B ack in his office, Ray worked on sketches he had made of Achilles Antoniou’s secret playroom. Go medieval in that basement. Underground, seen by a select few, the big, exotic room would not affect the exterior or core design at all, so Ray didn’t feel any kind of call for a design aesthetic. The fruit cellar on Bright Street flashed through his mind, the single bulb that dangled in its center. He pondered lighting-spooky uplights?
Bare bulbs, like Picasso’s Guernica . What was Antoniou going to do down there, put in a purple bed or a rack?
Denise came into Ray’s office, youthfully enthusiastic, wanting to talk color and furniture. She had tortured her short hair with rubber bands and she wore a leather vest; in the cold office, she could. She looked out the glass walls toward the reception area. “One thing. I’ve been thinking. You need a backup plan.”
“Too late for that. I’m committed.”
“It would be no trouble to quickie-revise some existing drawings that would satisfy him for the moment. Let things calm down between you and Martin.”
She let that notion twist for a moment, then said, “Pretend to go along, then whittle away at Martin and Mr. Antoniou.”
“Finally, a tempting suggestion.” He opened and closed a few drawers. “Now where do I keep that big sharp Exacto of mine? Good for whittling when all else fails.”
“Ha, ha,” she said. “You work them, together and separately, until the client’s ready to take that extra step forward. You’ve done it before.”
He sighed.
“Nowhere is it written that good architects must be uncompromising.”
“Et tu, Denise?”
“I’m on your side, Ray.” She gave him a half smile, then frowned, gazing beyond him out into the hall. “Uh-oh.”
“What is it?”
“He’s here.”
In the conference room, the streaked rosewood surface of the table cold to the touch, Ray sat, plans spread out in front of him. At the head of the long table, Antoniou reposed, no other word for it. His big eyelids had sunk over his brown eyes, like windows with shady awnings pulled down over the bright parts. Martin sat directly across from Ray.
“We’ve been talking these last few minutes,” Martin said, without preamble.
Ray nodded, looking toward Antoniou, whose sunken head sunk lower.
Not a good sign.
“Achilles has already told you that your basic design, while no doubt brilliant, is not really what he has in mind.”
Ray wondered about the basement, but another peek at Antoniou told him the truth. The client’s hooded eyes rose to meet his momentarily, blazing. He was reminding Ray to protect his secrets.
Did that mean he might still go with Ray’s ideas? Was there wiggle room? Or had Martin bent his ear?
Martin pulled out a sheaf of photographs of the inspirational Greek island. “As per our earlier conversation,” and he went on for quite a while, the gist of the lecture being: here’s Santorini; ain’t it beautiful, and this is what Antoniou insists upon.
“Simple blocks, stacked. Curved, plastered. Bright white.”
Ray felt his pulse beating in his neck. He wondered if they could see it. He struggled to control an impulse to leap up, grab Martin by his neck, and strangle him until his pasty face turned black.
Antoniou, looking at Martin, nodded. Anyone this guy hired could come up with an adequate basement for Antoniou’s purposes. Antoniou didn’t need Ray. He didn’t need this firm. He had the money.
But Ray could let it be known. Around town. Dungeons and Dragons at the Antoniou palace.
He pressed his mechanical pencil against a blank page in front of him. The tip broke off. He realized he had been clicking it while Martin spoke. It lay in a gray line, like a fallen cigarette ash.
This beautiful design was the one good thing he had going in his life now. Without Leigh. Without the belief in himself as a good man.
Going, going-
To gain time, Ray repeated, “Santorini.” Should he reproduce another ancient place with soul in a new place where it wouldn’t belong, where it would look like a hangnail on a beautiful hillside, swollen, burning white, ugly, obtrusive?
“We need a new set of plans, Ray, ones that reflect Antoniou’s original concept. And we need them soon. Joey Zaremski promises he can help.”
