The Memory Child (15 page)

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Brian

August 2013

I
still can’t believe you
did it.”

Brian raised his wineglass and clinked it against Diane’s sparkling water–filled glass. They sat at their favorite table in Luigi’s, celebrating the new change in th
eir lives.

In two short months, Brian had managed to list, sell, and move them out of the condo and into the new house. He didn’t want to waste any precious time getting their new home ready for their expandin
g family.

“
We
did it,” he corrected her. Sure, he did most of the heavy lifting, organizing the moving company, the cleaning crew, and setting up their new addresses with the local companies, but if she hadn’t given him a list of all the things that needed to be done, he would have failed
miserably.

Diane smiled. “I’m just glad it
’s over.”

“Diane! You’re here!” Marcello’s loud voice boomed throughout the restaurant. A large smile filled his wife’s face and Brian just shook his head at the nois
y Italian.

“Is today the day? Is that why you are here? I’m honored you would celebrate your new home with me.” Marcello leaned down and placed a kiss on each of Diane’s rosy cheeks. She beamed at him before nodding tow
ard Brian.

“And you, you did it all! My son, he worked out okay, right? I told him if he messed up any of your furniture I’d send him back to the old country, where he’d learn what hard work was al
l about.”

At Marcello’s insistence, Brian had hired his son and some friends to set up the furniture in their new home and help him get thin
gs ready.

“They were fine. You should be proud.” Brian patted Marcello on the back. “He’s a very hard
worker.”

Marcello nodded. “Good. Good. You never know with kids. You can train them all you want, but when they grow old enough, you just gotta hope and pray they heard you through all th
e noise.”

“You’ll have to come over to see our new place, Marcello, and bring your lovely wife as well once we’re all unpacked,” D
iane said.

Brian sat back, slightly amazed. She’d never invited Marcello over. In fact, the first and only time Brian had ever suggested such a thing, Diane had shot him down, saying that confining their relationship to the restaurant was all th
ey needed.

“Really? We would love that. What an honor! I’ll bring some of my best wine, the stuff I keep hidden away for only special occasions. Thank you.” Marcello kissed the top of Dia
ne’s hand.

Brian watched the scene play out in front of him. It was interesting to watch his wife blush like a sc
hoolgirl.

“What was that about?” Brian leaned forward and spoke softly as Marcello greeted guests as they
walked in.

Diane
shrugged.

No way, he wasn’t going to let her get away
with that.

“Spill. I know there must be a reason for the sudden change o
f heart.”

Diane played with the cloth napkin on her lap, her eyes downcast in a rare moment of insecurity. Either she was playing him or this was all hormona
l. Again.

“Our new place has a different feel to it. More welcoming. Friendlier. I thought maybe it was time to be the same way. More per
sonable.”

“You are. Everyone lo
ves you.”

She shook her head, disagreeing
with him.

“Diane.” Brian leaned forward and reached for her hand. “Honey, you’re perfect just the way you are. You don’t need to
change.”

“You have to say that. But we both know it’s not true. In the past, maybe.” She glanced up at him. “But lately, it seems like I’ve been so focused on my career that I’ve forgotten there’s more
to life.”

Brian didn’t know what to say. He couldn’t really deny it, because she had been more focused on work than anything else. Look at how she’d acted when she first realized she was pregnant with their baby. But slowly he’d started to notice a change in her toward their baby. More accepting and…dare he say it…
excited?

“Is there anything I can do to help?” He took the easy way out and didn’t outright agree
with her.

She chuckled. “You can agree with me, you know. I’m not going to bite your h
ead off.”

“Not now, maybe, but later you might.” He leaned back in his chair and reached for a piece of the warm buttered garlic bread Marcello had brought to th
eir table.

She winced. “Have I been t
hat bad?”

Brian rubbed his chin and smiled. “Only if you consider throwing a pickle at my back because you thought I was ignoring
you bad.”

Diane covered her mouth with her napkin and started to laugh. “I’m so sorry.” Her laughter was contagious and had Brian chuckling
himself.

“You have to admit, though, I had a good point.” Diane managed to calm her laughter but the smile
remained.

Brian nodded. “Sure, but what about when you got upset over how I wrote in pen on the boxes instead of using those notecards you wanted me
to use?”

She bought him over one hundred pale pink notecards and said it would make her life easier if he labeled each box with its contents on these cards, then taped them to the boxes. He’d told her she was crazy and used a black pen to mark which room the boxes should go to. Diane had thrown her hands up in frustration and actually stormed out of the house, only to return twenty minutes later with two ice-cream sundaes. Apparently, that was her way of apo
logizing.

He still refused to use the
notecards.

“No way. Trust me, as you start looking for things, you’ll be wishing you had used
my idea.”

In this moment of smiles and comfortable silence, Brian realized he was happy. Really happy. He couldn’t wait to eat a delicious dinner and then take his wife home and make love to her for the first time in their
new home.

“I think we should skip dessert tonight,” Brian suggested as he took a sip of
his wine.

“Really? Did you not hear Marcello tell us about the che
esecake?”

“We could take it home and eat it later.” He shrugged. He could think of a few ways they could enjoy the
dessert.

