Fairplay, Denver Cereal Volume 6 (35 page)

“
Some think more than
others,” Charlie smirked.

“
Right,” Noelle said.
“Because we can think, we get… um… separate from life
itself.”

“
What?”

“
We think about life
instead of just living it,” Noelle said.

“
Um, okay.”

“
See that tree,” Noelle
pointed toward a fruit tree in the backyard.

“
Sure.”

“
That tree doesn’t think
about life,” Noelle said. “It just lives.”

Noelle stopped washing and looked at Charlie
expectantly.

“
And how does that relate
to life being fair?”

Noelle rolled her eyes.

“
Listen, I asked you a
serious question,” Charlie said. “You don’t have to make fun of
me.”

“
I would never make fun of
you or anyone,” Noelle said. “I’m trying to figure out a way to
explain it.”

“
When the tree gets
watered, does it judge that it’s getting too much water or too
little?” Mike asked from the doorway. He was so clean shaven that
Charlie didn’t recognize him until he spoke.

“
Right,” Noelle said. “A
tree can’t think. It uses what it gets and grows.”

“
People think,” Charlie
said.

“
And?” Noelle
asked.

“
People use their minds to
judge,” Mike said. “I like this color. I don’t like that brush. I
don’t like this person. I like that cereal.”

“
This is fair,” Noelle
said. “Or this isn’t fair. But judging or thinking isn’t living so
we can’t ever know if life is fair or not fair because every time
we think, we have to let go of living to think.”

Noelle and Mike looked at Charlie
expectantly. He scowled at them.

“
How do you know this?”
Charlie asked Mike.

“
I learned it from
Noelle,” Mike said. “I read some things but it didn’t make sense to
me until Noelle and I talked about it.”

“
We were talking about
painting. I can draw or paint a great picture of a…” One of
Delphie’s bees hovered in the doorway. “…a bee. But the picture
isn’t the bee. Even if I draw it as close as possible to the bee
and it looks just like it. It’s still just a picture.”

Mike and Noelle looked at Charlie.

“
And?”

“
Thinking about life isn’t
life,” Noelle said. “Like a picture isn’t a bee.”

Standing dead still, Charlie’s eyes
blinked.

“
Thinking life is fair or
not fair isn’t life,” Noelle said.

“
Because it’s thinking,”
Charlie said. “And thinking is like a picture. It’s not really
life.”

Noelle nodded.

“
Oh,” Charlie
said.

“
Like when those girls
were mean to me,” Noelle said. “It hurt my feelings and I thought
they were pretty mean. But those were just thoughts. They weren’t
real. When I let go of the thoughts, and just live, it all seems
pretty silly because I’m really okay.”

Charlie nodded.

“
Even looking like a boy
is okay,” Noelle said.

“
You don’t look like a
boy,” Charlie said.

“
Does that help?” Noelle
asked.

Charlie hugged Noelle.

“
Good because we have a
lot more to do,” Noelle said.

“
She’s a task master,”
Mike said and went back to cleaning up the carriage
house.