Oh, yes, another jab from Martin. Martin had worked out how to keep the commission within the firm, initially selling the client on Ray’s brilliance, with the sly idea of substituting one of Ray’s smart protégés if Ray didn’t pan out. Ray had hired Joey when Joey first got out of Cal Poly, a probational graduate with no awards, nothing to his name, not even rich parents who could hire him to build a statement house he could show to prospective employers. Ray had studied his designs, loved them, and taught him everything he knew. He believed Joey had no notion of Martin’s underhanded wrangling. He trusted Joey.
“Joey refuses to work without your involvement, Ray,” Martin said, as if reading his mind. “He considers you his primary influence, a kind of mentor. So here’s the deal. You do the design, no restrictions except doing what your client wants, working in concert with this young architect I know you respect. Any parts you don’t want to do, you have Joey handle.”
Now was his chance to launch into an impassioned sales job that would turn all this around. He could make them see. He could appeal to Antoniou’s snobbery, give him a diplomatic lesson in how run-of-the-mill his dreams were in Laguna. He could.
But he didn’t have the energy, and maybe he didn’t have the skill. The moment passed.
Martin stood up. Antoniou also stood.
“It’s gonna be fine,” he said to Martin, not looking at Ray. “Ray and I understand each other. We’re gonna get along great.”
Kat got off work at five and headed straight for her sister’s.
“Hand me the powder,” Jacki commanded, hand outstretched, leaning against the changing table. The baby wore no diaper.
“Go sit down. I’ll do that.”
“Third shelf down.”
Kat located the blue container and handed it to Jacki.
The baby boy lay on a paper diaper. After powdering the reasonably clean bottom, Jacki endeavored to pull up the middle section of the paper diaper and flip over the side pieces, so that the Velcro would grab. The baby fought, sobbing, face twisted up like a pretzel, tiny fists tight.
Jacki breathed deeply, then tackled the child again. This time, the baby did not roll over beyond the white padding. “Gotcha!” Jacki crowed, folding down the side of the diaper that would keep her out of trouble, at least for the immediate future. She picked up her newborn boy. “L’il animal,” Jacki mooed. Perspiration had turned her once shiny streaked bangs a dingy, greasy color. “L’il fella,” she went on, kissing first his toes, then his stomach, and finally his moist cheek.
She let Kat carry him into his bedroom and tucked him into his turquoise-linened crib.
After listening at the open door for a few minutes, Jacki closed the door. They sighed, then laughed, snickering at each other’s dishevelment. Kat straightened her shirt, now with a blob of vomit on the shoulder. Jacki smoothed her hair. She wore a robe and fluffy slippers and a walking cast on her foot, and was exactly two hours out of the hospital.
“Want a cup of tea or something? Beer?” Jacki asked in a whisper, as she tottered toward the kitchen.
“Hard choice.”
“Beer it is.” She opened the refrigerator, pulled out a bottle, and popped the top, handing it to Kat. “Too bad they accuse mothers who drink beer when they nurse of abuse these days. I could use one.”
“Best beer I’ve had in my entire life.”
“He’ll be up again in two hours and I’ll nurse him. I need to grab a nap in a minute.”
Kat set her beer down on a grease-speckled table she could not recall ever being speckled before. “I have a lot I need to talk to you about.”
“Did you hear something?” Jacki said, placing her finished bottle on the kitchen counter. “I could swear I heard something.”
“Leigh-”
“Beau’s crying,” Jacki said.
“Is that his name?”
“Beau Thomas Chavez.” Jacki opened the door to the baby’s room. “Dignified and historic; that’s our boy.”
Kat followed her sister into the twilit room. Two glass night-lights shaped like daisies poked through the dark-orange gloom.
Jacki pushed open the window curtains, letting in the last light of the day. “I should have nursed him longer before putting him down. His stomach is minuscule. Babies need to eat all the time.” She sat in a wooden rocking chair and pushed off from the floor like a person trying to have fun. She closed her eyes and pressed her back against the chair, supporting her child on a pillow. “Incredible, isn’t it. Owowow-”
Her eyes closed and she snored, head at an odd angle, her baby safely propped on pillows as he nursed. When he let go of the nipple with a tiny pop, she awoke instantly. She handed Beau off to Kat. “Wet again.”
