17. Taylor
Chapter 17
Taylor
I lay awake for what feels like hours, listening to the two of them breathe, before sliding out as quietly as I can and collecting my shorts.I’m sure no one can hear me, but I still take care to avoid the squeaky spots on the narrow staircase up to the attic room that I’m finally starting to think of as my own.
Neither Gem nor I were completely sold on the idea of moving in together, and getting an apartment this close to the school would have been impossible anyway. I was staying over most work nights after our first year together to avoid my two-hour commute from Bainbridge Island, and we were both feeling confined from the loss of personal space.
I know Gem needs her own room, her own quiet place to retreat, and I’m the same way. Even if we could have convinced the other girls to let me move in, that small bedroom, already cramped with Gem’s every worldly belonging, would have been the end of us. Luckily, the twins stepped in and offered me the cat room.
Whatever cat the small, low ceiling, A-frame room was named for was long gone by the time Gem and I dragged brooms and Windex up the tall staircase to clean out years’ worth of dust and cobwebs. I scored a twin size futon, and she relocated a large, round hat box from somewhere else in the house to serve as a table for my phone and water glass.
Over the last two years, it’s gained some personality. I have a few pictures of Gem and me, of my family, of the view from the ferry ride on a sunny, foggy day. Gem installed a wire wrapped crystal hanging over the head of the futon to help me with grounding, inspiration, and good luck, of all things.
It’s a far cry from where I imagined myself five years ago, at the height of my ambition, when my own restaurant downtown was so close, I could almost claw my way to its heart with my tired, bandaged fingers.Walking away from that opportunity was like leaving a pile of money in a burning room to save an injured child across the hall.
But maybe money’s a bad example.
If the opportunity had been promising piles of money, I wouldn’t have had to walk away at all.
That’s the thing about the restaurant industry. There are no guarantees.
All you can do is cut yourself open and bare your tender insides for the vultures and hope they like what they see.
When my alarm goes off at six am sharp, I’m relieved to be roused from a deep sleep. It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve worked all day after one, two, or even zero hours of sleep, but it’s never ideal.
I click the button to silence the alarm and notice a text from the night before.
Mom: Looking forward to seeing you two tomorrow!
I groan and set the phone back down.
How could I have forgotten today was New Year’s Day?
Last night, after sending everyone home to enjoy the holiday, I spent several hours closing down the kitchen for one of the two days a year we don’t open for student meals, making sure the vending and soda machines were full enough for whatever stragglers wandered in.
I’d only been home long enough for a shower when Gem texted me that she and Ainsley were back from the bar, and she wanted me to join them. I thought I’d have a few more hours to myself, or that she’d try to talk me into coming out with them, but apparently Ainsley has the same outlook on late night partying as I do.
Hard pass.
Miraculously, I drift back off to sleep and wake a while later to Gem crawling beside me in the tiny bed.
I wrap an arm around her and pull her close. “Happy New Year, love.”
“It’s not really the new year except in the capitalist patriarchal colonizer calendar, but thank you,” she whispers, snuggling in.
I pull her close and smile. “Did your captive escape?”
She shakes her head. “He’s still asleep.”
“What time is it?”
“Going on eight.”
Dang. I can’t remember the last time I slept so late. “We’re catching the bus in less than an hour.”
“I know.”
Her words are soft and heavy. I hear what she’s not saying and try to make myself let her off easy. To say it’s okay without her having to ask.
But I don’t.
“Do you think…” she says finally, trailing off as her fingers dance across my chest.
I take too long to respond, and she starts to pull away, but I hold her tight. “Of course. The more the merrier.”
“Can I tell you a secret?” Ainsley asks as we settle into our seats on the ferry.
“Yes, please,” Gem answers right away, snaking her arm through his and pulling him closer to her right side.
I already have her left arm held tightly in mine.
“I’ve never been on a ferry before.” Ainsley’s statement falls like a rock into the air around us. “At least not one in this country.”
“I’m going to punch you in the face right now,” I huff out.
Ainsley laughs, but Gem tosses me a look that clearly says—be nice.
And hell, it’s a holiday, and I have every intention of being nice. But that? That little bomb about having lived in this city for years and never once taken a ferry? It’s too much.
“Yeah,” he goes on, as if his hole wasn’t deep enough. “I guess I just got busy with school and stuff. Never wandered out to the islands. I usually head out of town on breaks.”
“I take the ferry every day.”
Gem turns on me once more. “You do not,” she rightly calls me out.
“I used to,” I correct myself, feeling foolish and desperately wanting to talk about anything else right now.
Ainsley changes the subject. “Do you have a big family out there on the island?”
