It drove Sienna insane that my source of income sounded so childish. At parties, she avoided talking about what I did as long as possible. I was not a tested, accepted, and career-tracked college student. In her circles of high achievers, that was impossible to understand. Throw in the whole making money playing video games bit and they looked at Sienna as if she was joking.
Still, she wanted to be the perfect pre-med package, and that included the high school sweetheart. I kept her from having to deal with flirtations and distractions. But after the third campus mixer, she realized I was more a blight on her image than a help. While she made up stories about me traveling or finding consulting work, or whatever other vague label she could slap over me, I became a success.
I glanced around the funeral reception and shook my head. Even if Sienna and I had stayed together, she would not have cheered my success. The gamer world was prone to mockery, outsiders did not understand it, and Sienna wanted something that was obvious. I always thought she'd end up with a luxury car salesman. Or maybe a real estate agent. Someone subservient to her career but dependable, upstanding, and normal.
Disgusting.
I could not help but see an overlay of Dark Flag. Ben would try to gather a clan and it would work, but they would die within days, routed by underlings, cleaned out by thieves, or razed by a ruthless leader that did not care about appearances. It was the kind of world where small talk had burned away in the apocalypse. All that mattered was finding your inborn talents and using them to survive.
I could not take on any desk job or career track that forced me to mimic rote skills. I could not pretend to be content with a day job. I wanted to use my talents, not store them in bins in the garage for the occasional hobby.
Maybe if I had explained it better to Sienna, maybe if I'd given her a rundown of my success, she could have come around. Did it matter that we'd end up in the same place, only together? We'd still be at some backyard party with me on my own and nothing to say. Except she might still be alive.
The thought burned down my throat and into my stomach like a shot of whiskey. I turned to see if there was anything to drink, anything to kill the feeling of guilt. A hired bartender in a crisp white shirt stood behind the counter of the outdoor kitchen.
He looked bored, mostly pouring iced tea, and I startled him. "Please say you have whiskey."
"Irish wakes are my specialty," he said. He poured the shot and left the bottle on the counter for me.
"Can I have a, um, another?" Quinn said. She glanced away from me.
I watched as the bartender poured her a diet soda, swept the whiskey bottle out of sight to add a splash, then gave her a lime twist. He handed me back the bottle and Quinn watched as I poured myself another shot. I toasted her before I tipped it back neat.
"Lots of people from high school," I said.
"At least they remember you," Quinn said. "Sienna always hated that I could not make a better impression at social gatherings." She stood up straight and took a step before her shoulders slumped and she turned back to the bar for support. "She always gave me the best advice and I never took it."
"And now you think if you had, things might have been different?" I asked. "You can't do that. It doesn't work that way."
"What doesn't?"
"Life."
"So, it's not worth thinking about?" Quinn asked. Her chocolate brown eyes took on a hard edge.
"No, it’s just there are too many answers to 'what if,' and none of them can change what happened," I said.
"Why are people
always so wise and philosophical at funerals?" She gulped her drink and held out the glass for another. "This is why I'm done talking with people. I'm not searching for answers or trying to see the silver lining. I'm just trying to survive."
Quinn thanked the bartender, took her refill, and disappeared into the house. I took two steps to follow her before Mrs. Thomas appeared and blocked my way.
"Owen Redd, we weren't sure you were coming," she said.
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Thomas. I should have stopped by sooner." I looked longingly at the whiskey bottle, but knew it was not a good idea to drink in front of Sienna's mother.
Mrs. Thomas had a tendency to overdo everything. She threw herself wholeheartedly into any activity, from chronicling Sienna's successes to redecorating the house to having a few drinks to celebrate her daughter's accomplishments. A few always turned into too many. Or sometimes, it took no drinking at all for her to shift from high speed to sinking ship. Her mood could swing to dire melancholy, and I worried the gentle smile on her lips was a thin facade.
"You probably knew our daughter best of all, and yet no one understands why you two were together." She stared over my shoulder at the bartender until he brought her a glass of white wine. "I used to think of you like the moon, just drifting around her and catching her light. She was the sun, Owen, the bright golden sun." Her breath hitched. "No. A shooting star, I guess."
"She was golden," I said.
"I get it, you know," Mrs. Thomas said. "I get how Sienna could go from way up there to way down here." She looked at the ground and swayed. "I feel it too. Everything lifts you up, up, up and then the air is too thin, you can't breathe, and you crash down. She just wasn't supposed to fall. Someone was supposed to be there to catch her."
She looked up and the flash of hatred was sharp. I pulled back the hand I held out to steady her. Mrs. Thomas blamed me. No wonder Sienna's father had asked me to leave. The longer I stayed, the more people would feel the same way.
I was supposed to be with Sienna. I was supposed to know how she was doing. I should have seen it coming and stopped her. I should have loved her enough to keep her from it.