Yield (8 page)

The majority of her jewelry contained some musical instrument. It had started all by chance, her jewelry designing. Her knotted bracelet had been her first and pretty much only thing that didn’t have music associated with it. She had found a guitar string lying around and she had begun to play with it. That guitar string had snowballed into her loft.

The black ring on Doyle’s thumb? Hers. She had found herself staring at an ebony piano key a year ago. Since she couldn’t carve worth a damn and the key was narrow, she had found a carver to do the work for her. Two angled lines in a wide based vee so the skin showed and the inside had to be rounded to fit the thumb. That had been the hardest because when had she ever touched his thumb to make sure the wood would rest perfectly? She hadn’t.

Luck and skill. Once the ring was put together, and it just looked right to her, she had tucked it into a small ring box and with his name on a blank card, she had left it at the club. Risky. Foolish. When she next saw him he had been wearing it.

A piece of her was on him.
 

She should tell him. Actually, she
wanted
to tell him.

Pressing the tip of her finger against the drum stick, she set it rolling across her floor before she impulsively reached for her phone.
I have a secret
, she texted him.

His response came a few minutes later.
Only one?

Many. But I’m only going to give one.
She retrieved the drum stick and ran her thumb over the tip, studying the edge then down the narrow neck. Beside her the phone chirped a few times. Pressing her thumb against the pale wood, she shut one eye as she looked at a child’s ukulele on the wall. “Well, hi,” she said as she picked up her pencil, frowning at her phone when it nagged her again.

Kate.

Second. I gotta do this before it’s gone.

What?

Kate.

Kate.

She bent over the sketchbook and put the piece down before it was gone. Not that it would disappear, but yeah. Once it was in her head, it was there, but now…now it was tangible. “Fun,” she said as she looked at the drawing. The cherry red of the ukulele’s sound hole with the tip of the drum stick dangling in the middle. Fishing wire, she thought, so it looked invisible. She’d keep the chipped paint surrounding the sound hole because it had musical notes and she’d carve on onto the drum stick. The nylon strings braided to make up the chain for the oversized necklace. “Jamboree.” Not done. She drew a fine line at the bottom followed by a musical note that would sparkle there. Red? Oh yeah, red.

Smiling she tapped the drum stick on the floor and picked up her phone.
Sorry. That was rude.

Hm.

Do you still want the secret?

If it’s that you brat, not really a secret.

That made her grin.
I don’t brat. Do I?

My hand. Your ass. That’s what bratting gets you.

A shiver moved down her spine and she flattened her hand on her stomach.
You keep saying that and yet…

My hand. Your ass. Tell me.

Kate exhaled and realized she was nervous. Really nervous.
You know that ring on your left thumb? I gave that to you.

She shook out her hands and hunched over her phone.
I made it.

I know.

What? How… You know?

Now I have a secret.

Kate stuck her tongue out at the phone and went to retrieve the ukulele. In the bedroom upstairs she had all her heavy-duty machinery. A band saw was against the wall, while a lathe was along the other, and a table saw sat in the middle of the room. Just your normal loft decor.
 

Really, she probably should’ve found an industrial workspace, but here she had a view out the large windows of the harbor. The space didn’t feel like a shop class. It felt like a studio. And it was hers. While there were no pictures of her family and she was no longer hoarding images of Jace, this space had Kate Jace Jennings all over it. Her bedrooms at the apartment and the mansion were just for sleeping in. This was where she lived.

She pulled on her work apron and grabbed her safety glasses. Her phone was set on the low wall that opened up the workshop to the loft, music playing from it. Not Cyanide. Sitting on her stool, she unstrung the ukulele and set the small tuning pegs in a little bucket to be added to the storage shelves. Next she took the ukulele to the table saw, adjusted everything and with a small prayer to the machine gods that she didn’t cut off anything that needed to stay attached, mostly to her, she neatly sliced off the front of child’s instrument.

