Chasing Charlie Read online

CHAPTER THIRTEEN: A BAD IDEA

  “I’m really sorry, again,” Angela said when Vince let her into the apartment later that evening. Little did he know she had many times considered not coming back.

  “Really, it’s okay,” Vince said, chuckling reassuringly. “I told you, it was my fault. Hey, Charlie,” he called into the back of the apartment. “Want some ice cream before bed?”

  Angela had met Charlie on several occasions; he knew her well enough to remember her name and be comfortable around her. “Hi, Angela,” he said with a bashful smile.

  “Hi, Charlie,” she said, smiling broadly as she crouched down to his level. “Did you get to see your uncle today?”

  “Yup,” Charlie said with a smile back, growing warmer toward her immediately. “We went out to dinner!”

  “Oh yeah?” Angela went on, looking up at Vince, who was dishing up their dessert. “What did you have?”

  “Pizza!”

  “It’s a healthy day around here,” Vince remarked.

  “Sounds like it,” Angela laughed.

  “Uncle Mitch said Daddy needs to eat better,” Charlie said, causing his father to roll his eyes.

  “Did he now?”

  Charlie nodded. “Daddy’s sick. Did you know that?”

  “Charlie,” Vince chided him. “Not everyone wants to talk about me being sick, okay, buddy?”

  “I do know your daddy’s sick, but I think he just wants to relax and have a nice time tonight. Think we can do that?”

  “Okay,” Charlie said. “Can we play Uno?” he asked her.

  “That’s up to Angela,” Vince cut in.

  “That’s why I asked her,” Charlie pointed out, not realizing how sharp his comment was. To the adults, his quick response was amusing.

  “Uno happens to be my favorite,” Angela said matter-of-factly.

  “I’ll go get it!” Charlie hurried off to his bedroom.

  “Sorry,” Vince muttered.

  “Oh, don’t be. He’s adorable. It’s nice to be around kids in normal environments. I think Charlie is my only source of that.”

  “Planning on having your own someday?” Vince asked before he thought any better. Do you really want to know the answer to that? he asked himself.

  Angela was as caught off guard by Vince’s question as he was. “Umm, I don’t know. Hoping, sure, but planning…well, that involves a second half to the equation that I don’t exactly have right now,” she said with less enunciation than usual, helping transport bowls and spoons to the dining room.

  “Maybe when we were kids, that was the case, but it’s pretty mainstream to go it alone these days,” Vince pointed out.

  Angela shook her head. “It’s a package deal for me. I don’t just want a child, I want a family. And I think with my career, being a single mom wouldn’t really be fair to my kid—oh my gosh, I’m so sorry—I didn’t mean anything by that—”

  Vince grinned at the way Angela’s hands covered her mouth. “It’s fine,” he said lightly. “It’s…not far from the truth. It’s not ideal,” he added a little more gloomily when he heard Charlie trotting down the hallway.

  Charlie effectively dissolved the tension in the room without trying. They let him shuffle the cards, which involved swirling them in one giant mess around the table. After taking a few minutes to deal three hands of cards, he set his down and began to scarf his ice cream.

  “Slow down, kiddo,” Vince warned.

  Charlie barely heeded his father, taking as big of a bite as he could before setting down his spoon. “Hey, Daddy?” he asked with his mouth full.

  “Yup?” Vince played a card.

  “What’s a knucklehead?”

  Both adults glanced at the little boy, his father for longer. “Who taught you that word?”

  “Auntie Jen was talking to someone on the phone and she said Uncle Mitch was a knucklehead.”

  Angela was hiding her face behind her cards now, unable to suppress a grin.

  “A knucklehead is what you call someone when you don’t know them very well. That’s what it means,” Vince said uncertainly.

  “So my teachers are knuckleheads ’cause Auntie Jen says you don’t know which one is which?”

  Vince took in an impatient breath. “Okay, Charlie, I fibbed. Knucklehead is not a very nice word.”

  “Then why did Auntie Jen call Uncle Mitch one?”

