Until the storm breaks, p.4
Until the Storm Breaks, page 4
My phone buzzes. Text from an unknown number, but I recognize the area code. Seattle.
Calvin: This is Calvin. Got your number from Dominic. The raccoon is currently in my cabin. Advice?
I stare at the message. He texted me. About Gerald. Like we’re... what? Neighbors who text about wildlife?
Maren: Don’t make direct eye contact. He sees it as a challenge.
Three dots appear immediately.
Calvin: You’re joking.
Maren: I’m deadly serious about raccoon etiquette.
Calvin: He’s eating my protein bars.
Maren: Those are HIS protein bars now. You need to accept that.
Calvin: Lol. He’s also judging my dinner choices. Apparently microwave burritos aren’t sophisticated enough for his palate.
Maren:
Calvin: Any other wildlife I should know about?
Maren: Just the local eagle that steals sandwiches from the porch. He’s partial to turkey. Sweet dreams.
A pause. Then:
Calvin: Please tell me you’re joking this time.
Maren:
I almost smile. Almost. Then I remember how I attacked him the second he got out of his truck, and then that awkward dance in the tiny hallway earlier, both of us trying to navigate around Susan’s absence and each other. But I save his number anyway. Just in case of future raccoon emergencies. That’s all.
By nine, the dinner rush has mellowed into the comfortable hum of regulars nursing their drinks. The bar feels warm tonight, that particular kind of warmth that comes from bodies and conversation and the kitchen running full tilt. I’m restocking clean glasses when my eyes drift to the photo on the wall above the register. Susan and I on the day I officially took over the bar, her arm around my shoulders, champagne glass raised. She’s beaming with pride, and I’m grinning like I can’t believe my luck. Seven years ago, but it feels like yesterday and a lifetime all at once.
My hands stop moving. I realize I’ve been drying the same glass over and over, the bar towel squeaking against already-dry glass.
“Need a break?” Lark asks softly, noticing my stillness.
“Yeah. Just... give me a minute.”
I duck into the walk-in cooler, pulling the heavy door shut behind me and letting the cold air shock some sense back into me. I lean back against the stack of beer kegs, their metal surfaces cold even through my shirt, and just breathe. My breath comes out in visible puffs in the chilled air.
Susan was supposed to be here this summer. Not literally here in the bar, since she’d stopped coming once she started forgetting people’s names, but here in the world. Teaching me her blackberry jam recipe like she’d been promising for years. Sitting on the porch with her coffee and crosswords, calling out clues she thought I might know. Still being my person, my anchor, the woman who became my family when I had none left.
When I come back out, Lark’s waiting by the garnish station, restocking cocktail onion jars. She looks up when she hears the walk-in door seal shut behind me. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” I head straight to the register and pop it open, pretending to check the coins. “Just needed a second.”
“Want to talk about it? Or want me to distract you with inappropriate questions about Calvin?”
I smile at her tone, that particular Lark mix of genuine concern and deflecting humor. “How about literally anything else?”
“So tell me, is he still hot in that ‘I read Proust for fun’ kind of way?”
“So much for anything else,” I say, trying to sound exasperated but probably failing. “He’s grieving his mother. And I’m not interested.”
“Liar,” she says immediately, not even pretending to believe me.
“I’m not. And based on our interactions so far, he definitely isn’t either,” I say, moving coins around as if I’m actually counting them.
The truth is, even if he was interested, Calvin Midnight is exactly the kind of bad idea I don’t need right now. He’s only here until the estate gets settled, then it’s back to Seattle. And men like him date other writers and professors. Not bar owners. Plus we got off to a rough start. Three solid reasons right there. More than enough reasons. Definitely enough.
“Uh-huh. So what did you guys talk about?” She sets down the jar and leans against the bar, arms crossed.
“I dunno. He accused me of hoarding hot sauce,” I offer lamely.
