Two

Rebecca pressed her temple to the window of her brother's Corolla and the glass pressed back. Tom had keyed the ignition and the car wheezed to life.

"This year's gonna be better," her brother said at the beginning of the year, because The Market was going to change. It was a promise and a prayer. The Market passed Tom's lips in reverent whispers.

The year Rebecca stopped being a sweet girl, a clever girl, and a pretty girl, Tom had made the same promise.

It was after he sold their house to cover their mother's life support, and when not enough time could be bought, he cried for days; he was so good.

He was full of promises. After passing through college, he flew all the way back from California to take care of his kid sister. If people asked, he tried and failed to conceal his love for crisp, shimmering West Coast summers. If they probed further, he hinted modestly at the job offers he had lined up like cars of a choo-choo train in San Francisco.

So went the story. If their neighbors were the kind of neighbors who remembered their names, their marvel might have lingered.

As Tom pulled out of the driveway, something crunched and creaked beneath the tires, which could be a brittle boned baby bird but was more likely one of the beer or soda cans that littered near the curb of the street. Rebecca didn't want to see.

She toyed with her steel bangle. When she pressed it into her skin she made parallel lined indents in her wrist.

"Don't you have something better to wear?" Tom asked as he drove. He spoke gruffly and rapidly, like she was some mangy pigeon inside his newly vacuumed car.

"No," she said, and stopped smoothing the folds of her wrinkled beige dress.

"Something with a little more color?" Tom continued like she was mute.

"No," she said.

"Something festive, for once?"

Rebecca watched her faint reflection in the window pane. She watched naked tree branches outside hurl through her other ghost face.

"You hear what I said?" The pine scented air freshener swung to and fro precariously above the dashboard.

"Nope," she said.

Tom muttered something under his breath that sounded like bitch.

Just marvelous, Rebecca thought.

The year Tom got his B.S. in business, the Mercedes-Benz their father called their mother's midlife crisis trampmobile veered off the highway, ending upside down in the woods edging the very golf course frequented by what their mother called their father's man-opausal mafia. Their parents were together, on the way to their divorce.

When a girl lost her mom and dad the flow of encouragement ebbed. So Rebecca got to figure out sooner than later that she was sullen, foolish, and sagging with baggage.

Tom was debt free thanks to their parents' six digit salaries. Grandpa Ken and Grandma Lynn had entered an assisted living community, Uncle Gary spent more time in Brussels than he did at home, and Aunt Caroline had to check under her car for explosives every morning before driving to work at her abortion clinic. To protect Rebecca from international relocation and routine death threats, Tom was the least unsuited of Rebecca's potential guardians.

In conversation, he highlighted the bank he worked at instead of the administrative duties he worked, multiplied the job offer he didn't take by three, and divided the number of times per week Rebecca had to make her own dinner by two.

Tom was too busy Paying the Bills to explain, of course, but her mother worked in investment banking, and this much Rebecca understood: when times hardened the demand for princesses fell. When Tom moved back he established The Market as fortune and himself as its diviner. Rebecca lived in a theocracy where she was ambivalently agnostic.

So The Market was going to change for the better, declared Tom, the all knowing one. Rebecca wanted to know whether consulting star charts was sufficient or whether it took sacrificing a goat under a full moon to reveal so momentous a revelation.

Their new rented house sat in a dusty corner of town that would never be purchased by contractors and turned into yuppie dream homes. Her room had slanted walls that folded down on her.

Change that, she thought. She didn't say it to Tom's face, though, because when two people lived under a roof that groaned in moderate rain, there was only so much anger they could afford to take out on each other.

And today Tom was in a remarkably good mood and made it clear Rebecca should be too.

She was going to love this, said Tom, grudgingly. She believed him, grudgingly. Because he knew what she loved.

Because before she finished the eighth grade Rebecca started looking forward to A's on tests and long weekends and good movies— she wasn't picky. Because she was like a barnacle and she could be scorched dry or crushed and she'd cling on to that piece of rock, her life, for all her worth. Because the most striking and saddest lesson Rebecca learned the day her parents ceased to be, was that she wanted, more than anything, to continue being. For now and for ever. Maybe that's what it meant to move on or grow up.

.~.*.~.

What she was going to love was a French restaurant downtown with a name she couldn't pronounce without embarrassing herself. Tom would know. He studied French for years, probably, Rebecca thought, in preparation for reading menus sans prices.

