Legacy (7 page)

April

Chapter 8

“I
don’t understand, Wesley. Why do you
need
to put that loveseat in the pool house? It won’t go with anything in there!”

His mother was practically chasing him through the French doors. Wes didn’t bother coming to a halt with the dolly. Gloria Clarkson didn’t remember the conversation she’d had with her son the week before, and the fact that she’d probably remember this one was just his bad luck. Of course, at 1 p.m., she more than likely hadn’t started drinking yet.

“Mom, I called you two weeks ago and asked if I could store a few things in the pool house for a little while, and you said yes,
remember?”
Wes made sure that the irony in his voice was hard to miss.

He heard her footsteps stop behind him, and he imagined his mother blanching. Under no circumstances was Gloria Clarkson an alcoholic, and forgetting whole conversations with one’s son about furniture storage was something an alcoholic did.

“I was thinking of another chair...the tangerine one,” she lied.

Wes rolled his eyes and unlocked the door to the pool house.

“Like I’d own a
tangerine
chair, Gloria,” he muttered.

“What did you say, Wesley?” she asked, closing in on him. He turned to see her standing with her arms crossed over her sable poncho sweater that perfectly matched her sable boots. Black skinny jeans completed the ensemble, and Wes would have bet money that every pair of pants his mother wore came equipped with some kind of industrial strength tummy panel. No one could drink three Derby’s a night and not have a booze gut.

Wes shuddered at the thought.

“I said it’ll only be for a few months while I’m living with Corinne.”

Wes’s mother screwed up her mouth like she’d eaten a bad cocktail olive.

“The one with the blue hair?”

In spite of himself, Wes smiled. When Michael had first started seeing Corinne, she’d sported an electric blue streak at the nape of her neck. Wes had invited them to a pool party his parents hosted two summers ago, and he’d secretly relished scandalizing his mother and her friends.

“Her hair’s not blue anymore, Mother, but yes. Corinne. Michael’s girlfriend.”

Gloria Clarkson fingered the spill of beads at her bosom and shook her head.

“Such a pity,” she sighed, and Wes counted to three as he pushed the dolly over the pool house threshold. On three, she expressed her disapproval. “Still, I don’t see why you’re getting involved. The girl must have her own people...”

His mother droned on, and Wes kicked himself for coming at all. Couldn’t he just have sprung for the bigger storage unit? Then he wouldn’t have had to keep the overflow at his parents’ house, and he wouldn’t have to suffer this conversation with her. One, unfortunately, she’d revive later when she wanted something from him.

Wesley, if you hadn’t meddled with that blue-haired girl, I could host a decent luau. So, be a dear and at least come to brunch on Sunday. The Rossis will be here, and you know how tiresome it can be for poor Sarah.

He could almost hear it, and hearing and decoding were one and the same.

Wesley, you asked me for a favor, so you are in my debt. Come to brunch on Sunday and flirt with Sarah Rossi so your father won’t.

It was better not to be in her debt. He hadn’t thought that a loveseat and two end tables would cost him too much, but he’d been wrong before.

“I mean, it’s not like she’s his widow,” his mother added in a tone that he knew she thought charitable. “For heaven’s sake, they weren’t even engaged.”

Wes was pushing open the furniture arrangement in the living area of the pool house to make room for his loveseat, and his mother actually stopped talking to watch him in irritation.

“Mom, my best friend’s dying wish was for me to help his girlfriend,” Wes said, fully aware that his words would change nothing. “Can I keep these things here for a few months so I don’t have to rent another storage unit? Tell me now while I still have the moving van.”

Gloria Clarkson rolled her eyes.

“Wesley, you’re always so dramatic,” she sighed, waving a hand at her disrupted tableau and turning toward the door. “So, I can count you in for next month?”

Aww, fuck. Here it comes.

“What’s happening next month?” Wes asked, his intestines already shrinking.

His mother tsked and put her knuckles to her hips.

