Balancing the Scales Read online

  “No problem. It’s quiet out on the deck right now. The bottle of champagne is in a bucket, and this is your glass.” I take a flute full of golden bubbles from her. “She’s right out there.”

  I follow the direction of Alicia’s hand toward the observatory deck. As I step outside, Becky is being handed a glass of champagne by a waiter. She looks completely confused and downright adorable.

  When she’s alone, staring at the glass in her hand and looking around her, I approach from behind. “I received a call from the district attorney’s office. Apparently some tourist smuggled a cheesecake to the top of the Empire State Building.”

  The chug of her shoulders tells me she’s laughing before I reach her side. I stand next to her, both of us looking out at the view of Manhattan against the night sky.

  “I forget how beautiful it is up here,” I tell her. She glances at me. “It’s criminal not to enjoy a good bottle of champagne with a view like this.”

  She looks to her feet, then lifts her head to show me that mind-blowing smile. “I thought I was the one supposed to be apologizing.”

  “Well, since I’ve developed a sweet tooth, I couldn’t resist that cheesecake.”

  “You seem to make all my experiences just a little bit more special, don’t you, Drew Harrington?”

  Suddenly feeling nervous for absolutely no reason, I put my free hand in the pocket of my pants and look away from her to the horizon. “Well, don’t tell anyone, or you’ll ruin my reputation for being a hardass.”

  “Your secret’s safe with me. Hold this for me?”

  She hands me her glass, and I watch her go to a bag she must have left on the ground, now next to a champagne bucket. She comes back holding a cheesecake. As she does, a live saxophonist begins to play the sounds of Kenny G. We lean back against a railing, taking turns working our way through the bottle of champagne and bites of cheesecake.

  Up here, high above the city, with her, with a killer cheesecake, I don’t have a care in the world. I can’t remember the last time I felt like this.

  “I’m sorry about earlier, on the phone.”

  I take the cheesecake and fork from her. “Don’t worry about it. I don’t know why I mentioned it. I just happen to be going to Staten Island this weekend, andI thought maybe I could show you the boardwalk.” I put a spoonful of utterly delicious chocolate orange cheesecake in my mouth. Without swallowing, I tell her, “It’s not worth getting fat about.”

  “Oh my gosh, that’s disgusting,” she says through a chuckle.

  “So was the thought of you sitting up here eating an entire cheesecake by yourself, Chubbs.”

  She snorts, actually snorts, and it’s the funniest thing I’ve heard in a long time.

  “I wouldn’t have eaten the whole thing, you know.” She takes a breath and closes her eyes, lifting her face to the sky. She looks relaxed. Peaceful. Angelic even. “The saxophone is beautiful.” The saxophone is nice, for sure. But what is truly beautiful is her skin, glowing under the twinkling city lights, her long hair flowing down her back. The curve of her body in her tight pants and sweater. While her eyes are closed, I let myself indulge in the sight of her. Those pink lips. The way her bottom lip is more plump than the top and begging to be nipped between my teeth. My cock twitches at the thought of kissing her skin. Running my tongue along her neck, her collarbone.

  “When I left the UK, I left a nine-year relationship.”

  Her words are barely more than a whisper above the saxophone, but they bring me back to the here and now. I think of an appropriate response as I will my semi-on to disappear. I want to keep her talking and letting me in. For some reason, I want to understand this woman.

  She inhales deeply. So deeply her chest rises. “I feel like I’ve only just found out who I really am.” She opens her eyes and turns her head to look at me. “I panicked earlier because I’m not here, in New York, looking for a relationship, and family just sounded relationship-y. Although, I understand it wasn’t intended to be, obviously.” She squeezes her eyes shut and shakes her head. “You must think I’m crazy.”

  “I don’t.”

  When she opens her eyes, they’re staring right into mine. I have forgotten entirely what we were talking about.

  “This job came up in New York and I wanted to get away. I wanted to get off my doorstep and leave behind… I just wanted to be allowed to be myself.”

