Take This Man (19 page)

He
eased her qualms by enfolding her gently in his arms. “It’s good to see you
again.”

His
embrace warmed her. There was nothing sexual in it. It simply expressed
brotherly, comforting affection. “Thanks. You, too.” Elyse found it impossible
to say much more because her throat was clogged with emotion.

He
stepped back and gestured to the sofa. “Have a seat.”

Elyse
glanced at the large-screen television. Some movie with Keanu Reeves was on.
Matthew picked up the remote from the coffee table and muted the sound.

She
hitched the strap of her purse over her shoulder. “I can’t. I’ve got a cab
waiting—”

“Look,
I got you here under somewhat false pretenses,” Matt confessed. “I know you
came to pick up your stuff, but I was really hoping we could talk for a few
minutes.”

“I’d
like to, really, Matt, but I think I should get my clothes and go before Adam
gets back…”

Matt
blinked at her, confused. “He didn’t go anywhere. He’s here.”

Elyse’s
heart stopped, and a cold wave of anger passed over her. “He’s here? What’s he
doing, hiding?”

“He’s
in the bedroom. He’s sleeping.”

“Sleeping?”
Her eyes went wide. Her guts had been in knots since yesterday, but apparently
he had no such affliction. “Just taking a little afternoon snooze, huh?”

“Sleeping
it off. He got wasted last night, and made himself sick.”

“Really.
Wasted. Was he celebrating?”

“
No
.
Elyse, no. Ugh…” Matt groaned. “I’m fucking this up…look, please sit down for a
minute.”

“The
taxi—”

“Let
me take care of it. I’ll drive you back to wherever you’re staying.”

She
reached into her purse for some bills, but he waved them away and stepped
outside to settle with the taxi. When he returned, he sat in a faded armchair
and Elyse sank onto the worn old sofa. He gazed at Elyse, his hazel eyes full
of concern. The brothers looked a lot alike, but Matthew wasn’t afraid to let
his expression reflect his emotions. Adam’s face was like a door with a “Closed”
sign on it.

“My
brother’s always calling
me
dumbass, but he’s the one…” Matt shook his
head in frustration. “He really does care about you.”

“He’s
got quite the way of showing it.”

“He
can’t show it, that’s his problem. That’s why he got drunk off his ass last
night. He went to a friend’s house and passed out on her couch. She called me
this morning to get him home.”

The
she
hadn’t escaped Elyse’s notice. “Is this friend named Kim?”

“Yeah.
Kim. But nothing happened, besides him getting drunk.”

“And
you know this how? Never mind,” she said quickly, pissed at herself for even
caring. It wasn’t her business. She and Adam weren’t together. Damn it. When
was she ever going to stop caring?

“I
know because he wouldn’t do that. Not when he loves you the way he does.”

Elyse
blinked back the tears stinging her eyes.
God damn it
. If only it were
true. That Adam really loved her.

Matt
leaned forward in his chair, his hands on his knees. “Has he ever told you much
about growing up? What it was like?”

“No.”
She swiped at her eyes. “You know he doesn’t like to talk about that.”

“
Touchy,
feely crap
,” Matthew said, mimicking his brother’s dismissive voice and
facial expression.

Elyse
cracked a weak smile. “Yeah. He told me after your dad died, your mother had to
work a lot, and it was up to you guys to take care of things.”

“Right.
Then she got married again. He ever tell you about Don?”

“Your
stepfather? Well, I know he drank.”

“Yeah,”
Matt said. “Don was a drunk.”

“And
Adam hated him.”

“Hates
him. Still. Mostly because of the way Don treated our mother.”

Elyse’s
skin went clammy with dread. “He didn’t—”

“No.
He didn’t beat her. Don was a sponge. He couldn’t hold a job because of the
booze. Then he couldn’t get a job, and finally didn’t even bother to try. So my
Mom had to work two, three jobs to hold it all together. Don was useless. Total
waste of space. But my mother never even thought about divorcing him.”

