17. Ambrose
Ambrose
“These are our current interest percentages on loans, and then the number the bank made last year in that interest. Calculate the number of last year’s interest we accrued in loans, and we’ll compare numbers.”
I scanned the numbers on the paper that Henry Dawsey showed me.
He was supervisor for loans at the bank, handling each account as if it was the easiest thing in the world.
But it was hard to focus on what I was supposed to do as we both worked separately on our own pieces of paper.
Nothing written in ink made sense. I was too foolish to understand. Too distracted…
This was my fifth day of training, and working with Henry all week had been nothing short of a headache. By the tired look on his face, he probably had a headache too from training me. There had certainly been many near eyerolls on his part. I knew I wouldn’t be easy to train for this sort of work.
After a few minutes, Henry shifted in the chair from across the table. “Let me see what you have.”
I hesitated and leaned back. I didn’t even get halfway through the assignment.
When Henry saw I wasn’t finished, he eyed me. “What’s taking you so long?”
“I want to make sure they all add up correctly.”
“Right.” He sighed heavily. “Maybe you should take a break.”
“I’m almost done.” I gripped my pen and bit my tongue from saying any more, but it was hard to add the numbers in my head.
I had to use the method I was taught in school, adding the numbers in small groups on the paper before finally getting the total.
It took much longer than I knew it should, and by the time I handed the paper over, Henry had an annoyed expression on his face.
He looked them over, then sighed. “Well, Amby, you’re off by a couple of hundred.”
“What?” I took the paper back, and his own, to compare them. “No, I…” But I didn’t have to look long to know I was wrong and he was right. Henry was a supervisor , and who was I? Just the Somerset son. My last name was the only reason Henry didn’t tell me bluntly that I was an idiot.
I didn’t want to learn about loans, but what choice did I have?
God, how I wished to go back to my desk in the corner and fill out invoices before doing my afternoon courier work.
I could do that forever and be fine. It was easy work.
It didn’t put me under immense pressure to succeed. But this new work… It was awful.
“I think that may be enough for today, Ambrose.” Henry rose from his chair.
I got up too. “I know it’s been a long week, but I’m trying.”
“Are you? Currently, I don’t see you stepping up into the loans department anytime soon.”
“I have to train to do this work.”
“Then try harder. Otherwise, Mr. Somerset will be here until he’s on his last leg. Would you really put your father out like that?” When my jaw tightened, Henry shook his head. “Perhaps being a messenger boy has made you used to easy work.”
My blood ran hot at that insult, and I blurted out the first thing that came to mind, “Well, it’s a good thing someone is a messenger here, otherwise your consort wouldn’t get her blessing from your bank account once a month. Don’t worry, I won’t tell your wife.”
Henry stared sharply at me, looking as if he might throttle me if he could.
But before he could do or say anything, I turned on my heel and left his office.
I felt slightly better telling him off. But he was right about one thing, I wasn’t ready.
Even Henry could see that from only a few hours spent with me.
My wish had been granted to go back to my other work, and I happily made my way to the mailroom, where someone handed me a courier bag.
I was so used to delivering or picking up mail that I knew what I had to do without much thought.
Yes, being a messenger boy was easy work, though it required me to still work at a place where numbers were not my friend.
But put a piece of wood in my hand and I could shape it into whatever Henry wanted.
I doubt he could put together a table and six chairs to complete a dining set.
Eager to leave the bank, I made my way outside and inhaled the breezy air. Everdeen was bustling with the upcoming spring events. Everyone was out and about, purchasing or selling something, which was good for the town’s prosperity.
As I walked along the sidewalk to my first stop, I pulled on my cap, nodding at familiar faces as they passed.
The patio of the Rustic Rose Cafe was filled with people drinking tea and eating pastries.
A young group of men in finery shared a cake topped with a small wooden horse, gossiping about the upcoming derby.
Across the street, Suzie Myers swept the doorstep of her jewelry shop, while Brody Swells cleaned the windows of the line of shops on Main Street.
Birds chirped in the scattered trees, and the chapel bell in the distance rang up to twelve.
A group of girls walked past me, chatting about the upcoming Founders Day Festival in a few weeks.
“I’m tying a yellow ribbon around my wrist,” said a blonde-haired girl in pigtails. “So the rest of the year will bring me joy and happiness.”
“Ella and I want to give each other purple for friendship.” A girl with short brown hair grabbed her friend’s hand.
I wondered what color ribbon I might choose this year. If I could tie one around someone’s wrist, as many of the courting lovers did, I’d choose pink for Zeth, for his affections toward me.
