4. Kieran
Chapter 4
Kieran
“Three times in one week, Kieran.” Mom stood at the counter stirring cookie dough. She kept her back to me, but I didn’t have to see the look on her face to know the expression on her face. The slight smirk of knowing, the glimmer in her eyes from calling it out, and the smoothness of her brows, indicating how unbothered she was by literally anything.
I, on the other hand, hadn’t stopped feeling concerned, bothered, and downright paranoid ever since Shane called me and asked me to help with his latest pet project. For as long as I could remember, Shane was the guy who would bring stray animals home. When a bird flew into the window and stunned itself, Shane was the first one out there with a shoebox and a towel to keep it sheltered and safe until it recovered.
But Mom’s house wasn’t a shoebox and Clayton wasn’t a bird. Though he looked to be about as fragile as one.
“He’s done a therapy session nearly every day that he’s been here. Not that I need to report to you, but Clayton told me I could tell my boys whatever I felt necessary to tell them.”
“You act as though I’m here because Clayton is here. Can’t a guy hit his Mom up for homemade cookies now and then?”
Mom turned and looked at me. “You’re a shameless liar, Kieran. You’re here checking on that boy. ”
“He’s hardly a boy, Mother.”
“He’s as old as my kids, therefore he’s a boy. That’s how it works.”
“How are the girls getting on with him here?”
“Don’t you worry about them. Clayton’s been fine. He comes out to do his therapy and he visits with us at meals. Other than that, he stays in his room a lot. I think he’s still having some trouble recovering from what happened.” Mom kept her voice low to relate that last bit of information to me. “He has nightmares sometimes. I think that’s why he’s had so many therapy sessions. And he seems determined to get out of here.”
Clayton had only been there for a week, but he’d already wrapped my mom around his finger. She suffered from the same affliction as Shane. I called it Good Samaritan Syndrome. Neither one of them could walk past a person in need if they thought they could help. It was endearing and admirable, and in cases like this, infuriating.
Clayton wasn’t someone who could be trusted. Telling mom to lock up her valuables was on the tip of my tongue, but for now Clayton was house-bound unless someone else took him somewhere, so the chances of him ripping off my mom were slim to none.
If I wasn’t trusting enough, it was because Shane was too trusting. He wanted to believe the best in everyone. Most of the time it worked in his favor. Everyone loved Shane, even back before he’d won the money and turned into a philanthropist. Shane was the good one. Brodie was the little ball of sunshine. And I was, well… I was me. Not the life of the party. Not the favorite Taggart boy. I could deal with that. I was happy to have it that way if it meant keeping my family safe.
The sound of wheels on the floor got my attention and I turned to see Clayton on a rolling stool, not unlike the kind they had in tattoo shops that artists sat on. Clayton stopped when he saw me and his perfectly pleasant expression dimmed to a respectful resignation .
“Kieran,” Clayton greeted me as he scooted around the room awkwardly using his one good leg to drag himself.
“What are you doing?” I could have tried to be less incredulous, but the tone of my voice had never bothered to ask my permission before and it wasn’t going to start now, no matter how many murderous looks my mother was sending me.
Clayton looked up at me—even when he was standing he was shorter than I was, but from his current disadvantage, I towered over him.
“I’m getting a glass of water, and then I have a therapy appointment.” Clayton spoke to me like I was five.
“I meant why are you scooting around on a stool?”
Clayton rolled his eyes. “Have you ever tried to navigate a wheelchair with one hand? It’s not exactly easy. I realized that moving around on the computer chair was a lot more doable for me. It’s better than hopping and I can’t quite manage crutches.”
“Stop giving him the third degree,” Mom cut into the conversation and I tried not to flinch at her admonishment. “Did you want cookies for your appointment?”
“Yes, please. Do you have any oatmeal raisin left?”
“I sure do. Made a fresh batch this morning. Let me get you a plate.”
Standing aside, I watched my mom buzz around the kitchen gathering cookies and pouring cold water into a metal tumbler with a straw. “You scoot on ahead and I’ll follow you and get you settled,” she told Clayton. Shifting her gaze over to me, some of her sunny demeanor fell. “You don’t go anywhere.”
Clayton coughed to cover up his laugh and he made his way through the kitchen, using his good leg to push or pull himself forward. Gripping the doorway with his usable hand, he propelled himself a little easier. Mom patiently followed him and they chatted away like they were old friends. I heard their quiet voices then the click of the office door shutting.