Charlie settled into drying the brushes that
Noelle cleaned. The information rattled around in his brain.
Sometimes, he was sure he understood what she’d said. Other times,
he was just confused. By the time everything was clean and dry, he
knew one thing for sure: his new sister was a very special girl. He
was going to do everything in his power to help her stay that
way.

~~~~~~~~

Tuesday evening—6:15 P.M.

“
You’re sure this is
okay?” Sandy asked Jacob. “I mean we live here and take so much
and…”

“
We have plenty of space,”
Jacob said. “Plus, we’ll be done before the kids finish their
exercises with Ivan.”

“
But…” Sandy
started.

“
Stop,” Jill said. “Sandy,
you’re just putting a few boxes here.”

“
It’s all of Andy’s stuff
from the storage unit and everything from the apartment
and…”

“
If you don’t put it here,
how can I go through it?” Valerie smiled. “I have mad skills Sandy.
I’m telling you, mad skills.”

Sandy smiled at Valerie’s fake gangster
talk.

“
We’re still trading for
hair services,” Valerie said. “You’re going to make sure my hair is
not wild girl weird.”

“
I promise that you will
not look crazy weird in any paparazzi photos,” Sandy
said.

“
See, that’s a fair
trade,” Valerie said.

Sandy smiled at Valerie’s bright face.
Wearing a pair of Blane’s old overalls, Heather hugged Sandy.

“
Come on,” Jill
said.

“
Aden’s here with the
movers,” Tanesha said.

They started walking toward the door of
Honey and MJ’s old apartment. Since the apartment wasn’t quite
ready for MJ and Honey to move in, all of the furniture was still
stored away. They had easy access to move the boxes through the
apartment and into the basement.

“
Where’s your guy?” Jacob
asked as he walked past her.

“
What guy?” Tanesha
asked.

Surprised, Jacob stopped short. Tanesha
laughed at his surprise.

“
I don’t know! I can’t
keep track of his drama,” Tanesha said. “He
said
he wanted to be here but you
know how men are.”

Jacob and MJ shared a look and went out into
the driveway. In her sport wheelchair, Honey was in the middle of
the driveway directing the truck. It backed up to the apartment
door. The friends and movers began unloading. After making a few
trips, Jill was coming back for another load of dresses when she
ran into Aden.

“
Can I ask you something?”
Aden asked. His eyes scanned for Sandy.

“
Sure,” Jill stopped to
look up at him. “What’s going on?”

“
Has Sandy talked to you
about her mom?” Aden asked. “I mean Andy?”

Jill shook her head.

“
And the FBI?” Aden
asked.

“
Sandy didn’t tell you?”
Jill asked.

“
She won’t talk about it,”
Aden said. “She’s been acting strangely and I…”

“
One thing I know about
Sandy is that she will only talk when she’s ready. It’s hard to
wait, but Sandy has to… “ Jill shrugged. “She has to work things
through before she talks about them.”

“
I know she’s like that
but…”

“
You know Tanesha? If
something’s going on with her, she’ll tell you. Right there,” Jill
smiled. “I’m sure she told Jeraine exactly what she said to Jacob;
Tanesha does not hold back. Heather is more up and down than that.
She’s as likely to spill everything all at once as go off in a
huff. I’m somewhere in between. I talk to people I trust and don’t
say anything to anyone I don’t trust.”

“
I think Sandy trusts me,”
Aden said.

“
She does,” Jill said.
“Sandy’s different from us. She’s painfully private. If you
pressure her in any way, she’ll feel threatened and she’ll clam up.
But you have to know, she will let you know what she wants you to
know.”

“
She wants to control
things.”

“
It doesn’t seem like
control to me,” Jill said. “I think it doesn’t occur to Sandy that
anyone would want to know little things about her and her life. You
know, before she met us, she was alone a lot. Her interactions with
people were… not healthy. She forgets that other people want to be
included in her inner world.”

Aden nodded. He smiled at Sandy when she
walked by.

“
So you don’t think she’s
not talking because she’s really upset or there’s something wrong
with… us?”

Jill smiled at his insecurity. He
shrugged.

“
Why don’t you tell her
you care?” Jill asked. “Tell her you’d like to know when she’s
ready to share?”

Aden nodded.

“
I’ll tell you this,
Aden,” Jill said. “Sandy is happier than I’ve ever seen her. She’s
so thrilled that Charlie and Sissy are close. She adores Nash and
Noelle. And you’ve seen her with Rachel.”

“
But me?”

“
You’ve made all this
happen,” Jill said. “I doubt Sandy will ever be able to tell you
how much she cares about you.”

“
She shows me every day,”
Aden said.

“
So hold onto that,” Jill
said. “And don’t worry. I promise you, if something’s wrong, you’ll
be the first to know.”

Aden nodded.

“
Come on,” Jill said.
“Let’s finish up.”

Heading back to the truck, Aden walked into
Sandy. He wrapped himself around her small form.

“
I love you,” he whispered
in her ear.

She gave him a lovely smile, kissed his
lips, and continued into the Castle. He watched her hips sway. She
turned at the door and winked at him. Smiling at his own
insecurity, he picked up one of the last boxes.

