She nodded, smiling, opening her mouth to say something Nick guessed would have been a conventional greeting, and then her face crumpled. “Oh, God. God, this is --”
John cleared his throat. “Awkward? Aye, it is. And I’m John, by the way. John McIntyre. Pleased to meet you both.” He was so matter-of-fact about it that Nick felt a bubble of amusement, inappropriate, unexpected, and welcome, rise up. John clearly didn’t want to have to deal with another of Brian’s girlfriends becoming hysterical.
She blinked, what might have been a sob catching in her throat. “I’m Stacy. And, yes. Yes, it is.” She swallowed hard and took a step toward Nick, hugging him. “You look so much like him,” she murmured into his shoulder. The light, floral scent she wore surrounded him and he realized as his arms came up automatically to hold her that she was shaking. “Your eyes…”
He wasn’t sure if she was talking about Josh or Brian, but it probably didn’t matter. Nick let go as soon as she started to pull away. “I know you probably never expected to hear from me,” he said awkwardly. “And you probably wouldn’t have, if…” He glanced at Josh, who still looked solemn.
“Our father died,” Josh said. “In a plane crash. I cried. Did you?”
“No.” Nick wanted to be honest. “But I’m sad. I never really knew him. Maybe I would have gotten to know him, later, if he was still alive.”
“Why didn’t you know him?” Josh stared at him, wide-eyed. “I didn’t think anyone couldn’t know their daddy.”
He glanced at his mother for support and she tousled his hair. “You ask too many questions,” she murmured. She gave Nick and John a smile that seemed more relaxed now, as if Nick’s own nervousness had been reassuring. “Please; both of you, come in, sit down --”
She ushered them, not into a formal room, visible through an archway, all white and pale green, but the kitchen at the back of the house, sunny and welcoming, with a refrigerator serving as a memo board and gallery for Josh’s artwork.
“Coffee? Or iced tea?” Stacy asked, hovering between the coffee pot on the countertop and the fridge.
“Iced tea sounds great,” Nick said. Stacy opened the fridge and took out a tall glass pitcher and a small lidded glass container that proved to have sliced lemons in it.
Josh was watching from the doorway. “I got to stay home from school today,” he offered.
“I guess you did.” Nick hadn’t realized until then that it was mid-week; he’d lost all track of time, really. “Do you like school?”
“Sometimes.” Josh shrugged, fingers worrying at the bottom hem of his T-shirt, which had a cartoon drawing of a skateboarder on it. “I like math. But not reading.” He brightened. “I like recess best.”
Stacy gestured at Nick and John to sit at the table and set their glasses of tea down. John looked at Nick and widened his eyes slightly, jostling the bag he was still holding into Nick’s thigh until Nick took it.
“We brought you some things,” he said, glancing at Stacy for permission.
“Oh, you shouldn’t have,” she said automatically, her eyes softening. “He has so much --”
“Mom!” Josh came forward eagerly but hesitated, good manners preventing him from grabbing. Nick smiled and handed him the bag, Josh’s smile blinding.
“Oh, cool.” He began to stack his loot on the table. “Mom! It’s that new Gameboy game; the limited edition racing one! And, look, a whole set of Pokemon cards and…” He investigated the bottom of the bag and pulled out the soccer ball John had tossed in.
“Neat.”
“It felt wrong not to bring something,” Nick said to Stacy, apologizing.
“It was very nice of you,” Stacy said. Josh brought out a handful of candy that’d been for sale in the cash register aisle of the toy store -- mostly sour and in vividly bright artificial colors. “Josh?”
“Thank you,” Josh said, glancing up at Nick and then John. “A lot. This is so cool. I’m gonna get my Gameboy.” He darted out of the room, and Nick could hear the sound of his footsteps as he pounded up the stairs.
“That isn’t all we brought,” Nick said, slightly distracted by John at his side, who had taken a polite sip of his iced tea and was now manfully swallowing it without grimacing. He’d forgotten John’s views on tea that was cold and milkless and far too sweet.
He took the envelope out of his pocket and placed it on the table. “Brian won some money before he died. Some of it he had with him when he -- when the plane crashed, but most of it was back at his apartment.” He could see the questioning look on Stacy’s face and he hurried on, wanting to get this over with. “His, uh, his girlfriend collected it and, well -- this is Josh’s half.” He placed his fingers on the envelope and pushed it closer to her. “I know this is probably one of those things where everything should be done through legal channels, but John and I just -- we want to go home. I gave my share to Alicia and --”
“You did what?” Stacy rolled her eyes, her Southern accent deepening. It seemed clear she knew Alicia well enough to dislike her. Which could mean they’d met once in passing; Alicia tended to have an impact. “Now, I’m guessing that was
her
idea, right?”
