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Fifty
Patrick
It rained into the night and all day Tuesday.
During the day, Cari painted with the door closed and I worked at my drafting table, catching up on work or working on plans for building that will never be built. When we got hungry, we’d wander down to the bar and ate. When we got bored or needed a break we’d watch movies.
And we fucked.
A lot.
But that’s all it was. Fucking. After we both got off, we’d part ways like nothing happened. We didn’t talk about it. We didn’t talk at all.
But at night, after I turned off the generator downstairs and the entire building was dark and quiet, I’d strip off my clothes and climb into her bed. I’d stare at the sky and listen to the rain—waiting for it to lull me to sleep and wishing she’d let me hold her.
I hate myself for what happened. What I did. The way I treated her. It doesn’t matter that she wanted it. Pushed me into it. I’ll never be able to touch her again without remembering.
It’s Wednesday and I wake up to feel of the sun streaming through the skylight above me, warm against my back. I know right away she’s not in bed next to me. Opening my eyes, I see her. She’s wearing one of my old shirts. It hits her mid-thigh, her hair gathered up in a hasty ponytail high on her head, paint soaked into her cuticles. Drying on her hands and legs. A smudge of bright yellow across her cheek. She’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.
She flicks her gaze between me and the canvas, dabbing her brush against her palette now and then. When she realizes I’m awake, that I’m watching her, a flush creeps up from beneath the neckline of her shirt, turning her neck bright pink. She looks away from me, dropping the paint brush in her hand to draw it against her thigh. After a couple strokes, she lifts the brush again and keeps painting.
I lay here and watch her, until she steps away from her easel, dropping her brush into the coffee cup full of murky water she keeps next to it. I’ve teased her a thousand times about how often she’s picked it up and almost taken a drink in one of her post-paint dazes. Instead of teasing her, I turn over to look at the cloudless sky above my head—a bright, brilliant blue that makes it hard to breathe—and wonder how we got here. How we ended up in a place where it’s expected for us to use and hurt each other.
I guess how doesn’t really matter. What matters is I don’t want to do it anymore. I don’t want to hurt her. I don’t want to punish her. I don’t want to blame her. And I don’t want to be the type of guy who would do those things to her. Not anymore.
But I know there’s no going back. Not for either of us.
Maybe Conner was right. Maybe Cari and I were never friends to begin with. Maybe this is always where we were headed. Maybe this is where we end.
Unable to stand another second of it, I leave her bed. I leave her room. I leave the apartment. Because if this is where we end, it’s the last place I want to be.
When I get tothe jobsite, I find low-level pandemonium. Panicked about storm damage, our multi-millionaire client and his poodle-toting trophy wife showed up as soon as the roads cleared. When I pullup, Declan has them corralled under the canopy we keep set up for shade, telling them they were absolutely not going to assess the damage for themselves. They’re going to go home and wait for a call from the insurance company. It’s what Declan is good at. Controlling a situation and the people in it.
Let him deal with it. These days, I can’t even control myself.
Half of my usual crew is milling around, dodging debris—ruined building materials and trash litter almost the entire site. As soon as they see me pull up, they start moving with a purpose. “No one’s leaving until this shit is cleaned up. Jeff—” I bellow without breaking my stride and he appears at the top of the stairs. “How bad is it?”
Jeff shakes his head like he’s trying to figure out a way to tell me I’ve got less than six months to live. “Lot of broken glass. Drywall’s soaked. Roof’s completely peeled back on the south end.”
Fuck me. Life is awesome.
“Alright.” I nod, keeping calm because none of this is his fault. I look at my watch. It’s 10AM. “You call everyone not here and tell them that unless they’ve got a legit and provable emergency, that their ass better be here by noon if they expect to keep their job. At noon, you call every temp we got on call and replace the assholes who don’t show.”
Jeff give me a bug-eyed look. “Yes, boss.”
“And keep those fuckwits out there in line,” I add, careful to keep my voice down. “The clients are here and they’re freaked. The last thing we need is them seeing the crew standing around, jerking each other off.”
Fifteen minutes later, I hear the slamming of car doors and tires crunching over gravel. Sufficiently talked off a ledge, our clients are heading home. Declan finds me standing in what’s supposed to be the gourmet kitchen. “Didn’t you get my text?” he says, clipboard in hand. If there’s anything Declan loves more than telling people what to do, it’s checklists. “We’re delayed until I can get an inspector out here to assess the damage.”
“No.” I haven’t checked my phone in three days. I don’t even know where it is. Dropped out of my pocket. Kicked in a corner somewhere. “And even if I had, I’d still be here.”
He cracks what passes as a smile for Declan. “Cabin fever?”
“Yeah—something like that.” I shrug, changing the subject because I don’t want to think about what I’ve been doing for the past three days, much less talk about it. “We’re gonna have to strip it down to the studs and start over.” The roof can be repaired and windows can be replaced. My main concern is water damage. Mold can be toxic. “That’ll put us behind schedule and over budget.”
Declan set his jaw, following the trajectory of my gaze. “Yeah...” he says, slapping the clipboard against his thigh. “We should know what we’re up against by the time the crew is finished with clean-up.” The money really isn’t a concern—that’s what insurance is for—but a rebuild is going to throw our entire build schedule off by months. I’m suddenly regretting telling Jeff to fire people who don’t show to help with clean up. Declan tips his hardhat back a bit to scratch his head before resetting it “How’d the bar hold up under the weather?”
“Good,” I say, giving him the first genuine smile I’ve managed in days. “I cranked up the genny and set the sandbags like your dad showed me. There might be some exterior damage but everything inside held up.”