Next she dug out a compass, marked her cut line plus her destination line and slowly cut the circle out. Sitting on the floor, with music filling the space with happy beats, she began to sand. Forget meditation, this was her zen. When the light began to fade from the windows, she finally turned on her lights and returned to smoothing the wood. She loved it when the circle became a true circle, when the broken edges were gone. Finally no marker remained and she blew off the wood dust. She turned it around to see the hand painted musical notes frame the inner circle. In some places the gold notes were faded, perhaps where the heel of a small hand had rested. Resting her elbows on her bent knees, the smell of sawdust tickling her nose, Kate felt at one with the world.
 

This was where she belonged. Here there were no doubts, no insecurities. No one judged her. No addict mother haunted the corners here, no uncaring father, no snotty half-sisters. It was just Kate and her dream. She picked up her phone and opened up the chat she had going with Doyle.

Remember how I asked you to tell me what world I belonged in since you said I didn’t belong in Edge?

It took a few minutes for him to respond. But his
yes
was blunt.

And how I said I was tired of being me?

Yes.

Do you want to see my world?

Yes.

She snapped a picture of her workshop and sent it to him.
Sometimes I forget not everything is shitty and that I do have a place in the world. Maybe it’s not the Cyanide world and it’s not Mom’s world. But this…this is Kate’s world. Do you want to see more?

Yes.

She cleared her throat as she stood up. Bracing her elbows on the wall she turned on the video function and scanned the camera over her wall of guitars, violins, cellos and everything else in between. Some were whole, some looked like her ukulele, some were just the sides, some just the front. There was her drafting table that let her see the water, the work table that was a disaster of all the things she had on the go. She leaned over the half wall where she had oh so meticulously painted her logo. Katey Jay Designs. The K and J entwined and a musical note was hooked over the curve of the J.
 

No one. She had showed no one. Who would she show? Who would she possibly share this with? A man who didn’t care about her? A man who had pretty much ignored her existence for twenty-four years? The same man who had broken her heart year after year after year. She exhaled sharply, turned the phone around and stopped recording. She hit send and continued to look down at her dream.

Her dream. The phone rang.

“Katey.” His voice was soft and she dropped her head into her hand. Tears slid unchecked, plopping onto the wood.

“I’m going to use him, Doyle. I’m going to use his celebrity and his name. I’m going to use the fact that I’m the daughter of Jace Jennings. When I’m done school, I’m going to open a store on one of the trendy streets and then I’m going to remind the world that thirteen years ago Kate Jace Jennings was the long lost daughter of Jace Jennings because if the only thing I have of his, is his name, then, by fucking God, I’m going to use it.”

“Good. I want you to remember this moment, Katey Jay.”

“Why?”

“Because this is the moment where you just owned yourself. Because this is the moment where you started to trust me. You know, this morning Claire said you’re tougher than I give you credit for. But pay attention, you’re even tougher than you give yourself credit for.”

“Yeah?” In the background she heard a girl shout for Dad. “You gotta go.”

“She’s twelve. She needs to learn patience at some time. Remember this moment, Katey Jay.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“Jesus. I’m hanging with my kid, girl.”

She smiled as she hung up. Wiping her cheeks, she looked out at the loft. “This moment. It’s a sunrise moment.”

****

Kate - 2002

Kate had never been to a school like her new one. She hadn’t liked her blue uniform with the school patch on the pocket of her blazer. Not until she had realized that
everyone
was wearing the same thing. Unlike her old school when she had shown up in used clothes, no one at her new school knew she had lived in a trailer starting to rot with a mother who was also rotting. She had looked like everyone else. The teacher had introduced her to her class, told her to sit in an empty desk and so had begun her day.
 

She had been terrified about her first day in a new school. Not that she had a lot of friends at her old school, but there had been comfort in the familiar. She had barely slept and instead had roamed the house, learning her way around. In the morning a man wearing a black suit had rung the doorbell and driven her to her new school. No one had wished her good luck or even saw her leave but that had been familiar.
 