“Aye, but it’s what Nick wanted,” John put in. “And it’s what Brian would have wanted, too.”
“How do you know that?” Stacy’s eyes were wary now, fixed on Nick. “I thought you hadn’t spoken to him for years. What’s going on here?”
Nick listened for the sound of Josh returning. “You don’t have to believe me -- you probably won’t, and I’m not sure I blame you -- but…I can talk to people. After they’ve died.”
Blinking, Stacy appeared to try to absorb that information. “You see dead people,” she offered.
“Exactly.” It wasn’t the first time Nick had heard it put that way, not since that movie had come out. “But I don’t just see them -- I talk to them. They tell me things; stuff they’ve left unfinished. And I try to pass that on to the people who knew them. Family, friends, whatever.” Stacy was watching him a little bit blankly, like she wasn’t sure what to believe. That was better, Nick thought, than her thinking automatically that he was some kind of crazy. “Josh should have this. Save it for when he’s older -- for school, or for when he wants a car or something.”
Stacy stared at the envelope, clearly pushing aside what Nick had told her as being irrelevant right then or too much to deal with. “That much?” She raked her fingers through soft brown curls, rumpling the careful styling. “God, poor Brian! He was always saying one day he’d hit the jackpot, and then when he does he dies before he has time to enjoy it. It’s just -- it’s just
him
, you know?” She blinked. “No, you don’t know, do you? I can’t -- I don’t know why he didn’t keep in touch with you. He was never all that good with kids, although Josh adored him because he always showed up with presents --” She smiled wryly. “Like you. But once you’d grown up…”
“I didn’t know where he was, even if I’d wanted to find him,” Nick said. “Which I didn’t. The last time I saw him was when I was…I don’t know, twelve or thirteen. Let’s just say I wasn’t impressed.”
Slowly, Stacy’s hand stole out and touched the envelope, her fingertips just brushing it like she was afraid it might bite. Then there was the sound of Josh’s footsteps on the stairs, and she picked up the envelope and slipped it into her purse, which was sitting nearby. She gave Nick an apologetic look which he completely understood. “He had his charms,” she said. “I’m sorry you never had a chance to know about them.”
“Me, too.”
Nick smiled at Josh as the boy came back into the kitchen holding something that seemed too small to be a video game player. “It needs batteries, Mom.”
“They always do,” John said. “You should have a charger, though, that came with it. Leave it plugged in overnight, and --”
Josh looked sheepish. “Yeah. I lost it when I took my Gameboy to the park, and Mom said --”
“You couldn’t have a new one for six months,” Stacy put in firmly, sounding, for all the magnolia in her accent, remarkably like Sheila. “And that the new batteries would have to come out of your allowance.”
John screwed up his face in sympathy. “And do you have any allowance left, lad?”
Josh sighed. “Yeah, I do.” He gave Nick a speculative look. “Want to walk to the store with me? I’m not allowed to go there alone and I
really
want to play my new game.”
Nick hesitated, not sure how Stacy would react to that, but she smiled tolerantly. “Would you? It’s only a few blocks away and he’ll keep on and on about it until I’m ready to scream.” She turned to John. “And maybe you’d like to keep me company? I’d love to hear about where you live.
“No, I do not,” John said with feeling. “And there’s no castle on Traighshee, but, aye, we’ve plenty of heather.”
Somehow, Nick found himself walking down the sidewalk with Josh bouncing along next to him. The boy was so full of energy it was almost astounding, he thought, trying to keep up with Josh’s rambling conversation about video games and the X-Box and something called, almost disturbingly, “butt bounces.”
“My mom wasn’t sure if you’d be nice,” Josh said suddenly.
“She wasn’t?”
“Uh-uh.” Josh turned around and walked backwards, watching Nick’s face. “She didn’t say so, but I knew she thought it.”
Perceptive.
“Moms have to watch out for their kids.”
“I know. She’s a good mom. She used to be sad about my father -- um, our father. But now she’s happy. My new dad makes her happy.”
“Being happy is really important,” Nick said. “Probably the most important thing.”