"We're here for a reservation, with Mr. Roger Phelan," Tom announced. He touched the knot of his tie.

Before he took interest in being Tom's mentor, Mr. Roger Phelan was a venture capitalist, which according to Tom, meant he poured money into high risk experiments. Rebecca thought Tom fit the bill well. Phelan had specifically requested Rebecca to be brought along, which was kind of awkward, she thought, since post-epiphany Phelan chaired the English Department at her school.

The maitre d' smiled as if they were all cultured pearls. Her eyes lingered long on the creases in Rebecca's dress. "This way, if you please."

The place was cool on the brink of cold. It did offer an electric fireplace spanning most of one wall, croaking and cackling warm orange sparks, which Rebecca supposed meant to stimulate the imagination. On another wall was a giant map of Europe made to look old in its uneven tawny color. The high black ceiling was inlaid with tiny lights probably made to resemble stars. Behind the bar area was a rack of wine bottles, probably empty but made to appear full, gleaming in blue neon light. Rebecca tried to not stare too much. Tom didn't.

Mr. Phelan picked a booth below a chandelier that splashed ivory light and made the gray strands in his auburn hair shine silver. If the restaurant had a website, he could model on the home page.

"Thomas!" he greeted. "How are you, my boy?"

Her brother was twenty-six. Rebecca didn't know anyone else who could call Tom boy and make him grin about it. Like her, Tom made pinball out of how are you, but instead Phelan turned to her. A smile spread over his face, and his clear eyes radiated warmth that infected and spread throughout her where the fake fireplace failed. "My dear."

"Hi Mr. Phelan," she said, though Tom called him Roger.

Rather than shake her hand he clasped it securely in both of his own. "Rebecca." He sounded her name in three distinct syllables. He had extremely straight and white teeth.

Here was a picture of someone successful. Here was someone who could grant Tom a quarter of a million dollars to buy and sell stocks. And when Tom let all that money slip away like sand through his fingers, here was someone who had the generosity to invite Tom to fancy dinners and give him hope to turn things around. Tom idolized him like he was a god.

The adults ordered white and red wine and she asked for water. Then Tom and Phelan went deep into their conversation about The Market and Nasdaq and Dow. Phelan asked Tom what he thought about trading stocks independently, leaving Rebecca to wonder how he ever became successful if he put so much faith in people who'd been losing money on parent subsidized lemonade stands.

She flipped through the menu. Tom said it was in her best interest to not make a fool of herself. Which probably meant finding a dish she could pronounce without butchering the French. Which whittled her options down to foie gras. There were many things Rebecca wouldn't do for her brother and eating liver was one of them.

"What would you recommend?" she asked the waiter. He was no older than Tom and had a stringy kind of mustache. She thought of bad waiter jokes and dug her nails into her inner wrist to stifle a giggle.

"The moules marinières is a favorite," he said. "Or perhaps you would like crevettes à la provençale, or poulet au porto? Simple, but delicious."

Confronted with all the ooh's and ah's, Rebecca managed, "Um." She could barely find what the waiter listed on the menu.

"May I suggest the crépes? It's stuffed with goat cheese." Mr. Phelan put in kindly. He pointed to a line on her menu that said, crépe au fromage de chévre.

Rebecca shot him a grateful smile. "Yeah. Crepes sound good. Thank you." She passed the menu to the waiter, feeling the leather moisten from her sweaty palm.

Mr. Phelan winked at her. "I confess, I had ulterior motives."

She smiled blankly. "What do you mean?"

"The crépe dish is one of four vegetarian dishes in the restaurant. I have rather specific views on food ethics."

Tom ordered some filet. Even though she was just a tagalong, Rebecca felt a little fountain of triumph jetting up inside her.

She must have made a good impression, she thought, because after the waiter left, all the attention shifted onto her.

"How's school, my dear?" said Mr. Phelan, breaking a bread roll. "Remind me, who do you have for English again?"

"Mr. Waters," she answered.

"Dan? He's very good, isn't he?"

"The best," Rebecca said. Phelan sounded like he was fond of Waters.

He beamed. "Good to know who to keep on the payroll."

She blinked.

He shook his head, laughing. "Thank goodness for tenure, hey? Otherwise two words from clever little girls like you and old people like me will go on a rampage making hiring and firing decisions." He sipped his wine.

"Right," she said.

Tom guffawed, but Mr. Phelan, and Rebecca, ignored him.

