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“You should take a taxi to the doctor’s office,” Brea said as she adjusted her hair in the mirror, prepared to leave. “There’s cash on the counter.”
Kenny groaned. “We can’t afford taxis, Brea.”
Brea turned around and gave him a look that meant business. After a dramatic pause, Kenny folded his lips and shrugged. “All right. I’ll take a taxi.”
“Good.” Brea ground her teeth together and stared at him, outraged with herself for not making time to go to his doctor’s appointment. In fact, she wouldn’t miss it. How could she? This was the man she loved, the one she wanted to move through time with. But just as she opened her mouth to tell him so, Kenny interrupted her.
“You’re going to work. We can’t both lose our jobs,” Kenny insisted. “And you know how weird Oriana gets when someone is sick. She’ll make a big show of it. She won’t leave me alone. The entire apartment will be filled with casseroles that neither of us will be able to eat.”
Brea laughed gently, although she wasn’t sure she found anything funny right then. As she walked toward him, her heart thrumming in her chest, she remembered their first kiss at the Martha’s Vineyard football field a few minutes after someone had thrown the final touchdown and the crowd had gone wild. She’d felt his heart beating through her coat, the stories of their lives braiding together, and the softness of his lips upon hers. It was as though they’d been transported through time.
But Brea had never imagined they’d be transported here to this impossibly terrible moment.
After Brea kissed Kenny goodbye, she hurried to the office to find Oriana in a state of panic.
“We have to cancel all the meetings today,” she told Brea, dragging her into her office, “because Walter Billington wants to see the painting. And I know, if we play our cards right, we’ll be able to sell that thing for four million. No more of this two or three million.” Oriana set her jaw. “Are you ready for this? It’s going to be an intense day.”
Brea heard herself tell Oriana she was ready and would do whatever it took. Internally, however, she felt weaker than ever. Most of her soul was back home with Kenny, wanting to help him get ready to go to the doctor. She wanted to hold his hand as they checked him out. She wanted to hear the doctor say firsthand that Kenny would be all right.
In the cab on the way to the gallery space, Oriana explained what she knew of Walter Billington.
“He’s one of the richest entrepreneurs in Manhattan, for sure,” she began. “His mother is a French heiress, and his father is an American businessman, and he inherited her wit and charm and his father’s business smarts. He must be about twenty years older than us. But he’s married to a woman around our age. And…”
“What?” Brea demanded when Oriana went quiet.
“And he’ll probably expect us to go out with him tonight,” Oriana continued. “It’s a part of who he is. He paints the town red, so to speak, and he likes to feel that the people he makes deals with can keep up with him.”
Brea wanted to groan, scream, cry, and tell Oriana flat-out that she had to be home that night to hear what had happened with the doctor. But that moment, the taxi yanked to a halt outside the gallery, and Oriana paid the driver and bustled out. Brea could only follow her.
Walter Billington arrived fifteen minutes later than he’d said he would, which, Oriana said, wasn’t too bad compared to most rich people who didn’t need to treat anyone with respect. When he strode into the gallery space, Brea was struck with the feeling that she’d never seen anyone quite as handsome, that he had a European air about him with an American charm that reminded her of cowboy films. He entered alone, having told his bodyguard to wait outside. Apparently, he wanted to experience the artwork without anyone else’s input.
And even when Oriana greeted him, Walter raised his hand and said, “Please. I go by first impressions of the piece before anything else. I don’t want the art’s narrative. I want to feel it myself.”
Oriana nodded, closing her mouth. Walter stepped closer, crossed his arms over his chest, raised his chin, and gazed at the painting for a long time. When Brea thought he was finished with his assessment, he took a step to the right as though to take it in from another angle. Brea wanted to roll her eyes into the back of her head, but she managed to stop herself.
After probably twenty full minutes without a single word, Walter turned toward Oriana, sniffed, and said, “Okay. Tell me about the artist.”
Oriana was like a very tight spring, ready to explode. Immediately, she launched into a story about the artist, who’d come from nothing and was interested in “the way people perceive the void of their lives,” whatever that meant. It seemed to ring true for Walter, though. His eyes echoed how pleased he was.
“We’ll go out tonight,” Walter said, his eyes flickering between Oriana and Brea. “And we’ll discuss the next steps. If that sounds all right with you?”
“Wonderful, Mr. Billington,” Oriana said.
“Please. Call me Walter.”
Oriana and Brea were wordless as Walter turned on a heel and breezed out of the gallery, back into the stairwell, where he disappeared. Oriana remained very quiet, so much so that Brea was worried she wasn’t breathing.
And then, Oriana fell to her knees, her hands in fists, and cried out, “Yes!!!!!”
Brea couldn’t help it. She laughed. The situation was so comical, so outside of time, that she felt she was in some kind of ridiculous film. Finally, she grabbed Oriana’s hand and pulled her back to her feet, where Oriana wrapped her arms around Brea and said, “I couldn’t have done that without you. I was so nervous! You were a stabilizing force.”
Brea shrugged, unsure what to say.
“We have to go shopping,” Oriana said. “We need to look the part of Manhattan clubbers.” She then turned to her side and placed her hands on her stomach, wincing.
“You can’t see it anymore,” Brea answered without needing to be asked. “You lost the baby weight quickly.”
“I’m sure you will too when the time comes,” Oriana said, smiling graciously— pleased that she’d dropped the weight from breastfeeding and going on long walks, most of them with Brea.
