CHAPTER 7 Wise Words from Wise Men

Mrs. Aino grabbed Zach's plate from underneath his fork, causing him to stab at the table and leave a smattering of yellow crumbs behind. "Here, have some more."

He certainly was good with mothers, Mina admitted to herself as she watched her mother shovel another slice of cake in front of the curly-haired, rumpled figure in a faded navy blue hoodie and fraying cargo pants. He knew just the right compliment and wide-eyed expression to bring out the maternal smothering in her usually-cool mother. Her elbows were aching from leaning them on the kitchen table for so long; she pulled back and rubbed them with her palms while pulling her feet onto the chair.

Her mother frowned at her. "Mina, put your feet down." She was back to scolding her; the presence of the interloper seemed to fill her mother with optimism. Mina knew her reasoning: if Zach was here, it was because something was happening, and it could only be something good.

She didn't have the heart to tell her, yet. Let her imagine Zach was her daughter's savior, and stuff him with cake.

Those few seconds as she had headed towards the door she had allowed herself to feel hope. Just a touch. Maybe she would let him see her for a second before she fled, just to drive home what he would be missing. She had no plan for what would happen after that first second.

But it wasn't him on her doorstep.

But Zach was no less intimidating, even though he looked like (and smelled like) he had slept in the back of a Volkswagen van.

"Mina!" He had hugged her, smiling, like none of the drama between her and his best friend had ever happened. She was too shocked to pick up her leaden arms to hug him back.

"What are you doing here?"

He shrugged, running a hand through his wheat-colored curls. "I was in the neighborhood. Thought I'd stop by."

Obvious bullshit, since she noticed a stub of a boarding pass flutter out of his battered backpack when her mother pulled him inside the house. He had introduced himself as a friend of Kevin's. Minutes later, she was feeding him.

"More coffee?" Her mother refilled his cup without waiting for an answer. Mina rolled her eyes; if she didn't stop the current tide, there would be rack of lamb in the oven in no time.

"Thanks, Mrs. Aino." God, he could even make his voice sound like Beaver Cleaver. She resisted the urge to reach across the table and pull his sleeves up to reveal his tattoos. Not that it would even shock her mom; she had nearly let her daughter marry a guy with clichéd hipster forearm stars.

Her mother slid into an empty seat and cupped her hands around her own coffee cup. "So what do you do, Zach? You look like a very creative person."

His eyebrows wagged at the compliment. "I'm retired."

Mrs. Aino's blue eyes blinked behind her glasses as she laughed softly. "Oh how nice."

"No really. Well, I mess around with a blog sometimes, and I buy a lot of commercial real estate, but other than that, I'm fully enjoying my permanent exit from the workforce." He slurped a mouthful of coffee. "Great coffee. Jamaican Blue Mountain?"

Mina noted that her mother's smile was frozen in place. "Are you sure you're a friend of Kevin's?"

"His nearest and dearest. Do you know if it's fair trade or not? No worries if it's not. But I know a guy that grows his own organic espresso roast in Kona. I can hook you up."

The back door banged open as Jason returned, unhooking the dog from his leash. "You guys sure you don't want come back with me? I've got to leave soon." He crossed the kitchen to exchange a quick bro-slap with Zach.

"Nope, we're good," Zach said before Mina could get a word in. He had barely been in her house for five minutes before declaring that he was her ride back into town, despite showing up without a car.

She was not having someone make decisions for her again. "I'm going with you, Jace."

Zach choked on his cake. "I thought you were coming back with me."

Now her mother was looking at her sideways. "Zach came all this way."

She nearly doubled over. "Without a car! Jason has a car. I'm going with him."

"Mina." He said her name in the same manner as Kevin did sometimes: a bit too brusque to be polite, but with enough gravitas to make her sit up and pay attention. They caught each other's glances across the table, and Mina found herself pinned like a butterfly specimen under his piercing stare. Out of the corners of her eyes, she noticed that both Jason and her mother were fixated on them, but she couldn't look away from Zach. Kevin's usually flippant, carefree friend was temporarily absent, and in his place was the cutthroat businessman that he had replaced. It was easy to forget that he had ever existed, but he was back, and he was in charge. "I need to talk with you. You know what it's about. Then I promise, I will take you back with no argument."

Despite her earlier promise, Mina sighed and gave in. "All right."

With those two words, he dropped his fork and slid back into the easy grin of a lifelong chronic. "All right all right all right! Want to go for a walk?"

Mina's mother made her take a sweatshirt. The nights were cool, even more so away from the city's insulating layer of car exhaust and concrete. The streetlights had just popped on to blend with the porch lights of the other houses, illuminating the chalk drawings on the sidewalk that some child had left behind. Mina breathed in the smell of fading heat and mown grass and wondered where the fireflies had gone. They used to always be around, and now it seemed that they had faded along with her childhood. "Where are we going?"

Zach was craning his neck, checking out the modest houses along the street. "You lived here. You tell me."

"Then why did you—OK whatever," She nodded up ahead at the corner. "We can go to the park. It's a couple of blocks that way."

He nodded. "Let's do that. Hey." She turned to face him, shoving her hands in her pockets. In the distance, an ambulance siren blared, and a few dogs joined in. Zach shifted and pulled a hand out of his pocket and scratched his nose. "Sorry I barged in on you. I pretty much figured you wouldn't answer your phone if I called."