“That’s... weirdly specific.” She shakes her head. “But also kind of funny. Now, how many times have you read his book? Really?”
“I don’t keep track. It’s a good book,” I say defensively, grabbing a roll of quarters from under the counter to restock the coin slots, even though we probably have enough.
“It’s a book written by a man you’ve been half in love with since you were twenty.”
“That’s not—” I stop, because what’s the point? Lark sees through me like I’m made of glass, always has since she started working here five years ago. Fine. Maybe I had a little crush when I first read his book. The way he wrote felt like he’d looked straight into my heart and described what lived there. But that was the author, not the actual man who’s currently living next door and making everything complicated. “Can we just pretend he’s not here?”
“Sure. We can pretend lots of things. Like how you don’t have that quote tattooed on your ribs.” She whispers the last part, cheekily pinching my waist where she knows the ink sits hidden under my shirt.
“Lark!” I hiss, glancing around as if she just spilled state secrets.
“What? I’m just saying, if my crush moved in next door looking like a boxer-professor hybrid, I’d at least fix my hair.”
I touch my messy bun self-consciously, feeling the pieces that have escaped throughout the shift. “I hate you.”
“You love me,” she says, grinning as she walks away.
The rest of the night passes in a blur of orders and small talk and the comfortable rhythm of service. Lark keeps shooting me knowing looks every time someone mentions Calvin, which is often. Small towns are like that. He hasn’t been home in ages and new gossip spreads faster than spilled beer.
By the time I’ve cleaned up and locked down, it’s nearly one. I head out into the night—Lark left hours ago in her beat-up Honda that runs on hope because her shitty ex took the truck in the divorce. I start the walk home. It’s only just under a mile, and I need the air.
Laila meets me at the edge of the property, tail wagging like I’ve been gone for years instead of hours. She falls into step beside me, and we crunch along the gravel drive in comfortable silence. The July air smells like saltwater and Doug fir and that green scent of everything growing too fast.
Inside my cabin, I grab clean clothes and slip into the shared bathroom, careful with the door. I shower quickly, conscious of the thin walls and the late hour. When I walk back to my room, still toweling my hair, I collapse on the bed, landing on the book hidden underneath. I should move it. Put it on the shelf where it belongs, spine out, nothing to be ashamed of.
Instead, I shove it to the side and pull the blanket over me. It’s now past one in the morning. I wonder if Calvin’s asleep over there, or if he’s lying awake too. If the cabin feels wrong to him, knowing Susan lived there.
It’s strange how absence carves space in the world.
That’s the line I reread obsessively, the one that guts me every time. But it’s not what I chose to ink on my skin. No, I picked the reckless one, the one that made me feel brave: Some storms are good enough to dance in. Even if they ruin everything in their path.
Yeah, well. Calvin Midnight would know all about storms that ruin things. About writing beautiful words about destruction being worth it, then running for shelter the moment real damage threatened. When his mother’s mind started slipping, when things got messy and hard, where was he?
I close my eyes and try not to think about the way he looked this morning. Try not to remember that I have those lines tattooed on my ribs, hidden where no one can see. Two sentences about embracing chaos, and here I am, serving the same drinks to the same people every night, playing it safe. Try not to think about my own notebook, full of crossed-out first lines and stories that never make it past page three. At least he finished something once.
I pull the pillow over my head, as if that could muffle my thoughts. But trying not to think about Calvin Midnight is like trying not to hear him through these walls. Impossible.
And getting harder by the minute.
CHAPTER 4
CALVIN
The heavy bag takes my right hook like it owes me money.
Five-thirty in the morning, and I’m already drenched in sweat, working combinations in Dad’s old garage gym. The detached garage sits off to the side of the Victorian, converted into his personal boxing sanctuary back when I was a kid. He’s been gone for over ten years, but the space hasn’t changed much—same cracked concrete floor, same water-stained posters of Ali and Frazier, same smell of leather and rust and decades of effort. The garage door’s rolled up, letting in the salt air and the first gold streaks of sunrise over the water.
