Don’t save a prayer for me now
Save it ‘til the morning after
No, don’t save a prayer for me now
Save it ‘til the morning after
--Duran Duran, Save A Prayer
He’s half-awake when he hears the phone ring. He flips over to the side of the bed, picks it up, growls “Hello?”
“Raphael?”
”Richard.” He half-sits, supporting his body with his arm. “What’s up?”
“That is your brother in the hospital.”
“Yeah.” Starting already. Dammit...
“Good. I’ve already hired him a lawyer...”
“For what?”
“You haven’t heard yet?”
“Richard, it’s nine o’clock in the morning...”
”The Attorney General’s office filed a motion to dissolve your brother’s marriage half an hour ago.”
“Shit,” he says, lying back on the bed and looking at the ceiling. “Anything else?”
”Not yet. But I’d find a guardian for those kids of yours...”
Leonardo is already up, setting the table for breakfast, nervous as hell. “You know,” Raph says, “he may not be up ‘til noon or something... they had a hard night.”
“I remember him,” Leo says. “He’ll be up.”
The door to the bedroom opens like it’s on cue, and Isamu emerges. He and Leo just stare at each other.
Raph glances at them both. “Um... I gotta go talk to April... I’ll be back, okay?”
Neither of them answer.
“Hey,” Leo finally says, after the door has shut behind his brother. “How ya doin’?”
"All right,” he says, smiling.
“I got breakfast started.”
“Great. Anything I can do?”
“Um... not right now.”
They both stand there, smiling, with no idea what to do next. Finally Isamu starts: “I... I had a question.”
“Sure... what is it?”
“What...what do you want me to call you?"
Leo frowns, confused.
"I always used to call you Leo-san,” Isamu says helplessly, “But... do you want me to call you Father?"
"I...I don't know, not Father..."
"Dad? Tousan?"
"I..." Leo stares at him. "I just..." He pulls Isamu into his arms. "Isamu..."
"Dad?" Isamu says.
"Yeah," Leo stutters through his tears. "That's fine. Leo-san, Dad, 'Hey you'..." They both laugh. "I'm so happy, Isamu, I'm just so happy you're here...my son...after all these years..." He hugs him tighter, and Isamu puts his arms around his father's shoulders.
"I love you," Isamu says. "Dad."
"I love you, Isamu, I love you so..."
April opens the door to find Raph.
“Everything okay?”
“So far,” he says. “But... got some more papers.”
She smiles. “You wanna give me more money?”
“You wish.” He hands her the documents.
Her smile fades as she reads, the cloud that’s been over her head redescending. “Raph--”
“Yeah, I know.”
“You really think they’ll try to--”
“They filed to dissolve Mike’s marriage this morning.”
She closes her eyes, sighs. “Raph... I wish there was something more I could do...”
“You got enough to deal with, April. How the girls doin’?”
“They’re all right. I mean...”
”Yeah.”
“As good as they can be, I guess. Robyn’s flying out today... she’s due at JFK this afternoon.”
“Do you want us to...”
She shrugs her shoulders. “She’s already seen Mike on the news, Raph. I can’t lie to her... it’ll probably explain a lot, really, all the things I haven’t told her...”
“April,” he says. “You’ve done so much for us... tell her what you need to, okay?”
“I have to,” she says. “She’s my sister.”
“Dad?”
“What?”
“I... what should I do about this?” Carlos holds up the jewelry box. “I got it for Raven’s recital, but...”
But she’s burying her father instead. “Well... probably ought to take it back to the store, unless you want to save it for some other time...”
“I don’t know. I really wanted her to have it...”
“I know. Can I take a look?”
Raphael puts his hands over his son’s, takes the box from him, opens it, stares. “It’s beautiful,” he says slowly.
“It wasn’t as expensive as it looks, Dad...”
“No, no,” he says absently, “that’s fine... I think... I think maybe you ought to save it for a while, see how you feel, okay? You can always take it back later...”
“All right... Dad, are you okay?”
“Yeah... I’m fine, mi hombre... just tired.”
“He’s suing for custody.”
Maureen takes a breath. “I have his word--”
“It’s not worth the paper it’s printed on, Maureen,” Richard says calmly. “He’s talking about the conditions she’s being kept in--”
“What--” She’s too angry to get anything else out.
