Chapter 17 Eliana
ELIANA
cor·ked: /k?rkt/: adjective
The click of the door sounds like a period at the end of a sentence I never wanted to end.
I slide down the wall until I’m sitting on my crappy linoleum, still in my shabby little skirt.
I lace my fingers in my lap and look at them, half-illuminated by the migraine halo of streetlights through blinds.
They’re shaking, I notice, though whether from the wine, the oysters, or the sheer whiplash of the day I’ve had, I’m not sure.
I do what I always do when I’m feeling overwhelmed: I start inventorying. Lists are satisfying. Lists are safe.
Well, usually. But this list is full of bombshells and danger zones, one after the next. Because, even though it’s a bad idea, I can’t stop myself from listing all the things from tonight I know I’ll never, ever forget.
(1) Bastian Hale’s thumb caressing my throat as I swallowed Chilean Carménère.
(2) His laughter—real, authentic, honest-to-goodness laughter, un-self-conscious and unguarded—when Dante recounted the Great Lobster Bisque Fiasco of ’17, which involved fourteen gallons poured down a storm drain and somehow led to the police being called.
(3) Most of all, how the everpresent storm and steel left Bastian’s face, in a way I didn’t think it could. That’s what I’ll remember. That’s the taste that’ll stay simmering on my tongue, even after the lights go out.
Eighty-seven days left, I told him. Not ninety. Eighty-seven.
Then we’d better make them count.
What terrifies me most of all isn’t the disease that’s coming for me—though Christ, yes, of course the disease—but the sense that there are other things spiraling out of my control.
Things that can’t be contained in neat little lists.
Then we’d better make them count metastasized during that car ride home until it was a third thing in the car with us, a living, breathing creature whispering filthy little fantasies in my ear.
I kick off my shoes. They land with a thunk halfway across the room. He hugged me tonight. He did it without a second’s thought. His body just told him to do it and so he did, and I hugged him back because what else could I possibly do?
It occurs to me that I should quit. Not the job—I need the money and the insurance and besides, I’d never go back on my word. But I should quit this. Whatever this is. I can’t be getting loopy for a man like Bastian Hale.
He’ll ruin me in the end. It’s the only outcome possible.
My phone buzzes in my purse. Yasmin, of course.
YASMIN KAUR
BITCH WHERE ARE YOU??? You said you’d text after the investor thing
Home. Alive. Slightly drunk. Have you ever had shellfish?
Explain immediately or I’m coming over to interrogate you
He taught me how to eat oysters
That’s the dirtiest thing I’ve ever heard and you didn’t even mean it that way
I giggle, then tear up, then feel horror at myself because that’s an insane set of reactions.
But I am being insane. I am being weird.
Because I’m sitting on my floor, tasting phantom oysters, and wondering what would have happened if I’d been brave enough to ask what “this” meant when Bastian said “not this.”
But I already know what this is.
This is trouble.
Suddenly, my phone starts freaking out in my hand. I assume it’s Yasmin again, because Lord knows the girl has zero tolerance for being left on read, but when I glance down, I see it’s not her at all.
Elly baby please call me
It’s an emergency
I need you
WHERE ARE YOU???
This is your MOTHER
i could be DYING and you wouldn’t even know
I close my eyes and count to ten. Then twenty. The lingering warmth from the evening evaporates like wine left open too long, all the good flavors turning to vinegar. Then, with a sigh that comes from somewhere deep in my bones, I dial her number.
She answers on the first ring, which means she’s been sitting there with the phone in her hand, waiting. “Finally! I thought you were dead in a ditch somewhere.”
“I’m fine, Mama. I was at a work thing.”
“A work thing? At this hour? While your mother is having a crisis?”
I press my fingers to my temples, feeling the beginnings of a headache that has nothing to do with Chilean Carménère. “What crisis? Are you hurt? Is it money again? Because I already sent—”
“I can’t tell you over the phone.”
“Why not?”
“Because I need you here. I need my daughter.”
“Mom, I’m exhausted. Can’t this wait until tomorrow?”
“Oh, I see. Too exhausted for your own mother. Too important now with your fancy job and your ‘work things.’” She lets out one of her signature martyred sighs. “I should have known. You’re just like your father.”
There it is. The nuclear option that she’s never hesitated to detonate. Comparing me to the man who left us when I was three, who I barely remember except as an absence shaped like a father. She knows exactly what buttons to push because she installed them herself.
“That’s not fair.”