I didn’t sleep much. I’d heard Maren come home at around one, her footsteps on the gravel quiet and careful. Heard her cabin door close, then the shower running from the shared bathroom, then nothing but my own brain refusing to shut the fuck up.
When’s the last time you were even here?
Her words have been rattling around my skull since yesterday. I wrote about loss like I understood it, packaged grief into pretty sentences. Then when Mom started forgetting our names—when she needed real help—I stayed in Seattle.
The last few visits home were brutal. She’d grab my wrist, tears streaming: ‘Hank? You came back?’ The hope in her voice when she thought I was Dad nearly broke me. It happened every time toward the end. Despite being adopted, I look too much like him, which made her confusion worse. My brothers and I all agreed it was better if I stayed away. I told myself it was better for her. Doesn’t make the guilt any lighter.
The bag swings back. I plant my feet and throw another combination. Jab-jab-cross. The rhythm settles something in me and makes the guilt manageable. This is the only meditation that’s ever worked for me. Fists and leather and the burn in my shoulders. I didn’t realize how much I’ve missed it in Seattle. I should start boxing more in my free time, hell maybe I could even start teaching a class in the evenings when I’m back in Seattle and—
“You’re dropping your left shoulder.”
I glance back, startled. “Morning to you too, Dom.”
Dominic steps in, grabbing tape for his wrists. Same dark hair as always, same broad shoulders, that same way of taking up space in a room like he owns it. The years of running Midnight Boxing have kept him in fighting shape, especially with the MMA classes he added to the gym’s offerings. He’s broader now than last time I saw him, more solid through the chest and arms. Though I’ve still got a couple inches on him, something that’s annoyed him since I hit my growth spurt at sixteen.
“So were you gonna stop by the gym now that you’re back? Say hi?”
“I got in yesterday evening.” I throw another combination, harder than necessary. “And had just picked up Mom’s urn. Wasn’t exactly in a social mood to make the rounds.”
“Just making sure you’re not bolting back to Seattle quite yet.”
I resist an eye roll and don’t take the bait. Yes, I haven’t been home much. No, I’m not fucking leaving before the memorial. He’s winding me up on purpose. Always knows which buttons to push.
“Theo and Alex said you didn’t stay long at the restaurant yesterday,” he continues, finishing with the tape.
“I stayed for a bit. I was tired after the drive.”
“Jack actually hung out with them. Came by my place too.”
“Yeah, he mentioned that when he got home. We caught up after.” Caught up meaning we drank beers on the porch and talked about everything except Mom until almost midnight.
He doesn’t respond, just moves to the speed bag with that same focused intensity he’s had since we were kids. Two years older than me, he’s got that successful small business owner look now. Confident, tired, slightly annoyed at everything.
“You’re sweating like someone who’s thinking too much,” he says, settling into his rhythm on the bag.
“That’s what professors do.”
“Yeah?” he verbally jabs, “how’s that working out for you?”
Dominic starts working the speed bag, his rhythm perfect, mechanical. He was always the technical one. I had power; he had precision. Made us good sparring partners until I left for college and he stayed to run the gym with Dad.
“So,” he says between strikes. “Maren.”
My shoulders tense. “What about her?”
“She’s been here for years. Took care of everything. Mom. The cabins.” The speed bag blurs under his fists, that perfect rhythm he could do in his sleep. “You good sharing space?”
“She’s nice.” I don’t mention that I started things off by being a complete prick.
“She’s nice?” He stops the bag with his palm, giving me that older brother look he perfected when we were kids. The one that says he knows exactly what I’m not saying. “That’s what you’re going with? Half the men in this town are trying to get in her pants every Friday night, and you’re going with ‘nice’?”
“Classy, Dom.” I grab my water bottle.
“Since when do you care about classy?” He’s still giving me that look.
