Lancaster Green Chapter 17
James knew he had made the right decision coming to Auntie Jules’s birthday party, but that didn’t make it any less overwhelming. He’d gone in with his gift, accepted a huge hug, then others as various family members gathered around to say hi, lied about his non-existent back pain getting better, and dodged a few comments about his gloves. Then he escaped out onto the porch, where he could breathe a little easier.
Gabriella wasn’t here yet. She got out of work in about an hour and had said she would come over straight from there. So if he could just hold on for a little while, he’d be alright.
“Hey.”
James looked up from where he was sitting on the porch swing, trying not to think about Polly Grace attempting to get into this house. Angie stood in front of him, wearing a heavy coat over a thin t-shirt. “Hi.”
“I saw that you got almost all gummies this time. You good?”
James laughed. “My doctor cracked down,” he said, running a hand through his hair. “My old lungs can’t handle all the smoking.”
“Want one?”
“Right now? God, yeah, but I can’t. I’m just going to stay a little longer and then I’ll just…go home,” he ended uselessly, as though Angie was really wondering about his plans after this.
“JAMES!”
Their cousin Manny came stomping up the porch steps and nearly pulled James to his feet as he hugged him. “Dude, your work is the freaking weirdest shit,” he said. “Gabs had me come in and inspect a demon house for her. What the fuck?”
“Yeah, thanks for doing that,” James said.
“Yeah, man, no problem. Hey, how’s your back doing? Almost ready to get your ass whooped? Me and Reese both have next Saturday off. Well, I mean, I do. Mister Big Shot sets his own fucking schedule now. But come shoot some hoops with us if you’re feeling up for it.”
“Um, maybe,” James said, as though that was at all a possibility.
He felt a little better as the night went on. Gabriella got there with a plate of cookies and he took one, despite the fact that he hadn’t been able to bring himself to even go near the tables stacked with food before now.
Celia, the girls, and Forester arrived as James was trapped on the porch in conversation with Uncle Paul. Paul interrupted himself to say hello to Celia and James took advantage of the situation to get away from the conversation and say hello to the girls, doing his best not to cry as they all hugged him.
“What’s wrong with your hands?” six-year-old Krissy demanded as she looked at his gloves.
“I just hurt them,” James lied as Penny, who he was pretty sure was now twelve, glared at her sister. “I’m fine, don’t worry.”
“Captain McManus,” Forester said with a wide grin under his bushy beard, holding a hand out to shake.
“We’re literally at my family’s house and you’re here on a date with my cousin,” James said as Forester crushed his gloved hand into powder with his grip. “And I’m not captain anymore. It’s James.”
“Jack, then.”
He turned to Celia, who looked like she had seen a ghost for a second. Then she smiled at him. “Hi.”
“Hey, Cel.”
She hugged him and something in the way that she gripped him made it crystal clear to James. She knew everything. He took a shuddering breath, torn between throwing her arms off of himself and running away, and staying right where he was and just bursting into tears on her shoulder.
Of course she knew. She was dating Forester. He was Foundation and the whole Foundation knew what had happened, confidentiality be damned.
Celia let go and her smile faded slightly as she looked at him. “James-” she started.
He shook his head. “I’m fine,” he said. “Um, how are the girls?”
“Uncle James, I have your ticket for the play,” Penny said.
“Great!” he said, forcing himself to smile. “That’s awesome, Pen, thank you.”
“Girls, how about you go say happy birthday to Gramma,” Celia said, still looking at James.
Baby Jenny was walking now. Not steadily, but she had her feet under her as Penny held her hand and steered her toward the kitchen. “How are you doing?” Celia asked.
She knew, she had to know. “Fine,” James lied.
He needed to get out of here or he was going to lose it. “Hey, can you tell your mom happy birthday again for me?” he asked. “I have to get going.”
“Already?” Celia asked, her face falling. “James-”
“Yeah, sorry. I just remembered-”
The front door opened and Gabriella and her mother came out, both holding plastic cups filled with red wine. “Gabs, I need to go,” James said. “I’ll see you tomorrow at work.”
