Rise: How a House Built a Family(17)
The kids had to be kept away from these important experiments, and I wasn’t allowed to touch them either. Jada was just a toddler, grabbing with damp fists at the metal pieces whenever she tottered close. But she was easier to keep clear of the parts than Drew, who was early in his elementary-school years and already building perpetual-motion machines and robots. They were learning, though, that touching the forbidden projects was not worth Adam’s belt.
Someone always wanted the ideas blossoming in his head, the things he put on paper only after they had bent and tortured him—and me—for months. In a single hour he might sketch ideas for bubble-bath containers, children’s socks, and complex laser scanners. But he had never actually sold a patent. Not one. And while I’d seen them come in the mail with a gold seal and a red ribbon to prove their status with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, I had no idea where he hid them after holding them up in victory and promising big things.
I had never seen the cars following him, or noticed anyone sitting in the red truck in the neighbor’s backyard. That’s what he was staring at, writing a secret message on the window to someone hidden in that truck.
“Why isn’t it a black truck,” I asked. “I thought you said a black truck was following you.”
“That’s part of the message. They want to make sure I see it. A red flag.” He pointed up at the air-conditioning vent over his head and then pressed an index finger over his lips to let me know they were listening. They were always listening. And then, as though he’d still been counting off the seconds while answering me, he broke off to drag his index finger slowly across the glass to form a letter “G.”
I tossed a small handful of rock salt into the aquarium and sprinkled fish flakes on the waving surface. He wasn’t going to tell me anything more and I wasn’t in the mood to be reminded that I wasn’t smart enough to understand the intricate details of high-power negotiating.
When I looked up, he had formed his index finger and thumb into the shape of a handgun, the way my brother and I had when we were barefooted Indians fighting cowboys around jack pines in Wisconsin. He jerked the hand back and then settled the fingertip against the glass again and again.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
The phone rang, but he didn’t seem to notice. I went to the den and closed the door before I answered.
“This is Mr. Travis from the Peabody. I’m calling about an outstanding balance, three months overdue.”
It was hard to concentrate. Images of Adam shooting out the back door at the red pickup truck were circling, looking for an explanation before they settled on a perch. “We’ve never stayed at the Peabody,” I finally said. “There must be a mistake.”
“No mistake. I’ve got the invoice in front of me for a boardroom rental totaling twelve hundred dollars.” He continued with the date and time, but they meant nothing to me. I got a kick out of how hard he tried to sound stuffy, failing miserably with his extreme Southern accent. “… the Furton boardroom for six hours. The bill is nonnegotiable.” I heard something tapping, like a pen on a desk, and reminded myself it was not Adam’s finger against the door glass.
I had little fight left in me, but we didn’t have enough in our bank account to cover the bill. Adam had been taking a lot of time off to work on the patents. We’d have all the money we ever needed after just one big sale, he promised. I blew out a breath and realized I was still holding the phone. Rustling and whispering on the other end surprised me. Mr. Travis should know that whispering wasn’t the least bit stuffy or dignified.
“Miss Kimmy helped your husband prepare the room and has some insight if it would help.”
“Yes, plea—” But he had already handed the phone over and I could hear the rapid, nervous breathing of a young woman.
“I was, like, the one to help set up the boardroom that day. He was two hours early, and he talked half the staff into helping him.” She breathed out a laugh, but not a happy one. “He kept, like, winking at the women and patting Jeff and Tyrone on the shoulder like he’d known them his whole life.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “I talked the kitchen into giving him enough coffee for his guests even though he didn’t pay for it. He said it was a big event—real important, like.” She was talking in a normal volume again.
My hair stood on end. Of course it was a big event. All Adam’s events were big. And it was no surprise that he’d charmed everyone into serving him; he had that way about him. He was likable, believable, and the nicest guy in the world … until he wasn’t.
She wasn’t done, though. “He named a bunch of super important guys from Apple and Google and stuff like that. Big people. There were execs coming in from all over the country, or maybe he said all over the world, I don’t remember exactly. And he had a patent—even showed it to me when no one else was looking—that all these companies wanted to buy. It looked real. And he didn’t seem like he was crazy or anything. Not at first.”
Oh, Kimmy, they never do. They never seem crazy until you get up real close. Then you see crazy like you never imagined.
All at once I was furious. He had really done it. He had made a big deal and sold one of his patents and then hid it from me. After all the years I had tiptoed around and tried to make his life happy, he had cut me out at the end. I was speechless, and it seemed little Miss Kimmy was, too. But then she started again in a whisper I could barely hear through the angry blood pounding across my eardrums.