"No, I would have!" The volume and pitch was too high; he would know that she was lying. He didn't call her out on it, though.

They reached the park right as the last natural light expired, revealing a shining quarter moon. It reminded Mina of the storybook princesses that she had just burned, so she forced her eyes to look at the ground instead.

"We used to come here a lot," she said to Zach as they crossed the grass over to the swing sets, kicking dead leaves out of the way. School had started, and the usual packs of teenagers playing of pickup ball were conspicuously absent. "Jason and I. They used to have these really heavy animal swings; they were made out of metal or something. Mine was a seahorse." Mina smiled as she settled back into a swing. Zach dropped into the one next to her, and almost by instinct, they both kicked slightly and started swinging. "I named her Seahorse."

"Original."

"I know, right?" The bottom of her Chuck Taylor scraped the sparse gravel under the swing, kicking up clouds of dust. "Jason's was a dog, except he would call it the "wolf". I thought all dogs were wolves until I was like, in kindergarten. I told the other kids that we had a baby wolf and they all laughed at me." She smiled at Zach. "So Jason came and beat them up for me."

"Hm," Zach said. "He's a good brother. He looks out for you." The swing chains clanged against the metal frame as they swayed back and forth. "A lot of people do."

Mina lowered her face and didn't respond.

Zach was a persistent bastard. "It's OK to let them."

A swath of hot fire cut through her body. "You don't have to do this."

"Do what?" His feet hit the ground as he skidded to a standstill, and then reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, shiny object. "Wanna burn?"

"Huh?" A crumpled plastic Ziploc bag came out next. Zach reached inside and pinched a bud between his fingers, and then broke off a small piece and packed it into the glass bowl in his other hand.

Mina blinked, incredulous. "You—you brought weed?"

"No, what are you, crazy?" he huffed. "You can't go through airport security checkpoints with freaking bud on you."

"So where did you—"

"I bought it at the corner shop at the end of your street right before I came over."

"Are you kidding? Mrs. Yang's store?"

He pulled a flat square out of his pocket and struck a match. Mina had never seen anyone light a bowl that way. He took a few quick inhaling breaths, sucking in the smoke before it could curl away, and shook out the match. "Yeah, Mrs. Yang—" His face scrunched into a mass of crinkles as he hacked out a bursting lungful of smoke. "Has a 'gardening' business on the side, ah." He bent slightly and coughed some more. "Sorry. My sinuses get all dry from that fucking recycled air on the plane."

It had been a long time since she had partaken in the sticky green--way before she had met Kevin--but she accepted the bowl in slightly trembling fingers. "Don't you have a lighter?" she asked when he passed her the matchbook.

He helped her relight the smoldering buds with a match. "And add more bullshit plastic to the over-capacity landfills? Fuck that. There's enough microplastic in the ecosystem to give us birth defects for the next three generations, and it was all added in the last half of the twentieth—"

"OK!" Mina coughed out a huge cloud of scorching smoke. It was better not to get Zach going on one of his tirades, although it was probably preferable than what he was really there to talk about. Might as well get it over with, she reasoned, still coughing out of a burned, aching throat.

Zach brought the bowl to his lips again and struck a match one-handed; he obviously had it down to a science. He took another huge hit, held it in, and then exhaled a smoke plume the size of a small zeppelin. "Ugh. This shit's harsh. Probably grown in fucking dirt, goddamn hicks."

"Zach!"

"What?" He hocked and spit in the dirt.

She took the offered bowl again. "I know you're not here to assess the quality of weed in my neighborhood."

"What? You don't know that," Zach said, twirling back and forth on his swing seat. "Maybe I'm here to specifically check out the ganj in small town America. A weed tour, if you will."

Mina's head was beginning to inflate and fuzz away as she took another hit. "Zach."

"The next town over looked promising. Lots of TCBYs. You don't put those up unless you have a significant stoner population. Those and twenty-four-hour White Castles."

"Zach!"

"What?" His eyes were beginning to get glassy. "Hey, when we're done here, we should go to TCBY. They have this slushie thing called a Juicy Orange, and it tastes like a real orange." He wiped his face with the back of his sleeve. "Or we like, get a real orange. Oh, but then it's not cold. The coldness is the goodness of the Juicy Orange."

Mina started giggling compulsively. "Why are you doing this?"

"Doing what?"

The giggles turned to braying laughter. "You're making—making me laugh when all I've been doing for the past week is—" Her laughter petered out, and the aching in her chest returned. "—is, um, cry."

Her statement partially killed the buzz they had going. Zach busied himself by scraping the ash out of the bowl with a fingernail. Mina waited for him to speak.

There was no humor in his voice when he did. "Where do you want to start?"

She shrank a bit into herself, her thoughts breaking into fractured pieces. "I've made my decision."

"So I've heard."

"You did," she said. "I guess you did."

He swiveled the chain until he was facing her, his eyes lit up like fire through the haze of THC. "And you're completely set on it?"

"I—I guess so."

"You guess so? Why? Why now?"

"It's—"

"You're just going to give up on him? Do you even know what you're fighting about?"

Enough. "Zach, do you know what he said to me? Your friend?"

He didn't even give her the chance to pick up steam. "Yeah, I do. I know it was fucking bullshit thing to say to the person you love, and I would kick his fucking ass if I were you, but don't put this all on him!"

