little queasy about subjecting my brother to that kind of attention.
“So you’re a judge,” Marnie was purring when I reached the lobby. “That must be so exciting.”
“It has its moments,” William said, easing back. Then he saw me and grinned. “Hey, Aud.”
“William, I see you’ve already met Marnie.” I shot her a look. She shrugged and smiled. “Why don’t you follow me back to my office and I’ll grab my purse?” I was trying to spare William further exposure to Marnie’s charms.
He dutifully followed me back to my office, where no one would be leaning over the furniture practically naked. However, there was still a certain complex coworker delighted by my brother’s arrival.
“I’m Jason Roma,” he said before I had a chance to squeeze a word in. “I’m glad to finally meet a member of Audrey’s family.”
“William Gordon,” my brother said, pumping Jason’s outstretched hand and looking him over with curiosity.
I cleared my throat. “Jason and I are sharing an office while we manage the courthouse project together,” I blurted. “Now where do you want to go have lunch?”
William didn’t answer the lunch question. “So you’re a project manager too,” he said to Jason. “I asked Audrey if we could stop by the site of the courthouse.”
“Which must interest you more than the average person,” Jason said. “I imagine you’ll be working in the building when it’s finished.”
“I will be,” William agreed. “How long have you and my sister been working together at Lester & Brown?”
“There’s a new sushi bar down the block,” I broke in. “But they get crowded at lunchtime, so we should get going.”
Jason stepped to my side. “Audrey and I have been working together for years,” he said. “Long enough to become great friends. I’m glad to have this chance to collaborate with her on a project of this size. She’s brilliant.”
William smiled with pleasure to hear me being praised. “Yes, she is. I always tell her that, but somehow I think it means more coming from someone with no genetic link.”
“She’s the best there is,” Jason confirmed. He gave me a friendly squeeze and paid no attention to my subsequent glare.
Unfortunately, William was always the essence of manners, so I knew what would come next. “You busy for lunch, Jason? You’re welcome to join us.”
“Thank you, I’d like that,” said Jason, and I had no idea if he was sincere or if he was just hoping for an opportunity to subtly torment me. True, we were getting along better these days, but just because I had stopped having fantasies about throwing staplers at Jason’s head didn’t mean I wanted him cozying up to my family. Some worlds just shouldn’t collide.
“Is that okay with you, Audrey?” Jason asked in a tone that indicated he couldn’t imagine why it wouldn’t be okay.
I shot him a look that warned that he shouldn’t disrupt our fragile peace by making oblique references to my nipples in front of my brother. “Yes, that’s fine.”
Behave. Please behave.
The sushi restaurant already had a line twenty deep, so we opted for a trendy pita-wrap place around the corner.
“How’d you get off work early?” I asked William when we sat down. As far as I knew, he never took a day off from the bench. He routinely put in twelve- to fourteen-hour days even when court wasn’t in session.
“It’s Good Friday,” William reminded me. “The building closed down early, and I wanted to get some shopping done for the boys this afternoon.”
“Are Leo and Isaac all ready for the Easter bunny?” I asked, smiling at the thought of my rambunctious nephews.
He nodded and set down his glass of water. “Jen has them Easter morning,” he said with a hint of dejection. “I’m planning to get them around eleven and bring them to Mom and Dad’s house. By the way, you’re coming on Sunday, right?”
“I wasn’t aware I was invited.”
My brother raised an eyebrow. “It’s Easter, Audrey. Standing invitation.”
More than likely I’d receive a text from my mother sometime tomorrow afternoon, an afterthought. After all, that was what had happened last year and the year before.
“Come on,” William prodded. “Mom is ordering one of those two-hundred-dollar gourmet hams for dinner, and the boys will be crushed if their Auntie Audi isn’t there.”
“Auntie Audi?” Jason chuckled. “I kind of like the sound of that. How old are your boys, William?”
“Isaac’s five and Leo’s six,” William said, immediately whipping out his phone to proudly display a picture of his smiling sons.
Jason examined the image. “Damn, they sure look like you.”
“That they do,” William said as he pocketed his phone once more.
Suddenly I was reminded of my little run-in with William’s ex-wife a few weeks back. I hadn’t mentioned that encounter to him yet. I wouldn’t be mentioning it now. More than a few times since then I’d thought about Jennifer’s words, remembered her eager plea to meet for lunch sometime. But my loyalty was to William first, and it felt too soon to start socializing with his ex-wife. Someday the raw wounds might heal enough to reconsider. There were still the boys to think about, and it was in their best interest for all the adults in their lives to be on good terms. Plus, I genuinely missed the easy friendship Jennifer and I had once shared. I missed the way she would call me out of the blue just to tell a funny story about Leo giving his pet turtle a bath in the toilet or inform me that I simply had to meet her for lunch on Friday at the new Thai restaurant on Central. I liked the idea that at some point Jennifer would somehow be part of my life again. It couldn’t happen yet, but there was plenty of time to sort it out.
Jason wanted to hear more about William’s work as a judge. When William talked, it was difficult not to be awed. Not many people had the responsibility to decide the fate of their fellow human beings.
After an hour William glanced at his watch and said he had to get going. His briefcase was full of paperwork he needed to deal with if he wanted to have some time with the kids this weekend.
“But you wanted to see the courthouse site,” I reminded him.
He glanced at his watch again. “Let’s make it another time. Can I tell the boys you’re going to be there on Sunday?”
I sighed. “Yeah, I’ll be there.”
William flashed a confident grin. “Good. What are your plans for the holiday weekend, Jason?”
For a horrifying second I wondered if William was inviting Jason to my mother’s would-be Easter celebration. The lunch with William hadn’t turned out so badly, but I couldn’t quite handle the idea of Jason Roma grinning as he observed the upper-class dysfunction of the Gordon family.
“I’ll be spending most of the weekend with my father,” Jason said.
“Your father?” I was startled. I’d wondered about the “family obligations” Jason had cryptically mentioned. In six years, the only time I’d ever heard him mention his father was that tragic story of abuse he related at dinner. And he never said that his father was still living around here. Once he’d stated that his mother lived in Europe now, but there was never a word about his father. I hadn’t even realized the man was still alive. I felt bad I’d ever questioned Jason’s honesty about his personal commitments.
Jason nodded and looked away, and I took that as a hint that he didn’t want to discuss his family matters with me, which was fine. He and William shook hands before my brother offered me a quick hug and hurried out.
“The office is closing early today,” Jason told me when we were out on the sidewalk. “I just got the email.”
“Good, then it will be nice and quiet this afternoon while I’m trying to work,” I commented, to no response. I waited until we’d walked about twenty more yards before I said, “What?”
“I was thinking.”
“About . . .”
“You. It’s no wonder.”
I stopped walking. “What’s no wonder?”
He looked at me as if I were a puzzle he’d just brilliantly solved. “It’s no wonder why you’re driven at work to the point of obsession. Now that I’ve seen what you’re trying to live up to.”
I didn’t appreciate the remark, no matter how true it was. I didn’t even like admitting to myself how much I wanted to live up to William’s example. Even at a young age I’d longed to have my parents look at me with the same kind of pride they reserved for their son. I never held that against my brother, though. It wasn’t William’s fault he was practically perfect.
“Jason, do me a favor and keep your asinine little observations to yourself.”
I stalked back to the office and buried my face in my work until it was dark outside. Jason remained for a few hours after most of the staff had cleared out in anticipation of the holiday weekend. When he told me to have a nice weekend, I nodded and said, “You too,” but I didn’t even look up from my computer screen.