~~~~~~~~

Tuesday evening—7:15 P.M. MST (6:15 P.M.
PST)

“
I have to leave in about
twenty minutes,” Ava said to Seth via her webcam.

“
Sorry we were so late
getting back,” Seth said. “Traffic.”

They ate dinner together via Skype every
night they could make it happen.

“
You can’t control
traffic,” Ava said.

“
I hate to miss our time
together,” Seth smiled.

Blushing, she smiled. There were voices in
the background and Seth turned for a moment listening to
something.

“
Schmidty is taking Lizzie
out to dinner,” Seth said. “See you later.”

He was silent for a moment and she heard the
door shut.

“
They seem really happy,”
Seth said.

“
That’s great news,” Ava
said. “She’s been pretty miserable.”

Seth nodded.

“
Is he going to be all
right with her giving the baby up?” Ava asked.

“
He thinks her
relationship with her step-father was more like rape and less like
love,” Seth said. “He thinks it’s better for the child if he’s with
parents who don’t have that baggage.”

“
He’s right,” Ava
said.

Seth nodded. They fell silent as they each
opened their foil wrapped dinners.

“
What did you get?” Seth
asked.

“
Veggie enchiladas,” Ava
said. “You?”

“
Yum,” Seth said. “More
salad and tomato soup. I’m the salad king.”

“
It supposed to help you
get better,” Ava said. “How are you feeling?”

“
Better,” Seth said. “The
doc’s trying to set up some physical therapy to get me moving
again. But I don’t know when I’d have time.”

“
Between a cold case and a
movie?” Ava smiled. “Who has time?”

“
Bingo,” Seth laughed.
“How did your review go?”

“
Not great,” Ava took a
bite of her enchilada.

“
You just received
commendation from the FBI, the UN, the President, and… well,
everyone,” Seth poked at his salad. “What’s his problem?

Ava pointed her fork at him.

“
Me?” Seth
asked.

“
Interdepartmental
relationship,” Ava said. “He told me I should think about leaving
the DPD. He gave me a week to make a decision.”

“
Seriously?”

“
Seriously,” Ava said.
“I’ve been offered a job at the FBI but that’s in Virginia. I’ve
been offered a job at the UN but that’s in Geneva or New York. And
the DPD are getting that new building. The Captain promised us that
we could have our own lab. Once the new building is done, the CBI
will be secondary to what we could do.”

“
What options did he give
you?”

“
Leave, of course,” Ava
said. “End it with you. Step down lab head and let Bob run the lab.
But Bob doesn’t want to run a lab. He’s retired. No one on my team
wants to deal with all this departmental crap. That’s why we work
this shift.”

“
Why is this happening
now?” Seth asked. “If he had something to say, I would think he
would have said it when we were in IAD review.”

Ava shrugged.

“
We could always say we
broke up and not,” Seth smiled.

“
I don’t want to lie,” Ava
said. “It’s too much work. Plus, what would we do when we have kids
or whatever?”

“
I’ll be home this
weekend,” Seth said. “Don’t do anything until then.”

“
I know that look
O’Malley,” Ava said. “You have a plan.”

Seth nodded.

“
What are you going to
do?” Ava asked.

“
I’m going to quit,” Seth
said.

CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED and SEVENTY-EIGHT

Plum

Wednesday morning – 9:15 A.M.

“
How many houses are we
going to see?” Jill asked. Driving her Lexus SUV, she turned down
Twentieth Street. Heather was sitting in the back seat.