That outburst was unexpected. "What?"

"You heard me," Zach said blandly, firing up another match. He took a hit from the bowl. "Now, I don't know everything, so stop me if I'm way off base, but you hid things from him too."

"I did not!"

"Really?" Zach coughed dryly. "So why did he go for so long thinking everything was OK?"

She turned from him and waited for her face to stop burning. "That's not true. I—"

The buds smoldered and went out, and he didn't make any move to relight them. A cricket started chirping somewhere in the dark grass, and it was several long moments before he continued. "Mina, look, I get—that Kevin doesn't always get it, you know. I—I've been through a lot with him."

"I know."

"I don't think you do." He sighed. "I know you know everything that went down with us in high school."

"About the drugs?"

"Yeah, that. I'll spare you my unorthodox albeit correct view on our country's misguided 'war on drugs' and just remind you that the dumb fuck almost went to jail for me because…well, just because he's that kind of guy. But you should already know that about him."

She didn't respond.

Zach soldiered on. "It took me a long time to figure out why he did all that for me. I mean, there was nothing for him to gain: he got kicked out of school, his parents nearly died of shame, there are some relatives that still hide the silver when he comes over…not to mention the brush with getting thrown in 'pound me in the ass' prison—"

"Zach—"

"OK, that's a bit much. Juvenile 'pound me in the ass' prison."

"Zach—"

"Juvenile 'shank me in the side' prison." That last one made him snicker. "Sorry, I digress. Where was I?"

The outburst had made her smile for a second. "You were telling me why Kevin took the fall for you."

"Oh yeah. And nearly went to juvenile 'make me your bitch' prison. Um, yeah. So that." His face went blank for a second before snapping back to focus. "I won't lie to you and tell you that he never does thoughtless things - because fuck, I couldn't get his drunken ass to call me back for two weeks. He does it because he cares about you, Mina. He cared about me when we were stupid high school kids and he took the fall for me because he knew he could get out of things that I couldn't. He didn't want my life to be difficult when he had the power to change it positively."

She reached over and pulled the bowl out of his hands. "So you're saying he couldn't stand back and let me fix my own problems."

Either that statement or his buzz made him pull a comically hilarious expression. "What? No! What are you talking about?"

"I don't know! You started this!"

"Maybe I shouldn't have blazed," Zach muttered, taking the bowl back from her hands and lighting a match. "Look, Mina, Kevin's wasted so much of his life on his job - which I KNOW you know my feeling on investment bankers. Soulless bastards that take your money and splurge on lavish yacht parties while sending you bank statements showing your losses. I know. I was one." He paused to take another hit of the pipe. "This really is schwag. Tell Mrs. Yang to stop letting the dog pee where it grows.

Anyway," he continued. "You gave him something to care about - something to come home to other than a random hotel in some random city. The fuck you didn't change him. I couldn't tell you the last time that Kevin actually lived in a home that he owned. You changed that about him and now you are going to sit here and tell me that you don't understand why he did what he did?"

"I didn't change him!" Mina waved away a cloud of smoke. "It didn't work that way. He was padding my bank account and not telling me, Zach. That was dishonest."

"How did you guys split expenses then?" he asked. He must have noticed her averting her eyes. "Oh come on! Don't tell me you guys didn't even talk about it."

"Not really," Mina admitted.

His double-take was heavily exaggerated; being high seemed to propel him into overdramatic, highly-concentrated Zach. "What? Why? You two dated for—how long? And moved in together? And you never sat down and talked about that kind of shit? Why?"

Without the protective barrier of sobriety, her guard was down. "Because it makes me uncomfortable!"

Zach scoffed so hard he nearly lost his balance. A lucky instinct kicked in and he caught the chain of the swing to keep from tipping backwards and headplanting into the ground. "OK no offense, but I'm a freaking eco-yuppie stoner who hasn't had a real honest-to-G-d relationship in…well, ever, but even I know that one is supposed to function as a partnership, not a loose alliance between two separate parties that compromise between sporadic bouts of communication. And brain-melting sex."

"Look, I just didn't want to depend on someone again. After Casey…" she sighed. "Casey fucked me over."

He let his head tip back as he stared at the stars, his green eyes far away. "If I wasn't so high, I'd say 'Casey fucked you up' Mina, but that's rude and I won't say it out loud. I'll just think it really loud."

"Zach?"

"What?"

Her voice was dry. "You did say it out loud."

"Oh. Sorry." He hocked again; Mrs. Yang's scrub brush was apparently creating havoc in his mucous membranes. "Well it's about fucking time that someone did. Now either take a hit off that pipe or give it back."

She gave it back. "I'm sorry, I'm just-I haven't been with someone who actually—" She swallowed the hard lump in her throat and tried to center herself. "--who actually loves me."

He blinked once before striking another match. "Go back to him, Mina. Let him apologize; tell him what a massive asshole he is, then have some of the best make-up sex ever. Because you're right: he loves you. I haven't seen him in love since uh…huh. Maybe never? No wait—Tasha Corey, junior year, and maybe that Italian girl with the clothes. No, not the Italian. He never called her back. I did."

Mina let her hair fall in front her face and leaned her head against the swing chain to hide her smirk. "Did he ever call those girls strippers?"

That statement cut Zach off at an impasse; he froze with his mouth open and his index finger pointed up like Socrates. "Uh…"

"Exactly."

