Fool's Gold (Contemporary Romance), page 17
“Mom?”
“Ben, good morning.”
“What’s up, Mom? I’m already at work.”
“So early, Benjamin? It’s only seven.”
“It’s eight. What do you need?” Chatting with his mother was low enough on his list of things to do, anyway, and the fact that she was calling barely seven hours after Victoria had left had put him on edge.
“Nothing, dear. I just haven’t heard from you in a few weeks and I was wondering if you were ever coming back home.”
“I wasn’t planning on it, no. I’m happy here.”
“Have you talked to your sister lately? She hasn’t been returning to my calls.”
Beta sighed. That was just like his mother: try to turn one sibling against the other. “Christine is a grown-up. The next time she plays a show in the city, I’ll try to go watch it, but otherwise I let her live her own life.”
“Well, there’s no need to be rude. I just thought that maybe if you’d seen that horrible Strauss girl, then you might have talked to her about Christine.”
“Do you want me to hang up the phone, mother? Because that’s what I’m hearing right now.”
“Now you listen to me, young man. That Strauss girl is nothing but trouble and I don’t want you seeing her, you understand me? Why, I just talked Sister Jeanie and she was telling me that Octavia Strauss was out last weekend with another man and if there’s anything I’ve learned it’s that a bad apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, so--“
Beta turned off the phone and set it carefully on his desk. That was about enough of that. If she wanted check on him, fine. He could live with that. If she wanted to ask about Christine, so be it. He could sort of understand that. But to call and start harping on Victoria? What had she ever done to his mother to deserve that kind of tirade? And who cared if Victoria’s mom made bad decisions? It wasn’t like Victoria was following in her footsteps.
He ground his teeth and tried to focus on the screen. He had a list of tasks as long as his arm, and they weren’t getting any shorter while he worried about pointless crap.
The phone rang again.
Beta snatched it up, ready to start firing full photon torpedoes, but as he hit “Answer” he realized it wasn’t his mother: it was Victoria.
“WHAT DO YOU-- Uh, hi, Vicks.”
“Wow, good morning to you, too. Am I interrupting something?” She sounded awful cheerful.
“No. I just had a chat with... with someone I’d rather not have talked to. What’s up?”
“Hey, I have the evening off and I was wondering...”
Beta didn’t know it was possible for a human body to freeze up like a copy of Windows 98, but he found that he couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe and couldn’t think.
“...if you had any plans tonight?”
“No,” he squeaked.
“Well, I’ve been in New York for nearly six months and I haven’t been to the Natural History Museum. Do you want to go?”
His hands unclenched and flew to the keyboard. Seconds later a browser was open and he was staring at the visiting hours. “It closes at 5:30. What time did you have in mind?”
“Oh. I hadn’t looked. But you do want to go?”
He glanced at the task list and then at the clock. Screw it. He could take an afternoon off. Sol would understand. Probably. “Yes. Of course. Uh, I can go any time after lunch.”
“How about 3:00 then?”
“Okay.”
“See you then.”
The phone went dead. Beta very carefully set it back on his desk, then leaned back in his chair. “Well, holy shit.”
“I had no idea you were so happy to see me.” Sol stood in the doorway, an amused smile on his face.
“Good morning, boss.”
“I take it you just won the lottery?” Sol asked.
Beta shook his head.
“NASA accepted you for astronaut training?”
“No.”
“Well, do tell. I don’t want to stand here and keep guessing.”
“That was Victoria. She wants to go to the Natural History Museum.”
Sol grinned. “Congratulations on your date, Benjamin. And you’re welcome.”
“I’m welcome?”
“Well, it was only after she met Aaron and me that she warmed up to you, right?”
Beta raised an eyebrow.
Sol rolled his eyes. “I’m jesting with you, Benjamin.” He backed out of the office.
“Hey boss, is it okay if I take the afternoon off?”
“Of course, Benjamin. I would never stand in the way of young love.”
