Leo's Chance(39)

"Do it. Why haven't you?"

"Well, I need a computer to be able to write. I brought a flash drive back and forth to the library for a while, but it's just too impractical. And when I was feeling inspired, the library was closed… you know. It just didn't work."

The waiter interrupts us, setting our food down. Evie digs in, closing her eyes and moaning, as she tastes the first bite.

"Good?" I ask, my mind going somewhere other than dinner.

"Mmmm," she says, nodding.

"Will you stay with me again tonight?"

"I can't, Jake. I need to get ready for the week. I need to go home and get myself organized."

"Tomorrow night?" Every night for the rest of your life?

"Can't tomorrow night either. I have a catering job that'll go late. I don't usually do them on Monday nights but it's some sort of art showing at a gallery downtown." She glances up at me, narrowing her eyes. "You won't be there, will you?"

I laugh. "Wasn't planning on it but maybe now I'll have to see what I can arrange."

"Don't you dare."

I’m quiet for a minute, completely disappointed. "I have to travel to my office in San Diego on Tuesday but I'll be back Wednesday evening. Will you stay then?" I’m slightly pissed off that I won’t see her for three more nights.

But she smiles. "Okay." I smile back.

We focus on dinner for a few minutes before she asks, "I'm assuming you went to college?"

"Yeah, I went to UCSD. I was in school and also working with my dad, learning all about the company since the plan was for me to start working there when I graduated. We just had no idea at the time that I'd be running the damn thing. That's when my dad and I finally formed more of a relationship than we'd ever had. I had moved out of our house and that was really the thing that allowed us to start over. It was the first time I was really something close to happy in a long time, being away from my parents, just 'finding myself' to use a clichéd expression."

I briefly think back to that time and stop myself from grimacing. Once I got out of that house, I had started doing a little better, seeing more clearly that my dad, Phil, was not to blame for what had been happening with Lauren all those years. The problem with letting go of that anger toward him was that I then had to accept the full responsibility of what had happened. The intense guilt I felt sent me into another spiral of depression that I was still in when I landed myself in the hospital.

She nods, watching me closely. "You're not close to your mother?"

Her choice of wording makes me almost gag. "Close?" If she only knew how close we really were. I cringe but answer her question in the way she means. "No."

I force my mind to go back to the conversation we were having before the topic of Phil and Lauren came up. "I want to pay for you to take classes, Evie."

She blinks, tensing. "What? Why would you do that?" Uh oh, hostile territory here.

I force myself to tread carefully. Obviously she doesn’t like the idea. I don’t blame her – it would have pissed me off to take charity from someone, too, if I had been offered it at any point in my life. But what I need to make her understand is that things coming from me aren’t charity. I want her to know that I care about her and will do whatever I can do to make her dreams come true, not because I feel sorry for her, but because she’s incredible. "Because I believe in you. Because I think you're smart, and I think you just need a small break to be able to reach for your dreams."

A memory comes to me suddenly of the Christmas I was eleven, right before I went to foster care. Christmas was like any other f*cked up day in our house – no tree or presents or anything, but I knew what day it was and it pissed me off, and so I had left the house and walked around for a while, just to get out of there. I did that as much as possible, as long as I knew Seth was safe for a little bit. When I came back, there was this black garbage bag sitting on my house stairs with a red bow on it. I opened it up, kinda confused, and inside was this stuffed dog wearing a red sweater, and a football. I had no idea who had left it there, but to my eleven year old mind, it was some kind of magic. I knew the football was probably for me and the dog was for Seth, but something in me wanted that dog instead of the football, and so I gave the ball to Seth, even though I knew it made me a f*cking * to want that stupid stuffed animal. But I knew Seth wouldn’t care either way, and so I took what I wanted. I would have never admitted it to anyone and I kept it hidden from my dad, but I loved that damn dog.

I had taken that dog with me to foster care and kept it hidden under my bed, only taking it out at night to sleep with. A couple months later, I was in the grocery store with my foster mom and I looked at the bulletin board at the front of the store and there was a big call out for volunteers to deliver Christmas gifts to needy kids. When I looked closely, there were pictures of the volunteers from the year before, dropping off black garbage bags tied with red bows on porch steps. Something in me crashed and burned and then shriveled. The shame and deep disappointment that washed over me in that moment was so intense, I almost started crying like a baby. It wasn’t magic. It was charity. The thing was, I had known in the back of my mind that it wasn’t magic, but before that moment, I could pretend I didn’t. Now I had the proof staring at me from that bulletin board. I hated myself for hurting so damn much.