You and I, Me and You Page 17

  “I saw on the news that you got him. The Little Canada cops are getting the credit, though. Little hosers!”

  “The important thing is, evil was stymied and his poster collection was ruined.”

  “What?”

  “’Bye.”

  chapter fifty-five

  Not a creature was stirring, not even a fake FBI agent. But old habits die et cetera, so I made sure the conference room door was closed. Then I sat, brought up the file on my phone, clicked Play, and hunched forward. The saying is “I’m all ears!,” when it’s something you want to hear. I was no ears.

  Then I saw myself on the screen, my hair scraped back into a high ponytail. No makeup except some cherry ChapStick … Shiro loved the flavor of artificial cherries, which was one of the many things about her I would never understand. They weren’t cherries, for one thing, more like the cherries that popped up when you played the slots. Metallic cherries with no juice. Who tolerates it, much less smears it on their mouth, where, pardon the obvious, the wearer can’t help but taste it?

  (Get on with it. Quit stalling.)

  All right, good advice, but I stand by everything I just said.

  My eyes in Shiro’s face were calm and patient, our mouth a line. Our gaze was steady; our breathing was steady. Shiro could bluff the finest poker player on the planet. She’d done it to me plenty of times, and I lived inside her head. You can’t get any closer than living inside someone’s head. So what does it say about her (and me) that I had no idea what she was going to say now, in the six minutes she had stolen in the middle of a very busy day? What had been so important?

  “We must break up with Patrick immediately. We must move out of his house immediately. Note I did not say ‘our.’ It was never ‘our.’ He found it; he bought it; he would not hear of us contributing, which was gentlemanly in a chauvinistic way.

  “I know this is difficult for you. But it will be so much worse for him; you must understand that. I think you do understand that. Because I know you, and though you are a hider, you are not a liar—even to yourself. No more than I, at any rate. Do you truly think Patrick will not eventually notice you are going through the motions?

  “Quite unconsciously, and understandably, you have made a suit of shining armor, you have created a picture of the Perfect Man for You/Us and, whether it fits him or not, you’ve stuffed poor Patrick into that armor. At best it’s unfair. At worst, it could result in considerable damage, the kind of damage that will keep you (and others) awake at 2:00 A.M. in Patrick’s bed while he sleeps beside us in piss-ignorance. Not to overstate my case, but this will be the thing you regret on your deathbed. That, and not investing in Twitter.”

  “I was still a teenager!”

  Shiro took a breath, held it for a beat, then whooshed it out. “My old friend. This is harder. I must tell you my motivation for this conversation—”

  I was pretty sure conversations were two-sided.

  “—shush, I knew you were going to say that. But I am not only trying to act in Patrick’s best interest; my motives are not as altruistic as that, and I cannot pretend otherwise. I am acting in my interests as well. I am in love with Dr. Gallo.”

  Well, poop on a cracker. I was, too. Also: “Dr.” Gallo? Was it possible she didn’t know his first name? Formal was one thing, but …

  “I don’t want to live with another man and perhaps raise a family with him when I love someone else. I know you are a hider, Cadence, and I know it is my fault.”

  What?

  “I let you hide because I am selfish and I want to live. My existence is one hundred percent contingent on letting you hide. You made me by necessity—in many ways you are my mother, not my sister. And I was grateful to live. But now I see I am … I guess I would say I have become your personal escape hatch. That is not my function; it is not my design. I cannot let you hide from this.”

  What are you saying? I was starting to feel the familiar throat-clogging panic at the thought of being abandoned. By anyone: Patrick, BOFFO, Shiro …

  “Don’t fret, Cadence.” Her smile on my face was bitter, bitter. “This is not a suicide note.

  “We love Cathie—ah, you do, I mean, and I do not dislike her. But for years, she was all the family you had. Small wonder you decided to fall for her brother. You’re repeating childhood patterns, Cadence, and given our childhood, that is the polar opposite of healthy. You saw that moving in with Patrick, making a life with him, would open doors. What you could not face—what I would not face—was that that very same decision makes other doors swing shut. Doors we may never get to open again.”