He let a few moments pass by before bursting out: "Well, were you?"

"Zach!" If he weren't a moving target, she would have tried to hit him. "Fine, I did, OK? One, I needed the money, and for your information I was a burlesque dancer. Burlesque dancers are NOT the same as strippers. God, don't let Raye ever hear you say that or she'd smack the curl right out of your hair."

His hand went up to his head and he patted it reassuringly. "My mistake."

She settled back. "That's OK."

Zach rubbed his eyes. "Listen, I am high, really high, but the stripper thing? It's not such a big deal as you think."

"Oh really?"

"Yes, really. Hee hee, yes really." He said that last part in a high pitched lisp, and continued. "Oh really, ORLY."

"Cut it out!"

"Sorry, if you get to stall, so do I." Zach turned back to her. "What's really the issue, Mina? The money? The apartment? Do you want him to quit his job so that you don't have to worry about how much more he's making than you? Although I've been trying to convince him to do that for years and he doesn't seem to know good advice when he hears it." He paused and realized had lost himself in another tangent. "Heh. I digress again. What's bothering you?"

This was the question she didn't want to answer, not to her parents or friends, not to Zach, not to Kevin. Especially not to herself. The truth of the subject might send her into a vortex of introspection that she might not be able to crawl out of. But now that it was voiced out loud, she couldn't stall anymore. "I miss him."

"You do?"

"Yeah." The dirt at her feet glowed amber under the streetlights; for the first time in days, she wished she had her paintbox with her so she could make that color. The words spilled out of her like water rushing through a hole. "I really loved him, Zach. I could depend on him to let me do whatever I wanted. It was weird, like, there would be times when something would happen, just stupid little things, like I would be out with him, at some stupid dinner or party at one of his coworkers homes--"

Zach interrupted her by audibly groaning. "Oh G-d, did you get stuck at Mark Conway's house in Nassau? I hate that cockbag."

"Yeah, that was one of them. Anyway, we would go, and if I wasn't happy, he would take me home. Casey would have fought me, and made me feel bad so that I would stay, or else would leave and make me feel bad later, but Kevin never did that. He would always do what he said; he was always somewhere when he said he was going to be, he would do things for me and not expect me to do it in return." A laugh too tired to be a giggle momentarily bubbled to the surface. "My God, he would go with me to all of these gallery openings and never complain about them, even though half of them were enough to drive me to insanity, and I was friends with those people and..." She took a breath, realizing that she was gushing, but not caring anymore. It felt good to get it out like this. "And every time he came home, he'd be so happy to see me. And I would be so happy to see him. He made me happy."

She felt the pressure of a hand on her shoulder, and looked over to see Zach straining sideways on his swing to be able to reach her. The sight of him made her roll her eyes and smile.

Zach's voice was warm when he spoke. "He still wants to see you happy, Mina. I know he does."

Her eyes were filling with tears again, but she blinked them back, even though it burned. Zach's hand trailed down until it was grasping hers. "Can you at least go back and tell him this? I can't force you guys back together, but can you at least do that? I think you owe it to each other."

The wind batted her hair around her face; it was getting cold, and late.

"I already told him that it was over."

Zach sighed as he released her hand. He held the small dime bag up to the streetlight as if that would somehow cause it to magically refill. "Good, now you both said equally stupid things. At the very least let's get out of here and back to the city where I can score some decent Purple Haze. You ever try that? It's like sucking a buttery cannabis dick, unlike this fucking scrub."

For the first time in days, Mina laughed. She reached across the divide and planted her hand on Zach's chest, right on the zipper of his hoodie, and pushed him backwards off the swing. His legs flew up comically as he landed on his back in the dirt. "Oh, you gutterslut," he muttered, but made no move to get up.

"Zach, never change."

"You know what would be really good right now? Ice cream. With sprinkles."

Her mouth watered at the thought of sugary, creamy coldness. "Rainbow ones."

"No, wait. I changed my mind. I want an ice cream cone--a WAFFLE cone--with sprinkles, and no ice cream."

She frowned. "Then it's just jimmies."

"Yeeeah. A cone full of sprinkles." Zach stuck out his tongue as if he was going to lick his lips, but seemed to forget about the purpose halfway through the action and spoke around his outstretched tongue. "You know what else?"

"Huh?"

Before she had a chance to react, he pulled her down into the dirt with him. "HA! Now you're all dirty and the Dairy Queen people are going to laugh at you."

"I doubt it," Mina groaned, getting to her feet. "I used to work there in high school."

"Get the fuck out." She nodded. "Damn, why didn't you say so? Hook a brother up!"

When they returned to her parents' house, frozen confections in hand, Jason was waiting patiently on the front porch with the light off. Mina frowned and licked a trail of melting ice cream off of the back of her hand. "Jace? What are you doing out here?" He should have left hours ago. Inside the house, she could see the flickering lights coming from the living room as her parents watched television in companionable silence.

He shrugged and put his baseball hat back on. "You guys don't have a ride and I'm not about to leave you here. You want to take off now or wait until tomorrow morning?"

Mina yawned and dropped her exhausted body on the porch step. Her mind was too blurry to face anything that night that was more complex than the stump of her waffle cone. "Tomorrow. You can crash here tonight, Zach."

He dropped onto a chair and ran his fingers through his hair. "Well yeah. Where else was I going to sleep? On the sidewalk?" He yawned, stretching his boyish face out. "Can I sleep in your bed?"