  “She was just joking. Your turn. Red six. Got any reds or sixes or wilds?”

  —

  “Can I get you a drink? We might have a couple beers left,” Vince said while Charlie changed into his pajamas.

  “Sure, a beer sounds good,” she replied, not seeing the harm and not wanting to be rude. “Are you good to drink on the meds they gave you?”

  “No, but I haven’t taken any yet today. If I take any before bed, one beer would be burned off by then.” Vince set their beers down on the coffee table. “I’ll be right back.”

  Vince’s absence while he tucked Charlie into bed gave Angela time to think. Perhaps too much time. She got to wondering why on earth she’d come here today, why she’d been so obvious. She cared, of course, and there was no mistaking that, so her visit at least served the purpose of seeing to it that Vince was doing all right. However, staying behind for a drink once he put Charlie to bed seemed to say something different that she wasn’t sure she wanted to say.

  “He seems to like you even more than the last time you saw him,” Vince noted optimistically when he joined Angela again a few minutes later.

  “It was the ice cream. Works every time.”

  “That may have helped.” Vince sat in a chair, perpendicular to Angela, who had taken up residence on the end of the couch.

  Angela found herself with nothing to say. Her relationship with Vince didn’t usually go that way—typically, she could find something to talk about, even if he was attempting to close her out. Presently, though, Vince seemed open to a conversation, yet Angela didn’t know what it was that she wanted—or what it was that was appropriate—to bring up. She supposed that struggle would become more and more common as Vince’s last months ticked by. She just twisted her beer bottle in her hands, not even taking her first sip until he did.

  “Thanks for being flexible,” Vince said, apparently just as unwilling as Angela to put the awkwardness of that afternoon behind them.

  “Of course.” She offered him a cursory glance and a halfhearted smile.

  “How was your day?”

  “Pretty uneventful,” Angela said. She didn’t look up in time to see Vince licking his lips. “Caught up on some stuff around the apartment. It’s kind of funny, actually…when we’re gone on long cases and I don’t have time to dust, even, it starts to look like no one lives there. But then when I clean, it still looks like no one lives there.”

  “Well, even when we’re in town, you’re still at work late every night. I would say you live at the office.”

  “Exactly. Makes me feel like I should downgrade. If I’m only awake at home a few hours a day and no one else lives there with me, what’s the point, you know?”

  “I understand. I wouldn’t have this big of a place if I was on my own either.”

  Angela didn’t voice her observation that Vince’s apartment wasn’t big at all. It actually seemed rather cramped right now, but that easily could have had a lot to do with the unease she felt, and the fact that Vince, who she prayed couldn’t read her mind right now, sat so close to her. The relative silence that prevailed wasn’t helping matters.

  “Do you want to talk about the elephant in the room?” Vince offered after a minute passed by with nothing said between them. He seemed to want to take back his question the second it was uttered.

  “Elephant in the room?” Angela echoed, snapping out of her trance.

  “Well, I guess it’s not an elephant in the room if we aren’t thinking the same thing,” Vince said.

  “Well, what were you thinking?”

  Vince shook his head, raising a hand
shortly to wave her concern away. “Nothing. Never mind.”

  “Is it the cancer? Because we can definitely talk about that if you want.”

  “No, it’s not that.” Vince sounded genuine, making Angela all the more interested in what was actually on his mind, but she didn’t push it. “Don’t worry about it. Have you heard from anyone on the team again?”

  “Not today,” Angela said, feeling like she’d just dodged a bullet. Although she was dying to know what was going on inside Vince’s head—what his elephant in the room was—if he had told her, she may have felt compelled to be equally honest with him out of respect. And she didn’t see how that could end well unless they were indeed looking at the very same elephant. “You?”

  “Nope. Nothing from Whittaker, either, and she’s gone now.”

  Angela frowned. “I told you—”

  “I have let it go, trust me. That was actually the first time she crossed my mind since I left the office yesterday, I promise. Just…trying to make conversation.”

