Originally posted May 12, 2010
((As I passed on this bit to Kori to get her sign off on the characterizations of Diana and the description of the apartment, she assured me that Kori's story would continue. Writing this, however, helped me close this chapter in Chance's life. Both of these character's stories would continue, but I found it unlikely they would ever intertwine directly again.))
The attorneys had finally left, leaving Chance to the penthouse. "You can stay here as long as you want," Diana had told him. Deep rings surrounded her eyes; usually straight shoulders slouched. Chance wanted to offer Kori's personal assistant a drink, an opportunity to sit down, talk, and morn together. The green clad executive never dropped the veil of professionalism. She talked about everything of importance and mentioned nothing that Chance wanted hear. When she left, when they all left, Chance pulled out the vodka.
He spent long moments with the bottle and the skyline, standing on the balcony in the cool spring evening. Eventually, he dug his cell phone out of his pocket. He made a call. "You hungry? Good. Come over. I need to cook something."
--
There had been more tears. Chance thought he could keep it together until his old friend embraced him. He wept in the hallway, unabashed before drawing enough breath to invite Eddie inside.
They shuffled in together. A bottle of wine was found and glasses filled. Chance pointed to the piles of papers on the granite of the kitchen island, then went to see what the refrigerator gods would offer for sacrifice. Chance accepted the gifts of two fillets, a sweet potato, asparagus, bleu cheese, and bacon. He pulled some vegetable oil from a cupboard. Everything tasted better deep fried, under cheese, or wrapped in bacon.
Chance worked in silence as Eddie read through the documents. The vegetables fell into identically sized shapes under the young man's knife. He turned on the broiler and poured some oil into a deep frying pan. Behind him, Eddie whistled softly.
"That's a lot of money, Chance." The cook nodded, securing strips of bacon to the fillets with wooden skewers. "I make about two dollars a second, just by breathing," Chance commented. "Probably just 90 cents after taxes," Eddie remarked with a quiet chuckle.
Chance placed the steaks in the broiler tray the walked over to the counter to refill his glass of wine. He sighed. "I'm going to need to hire an accountant." The bald police lieutenant slipped off his reading glasses to clean the lenses on a napkin. "Chance," he said, "You're going to need at least two."
The younger man gripped the edge of the countertop and sagged for a moment. He lifted one finger in the air twirling it slowly. "I won the dead girlfriend jackpot," he exclaimed flatly. "Woo-fucking-pee." Chance took a long swallow of the chewy Zinfandel.
"Chance, no one gives this much money away to someone they didn't trust. Knowing you, this money is going to do a lot of good for a lot of people."
Chance nodded. "I know, Eddie. Kori always took excellent care of me. The money and the things were the least attractive thing about her and now? And now they're all I really have left."
The older man nodded, slipping his reading glasses back into their case. He listened as Chance continued. "I thought I had this all worked out when I was dating Reg, American Promise. Do you remember her?" Eddie nodded again. Chance's high school girlfriend had come to BBQ's at the policeman's home. "Risk is part of this job. I understand. But to die in a plane crash? It seems... It seems so mundane. I keep thinking she's just going to come back; just walk through the door." Chance shook his head slowly. "There was so much work left that she wanted to do." Tears threatened again with a watering of the eyes. The young man repelled them with a long sigh and turned back to the stove.
Eddie let the silence hang a minute, taking a sip of his wine. "Are you going to the service?" Chance shook his head. "No. It will be attended by some heads of state and other executives. That wasn't a part of Kori's life I knew very well. I will go visit her grave at the castle sometime soon."
"What happened to Akemi?" Eddie asked, his eyes blinking. "I honestly don't know, aubelo. I was not given guardianship. She's been staying at The Haven and working with Kori's assistant directly. I haven't been over there. I've left messages for a few friends. I haven't heard anything."
The red wine swirled in Eddie's glass. "What do you plan to do now, hijo?" Chance checked on the asparagus in the steamer before adding the sweet potato slices to the oil. "I don't know that either, Eddie. I really don't know. It took me so long to accept the idea of being a father and a husband. I think it's going to take me some time to get used to the idea that all of that is gone."
--
The staff had changed the linens. Exhausted and more than a little buzzed, Chance had crawled into bed expecting to snuggle her ghost. The staff had changed the linens. He found no scent of her on her pillow.
He sat up in the bed they shared to look around the room. Artifacts and books lined the shelves and cubbies throughout the room, expensive nick knacks and trinkets arranged by some interior designer. If any of them had meaning to Kori, she had not told him. A maid had removed the last remaining scrap that he knew of her presence as easily as she had stripped the bed. The room never reflected Chance. No ghost of his would ever find purchase here.
Chance rose to his feet and unsteadily slipped into a pair of sweatpants. He walked to the huge walk-in closet. A few necessary items found their way into a large gym bag, leaving behind hangers full of slacks and shirts. Chance gathered some toiletries from the marble bathroom, stuffing them into the sack.
The living room betrayed no sense of her, of them. He walked to the massive multimedia system to pull a DVD from a tray. He trotted back to the bedroom to pull a book from her nightstand. Her favorite movie and book safe in his care, he walked to the door.
Kori would not be walking through that door. They would never have the opportunity to make this space their own.
Chance turned to look at the penthouse one last time, his hand on the knob of the portal. An image of them, embracing on the balcony appeared in his mind. He proposed in that doorway. They watched The Count of Monte Cristo countless times from the comfort of that couch. That was the past. Whatever the future held for him, it didn't offer it to him in this space.
The door swung shut behind him with all the finality of a book closing on a chapter.
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