Chapter 36
36
“ Y ou probably want a printer out here,” Simon told Carlisle as he looked around her set up. “Can you get one dedicated to labels? Something with just black ink.”
“Probably.” Carlisle looked as if she hadn't considered that yet.
They were alone now. He’d met Charlie briefly for the first time and Simon tried to ignore that it had been awkward.
It was clear that her twin was proud of her, and that part was great. Charlie had been pleasant, but he'd caught Simon off guard.
His replies had been short and almost cut off. Maybe Simon was just reading that into it because Charlie seemed to take absolutely no issue with Simon and Carlisle's relationship. After a few moments, Charlie simply turned to his sister, and said, “I promised Mom I'd be home for dinner. This took longer than we thought.”
“Of course.” She told him goodbye and waved him on. Simon watched as Charlie had headed down the long driveway as if he were going to just walk the handful of miles home in the dark. But in the cul de sac, he climbed onto the bike that was there and revved the engine before peeling out.
“Is he okay?” Simon felt the need to ask, though he knew there was probably no answer to it. Carlisle had told him what she could—maybe just what she had deemed appropriate. Simon understood. Just because they were a couple didn't mean there were no secrets between them. Some secrets weren’t hers to tell. If Charlie didn't want Simon to have his story, Carlisle wouldn’t share it.
He didn’t share everything about his family either. Darcy and his mom didn’t deserve to have all the dirty laundry hanging out. So he left Carlisle’s answer as the short nod and head tip that said “mostly yes, but not fully.”
He changed the subject. “Should we pack the first few orders?”
He was starting to pull one of the top boxes down when she yelled.
“No!”
The gravity and severity of her tone surprised him. “I'm sorry.”
“It’s just . . . Jane and I are packing the first few orders together.”
“Of course. You should.” He stumbled around not wanting to step on her toes but excited and wanting to be part of her business. He was proud of her, though he understood he was outside looking in. He didn't have a real place in it, other than as the supportive boyfriend.
“Jane gets her shipment of boxes tomorrow.” Carlisle waved her hand around at the stacks. The place was immaculate, even if she wasn’t. He wondered if she knew she had dust in her hair and a triangle of gray marked the back of her t-shirt. Simon held his tongue.
“I'm going to go and help her.”
“Good.” She was cute when she was messy. The realization of just how far gone he was for this woman startled him. He would have said their relationship had been easy, but it hadn’t. She’d seen his scars and pushed him when he stayed silent. He’d acted as though if he didn’t tell her about them they didn’t exist.
He’d been there when she woke up at night, hands flailing as if to grasp at something that wasn’t there. He was here for the first orders to go out for her new business. He could see she was both thrilled and petrified.
He was definitely in love with her.
Choking on the thought, he spoke to cover the realization that hit him like bricks. “Okay, we don't pack orders, but let's start to get organized. Is there going to be a shipping station at Jane's, too?”
“Not yet.” Carlisle was still looking around. If she saw his turmoil, she wasn’t reacting at all. “We’ll bring them over when we run out here. We might set up a second shipping station later if we get that many orders.”
Simon nodded, pushing his mouth out to a smile. Not that she was looking at him. He was looking at her though. Hair in a ponytail, t shirt revealing the curves he liked to touch. Her hands were filthy, and he still wanted them on him.
She spoke before he could blurt out anything embarrassing. “I like the idea of a label printer but we're trying so hard not to invest any more than we already have.”
“I understand. Still, it would save you money in the end.”
She nodded, clearly considering it. “How many labels do I have to print before I start saving money?”
“Probably only a thousand.” He was estimating.
“We're not there yet. Not even close.”
He knew they'd sold a good handful already, which was fantastic for no advertising and for technically not even really having a product until today. Putting his hands on his hips, he looked around the garage. “There's more than a thousand here already, right? ”
“Oh, yeah.” She said and he understood: Carlisle and Jane were gambling on themselves. They were gambling on a great idea.
