Page 3 of Almost Paradise

“You can’t run off like that, Carter. Come on. You want more cake?” the older boy asks. He’s holding Carter in his arms bridal style, while he wiggles around like a fish. I wouldn’t be surprised if he flails out of the older kid’s arms and falls on the floor.

I don’t know why I do this, but I stand, ready to act in case I need to run across the room and rescue the kid.

“Video game,” Carter says, his voice loud and clear. It’s only when the older boy puts him down and they run to one of the games that I let out a breath of relief. Realizing that I’ve given this kid enough of my time, I turn back to the bar. On my best day, I don’t like kids. They are loud, messy, and demand too much time and attention. Time I’d rather devote to keeping my father’s legacy alive and to expanding Paradise Construction to Canada and beyond.

“You got a menu?” I ask the bartender. “Forget the menu. I’ll have an order of buffalo wings and a personal-size pepperoni pizza.”

He gives me a firm nod and taps something on his computer screen. The last thing I want is to eat at a place like this. I don’t eat junk food or processed food. I have a personal chef that cooks for me every day. I have him send me lunch while I’m at the office. I’m a stickler for what goes inside my body. I work out too hard to let that go to waste by eating crap, but I need some comfort food today. One bad meal won’t have much impact, if any.

The past few months have been a shit show in my private life. My father got sick and died within months. My mother is not processing his death and is acting as if he’s only away on a business trip. Before he got sick, there was a weird distance between us. The day he died, I spent the entire day at his bedside. He had hospice care at home, and I sat there and held his hand.

I’m the strong one in the family. I don’t know when or how I was assigned that role, but it’s mine. My mother was falling apart and talking nonsense.

“He’ll be better when we go for a visit to our house in Honolulu,” she had said. I remember locking eyes with my sister Hannah and shaking my head in disbelief. “You know how much he loves the beach. I love Boston, but the weather here leaves a lot to be desired.That’s probably what’s wrong with him. He needs sun.”

It was November in New England. Of course, the weather wasn’t great. Earlier that day, it had rained, and the late autumn leaves were like a blanket on our sprawling estate. While my mom was acting irrationally, my brother was passed out drunk somewhere in the big house while my sister dealt with the hospice nurse, and I made funeral arrangements behind my mother’s back.

I remember holding my dad’s hand and waiting for him to say what he had been trying to say all day. I knew my dad. I knew his ways. He wasn’t one for idle chitchat. Not even in his last hours. His words always meant something, and he tended to get right to the point. He opened his mouth several times as if to speak, but the words never came.

It was after nine when I left to go home. My house is on the property and less than a quarter mile away. I was barely there an hour before my sister called saying Dad was asking for me.

“Just come in the morning, honey,” Mom said. “He’ll be back to his old self by then.” It’s as if she refused to understand that Dad was terminal and wouldn’t likely live for another week.

I remember running across the massive property and sliding in through the back door. I took the back staircase three at a time. His eyes were wide open when I got there. I grabbed his hands, which were ice cold, and waited for his words. Words I was sure would be his last to me.

“I’m sorry, Drakey,” he managed to croak out. Dad never apologized. Not once in my life had I ever heard those words coming from him. I don’t think he ever apologized to my mother. “I thought I was doing the right thing.”

Dad also never talked in circles. He wasn’t getting to the point, and that put me on edge. That worried me.

“It’s okay, Dad. What did you think was the right thing?”

He squeezed my hands and lifted them to his mouth, kissing the backs of them. Dad never kissed me as a kid. The only child he kissed was Hannah. It was always a kiss on the forehead for her and a firm handshake for me and my brother.

“I—” The rest of the sentence never came. He took a deep breath that turned into a wheeze. He had a coughing fit and the nurse rushed in. Ten minutes later, he was pronounced dead.

The bartender drops a steaming basket of wings and a pan pizza in front of me. Normally the sight of something like this would make me queasy, but today, it makes my stomach growl and my mouth water in anticipation.

“I’ll have another beer,” I tell him.

He gives me a curt nod. I like this guy. There is nothing more inane and annoying on this earth than pointless small talk.

“Fuck.” I burn the roof of my mouth with the hot cheese on the first bite but it’s not enough to stop me from taking a second. The bartender hands me my third beer just in time to cool my burning mouth.

I decide I’m going to eat all this terrible food and enjoy every bite. I don’t even care about ruining my white shirt. I’m sure I have about a hundred at home just like it.

“Carter? Mason? What are you guys doing out here?” The buffalo wing stops halfway to my mouth when I hear that voice.Hervoice. The voice I’ve been hearing in my head since she left.

Despite the comfort I’ve gotten from Scarlett since my father was diagnosed, it wasthisvoice that I longed to hear.

It can’t be. I haven’t heard that voice in about four years. Not since she left me and took my heart with her.

My appetite for food disappears, and in a moment, I’m reminded of everything we once shared. I refuse to turn around. This is just my imagination. She’s not here. Thoughts of her would not leave me when my father got sick, and they haven’t stopped since he died. She’s even found her way into my dreams. This is just my mind playing an awful, sick joke on me.

“Sorry, Aunt Nia,” the older boy says, and my stomach sinks to my shoes.

Nia. That’s her name. This can’t be happening today of all days. Not on the three-month anniversary of my father’s death. I need to be around people who care about me, not her. “You know how Carter likes it when I chase him, and he got distracted by that game.”

“Carter, you can’t do that here, okay, sweetie?” Nia says. It’s definitely her. After all this time. I was fine with never seeing her again after the way she ended things, but the universe is always messing with me. “There are too many people around. We don’t want you to get lost,” she chastises. Yeah, that’s her. That’s the voice. I’ve been obsessed with it since I first laid eyes on her over four years ago. Well, first it was her face. Then her body. Then it was her voice. After that, it was everything about her.

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