  “I get that.” I do. Entirely. I’ve worked hard to make a life for myself that is completely different from my childhood, different from my parents’ struggles to bring up a family of three. “I know the feeling.”

  “I just don’t want to lose the self I’ve found. I’m just not looking for a relationship, Drew. Not that I’m a one-night-stand kind of girl either.”

  “You’re babbling, British Becky. You don’t need to defend yourself. Believe me, I know you’re not a one-night-stand kind of girl.” She bites down on her lip and nods. “I’m really not anything other than a one-night-stand kind of guy, so this works quite well, wouldn’t you say?”

  She smirks. “We’re completely incompatible.”

  “Exactly. I like spending time with you, Becky. You make things…better, somehow too. So, what do you say we hang out sometimes and we don’t worry about the stuff that makes life complicated?”

  “Sounds good.”

  We resume our position, both leaning back against the railing. I meant what I said. I enjoy her company, and I’m not looking for a relationship either. But I can’t pretend her words haven’t cut me. Why? I have no idea.

  We watch the city and listen to the smooth sound of the sax, in silence. Comfortable silence. It’s not until we’re out of the clouds and back on the sidewalk that I ask the burning question I’ve been wondering about. “What happened? With you and the guy?”

  Her exhale puffs out her cheeks. “Long answer. I was seventeen when we got together. I wasn’t the most confident person in the world. He represented safety, I guess. He cared for me and looked out for me. I was naïve. I didn’t realize that he, the town I grew up in, family, everything stopped me from ever working out who I really am. Short answer—babies.”

  “Babies?”

  She shakes her head quickly. “Oh, I don’t have them. You could say we split because we were in different places about the idea. I mean, that’s kind of why we split. I should have walked away a long time before I did.”

  I don’t know why I keep pressing for more, but I do. “You wanted kids and he didn’t?”

  She stops abruptly, making me stop and face her. “Men. You all assume we women want to clean your dishes, do your ironing and have your babies, don’t you?” She’s scowling and there’s definitely a lot of meaning behind her words.

  I hold up my hands. “I stand corrected.” But I want more. “So, it was you who didn’t want them?”

  She eyes me for some time, as if trying to read my mind. Then she nods slowly. “He did. I didn’t. Not then.”

  I’ve never given serious thought to whether I want kids. I love my niece and nephew, but I’ve always had bigger things happening. I’ve never seen myself taking the step that comes first—the getting a wife part. But the scary as hell thing is, I’m looking into the eyes of this woman I hardly know, and for the first time ever, I can imagine it all. The house in the suburbs, children in the yard, lazy Sundays with my family. I can see my unborn child in her arms. And it scares me to fucking death.

  “But, I’ve come to appreciate since I’ve been here….” She swallows deeply, and the way she looks at me now, the way I think I’m looking at her, it’s like she knows everything there is to know about me, and it’s all okay. “I just couldn’t imagine having children with him.”

  My arms are aching by my sides because I want to take her cheeks in my palms and press my lips against hers so damn much.

  But she isn’t looking for a gu
y.

  And me, one-night guy, I am definitely not the man for her anyway.

  I throw out an arm and turn to face the road, finally able to breathe. A yellow cab comes to a stop. “Come on. I’ll ride with you.”

  We drop Becky at her block, which fortunately isn’t too far away, because the silence between us this time isn’t comfortable. It’s awkward as hell. When she tells the driver to stop, I’m relieved. I need a cold shower and something hard and amber colored, on the rocks.

  I step out of the cab so she can climb out on my side without stepping into the street. When she’s on the sidewalk, she tries to give me money, which I turn down. “Okay, well, the next one is on me. Thanks for tonight, Drew. I had a great time.”

  “You’re welcome. Thanks for the cheesecake.”

  “And the gym hours?”

  “Right.” Just like that, the tension between us fades, and we’re back to being buddies. “Listen, the offer still stands. If you want to come to Staten Island this weekend. I’m going anyway. And now that we’ve established we are completely platonic…”

  She’s laughing and shaking her head as she walks to the door of her building. “Okay.”