I shrug.
“Yes,” Gem answers for me. “His parents and youngest brother all live at the house. His other brother will be at brunch today from the peninsula. ”
“I always wanted siblings,” he says, a bit too nostalgically.
“It’s not all it’s cracked up to be.” I don’t know what’s wrong with me, but I can’t seem to shake it.
Gem smacks me hard on the arm. “Taylor!”
“Sorry. It’s great. My brothers are great.”
And they are. They’d be a lot better if they got jobs to help with the giant mess of a financial situation we’ve gotten ourselves into with the house, but you can’t make people do anything. Believe me, I’ve tried.
We spend almost the full thirty-minute ferry ride braving the freezing cold wind so pretty boy can stand on the bow like it’s the goddamn Titanic. By the time we walk off, I’m barely keeping it together.
This is not the attitude I need to be taking into that house.
“Anything I should know before we get there?”
I glare over at him, where he cradles the fancy bottle of wine he almost made us miss the bus for. “Take your shoes off.”
He just nods. “Okay, easy enough.”
“They’re going to love you,” Gem assures him, leaning in close.
And, as usual, she’s right.
“You finally made it.” My mother gushes over us as if she didn’t just see me a week ago.
“Come in out of the cold.” My father ushers us all into the mudroom and closes the heavy front door behind us. “Grab some slippers.”
He pauses, taking in the stranger bundled between Gem and I for the first time. “I don’t believe we’ve met.”
Ainsley pulls off his black beanie, revealing perfectly mussed hair and rosy cheeks as he holds out his hand. “Ainsley.”
My father shakes it with a smile. “Pleasure to meet you, Ainsley. Any friend of these two is family around here. You can call me Pops.”
After so many years of the boundless enthusiasm of these two, I’m more or less used to it, but I do enjoy watching a new person bathe in it for the first time. It’s like a special little bubble of warmth you think was created just for you.It takes years before you realize they do it so they can float around as if the world is all roses and bunny rabbits, while in reality, it’s crumbling down around them.
“Coats there on the hooks, slippers in the bucket.” My dad continues showing us the way as if I hadn’t spent every day of my childhood in this house.
Pretty soon, we’re following them both toward the kitchen while my mom rattles off the many warm breakfast beverage options she has lined up in her clown-car pantry.
“We saved all your gifts here, Gemma, instead of sending them off with Taylor, because we knew you’d be coming.” My mom stops short in her fussing over Gem and considers Ainsley, wide eyed. “We didn’t know you would be joining us, Ainsley, or we would’ve made sure to get you something.”
Ainsley just flashes another of those prize pony smiles and produces the wine from under his arm. “No need, ma’am. I brought you this as a thank you for having me.”
I have to chuckle to myself at the idea of billionaire heir Ainsley opening a pair of Walmart slippers on my parents’ fifty-year-old couch, but the hilarity of it all is cut short by my mom taking my arm and dragging me aside as the others go ahead into the kitchen.
“I got another notice on the door yesterday, Taylor. ”
I let my breath out in a long, slow stream, trying to keep my cool. “On New Year's Eve? That seems inappropriate.”
She’s shaking a bit. I can feel it where her hand rests gently on my upper arm.I want to be mad that they’ve let it come to this, keeping secrets and ignoring problems until they created a situation dire enough to cost us everything.
And I am mad.
But right now, my mom just seems so…old.
“I’m going to take care of it, okay? I’ve got another meeting with the bank on Thursday, and we should be settled with the mortgage. You and dad sent in that paperwork, right?”
She looks down at her hand before meeting my eye. Never a good sign. “I’m pretty sure your father did, yes.”
“You’re pretty sure? Or he did? This is really important. I can only do so much. You two, as the owners of this house?—”
“We’re doing the best we can, Taylor.” Her tone turns sharp as she cuts me off.
I know what those words mean. Conversation over.
She walks back into the kitchen without even giving me a chance to respond.
If Gem wasn’t here, I’d follow her in there and push the issue. But I can’t do that today, so I let it go as best I can. There’s always tomorrow to pick up where we left off. And the next day. And the day after that.
When I rejoin the lively group in the kitchen, my brothers are introducing themselves to Ainsley, shaking hands, and no doubt fawning over the guy’s freaking aura. I come up next to Gem and watch, keeping my mouth shut. She leans back into me slightly, offering the warmth of her body as reassurance. Letting me know she understands this is hard for me, and as usual, it works.
We’re herded to the dining room, only separated from the kitchen by a low eating bar. My mom walks around the table, pouring coffee like a diner waitress, and I try to focus on the conversation, rather than jump up to try and help.
