“I want to do Vanessa Redgrave. I want to do a one-man show where I play Vanessa Redgrave playing Joan Didion. Other than that, I really think we’re done here.”
Cassie sighed. Now it was clear. “You’re not taking me seriously.”
“Oh, was I supposed to?”
Cassie screwed the cap on her bottle of water and picked up her sunglasses from the counter. “It’s okay. I’m used to men not taking me seriously.”
Patrick slid down from the counter. “Oh, don’t do that. Don’t you lump me in with the patriarchy—I’m wearing a dress, for Christ’s sake. But you show up at my house without so much as a phone call. I don’t know you. I don’t know what you want.”
“It’s okay if you don’t take me seriously, because I take myself seriously enough for both of us. You might think this is a joke, but I know more about you than you think I do and I drove two hours to have this meeting with you. Has Neal ever done that? I highly doubt he has. I know you were unhappy on television. I know your first love was the theater. I know you’re not serious about doing a solo show, because your favorite part of acting is reacting, and that’s where you truly shine.” Cassie took a deep breath. “I know when you left LA, you didn’t go far, because you’re not done with your career. You’re testing me. That’s fine. I will take your test and I will pass it. And I’ll go, but this conversation isn’t over.”
“Tammy Tetons,” Patrick said as a smile spread across his lips. “Okay.”
“Okay?” Cassie asked hopefully.
“Okay.” Patrick repeated, realizing he didn’t totally hate her. That seemed . . . new. Another crash from the other room. “Don’t make me come in there!” He turned to Cassie. “Actually, do you have a job right now? Something out of state that would take me far away from here?”
She struggled for an offer that might do.
“I’m kidding. I have to go. We’ll need to continue this some other time.”
Cassie opened the calendar app on her iPhone. “Okay, so when would be a better time?”
Patrick raised his arms, making him resemble a kite. “I’m going to need you to figure that out.”
“Come back to work, Patrick. Come back to Neal. It’s time.” She scanned his eyes for any sign this was sinking in. “Promise me you’ll at least think about it.”
“I’ll think about it.” But the truth was, at the moment he had bigger things to think about. Like where to buy bicycle helmets.
NINE
If Maisie and Grant were going to insist on keeping the temperature at anything less than one hundred and one, they were going to have to consider a new descriptive word for the hot tub. Patrick didn’t force the issue—boiling children while they were entrusted to him seemed unwise. And it was summer, after all; even though the sun had dipped behind the mountains, it was still hovering around ninety degrees (his blood had thinned over the past few years, but it doesn’t mean theirs had). Still, it had become a routine. Each evening after lupper they had a post-meal swim and a soak and partook in one of their favorite activities, watching the outdoor solar lights pop on as dusk settled over the yard.
“There’s one!” Grant yelled. He splashed the twist right out of his uncle’s vodka on the rocks as he raised his arm from the water.
“Easy. Easy.”
“It’s one of the colored ones!”
“Score,” Patrick said with just enough interest to keep Grant from throwing a fit. But the colored ones were fun, situated under the citrus trees (tangelo and Mexican lime mostly, a lemon and two pink grapefruit) that lined the back of the property and made interesting shapes and shadows along the white concrete wall that separated his property from JED’s.
Patrick looked up for a glimpse of Venus, usually the first light to appear in the gloaming, but quickly abandoned his search. It was getting harder and harder to see without his glasses, which he largely refused to wear on principle ever since his eye doctor suggested it was about time for progressives, which, as far as Patrick could tell, was a fancy way for him to avoid saying bifocals. Besides, tonight they were not there just to count the lights and the shimmering stars as they made their appearance in the sky. Patrick had an agenda, developed from the book he’d ordered himself on grief. He took a long sip of his drink for courage. “I was wondering if either of you were missing your mom tonight, because I know I was—missing her—and I thought we might talk about it.” His reading had suggested he find a way to communicate his own grief to light the way forward. And when it came to his own grief, oh, where to begin.
Grant sculled across the water, using his cupped hands as oars. Maisie kicked her legs until they broke the surface.
“C’mon. You gotta help me out here. You don’t talk to me about this stuff. I’m not sure if you’re waiting for me to talk to you. We can’t waste the whole summer being polite.” Patrick had been wondering of late if Clara hadn’t been right. He could clothe them and feed them and keep them alive, amuse them with a playful remark. But was he really what they needed in this fraught situation?
Grant propelled himself back to Patrick’s side and sat next to him, placing his small hands on his uncle’s shoulder. He whispered in Patrick’s ear. “You mith Mom?” It was as if the concept took him completely by surprise.
“They were friends, dummy,” Maisie said.
“Hey, hey, hey. No one’s a dummy.”
A bat flew by overhead and Maisie screamed.
“It’s just a bat. They’re friendly. They eat bugs.”
“Bats are for Halloween.”
“Well, in the desert they’re for summer, too. But they never bother anyone. They just do their thing.”