  “Okay?”

  “Okay, New York Drew.”

  Chapter 10

  Becky

  2007

  I’m the last person to leave my nanna’s graveside. Her friends have left, Aunt Lizzie has gone, and the priest who performed the service is heading back inside before the ominous gray sky bursts.

  She’d been sick for a while. Nothing specific, really. Infections she couldn’t shake, pneumonia, flu. The hospital says Nanna really just died of old age.

  It started with bronchitis three years ago. I wished I could have moved into her house or brought her to live with us but I was just too young to care for her alone. Aunt Lizzie—my dad’s sister—was visiting once a week, taking a five-hour round-trip train ride. But we weren’t enough.

  Reluctantly, we found Nanna a nursing home. It wasn’t a sad, melancholy kind of place. It was more like a hotel that happened to have caregivers on site. She had some nice friends there, and I visited her at least three times a week after school.

  It didn’t come cheap, and Nanna hated that. She wanted to leave what little money she had to Aunt Lizzie and me. But there was no chance I was putting her in some skanky home, just so I could get her inheritance.

  I dry the last of my tears on a tissue that’s now so overused it has become a ball of paper strands. I press my fingertips to my lips, then blow them in the direction of Nanna’s temporary headstone. “I love you, Nanna.” The words make more tears fall. I wipe them away and walk the long path out of the cemetery toward the bus stop.

  The number 10 bus pulls up just as I arrive at the stop. I pay the driver and take a seat at the back of the bus, where I am less likely to be seen or spoken to.

  The bus drops me about a kilometer away from my house. The gray sky has now turned to rain and continues to darken as dusk descends. By the time I reach my house, my hair is wet and sticking to my skin. My wool coat, which was one of Nanna’s and is really too big for me, is saturated.

  I slip inside the house and hang up my coat on the old wooden stand by the door. I slip off my flat black shoes and stack them neatly on the shoe rack, despite the fact tens of pairs are scattered around the hallway floor.

  “Rebecca, is that you?”

  I follow my mum’s voice to the lounge. She’s standing in front of the wall mirror that hangs above the old stone fireplace, fixing gold hoops into her ears. She speaks to my reflection. “Dave and I are going to the pub quiz at The Heath. Your brothers and sisters are out, so it’s just you for dinner. The oven is still broken but there might be something in the freezer you can microwave. Of course, now that Meg’s money will be coming, we can afford a new cooker. I’m so excited to replace the kitchen. If there’s any left over from your inheritance, we might be able to get a new tub for the bathroom.”

  She turns to face me now. “How do I look?”

  I consider her wet-look leggings, leopard print blouse and ridiculously clunky heels. “Nanna said that money was for me to go to university.”

  She plants her hands on her hips. “Yes, well, your nanna isn’t around anymore. We need to fix things in the house, Rebecca, and I don’t see you contributing any other way, do you?” Besides the money that was left from my dad’s estate, that I never saw, you mean?

  “But—”

  “Sweetie, it’s a nice dream that Meg had for you, but it’s not like you’re going to be a lawyer or a doctor now, is it?”

  “I was going to do a culinary course.” I can feel my eyes stinging for the millionth time today.

  “Well, if you want to cook, all the more reason to have a nice kitchen to do it in. You don’t need a degree to read a recipe, Rebecca. It would be a waste of money, and I don’t think Meg would have wanted that, do you?”

  She walks by me, not saying another word on the subject. “Dave! Let’s go. I told Rhonda we’d be at the pub by seven.”

  But that money is for my education, just like the money my father left.

  I’ve so often wondered how different things would have been if my father had taken me to live with him, if he’d never died, if I had been allowed to live with Nanna.

  Nanna used to tell me about my father. “He was a very good businessman and a good person,” she’d say. She only told me one time what happened between him and my mother and she would never repeat it.