Kat changed him. They put him down. He dozed for a few minutes, then awakened, his cries amazing considering the size of his voice box.
“Forgot to burp him,” Jacki said, patting his back while he rested against her shoulder. He burped and threw up, then went peacefully down to sleep.
For twenty minutes.
Etcetera.
“I have to go,” Kat said.
“No,” Jacki wailed. “Raoul’s due home in an hour. I’m a sweaty pig and there’s no food.”
Grimly, Kat ran out to the store, bought a roasted turkey breast, rolls, packaged salad, and carrot cake. She had trouble parking, which involved giving one person the finger and screaming at another one before she landed a spot. She lugged the bags up the elevator. She unloaded the sacks in the kitchen, laid out the food on the counter.
She checked on Jacki and the baby. They were asleep in a rocker and a bassinet, respectively.
She sliced the turkey, found an almost clean platter, which she wiped with an almost clean dishrag, and assembled the salad into a pretty bowl. She found the dregs of some Caesar dressing in the fridge, which she splashed into a cute bowl with a spoon. She located two new place mats still in plastic. After wiping the table, she set them down, found candles and holders in the cupboard, and placed them in the center along with a box of matches. Then she stepped back again to observe her handiwork.
The crusty kitchen counters, rising above the dining table, detracted from the overall mood. As the sun weakened, crawling across the hardwood floors in a golden streak, Kat found bleach under the kitchen sink and blitzed through the kitchen, flinging dishes into the washer.
Raoul arrived exactly on time, full of kisses for Jacki, all smiles, and Kat was free.
Outside, pulling his Honda into the spot next to her, Jacki’s downstairs neighbor, who had invited Kat to come with him to watch the sunset several times, loitered. He had a thin mustache, a sliver of hair in the middle of his chin, and shaped sideburns. All this decorative shaving gave Kat the creeps, although she realized in a previous life, only a couple of months ago, she had thought him a bit of a hunk. He approached her car.
“How about a late drink, honey?”
She hated that her window was cracked low enough to let this guy’s voice get heard. “Uh. Sorry, Josh. Busy.”
“Hot date? Where are you going?”
“Stuff to do at home.”
“What stuff?” Big smile.
She had never figured out how to extricate herself gracefully when someone paid her too much attention. If she openly rejected him, saying, mind your own business, she’d upset him and the blow to his male ego would turn him hostile and he would say something hurtful. If she said, I need to wash my hair, same deal. She contemplated her options, feeling perplexed. Had Ray Jackson felt this way when he spotted Kat outside that house on Bright Street? Hunted?
“You bring over different guys all the time.”
She had brought a few of the good ones to Jacki’s. Not-so-hidden meaning: why not me, too?
“You’re a player, just like me. Admit it.”
“Josh, would you please back off so I can pull out?”
A certain light penetrated his flat eyes. Hostility, coming on like a 747.
Would she, two months ago, have gotten out of her car at this point, put her hand on his butt and said, follow me home, let’s go?
“Aw, come over for a coupla minutes. What’s your problem? You’re here. I made a cool drink you’ll like. Gin and lemon. Fresh mint on top.”
How did he know her favorite drink? Probably observed her once in a local hangout. Note to self: excellent reason to cruise far from her own home and Jacki’s, too.
The Echo’s interior was heating up. Perspiration pooled below her thighs on the scratchy fabric of the seat.
Get me out of here.
Could she reverse the car without knocking him down?
Without warning, as if suddenly transforming from an insensitive clod into a sensitive one, he backed away, shrugging. “Okay, another time,” he said.
Relieved, Kat said, “Josh?”
He turned back to face her. “Yeah?”
“You have a lot to offer the right woman.”
He shuffled his feet. “Yeah,” he said. “I do.”
“I’m looking, but I’m confused.”
“Me, too.”
“I’m not for you, Josh.”
“Guess not.”
“It’s tough. Don’t give up.”
He sighed. “You, too.”
Being a player was getting so old.