Chapter 11
I CAN BE NORMAL
Oliver
Three days.
Or less if I decide to drop Daphne off at a hotel, call Margot, ask her to do me one final favor, and then I can truly disappear.
Not that that’s a good option either.
On top of my father’s insistence that I pick things back up with Margot, her father cornered me at the party last night to tell me that now that the Miles2Go reputation had been redeemed and my father had served his time, the Merriweather-Browns were looking forward to renewing discussions between us of a potential merger of some of our smaller divisions to create one-stop travel centers for road-tripping families.
As if I’d still be in control.
Still working for M2G.
Which makes me suspect Margot’s recent renewed interest in him was professional instead of personal. Convenience stores and hotels are a good match, and it was a match we were supposed to make before my father went to prison.
When I hurt her by calling things off.
Why would she keep my secret that I’m running away now?
I shouldn’t have gone to see her at all last week, but I felt like I needed closure.
I needed to look her in the eye, see that she’s okay, that she doesn’t hate me anymore.
Not because I want her back—I’m not the same man I was when we got engaged, and I can’t begin to imagine finding peace with her and the life she wants to keep living now—but because I needed to tie up that one last loose end.
For me.
And one more loose end is exactly what I’m pondering as we approach the outskirts of Pittsburgh.
How do I get rid of Daphne without her alerting my family that I’m gone before I’ve done what I need to do with the cash in my trunk and find wherever it is that I’m supposed to start my new life?
I’m supposed to have two weeks before they know anything’s wrong. So I might need to keep Daphne with me for the full two weeks.
I don’t want to tip my hand to her this early though.
The minute I stop at a gas pump, she leaps out of the car. “Potty,” she says. “By the way, you parked on the wrong side for the gas tank. There’s this little arrow thingy on your gas gauge that points to which side your tank is on. For future reference. Don’t leave without me.”
She dances inside the convenience store almost before I’ve unfolded myself and climbed out of the car.
She finally stopped talking once she climbed into the back seat, and after I got the radio turned on, I almost forgot she was there.
Almost.
Hard to forget I have a stowaway who’s somehow managed to already blackmail me.
I look at the pump, and Cupholder the hermit crab waves at me from a video screen centered above the payment display.
I blink at it.
Why did I pick a Miles2Go?
Why?
I didn’t have to pick a Miles2Go. There’s a different store, a different brand, right across the street.
And I went immediately for the familiar.
Even though I’ve never driven up to one of these in my life.
It’s not simply the summer heat making me sweat in my flannel now. I grunt to myself, get back in the car, crank the engine, and turn it around so the tank is on the same side as the pump.
Facing this way, I can clearly see the wildflowers blooming in the grassy area between the parking lot of this shop and the next one down. At least four butterflies flutter among the purple cornflowers and black-eyed Susans and milkweed.
My heart squeezes in my chest, but for once, it’s not anxiety or fear or overwhelm or stress or anything bad.
It’s pride.
Fucking pride. Pride that I earned.
Because I did that.
I gave bonuses to franchises that planted butterfly gardens.
But after being in crisis management mode for the past four years, this is the first time I’ve seen one in person.
If I were alone, I’d walk over and watch the little ecosystem in action. Take five minutes to breathe and soak in my favorite pet project.
The one my father told me I could do with some special projects funds.
The same special projects funds that he used to buy thirty million dollars’ worth of useless wines.
And that’s how it always was.
Of course, Oliver. Of course I want to hear your vision for the company. Oh, haha, butterflies at gas stations. Get that out of your system now because when you’re CEO, you’ll have bigger fish to catch. Or should I say, bigger butterflies to catch?
Of course I’m listening to you, Oliver. But what you think is important isn’t what the family needs you to think is important so that you can keep our shareholders happy.
And the flip side of that reminder was always and the family holds the majority of the shares, so keep us happy first and foremost.
I rub my chest and blink back the heat in my eyes as I climb out of the car again.
My arms are starting to lose circulation.
Most of the wardrobe I ordered online to be delivered to the cabin didn’t arrive, so my options were limited this morning.
Very, very limited.
And of what I did get, not all of it fit right.
I need to stop somewhere to get more clothes, but I’ve prioritized getting as far from New York as I can, as fast as I can, first.