“I know,” he says. “But we’re going to have to hit them hard, and fast. You’ll probably have to do some interviews... you’ve got a little bit of an edge with all of your husband’s fans. The calls and letters you’ve already gotten are a good sign. We’ll try to do everything we can on our end...”
Her eyes are skeptical. “And what’s that?”
“We’ve got some weight,” he says matter-of-factly. “We’ll throw it around.”
Samuels squints at the bandaged figure on the bed. “He gonna make it?”
“You got me. Doctors say it’s pretty touchy. Whoever attacked him sure didn’t want him to make it...”
“What’s his name?”
“John Doe, as far as I know. That’s one of the things we want you to find out.”
“So why do you think--”
“Look at the wounds. No normal knife does that, and Bert said it looked like some kind of Japanese weapon, a sai...”
”So he used a sai. That doesn’t mean--”
“I ain’t finished yet, Samuels.”
Samuels looks at the captain suspiciously.
“The building they pulled him out of was lousy with bodies. Foot bodies.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. And as far as they can tell they weren’t New Yorkers.”
“Think Japan’s getting involved again?”
“Don’t see why not.”
“Christ... we could have another mess on our hands--”
“Exactly. That’s why I want to know who this John Doe is. And why he’s here. And if he lives, I want you to arrest his ass before he can do any more damage.”
He opens the box, gets gets the necklace out, holds it to the light. Almost identical to the one Carlos got at the store... How did you remember it? Not enough to know, but enough to buy her the same damn necklace...
He puts it against his hand, looks at the way the gold shines. He remembers her now, holding Carlos in her arms...
A la rorro
a la meme
este niño ya se duerme
si este niño
se durmiera
cuanto se lo agradeciera.
He smiles, remembering how he used to tease her about the song, what its words really meant-- “if this kid would fall asleep, I’d be really grateful.”
He hasn’t thought about Maria in a long time. Her loss still weighs on him, but he’s gotten used to it, something he carries with him, doesn’t really think about any more. It’s been a long time since he remembered her well, remembered the shock of her death...
I had it pretty bad for you, Maria.
Almost as bad as this kid of yours does now...
A noise behind him: Lupe. His daughter’s getting better, but the old man still knows best. “Hey,” he says to her without turning around. “How’s it goin’?”
“Whatcha doin’ with Carlos’ necklace?”
“It’s not his,” he says. “This one was his mother’s.”
“Really?”
“Yeah... don’t tell him, okay?”
“Okay,” she says, confused, but reading his tone of voice well enough to know it’s important. “Dad?”
“Yeah?”
“You said you were gonna tell me about my mother.”
Damn your timing, Lupe... “Yeah...” He reaches out an arm, puts it around her shoulders, squeezes. “She wanted to tell you herself... that’s why I kept puttin’ it off.”
“Can I meet her?”
“You already have.” He braces himself. “Look, when your uncle Leo came back from Japan...”
The doorbell rings, again, and Leo gets up, ready to find the parents of the kids who keep knocking on the door and give them one hell of a lecture on the value of keeping track of your children so they won’t get strangled by angry turtles... good thing Raph’s out tonight. He flips the door open, takes a deep breath, and stops short as he sees the face, the blonde hair...
“What?” The smile is as mischevous as ever. “I don’t know what I did, but I promise not to do it again...”
“Renet?”
Raph leans back. New York is a big city, but in some respects it’s still as bad as a small town; word spreads fast, and evidently the size of his bank account has gotten around.
He can hear the whispers as he comes in, the same ones he’s heard all night... Fortune 500, say he’s worth a ton... Yeah, that one, name’s Raphael... all brothers, I hear the other one doesn’t go out much...
Used to be they’d look at the muscles under the ‘costume,’ get interested, come in closer.
Challenge was finding someone interested enough to not mind that he kept the ‘costume’ on.
They still look, and they still come; but all they see is money.
He turns to pay the bartender and sees Sean, sitting in the back of the bar, talking to some guy who’s got loser written all over him. Raph pretends not to notice them; after a while the guy gets up, walks to the bar, orders two drinks. Raph walks over to him.
“Hey,” he tells the guy, “you know that guy you’re with?”
“Yeah?”