  “I know.” I could feel tears sting my eyes. “I know this, Shiro. I swear I do.”

  She smiled from my face. It was odd. I had seen her before in pictures, on VHS tapes … as technology advanced, so did the methods our psychiatrists used to show us to each other. Always I had seen her as a petite Asian-American woman when everyone swore she was a tall blonde like me, that Adrienne wasn’t a redhead but a tall blonde. I still saw her, but in my body. Her expressions, the way she held herself, the way she spoke … those were all Shiro.

  If she saw a tape of me, whom would she see?

  “I know you know this,” she told me. “You will have figured it out by now. I wanted to explain my motivations and to tell you I will help you with this any way I can. I know you love Dr. Gallo as I do. And I know you will be kind to Patrick. I will help you with that as well.” She paused, and seemed to shrink inside herself a little. When she spoke again I could hardly believe it: Shiro was afraid. “Since I am demanding you do this right now, I will—I will tell Patrick if you cannot. That sort of thing is not my strength, but we cannot keep hiding behind walls built in childhood. I cannot accuse you of using me as a trapdoor and then insist you do something I do not want to face. I will tell him. If you want me to.”

  “I’ll do it,” I told her. “I don’t want to either, but it’s my decision, too.”

  She sat a little straighter and smiled at me. “Thank you, B.S.” Big Sister, her old, old nickname for me. I hadn’t heard it in years. It was true, I was the oldest; I had made the other two. They were born of my terror and despair; that was true, too. “I love you. Always.”

  “I love you, too,” I told her. And that was also true. That was the best truth.

  Shiro made as if she was going to stop recording, then caught herself. “I do not know when you will see this, so just in case, Sussudio is Ian Zimmerman. Good night.”

  Oh, goddamned Shiro Jones!

  I had to laugh. The whole thing, it was just too weird. Maybe that was the best truth.

  chapter fifty-six

  Patrick was waiting for me, and not in a good way.

  “Hey.”

  “Hey.” I kept my head down while I petted a delighted Pearl. I was half afraid he’d be asleep and I’d have to wake him up to break up with him. It was awful, but lying to myself and to him for even a few more hours seemed worse. But somehow knowing he’d been waiting up, unhappy, wasn’t much better. “Sorry to be so late.”

  “I know you were busy. Glad you’re okay.”

  “Yeah, I am. Listen, Patrick—”

  “We should talk.”

  “Yeah. I’ve—”

  “This is too much.”

  “I know. And the thing of it is—”

  “I mean, I thought we could make this work. But I don’t think we can. This—” He waved a hand, gesturing to the beautiful perfect house. “It’s only been three days—”

  “Two.”

  “Check your watch.”

  I did. “Oh.”

  “Yeah. So like I said, it’s only been three days, and you’re never here, or if you’re here you’re thinking about BOFFO, and if by the grace of the gods BOFFO loses funding you’re thinking about how you can find them funding so you can keep working a dangerous job, and meanwhile I’m stuck here with the dog—”

  “It’s only been three days!”

  “Yeah, that’s a lo
ng time to be stuck with the dog. I mean, I think Olive’s great—”

  “Pearl.”

  “Yeah, that’s another thing.”

  I threw up my hands. “You knew I was a multiple before we moved in!”

  “Yeah, but I didn’t know your dog was a multiple.”

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “What?” The oddest mood shift had come over me. I had dreaded walking through the door, cringed at the thought of hurting him. If someone had told me, It’s okay; he’ll break up with you first, I would have thought I’d be relieved.

  But I wasn’t relieved. I was fucking pissed. “So you’re dumping me because my dog has three names and I’ve got a real job like a grown-up instead of making chocolate chip cookies and calling it a career?”

  “You knew I was Aunt Jane before we moved in together! And speaking of careers, I don’t want that goddamned George Pinkman in my house, how about that?”

  “He’s never been in your house!” How dare he disparage my real partner against real crime, George Pinkman, a devoted sociopath who was sworn to fight evil as a fake FBI agent as long as fake BOFFO kept paying the bills?

  “I don’t want him in my driveway, either!”