"No!"

"Sorry, had to try."

Jason had been silently examining their exchange. "I can't believe this shit."

Mina blinked up at her brother from her porch step. "What?"

He frowned and glanced quickly at the front door before continuing in a whisper: "You guys smoked without me."

"How do you know?" Mina whispered. A glob of ice cream fell from her cone and splattered on the sidewalk, and she wasted half a minute watching the milky liquid run down the cement step.

"Uh, you're covered in dirt, Zach's got grass in his hair, you just wolfed down a Blizzard like the antidote's at the bottom, and you could use about a gallon of Visine." He looked genuinely pissed off. "I can't believe you didn't call me."

Mina snapped her eyes away from the white splotch on the ground. "Jace, we had shit to talk about. Stop whining."

Zach popped up like his backside was made of springs. "It's cool, I'm down to smoke again if you are. Go for a walk?"

"I'm down."

She watched the two figures take off down the dark sidewalk and pulled her sweatshirt. Zach's voice faded as they moved farther away. "For the record, Mrs. Yang sells terrible weed."

"Ugh, never buy off of her. Ask for Billy Yang."

"Don't call me anymore. I have nothing to say to you."

That was it, and it was done.

It took about a half an hour for him to process while sitting alone in the dark, ignoring the nagging biological impulses of nourishment and sleep while trying to find where to compartmentalize that statement in his mind. After another half hour, he found it.

He was a failure at relationships.

The revelation was met with quiet acceptance rather than anvils dropping in his lap. A part of him had always known that he was destined to roll through life without pairing comfortably with a partner; his friends and associates seemed to pick up other people with ease. He always knew Serena would be swept away, story-book style, in an epic romance—her idealistic nature would grant her nothing less, but he was still reeling from how that turned out. He had thought that Darien would settle down with Trista, but both of them continuing their ridiculous charade until a explosive divorce, and then finding newer, younger models to restart the cycle. Kevin thought that Zach would bounce around until finding someone as annoying as himself, and then falling off the grid to save redwoods and breed a score of equally annoying little eco-warriors with curly Jewfros and hacky sacks in their pockets.

He had never pictured anything like that happening to him.

What had he pictured? Working a lot, probably taking over the whole shitbag one day, drinking a lot, scoring women who looked the same and remained the same age, even if he didn't. Buying something completely outrageous just because: a stadium, a media conglomerate, chunks of real estate, maybe an island. Sending nice things to his nieces and nephews. Getting his parents the very best home care when they grew infirm. Eventually dying without retiring.

And then one night, on his birthday, a beautiful young woman stripped down to her lingerie and revealed that when she wasn't enticing mortal souls with her angelic face and breathtaking body, she really liked to paint. She lived to paint. He had looked her up, and discovered that she was good at it. Really good. He had always wondered what people wore under the armor, if the custom tailored suits and expensive haircuts hid things that they tried to bury. They all claimed to love golfing and boating and wine and cigars; it was always bullshit, since no one genuinely liked any of that crap unless their livelihood depended on it. Perhaps this generic junior account exec had a passion for camping, or writing novels, or building tree houses, or cooking. Perhaps that other one, the one that looked exactly like the first, was into bowling or making furniture or playing the violin. He would never know because they wouldn't tell him, or anyone, for that matter—but they would dissolve in their passions behind closed doors and those were the moments they lived for.

So what was his passion?

The only thing he could think of was Mina.

He knew there was not a creative bone in his body; his mind worked with analysis and numbers, not interpreting feelings into visualizations. He could never even attempt to do what she did every day, pouring her heart onto canvas and risking scathing criticism for scant words of praise. Maybe once in a while someone would study a painting and have an emotional response to it, churning up feelings that they didn't know existed. The first time he had laid eyes on Victory, he couldn't believe that it was made by a single person and a ton of acrylic paint. It seemed too incredible to be artificial.

She had taught him that, perhaps by accident: that life was lived outside the uniform. The best parts were moments between the drudgery that filled others with light. Her light shone too brightly to be buried; he wanted to grab her and hold her above the rooftops, shout to the world about her generous heart and her immense talent, have heads turn to her and worship her like a goddess, because to him, she was one. He wanted every day of her life to be as happy as he felt.

But it hadn't worked. He couldn't do it.

This was not for him.

There was no good place to start, so he went right for the core.

Her suitcase was shoved in the back of the closet, and to his dismay, was already filled with balled-up, seldom-worn clothing. What the fuck? He pulled out a few of his instead; he could always buy new ones. Tomorrow, he could buy new ones.

The drawer that was emptied first was an unwise choice; the shirt lying on top was her Warhol tee with the cans, her favorite. He had never asked where she had gotten it, and what made her love it so much. It didn't matter anymore.

These shoes were probably Raye's; they would end up back with her.

He knew the story of the black dress. It was found at a consignment shop, was hand sewn, without a label, and fit her like a second skin.

A pair of blue panties with a faded Popsicle stain.

Cat hair clinging to an old cardigan sweater.

The black fedora.

A wooden box containing fifty thousand dollars worth of pearls. She hadn't taken it with her.

Art books on the nightstand with a cardstock flyer for an art show serving as a bookmark.

Cosmetics were tucked into plastic gallon ziplocks, including the unopened ones in the bathroom closet.