Raph reaches down to his belt, pulls a fifty out of his wallet. “Forget about him.”
The guy looks at the bill for a second, as if he’s waiting for the numbers to reach his brain. “My memory’s better than this,” he says finally.
“All right,” Raph says, and the money disappears. “How bout, ‘forget about him and I won’t beat the shit out of you?’”
The guy’s mouth drops open. Raph smiles.
Shows his teeth at any rate.
The guy takes off.
Raph throws the fifty at the bartender, takes the drinks, and makes his way to Sean’s table.
They sit in a circle, as much as they can, and watch Carlos draw the sigils on the floor.
“Almost midnight,” Angela says, her eyes nervously keeping watch.
Carlos looks around at his cousins, his sister. “Everyone ready?”
They nod. Isamu holds the katana inside the pentagram, ready, waiting...
Mike’s finally asleep. Maureen shifts on the cot and looks up at the ceiling. The cops came in this morning, and Don and Mike repeated the story they’d cooked up about trying to scrounge electronics from the building. The cops seemed to buy it, for whatever reason, and they all breathed a sigh of relief. At least they were safe from that now. For Maureen at least, it’d gotten her thinking that they were going to be okay...
And then Raph had told them he wasn’t sure if Satoru was really dead...
I hit him in the neck. There was a lot of blood... he should be dead... but they had this thing in the paper, they’d found a John Doe in the building. And Leo thinks... he thinks it could maybe be him. Don’s gonna get into the records and see if he can figure it out.
Great.
So we’ve got him and the kid to worry about...
Kid? What kid? They hadn’t told her about Keishi before.
Adopted, Karai says Satoru couldn’t have kids, but... doesn’t make any difference. Still his kid. He’ll still want revenge when he gets old enough...
Maureen rubs her face with her hands, puts them over her eyes for a second. As if it would help.
“They wanted to interrupt the timestream.”
”Why?”
“Because they wanted me to show up and stop them.”
Leo shakes his head, still uncomprehending. “But...”
"You know, I'd show up and scold them, drop in and see you... they’re worried, Leo. Ookami and Carlos most of all. They don’t want to lose you.”
“Lose me? To--” He realizes as soon as the words are out of his mouth, and shakes his head. “They’re worried about her.”
She nods. "I'm assuming they just talked Isamu into it..."
“They don’t want me to leave them...”
“It’s kind of cute, really, when you think about it, they’d risk frying their butts just to keep you
around...”
“You wouldn’t really have...”
”Nah. Usually you just scare ‘em a little and they’ll quit. They weren’t doing anything anyway, but we usually try to nip it in the bud before they stumble on anything that’ll actually work.”
He laughs. “Scare the hell out of ‘em so they don’t try again?”
She smiles. “And if they do... they’re still doing something that won’t work.”
“Clever,” he tells her. “So what exactly is happening to them?”
“Oh... not much.”
He raises his eyes to hers, his skepticism almost audible.
”Oh,” she shrugs, “they’re getting chased by some dinosaurs, that’s all... it’ll be good for them. Bonding, ya know?”
“Renet!”
“Oh, don’t worry,” she says, pouting a little. “They’re fine. One of the apprentices is with ‘em...”
“Is the apprentice anything like you were?”
“Leo!”
“Well?”
“They’ll be fine,” she says firmly. “If anything goes wrong, my beeper goes off, and I run in to save the day, okay?”
“Okay...”
“So tell me about your kid,” she says, craning her arms around his neck.
“I can get us out of here,” Ebric says desperately, digging around his pack. “Timestress Renet left me a way to signal her if anything really went wrong...”
Ookami stops slashing at her raptor long enough to snap, “It has!”
“Now if I can just find the control...”
He turns over, watches her sleep. God, she’s beautiful...
She feels so good in his arms. He wants to keep her here, to ask her not to leave.
That was never the deal, he tells himself. She can’t have a normal life, you know that. She needs someone who won’t ask her to stay, who doesn’t mind he only sees her every couple years...
She fumbles in her sleep, reaching toward him, and he gives her his hand. She takes it, pulls it to her body, smiles.
Dammit, Renet, I never thought I’d fall in love with you.