She
bit her lip. “How long did it go on?”

“Well,
let’s see, I was ten and Adam was twelve when they got married. Adam moved out
of the house when he was sixteen. Did he tell you that?”

“No,
he never—how did he manage?” So young to be out on his own. Elyse’s heart ached
with sympathy.

“He
lived with different friends, here and there. We didn’t have any relatives to
go to.”

No
relatives. At least she had Grandma Wanda, as awful as she was. Why had Adam never
shared any of this with her?

Because
he didn’t want her feeling sorry for him. Because he didn’t want to sound like
a crybaby.

Because
he didn’t want her getting too close.

“That’s
kind of how our business got started, you know. We did yard work and odd jobs
to make some extra money to help out. Adam wanted to quit school at sixteen to
get a full-time job. My mother begged him not to.”

Elyse
closed her eyes. Had she known this years ago, she’d have loved Adam all the
more. Knowing now only made her heartsick and sad. It was too late to matter
anymore.

“Matthew,
I don’t see what all of this—”

“I’m
telling you this because I don’t think you really know my brother. That’s the
problem. He doesn’t let anyone get close enough to know him.”

Elyse
slumped against the sofa in defeat. Her posture encouraged Matthew to continue.
“All right.”

“Anyway.
Adam hated Don’s guts. They fought all the time—when Don wasn’t too drunk to
stand up, or wasn’t passed out somewhere. Adam begged my mother to dump him,
but like I said, she wouldn’t. So he left at sixteen. Six years later, our
mother was killed by a drunk driver. And I think Adam has always blamed himself
in some way.”

“That
makes no sense,” she murmured.

“No,
but…look. When Adam left home, part of him felt like he was abandoning our
mother. But I think he also felt she’d already abandoned him.”

“Because
she chose Don over him. And over you.” She understood abandonment. After all,
hadn’t Sunny abandoned her, leaving her in the less-than-loving care of Grandma
Wanda? Elyse knew how it felt to be shunted aside in favor of someone else, to
feel unimportant.

Matthew
nodded. “My brother and I have both been dealing with a lot of crap from those
days. It’s funny, but Adam was the one to point it out to me a while ago, when
I was having some problems.”

“You
have nothing to feel guilty about,” she told him. “Either one of you.”

“Guilt’s
a funny thing. It doesn’t always make sense. We both wanted to protect our
mother, in different ways. Adam left to spare her all the fighting, and I
stayed to try to make things better. But neither one of us was able to save
her.”

“But
it wasn’t your job to save her. She had choices.”

And
so did you
,
spoke a voice in Elyse’s head.

“I
don’t know what happened between you two. But do you think there’s any way the
two of you—”

She
shook her head. “I don’t know. I think we’ve hurt each other too much.”

“I’m
sorry to hear that.” His voice was soft, resigned. He got to his feet. “Well,
let me get your suitcase.”

“Actually,
I…I’d like to stay awhile and…” What was she saying? She paused a moment to
wrestle with her conflicted emotions. “You’ve given me a lot to think about.”

Matthew
understood she needed time alone to consider all he had told her. He smiled. “Stay
as long as you like.” He picked up the remote control and turned on the TV’s
sound. “I’ve gotta get going anyway. Somebody’s waiting for me.” He gave Elyse
a grin.

She
grinned back. “What’s her name?”

“Andie.”

“Oh.”
Andy? Something
had
changed since she’d last seen Matthew. At a bit of a
loss, she fumbled for the right response. “Nice.”

He
laughed at Elyse’s assumption. “Andie, short for Andrea.”

“Oh.
Well.” Elyse felt her face get hot and she laughed, too. “She’s a lucky lady.”

Matthew
shrugged. “I’m a lucky guy.” He walked to the front door then turned, thrusting
his hands in his pockets. “I hope I see you again real soon, Elyse. Bye.”

“Bye.”