She started to say something, but he rushed off the porch and down the row of cars lining the street. His was parked just off the grass, far enough away from the house that no one would be able to catch up with him. With shaking hands, he managed to turn the key in his ignition and hurry down the quiet road.
When he got home, Graham was there, reading one of his many psychology journals on the couch. “Hey, I didn’t expect you til later,” he said. “How was it?”
“Fine,” James said, going straight past him and into his bedroom.
He locked the door to keep it from popping back open, then collapsed onto his bed. What had he been thinking? Of course that wasn’t going to work. Celia looked scared of him for a second. She’d hid it well. But she’d been scared too, he’d seen it.
He stayed where he was, wishing for a joint if only so he could just go to sleep and forget about all of this. Then he heard Graham open the front door. He was talking to someone and seemed happy enough, so it was probably Madelyn stopping in on her way home from work. It was good that they had found each other. Something good from that shithole of an institution.
There was a knock at his bedroom door. “James?” Gabriella called, her voice muffled.
James sighed and stood up. He undid the lock and opened the door. “Gabs, you didn’t need to leave,” he said.
“I wanted to check in on you,” she said. “I can go back later. What happened?”
“Celia knows.”
“Forester didn’t tell her,” Gabriella said quickly. “But yeah, I guess she heard some people talking about it at a Foundation event. She told me after you left. She was worried about you.”
So they were gossiping about him at Foundation cookouts. Great. He was a fucking joke in the Foundation, just like all those goons who had hated him for calling them out for their fake training wanted.
There was another knock at the front door and Graham went over to answer. Celia was standing there with a large bag slung over her shoulder. James didn’t know that she even knew where he lived, but here she was.
“I’m sorry, Cel,” he said.
“What do you possibly have to be sorry for?” Celia demanded as she came over and dropped the bag. “I’m so sorry, James. I’m glad you’re okay.”
“I scared you,” he said.
“Oh my God, I was scared for you, you jerk,” Celia said. “James…”
He glanced over at Graham, who shrugged and then almost laughed as there was another knock at the door. This time it was Angie. “Who messed with you?” she demanded as she came in. “Was it Uncle Ritchie? I’ll fucking kill him.”
God, if Uncle Ritchie found out, James could just skip every family event for the rest of his life. He wasn’t sure what to do right now, but he was getting overwhelmed standing here in his bedroom doorway, surrounded by people who just wanted to help but couldn’t. And it didn’t help matters when there was another knock at the door and now Manny, his brother Reese, and their cousin Ricky were all there, tumbling into the apartment after each other.
“Dude, what happened?” Reese asked as though it hadn’t been months since James had seen him. “We heard you guys out on the porch and then you just ran.”
James ran a shaking hand through his hair. “I’m sorry, guys,” he said. “You didn’t have to leave to come check on me, I’m fine. Everything’s fine. How the fuck do you even know where I live?”
“Look, if someone messed with you, tell us. We’ll kick their ass,” Ricky said, as though he wasn’t the smallest one there. But maybe he could, who knew? “Was it the whole thing with your back? What happened?”
“Fine,” James said, suddenly fed up and desperate to be alone again. “No, it wasn’t my back, alright? My back is fine. I got mind-controlled. I was on a case, a woman poisoned me, and she controlled me for three fucking days. And I tried to kill my friends, including Gabriella. There, now you know. Now you can go.”
He was going to close his bedroom door and lock it, but he was frozen here. There might as well have been a spotlight on him. “Holy shit,” Manny murmured.
“Who was it?” Ricky demanded. “We’ll still kick their ass.”
He glanced over at Angie, whose face was set with anger. “I will fucking kill her,” she said.
“Please don’t kill anyone, Angie,” James said, his heart racing.
They should be leaving. Why weren’t they leaving?
“James, I brought some food from the party,” Celia said. “Want some?”
“She says some food,” Reese said, glancing behind them. “She brought a fucking duffel bag full of food. Hey, man, what’s your name?” he called over to Graham, who was sitting back on the couch.
“Graham.”