“I raised you alone, Eliana. Alone! Is that fair? I worked three jobs, destroyed my back, gave up everything so you could have a better life, and now, when I need you—really need you—you’re too busy with work things.”
I stand up, pacing my tiny apartment in my bare feet. The linoleum is cold and slightly sticky in places I don’t want to think about. “Mom, please just tell me what’s wrong.”
“I need you here. Tonight. It can’t wait.”
“It’s past midnight. I have work tomorrow at—”
“Work, work, work. That’s all you care about. But when I—”
“Okay!” I cut through her monologue before she can get a full head of steam. “Okay. I’ll come.”
“Really?” Her voice shifts immediately into a saccharine purr. “Oh, baby, thank you. I knew I could count on you. You’re all I have in this world.”
“I’ll be there in thirty minutes. I’ll have to get an Uber, or a— Shit, yeah, I guess an Uber. It’ll take— Just, hold on, okay? I’ll be there soon.”
“Drive safe, baby. I love you.”
“Love you, too, Mom.”
I hang up and stare at my phone. The warmth of Mermaid’s Purse is now completely gone, replaced by the familiar chill of duty and guilt and the exhausting dance of being Georgia Hunter’s daughter.
I grab my jacket and head back out. The hallway feels colder than it did five minutes ago. The stairs seem steeper. Everything that felt light and possible now feels heavy and inevitable.
You just can’t beat your roots. You can kick and scream all you want, but at the end of the day, they’re still there, keeping you stuck in the ground right in the place where you were born. Might as well save your breath and accept it.
When I push through the building’s front door, I stop short.
Bastian’s car is still there, idling at the curb. He’s sitting in the driver’s seat, staring at his phone like he’s having an argument with himself about something. The interior light casts shadows across his face.
He looks up when he hears the door. Sees me. Then he’s out of the car before I can figure out what’s happening.
“Everything okay?” he asks.
“Yeah, just… family stuff.” I hitch my purse higher on my shoulder, already doing the mental math on how long it’ll take to get to Mom’s place on the L at this hour. Do I have my pepper spray with me? It can get nasty on the train at night, especially for a single woman.
His brows furrow. “What kind of family stuff?”
I could demur. It would probably be better for both of us if I just insist everything’s fine, keep it light, keep it professional. But I’m tired, and the wine is still making me honest, and he’s looking at me with those eyes that see too much.
“Just my mom. She needs me to come over. It’s probably nothing—it almost always is—but I should check on her.”
Bastian’s already moving back toward the car. “Get in.”
“What? No. Bastian, you don’t have to—”
“Get in the car, Eliana.” He holds the passenger door open for me.
“This is kidnapping,” I protest. But I reluctantly let him help me into the seat.
He gets behind the wheel. “Where does she live?”
“Bastian, you really don’t have to—”
“Address, Eliana.”
There’s something in his voice that makes me stop arguing. I give him the address—way out in Humboldt Park, a solid thirty-minute drive from here. He puts it in his GPS without comment and pulls away from my building.
We drive in silence for a few minutes. The city slides by outside, transitioning from trendy River North to grittier neighborhoods. I sink lower in my seat with each passing block as I watch my two worlds collide in real time.
Then “Baby Got Back” comes on the radio.
We both freeze as Sir Mix-a-Lot enthusiastically declares his appreciation for substantial posteriors.
The contrast between the serious moment and the absolutely ridiculous song is so jarring that I snort.
Bastian’s mouth twitches. By the time we hit “My anaconda don’t want none unless you got buns, hun,” we’re both laughing—real, helpless, tears-in-your-eyes laughter.
“If you want, we can—”
“No!” I slap his hand away before he can change the station. “We have to commit now. It’s the law. No skips, ever.”
So we sit there, two adults in a luxury car, while Sir Mix-a-Lot waxes poetic about the female form. Bastian even drums his fingers on the steering wheel during “L.A. face with an Oakland booty,” which might be the most surreal thing I’ve witnessed in my entire life.
When the song ends, we’re both still grinning like idiots. But reality creeps back in as the neighborhoods continue to get rougher, the streetlights fewer and farther between.
“You don’t have to see this,” I say. “My life isn’t… It’s not oyster bars and Michelin stars.”
He flexes his fingers on the wheel. “I didn’t ask for a curated version.”
“I know, but—”
“But nothing. Unless you want me to drop you off and leave—”
“No.” That’s a little too fast and a lot too vulnerable, but I say it anyway. “I just… Don’t judge me for where I come from, okay?”
He glances at me sidelong. “We all come from somewhere, Eliana.”