“Why did I even bother to send a save-the-date? You never read your mail,” she bemoaned, rolling her eyes again. “James Hargett, one of the senior partners, is running for judge! We’re hosting his announcement event. You
must
come, Wesley.”

Showing up for brunch with the Rossis or the Belamies was one thing. His parents’ closest “friends” were as fucked up as they were, so the “happy family” charade was not as high stakes with them. An event like this one—with a few hundred people—was like juggling knives.

While Wes’s mother “was not an alcoholic,” Wes’s father, Harold Clarkson, “was not a drunk.” Once, when they were both 16 and Wes had turned up at the Roush’s front door at 10:30 on a Sunday night, Michael had asked him to explain the difference.

“An alcoholic is embarrassing,” Wes had said, lying flat on Michael’s bed and bouncing a tennis ball against the ceiling. “A drunk is mean.”

Harold Clarkson was handy with a belt, but as a lawyer who represented all manner of filth, he knew better than to leave marks, even after an absurd number of scotch and sodas. But he knew how to cut someone open with his eyes and burn their entrails with his tongue. He could do this with or without a drink—as his history in the courtroom attested, but the more hydrated he was, the more bloodthirsty he became.

When he’d gotten old enough to think such things—11 or 12—Wes always marveled that his parents had so many friends. If he couldn’t stand to be around them, how could anyone else? Still, at their cocktail parties, Wes’s father was always at the center of a raucous and well-heeled circle. Men, young and old, surrounded him like bums around a trash can fire.

It wasn’t until Wes was 19—and already working at Lafayette Fitness Club—that he understood. Weak men—no matter how rich or handsome—were attracted to power. The kind of power Harold Clarkson had didn’t just come from money—though he had it—or his leonine handsomeness that would distinguish him even in old age; it came from a core of confidence that he could take from anyone what they held most dear. A fortune. A child. A life. Not that he
would
take it, but that he
could.

Wes assumed that his father’s associates were just as repelled by this power as they were drawn to it—if they understood it for what it was. But whether they did or not, they sensed, like Wes did, that when they were in its presence, the danger came from turning one’s back on it.

A party for a partner who was running for a spot on the bench would spell trouble. Half of the guests would be members at the gym, and a fair number would be Wes’s actual clients. Between keeping his mother from falling into the pool and dodging his father’s questions about when he planned to give up “this faggoty personal trainer thing and go to law school,” Wes thought he’d rather face a firing squad, but this—his mother had determined—would be the price of furniture storage.

Wes suppressed a sigh and accepted his fate.

“Sure...I’ll be there.”

Chapter 9

T
he last Sunday in April was Shove-In Day.

That was what Corinne was calling it instead of Move-In Day. It wasn’t even 10 o’clock in the morning, and Corinne thought that if she started screaming now, she might never stop.

“That won’t work,” she said, stopping Wes and his friend Chad at the front door. “There’s no way two queen-sized beds can fit in that room!”

Wes arched a brow at her as he steadied the bedframe he was holding.

“No shit. This one’s staying; that one’s not,” he leveled, smugly.

“Wes, don’t I get a say? It’s my stuff—” He cut her off.

“Look, Corinne, more than half of my belongings are in storage, but I’m keeping my bed. Non-negotiable, which means that one goes.” He pushed past her through the living room, and Chad gave her an apologetic shrug.

“Well, where’s it going?” she demanded, hot on their heels. “I don’t have anywhere to store it, and that bed actually belongs to me, you know.”

Wes pivoted his end of the frame carefully into the hall.

“Mr. Dan and Mrs. Betsie said that we could move a few things into Michael’s old room upstairs until you need them again,” he said, disappearing down the hall and leaving her feeling a little chagrined for her attack.

Corinne didn’t like feeling chagrined; she’d rather feel annoyed. She was being invaded, after all.

“Well, at least let me strip it before you start taking it apart,” she murmured, squeezing past them and yanking the ice blue duvet off the bed. She removed the sheets seconds before Wes and Chad slid the mattress off and pushed it down the hall.