He can hear sounds in the living room; Raph getting back. Sounds like he’s not alone... Leo frowns, hoping his brother hasn’t done anything too stupid. He relaxes when he hears the coughing; Sean’s, a smoker’s hack almost as distinctive as the one Don’s developed.
Guess he can’t really blame Raph for not wanting to be alone tonight...
Renet gets up near midnight and almost collides with Raph on the way to the bathroom. “Sorry,” she says, puts out a hand to steady herself and finds herself touching his shoulder. He catches her wrist at about the same time and they smile at each other for a second.
She lets go, he lets go, and they’re almost apart when he says, “hey...”
She turns to him.
“Thanks for comin’ tonight.”
“Oh, I had a job to do... just figured I’d stop in...”
“He really... it’s good to have you around, Renet.”
“It’s good to be around.”
An awkward silence, and then: “Can I ask you something?”
“Sure.”
“Why... I mean, you’ve got your pick, don’t you? You’ve got the whole universe... all that time... why him?”
”Because I love him,” she says. “Because he wants me to stay and he’ll never ask me to. Because... he’s your brother, Raph, you should know...”
“You don’t have any brothers, do ya?”
“I have a sister...” She pauses for a second, and then smiles at him. “Yeah, I guess you’ve got a point.”
He smiles back at her. “’Night, Renet.”
“Night.”
Don hears the crash when he’s out on the fire escape; he gets down just in time to see the car squealing away, to see the flames spreading in the window... it’s the Matthews place, he’s seen their kids at Halloween... shit.
Those bastards, bad enough to take it out on us...
He runs in, helps them beat out the flames, offers to call the police, but the wife, Athene, that’s her name, is already on the phone. He stays until the cops come, standing nervously outside the building smoking cigarettes, hoping he doesn’t see another car, another Molotov cocktail.
Byron could’ve handled this. He’d be in there right now, cracking jokes, making people feel better... all he can do is get the hell out. He saw the look on the father’s face... this is your fault. What could he say? He was right...
A noise beside him and he starts. Karai. “Are they all right?”
He nods. “Scared.” He takes another drag. “I didn’t think it would start this soon... guess I should have known better.”
“When we suspect the worst we’re usually right...”
She turns at the sound of footsteps. Leo and Renet evidently chose to take the stairs. “Fire out?”
Don nods at Leo. “This is insane.”
“Richard’s found out that the publishing company’s gonna try to get Mike’s intellectual property rights... have the state declare him unfit, that sort of thing...”
“How are we even gonna fight this?” Don asks, flicking his ash away absentmindedly.
“Richard says we’re gonna fight fire with fire,” Leo tells him. “Whatever that means.”
Karai has been looking at Renet, wearing Raph’s big leather jacket over a tank top and a pair of ludicrously tight jeans. She begins ransacking her English and Japanese vocabularies for the right word to sum up the package-- the bright, almost empty eyes, the hair, the wardrobe-- and finally settles on bimbo. She casts a look at Donatello. He smiles at her wryly and offers her a cigarette.
“Very funny,” she mutters.
“What?” Renet asks innocently.
“Nothing,” they chorus. Renet gives Don one of those I thought-you-were-on-my-side looks and he shrugs his shoulders. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing, really,” she says, too casually, and Don’s smile disappears.
“The kids--”
“The kids are fine.”
“Renet--”
“What about the kids?” Karai’s voice is icy.
“They’re fine,” Renet insists, “I’ve got everything under control...”
Don flicks the stub of cigarette out of his fingers and moves to face her. “I’ve known you too long to buy that story...”
“Look--”
Leo has had his hand on Renet’s waist, and he feels the vibration at the same time she does.
They exchange glances.
“I’ll be right back,” she says nervously, releases herself from Leo and takes off into the alleyway.
“I’m coming with you--” Leo says, starts after her.
“My son--” Karai passes him and is the first into the darkness of the alley.
It’s empty.
Karai turns to Leonardo and hisses a question in Japanese.
“You wouldn’t believe me even if I told you.”
“Cops,” Don interrupts before things get any worse, and they watch together as the cars approach the building.
“Nothing’s happening,” Carlos says sullenly.
“Just give it a second, willya?” Angela frowns at the beeper.
“What are you waiting for?” They look up and Renet’s standing at the mouth of the cave, near the fire they’ve built for the raptors.