When Mom returned, she folded her arms in front of her and stared me down.
“He’s fine, Kieran. He’s very well-behaved. And I check the computer every night before I go to bed. The only thing he does is talk to his therapist.”
“Well, make sure you keep checking. He’ll wait until your guard is down.”
Mom’s face softened. “Kieran, my sweet boy, I wonder how I failed you. You’re so suspicious of everyone.”
I didn’t have the heart to tell her that someone had to be suspicious. If she and Shane wanted to save the world, that was great, but someone had to be the one to save them from themselves.
“Forgive me for being cautious about a man who stole from his best friend. It’s not out of line to be worried about something like that happening again.”
Mom shook her head sadly, but changed the subject. She had always been an expert in picking her battles. “Are you taking cookies with you today? I’ve also got some bread I baked with the girls.”
“I’m fine, Mom. I still have cookies from the last time I was here.”
Mom shot me a sly grin, like she’d known I would say that. “Yes, you probably do. You’ve been over so often lately, looking after your dear old mother. What a nice, loyal son I have. Maybe you’ll come over more often when you’re not doing it just to lurk and intimidate my guest.”
I only barely refrained from snorting in derision. “I don’t think he feels very intimidated by me.” And if he was intimidated, I was glad. That meant he might think twice before doing anything stupid .
“I heard from Brodie last night,” Mom said, changing the subject again. “I tried to convince him to come for a visit, but he’s madly in love with the view from his hotel balcony and he’s not ready to leave it yet.”
Brodie had always wanted to travel the world and every time we talked to him, he’d fallen madly in love with another piece of it. This week it was some lush green hills outside his hotel in Scotland. Last month it was this little coffee shop in Manchester that had the cutest little cat living in the window of it. He once professed his undying love for a very specific stretch of beach in Spain.
It was easy to fall in love with the grand things, he’d told me at one time. Anyone can go to the Sistine Chapel and fall in love with the art, or go to Athens and succumb to the beauty of the acropolis, he’d said. Brodie appreciated those things, but he found the beauty in the mundane too. He once had a week-long love affair with the food from a particular vendor in Turkey.
He was easy to miss.
I couldn’t help but wonder what he’d think of the whole Clayton situation. I wondered if, like Mom, Brodie would welcome Clayton into the fold. He was kinder than Shane or me put together. He easily made friends wherever he went. I didn’t think there was a single person on the planet who didn’t like Brodie.
“While you’re here, can you take this bag of trash out to the cans for me?”
“Of course. I was on my way out anyway.”
“Well, when you come over in a couple days to make sure he hasn’t emptied the house of everything of value, how about you leave some of your attitude at the door? He’s had a hard time, Kieran.”
I wanted to tell her that his suffering had been his own doing. It wasn’t anything but the consequences of his own actions that had him in his current state. But I held my tongue. I also knew what battles to choose, and this wasn’t one of them.
“I make no promises.”
Where Brodie might see the beauty in everything, I saw the reality. The cat he’d fallen in love with at the cafe had been abandoned to the streets and only by virtue of being a cat had it survived. And it did so by inviting itself to live in the front window of the cafe. The stretch of beach he’d fallen in love with in Spain had sand that was full of micro plastics, just like every other beach in the world now. The view from his balcony in Scotland was nice, I had to admit that much, even if it hadn’t stopped raining since his arrival.
I’d have liked to see the beauty in everything the way Brodie did. Or the good in everyone the way our mom did. But something inside me must have been broken and I hated how that made me feel cold. I’d once tried to see the world the way Brodie did, but I could never manage to keep the illusion up for long. It was the same with people. I wanted to think the best of them, but people routinely proved me wrong.
Shane once asked who hurt me, but the truth was that no one had hurt me but myself, I supposed. My outlook on people and anything else didn’t stem from some sort of tragic heartbreak, which only made it worse in Shane’s opinion. How could I not trust anyone when no one had hurt me and somehow ruined my ability to trust people? He didn’t understand that you didn’t have to thrust your hand into the fire to know it was hot. Not every lesson had to be learned the hard way. Mom might trust Clayton and believe that he wanted to change, but she never had a problem seeing the best in people.
All I saw when I looked at him was someone who’d already betrayed his best friend. I didn’t understand how she could see anything different.