The Cornerstone (15 page)

And I had an event that weekend. Or, more precisely,
Sam
had an event that weekend. He was arguably one of the most talented, sought-after young architects in the region, and he was in constant demand for speaking engagements and conference appearances, not to mention the awards that came his way. But he hated it. He did everything to wiggle out of attending, and when he did, it was because I was dragging him.

Maybe this was a good time to change that routine.

“Sam…” I searched my notebook for the Architecture Society of New England’s invitation. I couldn’t remember whether it was black tie, and if I was bailing on him, I was at least going to remind him to get his tux pressed. “I can’t go with you to the ASNE event in November.”

Patrick:
When you said ‘move on’ I thought that meant we were moving on

Patrick:
Didn’t realize we’d be kicking hornets’ nests…

Shannon:
Shut up

“And where will you be?” Sam asked.

I murmured, “It’s personal. If you need me to find someone to go and hold your hand, I will, but don’t pout over it.”

Patrick:
I needed him to work on a flow issue with the Castavechia restoration

Patrick:
Now he’s going to spend the day being petulant

Patrick:
Well done.

Sam snapped his laptop shut and stood, and his chair crashed into the brick wall at his back. “You’re being a dick, Shannon,” he called.

We listened as he stormed down the stairs, and the table was silent until Riley burst out laughing. “He’s such a fucked-up diva,” Riley said.

Matt leaned back in his chair, one arm crossed over his chest. “What are we doing about this? I think it’s obvious that he’s not doing well, and I don’t think we can sit here and watch it get worse.”

“We can’t drop him off at a psychiatric hospital. As much as I’d like to,” Patrick added under his breath. “Until he’s willing to admit he needs some help, all we can do is keep the boat from rocking.” He glanced over at me. “And not blow off appointments with him.”

“He shouldn’t have flipped out like that,” Riley said. “Sam blows off everyone else and gets away with it because he’s a tortured soul and creative genius. That elevator was coming down regardless of whether Shannon was in it with him. I want to hear more about the rest of his weekend. It sounded like a great time, and it’s fucking weird because he doesn’t do shit like that.”

“Exactly,” Patrick said.

“Go right ahead,” I said. “Report back.”

“I think it’s my turn to check on him,” Matt grumbled. “I’m giving him five minutes to get over his shit.”

“No, no,” I sighed. “I’ll deal with him. He wants to be pissed at me, so let him be pissed at me. And,” I continued, tapping Patrick’s arm, “I’m going to talk to him about that project. The restoration and remodel for the musician’s house. If that doesn’t blow his skirt up, I don’t know what will.”

“All right,” Patrick said, nodding, “everyone get back to work.”

There was a time when Sam was my best friend. We were inseparable, and when we weren’t together, we called and texted constantly. There wasn’t a thought that drifted through his mind that he didn’t share with me. He appointed himself my chief stylist and online dating coordinator, and was my primary brunch-and-open-house companion. He even invited himself to pedicures with Lauren and me on occasion.

But then Angus died last winter, and though it should have alleviated the pressure on Sam, it made everything worse. He pulled back, curling in on himself, and pushed everyone away by small degrees. He cut me off slowly, and at first, I didn’t think much of his absence at pedicure night or the shortage of text messages bitching about temperamental clients who deigned to challenge his ideas. Drinking and meaningless sex were his solutions to everything, and he plastered on a smirk that dared anyone to question his happiness. There were days like today when I was certain he wanted someone to pick a fight with him just so he could unleash some of the emotions building up inside him.

The thing about Sam was that he only understood through experience. No one could tell him how to grapple with his issues; he had to live them. And I was starting to suspect he needed to feel the cold stone of rock bottom before he’d be able to take a step forward.

That scared the shit out of me. Sam always required so much
more
. He was born premature, and struggled from his first breath. The universe wasn’t kind to him, hitting him with diabetes, immature lungs, digestive issues, plus the challenge of arriving too early, too small. Nearly four months passed between his birth and his first day outside the hospital. For the first years of his life, he spent nearly as much time in the hospital as he did at home, always fighting off infections or learning to control blood sugar spikes or evaluating his slow growth.

I was almost four when he was born. I was always helping my mother with something. Folding clothes. Cleaning up the playroom. Mixing bottles. Rubbing Sam’s belly when he whimpered in pain. My mother relied on me, and when she died, I was the only one who could care for my siblings, Sam in particular.

His rock bottom was far worse than that of Patrick or Matt. Those two could drink until they pissed pure whiskey and live to tell about it. That was why we were all hovering around Sam: we knew the fall was coming, and we knew it wouldn’t be a smooth landing.

Instead of parking myself at his side, I gave him time to cool off. I sent Tom to Sam’s favorite cold-pressed juice shop in Kendall Square to grab one of those horrid blends he and Andy enjoyed so much. He’d be hungry at some point, and then I’d deal with him.

*

Sam was hunched
over his desk, deep in his design when I stopped at his door later in the afternoon. The world quieted when he was working, and it wasn’t until I knocked on the door that he looked up and glanced at me over the frame of his glasses. “I come bearing gifts,” I said, raw pistachios and an old-fashioned glass bottle of swamp water in hand. “You have to be hungry.”

Sam stole a glimpse at the clock and nodded, beckoning me inside.

“I wanted to apologize about Friday. There’s nothing else I can say other than I’m sorry.” I set the bottle down, and dropped into a chair angled in front of his desk. “Carrots, honey, lemon, and celery. Andy said you were loving all things carrot.”

“Thank you,” he said. “I was going to stop for lunch soon.”

At four in the fucking afternoon?