  “He made one mistake, Rebecca,” she told me. “He and his wife were having some problems, and your mother was in a bar one night when he was looking to drown his sorrows.” She made a point of telling me that I was not a mistake, that he loved me very much. Nanna said he had tried to do the right thing and stay with my mother when I was born, but my mother had a number of men on the go and she drank a lot—Nanna couched that in better terms, but I knew the truth. I lived the truth.

  “Your dad wanted to take you with him when he moved back in with his wife,” Nanna told me. But she said my mother wasn’t interested in him taking me; she was more interested in the money he would send every month. I never had reason to question the truth of that statement.

  My father died in a road accident when I was one. I don’t remember him. I do know that his wife sent some money to my mother from his estate. I have never seen a penny of it.

  When I hear the front door close, I wander into the kitchen. It really is a dump. The cupboards are held together mostly by nails. The work surfaces are cracked and bubbled at the seams.

  I wish I could throw myself on the floor and kick and scream and demand that someone hear my voice.

  I open the freezer and see ice for Dave’s gin and tonics, a can of beer he must have forgotten to take out of there, and a small cheese pizza. I close the door and head upstairs to my bedroom. I lie back on the bed, not bothering to turn on the light. Not bothering to take off my dirty clothes. And I sob, for no one’s ears except my own.

  At some point, I must have cried myself to sleep because it is almost ten p.m. when I wake. And I wake with a new resolve. I’m going to leave home. I don’t know where I’ll go. Perhaps Aunt Lizzie’s. I’m seventeen. It’s not like I can’t fend for myself. I just need somewhere to stay. Somewhere far away from here.

  I drag a bag out from under my bed and start to stuff clothes inside. I grab the toiletries I absolutely need, like a toothbrush and toothpaste. Locating the tin I keep hidden in the bottom of my clothes drawer—away from my brothers and sisters—I count the money I have saved inside from making coffee on Saturday mornings. Forty-six pounds and twenty-one pence.

  Before I leave, I glance one last time around my tiny bedroom. I don’t feel sad. I feel relieved to be going.

  My coat does little to shield me from the blustering wind and rain until I reach the bus stop where
I got off just hours ago. I’m still wearing my black skater-boy dress and thick wool tights.

  I ride the bus to the nearest station and go inside, still with no idea where I am headed. I remember the name of Aunt Lizzie’s town in Yorkshire, but the information stand is already closed for the night. The entire station is deserted but for the driver who just closed down the bus I came in on.

  “Excuse me. Excuse me. Can you tell me how to get to York on the bus?” If I get to York, I’ll be closer to Aunt Lizzie. I can work out the rest from there.

  “York? Treacle, that’s a long way. You need a coach.”

  “Where would I pick up the coach?”

  “There’s a station on the other side of town, but you won’t be able to book a ticket now.”

  I jump, startled by the sound of a breaking bottle. Two drunk-looking men start having an argument. “Okay, then can I take buses from here and keep switching?”

  The driver scrutinizes me and the big bag I’m carrying. “I’m sure you can but not tonight. The station is almost closed. Why don’t you go home and, if you still want to get to York tomorrow, someone at the information desk will be able to help you?”

  He heads out to the car park, and I slump down onto a metal bench. The cold penetrates my wet clothes and makes me shiver. The arguing men start moving away from the station, and my heart rate calms a tad.

  I take the money from my pocket and wonder how far it can really get me. As I do, I realize, I don’t have anywhere else to go.

  I’m not going back there. I won’t.

  A loud group of people burst from the doors of a pub across the road from the station, laughing and joking.

  Well, if beer makes people happy, I’ll take it.

  I lug my bag to The Lion’s Head and take a spot on a stool in one corner of the bar. It seems like it is starting to empty, but people are still being served, and a group of men are still playing pool.

  “What can I get you, love?”

  I try not to seem sheepish when the middle-aged man leans his big hands on the bar and towers over me. “Erm, a bottle of lager, please.”