“Terrific,” he said. “And let me reassure you that I will do everything I can, so I want you to stop worrying.” He beamed at her, and I have to say that it was a far shoddier effort than even B
rian’s fake smile. “And I want you to call me if I can help with anything.” He nodded slowly. “Anything at all,” he said, with a little too much emphasis.
“Thank you, that’s really very— We will, and thank you,” Rita said, and a few moments later we were in the waiting room again and the receptionist was handing us a stack of forms and telling us that if we could please just fill these all out for Mr. Fleischman he would appreciate it very much.
I looked back down the hallway to the door of Fleischman’s office. He was standing there, looking around the half-closed door. I was pleased to see that at least he was no longer looking at the front of Rita’s blouse; instead, he was staring at the seat of her skirt.
I turned back to the receptionist and took the forms from her. “We’ll mail them in,” I said. “My parking meter is about to expire.” And as Rita frowned at me and opened her mouth to say something, I took her firmly by the arm and led her into the elevator. The doors slid mercifully closed, shutting out the nightmare world of Figueroa, Whitley and Fleischman for what I devoutly hoped would be the very last time.
“You could have parked in the building and they validate?” Rita said. “Because I don’t even see— Dexter, I didn’t know there were any parking meters at all in this part of—”
“Rita,” I said, pleasantly but very firmly, “if I have a choice between watching Larry stare at your cleavage and going to prison, I think Raiford looks like a good idea.”
Rita blushed. “But that isn’t even— I mean, I know, my God, he must think I’m blind or else— But, Dexter, if he can help at all? Because this is still very serious.”
“Too serious to trust it to Larry,” I said, and the elevator gave a muffled ding! and the doors slid open and spilled us out onto the ground floor.
I walked Rita to her car. Following her own excellent advice, she had parked it in the building’s garage, although she had failed to get her ticket validated because I had rushed her out before she could ask the receptionist.
I reassured her that the extra ten dollars would not really send us plummeting into bankruptcy, promised her I would ask around for another lawyer, and watched her drive away into the traffic on Brickell Avenue. Rush hour was already starting, and I wondered how Rita ever managed to survive Miami traffic. She was not a good driver; she drove the way she talked, with lots of stops and starts and sudden changes, but she made up for that by being the luckiest driver I had ever seen, and she’d never had even a small fender-bender.
I got into my car and started the tedious drive home, south again on Brickell for a few blocks, and then west and up onto I-95 until it ended and dumped me down onto Dixie Highway. I found myself pondering as I drove, which is never a great idea in Miami’s rush-hour traffic, and at the intersection of Le Jeune I very nearly plowed into a Jaguar whose driver had made the perfectly reasonable decision to turn left from the center lane. I swerved around it at the last second, earning myself a loud and operatic chorus of horns and bad words in three languages. I supposed it served me right for criticizing Rita’s driving.
Somehow I made it home without smashing into a tanker truck and being consumed by a giant fireball, and I had just enough time to make a pot of coffee and pour myself a cup when Rita burst into the house, with Lily Anne in her arms and the other two children following along in her wake.
“You’re home!” she said as she rushed through the front door. “Because I have some wonderful news, and I have to— Cody, don’t just throw your jacket there; hang it up on the— Astor, for God’s sake, don’t slam the door like that. Here, take the baby,” she said to me, thrusting Lily Anne in my direction and turning away again so rapidly that I had to lurch forward to grab the baby, spilling a quarter of a cup of coffee as I did.
Rita put her keys into her purse and the purse on the table by the front door as she continued. “Brian just called me, your brother?” she said, in case I had forgotten who Brian was. “And anyway, he told me— What, dear?” she said, turning to Cody, who was at her elbow asking her something in his soft voice. “Yes, you can play the Wii for an hour now— So, Brian? When he called?” And she came back over to me where I stood juggling Lily Anne and my cup, with one foot in a pool of spilled coffee. “Oh,” she said, frowning at the small puddle on the floor. “Dexter, you spilled your coffee. I’ll get it,” she said, and rushed into the kitchen, hurrying back out again almost instantly with a wad of paper towels. She squatted down and began to blot up the coffee.
“What did Brian say?” I asked the top of Rita’s head, and she glanced up at me with a radiant smile.
“We have to go to Key West,” she said, and before I could ask her why we had to go, or why Brian could order us around like that, and why that made her so happy, Rita leaped to her feet and ran for the kitchen with the wet paper towels clutched in her hand. “Honestly,” she said over one shoulder, “nobody else around here ever even—” And she was gone through the kitchen door, leaving me to marvel at the fact that I somehow managed to survive in this house without ever knowing what was going on around me, or even what I was talking about.
But Lily Anne reminded me of the futility of trying to understand the harsh conditions of our bleak existence; she gave me a clout on the nose that brought tears to my eyes, topped it with a hearty chuckle as I blinked at her through the haze of pain, and then Rita whisked back into the room and snatched the baby from my arms.
“She needs a change,” Rita said, and hurried away toward the changing table before I could add that I did, too. But I followed along behind her, hoping for some kind of clarity.
“Why did Brian say we have to go to Key West?” I asked her back.
“Oh,” Rita said. “It’s about the house? Brian said that they’re all going to be there— Stop fussing now, silly Lily,” she told the baby as she began to change the diaper. “And so if we go there, too? It’s a very good opportunity for— And with Brian’s connections? We could get a really good deal, too. There you go, little sweetie,” she said as she put the fresh diaper on Lily Anne. “So if you promise to call around about the lawyer? Tonight? Because we would have to leave tomorrow morning.”
Rita turned to me with Lily Anne in her arms, and I had to believe that the expression of excited pleasure on her face had nothing to do with the amazingly rapid diaper change she had performed. “It’s just a chance,” she said, “but it’s a wonderful chance. And Key West! It’s going to be so much fun!”
In every man’s life there comes a time when he must stand up, assert himself, and be a man. For me, that time had come. “Rita,” I said firmly, “I want you to take a deep breath, and then slowly, carefully, and clearly tell me what the hell you are talking about.” And to underline just how serious I was, Lily Anne smacked her mother’s cheek and told her, “Blap!” in a clear and commanding voice.
Rita blinked, possibly from pain. “Oh,” she said. “But I said—”
“You said Brian is forcing us to go to Key West, whether we want to or not,” I said. “And you said all the houses will be there. Other than that, you might as well be speaking Etruscan.”
Rita opened her mouth, and then closed it again. She shook her head and said, “I’m sorry. I thought I said— Because sometimes it seems so clear to me.”
“I’m sure it is,” I said.
“I was in the car, picking up the kids?” she said. “And Brian called me. On the phone,” she added. The thought of her talking on the phone in the course of her already erratic driving made me very glad I was off the roads already. “And he said … He told me that, you know. The real estate company he works for? They’re about to file Chapter Eleven and they need to raise as much cash as they can.” She gave me another very warm smile. “Which is wonderful news,” she said.
I am not really a financial maven, but even I had heard of Chapter 11 before, and I was reasonably sure it had something to do with bankruptcy. But if that was true I couldn’t see why that would be wonderful news, except for any business rivals Brian
’s employers might have. “Rita,” I said.