“Brian…” The tone of her voice and the way she leaned toward him gave him all the incentive he needed to make sure their dinner was enjoyable but fast. Thank God the waiter arrived with their orders. He didn’t even bother to say thank-you; just grabbed his knife and started to cut his steak. This would be the fastest dinner they’d ever eaten at
Luigi’s.

It might only have been a week since the last time he made love to his wife, but he could have sworn it felt li
ke a year.

“Whoa, slow down there. I’m not going anywhere anytime soon. All we have waiting for us are boxes to unpack.” She shook her head. “Wait, let me rephrase that. All you have waiting for you back at the house are boxes to unpack. I plan on becoming familiar with my new bathtub before anything else
happens.”

Brian
groaned.

“You can always dry me off,” Diane suggested. She winked at him from across the table before spearing a piece of chicken from her p
asta bowl.

“Besides,” she said, between mouthfuls, “you’ll need to find the box with our bedshee
ts first.”

Brian
growled.

“Actually, do you think we could stop by the office on our w
ay home?”

“Diane.” Now she was goin
g too far.

“No.” She shook her head. “I’m serious. There’s a file I’d like you to look at when you have the time. Walter has a new idea on some program he thinks would help some of our processes, but before I hand it over to Neil I’d like you to take a look at it and see if it’s even p
ossible.”

“If this is your idea of foreplay…” He reached for his wine to clear his thoughts. Whenever she asked him to look over one of Walter’s big ideas, it usually ended up with him needing a stiff drink. This didn’t bode wel
l for him.

“You can always look it over tomorrow. We have the whole weekend ahead of us.” She sat back and allowed the waiter to take her now-empty plate. Brian glanced down at his own and realized he’d hardly touched his steak
or pasta.

“Right,” he mumbled. “A weekend spent unpacking and trying to find a way of making Walter’s dumb-ass idea into a good one. Sounds like fun.” He kept his focus downward, knowing Diane probably didn’t hear him, since she ordered dessert while he was
speaking.

“What did
you say?”

Brian sighed as he chewed on the dinner that no longer appeale
d to him.

“Nothing. If it makes your life easier at work, then there’s nothing I’d like to do more than help you with this
project.”

Th
e echo of Brian’s cell phone as it vibrated on one of the plethora of boxes in the room had him wanting to punch something. He’d set the phone down and since then it had gone off repeatedly for the past three hours. At first he tried to ignore it. It was Saturday and the entire office knew he was off-line thanks to this move. But its incessant buzzing had gone beyond i
rritating.

At the time, saving money by unpacking himself seemed like a smart idea. He now realized that a more brilliant idea would have been paying for the complete
package.

He’d thought Diane had been kidding when she said she wasn’t unpacking. Apparently, he’d been wrong. She had no problem going out for a spa day with her girlfriends while he slaved away trying to find items in boxes that he should have label
ed better.

Damn Diane and her notecards. Damn his pride in thinking he could do
it better.

What he needed was a nice cold beer, but that meant stopping so he could drive to the liquor store, and he wanted to get as much put away as possible. At least the movers had placed boxes in the right rooms. He’d leave Diane’s office boxes for her to unpack on her own and his own office boxes for later. But the kitchen, bathrooms, bedrooms, and countless knickknacks and clothes—it was all
too much.

He wouldn’t admit defeat, though. Maybe he’d call Marcello’s son and see if he wanted to make some extra money. Perhaps if the kid had a girlfriend, he’d even bring her along. Heck, he’d be willing to pay her double just to get the kitchen started for him. In this case, he had no problems admitting he was over his head, but it wasn’t in his nature to be a
defeatist.

Brian grabbed the end of his T-shirt and lifted it up, wiping sweat off his forehead. Even with all the windows open, he was roasting. It was the middle of summer and they had to pick the hottest weekend of the month to move. No wonder Diane was so grump
y lately.

He grabbed yet another box labeled “living room” and tore the packing tape off the top. Throw cushions. Fabulous. He grabbed the first one and tossed it behind him, aiming for the couch but not really caring where it landed. Beneath that were paper-wrapped bowls and vases. Brian glanced around the room, wondering where he was going to put everything. He knew Diane had a place for every single item in these boxes, but
seriously?

As he unwrapped a white handblown glass vase he’d bought as an anniversary gift one year, the front doorbell sounded, followed by three loud knocks. He stepped to the side to look out their large bay window and saw a black SUV in their
driveway.

He recognized the vehicle. If his boss was making house calls, the day was about to go down
hill fast.

“Door’s open,” Brian yelled across the room. He continued to unwrap the contents of the box while Tim Wainright walked into h
is house.

“How’s i
t going?”

Brian shrugged, glanced around the box-filled room, and then smiled as Tim lifted up the case of beer in
his hands.

“Housewarmi
ng gift.”

Brian stepped over some boxes and lifted the beer from his bos
s’s hands.

“You have no idea how much I needed this.” He led the way through the hallway to the kitchen, set the box down on the counter, and reached for a drawer for a bottle opener, only to stop midway. “I have no clue where the bottle opener w
ould be.”