Those were the easy parts.

He hadn't entered the studio since she had gone, but there were boxes in there, and a painting half-finished propped on an easel: a human figure twisting around and reaching an arm out to something, or someone. How appropriate.

The paintings around the house came down first, and were slid into wooden boxes with the utmost care, and stacked against a wall.

She had played "Blonde on Blonde" on a continuous loop when painting the one with spikes of sap green against the cadmium yellow background. He knew all the names of the pigments by now.

The mercury vapor headlights of his car shining on the frozen street inspired the blurry wash of purple watercolor that somehow made up a picture of snow.

The creation of the one with sleek obsidian rock depicted in oil paints was so messy that it had obliterated her coveralls to rags.

He had helped stretch canvas for the collection of shapes that vaguely resembled a spaceship.

The phone rang, and he didn't even let himself have hope that it was she. His presumption was correct, but if he didn't answer, it meant an entire night of rapid fire calling and texting until someone picked up. "Yeah?"

"So?"

"So what?"

"Why do you think I'm calling you in the middle of the night? What's the deal? How'd it go?"

"It didn't." Strange, he thought those words would be harder to say.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean it didn't, Zach. It's over. Sorry." He hung up the phone and continued the cleanout.

Zach called back, but he let it go to voicemail. Fuck it; they had the rest of their lives to hash out what went wrong, but he did take a look at the ensuing text message.

fuck that goonies never say die!

"Sure, Zach," he muttered, and turned the phone off.

It was past dawn when he quit for that day. All of her completed works were packed in crates, and he had run out of boxes to pack up the works in progress—he would have to make a few calls to take care of the rest.

The bathroom looked empty without her things around.

He took the garbage out.

And then went to Starbucks to avoid seeing Makoto that morning. Coward.

The calls were easy enough to avoid, although Serena kept ringing in. He wondered if she had a sixth sense about things and knew what he was up to, even though he didn't answer. Finally, his assistant rang. "Mr. Chaston? Your sister is here."

Goddamn it. "Can you tell her I'm busy?"

"She's says you're not, and um—" There was a muffled noise as he covered the receiver. "She says if you don't open the door she's going to tell your mother that you killed her cat. On purpose."

He threw the Starbucks cup in the rubbish can and conceded. "Fine, let her in."

The door flew open like it was kicked and Serena stomped over to his desk in a blaze of stilettoed glory. Kevin frowned at her. "That was low, even for you."

"Oh shut up!" He couldn't instantly recall another incident in his life like this: Serena appeared to be genuinely angry. Her breath came in puffed gasps as she smoothed down her hair with both hands. "You suck!"

"Tell me something I don't know," he said, settling back in his chair. His eyeballs burned with fatigue. "You came all this way to yell at me? Do your best; everyone else got a shot."

"Zach called me! He told me that--"

Enough of this. "Stop it." Her mouth stopped moving. "I talked to her, and she doesn't want me in her life. I'm going to respect that."

"Argh!" She stomped one delicate black high heel with enough force to splinter a crater into the floor. "That's not what you're—true love is supposed to be like---this isn't the way it's supposed to happen! You're supposed to find a way to get her back you big idiot." Her breath was coming faster as her face flushed scarlet, and he instinctively reached for a box of tissues. She sank into a chair, minding to cross her ankles, and started weeping into a Kleenex. Kevin got up and patted her head.

"It's OK."

"No it's not!" she moaned into her hands. "This wasn't supposed to happen this way! You guys were supposed to have a happy ever after."

He put his hand on her quaking shoulder. "You still believe that?"

She lifted her head to look at him, her baby blue eyes swollen and red as the tears continued to fall. "Of course I do." She hiccupped, and he turned away to get her a glass of water. She downed half of it in one swallow. "I have to. I don't want to think of anyone ever having to be lonely, and…I know that you've been lonely."

That was enough to send him reaching for the scotch. "Don't worry about me."

"I can't help it," she said miserably. "You were…really happy with Mina. I could tell from the first time I met her at the Red Ball…it was different than any other one before." She paused and let out a small laugh. "I could tell you loved her so much."

"I know." He drained his glass and forced his tongue to continue the thought that had been circling his mind ever since he heard her voice that night. "I still do."

Serena let her head fall in a nod and sniffed. "You have cat hair on you."

"That doesn't matter."

"This isn't fair."

"Yes, it is."

"How can you say that? You've never dated anyone before except hoes, and they don't count."

"I guess I'm not cut out for this."

"That's such shit and you know it."

"I don't. And please, you're not making this any easier."

She threw him a disgusted look; for such a pretty girl, she could pull some scary faces. She must have got that from their mother. "Listen Kevin, you're not the only one losing someone here." Her hands fiddled nervously with the tennis bracelet on her arm. "You know, I wish we could have made more books together. Mina and I. I mean, we might be able to, but not in the same way, you know. It's like—she could see into my head sometimes, and draw exactly what my characters look like, without me telling her. I don't know if we could do that again."

The silence held for a few moments as neither sibling spoke. "I'm sorry," Kevin said.

"Yes, I know." She stood up and brushed the wrinkles off the front of her skirt. "What are you going to do now?"

He had just noticed that there was some housecleaning to do in the office, too. "I need to do one more thing. I may need your help."