Things were turning up.
Chapter 37
Museum
TEDDY Roosevelt sat astride a great green horse with a pair on Indians flanking him on either side. The lot of them were up on a pedestal, towering over the Central Park entrance to the museum. Beta waited on the steps behind Teddy, scanning the crowd for Victoria.
She strolled up from the south, probably from the 72nd Street station. She wore a long cream and black pea coat cinched tight around her a waist. Brown hair flowed in waves beneath a simple red knit cap. Beta waved from the steps, trying to catch her attention.
She saw him and waved back as she approached. “You have any trouble getting the afternoon off? I didn’t really think about you being in a nine to five job.”
“I’m good. If you didn’t pick up on it last night, Sol’s a pretty laid back guy.”
“I guess that’s true. You want to go inside and get out of the cold?”
“I’d love to.” Beta left his hands out of his pockets on the off chance she wanted to stroll as a couple. Victoria jammed her hands into her pockets, oblivious.
Beta stopped at the service desk inside the door and paid for their tickets. He still wasn’t used to being able to spend forty bucks without worrying about it. It felt good.
“I can get mine,” Victoria offered, pulling a wallet out of her coat.
“It’s okay.” Beta took the two dollars of change and stuffed it into his coat. “My treat.”
“Beta, you don’t have to pay for me. It was my idea.”
“It’s okay.” He took a map.
Victoria made a “harrumph” sound, but didn’t argue the point. They walked toward the towering dinosaur skeleton, and Beta took in the atrium for the first time.
Rose colored pillars towered over the periphery, and some kind of long necked dinosaur climbed toward the heavens in the middle. It was up on its hind legs, kicking out toward a second dinosaur with the front.
“What is that thing?” Victoria asked.
“I dunno. A brontosaurus?” They walked closer, looking for a plaque.
“God, look at the thing’s claws.” Victoria pointed toward the smaller, attacking dinosaur. It had claws the size of carving knives, each with a wickedly curving tip.
“Bet it would make a heck of a back scratcher,” Beta said.
Victoria made that “harrumph” sound again. “There.” She pointed to the gold plaque on the base of the exhibit. “It’s a barosaurus.”
Beta shook his head. “I don’t think that was in any of my kindergarten dinosaur books.”
“See, it’s defending its baby.” Hidden in the back was a much smaller skeleton.
“Kind of morbid, don’t you think?”
Victoria shrugged. “That’s life.”
Beta pointed to the hall beyond the one they were in. Displays with bears and elk were visible. “Do you want to see what’s in there?”
“Where’s the whale?”
Beta checked the map. “Down there on the right.”
They walked side by side, and Beta noticed that Victoria had taken off the mittens and stuffed them into her pockets.
Victoria gasped as they reached the entrance to the oceanic exhibits. The whale hung overhead, a massive, leaping blue creature. Even Beta paused. It was truly breathtaking the way it curved toward the ground, as if it were diving from the blue glass panes of the ceiling into the tile below.
“I knew it was here,” Victoria said, “but the pictures don’t do it justice.” She walked forward, her neck craned up as she passed under the beast.
Beta trailed back a step, splitting his attention between the whale, Victoria and the gaggle of elementary students that were wandering the gallery.
Victoria stopped directly under it and turned slowly, taking in the galleries to either side. Stuffed walruses stared back, jealous witnesses to her fascination.
Victoria grabbed his hand. “Come on, let’s go upstairs and see it from above.”
Her hands were like ice. Ice that warmed his heart and took away his breath. Beta walked beside her, letting her admire the whale while he threaded them through the crowd. They stopped at the top of the steps and Victoria squeezed his hand. “Isn’t it wonderful.”
He glanced at their clasped hands. “Beyond everything I ever imagined.”
Victoria faced him and smiled, and at the same time she seemed to realize that she had hold of his hand. Doubt flashed in her eyes and her grip relaxed. Beta squeezed her hand, thinking to enjoy it for that final second, but to his surprise, she squeezed back and her smile only broadened.