Hearing the tone in her voice, he turned back, smiled his brightest smile, put his hands on her shoulders, and wished he could transfer all of it directly into her just by his touch: his pride, his excitement, the sheer joy.
He'd gone to business school, but he'd never started his own business. Simon never had the chance to gamble his own money, his paycheck had always been carefully allotted. He should have known that first day he’d recognized that Darcy’s behavior wasn’t normal. He’d had suspicions, but didn’t know anything about mental health really. He and his mom had missed a lot of the early signs.
At thirteen Darcy had gone into her first full artistic frenzy. Already both skilled and talented, she’d been taking art classes seriously since the elementary school art teacher had commented how good she was. His mother had covered summer classes and more to develop the skills and shape his sister’s innate ability.
But in the first binge, she'd spent three days in her room, hardly eating, running through supplies at an alarming rate and mad that she couldn’t make paint or clay dry faster. She’d even gone to school, checked in, then turned right around and walked the four miles home. She let herself into her room and painted frantically all day and all night.
They hadn’t disturbed her.
Simon had already been at college by then, so he hadn’t seen the extent of it. His mother had been proud of the art Darcy created. It was only later that Darcy confessed to Simon that she was skipping class to work. At least when his mother found out from the letters and notices from the school, Simon had already heard that part of it.
Darcy had fallen quickly afterward into a serious depression. At first, his mother had brushed it off. “She's an artist.” “She's temperamental.” “Did you see her paintings?”
That’s what it eventually came down to: When Darcy was up, she was brilliant. In high school, her art was shown in a local gallery. Simon couldn't have been more proud but even then, he'd been starting to push his mother to get Darcy diagnosed.
Their money situation hadn't been good. Darcy had still been on Stephen’s policy and he still paid child support for her. The one thing about Stephen was he earned well. But there was no child support for Simon, because Simon wasn't Stephen’s kid. For that, he would always be grateful. However, it meant his mother once again had taken him on at her own expense. Later he found out that she’d dropped her own health insurance to help with his tuition and cover Darcy’s art classes.
When Darcy was in tenth grade her depression was severe enough to get her hospitalized. Then later, when she'd swung up again, his mother declared her cured.
That was when the first bills began to roll in. More than his mother could cover.
Simon had become the earner. He'd just graduated business school and had thoughts of law school, but realized it wasn't time to spend more. It was time to start putting money back into his family. He could help his mother rather than be a drain for the first time.
He felt odd, standing here in Carlisle's driveway, understanding her dichotomy. On the one hand, she was living a dream a lot of people had: starting her own business, working with her best friend. She had an excellent product, and he had no doubt it would fly off the shelf—or out of her garage. Hence his recommendation that she just go ahead and invest in the printer.
On the other hand, he was stuck. He couldn’t do anything more than tell her how proud he was. He wouldn’t mention he was a little bit jealous. He wasn’t. He wouldn’t be. He had his mom and Darcy and that was a lot.
Ignoring his own thoughts, he added, “You can sell off a label printer later if you need the money. They don't devalue much.”
She raised one eyebrow at him and quirked one side of her lips, knowing he was trying to talk her into it.
“Also,” he told her, “They’re for businesses like this, so they print fast .”
This time one eyebrow went down, her lips pursed. He understood that her own printer was not fast. That may be the selling point, as if he would make a commission off her buying one. He just wanted Carlisle to do well.
She turned back to the tabletop, fidgeting with the labels laid on it, with two still-folded boxes waiting.
At the same time her business was starting to pick up, he had to acknowledge that her business only existed because she'd suffered an unimaginable horror. He didn’t say that part out loud either. “I'm excited for you both.”
“Me too.” But the tone in her voice was flat. Her excitement at seeing all the boxes had dissipated.
He turned her around, holding her shoulders again as he looked her square in the eyes, and he saw her worried expression.