“You’re happy.” Josh sounded very definite about it. “On top there’s all this stuff…but you’re happy, right? Deep down happy?”
It was a strange way of putting it. On top? On top of what? Nick settled for nodding and giving a fairly bland reply. “Yes, I am. I live in a beautiful, peaceful place with someone I love. I’m happy.”
He let the memory of the island rise, his next breath of humidity drawn into his lungs almost a shock when he’d been remembering the cool, sharp taste of salt, sea air. For the first time in a while, he thought about how they’d left the island and what had happened just before. Michael was probably wondering how he and John were doing; if they’d managed to put what had happened behind them…
Josh kicked a small stone out of his way, the rattle of it against the sidewalk lost in the roar of a bike going by. It took Nick a moment to realize that he’d been asked a question. He turned his head and smiled down at his brother. “Sorry, Josh. What was that?”
“I said --” Josh shook his head, his eyes distant for a moment. “Never mind. I know.” He grinned, his face lighting up. “When we get to the store, I’ll buy you a popsicle if you want.”
“Does that mean you want me to buy you one?” Nick had never known much about kids before meeting John but he’d learned fast on the island, where there seemed to be a dozen children who called John “uncle”, although he was only related to some of them very distantly.
“You
are
a grown-up,” Josh pointed out.
Nick smiled. “And that means…”
“Duh, you’ve got more money than me.” A dog stuck its head unexpectedly through a gap in the hedge to their right and Josh stumbled; Nick caught his arm to keep him from falling, but the boy got his feet under him again and darted forward, hand outstretched, before Nick could do anything to stop him. “Good boy, Gizmo. Good boy. Good dog.” The fluffy brown dog’s tongue licked at Josh’s hand -- they obviously knew each other. “Mom says I can’t have a dog until I’m ten,” Josh explained, patting it on the head one last time before he started walking again.
“She doesn’t want to have to be the one taking care of it,” Nick guessed.
Josh nodded. “I would, though. I wouldn’t want the dog to be sad because it thought I didn’t love it enough to take care of it.”
“I guess,” Nick said, trying to keep up. “Do you have any pets?”
“A goldfish.” Josh pulled a face. “It just swims. It doesn’t care about anything but that.”
“It’s a simple life,” Nick agreed. “But boring.”
“Big time.” Josh shrugged, dismissing the subject. “What do you do? My dad -- my new dad -- he’s a doctor. He helps people, sick people. He makes them better.” There was another sidelong glance from eyes that gave Nick a little jolt of surprise because, yeah, they really were like his. “Do you help people?”
“Sometimes.” Nick thought about how to be honest without telling the whole truth. “I try to. I write things, sometimes. Articles for magazines. Now I’m trying to write a book.”
“Will it help people?” They paused outside the drugstore, standing far back enough that they didn’t trigger the automatic doors.
“I hope so.”
“Not just people who are alive?” Josh asked.
Nick was so shocked that he didn’t move, not even when Josh went into the store, leaving him standing there on the sidewalk. By the time he’d recovered enough to follow into the cool air-conditioned building, Josh was already standing in front of the battery display, hands on his hips as he looked for the right ones.
“How did you know that?” Nick asked quietly.
Josh unhooked a pack of batteries from the display and handed them to Nick as he dug through his pockets for some change. Nick let him; he wasn’t going to interfere with Stacy’s rules by paying for them himself, and he was too focused on what Josh’s answer was going to be, anyway.
“I…” Josh screwed up his mouth. “I was on the stairs,” he said slowly, carefully, as if he was testing the words. “I heard you and Mom talking. About what you can do.” He took the batteries out of Nick’s hand and began to walk toward the counter. “Pretty cool,” he threw back over his shoulder.
“You think?” Nick asked. “Hey, wait. You still want a popsicle?” What looked like a freezer case was over to the left.
“Oh! Yeah.” The boy lit up, suddenly appearing his age again instead of being so serious. “Do you want one? They have bomb pops. Hey, cool! Tongue splashers!” The vivid wrapper led Nick to guess this was one bright with artificial colors.
“I don’t want one of those,” he said. “How about that snow cone?”
Josh grabbed it. “They aren’t as good as the ones at the fair, but the bottoms get really syrupy.” He handed it over and they went to pay, Nick giving the cashier several dollars to cover the popsicles and letting Josh keep the change. “So can you?” he asked, as they stepped outside. “Really?”