  “Well, then, how was your, uh, visit with your brother?” Angela inquired, partly out of a need for small talk to fill the stillness and partly out of sincere curiosity. Vince’s appearance when he’d answered the door for her earlier that day had left her rattled for her entire drive back home.

  “It was…sad…but in a good way, I suppose. We’ve never really been close, and it’s hard on me knowing that I only have so much time left to fix that, but at least there’s the motivation now. It’s not the best reason to be motivated, but it’s something.”

  “I’m sorry, I can’t imagine what that must be like. How did he take it?”

  “He’s angry…in denial a little, too. Thinks there’s got to be something out there to get rid of the cancer, no matter how much I try to convince him otherwise. I’m sure I’ll be getting calls from him left and right asking me if I’ve heard of this drug and that drug.”

  “It must be nice to have some family, though. Even if he’ll be a little pushy at first, at least you know he cares, right?”

  “Oh, of course. I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. He flew here on a moment’s notice even though he has to work early tomorrow, and then he wouldn’t let me pay for his ticket. I’m thankful to have someone in my life who just…dropped everything and didn’t question why I didn’t want to share the news over the phone. He was great about it.”

  “That’s good.”

  The rest of their beer bridged the gap in the conversation. Angela found the bottom of her bottle and was unsure if she could stand being so close to Vince for much longer when her heart felt so exposed. He simply couldn’t know that she was thinking of anything but him dying. She thought he probably wanted their conversation to revolve around something else, but not something that so devalued his predicament.

  “Are you okay?” Angela heard. She kicked herself for not putting on a more alert and interested façade. She was still concerned about Vince’s situation with his brother, but her other thoughts were too distracting.

  “I’m fine. I’m sorry, it’s just been a long week. Not like you don’t know that.”

  “I definitely understand,” Vince said. If Angela were to have looked up at that point instead of studying the pre-weathered knees on her jeans, she would have seen the face of a man who had merely been making conversation, just like her. A man with a troubled, wanting heart.

  “Just going to relax with Charlie tomorrow?” Angela asked, attempting to pull herself back into the conversation.

  “Well, I haven’t been to church in a while. Jen normally takes him and I just go to the grocery store or something. But there’s no time like the present for starting up again. Maybe I can find some meaning or some guidance. I don’t know.”

  “I hope you find both,” Angela said. “Can I ask why you stopped going?” She herself was a disillusioned Christian with a rather difficult history, so the topic piqued her curiosity.

  Vince shrugged. “I guess I started feeling guilty a few years ago, like I wasn’t focusing on my family enough, like I was being selfish. I didn’t like that feeling, so I started making excuses not to go. The less I went, the less people expected me to go. And then when everything happened with Kate, I just…I’d had enough, you know? And even after she died, I never felt the push to start going back.”

  Angela remembered what a tumultuous time Vince’s divorce had been for him. Though he had never admitted it outright, though he had always blamed his own lack of presence for his marriage falling to shambles, his ex-wife had been rather generous with the custody arrangements and Vince maintained that the split had been a mutual decision. Angela always thought a disgruntled wife who felt lonely and abandoned would have sought sole custody of any children and allowed the so-called inadequate father visitation rights at best, but Kate had agreed to split custody evenly with Vince. The circumstances had never seemed to fit Vince’s description of the demise of his marriage. For a while, his friends’ suspicions that Kate had been unfaithful had been just that—suspicions. But one night out at a bar after a long case, Marshall had had one too many and had actually asked Vince in front of everyone else if Kate had cheated on him. Vince, intoxicated as well, had just taken another sip of scotch and had never said another word on the matter.

  “Did I say something?” Vince asked when he realized Angela’s thoughts were wandering.

  “No, sorry. I hope you get what you’re looking for when you go back to church. I really do. We sound like we’re kind of in the same place. I haven’t gone in even longer, though. Not since I was eighteen, I think. I still believe, but I just don’t feel compelled to do anything about it, which I know is awful.”

  “Would you like to come with us?”

  “Oh, no, but thanks. You should just go with your family. Don’t be distracted by me. I hope it goes well for you.”

  “Thanks. We’ll see, I guess.”