Corinne looked back at Michael’s desk and his weight bench. This had been his space, just as the sunroom had been hers. She knew—with a kind of full-body certainty—that Michael would have approved of Wes moving in, but
she
wasn’t ready to walk past the doorway and not be able to picture Michael bent over his laptop, working. Or Michael, gorgeous Michael, bench-pressing, shirtless and glistening.

Everything was being erased.

She stared at the room, at these
things
, and she felt her heart start racing. She didn’t recognize her life anymore. She didn’t recognize herself. Corinne leaned back against the wall to steady herself because now her legs shook underneath her as if the ground were vibrating. She clutched the bundle of bedding in her arms to hold onto
something
, but a murky fear—like she’d only felt in the hospital when doom had replaced hope—overtook her.

Corinne heard the men come back inside, talking, and she wished she could retreat to her room, but her body would not obey. Trembling and clutching was all she could do.

Michael, help me!

“...the box springs will be a bitch,” Wes said, turning into the hallway. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him stop short.

“Corinne...?”

She didn’t want to look at him, but Corinne doubted that she could turn her head even if she tried, but Wes stepped in front of her and met her eyes with a puzzled look that shifted quickly to something else.

“Chad, could you give us a minute?” Wes spoke without taking his eyes off her.

“Oh...sure...” Corinne heard Chad turn from the hall and clear the living room in no time.

Inside, Corinne was dying. She had no idea that someone could endure such suffocating fear and stinging humiliation in the same instant. She could feel that her face had hardened into an ugly pre-cry mask and was frozen there.

“Corinne...” Wes spoke softly, as if he were addressing a child. “What’s going on? What are you thinking?”

Corinne opened her mouth, but no sound came out, and then, from some ancient place in her mind, she remembered to draw air into her lungs. The gasp that followed was ear-splitting, like she’d never inhaled before.

“Breathe...” Wes told her, placing a hand on her arm. “And tell me.”

“Idon’tthinkI’mreadyforthis!” she rasped on the exhale and swallowed another breath, greedily.

“Here, give me those.” Wes took the sheets and bedspread from her and dropped them to the floor before grabbing her hands and stacking them on top of her head.

“Whatareyoudoing?”

“You’re having a panic attack,” Wes explained, calmly. “This will help you breathe.”

“Howdoyouknow?” She wanted to sound challenging, but it came out squeaky.

Still, Wes raised a brow at her, but she caught the hint of a smile in his eyes.

“Human physiology,” he said. “You should probably sit down. Any second now, the adrenaline’s going to wear off, and you’ll go all rubbery.”

Corinne took another deep breath, and as if on cue, her knees started knocking. Wes walked her to Michael’s desk chair, and she collapsed on it.

Wes sat on the box spring at her knees and watched her, silently.

“That’s never happened before...” she managed, pulling her hands to her face and looking at him through her splayed fingers. Now that the terror was ebbing, she wanted to crawl in a hole.

“What set you off?” he asked, peering through her fingers with a scrutinizing frown.

Corinne hesitated.

“I...don’t want you to move in,” she stammered, feeling like a teenaged stepchild.

Wes blinked, his face an unreadable mask.

“You don’t want me to move in? Or you don’t want me to move your stuff out?” he asked, pointedly.

This time she didn’t hesitate; she blurted.

“I don’t want you to move Michael’s stuff.”

The mask melted, starting with his eyes, and Wes’s whole posture softened.

“Oh,” he whispered, taking in the room around them. “Okay.”

Corinne dropped her hands.

“Okay?”

Wes craned his neck to survey the space again and nodded.

“I just want my bed, Corinne. I can leave everything else the way it is...for as long as you need me to.”

“
Really?
”

“Yeah, it’s no big deal,” he said, shrugging, and Corinne wondered if he was lying. “I stored a lot of my stuff. Most of the boxes are full of clothes and shit.”

Corinne stared at him. This was not the Wes she knew, and it was weirding her out. She didn’t like the idea of being in Wes Clarkson’s debt or feeling like his charity case. She’d told him that the bike wasn’t important to her, and she’d meant it, but it did help to remind herself that the dollar value involved negated any pity factor on his part.