Zeth…
When I raised my head, I saw the green ivy that covered the laundry in the distance, and my stomach fluttered.
After our intimate encounter the other day, I wasn’t sure where Zeth and I stood.
We weren’t acquaintances, and we weren’t courting lovers.
We were in between. Familiar friends, but also more than that…
I adjusted the strap of the courier bag on my shoulder and peered down at the sidewalk.
Zeth never mentioned giving up his courtship of Annabelle.
We didn’t talk about us at all. I helped him clean the kitchen and stuffed the hole in the window with one of Zeth’s undershirts.
Then he gave me a quick kiss on the nose before Annabelle and Millie returned from their visits, leaving me confused.
I still felt confused.
I planted my hands in my pockets, watching as the sidewalk became rougher.
There was a specific crack that reminded me of a wishbone, and I stopped, knowing right where I was.
I looked over at the laundry’s wide windows to see no one inside.
That didn’t stop me from walking over to the chipping door, where an array of blue, green, and yellow showed through from being repainted so many times.
I hesitated before I pulled up my arm and knocked.
The rush of seeing Zeth made my mind swirl.
Would he be happy to see me? Was he still planning to marry Annabelle?
Zeth needed money and security, yet he could work for those things on his own.
Millie had already gotten a job in town.
He could do the same. Why, exactly, did he need to marry into money?
Then again, I’d never been in his situation before, where one needs money so badly, their very survival depends on it.
I was being selfish. But…
We needed to talk about this. About us. The feeling of shrugging this whole thing off and not talking about it was bothering me.
It made me hurt, and it was hard to eat or sleep.
Zeth’s words about things being different now hit me hard.
Things were different. We couldn’t control our futures, and it was drowning us.
I needed to know if my choice to pursue the bank and a wife was the right one.
I needed answers from Zeth. Perhaps a sign.
When Zeth didn’t come to the door, I turned around. He and Millie had to be gone somewhere. Or maybe he saw it was me and didn’t want to open the door.
I looked across the street in time to see Damien Cooligan tip his cap at me with a wink.
I gave him the finger, which made him frown, before he walked on.
It was rude, but Damien wanted one thing, and that was sex.
I didn’t want him. I didn’t want just sex.
I wanted a connection, a companionship that made sense.
Zeth and I made sense. Every intimate encounter with him was magnetic.
Each tender touch was like static. The things we did together, the topics we talked about, had always been full of meaning.
We’d always had each other’s backs as kids, and as teens, Zeth had helped me through the sadness when my mother died.
He was always there for me whenever I needed him, in body and soul.
But I admit, both of us could have talked more to each other about the things that bothered us. Zeth often guarded himself and clammed up, and I used to get so frustrated with him. I should have been willing to listen and understand.
When he asked me to marry him, we were only sixteen.
I knew of my father’s expectations then.
The fear of him rejecting me was more powerful than my fear of losing Zeth.
I had refused his proposal to please my father.
If I could talk to my younger self, I’d have to admit things never got any better for following Father’s legacy.
I still didn’t want to be at the bank, I still couldn’t attain Father’s approval no matter what I did, and I still hadn’t married a woman. And to top it all off…
I was still deeply in love with Zeth Washer.
This realization struck me powerfully as I stared at the laundry’s chipping paint.
For nine years, I had made no progress toward happiness, sinking ever further into the shadow of my father’s disappointment.
My heart fluttered like a hummingbird’s wings against the bars of its cage. I had to get out of my own prison.
Why couldn’t I have Zeth? And why couldn’t he have me?
Even if my father didn’t approve of us, and I lost my inheritance, I would still strive to give Zeth what I could.
My devotion, my love, what money I did make.
Together, we could make enough to live. I just didn’t know if he felt strongly enough about me to abandon his dreams of elite living for him and Millie, to risk it all by chancing a courtship with me.
Still, I had to know. I had to talk to him, because I was aching from imagining him married to Annabelle while glancing at me from afar at social events…
I deserved to be happy too, like my sisters.
So did he, if he wanted me. This was the choice that hung over my head, to talk to Zeth about being together, or lose him forever.
Emboldened, I dug in my carrier bag until I found my notepad.
I pulled out the pen from my pocket and scribbled a note for Zeth, hesitating on how I should sign my name.
My breath hitched as I chose my signature wisely.
Then I folded the paper and slipped it in the crack of the door near the knob so he would easily see it.
Then I left the laundry in a rush, my stomach full of anxious butterflies.