He
left, closing the door quietly. She sat for a few moments, and then she pulled
her cell phone from her purse and punched in Jason’s number. She could have
texted him, but she really needed to hear his voice.

“Hello?”
The mellow tone of his voice calmed her.

“Jason?
Are you still—”

“No,
I cut the visit short. There’s only so much torture I can endure.” He sounded
tired. “I’m on my way back to the hotel now.”

“Well…I’m
still at Adam’s.”

“All
right.”

“I—I
don’t know how long I’ll be. It’s not fair, making you wait…”

“It’s
all right. I’ll be here. Are you two going to talk?”

“I
don’t know. I don’t know what to do,” she said. She hated this, feeling so
stupid, so unsure.

“You
do
know.” Jason was not about to let her wallow in self-pity. “There’s
no reason the three of you can’t live happily ever after.”

“Three?”

“You,
Vostek, and the cat.”

“It’s
not that simple.”

“Only
‘cause you’re stubborn as hell. Look, your job, your schooling, whatever—it can
all be worked out. You’re the only one who can decide if you love the man
enough to make it work.” Even through the cell phone, Elyse heard his heavy
sigh. “It would be awfully nice if
one
of us could have a happy ending,
Leelee.”

****

When
Adam awoke, the sun was beginning to set. Shit. He’d slept the whole day away.
Groaning as he flopped his legs over the edge of the bed, he sat up in
increments, holding his throbbing head to keep it from falling off his
shoulders. His stomach was sour, and his mouth tasted like a herd of buffalo
had walked through it.

The
last he remembered, he was lying on Kim’s futon, afraid to move his head for
fear of spewing the contents of his stomach all over the living room.

A
sodden lump, he was too big for Kim to maneuver, so she had to call his brother
to come get his ass. He vaguely remembered the two of them half-carrying,
half-dragging him out to Matthew’s truck, where Wash threatened to beat his
brains out if he puked inside. Adam had to ride the entire way home with his
head hanging out the open window, like a damn dog.

If
that wasn’t humiliating enough, he then had to listen to his pain-in-the-ass
brother’s lecture. It began as soon as Matthew got him home and heaved him onto
the bed.

“What
the hell is wrong with you?”

Adam
could only groan in response. He winced as Matt twisted off one of his shoes. “Ouch!
Watch it.”

“Aw,
shut up. Pussy.” Matt dropped the shoe and wrenched off the other even more
roughly.

“Hey!”
Adam tried to kick him.

“Ha!
Missed.”

“Shithead.”
Adam felt so lousy, he couldn’t even curse with conviction. He lay sprawled on
the bed, his arms flung wide.

“Back
atcha.” Matthew grabbed him by the shoulder and rolled him to his left side. “Lie
this way. In case you puke, you won’t choke on it.”

Adam
almost heaved then and there at that delightful image. His brother placed an
empty wastebasket near the bed. “You can hork into that.”

Adam
gagged. “Go ‘way.”

“What,
and miss all this? Hell no. Why, this brings back all those fond memories of
how Mom used to do this for Don. Remember? How he’d get stinkin’ drunk, and she’d
put him to bed all nice and cozy? And then she’d tell us ‘Ssshhh, be quiet, don’t
wake your stepfather. He’s
sick
.’”

A
red wave of rage pounded over Adam as he thought of all the ways their mother
coddled Don, protected him. He squeezed his eyes shut as if that could close
out the memories.

“Or
maybe you don’t remember,” Matthew went on. “You weren’t there that long, after
all.”

Adam’s
eyes snapped open but he was afraid to look at his brother. A heavy mantle of
guilt pressed down on him. It was true. He’d bailed on his brother and his
mother when things got tough.

He
was afraid of the anger, the blame he might see in his brother’s eyes. But
Matthew watched him stoically. “I never blamed you for that, and I don’t blame
you now.” His voice was low and raw. “But it’s time for you to stop running,
and stop pushing away the people who care about you. Me. Elyse.”