Where the Forest Meets the Stars(64)

She pulled him down the sidewalk. “Come on, Nick. I have stuff to do.”
They entered Morrill Hall and took the stairs to the fifth-floor biology office. Jo left Gabe out in the hall so he wouldn’t have to chitchat with the secretary while she did her paperwork. “Now, the bank,” she said when she left the office.
Gabe started for the stairway they’d used on the way up. “No, this way,” Jo said, gesturing toward the eastern stairwell. “We’ll come out closer to my car.” They walked a long corridor past office doors. The majority of biology professors and graduate students were away from campus working on their summer research.
“After the bank, are we getting on the road?” Gabe asked.
“Only with a fight.”
“Why?”
“Ursa is set on having dinner with Tabby at a restaurant she likes. Would that be okay?”
“I guess so.”
Jo wrapped her hand around his. “It’s a pizza place—really casual.”
“Gabe?” a man said behind them.
They turned around, hands parting. Dr. George Kinney stood in front of an open office. He walked toward them, clearly confused but smiling, his gaze fixed on Gabe. “I thought I was imagining it when I saw you walk by.” He stopped in front of Gabe. It was like a strange mirror of time, the elder reliving the face of his youth, the young man confronting his future.


27

They looked more alike than Jo had realized. They were about the same height. Dr. Kinney also had blue eyes, but a lighter shade. His hair was white and he wore it on the long side like Gabe, his part on the right, while Gabe parted left. Dr. Kinney was slimmer than Gabe, but robust, as fit as a man could be at the age of seventy-three.
“I almost didn’t recognize you without the beard,” Dr. Kinney said.
The irony of the comment wasn’t lost on Gabe. But he said nothing.
To ease the awkward silence, Dr. Kinney turned to Jo. “Good to see you, Jo. How’s your research going?”
“Very well,” she said.
“Glad to hear it. I hope that living room air conditioner isn’t giving you too much trouble. Do I need to replace it?”
“It’s fine. I don’t use it much.”
“I see you’ve met the neighbors,” he said, glancing at Gabe.
“Yes,” Jo said.
“We should go,” Gabe said to Jo as if Kinney weren’t there. His contempt was palpable, shocking even Dr. Kinney, who must have been accustomed to it. But rather than back down and retreat to his office, Kinney said, “Gabe . . .”
Gabe reluctantly looked at him.
“I’d like to talk to you”—he directed his arm toward the open door down the hall—“in my office.” Relaxing his tone, he added, “If you can call it that. When you’re emeritus, they give you a closet. Sometimes the janitor accidentally puts his mop in there.”
Jo smiled. Gabe didn’t.
Dr. Kinney kept his eyes on Gabe’s. “Lynne is very sick. She has a month at most.”
“I’m sorry,” Gabe said at last.
Dr. Kinney nodded. “Please come into my office. I need to talk with you.”
“Sounds like you two need privacy,” Jo said. “I’ll run over to the bank while you talk. Meet me on the benches out front when you’re done,” she said to Gabe.
“Sounds good,” Dr. Kinney said.
She walked away before Gabe could refuse. “Take as long as you want,” she said over her shoulder.
She expected Gabe to be at her side any second, but she made it outside alone. Somehow she found her car and made it to the bank, though every bit of her brain was focused on Gabe and Dr. Kinney.
She drove back to Morrill Hall. Gabe wasn’t on the benches. Either he’d run off in a panic and forgotten the meeting place, or he was still talking to Dr. Kinney. She sat on a bench and waited. After fifteen minutes, she started browsing on her phone.
When forty minutes passed, her worries intensified. Maybe Gabe had snapped and run off. She considered going inside to see if he was still in Kinney’s office, but interrupting them would be weird and intrusive. She also contemplated calling Tabby to see if he’d gone home, but she couldn’t possibly explain a call like that.
Ten minutes later, Gabe came out of Morrill Hall, his body limp.
Jo approached, but he kept walking. “Are you okay?”
“Yes,” he said.
“What happened?”
“We talked. About everything.” He kept walking, no apparent thought to his direction.
She had to let him come back to reality on his own. She remained silent as they walked. When they arrived at the large expanse of the quad, he stopped and stared, seeming to register where he was. He started walking again, fast, as if hurrying to some known destination. He stopped at the closest tree and flopped to the ground in its long shade. He lay on his back in the grass, the bottoms of his palms pressed into his eyes. Jo sat next to him, caressing his chest.
“You were right,” he said, hands still pressed on his eyes. “My father—Arthur—knew and let it all happen.”
Jo considered saying I’m sorry , but it made no sense.
He took his hands off his eyes and looked at her. “He was glad George gave Katherine a son. Arthur was glad to have a son, too. He was impotent. Lacey happened one of the rare times when he could do it.”
He put his palms over his eyes again. “Lynne’s liver is shot. I never knew it, but all those years she was an alcoholic. When I was a kid, I thought her stony face and silence were signs of how dumb and uninteresting she was. But I guess she was drunk.”