I’m starting to reconsider that as I unbutton my flannel in the heat and study the pump.
Cupholder waves at me again from the screen and then shrinks to one corner as a video starts, featuring some newscaster behind a desk.
Fresh gossip out of New York this morning as pictures are emerging of the welcome-home party held last night for William Cumberland, beleaguered former CEO of the Miles2Go conglomerate of convenience stores and gas stations, following his release from prison earlier this week…
My jaw tightens, and I grab the nozzle to refill the gas tank as I actively ignore the video screen.
I turn to the car, remember I have to pop open the gas cap, then remember there’s a button inside the car to release it.
It’s pumping gas.
I’ve been around the gas industry my entire life.
I’ll get this.
I’ll get this before Daphne gets back out.
I angle a look inside the store and don’t see her.
Should be easy to spot her, because she’s Daphne.
She’s never not standing out, so she must be in the bathroom.
Swear to god, if she betrays me, I’ll make her life hell.
I find the button to pop open the gas tank inside the door, then unscrew the gas cap.
More pictures of my father—including some in an orange jumpsuit and some with him holding up a bottle of counterfeit wine—appear on the video screen as the reporter hustles through covering that he used company funds to purchase fake vintage wine from a scam artist.
And then there’s my name.
I look back at the video screen.
And there’s my picture.
Fuck.
Three other people are pumping gas, including one on the other side of the pump from me.
I duck my head and shove the nozzle into the gas tank, except it won’t fit.
The hell?
Why won’t it fit?
I angle it differently and try to push it into the hole, but it doesn’t go.
It hits the rim of the tank and stops.
I shove.
It doesn’t move.
I shove harder, but not too hard.
A fire broke out at a pump at one of our Nevada franchises last year, and I do know a thing or two about metal-on-metal causing a spark.
So why the hell won’t the damn nozzle go into the damn hole?
I look at the pump, still keeping my head down. The guy on the other side of the pump isn’t looking at me, and the newscaster has gone on to talk about expected weather in the Pittsburgh area.
But I don’t want to draw attention to myself.
There’s a little diagram on the pump.
It shows the nozzle going into the hole for the gas tank.
It doesn’t show Superman.
There’s no picture with a specific diagram of how the nozzle fits in the hole.
Did I buy a defective car?
Is there something wrong with my car’s goddamn gas tank?
What the actual—
“Problem, Captain?” Daphne says next to me.
Jesus.
I’m in flannel and boat pants, and she’s in a cocktail dress.
I don’t want to think about what this looks like.
“The fucking nozzle won’t fit in the fucking hole,” I mutter to her while I demonstrate. “It’s too big.”
She looks me dead in the eye. “Bet that’s the first time you’ve heard that in your life.”
Is she—
Dammit.
I walked right into that.
My molars grind together as she grins and takes the stick from me.
“This particular nozzle,” she says, “is for diesel. Your car takes regular unleaded. This nozzle. This one over here on the other side of the pump.”
The guy across from us lifts his eyes to look at us as my face heats even hotter.
I knew that.
I fucking knew that, but today is going so wrong that my brain is malfunctioning.
Daphne—standing there in her cocktail dress with her bedhead somewhat tamed but not enough to look normal, especially with the blue and green streaks making her look like a goth mermaid—smiles at the guy who’s now watching us and gives him a little finger wave.
“We’re getting into character to audition for a reality TV show.
Bros and Hoes. Have you heard of it? It’s awful.
Like, truly awful. But don’t we look like we belong?
We’re going to do this bit so my friend Spencer here looks like a complete idiot who doesn’t know how to pump gas. Do you think they’ll buy it?”
The guy ducks his head and mutters something while he goes back to his own business.
“Bros and Hoes?” I hiss at her.
“I know. I hate that word. It’s so demeaning to women and their sexual experience. That’s why I didn’t tell you sooner where we’re going. But if the producers want to give me that much money to call me names, whatever. It’ll pay for my astrophysics degree.”
The screen on the pump cycles back to the same story about my father being released from prison and the party my mother threw him last night.
Daphne stares at the screen, then grimaces. “I hate dresses,” she mutters.
I look at the screen too.