Serena nodded, seemingly afraid to disagree. "Thanks," he murmured, putting a hand on her shoulder. She puts hers on top, and smiled up at him, traces of sadness still existing in her eyes.

The phone rang, and he pulled away from her to check the ID. "I have to take this."

She didn't change expression. "Do you really have to?"

His eyes didn't leave the string of numbers. "This one, yes."

Thankfully, Zach fell asleep in the backseat on the way back. "You have work to do today?" Mina asked, staring out the window at stark highway as the miles passed by.

"Some," Jason said nonchalantly. "Nothing too major. I was going to start looking into taking that trip, I guess. Thanks again."

"Stop thanking me," she muttered. Her brother was being exceptionally nice to her, along with both of her parents, after she had made the declaration that she was heading back to the city. Her mother had tears in her eyes when she hugged her goodbye.

He shot her a sideways glance, but she was too preoccupied to notice. "Do you know what you're going to do?"

"No." She traced her finger along the passenger's side door. Interesting texture; it had never occurred to her to draw the inside of Jason's car before, but the concept seemed appealing at the moment. "I guess I'm going to go home and talk to him."

"Good idea." She could tell that Jason was being deliberately noncommittal; he always felt the need to please everyone. "Do you know what you're going to say?"

"I don't know," she said blankly, still looking away. "I have no idea." She stopped and shifted around in her seat, rehearsing the scenario in her head. She needed to come prepared or she would fall apart, but she couldn't think of anything to say that didn't involve a huge emotional drain. Perhaps it was better to go in cold and see where it took her, although it couldn't be anywhere good. "I guess I'll just see what happens."

"Mina?"

"Yeah?"

Jason drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. "Don't worry. You'll be OK."

"You're just full of Dr. Phil, aren't you?"

"Hey, I'm about to be blissfully happy with my girlfriend. I want the same for my little sister."

The jolt she felt in her stomach meant it was definitely time to change the subject. "So, Aspen or Swiss Alps?"

"See, I'm kind of torn on that. If I break my leg in the States, I'll have to go through all of that health insurance bullshit and probably be eating generic Spaghetti-o's for the next five months."

"No you won't," Mina smirked. She had been there, and she sure as hell wouldn't let that happen to Jason.

"Yeah well, the Swiss will patch me back up and send me on my way without bankrupting me, but on the other hand, there's more of chance that I'll die on those slopes than Aspen. So now it's a choice between survivable injury and penury or potential death. Potential death is sounding better since we'll have a wedding to pay for, too."

A gasping snort came from the backseat as Zach started to snore. Mina grimaced at the sound; he sounded like a congested barnyard animal. Must be the shrub weed." You could just not get injured."

"There is absolutely no chance that I won't injure myself when there is a mountain and snow involved. Remember my senior trip?"

"At least it wasn't your throwing arm."

"Still hurt like hell."

"Who's going where?" a sleepy voice asked from the backseat. "I want to come."

"Jason and Raye are going on a ski trip, but you can't go, Zach. It's a trip with a purpose. Wanna see the ring?"

Zach was slouched in a half-recline, but his eyes popped open at that. "What? Are you serious?" He straightened. "You're taking Raye off the market permanently?"

Jason glanced in the rearview. "Yes?"

"Fuck," he muttered, leaning his head back and yawning. "Is she knocked up?"

"No."

"Goddamn it, I never got a chance to tap that. Eh, it's not that bad. Married women like me, too."

"Zach!"

"I'm kidding! G-d. I would never try and fuck one of my friend's wives." Mina glanced in the side mirror and noticed that he was looking at her when he said that. She reached forward and pushed the mirror angle away from her.

It wasn't long before the hazy view of the city peaked over the horizon. Traffic increased and then ground to a standstill, and inwardly, she was grateful for the delay. It still hurt to think of facing him, even though it was all she wanted in that moment. Jason sensed it, naturally. "Zach, you want to crash at my place?"

"Sure. Thanks. You want to not crash at your place and leave me and Raye alone?"

"Nope. I don't trust you. Also, she would never forgive me."

"She would never forget me." He grinned at the middle finger that sprung up at him.

Five miles. Three. Two. Four blocks. One block, and then Jason turned the corner and they were on her street. Her throat closed up with anxiety as he pulled in front of her building. The doorman bounded over to the door and then the path to the entrance was open, and she had no choice but climb out of the car, shoulder her bag, and stand immobile on the damp sidewalk.

Jason peered out of the car through the passenger side as Zach crawled out of the backseat and into the front. "Uh, are you going to be OK?"

He and Zach were both looking at her expectantly, their eyes boring into her, and she forced her head to nod. "I am."

Her brother was far too perceptive to let that slide. "I can wait."

"No, it's OK," Mina said, waving him off, even as her breath started to pick up. It was only a short elevator ride until she had to face him. "Go. I'll call you if I need you."

"OK," he said as the doorman shut the door. "I'll have my phone on." Zach held up a palm as they pulled away. She could practically hear his unspoken message. Remember what we talked about.

The doorman pulled the door open for her. "Ma'am." He must be new; she didn't recognize him, which meant he didn't recognize her. There was still a chance to turn tail and run, hail a cab to Jesse's apartment, curl up with her cat on his bed and stay up all night psychoanalyzing what was wrong with her, with him, with the entire world until she was brave enough to face him. Which may be never. Cowardice was so comfortable.