Lunch had been provided so she hadn’t been hungry. She had even made a few friends, which in itself was amazing. At her old school she had stuck out and not in a good way, so friends had been pretty rare for her. Plus, it wasn’t like she could invite anyone over since who knew if Mom was sober or alone? Even though she had craved the company of others, she hadn’t sought them out. But now…now she looked like she belonged. Her uniform was her new favorite thing.

Shutting the door behind her, she winced at the echoing bang it made. Even now she expected Mom to yell at her to not make so much noise. No one yelled.

She took off her shiny new shoes and set them in the closet and took her new bag up to her room. The new desk that Mrs. Dawson had magically made appear was ready for her to work on. It was a lot prettier than the battered table she had worked on before. No wobbling. No weird stains. She couldn’t wait to use it. She had resisted the call of the glossy white paint, patiently waiting to use it as it was meant to be used. She changed out of her uniform, setting it in the hamper Mrs. Dawson had told her to put it in. She had two uniforms, one to wear while the other was being dry cleaned. Dry cleaned!
 

Kate changed into a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, pulling out her books, determined to prove that she wasn’t as useless as Shaelynn said she was. Kate did her homework, swinging her feet as she hummed. No one was there to tell her not to.
 

Sometimes she missed Mom, but mostly it was a relief to not be screwing up all the time. No bottles were thrown at her, there was always food, and she didn’t wake up scared.
 

She lost track of time as she completed all her homework and even started to read a book for one of her classes, so when her stomach growled at her, she was a bit surprised. She left the quiet of her room and found herself standing there, listening to the quiet of the house.

It was a weird quiet. Usually Shaelynn was complaining about something or yelling at Mrs. Dawson. No dinner smells drifted up. The house felt different. Holding her breath, she walked down the stairs and saw the kitchen was empty. The large glass table wasn’t set, the television or stereo weren’t on. Her stomach started to hurt as she walked down the curving stairs into the basement.

The faint sickly sweet smell that seemed to cling to the room was still there but no one was on the round sectional couch, no smoke drifted up to the ceiling. She walked to the room that she wasn’t allowed in and knocked quietly on the door, wondering if Jace was inside. The door was locked.
 

She folded her arms over her chest and began to search every room in the house on every floor. There was no one here.
 

Her stomach wasn’t growling from hunger so much as it was from nerves. Her heart was beating so fast against her ribs, her chest actually hurt. In Jace’s office, she looked for a clue. He didn’t really use the office, his personal assistant did, so it was neatly organized, but there was no clue as to where everyone was.

All she knew was that they weren’t here.

No one appeared when she got ready for bed. The house was still unnaturally empty when she crawled out from under her bed, needing the comfort of her private hiding place. She sat on one of the stiff leather couches wearing her new uniform and stared at one of the weird paintings. She should eat, because her head felt funny and she felt a little nauseous. She had missed enough meals in her life to know what was wrong.
 

The doorbell rang and it seemed to echo around her, bouncing off the floors and walls. Kate picked up her bag and tried to breathe past the tightness in her throat. Her eyes burned as she opened the door to see the driver from yesterday.

“Good morning, Miss Jennings.”

She wanted to fling herself at the man. She locked the door and followed him to the shiny black car sitting in the drive.
 

“Are you ready for another day of learning?”

She nodded as she slid into the back seat. She missed her mom. At least she had never forgotten her. Yes, she had spent a lot of time alone when Mom had decided she was old enough to look after herself, but she had always been there in the morning. Maybe passed out or drunk or high, but she was always there. She felt small and scared again. Like when Mom had died and she realized she was alone. Utterly alone.

She bent her head as the tears began to slide free. She was so tired of feeling alone and forgotten. She was just a kid. It was supposed to be different here. Reality had shown her otherwise but she still wished it were different. She wished Jace wanted her around. She wished he loved her. She wished she could call him Dad. She wished that this was like all her dreams. She wished. She always wished. She wanted life to be different. She wanted Mom back.