The Stand-In(44)

After fetching some tea for Mom and coffee for myself, I grab a newspaper and start reading out loud. I go slowly but don’t pay attention to the words because I’m thinking about building out my planner again. I need to check over what I wrote this morning but I know the idea’s there. I know I have it. A warm flush steals over me, a deep satisfaction I haven’t felt in a long time.

The two hours pass slowly and I fetch more coffee, more tea, and some cookies. Mom leaves the tea to form a scum on the top as she focuses on the nothing happening outside. Around us, the other residents flow into the room and take positions. That each has their own preferred chair is clear and I wonder what happens when an oblivious resident takes the wrong seat. Probably a cage match.

I get Mom to lunch, then head back to the Xanadu after giving her a kiss. Seeing her has calmed me and put this entire situation in perspective. I know what I need to do and I’m now ready to do it right.

No one is in my suite when I arrive but Fangli’s voice comes from next door. Mei sent me a calendar invite for an hour from now so I don’t waste time. I have to rummage around to find the paper Sam left me last night, and I spend exactly twenty minutes repeating the signature until I can mimic the smooth strokes without looking. I tuck the paper away with pride. A small achievement but done. A check off my list. Dopamine achieved.

I have forty minutes left so I pull out my laptop to make more sense of my notes. I’m in the middle of sketching out a visual for how my task list could look when a knock comes on the interconnecting door between the suites. Must be Fangli, ready a few minutes early. I leave my laptop up and go to open the door.

Sam stands there, hands placed elegantly in pockets, excellent wrists revealed.

I strive for a neutral expression as I step back and gesture for him to come in. Professional. Polite and distant in the way new colleagues should be. “I thought you were busy today.” We don’t have an event for a couple of days. Mei sent me a slew of calendar invites while I was with Mom that I read over so I knew what was coming before accepting rat-a-tat.

“I finished early and I don’t need to be at the theater until later.” He runs his hand through his wavy black hair and it falls back into his eyes exactly as it was, covering the thick, straight brows. “Fangli is upset because of our fight last night.”

He’s here because of Fangli. I try not to resent it. “I told her it was fine.”

“Good.” He hesitates and then glances over his shoulder. I peek over and see Mei standing alone in the middle of Fangli’s suite, watching us.

Sam closes the door and spies my laptop, which I shut down. “What are you working on?”

“Notes on what I’m doing here so I can sell them to the highest bidder when I leave.”

He stares at me with wide eyes and I rub the back of my neck.

“Give me a break,” I say. “It’s a personal project that has nothing to do with you, because you know what? I’ve had nothing to do with you for most of my life.”

There’s a brief silence and Sam rocks forward, hands in his pockets. “We might have gotten off on the wrong foot,” he says.

“We?” This is an impressively broad statement. “Might?”

He sits down. “I was in the wrong.”

“What?” I sit down as well and push my laptop to the side. The usual sharpness is missing from Sam’s voice and I think I’m talking to the real man, a creature as elusive as a cryptid.

He’s not looking at me but somewhere over my shoulder. “I was angry in the car last night and I took it out on you.”

“You were right,” I say. I end up looking over his shoulder as well, out toward the lake. “I wasn’t taking this seriously, but I will.”

“You’re not doing badly,” he says. “Don’t get me wrong, the fake sore throat was an appalling idea, but generally you’re trying.” Now our eyes meet and his skim away. “It’s what you said in the car. About Fangli.”

I want to interrupt but it would only be to hear my own voice. Instead I stay quiet because Sam is struggling and I don’t want to silence him.

“You’re right. Fangli is sick.” A light flush goes up from his throat. “Not physically. In her mind.”

“What is it?”

“She gets panic attacks. Bad ones, where she can’t tell what’s real and what’s not. She started getting them when we were students.” He pauses. “It can make her too anxious to work and she won’t talk about it much. Her manager told her to keep it quiet, said no one wants to think that Wei Fangli is crazy. She doesn’t either. It frightens her.”

The bitterness in his voice confirms the truth. “What has she been doing?”

“Acupuncture. Diet.” He sighs. “I talked her into working the show in Canada because I thought a new environment might help ease her into talking to someone and getting help. She can’t do that back home. She feels too much shame.”

“It’s getting worse?”

He drops his hands down between his legs and lowers his head. “She’s struggling. She’s desperate to hide it from everyone and I’m the only person she can talk to. I’m so used to protecting her secret that to hear you say it made me overreact.”

“She needs to talk to a therapist, a doctor. There are medications that help.” I hesitate. “I’m on them.”