Chapter 201
Chapter 200: Telling Lucian The Good News
CAMERON POV
Clam
I called Lucian at eight-seventeen, after breakfast had concluded and my mother had started making sounds about dinner planning-actual dinner planning, for the hypothetical future dinner-and my father had retrieved his newspaper and returned to it with the air of a man who had received good news and was allowing himself to sit quietly in the warmth of it.
Lucian picked up on the second ring.
“Good morning,” he said. The ‘professional version first-he always started with the professional version until he confirmed what register we were in.
“I told them,” I said.
A pause.
“This morning?” he said.
“Breakfast p>
Another pause-longer. I could hear him recalibrating. “Cameron p>
“They’d like to have dinner. Properly. With you.” I paused. “And with Lake, when he’s ready p>
Silence.
“Lucian p>
“I’m here.” His voice had changed registers. The careful one, now-the one he used when something had surprised him and he was deciding how to receive it. “You told them this morning p>
“I said I would p>
“I know. I just-” A breath. “I didn’t expect it to be this morning p>
“I told you this week p>
“You did.” A pause. “How did they p>
“My mother is already counting grandchildren p>
Silence. Then, very quietly: “What p>
“Nick, Lake, and Drew. She’s done the arithmetic. She’s also started planning a dinner with a specificity that suggests she’s been waiting for an occasion p>
“Cameron.” His voice was doing something I recognized but hadn’t heard often-a loosening, like something being settled down gently.
“Your parents are p>
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Telling Lugar the Good News
“A lot,” I said. “I know p>
“I was going to say generous p>
Claim
“Also that.” I looked out the window at the Preston garden. The Japanese maple stood in the corner, its branches bare now in November, showing their actual shape without the coverage of leaves. “They want to meet you properly. Not as Preston Investments event Lucian. As-the other thing p>
“The person you’re seeing p>
“Yes p>
A pause.
“Lake had akara for breakfast,” Lucian said, which wasn’t an answer to anything I’d said but was the kind of thing he said when he was processing something and needed to say something ordinary while he did it. “He was quiet. He usually narrates breakfast p>
“Still upset p>
“Still processing. He went to school with his thinking face on.” A pause. “Drew was at the gate when I dropped him. That helped, I think p>
“He’ll come around,” I said, and heard Sedona’s voice in it, and my own from the night before, and realized we were all saying the same thing to each other in rotation and hoping it became true through repetition.
“He will,” Lucian said. “He just needs-he needs to know you. Actually know you. Not the version he’s built from what he’s seen p>
“I know p>
“He’s fair,” Lucian said. “He’s more fair than he seems when he’s dug in. When he has the full information he reassesses.” A pause. “He’s his father’s son p>
I thought about Lake in the car, making his case with the evidence he had-logical, consistent, protecting the person he loved most. The architecture of it had been completely sound given his data set. The conclusion had simply pointed at the wrong man.
“I’d like to spend time with him,” I said. “Not formally. Not as a thing. Just-time p>
“I know.” Lucian’s voice was careful and warm in the specific way it was sometimes careful and warm. “He mentioned-before I dropped him-that you drove carefully p>
I waited.
“He noticed,” Lucian said. “That’s something p>
“It’s not much p>
“With Lake, noticing is the beginning of everything.” A pause. “He also mentioned-when I pressed him slightly-that he thought you looked important when you walked into rooms p>
“He thinks I’m scary p>
“He thinks you’re powerful,” Lucian said. “Which to a four-year-old is frightening and interesting in roughly
Telling Lucanthe Good News
Claim
equal measure.” Another pause. “He also told me that Sedona said you were the first person she called when she needed help p>
I was quiet.
“He filed that,” Lucian said. could see him doing it. He didn’t say anything about it, but he filed it p>
The Japanese maple. The bare branches The morning light through glass. “He’s going to be fine,” I said.
i
“Yes,” Lucian said. “He is.” A pause. “Cameron p>
“Yes p>
“Thank you. For this morning.” His voice was very even. “I know it wasn’t-I know it took something to do it p>
“It took less than I thought,” I said. And this was true. The thing I’d been bracing for-the weight of it, the potential for it to go badly-had dissolved in the kitchen light between my parents’ faces. What remained was something much simpler. Relief with a depth I hadn’t measured correctly in advance.
“Your mother is counting grandchildren,” Lucian said. There was something in his voice I couldn’t name precisely-something between bewilderment and something warmer than bewilderment.
“She does arithmetic when she’s happy,” I said. “It’s her version of celebrating p>
A pause. Then, quietly: “Nick, Lake, and Drew p>
“In that order,” I said. “She was very specific p>
Lucian was quiet for a moment. When he spoke his voice had the particular quality it got when something had gotten through the careful outer layer and landed directly. “That’s-” He stopped. Started again. “That’s a lot p>
“Yes,” I said.
“She included Lake p>
“Without hesitation p>
A breath. Not quite steady. “Cameron p>
“I know,” I said. Because I did know. Because Lake had been included not as a conditional or a complication but as simple arithmetic-this is who you are, this is who comes with you, all of it is welcome. My mother had not paused at Lake’s name. She had counted it and moved forward.
I thought about what it would mean to him-maybe not now, maybe not for months-that somewhere in a Preston kitchen, a woman he hadn’t met had counted him in a list of grandchildren without being asked.
He didn’t know yet.
He would, eventually.
“We’ll do dinner,” I said. “When you’re both ready. No pressure on the timeline p>
“Soon,” Lucian said. Quietly. “I think soon p>
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Telling Luciante Good News
“Good”
Somments
LUCK DRAW >
H
Vote
Florence
A passionate storyteller who brings emotions to life through her words. When she’s not writing, she finds peace nurturing her garden.