Page 83 of Act Like You Don't Care
He didn’t even look around, just stood there in the middle of the room with his arms wrapped around his torso and a terrifying frown on his face, bouncing lightly on his toes like he was warming up for a race. It looked like the standing version of that leg jig of his, when he was starting to feel anxious.
“We can still leave,” I said gently.
He shook his head and, with an effort I could plainly see, forced his body to relax. “No. This is the baby’s aunt, right? I can’t avoid her forever.”
“Yeah, but this isn’t great timing either.”
His eyes lit up. “Let’s blame the stalker. His timing sucked too.”
I chuckled, not so much because it was funny but to let him know that I could see he was trying. “Maybe we should have a safe word or something. When it gets to be too much, just say pumpernickel and I’ll whisk you out the door.”
He laughed, ducking his head uncharacteristically, then raising it to finally look around the room. “So this is where you grew up?”
“My teenage years,” I said, not seeing the memories until he brought them to my attention. “We lived on the other side of the boulevard before that.”
He nodded and strolled around the room. There wasn’t much of me left here—most of it was packed away in storage. But there were a few pictures of me from high school boxing and from martial arts competitions. A couple of medals. Some of the books I’d read back then. Even at that age, my interest in psychology was plain, I was amused to note.
Tam ran his fingers over it all but didn’t pick anything up. Taking the temperature of the room, I suspected, assessing the space for the shape of the person who had occupied it. Kind of the same thing I did with the case files that came my way.
Movement around the door caught my attention, but it was just my mother. “The meal’s almost ready,” she said in a normal voice, then, softer, “I’m sorry, they just showed up.”
Tam glanced at me and shrugged. “It’s okay,” he said. “I’m kind of used to it.”
An expression of sympathy spread across Mom’s face. “Still, this wasn’t the plan. I hope you’ll believe that.”
He smiled at her, a hint of mischief in his eyes. “I believe Miles’s reaction when he saw his brother.” The smile faded and he said earnestly, “It’ll be fine. I’m sorry that there’s been so much upset.”
Ma shook her head. “Life happens, mostly when you’re focused on other things. I made you some plain chicken, but there’s some grilled too, in case your stomach is up to it. Miles said you’ve been queasy.”
“Yes. Thank you.” He waited until she was gone before he turned to me. For a moment, I thought he was going to walk into my arms for comfort and I held my breath for fear of breaking the mood, but then the feeling faded and he simply said, “We should go out and brave the family, I guess.”
I nodded dumbly and reminded myself that I had no right to be sad right now, then led him back to the dining room.
Tam
As nervous as I had been arriving, I ended up liking Miles’s parents. A lot. I hadn’t really gotten to know them during the whole stalker thing but today they seemed kind and interested and asked me questions about me, not about my work or who I knew. Even Miles’s brother Jim, with his occasionally biting humor, was okay.
I tolerated Jim’s wife for Miles’s sake. And because I felt kind of sorry for her. I’d met similar people, most recently the guy at the party where I’d broken up with Miles. Beautiful, with just enough talent to get work, but a one-trick pony who hadn’t figured it out yet. If she could find a TV series where she could play that kind of character, she’d be okay—at least until the series was canceled. I spent most of the meal answering pseudo-casual questions about my work and contacts and wondering how to explain to her that her desperation and hunger were showing through her attempts at nonchalance and how bad that would be for her career. I also wondered when she’d get the hint that I wasn’t going to bring her to work with me and force someone to hire her.
Honestly, if she hadn’t married Miles’s brother, I kind of wondered if she wouldn’t have ended up as an escort eventually.
She was chattering on now about a general call she’d just done for a daytime soap and I was listening with only half an ear, concentrating on the bland chicken in front me and trying to remember not to press my leg up against Miles’s under the table. If we’d been together, I would have been playing all sorts of games with him under the cover of the tablecloth to take the edge off the stress of the evening.
We weren’t together, though. So I behaved, for both our sakes.
Would she ever stop talking? I wanted to ask Miles’s father about guns and his mother about that book series that Miles was named for. And Miles… He was getting snappy, trying to redirect the conversation, but you couldn’t redirect a bulldozer. Someone was going to have to say something. But who would break first?
I debated using our safeword, though how I was supposed to work the word pumpernickel into the conversation I couldn’t imagine. We should have picked something easier, even if it was originally just a joke.
“So, do you have any projects lined up for after Wirechild, Tam?” Odette asked brightly.
“A couple,” I said neutrally. Summer had found me a short guest stint on a popular animated TV series. Something to fill in the last few months before the baby came, without tying me into anything long-term. I hadn’t been sure about it—still wasn’t, to be honest. Most of my roles were dramatic or action. I was a little uncomfortable with the comedy and the idea of this character directly poking fun at me. “A guest role on The Witherspoons, then I’m taking a couple of months off.”
Time off—my mind went spinning off into the future. Miles and I hadn’t talked about this yet, about what things would look after the baby came. I was going to need a couple of months to get back into shape after the birth. After that… well, I didn’t know. Summer and I were looking at things.
“Oh, The Witherspoons!” Odette exclaimed, dragging me abruptly out of my daydreams. “I love that show! I always wanted to play a role on it! Was it hard to get in to talk to them? Who should I be calling?” She smiled brilliantly in my direction, but there was something frantic in the lines of her face.
“I really couldn’t say,” I told her, my voice sharpening with an irritation I immediately regretted. I softened my voice as I explained, “My agent hears about ideas and she shows me things that I might be interested in or will move my career in the direction I want it to go in. That’s what yours should be doing too.”