It would generally annoy me to have everyone’s attention on Ainsley, but for once, I’m grateful. The kid fields questions like it’s his damn job.
“Your family’s in New York?” my mom asks him as I dig into our traditional New Year's morning meal of Danish pancakes, bacon, and applesauce.
He nods, chewing with his hand over his mouth for a moment before answering. “It’s really just my dad and me, but yeah. He lives most of the year in New York.”
I keep my eyes on my plate, refusing to let his leading statement get to me. How easy it would have been to just say the guy lived in New York. Now we get to talk about how they’re rich and probably own houses all over the world.
Sure enough, one of my naive brothers takes the bait.
“And the rest of the year?”
“He and his friends own a resort on Faraday Island, which is off the coast of Belize. My dad has a house on the tiny neighboring island, Merit. He, and now his fiancé, spend about a third of the year down there.”
The table is alive with interested, impressed murmurs, as if being born into lavish wealth was some kind of moral achievement.
“Do you get to go down there, too?”
“Yeah, I go down pretty often.”
I know he’s not done, probably gearing up to tell some hilarious story about his childhood growing up jet setting from an estate in New York to the tropical island they own, but I can’t take it anymore.
“Gem just published a new ‘Zine.” I say, too quickly and too loud.
Everyone looks at me, including Gem, who understands what I’m doing and, judging by her face, does not appreciate having her art used as a segue to pull attention off Ainsley.
“Oh, Gem,” my mother shifts focus easily, looking at Gemma like she’s the only person on the planet. “I loved the poetry in the last edition. I hope you brought us a copy.”
Gem tosses me another look, but I just smile at her. “What he means is that I have another edition coming out at the beginning of the quarter. They’re getting printed this week. I’ll send one out with Taylor next time he comes.”
“Which will hopefully be in just a few days, right?” my dad asks me pointedly.
My annoyance flares, and I can’t contain it in time. “That depends, Dad. Did you send in the paperwork last week or not?”
A hush falls over the table, and I’m left holding my fork, glaring down the table at my elderly father while everyone stares at me.After a long moment where I realize not only am I the asshole, but his silence definitely means the answer is no, I sigh and look down at my plate, stabbing a powdered sugar covered dough ball far harder than necessary.
When I look up, people have shifted back to eating in silence, but my mother is still glaring at me, tears brimming in her eyes like I just ruined everything.
Always the asshole.
But someone has to be. Someone has to ask the hard questions and do the damn work. It wouldn’t have to always be me if someone, anyone, would just step up and help for once.
“One time, there was a wedding at The White Sands, the resort my dad owns, where they flew in baby tigers.”
I look up to find him watching me. Seeing me.
I look quickly back at my plate.
“Like in the Tiger King? ”
“Exactly like the Tiger King. I mean, without all the drugs and racism and stuff.”
“Did you get to hold one?”
Gem grips her gifts in one hand as she accepts a hug from each and every member of my family. Ainsley, giftless, but still clearly the favorite today, gets a round of hugs as well. I wait out on the porch, arms crossed.
“Well, that was…something,” he says once we’re finally seated in a booth on the ferry.
I just huff, arms crossed once more.
“What were those pancakes called again? Able skivers?”
“Cut the shit, Ainsley. My family has problems, okay? Sorry breakfast was such a bummer.”
“No, man. That’s not what I said at all. Breakfast was great. And all families have issues.”
“Oh, really?”
He laughs. “Are you kidding? My mom died when I was a toddler, and I was raised by four bachelors. There was a stripper at my eighth birthday.”
“They hired a stripper for your eighth birthday?” Gem chimes in, scandalized.
“No, no. She was one of my uncles’ dates. He swears he didn’t know, but you never can tell with those guys.”
I’ll be goddamned if the guy hasn’t made me feel better again. Jumped in with humor and distracted me from my own problems. If I didn't know better, I’d say he was doing it on purpose.
“I may not know what was going on in there, but I do know that most problems have at least something to do with money. So, if there’s ever anything I can do to help?— ”
“We don’t need your money.” The response is so automatic, I don’t even recall telling my mouth to speak the words.
He just shrugs, fully expecting me to say that. “I’m just saying. If there’s ever a reason to use my family’s mostly unearned fortune for something good, I’m here for it.”
The world in front of my eyes threatens to fade to black as I consider what he’s saying. That this guy could write one check, or make one phone call, and everything that I’ve sacrificed my life for would just be taken care of. Just like that. The unfairness of it all turns to bile in my stomach.
“Pass.”
He offers another carefree shrug.
Maybe I will actually punch the guy.