  “I know he can be unpleasant—”

  “Unpleasant?”

  I tried to rein in my temper. “Look, this obviously isn’t going to work.”

  “What I’ve been saying.”

  “Because you’re right. If you can’t handle three days of this, we’re doomed. Because I’m always gonna have to leave at all times of the day and night and I’ll never know exactly when I’ll be back. And until one of George’s one-night stands stabs him in the dick and he bleeds out, he’s gonna be my partner, and while I don’t exactly want him around, I can’t let you forbid his presence in your house.” His house, and it always had been. “And I’m always gonna have a dog…” Uh, maybe. How long did dogs live? “… who’s gonna have a relationship with all three of us, not just me. That’s the real problem, isn’t it? You thought you were fine with the three of us. But it’s really just me you want.”

  “Well.” He hesitated, as if gauging how much truth I wanted. Unlike Cathie, who would just give it to me whether she thought I was up for it or not. “Shiro, sometimes. But not Adrienne, no. I thought it was pretty cool at first, your other personalities. But Adrienne’s gonna do something really bad. She could kill me by accident. She’d be sorry later—you’d be sorry later—but I’d still be dead.”

  Unlikely. Adrienne wasn’t around much anymore. But Patrick couldn’t know that, because he didn’t know me. And that wasn’t his fault. The situation was our fault: I had moved in despite misgivings. Shiro had moved in despite misgivings. Adrienne had committed grand-theft auto, either in protest or celebration.

  “I think maybe it’s good we’re figuring this out now,” I told him. The wash of relief over his face was so immediate, I had to grit my teeth not to say something bitchy. “I think it’s better we finish tonight rather than limp along for another month or two or six or ten.” His shudder made me wonder if I could actually grit my teeth hard enough to crack a molar. “I’ll go to a motel and come back and get my stuff over the next few days.” I realized I couldn’t even commit to coming back and getting everything tomorrow. Later today, rather. I had no idea what tomorrow would bring. “I’m sorry. I know you are, too.”

  His face sagged, and for a moment I wondered if some of what he had said had been for show. But no … George was right, sometimes my ego did get in the way. If anyone would recognize that quality, it was him. “Yeah. I’m sorry, too. You’re being pretty nice about it—this was all my idea. And I pressured you into it. You didn’t do one thing wrong. It’s on me.”

  I smiled and arched my eyebrows. “It’s on us. All four of us.”

  He smiled, too, and even laughed. After that it was a little better.

  chapter fifty-seven

  He wouldn’t let me go to the motel. He insisted I spend the night in my

  (the guest?)

  bedroom. “I know you’re exhausted, and it’s not like we were even sharing a bed.” To his great credit, he didn’t sound miffed. “It’s stupid to go back out into the dark and the cold for a motel room when there’s a perfectly good Patrick-free bed just a few feet from here.” Okay, he sounded a little miffed. “You can gallop back into the chaos after a few hours of sleep. In fact, I hate the thought of you paying for motel rooms at all. You wouldn’t have given up your apartment if I hadn’t talked you into moving.” He was chewing his lower lip and looking through me, not at me, thinking while he talked. “Now you’re homeless and it’s my fault. That doesn’t work for me.”

  “It’s my fault,” I corrected him sharply, then yawned so hard I almost fell down. We agreed to continue the “It’s my fault”/“No, it’s my fault” argument after some sleep.

  “At least I can relax now that you’re home. As much as I can around you,” he added with (I hoped) unconscious reproach.

  I had a dim memory of sitting on my bed and starting to take off my shoes, and then about a second and a half went by and my room was filled with sunshine, I was lying across the bed with one shoe beside me on the mattress and the other still on my foot, and lo and behold, it was a new day.

  I knew good solid sleep like that, so long and deep you have no sense of time passing, was the best kind for your body, but I always preferred the nights when I kept waking up. Oh, good, it’s only 1:30; I don’t have to get up for six more hours! Oh, good, I still get four more hours. Three more hours. Like that. That sort of sleep isn’t nearly as good for you because you can’t get too far into REM sleep. But the night seems to last forever, and when you’re a multiple and know the next time you wake up you could be back on mainland China, it’s great to wake up over and over in your own bed.

