McGee had arrived.
“I was beginning to wonder,” Michael Boni shouted, as if over the clamor of a lunch-hour rush. And then something changed in his expression, a sour, unpleasant look of surprise.
McGee wasn’t alone. Behind her, emerging cautiously from the alley, was a tall, pretty blonde.
“Who the fuck is this?” Michael Boni said.
McGee gestured for the girl to follow. “A friend.”
McGee betrayed no reaction to the place, but the tall, pretty blonde was glancing around the dining room with her jaw set at an unpretty angle. Darius had seen her once before, through the glass of his guard booth. Just like on that night, she was following a step behind McGee, as if tethered by a string.
Michael Boni slid over to make room for McGee. Darius did the same for the pretty blonde. She gave him a faint, mechanical smile out of the side of her mouth.
“We haven’t been introduced,” Darius said, offering his hand.
“April.”
He tried not to be offended that she shook so warily.
Constance had been watching silently, as if waiting for something to happen. Now, with everyone settled, she threw a kitchen towel over her shoulder and retreated to the back room.
Michael Boni was still looking cross. “Is there anyone else you two are planning to invite without telling me?”
“Relax,” McGee said, slipping out of her coat.
April raised her hips and slid a phone from her back pocket, lowering her eyes to the screen. “Don’t let me interrupt.”
Michael Boni looked as though he was going to say something in response, but then he turned to McGee instead.
“It’s fine,” McGee said. “I’m listening. I’m here. Let’s get started.”
Michael Boni reached for the coffeepot, taking his time pouring a cup. Now everyone was waiting for him, which was how he seemed to prefer it.
His cup full, he slapped a notepad onto the table. “I drew a map.”
McGee was quick to grab it. She spent a moment looking the drawing over. “There’s another entrance here.” She pointed to a spot. “More out of the way.”
Then Michael Boni was staring at Darius, waiting for him to take a look. To say something, to have some sort of opinion. But from where Darius was sitting, the map was upside down. He tried turning his head. But even if everything had been right side up, he doubted he would’ve been able to make any sense of it. The place was too distracting. Plastic grapes dangled from the partition behind Michael Boni’s head, making him look as though he were wearing giant purple earrings. Across the room, a small, duct-taped fish tank lined with pink and blue gravel sat beneath a sign that said SKATES SHARPENED WHILE YOU WAIT.
“Well?” Michael Boni said.
“It’s fine.”
“That’s all you’ve got?”
Darius leaned forward, squinting into the far corner of the dining room, at something half hidden behind a pile of boxes. “Is that a barber chair?”
April glanced up from her phone and looked to where Darius was looking. “I think so.”
“Can we focus on this?” Michael Boni said, tapping his finger on the map. “Can we leave the decorations for later?”
From the kitchen came the clanging of pots, the scent of onion and garlic sizzling in oil. Darius wondered how long it took to make a stew. A slow simmer, a low flame?
“What time is it?” he said.
Michael Boni frowned. “You have somewhere to be?”
Darius could think of a lot of other places he’d like to be. Unlike the rest of them, he’d been up all night working. Grabbing one of the mugs, he poured himself some coffee. Most of all, he would’ve liked to crawl into bed. That’s where Sylvia was. Shawn and Nina, too. That was where all the sensible people were.
“How’s the bread?” April asked quietly in Darius’s direction, tucking her hair behind her ear.
“Delicious.”
And Violet would be in bed, too. But that was an image Darius tried to wipe from his mind. He’d been trying to wipe it away for a long time now.
Michael Boni and McGee had drawn closer on their side of the table, elbows touching as they bent over the map. Darius hadn’t been wrong about the two of them. They really were meant for each other.
April plunged the serrated edge of the knife into the crust, like a handsaw hacking through wood.
Michael Boni looked up, not bothering to hide his irritation.
April continued sawing until the bread tumbled free. “Oh,” she said, “am I interrupting?”
“Yes,” Michael Boni said.
“It’s fine,” McGee said. “That’s why it’s there.”
The crust ground beneath April’s straight white teeth. “So what’s it going to be this time?”
McGee glanced up distractedly. “Hmm?”
“What are you demolishing this time?” April said, tearing off another hunk. “There was what — the shoe place, the supermarket, the …”
“Jazz club,” Darius offered, and April thanked him with a tip of her crust.
“We can talk about it later,” McGee said.
April leaned across the table, peering at the notebook page. “I want to talk about it now.”
McGee tried to put on a patient smile. “You said before you didn’t want to know.”
“I changed my mind.”
“If you want to help,” McGee said, “great.”
April looked from McGee to Michael Boni. “Help do what?”
“Isn’t it obvious?” Michael Boni said.
April focused in on him. “Blow shit up?”
Michael Boni spent a moment sourly exploring the gaps and grooves of his teeth. “There’s more to it than that.”
April shrugged. “From the stories in the paper, I really couldn’t tell.”
Michael Boni turned to McGee. “Is she always like this?”
“No,” April said before McGee had a chance to answer. “I’m trying something new.”
“This has nothing to do with you,” Michael Boni said.
McGee reached out and put her hand on April’s slender arm. “I explained it to you.”
“But why ?” April said, pulling her arm back toward her lap. “That’s what I want to know. This isn’t you. You don’t just destroy things.”
“Have you been outside?” Michael Boni said. “Have you looked around?”
McGee nodded. “It’s already destroyed.”
“But this?” April glanced around the restaurant. “Is this what you want instead?”
“Why not?” Michael Boni said.
“It’s still ruins.” Darius said, the sound of his voice surprising even himself. “It’s just ruins made into something else.”
“What did you expect?” Michael Boni said. “Skyscrapers?”
Darius had never stopped to put it into words, but yes, he supposed he did. And why not? This place certainly wasn’t what he wanted. Castoffs, scraps, leftover trash from businesses that had failed or fled or gone up in flames. How could McGee and Michael Boni not see how depressing this was?
“It’s just nerves talking,” McGee said. “Stress.”
Darius took a slow sip of coffee. “It’s been a long time since I felt this calm.” He turned to April. “How about you?”
“I feel fine.”
Darius turned to McGee and Michael Boni. “We feel fine.”
In a whisper, April said, “Maybe it’s the two of you feeling nerves.”
Now Michael Boni was glaring at Darius. “You’ve known all along.”
Had he? He was no longer sure. All he’d ever really wanted was to be a better sort of person, the sort of man who provided for the future, who fixed what was broken. Above all else, he’d wanted to stop being weak. But what would Sylvia say, he wondered, if she were to see him in this dump, surrounded by these characters? Would she see the new man he’d been trying to become?
They’d known each other more than thirty years. All the way back to elementary school. No one believed them when they told the story, how he and Sylvia had grown up on the same block, identical adjacent buildings, apartments on the very same floor, rooms in the very same corner. But they’d been kids; they’d thought everything worked that way. And how one day when they were eight years old, they’d smuggled rulers home from school, and in their separate bedrooms they’d measured the exact same spot on the exact same wall, and there they’d drawn a circle, and into that circle they’d pretended they could talk to each other. Into that circle they could say whatever they wanted, could share their every secret. This went on for years, until over time they gradually forgot, the circles eventually fading. But by then Darius and Sylvia were inseparable, no longer needed their imaginations.
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