“Thank you again, Beta. Ben.” Her eyebrows furrowed. “Should I call you Beta or Ben? You’ve been Beta since we were seven.”
“Whichever you prefer.” He didn’t care; he was just happy to have her talking to him.
“How about Ben? We’re in a new city, in a new life. I think it’s time you should have a grown up name.”
“Ben it is.”
Victoria squeezed his hand again. “What else do you want to see?”
He didn’t have the faintest idea. All he wanted was to spend his afternoon with her, and it didn’t matter where. They go could go watch paint dry for all he cared, as long as she didn’t let go of his hand.
Brighter lights shined from an adjacent gallery. “How about the fish?”
Victoria swung their hands as she walked, and she told him how she still hadn’t found a singing gig. She talked about work as they passed by school after school of fish, and he told her about Jerome and Sol as they walked through the meteorites.
A line African elephants marched through the middle of another gallery. They stopped to admire them, and Beta turned to Victoria. “So what happened with you and Trent?”
She stayed quiet for a minute, and he thought she wasn’t going to answer. Then she spoke, her voice just above a whisper, “He wasn’t who I thought he was. He was handsome and charming, but he was also an egotistical workaholic that didn’t really care about people.”
Beta blinked. “Wow.”
She wasn’t finished. “And I caught him cheating. It wasn’t like ‘hey, he’s fucking that girl,’ but I caught another girl at his apartment. He tried to explain it away. And then I caught him with the same girl again at a restaurant.”
That wasn’t what Beta was expecting to hear. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting, but catching the asshole with his pants down was a shock. Guys like Trent were supposed to be smooth, careful. They were supposed to know how to keep their women apart.
“That’s... I don’t know what that is. I’m sorry.”
“I am, too. I should have known better.” She squeezed his hand until it throbbed. “But it’s done now. I’m moving on.”
“Good.”
Beta hardly noticed the museum, and when they found themselves being ushered toward the Roosevelt Hall by a security guard, he was shocked to see it that it was already after 5:30.
They stopped on the front steps with an icy wind snaking fingers down their necks. In front of them, out past Teddy and his Indians, lines of cabs clogged the street, stretching off into a white stream of headlights on the left and a crimson stream of taillights on the right.
“Is this where we part ways?” Beta asked.
“Is that what you want to do?”
“No.”
Victoria laughed. “I had a feeling you would say that. I know a wonderful Greek place if you feel up to a trip to Queens.”
“Absolutely.”
They walked hand in hand toward the train station.
Chapter 38
An Offer
THE museum and subsequent dinner with Ben had gone better than Victoria imagined. Had gone so well, in fact, that she found herself sitting across from him at a place in Little Brazil three nights later. Christmas was only a few days away and neither of them were planning to go back to Nebraska, but they hadn’t yet discussed plans. Victoria didn’t want to assume that Ben was planning to see Christine, but she hoped he was.
The waiter dropped off their check, and Victoria reached for it. Ben reached faster. She glared at him. He had paid for her at the museum and at Kyclades, but she was not going to let him make it a habit, new job or not.
“Beta, if you don’t let me pick up the check tonight, I’m going to be angry.”
He smiled at her slip with his name. Old habits died hard. He didn’t let go of the check, though.
“I can handle it.” He tried to tug it toward him.
“I don’t think so. This is a two way street. It’s my turn.”
“Vicks, I’ve been waiting for this for fifteen years. I’ll get the check.” He jerked it out from under her fingers. “Besides, you can get the theater tickets.”
“Theater?”
“Well, it’s not dinner and a movie without a movie, is it?”
“That’s such a cliché. What’s your next idea?”
He stopped, stumped. The gears turned in his head while he tried to come up with something else.
Victoria took pity on him. “How about we go get a drink somewhere and think about it? I’ll pick up the tab there, okay?”