  All that to say I knew I’d slept well and was grateful. There were many nights I was exhausted and couldn’t get to sleep. Paul’s trap for that poor woman, Ian Zimmerman, breaking up with Patrick … Like I said, glad I’d slept well.

  I could hear plates clinking and conversation, so I cleaned up as best and as quickly as I could, took a ninety-second shower, pulled random clothes out of a box and got dressed, then stumbled into the kitchen more damp than dry.

  And there was Cathie, methodically filling up each dimple in her waffle with exactly the same number of drops of syrup. “Waffles again?” I asked with faux annoyance. “That’s how great it was living with him,” I told her so she’d know the deed was done. “Homemade waffles every day.”

  Patrick handed me a plate and managed a small smile. I reminded myself that our breakup

  (His, honey. You got dumped.)

  could have gone much worse and kept the smile on my own face.

  “Green jeans—the colored jeans trend is done, by the way—a traffic-cone-orange sweatshirt, and white athletic socks,” Cathie observed. “A bold choice.”

  “Back off, it’s—”

  “Sunday,” Patrick prompted.

  “Right. I was testing you. Congrats, you passed.”

  “Don’t feel bad,” she told her brother. “She ‘tests’ me all the time. Listen, Cadence, we’ve been talking and we’ve got it.”

  “Sorry, what?” Pearl got up from her beloved blanket, slipped over to me with a shyly wagging tail, and nipped a small piece of dry waffle from my fingers. A no-no per both Patrick and Shiro, but heck. I missed my dog and had barely seen her for two days. Three days.

  Cathie winced when she saw how heedlessly I splashed maple syrup on my waffles. Not only did different numbers of drops go in each waffle dimple, I wasn’t even counting them! Too much to bear.

  “The living situation. Oh, God, how can you eat them that way?” She shook herself. “The house. Listen, you know I was gonna put mine on the market sometime next year anyway.”

  I nodded, mouth full. Cathie was an artist, a wonderful, gifted, clever artist whose lovely two-bedroom house was too small for her art, some of
which was the size of warehouse walls. She needed a proper studio; she needed more storage space; she needed south-facing windows; she needed kitchen grout she wasn’t compelled to clean with a toothpick. (Your garden-variety OCD sufferer would be content to clean it with a toothbrush. Not my girl.) She had been talking about selling the place for over two years.

  “Well, I like it here. And Patrick just moved here.”

  I winced and glanced at him. “Sorry you had to uproot your life.”

  He shrugged. “I was moving back to Minnesota anyway.” That, thank goodness, was true. He’d lived here as a boy, and always meant to return.

  “Right, and now he has. Sure, he barely got here and your relationship went ker-smash—”

  He and I groaned in unison.

  “—so I figured, I’ll move in here. It’s plenty big, and he says I can have the whole living room for a studio if I want.” In her enthusiasm, her face brightened and her tone lightened. “Plenty of windows, lots of natural light, and he can make one of the bedrooms, or the den, or the backyard, I don’t care, into a living room. And … you know.” She was now cutting her waffle on the dotted lines, so to speak, and then cutting them into their little individual squares. “We haven’t seen much of each other for a decade. We’ve been talking about it, and we think it’d be nice to be roomies for a while. I’ll keep my eye out for another house but will live here in the meantime.”

  “That’s great,” I said sincerely, “but what’s that got to—”

  “So I’ll rent my house to you,” she explained as if to a dunce. Which is what I was; I probably should have seen where this was going. I couldn’t blame the distraction of watching her “eat.” She’d been eating her breakfast like that for decades. “Or sell it to you, if you think you want to live there permanently. You’ve got somewhere to sleep tonight, you’re not blowing your pathetic government salary on awful motel rooms, I’ve got space and light to work, and Patrick doesn’t come home to an empty house. But you’ve gotta take the dog with you. Find a doggy day care or whatever. I can’t be around her without wanting to mop her.” She began to eat the tiny individual waffle squares, chewing each one five times. “So how does that sound?”