“Your beeper broke,” Angela says, tossing the object at her accusingly.
Renet doesn’t answer. Instead she turns her gaze to Ebric, whose unconscious body is lying at the corner of the cave. She raises a questioning eyebrow.
“He wouldn’t let Angela look at the beeper,” Carlos explains.
It seems to satisfy Renet, who turns her attention to Isamu, standing only a foot or so away. “Hi,” she says, “I’m Renet. You okay?”
He nods at her. After everything else he’s seen tonight, a tall perky blonde in his uncle’s jacket seems fairly normal.
“Welcome to the family, kid.” She makes a motion, and they’re gone...
Somewhere between the late Cretateous and the 21st century Renet pulls Carlos out of the timestream. “Look,” she says. “I want to talk to you.”
Carlos smiles at her, and she sees the note of triumph in his eyes. “How ya doin’?”
“All right,” she says cautiously. “Look, Carlos...”
“What?” A note of defiance; almost sounds like his father.
“You’ve got to realize; there are some things you can’t change.”
He frowns; he can see the direction she’s leading in, but not the destination.
“Look...” She sighs, presses her lips together. “Look,” she fumbles around in her bag, grabs something, presses it into his hand. “You can’t change it, okay. You’ve got to... you’ve just got to accept things the way they are.”
He stares at the paper. She takes a breath and starts again.
“I’m sorry, Carlos... but... you can’t... you can’t do this. You can’t keep scheming against her when... it won’t help. It won’t even make much of a difference. The only thing it’ll do is drive you and your uncle apart...”
Carlos says something, but she doesn’t catch it. “What?”
“Is he happy?”
“I think so,” she says, and holds out an arm to him. He leans into her, and she squeezes him. “He loves you guys, you know.”
“I know,” he says into her shoulder.
“C’mon,” she tells him, her face in his hair. “We’ve got to get back.”
“I want to know where my son is,” Karai mutters.
“That makes two of us,” Leo grumbles back. Don finishes his conversation with the cop, and turns toward them.
“Everything all right?” Don asks, looking past them to Renet and the kids. The kids look shaken and tired, but they seem to have all their original body parts, which is something to be grateful for whenever Renet’s involved...
Karai runs up to Isamu, questioning him near-hysterically in Japanese.
Ookami walks up to Leonardo and attaches herself to his leg.
“Where’s Ebric?” Angela asks.
“In the infirmary.”
Leo picks up his niece, kisses her forehead. She leans into him, puts her arms around his neck. “You want me to get your dad?”
She nods. Leo glances over at Isamu, still trying to reassure his mother.
“I’m fine,” Isamu says again, losing patience.
“What kind of woman--”
“The kind who can speak Japanese,” Leo says quickly, and everyone is suddenly very quiet.
“I’m gonna get Raph,” Leo says finally. “You guys wanna get a donut or something when I come back down?”
The kids nod, and Renet says, “sure.”
“Krispy Kreme?” Angela asks.
“If you guys want,” he says.
Raph’s half-awake when he hears the pounding. “What?”
“Me,” Leo says. “It’s Ookami.”
“What?” Raph disentangles himself from Sean and the chaos of sheets and blankets, gets up, opens the door.
She’s curled tightly against Leo. He reaches out, and she’s in his arms in an instant.
“They were messing around with the timestream-- tryin’ to anyway-- and-- anyway, they ended up in the Cretaceous and she’s a little freaked out. The rest of the kids and Renet and I are heading out to the Krispy Kreme, okay?”
Raph nods, squeezes his daughter. She won’t cry-- he knows better than to expect that-- but she’s real shaky. “Sean,” he calls behind him.
“Mmph? Um’h snweepin...”
“I’m gonna be in Lupe’s room for a while. Don’t leave.”
“Nngh.”
“Try not to get lost in the sixteenth century or something on the way, okay, Leo?”
“I’ll do what I can,” Leo says, suddenly sounding very tired.
Against her better instincts, Karai goes upstairs with Don instead of out to the Krispy Kreme.
“It always works out eventually,” Don’s saying. “Something about her... I don’t know.”
“But what... what exactly does she do?”
