Decon had a new jacket. It wasn’t even new-to-him, but genuinely, off-the-rack new, and he shoved hands in pockets that only held his hands and grinned at himself as he walked towards the Tenor Building.
It was a nice jacket. It looked good. It was canvas, had a nice stiffness, and the seams were tough and hard to move, and he was going to have to break it in. It had little rivets, and nice thread, and… if he thought about it any more closely he was going to accidentally take it apart. So instead he just reasserted that his hands were in his pockets and focused on smiling. He had already frayed a bit of the back, where there was a little split; it had been sewed together for some reason, and he spent a little too long trying to determine whether it was supposed to be sewed like that, and one of the edges had frayed under his attention.
He also had a new place to live, but he almost didn’t know what to do with that. It was semi-furnished, and he put a loaf of bread and some milk in the fridge, and bought a rice cooker (he just bought that, too, but secondhand because he wasn’t sure he trusted new rice cookers). He went to the corner store and bought some rice, and some cans of things, but the whole experience was too bewildering, and when he got them home he put them in the cabinet and ended up not cooking anything.
Brother Matteo had gifted him a plant, and he slept on the couch by the windowsill it sat on because one it got dark the place felt frighteningly, echoingly alone.
Seth was still transitioning to the city; she hadn’t seemed to want to explain the situation with her mother, but had hinted that her mother’s legal knowledge made securing the right conditions troublesome. Their arrangements were similar, to a point, and though he had already blindly signed the forms, she went to some length explaining what had gone into crafting them. She assured him – with that hyper-competent bearing that sometimes made him feel even more stupid, but somehow not in a bad way – that his situation was entirely fair and above board. It was just her mother giving her problems.
Much later he realized she was trying to assure him that just because her mother was applying her legal expertise to Seth’s situation, it didn’t mean that Decon’s situation was exploitative or unequal. The thought had never occurred to him. He chalked it up as yet another reason why she should probably continue to be in charge, despite her making sure to ask him about things.
For Decon, the arrangement with Mr. Tenor included moving expenses. Mr. Tenor’s associates had recommended a place. One of his many secretaries had arranged and then explained the accounts now set up in Decon’s name, which had been filled with an advance to cover unforeseen expenses. A lady in the lobby had taken the time to explain his new neighborhood to him. The brothers had thrown a little moving-out party, with slightly more gravitas than their average adoption bash. Brother Dominic cried.
After his all-cash grocery expedition had been completed, Decon had been walking around his new neighborhood and seen the jacket in the window. He hyped himself up to test out the card Mr. Tenor had given him. It worked, and now he had a jacket, and questions about how he was supposed to check on what happened with the expenses put on the card. The receipt he tucked in his back pocket, just in case. In his other pocket was the note the secretary gave him about how to catch the right train to get to the building. Thankfully she had drawn him a picture.
He smiled to the security guards, who didn’t react, and then to the front desk, who seemed confused. At the elevator, he paused to remind himself of the sequence of events, miming the actions, since the lobby was deserted. Taking the special card out of his for-the-first-time-full wallet (all weekend, he would pull it out because it felt weirdly bulky, panic at whose money he had somehow taken, then remember it was his). He counted until he got to the right elevator door, swiped the card, punched the right button, got in the elevator, punched the code he’d taped to his card, put the card to the reader, then punched what was either the right floor number or it backward.
The elevator ride seemed to take the right amount of time.
The ‘office’ sure had changed, though. There was still a lobby, but it was all bright colors now – white walls and green plants and tastefully colorful furniture. A hand-drawn map had been taped to where the secretary desk had been, roughly indicating that left was the living area, and right was the ‘office’ area.
He went left, down a short, well-lit hallway, at the end of which was a little nook for jackets and house shoes, and emerged into the kitchen.
His smile got dopey again. Next to the kitchen was a den area, but just past that, with a glorious view of the city out of a full wall of window, was a room with just one big table – big enough to host, small and plain enough to be homey. They spent a lot of time picking out the table.
Seth put her coffee down and shoved her newspaper to the side, smiling up at him as she – for all her dignity – bounded to her feet.
“This place looks awesome, Seth.”
“Yeah!” She spread her arms at the windows, then turned back to him. “I haven’t had anybody to gush to, but I think it came together really well.” She strode over to him, cocking her head playfully. “Nice jacket, by the way.”
Decon tried hard not to blush, and shrugged to show it off a little. “Thanks. What about our guests?”
“Well, Wes said that everything’s fine, but I get the feeling Wes could break all his fingers in a terrible piano playing accident and say that everything is fine while still trying to play. Firmament hasn’t said anything at all, since… you know.”
“Did Wes try the whole, ‘Call me…’ thing again?”
“Yeah.” Seth flashed him a little frown. “Didn’t work. Wes didn’t think it would – he talks about Firmament like he’s basically having reactions like any other person would, it’s just we can’t see them. So it made sense he wouldn’t respond because it’s a stupid thing to ask him.” She shrugged at Decon’s equivocal nod. “Yeah, I don’t know about Wes’ judgement when it comes to normal reactions to things. But he’s the best we got. Might as well listen to him.”
