Page 26 of Witch Please

“We were. I can’t even apologize for it because, well, babies come when they want to come.” He shrugged, laughing to himself at some memory I wasn’t privy to. “I imagine once the euphoria wears off she’ll remember she’s pissed at me because she had to give birth in a strange hospital with strange doctors.”

“Congratulations! And mom and babies are all well?”

“They were a bit early, so we’ll have to hang out for a little while. But that being said, my wife, my daughter, and my son are all doing great.” His voice caught when he said it, his face getting ruddy with emotion. “Tillie Joy and Nicholas Charles.” He pulled up a picture of Marley holding their new arrivals and showed them to me.

“I’m sorry that you couldn’t locate Asher. There were many people who thought that he would show up to see the first festival after his retirement. I’m a little surprised he didn’t come. But it is a hassle to fly from Key West to New Hampshire.”

“Well,” Ted closed out his phone and put it back in his jeans pocket. “Finding her Dad was my wedding gift to her. If I have to hire a P.I. to find him in Key West, I will. But, she seems okay with not meeting him. She had a really great mom who raised her. I think that keeping her memory going and holding on to all of the love that she had for her Mom, has made the disappointment of this trip okay.” He paused for a beat and then as if remembering he had an original purpose continued, “in all of the excitement of Saturday night, we forgot the box of old programs Sebastian had given to us. He said he would leave them with you.”

Granted the day hadn’t been the most normal day—but he’d never mentioned he’d be leaving anything with me. I glanced around my room and found a manilla envelope on my desk, resting on top of my Macbeth scripts with Ted’s name on it.

“Here it is! Oh I’m so glad. He hadn’t mentioned anything to me—I’d been afraid in all of the excitement of Saturday night he’d forgotten to leave it and he is unavailable today.”

“Yeah that’s what Kennedy said as well. I’m glad you had it though! He mentioned that his best friend is from Chicago, so if you ever find yourself there—we’ll be moving there after the New Year. I mentioned that to him on Saturday and he’d asked me to leave a card, just in case.”

Bear and Raven in the Morningshis card said. I’d never met anyone who worked in radio. That had to be a fun job.

“I hope your move goes well. And congratulations again on the babies! Give Marley my congratulations as well! If I happen to bump into Asher Krane, I’ll shoot you an email and save you the cost of the P.I.”

He laughed, waving over his shoulder as he saw himself out. It was when I turned away from the door that I saw Sebastian, sitting on the concrete bench in the garden just outside my window.

Chapter 20

The morning’s revelations definitely hadn’t brought out my best self. My confrontation with Imogen left me feeling rudderless. I tried to call Patrick, but it went straight to voicemail. I couldn’t stand to be in my office. A place I’d sat in earlier this morning and felt overwhelming joy and pride. Now mere hours later I felt nothing but betrayal and anger. The whole play, these last twelve weeks, felt dirty somehow. Damaged in a way I hoped time could eventually wear down the sharpest points.

“Patrick, I’m so glad you called me back.” I didn’t even bother with hellos. We’d known one another long enough that they didn’t matter anyway.

“Basti—I say this in the most brotherly way. But you really are an egoistic asshole.”

“I beg your pardon?” When I’d left a message for Patrick telling him I really needed to talk to him, I thought I’d at least be met with an inquiry into what was wrong, if not some form of empathetic greeting. “I’m the asshole? I call you—my best friend—emotionally distraught, looking to have a chat about it andI’mthe asshole? How about you have a look in the mirror. If I’m the kettle you’re the pot.”

“That quote was taken out of context. Something you should know since Imogen told you exactly that. And I was already about to call you when your voice mail popped in. You must have called while I was on the phone with Imogen.”

Of course he’d already talked to her. Why would I expectmyfriend to wait to talk to me first?

“I see you’ve already chosen a side.”

“Juvenile response, Basti. And she called me in a tizzy, because she didn’t know what to do. She told me she tried to tell you that the quote was out of context and you didn’t listen. Which I’m not surprised because you’re well, you. ButIcan tell you because I was walking up as she said it, she was actually defending you to the reporters who dismissed you and the play. She told them that since she was the expert in Shakespeare she knows more than anyone what a visionary you were and how you’d taken esoteric ideas that most can’t fully understand and married them with easily accessible themes of modern time. It’s the journalists that took her defense of you and manipulated the quote to suit their narrative.”

His explanation surprised me. Not specifically surprised by Imogen and her actions. She’d acted exactly to character over and again. The speed with which I’d doubted the woman who had been nothing but trusting and trustworthy from the start. That was the surprising thing.

“I thought that she—”

“Exactly why I called you an egoistic asshole. I understand you were deeply betrayed by that Emerson guy. I get it Basti, I really do. But you went thermonuclear on a woman who has spent years quietly cheering for you from the sidelines. The moment you looked to her for help, she gave it to you—without question—despite her own serious fears and trepidations. And you just spat in her face and told her to fuck off.”

I’d somehow found myself in the gardens. The concrete benches were still damp from the morning’s storms. Since my jeans already were damp from the rainwater they’d soaked up, moving to a drier area was pointless.

“Dr. Roland paid me a visit this morning. He told me that next semester, he thinks Imogen should be co-chair of the Literary Society, since she helped so much with this production.”

Saying the words out loud made me feel small. All of these things had been important pieces of my career trajectory for so many years. Especially the last few with Dr. Krane. I spent every waking hour willing him to retire. Trying to respectfully suggest it was time to retire. My patience slowly unspooling with each month as his forgetfulness became more apparent, and people began to comment with frequency about his tact in meetings. As his deterioration became obvious, so did his surly attitude especially towards me. When he finally announced his retirement it was as if a vise finally loosened around my psyche. I’d worked so hard for that next step in my career path, that the thought that Dr. Roland’s suggestion somehow meant he believed I wasn’t capable of handling the position on my own, had been a gut punch.

“Well.” I heard Patrick exhale directly into the phone, it tended to be his tell that he was working through something. “That’s a pretty gnarly rock to be stuck under. You could go back to Dr. Roland and tell him that while you absolutely value Dr. Pilar and her expertise, she had been misquoted in the paper and the vision and execution was yours alone. It might make you look pompous, but what college professor doesn’t at one time or another. On the other hand it’s Imogen. The two of you worked as a team by default anyway didn’t you? You told me she’d show up even when she wasn’t in a scene. She mentored Kennedy to make sure she stayed on the ball, helped the actors with their lines and delivery, pretty much did what Franklin should have been doing. And did it all without needing to be asked. So would it really be a bad thing if you shared the duties with her? She wouldn’t ever hamstring you. Aside from it not being in her nature, she’s in love with you.”

In love with me? How would he even know that. There’d been no declarations made.

“She toldyoushe loves me?”

It shouldn’t matter. Both of us were friends with her and had been for different reasons and through different moments in our lives. Why though would she tell him how she felt about me before telling me how she felt?

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