“Like Leo says,” Don sighs, “you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.” He grunts; he’d forgotten he left the door locked. He flips open the doorknob and touches a few buttons. The door unlocks.
“Impressive,” Karai murmurs.
“Just handy when you’ve forgotten your key,” he says dismissively, opening the door.
“What does he see in her?” she asks.
Don opens his mouth, thinks better of it, and pretends the question was never asked.
“I never thought he cared so much about the physical...”
“She’s smarter than she wants you to think,” he says calmly, going to the refrigerator and getting the milk. “Want something to drink?”
She shakes her head. “But still...”
Fuck it, Don thinks. “She’s never lied to him.”
She frowns. “I deserved that.”
“You deserve worse,” Don says darkly, pouring the milk. “But you’re Isamu’s mother.”
The anger that’s been welling up all night finally breaks out. “If you had a son, you would understand,” she hisses. “You would kill your own brother if you thought it would keep him alive. But here you stand-- no child, no lover, no one but yourself-- and think you can judge me. I’m tired of it. I’m tired of you all thinking you know what you would have done... tell me, Donatello. Tell me you could put your son’s life in jeopardy for the sake of your lover’s feelings.”
The heat comes on; ancient pipes kicking to life. Karai’s eyes are steady, defiant, the anger burning like a flame.
When Don finally speaks his voice is distant. “Unlike my brothers,” he says calmly, “I was blessed-- maybe cursed-- with knowing I’d never have what you’d call a ‘normal life’ even if I were human. For a lot of reasons. But... it doesn’t stop you wanting it. And when Byron and I...” he takes a sip of milk absentmindedly. “We talked about children. We both knew there wasn’t a snowball’s chance in hell, but we still talked sometimes... don’t talk to me about what I don’t have, Karai. I know that all too well.”
“I didn’t mean--”
“And I didn’t mean to be a bitter, cynical nicotine addict, but here we are.”
She smiles in spite of herself. “Life’s a bitch, isn’t that what you Americans say?”
He laughs, and the tension’s broken.
“I think I will have some of that milk after all,” she says.
Michael Campbell has been CEO of Stearns Publishing for twelve years. He thought he’d seen it all.
But finding out that one of your top-selling authors isn’t actually human is what you might call a unique experience.
The plan is to capitalize on the phenomenon in two ways-- first, in the public domain, with press releases expressing the company’s delight in discovering that one of their authors is as fantastic as the books themselves. Meanwhile, privately, Stearns will put their modest but noticeable muscle to use pressuring the legislature and District Attorney’s office to put as much of Michaelangelo Hamato’s considerable future earnings in the hands of Stearns Publishing as possible. The key to it all, Campbell reflects to himself as he flips through the stack of memos on his desk, is discretion...
“Mr. Campbell?”
“Yes, Davidson?”
“There’s a Richard Friedman here to see you.”
“I don’t have an appointment here--”
“He insists it’ll only take a second. Sir--” the secretary’s voice lowers-- “he’s from Astilla Holdings.”
Campbell recognizes the name; one of their largest shareholders. “All right, I can give him a minute.”
He arranges the papers on his desk while he waits.
Richard Friedman is tall, Caucasian, slim. “It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Campbell.”
“Please, call me Michael.”
“Michael.” Richard smiles, briefly, a confident, predator’s smile. “I’m going to dispense with the formalities and get right to the point, I know you’re very busy--”
“Indeed we are--”
“And that’s why I’m here; it’s about Michaelangelo Hamato.”
“Ah.” Michael’s smile is wide and as confident as Richard’s. “I’m sure you’ll be pleased to know we’re doing everything in our power to capitalize on this unique opportunity--”
“We’re well aware of that. That’s why I’m here.”
The smile freezes. Richard’s eyes flicker briefly with satisfaction and he continues. “The fact is that we feel Stearns Publishing needs to make immediate and public action to discourage this absurd attempt to strip Mr. Hamato of his citizenship. And his intellectual property rights.”
“I’m sure you realize that it is in this company’s best interest--”
“--to come out on the side of acceptance and tolerance. If Stearns Publishing’s involvement in this ill-considered enterprise were to become public...”
“I assure you that that will not happen.”
“It won’t,” Richard continues as if Michael wasn’t there, “because this foolishness is going to stop. You are going to publicly and privately lobby for the preservation of all of Michaelangelo Hamato’s rights.”