“Is the nurse around?”
“Downstairs with the clinic crew,” Seth reported, stomping her foot to demonstrate. “Mr. Tenor said it’s going to run like a normal but internal clinic for his employees, and with Wes here, the nurse will have way more to do hanging out down there, just dropping in for meals and being on-call for Firmament.”
“Makes sense,” Decon said, then craned his neck to look around the room. “Tour?”
Seth grinned. “Yesss!”
“Mr. and Mrs. Goodwin, sir.”
“Hm?” Mr. Tenor said over his coffee, which was still too hot to sip.
“We put them in the nook, as they seemed to want to imply their visit was social.”
Mr. Tenor raised his eyebrows and looked up, but his face was still buried in the steam from his coffee cup, willing it cool as he held it halfway between the desk and his face.
“Is anyone serving down there?”
“We sent Mike the intern for pastries. Molly made some espresso for them.”
“Tell me about fifteen minutes after the intern gets back.” The secretary started to leave, when Mr. Tenor’s booming question interrupted. “Where did you get the pastries?”
The secretary turned back around, made a mental note that they would half to re-transcribe and replace Mr. Tenor’s desk calendar for the thousandth time, since he’d just spilled coffee on it, but at least it wasn’t his pants, again. “Molly said Gino’s, if they’re still stocked, the corner if not.”
Between soft curses, Mr. Tenor said. “Get me fifteen minutes after if it’s the corner.”
The secretary nodded and left. At least now they had clinic for burns on site.
“Should we knock on the door?” Decon whispered.
“I guess,” Seth said. “If we want to talk to Wes, yeah.”
“I mean, but what if he’s asleep? What if it’s like… what if he’s not settled in?”
Seth threw her hands up. “We’ll have to ask him to find out, won’t we?”
“It just feels weird – I mean, he and Firmament actually live here. It feels like barging into someone’s place and waking them up. Seems rude.”
“Well…” but there wasn’t much arguing with this logic. “Maybe that’s part of what we’ll work out today – basic house rules. Can’t help breaking rules we don’t know exist yet.”
“I feel like we’re going to say that a lot,” Decon mumbled.
“We already have,” Seth mumbled back as she reached forward and delicately rapped her knuckles against the door. They waited.
They waited too long. They exchanged a look. Seth reached forward again and knocked louder.
Decon, bouncing a little in place, had almost turned to leave when the door opened. Wes stared at them.
“Good morning?” Seth said, because he didn’t look like he had just woken up at all.
“Yes,” Wes replied, then thought a moment, eyes cast to the side and said, “Yes, Good morning. I mean, just ‘good morning.’ I’m sorry. I forgot I could open the door.” He paused, then very deliberately said, “Good morning” one last time in an almost-normal way.
“Hey, so,” Decon said into the silence. “Have you looked around? We’re doing a tour. Want to come?”
“I haven’t,” Wes said. “I…” but he seemed not to know what to say.
“Wes, do you have four boxes of cereal on your bed?” Seth asked.
Wes turned to glance back, which let the door open a bit more, so they all could see four boxes of cereal stacked neatly at the foot of his bed, in an otherwise clinically bare room. He turned back around.
“Yes. Sorry.”
“I guess you like cereal,” Decon offered.
“Did anyone show you the kitchen?”
Wes looked at Seth, then back at the cereal, then back at Seth. It was obviously where he got the cereal. Whether he should have the cereal seemed to bother him slightly – either that, or he wasn’t sure he should admit to having seen the kitchen he had so obviously seen.
“Did anyone tell you that you’re allowed to use the kitchen?” Seth tried again.
“No,” Wes said.
Seth and Decon sighed in unison.
“Dude, have you even eaten anything in the last – what, didn’t you get here, like, Saturday? It’s Monday.”
Wes looked back at the cereal again, then at the floor in front of them.
“Okay, then,” Seth said, “we’ll obviously do breakfast first, and then we’ll take a look around. I want to show you the gym Wes. I think you’ll like it. And you’ll have to help us stock it with the right stuff.”
“Speaking of stocking the right stuff, I make mean pancakes, if we’ve got it,” Decon said. “Or are we more an eggs-and-bacon crew?”
“I vote pancakes,” Seth said. “Do we have a waffle maker? I hope there’s fruit. Mr. Tenor said he had it stocked since Wes and Firmament were going to be here, but I didn’t look through it because I wanted to wait for everybody.”
“Should I bring Firmament?” Wes said.
“Yeah,” a look of concern flashed across her face, but she put a hand to her chest and sighed with relief. “The nurse. The nurse probably fed Firmament. Did you meet the nurse?”
But this was a foolish question, so Wes didn’t answer; they quite correctly inferred from the fact he had hoarded cereal in his room and forgotten the door opened that Wes could not possibly have met the nurse because he hadn’t left his room except to sneak out for necessities over the last two days, like a criminal. It was a good thing the bathroom was en suite.
