Angela was staring into her cup, two spots of color high on her cheekbones. He watched her until she raised her head, but she wouldn’t quite meet his gaze. She said to Kenny, “Honey, you can watch the Cartoon Channel if you want to.”
“Hey, cool!”
And then to Hollis, “We can sit in the garden.”
The “garden” was a twenty-foot square enclosed by a board fence draped in scraggly wisteria. Brown lawn, a couple of pyracantha shrubs, two strips of flower bed that were mostly hard-packed dirt. She deserves better than this, Hollis thought. Kenny deserves better than this.
They sat in a pair of molded plastic chairs on a tiny rectangle of cracked concrete. Angela asked tentatively, “Are you mad at me, Daddy? About Ryan?”
“No.”
“I needed somebody. Not just for protection... I mean...”
“I know what you mean.”
“You understand, don’t you?”
“When is he moving in permanently? Be pretty cramped in such a small space, won’t it?”
“It’s not like that,” she said.” At least not yet.”
“He seems to think it is, from what he told Kenny.”
“He wants it that way, the three of us together again. Very much. Last night... he asked me to marry him again.”
Even though he insisted he wouldn’t yet. “And?”
“I didn’t give him a definite answer. I’m not sure it’s what I want. I still care for him... a lot. And Kenny does, too. But marriage so soon after David... and the situation the way it is... I don’t think it’s the right time to be making that kind of decision.”
“No, it isn’t.”
“Ryan says he understands. But...”
“But what? Is he pressuring you?”
“Not exactly.”
“What then, exactly?”
“He’s so sure it’s the right thing. He swears he loves us, and I know he means it. I can’t be as absolutely certain of my own feelings, that’s all.”
“Did you tell him about the note?”
She nodded. “I felt he should know.”
“What was his reaction?”
“He said he’d make sure nothing happens to us.”
“Uh-huh. Where is he now?”
“He left about nine. He had some things to do.”
“What things?”
“He didn’t say.”
“Be back when?”
“He didn’t say.”
“Just went off and left you and Kenny alone.”
“He can’t watch over us every minute...”
“I want to talk to him,” Hollis said.
“About his proposal? Please, Daddy, don’t interfere. It won’t do any of us any good.”
“That isn’t what I want to talk about. You have any idea where he went?”
“Well, Rhona’s, maybe. Most of his things are still there...”
Right, he thought. No need to move them over here just yet. A razor, a toothbrush, some clean underwear, a couple of packages of condoms — what else would he need?
He stood. “I’d better be going.”
“Can’t you stay a while longer?”
This was the last place for his showdown with Pierce; it had been a mistake to think he could manage it anywhere near Angela and Kenny. Neutral ground, someplace where he could stay focused and maintain a tight grip on his emotions.
“Things to do myself,” he said. “We’ll get together again later.”
She seemed subdued as they went back inside; she probably thought he was mad at her, even though he’d said he wasn’t. Disappointed was closer to the truth. She was so damn dependent on men, the wrong kind, like Pierce and Rakubian. If only she had a little more backbone, a little better judgment.
She said, “Should I tell Ryan you want to see him?”
“No. I’ll take care of it.”
Kenny was paying no attention to them, sitting cross-legged in front of the television, up close, cartoon images assailing his eyes and cartoon voices assaulting his eardrums. Angela pried him away, brought him over for a quick hug and kiss good-bye. “See you, Granpa,” he said, and hurried back to the TV.
“He’s a cartoon junkie,” Angela said apologetically. “Cartoons and computers, that’s all he ever thinks about. But he loves you, Dad. So do I, a lot. Really... a lot.”
More than Pierce, I hope. Enough to forgive me when all this is over.
Pierce’s sister and her family lived on the east side, in one of the endless sprawling tracts that had spread like a blight over what had once been rich agricultural land. Tract houses, tract planning, even the more upscale variety, offended his architect’s eye. Bland conventional design, corner-cutting by greedy developers that too often resulted in slipshod construction and serious problems within a few years. Starter homes, some of them; fulfilled aspirations for other suburbanites. Little slices of the downsized American dream. He couldn’t fault those who were unable to afford something better; the high cost of living in California had forced many to settle for less. But the majority nowadays had been brainwashed into believing conformity and mediocrity were something better, all that they needed or deserved.
The only way to do battle against that kind of mind-set, in his professional view, was to try to educate the people by providing better home design, better overall planning, better construction, even if it meant shaving profits. Not the people like Shelby Chesterton, the affluent minority, who could afford the very best and for whom Hollis could now and then indulge his esthetic vision to the fullest. People like the seniors who would inhabit the Dry Creek Valley development, which was why he felt it was important for Mannix & Hollis to be given the job. And they would be, he was sure. Gabe felt the same way; they had agreed that a good portion of their profit margin should be sacrificed in favor of architectural integrity. Do quality work and you’d continue to get quality jobs, and in some small way maybe you could make a difference in the long run.
He remembered the street Rhona Pierce Collins lived on, but not the number, so he stopped in one of the nearby malls (so insipidly conventional it might have been a shopping center anywhere in the country) and looked it up. When he got to the equally uniform three-bedroom tract he didn’t see Pierce’s pickup; but he stopped anyway, went up, and rang the bell.
Rhona was a female counterpart of her brother, except that she’d put on at least twenty pounds since Hollis had last seen her, the result of two children, poor diet, and not enough exercise. Yes, she said, Ryan had been there, but he’d left more than an hour ago. No, she didn’t know where he’d gone. Then, as Hollis was about to turn away, she beamed at him and said, “Well, I guess congratulations are in order, Mr. Hollis.”
“Congratulations?”
“Angela and Ryan getting back together, getting married again.” He said nothing, but his expression was enough to turn her smile upside-down. “Gee, I hope I didn’t let the cat out of the bag. You did know about it, you and your wife?”
“Yes,” he said, “thanks, Rhona,” and put his back to her before she could read the full message in his face and eyes.
Sunday Afternoon
He couldn’t find Pierce anywhere. He looked for the Dodge downtown, on another pass by Angela’s apartment, a few other places, and then drove out Western Avenue Extension to Chileno Valley Road. The Gugliotta ranch was seven miles out, a beef and dairy cattle operation on several thousand acres spread over the rocky foothills. The Dodge wasn’t there, either; and old Fred Gugliotta, whom he knew slightly, told him he hadn’t seen Pierce since Friday afternoon.
Frustration rode heavily with him on the way back to town. He ached to get this business over and done with; the longer it went on the more stressed he would be, and another of Stan Otaki’s warnings had been to avoid stressful situations. For the third time he did a drive-by at Angela’s. Still no sign of the pickup.