“I’m sorry, but you must realize I have to do what is best for the company, even if a minority of the shareholders disagree--”
“Majority,” Richard interrupts. “You do realize that we now own sixty-one percent of Stearns Publishing’s stock?”
Michael’s smile disappears; his hands begin frantically searching through the papers on his desk. “When did this happen?”
“This morning. If necessary, we will fight to remove you as CEO. If necessary, we will make this fight public. I think you’ll agree that that is in no one’s best interest.”
“Yes...” Michael finds the paper, stares at it. Attached is a profile of Astilla Holdings and its owner, Raphael Hamato... “There’s more than one of them?”
“More than one of what?” Richard asks innocently.
“Hold on,” Robyn says, frowning. “Exactly how many turtles are we expecting at this funeral?”
“Does it matter?”
“April, I’m just trying to figure out... there are four of them?”
“Yes,” April says. “Four.”
“And one’s in the hospital. Okay. I’m just... I wasn’t expecting this, okay?”
“Neither was I.”
“I know, I know... here, how about this?”
April frowns at the dress. “Yeah... but he never liked it. I’d like to wear something he liked, ya know? What’s up, Don?”
Robyn turns around to face.. a turtle.
She was expecting this, but... God. I’m really standing next to a giant turtle. “Hi...”
“Robyn? I’m Don, sorry, didn’t mean to startle you...”
“No, no, I’m fine...” she manages to move April’s dress to one hand and stick the other out. “Nice to meet you.”
He smiles and shakes her hand. Leathery skin, which she expected, and warm, which she hadn’t.
“April, about last night...”
“They’re staying,” April says. “I already talked to them.”
“April, maybe we shouldn’t be here.”
“You’re not--”
“We talked it over, April. We can all cover the rent until you find some new tenants... we don’t want to put you in danger. Or the girls.”
“No,” April says, in something like shock. “No, you’re not leaving... you can’t leave.”
“Somebody threw a Molotov cocktail through the window last night--”
“What would I do if you weren’t here?”
“Call us?”
“No,” April repeats, shaking her head. “I need you guys.”
“All right,” Don says. “If you’re sure--”
“Of course I’m sure.”
“Look, if it ever comes to the point--”
“It won’t.”
“If it does, we’d--”
“It won’t, Don. Go get Shadow for me, willya? I need to pick out a dress.”
“April?”
“Yeah?”
“I don’t know what we’d do without you.”
“Me neither, Don,” she says, trying to keep her voice casual. “Now go get Shadow.”
To: bensan@desert.net
Fr:don@turtle.net
Su: Interview
Ben, I’d be honored to be your interview subject for your paper on computers. Thank you for asking me. Do you want to talk by voice, or will you be sending the questions by email?
Say hi to your dad for me. Tell him thanks for that editorial he did for the Times; he sure wrote it fast!
--Don
April tells herself for the fiftieth time that this was the right dress, that Shadow had been right, that Casey had loved it and it was okay for a funeral.
The fact that it’s the most uncomfortable dress she owns should just be ignored...
“No,” Casey’s mother is correcting some poor victim, Arnold was his stepfather, not his father... he was my husband’s best friend, you know... there’s one piece of advice for you anyway, never marry your husband’s best friend. But Arnold was a good boy...”
Every time she says Arnold it drives April just a little bit crazier. At least she calls the girls by their names; she never liked those either...
At least the services are over. They weren’t that long, but they’d been painful. The worst was probably hearing Raph say, in his usual awkward, inarticulate way, that Casey was the best man he’d ever known. Everybody was crying after that one, even the ones who were now backing away from him nervously at the reception.
April takes a certain amount of satisfaction in knowing that they all seem to end up with her mother-in-law.
“And Arnold always--”
She stops droning in mid-sentence. April pokes her head out of the kitchen door, wondering what on earth could be powerful enough to shut that woman up...
Shadow. She’s facing her grandmother, practically in a fighting stance. “Casey,” she says firmly. “My father’s name was Casey.”
No answer from the old bat that time.
Thank you, April thinks fervently. You’d make your father proud...
She gets back into the kitchen so her daughters won’t see her crying.
--end chapter five--
On to Chapter Six