  “How are you feeling, by the way? And let me know if you ever get annoyed with me asking. I just feel like it’s strange not to ask lately.”

  Vince’s eyes lit up momentarily. “I appreciate the concern. It’s not too bothersome yet. Today’s been fine. Tired, but I’m tired every weekend. It’s always a game of catch-up.”

  “Tell me about it. I have no problem with the early mornings during the week, usually, but weekends that I’m home never involve waking up before nine. Ten is more typical.”

  “I wish six-year-olds were wired the same way,” Vince said.

  “When is the last time you actually got to sleep in?”

  Vince’s eyebrows rose in thought. “That’s an excellent question. Probably not since I was married, to be truthful. And even then, I usually couldn’t justify sleeping in on the weekends. Something always needed attention around the house, and that was the only time I could do it. That, and it was the only quality time I got with Charlie and Kate. And after the divorce, I had Charlie whenever possible, so I never slept in then, either.”

  “So it’s been a while,” Angela summarized. “Maybe once you’re done working, you can take naps after Charlie heads off to school.”

  “I might just do that. Wednesday’s the first day of treatments, though.”

  “Oh, that’s right. Nervous?”

  “Not really. I just don’t know what to expect,” Vince continued.

  “Wish I could help you there.”

  “I didn’t know we were supposed to get so much snow tonight,” Vince said suddenly, rising from his chair and going to the window to look outside more closely. Sure enough, giant glimmering flakes speckled the dark sky outside, adding to the foot of the white stuff already on the ground.

  “I should probably get going, then.” Angela readily took the excuse to leave. Her desire to be around Vince was currently outweighed by her fear of saying or doing something too telling.

  “That wasn’t me hinting that I wanted you to go,” Vince protested, following Angela to the door, where she crouched to put her boots back on.

  Wh
at was he trying to say? Angela wondered. Did he want her to stay, and if so, why? Surely he was tired and wouldn’t mind relaxing on his own or even going to bed early. Why would he insist that she stay? Fearing she was reading too much into things again, she shook her head. “No, I didn’t take it that way. My tires are…really awful. I need new ones. I, uh, should head out before it gets too nasty.”

  “Ah.”

  Angela’s overly eager imagination picked up on the dejection in Vince’s voice—or maybe she just invented it, she warned herself. Recklessness took over at the prospect of some sort of requited feelings, no matter how far-fetched that prospect was. She cleared her throat and stood back up. “Can I ask you something?” she said tentatively.

  “Sure.”

  “Earlier, when you talked about an elephant in the room, I know you said never mind, but I really am curious…” The eye contact she made with him just now didn’t last long; soon, her attention was focused on her hands, which she wrung repeatedly out of nerves.

  Vince’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. “It was…just me misreading things. Don’t worry about it.”

  Angela looked up again. “What things?” She felt rude for insisting, but Vince appeared to feel just as rude for evading her questions, because he gripped the back of his neck with his hand and answered.

  “I thought that you coming here meant something that I’m sure it didn’t, the more I think about it.”

  Not certain if she was hearing correctly—blind to the fact that, even if she was right, even if Vince was thinking about this visit in a different light, that didn’t necessarily mean that he felt the same way—Angela took a step closer. She could ask him to explain himself, but knowing Vince, even if he wanted the same things that she did, he would talk his way out of it, never give it a chance. He was too honorable a man to put someone else’s heart at risk like that, to start something new when he knew he was on his way out of this existence and into some other. So instead of seeking elaboration from him, she took one more step, leaving less than a foot between them. The time she spent gazing into his eyes, half trying to read them, and half trying to open a door for him into her own soul, was the longest she’d held eye contact with him all night. She still wasn’t sure what she saw besides the inevitable hesitance. Behind his vacillation, was he the least bit eager? Was he hopeful? Or was he simply anxious over the fact that she was crossing a line he didn’t want to cross with her, and he didn’t know how to turn her down?