“You can’t be skipping meals. I’m going to have Tom start placing a lunch order for you every day. You’re going to get yourself sick,” I said, biting back a surge of frustration. If I didn’t know better, I’d think he enjoyed the extreme bouts of hypoglycemia that followed his irregular eating.

“Save the nutrition lecture for another day, Shannon.”

Pick your battles. Don’t show up to every fight that sends an invitation. Lunch isn’t the hill to die on today.

“Fine.” I flattened my hands on my skirt and took a breath. “I’m sorry about the ASNE event. It’s the only event I’ll miss this season.”

“Actually, skip them all,” he said around a mouthful of pistachios. “I’m sure you have better things to do.”

I plucked a strand of hair from my hem and swallowed a grimace. If only Will was here to observe this exchange, he’d understand what I meant about family businesses involving much more than business. “Is this about Angus?”

“What? No. No, this has nothing to do with him, and if it’s the same to you, I’d rather we not continue bringing him up.”

“That sounds like it’s definitely about Angus,” I said.

“Shan, stop trying to psychoanalyze everything I say. I have a shit ton of designs to finish today, and I need to get my ass on the treadmill tonight, and then I’m going out. Thank you for lunch, but unless there’s something else, we’re finished with this conversation.”

I wasn’t leaving until he ate every one of those nuts, and the swamp water, too. “There’s one more thing. Something I hope will make you happy.”

My eye caught the framed snapshot from his desk, the one from the Boston Marathon finish line two years ago. I was in the middle, with Patrick and Matt on one side, and Riley and Sam on the other. Arms linked over shoulders, we leaned together, smiling. It was hard to process all the things that had changed since then.

Riley finished school and moved back from Rhode Island.

Matt met Lauren, and now they were married.

Angus died.

We hired Andy, and Patrick fell in love with her.

“Am I supposed to guess, or are you planning to say something?” he asked.

And I was here, as always, holding it together.

“It’s a good thing you’re cute, Sam. Otherwise I’d slap you upside the head for this shitty attitude.” I shook my head and flipped open my tablet. “I renewed your driver’s license for you. It will show up in a week or two. Oh, and I adjusted the automatic order for your replacement parts. When I went through the supplies at your place last week, it seemed like you were running low on infusion sets and insulin cartridges, but had enough skin preps and test strips for an eternity. Just let me know if you want more or less, or something different.”

Sam brushed the pistachio shells from his desk and glared at me, as if me keeping his life in order was a huge inconvenience to him. “Where were you this weekend?”

“I went away with friends.”

Just going to study my split ends while the runt attempts to interrogate me. No big deal
.

“Where?” he asked.

It’s sweet how he’s allowed to ask questions and I’m not. So sweet.
“Nantucket. I took the ferry.”

Sam arched an eyebrow. “Who did you go with? What did you do?”

He wants a story; I’ll give him a story.
“Simone and Danielle, and it was a regular girls’ weekend. Beach, brunch, booze. What else would we do?”

And he knew it was a story. I kept no secrets about disinterest in girls’ weekends, or my shortage of affection for my law school friends. The honest communication train ran both directions, and if he was locking me out right now, I was doing the same.

We’ll see how you like it.

“Why aren’t you sunburned?”

“Sunscreen,” I said with a shrug.

“Why don’t you cut the shit,” he said. “What is the purpose of this exercise, Shan? Does it not seem ridiculous that you’re keeping something from me? From all of us? And you do notice that you’re making a bigger deal out of it by lying about going to Nantucket, right?”

Kind of like how it’s ridiculous that you don’t talk to me anymore? Or you only take care of yourself when someone forces you?

“Since you have a busy afternoon, I’d rather get down to the reason I came in here,” I said. “We were approached last month by a real estate agent who was representing a very private client. Since the agent was absurdly vague about her client’s interests, Patrick and I decided not to engage.”

He blinked, annoyed with my deflection. “Okay.”

“The agent came back, saying the client really, really wanted to work with us. It seems the client saw the
Boston Globe
spread on the future of green restoration.” I motioned to where the freshly framed newspaper feature showcasing one of his projects leaned against the wall. Another reminder to get Tom on that project right away. “And the client insisted on working with you.”

“I don’t have much free time, Shannon,” he said. “And no offense, but I don’t have a lot of patience for dealing with agents.”

I bit back a quip about being the agent who put him through college. I needed him to take this project. It was the type of all-encompassing restoration that he adored. It would give him the meaning and focus he required to gain his footing again, and if it worked out the way I was hoping, I could put another pair of eyes on him at all times.

“Well, it gets better.” I toggled through a few screens on my tablet, then turned it toward Sam. “Turns out the client is Eddie Turlan, from The Vials.” I pointed to a picture of the punk band popular in the eighties.

I toggled to the street view map, and showed Sam the red brick house. Once he saw the gorgeous façade, I knew he’d fall in love. “They want you to design it, and they offered to go well beyond your standard fees.” I swiped to another screen, and handed the tablet to Sam. “Here’s the most recent communication from the agent.”

He read the email, his eyes widening when he saw the budget, and handed the tablet back to me. “I still don’t have time.”

“You could make time if Riley moved off Matt’s projects and started working with you.” Sam’s expression turned pained, and I held up my hand. Riley was the resident fuck-up, and he’d spent the past year and a half bouncing between Patrick and Matt’s projects as he refined his skills. Neither of them had any success in training him to consistently zip his pants. “I think you’ve argued with me enough today. Just listen. He’s come a long, long way in the past eight months, and you have to admit that.”

Sam grumbled out a sigh and I was taking that as agreement.