“Hey, Graham, nice to meet you. Listen, our cousin Celia over here – say hi, Celia – brought enough food to feed a family of seven for six weeks. I want you to come and help us eat some of it.”
“Right. And what’s her relation to Auntie Jules?” Graham asked dryly as James stayed in the doorway, stunned.
“Her kid, obviously,” Reese continued. “And half of this is Auntie Jules’s cooking.”
“I’m not saying no to that,” Graham said, getting up and coming over. “Bring it over to the counter.”
Celia and Reese followed Graham into the kitchen with the duffel bag and James looked at the others who were still there. “Come on,” Gabriella said with a smile. “Come out and eat with us?”
How was James going to go sit alone in his room after that? He followed Gabriella out to the now overcrowded kitchen, where his cousins were all talking over each other as they set out Tupperware, tightly wrapped plates, and what looked like one of Gran’s old ceramic bowls covered in aluminum foil. Reese hadn’t been kidding, the food packages covered the entire counter and spread onto the stovetop.
James eyed them. He was hungry, but could he trust this? The food hadn’t been the problem, he needed to just remember that the food hadn’t been the problem. So-
“That explains why you look like shit,” Reese said, opening cabinets at random until he found the plates and pulled one out. “Look at you, with that scarecrow-ass thing you’ve got going right now. Beating you at basketball wouldn’t even feel fair. Here, eat.”
Then, before James could say not to, Reese was dumping spoonfuls of everything onto the plate, piles of green beans, roasted potatoes, lasagna, seafood stuffing, and what might have been apple crisp merging in the center “Honest to fucking God, kid, you look awful.”
He pushed the plate into James’s hands and James looked down at the way the butter ran from the seafood stuffing and into the lasagna. “I mean, you don’t have to,” Reese said. “But…”
Then he was rifling through drawers, pushing Ricky out of the way until he found the one he was looking for and pulled out a fistful of forks. He dropped the pile on the counter, then handed one to James before turning to join the conversation his brother was having with Graham.
James sat down at the table and looked around. He was overwhelmed by the press of bodies in his apartment, but also just by the fact that they had stayed. Celia set down two waters, then sat down on the other side of the table while Gabriella and Angie brought their plates out onto the patio and the guys all moved toward the living room with Graham.
James hesitated over his plate, aware of Celia’s eyes on him. Then he took a small bite of apple crisp, staying far from where it was merging with the seafood stuffing. It tasted good, but he couldn’t bring himself to eat another bite, instead just taking a sip of water.
“Do you need to get back to the girls?” he asked.
“My mom and Jack have them.”
“Jack, huh?”
She smiled and shrugged. “I wasn’t expecting it,” she said. “But yeah, Jack.”
“How did that happen?”
“It was when he went home with us to make sure the house was fine,” Celia said as James picked up a green bean and took a tentative bite. “We ended up talking all night and just kind of…clicked. We didn’t get together right away, but we stayed in touch and just kept finding excuses to text each other. He came to check in a few times, I kept convincing him to stay for supper. And then I guess we both just kind of realized that what we were looking for was staring us in the face, so why bother fighting it?”
He wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to trust that feeling again. He hadn’t fought it, he hadn’t even known that fighting it was an option. But he smiled at her, hoping it looked real. “I’m glad,” he said. “He’s good to you?”
“Amazing.”
“Good,” James said, attempting to take another bite of the green bean before giving up. “And Penny’s show is coming up?”
“Yeah. She’s so excited. I think she might do a drama program at the school this summer too.”
“That’s great.”
“I know you said you’d be there, but if it’s too much-”
James held up a hand. He had promised Penny he’d go to her performance of The Wizard of Oz. He was going to keep that promise.
“I’ll bring her flowers,” he said.
Celia looked like she was about to say something else, but then shouting erupted from the living room. “Celia!” Manny called. “Hey, settle a debate for us.”
“Like I have nothing better to do,” Celia muttered, but she was laughing as she stood up and walked out of the room.
From behind the closed balcony door, Gabriella turned and caught James’s eye. She smiled and he smiled back, setting the green bean back on his plate.