  Angela didn’t know whether to feel ecstatic or terrified when Vince started closing the rest of the gap between them, when the rough heel of his hand brushed up against her neck and his fingers ventured into her hair. His movement was agonizingly slow, but eventually, she felt his soft breath waft across her lips, an odd combination of beer and ice cream that she was sure he now tasted on her as well. Neither shut their eyes until they shared one last nonverbal okay.

  Like any other first kiss she’d ever had, this one told Angela whether or not she could picture a future with the man whose lips rested on hers. Her hand reaching up to take hold of his shoulder was, she hoped, hint enough that he hadn’t read her incorrectly, that she’d hoped for this, and that she was thrilled about it. She saw something worth pursuing and now she would have given every penny she had just to hear Vince admit the same.

  Though Vince’s lips were gentle and polite, not asking for too much too soon, Angela still forgot how to breathe for long enough that, upon remembering, her breath was deeper than she’d planned. Vince took this as a sign of regret and he drew back, but Angela firmed her grasp on his shoulder and urged him in again to prolong their kiss. Fire blazed a path through her veins, prompting her arms to slink around his neck.

  Just when Angela felt that everything was finally falling into place, her lips found themselves alone.

  “I’m sorry,” Vince breathed, letting go of her like he’d burned his hands on a hot pan. “This is a bad idea.”

  “What? Why?” Angela’s mind still reeled from the kiss, and she wanted nothing more than to continue it. She would never get him back if he explained his reasoning, but she couldn’t ignore his qualms. She could listen and dispel them, but she couldn’t invalidate his feelings like that.

  “For starters, I’m your boss, and I mean that in a strictly bureaucratic, by-the-books kind of way. You know it’s not about me looking down on you.”

  “I know that. But your bureaucratic concerns are only valid for a few more days,” Angela pointed out.

  “Okay, then…how about the fact that I’m dying, and no matter how much either of us might want this, nothing is going to change that? Who wants…a relationship with an expiration date?” He gave her no chance to answer. “And I don’t do things half way. I won’t just fool around. I don’t work like that. It’s all or nothing, and all isn’t an option. So this is a bad idea, because I can’t and I won’t start a relationship with you. This is my fault. I shouldn’t have—”

  “Vince, can I get a word in edgewise, maybe?”

  “Of course,” he said with a clearing of his throat. The last woman to make him this nervous had been gone for a long time now. He was feeling rather rusty in his dealings with the opposite sex at the moment. He’d been on all of one date since the divorce and it hadn’t earned him a second.

  “I don’t think you should get to tell me that I don’t want a relationship with an expiration date,” Angela said after some careful thought. “I’m the one who will have to live my life once yours is over, so shouldn’t that be my choice?”

  Vince shook his head definitively. “I can’t do that to you, Angela. It would be completely selfish. And we’ve talked about how you haven’t lost anyone close. It’s going to be enough of a shake-up when it’s just a friend passing away. Trust me, you don’t want to go beyond that.”

  Angela had to leave before her humiliation brought her to anything worse than the crestfallen look she knew painted her face right now. As much as she wanted to stay and argue her point, she knew Vince well enough to know he wasn’t flexible right now, that her pushing would only upset him further, and in turn get her even more exasperated. Feeling like she had no more options, she said, “I’ll go, then.”

  “I’m sorry. I really am,” Vince said, mumbling.

  “I’ll take part of the blame, too,” Angela said hastily as she swung on her coat.

  “Are you sure you don’t want to stay and talk about this?” he offered in some last-ditch effort not to spend the rest of the evening without her. Even given the conflict between them, he despised the thought of her leaving.

  “I don’t think more talking would help either one of us,” she said honestly. “We’re both good arguers. That’s all we’d end up doing.” She picked up her purse. “I’ll see you Monday. I hope things go well tomorrow.”

  The second Angela was out the door, fleeing the scene of the ultimate rejection, Vince leaned back against the wall and let his head hit it only hard enough to make a noise. He wasn’t sure what should be the primary source of his anger: the selfish desire he hadn’t managed to stifle, or the over-analytical mind that had labeled the desire as selfish in the first place.