But she didn’t lie to herself. As much as she chafed against the idea of living with Michael’s best friend—or living with
anyone
—she knew it was her best option at the moment. She still couldn’t think about painting. The finished work that remained in the studio seemed to have been done by someone else; Corinne could hardly remember what it felt like to be inspired to touch brush to canvas. She didn’t like to think about it, but there were moments when she wondered if she’d ever paint again.

Corinne shook her head to clear her thoughts.

“Thank you,” she mumbled, finally.

Wes tilted his head and eyed her cautiously.

“What?” she demanded.

“Well, there is one other thing I’d like to bring inside...” Wes bit his lip, looking doubtful.

Good God, what is it?

A sex doll? A bong? His
Playboy
collection?

“Yeah...?” Corinne prompted, wincing.

Wes pressed his lips together and stared at her.

“What, Wes?”

Her worry doubled, tripled.

“Would you freak out...if I put my La-Z-Boy in the living room?”

Corinne let go the breath she was holding with a laugh.

“Go ahead....” She nodded. “Sure.”

Wes smiled then, white teeth and dimples, a full expression that she hadn’t seen since before.

“Dude,
awesome!”

This she recognized. And while his juvenile jargon made her roll her eyes, Corinne was a little relieved. It would be worse if he seemed like a total stranger, wouldn’t it?

As it turned out, there were several other things Wes wanted to keep that she wouldn’t have even considered objecting to, but he asked her permission anyway. His XBox—which had been to the house on
several
occasions—found a permanent home under the TV. His own TV and stereo actually fit on Michael’s bookshelf in his bedroom, and Corinne had no problem making space on the kitchen counter for his pint-sized
Capresso
machine, which was actually smaller than her coffee pot—even with the steamer arm extended.

“I’ve gotta have the caffeine jolt before a ride,” Wes explained, but then quickly added, wide-eyed, “But I swear, Corinne, it’s super quiet! It won’t wake you up, I promise.”

Corinne felt herself smiling.

“And it makes cappuccinos and lattes?” she asked.

“Yeah, I’ll show you later. It’s pretty easy.”

The last thing to come in, of course, was his bike.

“If you want, you can keep that in the sunroom,” she offered with a shrug. “It’s not like I’ve been using it, and it might make you feel a little less cramped in your room.”

Wes’s friend Chad had just left, and Wes was easing his Colnago through the front door when she spoke. He stopped and regarded her with a raised brow.

“You sure?” he asked, again seeming doubtful.

“Yeah, I’m sure.”

“Thanks, Corinne.” Wes aimed his bike towards the back of the house, and Buck followed him, clearly hoping that a trip to the backyard was in store.

The task of moving him in and getting him unpacked had taken just a few hours, but for Corinne, it was more physical activity than she’d had in months, and now that the work was done, she felt exhaustion settle over her.

She went to her room and closed the door behind her. Corinne stood there with her hand pressed to the wood. She felt the difference, closing the door in a house that no longer held just herself, that was no longer hers and Michael’s. She lived with someone else now, and she felt a little dizzy at the change. It was almost like the sensation of falling—an unexpected dipping—the way reality bobbed like a cork and sent out little waves of shock.

Michael was gone, and this was Corinne moving on.

She wanted to pull away from the thought, so she turned from the door and retreated to her bed, their bed. Tears welled in her eyes because she didn’t want to move on. If she couldn’t go backwards and touch the days when Michael was still alive—which to her still seemed so near that he was almost within reach (really, it was only 122 days, the blooming season of a creme myrtle, the lifespan of a red blood cell, a guarantee on a new mattress)—then at least she didn’t want to move forward.

Corinne didn’t have a choice, but if she did, she would hibernate indefinitely. Curl up in bed and let the world spin on like in a time-lapsed video where she was the rock or the lake or the mountain, and the skies strobed from day to night, clouds chasing moons, chasing dawns.