The image of his fingers touching hers as she drew a paintbrush down a strip of canvas fluttered into her consciousness, and she forced one foot forward. Then the other. The space between her and the door seemed to fold over, and she found herself in front of the elevator doors.

Her hands were trembling so much that it took her several attempts to get the key card through the reader successfully. The floors blinked by, and before she knew it, she was standing in the foyer, staring at the door and wondering how she could open it.

As it turned out, it only took a turn of the key.

Mina stepped through the doorway and felt her heart drop to the floor.

The walls were bare.

Everything else seemed to be untouched and neat: the white carpet, the white sofas (so dull), the polished dark wood of the end tables, the decorative vases that she hadn't picked out and was completely clueless as to their origins, since she hadn't bought them, and he wouldn't do such a thing. Serena, most likely. They were quickly forgotten as Mina pivoted in a circle, panic slowly building in her chest as she scanned the blank walls, and then she spotted the crates against the wall.

She tore the top off of one. Anger was nestled inside, packed in bubblewrap.

At first, unbridled rage swept through her like a prairie fire. How dare he.

Then came the crushing regret. Her things were packed. She was moving out of his life. She hadn't realized how much she had contributed to building this home of theirs until it was broken down and packed away.

A square piece of yellow paper stuck in the bubble wrap caught her eye. She reached in the box and peeled it off; one corner was sticky.

This was one of my favorites, but I know it wasn't one of yours.

Mina crumpled the Post-it into a ball and turned back to survey the room. Clean, polished, like it always was, but her influence had been systematically removed and packed away in boxes. He was letting her go. She would have to get used to being alone again. Alone with her paintings and her cat, free to come and go as she pleased, free to do whatever she wanted without consideration for another person. Free like an uncaged bird.

Free and alone.

A horrible, jeering voice surfaced in her subconscious. This is what you wanted.

No, she dumbly argued. Not this.

Then what do you want?

She didn't realize she was crying until she felt a hot teardrop hit the top of her hand.

"I want it back," she whispered, knowing that she was being dramatic, but unable to stop. The sight of the blank walls, with the anchors and hangers still poking out of the drywall, was almost accusatory in its very starkness.

Her fingers fumbled with her phone, and she dropped it to the carpet several times before hitting the right buttons. The call went straight to voicemail; his phone wasn't even turned on.

"Shit," she muttered, dropping it to the floor again. She tried a different number.

Paul, his assistant, picked up on the first ring, and she frantically ended the call before he could finish the greeting. He would be able to hear the tears in her voice, and that was a thought that she just couldn't tolerate. Not right now.

Mina started pacing nervously as she tried a third number, one that she wasn't supposed to call unless it was gravely important, but there was no answer on that line, either. This wasn't like him, to fall off the grid like this. She knew she couldn't stay in that apartment, with her paintings and possessions packed in crates, ready to be taken away from this life, away from him.

She hobbled into her shoes and dialed a last attempt. This one picked up.

"Mina?"

"Darien!" her voice collapsed into sobs as she leaned against the doorframe.

"Are you OK? Where are you?"

She sucked in several gulps of air and tried to compose herself. "Darien, I—I…"

"Calm down, Mina," he instructed gruffly. In the background, she could hear traffic and wind.

"I need to find out where Kevin is." She hoped that Darien could make out the words in between the cracking sobs. "Please, please I need to find him."

"OK, OK," Darien said. "I just left him."

"He's at work?"

"No, he had to leave."

"Oh." She leaned her head back and allowed a few more tears to escape. "Darien, everything got fucked up and then I left, and now I think that he thinks that—"

"Hey."

"I got mad and then I made it worse, but I didn't want it to end like this, you know? I just—I just wanted to know that he didn't think of me that way, and that he didn't mean it, and then I told him to go away, and he listened because," she paused and hiccupped. "Because obviously he does whatever I tell him to, even if I don't mean it. You have to help me, please, Darien. Please."

"Mina."

"Yeah."

He cleared his throat. "I know where you can find him."

"You do? Oh thank god—where?"

"Before I tell you, can you promise me something?"

"Yeah, OK. Anything. What?"

In typical Darien-fashion, he waited a moment for dramatic emphasis. "Promise me that no matter what goes down, you'll allow yourself to be happy."

"What?"

"Promise me you won't start thinking that you can't make someone happy. Because you have, you know. We're all…" He stopped and thought for a second. "We're all fucked-up, beautifully flawed people, and if we're lucky, we find someone just as flawed and fucked up as we are, and they love us and we love them because when we're with them, we forget that we're flawed and fucked up and life seems a little more tolerable. The truth is, you can be flawed and happy, and happy with someone, because love makes you see the good parts in that person and the good parts in yourself, and the stupid shitty parts don't matter as much, to either of you, because you love each other that much and you don't care about the crap when you're together."

Mina was silent as she let those words sink in. Her voice was strained when she finally spoke. "Darien?"

"Huh?"

She smiled through her tears. "Sometimes I think you've got the heart of an artist."

"Bullshit," he responded gruffly, but she could hear the emotion behind his words. "Don't get too excited; I think I got that out of a chick magazine. Serena keeps them in the bathroom and I get bored when I forget my iPhone."

She laughed and played along. "Of course."

"I've got a reputation to uphold. So do you want to know where he is or not? I can send a car."

Her eyelids fell shut, concealing the newly bare room from her vision. "Tell me."