17. Will
WILL
My father was already seated at a table when I arrived, a glass of chardonnay clasped in his long, slender fingers.
He wore dress pants and a light blue collared shirt, with not three but four buttons undone.
I shivered at the sight. Apart from being too skinny, he looked perfectly normal, not at all like a man with only months to live.
“Do you have a reservation?” the hostess asked. She looked to be about fifteen and wore the same the-world-is-a-wonderful-place smile that always graced Theo’s lips.
“I’m just meeting my dad.” I nodded toward his table, which sat in front of a large, open window. Her face fell in obvious disappointment. Clearly, she’d been expecting Andy. “Sorry. I’m the other son, Will.”
Her cheeks flushed red with embarrassment. “Right this way, Mr. Chapman.”
As we walked over, two questions tumbled in my brain like sneakers in a dryer: Why Derek and not me? Why give up and not fight?
My father stood. “The prodigal son re—”
“Don’t.” I held up a hand. “It’s okay.”
He sat back down, but didn’t take his eyes off me. We stared at each other for a long moment, then his shoulders slumped. “I see your mother has ignored my wishes, as always.”
“Yeah.” My shoulders fell, too.
“And what about Andy? Does he know?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
“Well, that’s something.” He poured me a glass of wine and forced a smile. “How was your drive?”
“Fine. Uneventful.”
“That’s good. I’m glad you made it safely.” He placed the bottle back in the ice bucket. “You’re looking well. I see Miles is taking good care of you.”
“I take care of myself.” Barring the occasional dinner out, I hadn’t accepted money or anything from my family in over four years, much to their chagrin.
“I know.” He leaned back and opened his menu. “This place is fantastic. You can’t go wrong. People come here from miles around.”
I looked out the window at the rolling fields, my gaze catching on two ravens cawing from a solitary apple tree. “I guess they’d have to.” There were probably more cows than people in this town.
“That’s true.” He laughed generously, which was off-putting. “I’m glad you’re here. You’ve always been my favorite scene partner.”
Rather than call bullshit, I swallowed another gulp of oaky chardonnay.
“Did you hear we got Amanda Brasel to play Emily, the girlfriend?” His gaze darted to my glass, which was already half empty. Ever since the bachelor party, I’d been drinking like a fish.
“That’s great. She’s really good.”
“Yeah, she arrived yesterday, same as you.” He stuck his aquiline nose in his glass and inhaled deeply, his silent signal to slow down and enjoy it. “She’s staying here at the inn.”
“Seems like a nice place.” I tore off a piece of bread and slathered it in herbed butter. Miles wouldn’t approve, but if there was a silver lining to the death of my comeback dreams, it was no longer having to live up to Hollywood’s body standards.
“I’m in the presidential suite. You should come up after dinner. Maybe we can run Friday’s scenes.”
“Sure, whatever.” I washed the bread down with more chardonnay and left a smear of butter on the rim of my glass.
“More?” He lifted the bottle from its ice bath. “I’m not drinking myself. It’s not allowed. But I still like to have a glass with dinner.”
I wiped my mouth with my napkin. “How are you feeling?”
“Okay. They’ve got me on some fantastic drugs. Don’t tell Enrique, though.” He swirled his wine and inhaled again.
I buried my face in the menu. Who was I kidding? I couldn’t ask Dad a real question. What if he gave me a real answer?
“I hear there’s a new man in your life. When do I get to meet him?”
Derek didn’t waste any fucking time. “Whenever you want.”
“You should’ve invited him to dinner. His son, too. Your mother must be ecstatic. Finally, a grandchild to spoil. I can’t imagine Nandi and Andy are in any rush.”
“Yeah, probably not.”
Andy’s fiancée, Nandini Dalal, was a celebrated model and actress. She was only twenty-two and likely not in any rush to test the boundaries of her perfect body.
“Derek tells me he’s quite the beanpole. The boy, that is.”
“Yeah, Theo’s tall and skinny.”
“Does he like cologne? I’ve got bottles and bottles of the stuff, and if I can save even one kid from dousing himself in that revolting Axe body spray, I can die a happy man.”
My face fell. “I don’t know. I’ll ask him.”
After the waiter left, my father abandoned idle pleasantries and got to work pretending to be helpful. “I’m sorry the meeting with Derek didn’t land the way we’d hoped.”
“Right.” He acted as if I’d been in on the plan.
Outside the window, dark clouds muscled their way across the horizon. My weather app was right. It was going to storm.
“Don’t let it get you down, though. Sometimes you have to go backward to go forward, and as soon as Sundowning comes out, everyone will see that the past is the past. You’re a gifted and talented actor.
” He paused as if he’d just said something profound and wanted the camera to linger.
“You belong on the screen. Never forget that.”
“It doesn’t matter.” I tore off another piece of bread. “How’s everything going? You ready to start shooting?” The best way to distract Dad was to get him talking about work.
My father lived his movies, every aspect of them, from the financing to the cinematography.
If he were playing a pilot, he would learn how to fly.
If someone in the restaurant needed emergency bypass surgery, my father was the man for the job because he’d once had a guest spot on ER, which, incidentally, he won an Emmy for.