“Well,” Decon said cheerily, clapping his hands together, “Let’s go get our potato and then get our pancake on.”
Bernhardt Tenor was an unfailingly affable man in social settings; the rumors of his ruthlessness in business were not all that made this affability off-putting. Mr. and Mrs. Goodwin had assumed the rumors to be both true, and a sort of everyone-successful-was-like-that kind of rumor. They had listened attentively while Bernhardt Tenor had carefully explained the virtues of each of the pastries in the basket, and diligently assisted them in choosing the ones that would best suit their tastes, with the sort of deep concern they expected from bellboys attempting to siphon off part of the concierge’s share of the tip by means of a conniving and overwhelming hospitality. Mrs. Goodwin, whose extensive financial empire had been, since she was sixteen, entirely under her control, kept narrowing her eyes when he looked away, as if peering for cracks in his pleasant façade. Mr. Goodwin, whose inherited wealth had, more than once, been in severe danger from people like Mrs. Goodwin and Bernhardt Tenor, seemed to have issues getting too close.
“At some point, you’ll have to go back for the poppy seed ones sometime. They’re my favorite,” Mr. Tenor said. He frowned, in what was perhaps a little too theatrically disappointed manner, ran his tongue over his teeth behind his lips, and added, “They’re often sold out quite quickly.”
The Goodwins replied with the usual return of my-favorite-bespoke-bakeries, which-neighborhood-place-was-better, surely-the-best-is-this-obscure-place, conversation. Keeping the conversation social – the only grounds on which they wished to engage with Mr. Tenor, and the only grounds on which they had shaky pretenses to – was a painful ruse to maintain. He dragged it out only a little longer by briefly diverting to delis. Finally:
“So,” Mr. Tenor said, moving away from the pastry basket to sit across from them and requesting a coffee with a look back at a hovering underling. “Since I recall sending you the information on the ATPEACe initiative, I assume you’re visiting because you had something you wanted to discuss in that regard?”
The Goodwin’s exchanged a glance, which seemed to be the signal to begin a coordinated and well-practiced attack.
“Yes, we were…” Mr. Goodwin cleared his throat, as the maneuvers were delicate. “We heard about your new initiative, you know, as one does, and we were of course in support of the premise. Having read some of your… promotional materials… we just couldn’t help but want to be more involved, if we could.”
“Yes,” Mrs. Goodwin followed up. “I’m not sure if you’re aware, but this particular kind of… outreach strikes a very personal chord with us.”
Though the brochures had been quite well done, no information was formally out yet. They took it as a good sign he continued to smile at them placidly instead of mentioning anything about ‘preliminary plans’ and ‘still in development’ organizational schemes. They exchanged another glace, this one more of the sharing-strength, bearing-up-under-burdens kind.
“Our son,” Mr. Goodwin said, meeting Mr. Tenor’s unchanged, smiling eyes. “You may have heard, I’m afraid – the rumors are hard to suppress – but our son, we think, may have…”
“He may be an Islander,” Mrs. Goodwin threw down the dirty word. The couple looked at one another again.
“And, well…” Mr. Goodwin began phase two of their mission.
“I’ve heard,” Mr. Tenor said as conversationally as a dumptruck offloading bricks. “An empath, right?”
Mr. Goodwin, fighting a flush, nodded. “We assume.”
“Yes, there’s not really a way to test,” Mr. Tenor said, as if expecting them to find this a fascinating aspect of the situation, too. “Everything is defined by experience. Tell me – did you read all the materials I sent?”
Both nodded.
“If you just wanted to donate money, you wouldn’t have visited,” Mr. Tenor said, rubbing his chin as he rested his elbow on his knee, creating creases in a disturbingly casual fashion for a suit quite that expensive.
“We will, of course, be happy to support the program,” Mrs. Goodwin said, lighting a glittering smile, “but, well – our support might be substantially more concrete if our son could possibly be involved in some of the actual programs.”
“He’s an empath,” Mr. Tenor said.
“We assume,” Mr. Goodwin replied. “But to our knowledge this… ability… has never interfered in his academic or professional performance. He’s a bright boy, and very… active, in his way. You know, kids today… He does need some direction, and possibly some… more supportive environments.”
“Did you read all the materials I sent?” Mr. Tenor said, again.
“Mr. Tenor,” Mrs. Goodwin said, smiling again, “of course we did. And Boswell is very excited about the program, and very eager to try to participate in whatever way he can. We just… you know, his hopes are up, and we hoped we might be able to assist in his application to participate.”
“We realize you haven’t made things public yet,” Mr. Goodwin said, raising his hands as if Mr. Tenor had objected, or seemed upset, or reacted at all. “We respect that, and this would just be between us. Our boy is very trustworthy – he wouldn’t brag to his friends. But if he could be considered, in whatever system you eventually get together to organize candidates, a little sooner, or even possibly a little higher than others, we would be just… extremely pleased.”
“And extremely pleased to demonstrate our support in more material fashions,” Mrs. Goodwin added.
“Mike,” Mr. Tenor called back, “could you bring copies of the materials we sent to the Goodwins?”