“Alright.” He peeled a few twenties from his wallet and left them on the ticket. “Ready when you are; I don’t need change.”
She sneaked a peek at the ticket as they put on their coats. They managed to eat in Midtown for under fifty bucks? She didn’t feel nearly so bad about leaving him with the bill.
Beta had a long, gray coat that reminded her of something Trent would have worn. It was nothing like what he had worn back in Nebraska. It was more professional, more adult.
“I like the coat,” she said as they hit the sidewalk.
“Thanks. Sol helped me pick it.”
“Your boss?”
“Yeah. He’s decided that I need to learn some style. It’s not really working.”
Victoria looked over his navy and crimson scarf, his leather gloves. “I think it’s working just fine.” She caught his hand in hers.
They made it a block before his phone started ringing. She recognized the Star Wars theme. “Who’s that?”
Beta dug his phone out of his pocket and checked the face. “Sol. You mind if I get it?”
“By all means.”
Beta answered it. “What’s up, boss?”
The phone warbled, but Victoria couldn’t make out what was being said.
“She’s with me right now actually.” He turned to Victoria. “How do you feel about meeting Sol and Aaron?”
“Uh, that’s fine?” His boss was asking about her? “As long as it’s not karaoke.”
He relayed the news into the phone and stuffed it back into his pocket. “That was weird. They want to talk to you. You specifically. He was actually asking for your number when I told him you were with me.”
“That is weird.” She walked in silence for a few paces. “What do you think he wants?”
“I have no idea. You haven’t been hiding a secret love of software development, have you?”
She laughed. “Definitely not. I need you to look at my laptop sometime, by the way.”
“Okay. Well, I don’t know what he wants. He’s at the Ginger Man, though.” Beta turned them right onto Park and they walked along for a few blocks, breaths forming clouds in front of them.
“I take it you know where we’re going?” Victoria had to resist the urge to check her phone.
“Yeah. It’s just a couple more blocks.”
Beta’s ears and cheeks were pink from the cold when they reached the bar. He opened the door and ushered her inside.
“There are couches in the back,” Beta said.
They walked past a long bar with tap after tap. There had to be a hundred of them. Victoria hoped they had something besides beer, too. Her experience with these sorts of places was mixed, and beer wasn’t really her thing.
Sol and Aaron were already there, and a third guy was with them. Aaron didn’t have his purple hat, but he did have a pair of snakeskin boots propped up on a coffee table. Sol lounged beside him, a great swath of purple silk that couldn’t quite decide whether it was a shirt or a sail stretched over his chest. The third guy sat beside Aaron, wearing jeans and a plaid shirt.
“Victoria!” Sol stood up, holding out a hand to shake. Victoria reached for his hand, but he pulled her into a hug instead of shaking it. “I’m so happy to see you.”
“Thanks, Sol,” she said as she extricated herself. “It’s good to see you again, too.” It was a little weird to have someone hug her the second time she met him, but he was so friendly, so honest, that she didn’t get a creepy vibe at all.
“Benjamin.” Sol nodded at Beta and sat down, not giving him the same hug. “This is Steve, a friend.”
Steve shook their hands. “Nice to meet you folks.” He sounded local.
Aaron waved, but didn’t get up. “Good to see you again.”
Victoria sat in one of the two maroon velour chairs while Beta took the other. “Ben said you wanted to chat with me?” she asked Sol.
“I do.” Sol leaned forward, resting his hands on his knees. “I have a proposition for you.”
Victoria cocked an eyebrow. A proposition from Beta’s gay boss? She hardly knew what to think. “Okay.”
“Aaron, Steve and I have a little project we’ve been working on for the last couple years. We have a band, and we need a singer.”
“You... you want me to sing for you?”
“Yes!” Sol slapped his knee.
“You’d be perfect,” Aaron drawled.
“And it’s jazz?” Beta asked.