By the time he rose to go to the bathroom, I was an expert on early-onset familial Alzheimer’s disease, rural Vermont dairy farming, and the glottal stop necessary for a proper Vermont accent.
My phone had been buzzing in my pocket all evening, so when my father left, I pulled it out, expecting a barrage of texts from Miles. Instead, I found messages from an unknown number:
How’s dinner going
Should I have a few shots ready
Theo is using your pull-up bar
I hope that’s okay
He wants to get swole for Ryan
This is your boyfriend btw
It looks like it might rain
Let me know if you need a ride home
I’ll come get you
The asshole ended with a kiss emoji followed by a mustache emoji. What a dick.
I texted back: Bourbon, please, and make it a double.
Dad insisted I get dessert. “The chef doesn’t make the pies.
The owner’s grandmother does, and not even a three-star chef can compete with a grandmother’s pies.
Don’t worry, I won’t tell Miles. Oh, that reminds me.
Does Andy know to give him his own invitation?
I think we all just assumed he’d be your date. ”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I’ll ask him.”
“I can do it.” Dad waved a hand. “I have to call him tonight anyway. I need to find out what kind of swans he wants for the wetlands photoshoot. Who knew there was such a wide variety? There’s the mute swan, which is what everyone pictures when they think of swans, but there are also black swans, whooper swans, trumpeter swans, tundra swans, and black-necked swans. ”
I ordered the strawberry-rhubarb pie, and it arrived with a scoop of vanilla ice cream just as the first flashes of lightning lit up the sky. A crack of thunder followed seconds later, and then the deluge came.
“I was right about the pie, wasn’t I?” Dad helped himself to a small bite. “You should order a few pieces to take home to Theo and . . .”
“James,” I supplied. “And that’s okay. They don’t need pie.”
“No one needs pie. That’s not the point of pie.” He added a bit of ice cream to his spoon.
I sighed and looked longingly at the empty bottle of chardonnay between us. All that remained was the piss-warm swill in my father’s glass. Would it be rude to drink it?
“This guy you’re seeing, James, he must be fairly new on the scene. You’ve never mentioned him before.”
I stifled a snort. “Yeah, fairly new.”
“Ryan is disappointed, but with over a hundred million followers on Instagram, he’s got plenty of other—”
“You don’t even want to try?” My voice cracked. I didn’t want to talk about Ryan, who was only being nice to me for Andy’s sake. “It worked last time.”
His smile vanished. “It’s too advanced this time.
It’s already spread to my liver and lymph nodes.
It might buy me a few extra months, but at what cost?
” He didn’t bother brushing away the tears sliding down his cheeks.
Just let them fall. “I want to spend what little time I have left with my family, doing what I love most: acting.”
I couldn’t speak. If I spoke, I might cry, too.
He set his balled-up napkin on the table. “Do you mind if we run the scenes tomorrow instead? I’m feeling a bit tired tonight.”
I looked at my half-eaten pie. I’d never wanted to run the scenes in the first place. “Of course. That’s fine.”
He forced a smile and placed his hand on mine, his skin cold and damp. “It will mean more if you earn it yourself.”
I tamped down the sudden bolt of anger in my gut. It was the same bullshit he’d spewed when I was a kid, telling me not to audition under the Chapman name.
“It doesn’t matter, Dad.” Sure, it was our last chance to star on screen together, but that was my dream, not his. He had Ryan and Derek now.
Another crack of lightning split the sky above the fields and the muddy dirt road. “It looks pretty nasty out there. I’ll have someone give you a lift back to your mother’s.”
“That’s okay. James is going to pick me up.”
I said goodbye to Dad on the stairs and walked straight into the bar.
Derek found me two hours later and pried the glass of whiskey from my fingers. “Let me give you a ride home.”
“I can walk.” I attempted to stand, but my legs were tingling, and I collapsed into Derek’s waiting arms. “I just have to get my sea legs.”
“My Jeep’s right out front.” Derek turned to the bartender. “Put it on my tab, okay?”
We were both drenched by the time Derek hoisted me into his Jeep and fastened my seat belt.
“You know about your dad now, don’t you?” Derek started the Jeep, but the windshield was too fogged up to drive.
“You mean about him dying?” I wasn’t sure if I was crying or if it was the rain.
“I thought so. I could see it in your eyes this morning. How are you holding up?”
“I’m fine.” How could I be anything but fine? I wasn’t dying.
“Your stepson is quite the character. He kind of reminds me of you.”
“Why, because he’s a stalker?” The words were out before I could stop them.
“No, because he’s fearless.”
I couldn’t see the scar because it was on Derek’s left eyebrow, but I could picture it, thin and white. “Why did I do it?”
The windshield was clear now, aside from the rain and wipers, so Derek put the Jeep in gear, and we pulled out of the parking lot. “It doesn’t matter, Will. You’re more than one drunken night. We all are.”
The world began to spin, and I felt like I might puke, so I closed my eyes. When I opened them, Derek was unclipping my seat belt.
“Let me help you out.”
I pushed his hand away. “I got it.”