“Doesn’t matter anyway,” I say, taking a drink. “She probably thinks I’m an arrogant dick.”
“Accurate.” He actually cracks a smile, the first real one since I got back. For a second he looks younger, like the brother who used to cover for me when Dad caught us out past curfew. “Doesn’t answer my question though. Thin walls in those cabins. Might make a man wonder.”
“Not your business, Dom.”
“Everything on this property is my business.” The speed bag starts up again, aggressive now. “Just saying, she’s not one of your Seattle groupies. She was good to Mom when it mattered. The town loves her. So keep your dick in your pants.”
Groupies. There’s that word again. Like I’ve had any groupies lately. Like I haven’t been living like a monk, grading papers and eating cereal for dinner. But I don’t correct him. Let him think I’m still that guy who had women lined up at readings. It’s easier than explaining how empty all that felt.
“We’re close with the buyer,” Dominic says suddenly, switching topics like he’s throwing a combination. No warning, straight to the body. “Should close right after the memorial.”
My stomach drops. “That fast?”
“Market’s hot. Good offer.” He keeps working the bag, not looking at me. “They’re eager.”
Our childhood home, where Mom taught us to make pie crust and Dad watched fights every Friday. Where we measured our heights on the kitchen doorframe every birthday. Soon it’ll belong to strangers. But better they actually live in it than watch it die slowly, waiting for one of us to come back.
My thoughts shift to Maren. What happens to her when new owners take over? “What about Maren?” I ask.
He pauses mid-strike. “We’re trying to work her into the deal. I’m negotiating. Mom would haunt my ass if we didn’t do right by her.” He resumes hitting the bag. “I’m trying, Cal. Really.”
I nod, but something sits wrong in my gut.
“This is happening, Cal,” Dominic continues, reading my silence. “We all agreed. The house has to go.”
The garage goes quiet except for the distant sound of waves. He’s baiting me. Wants me to swing first, verbally or otherwise. It’s an old pattern. Dominic pushing buttons, me trying not to react, both of us pretending we’re not still teenagers fighting over who gets the car keys.
“One round?” He tosses me a pair of gloves, the leather cracked but serviceable.
I catch them one-handed. “Your rules or mine?”
“Can’t exactly do MMA here—much as I’d love to slam you into this concrete, Mom would be pissed.” He grins, but it’s sharp. “So just boxing. Try not to embarrass yourself, Professor.”
We circle each other in the makeshift ring, a square of faded paint Dad laid down twenty years ago. Dominic’s stance shows his MMA training, too square, but he adjusts when I tag him with a jab. I keep my feet moving, hands high, old habits coming back like they never left.
He throws a testing combination. I slip it, counter with my own. We’re feeling each other out, remembering rhythms. He’s faster than he used to be, more aggressive. But I’ve got reach and I know his tells, the way his right shoulder dips before he throws his cross.
“MMA would crush boxing in any real fight,” he says, pressing forward with heavy shots.
“Maybe.” I pivot, catch him with a clean hook to the body. “But in a boxing ring, I’d mop the floor with you.”
We trade combinations, neither of us really trying to hurt the other. This is just how we talk. Through movement, through controlled violence. It’s easier than actual words. Than feelings.
The round ends with both of us breathing hard, a fresh bruise blooming on my ribs where he caught me with a solid right. No winner. Just more history written on our bodies.
“Still got those reflexes, I see,” Dominic says, grinning.
“Yeah, well, grading freshman essays is surprisingly good training for dodging punches. Both involve a lot of painful repetition.”
We grab water, cooling down. After a moment, Dominic drops his voice. “Theo told me you were talking about doing a bit of work on the house while you’re in town before the sale. You don’t need to, Cal. And you fixing the house now won’t change the fact that you weren’t here.”
“I know.”
“Do you?” He tosses his towel into the hamper. “Because it sounds like you might be trying to make up for lost time.”