The goat cheese in her crepes was very sharp, which Rebecca thought was a fun surprise, if not entirely appetizing.

For a while, he entertained Tom and Rebecca with stories of his partner James' toddler daughter. Since the first time she met him, Mr. Phelan liked made it clear that he was proud of his sexuality. That he had never even been in the closet.

When dessert time came, Phelan ordered a hazelnut dessert coffee and Tom was quick to follow suit.

"Sweets for a sweetie," he shot Rebecca another wink, and ordered chocolate mousse for her. Midway through dessert, Tom had to use the men's room. Rebecca guessed one had to be pretty hardcore to drink wine and coffee in the same meal.

"You like it?" Mr. Phelan asked as Rebecca spooned her mousse.

"Yeah, it's really…quite," she felt this warranted some fancy SAT vocabulary word, except she was bad at making things up on the spot, "exquisite."

The corners of his mouth flirted up. "You know, I have a housekeeper who makes some of the best desserts. Have you ever had princess cake?"

She shook her head.

"Well, Lucia's cooking is sublime. And if you haven't had it at all, I formally invite you to my house sometime just to try it."

She maintained her eager look, but she wondered why Mr. Phelan was insisting; he did work at her school. "I don't know if I can."

She thought to mention her hectic schedule, but already Phelan looked serious. "My dear, I know they teach you in school to not 'hang out' with strange men," he said, using air quotes. "But I hope that by now, you don't consider me a stranger."

"That's not what I meant," she stuttered. She hadn't thought all men were predators. "I mean, you're too generous, that's all. And I know my brother owes you money, and I don't want to take up any more of your time."

"Don't worry like that, my dear." He chuckled, waving his hand like he could flick aside mountains. "It's your brother's responsibility, not yours. And you should be more confident about yourself, sweetie. You're not taking up my time. Your letting me take up yours."

"I'd like to do something about it," she said, even though she wasn't sure she wanted anything to do with The Market.

He shook his head. "You do your part by smiling."

"You're kidding." Rebecca felt the corners of her mouth quirk up. If she wasn't careful, he might undo her.

"Chin up, sweetie. Show those dimples."

Rebecca didn't have dimples. Tom did. He got them from their mother.

But she smiled without showing her teeth. If he liked to see her smiling, she had all the reason in the world to do so.

.~.*.~.

Dan was carrying a box filled with copies of The Crucible when he saw her near his classroom, shoulders in a slight stoop, hair tied back, more than an hour before the bell rang for first period.

"Someone's here early," he called.

Rebecca straightened out of her slouch. "Hi Mr. Waters." Her glance flitted to the load in his arms. "Do you want some help?"

"If you could get the door, that'd be great."

"Yeah, sure." She opened his door all the way and leaned against it.

"Thanks," Dan said.

He put the box down on a desk and waited for her to leave or come in, but instead she stood there and studied some indistinguishable spot in the distance with serious, fatigued eyes, as if not quite out of a dream. Her bag slung from her shoulder across to her hip. It looked heavy.

"You usually get here this time of day?" he asked, though he knew she didn't, because he did.

"Huh?" She looked at him and for a second, her expression was so open it startled him. Then she covered a yawn delicately and shook her head. "My brother has an early morning meeting at work, so he had to drop me off early."

"I see," he said, and because he anticipated silence settling, he added, "How do you feel about orange juice?"

A slow smile lit up her face like beams of light breaking through morning mist. "Orange juice?"

He started keeping a carton in the fridge in the department office because coffee had begun giving him occasional headaches, the same way it did to his father when Dan was a boy. He didn't explain. It wasn't a very engaging story. "Is that a yes?"

"That'd be really nice."

"All right. Wait here."

When he got back, she was standing by the desk with the books, her fingers dawdling on the edge of the box. "The Crucible?" she asked as he pulled a cup out of his cabinet.

"Yeah, you know what a crucible is?" He watched her watch him pour.

The cover bore a picture of the original stage actors in Puritan costume, which Rebecca stared at with furrowed brows, like she could discern the meaning if she looked hard enough. "We used crucibles to heat stuff in chem last year. But," she looked up, "I guess that's not what this is about."

He passed the cup to her and poured a mug full for himself. Nodding, he said, "Well, there's that. But you're right. Here, a crucible is a test, or a trial."

"Which ends badly."

He studied her, surprised. "How did you figure that out?"

She shrugged and tapped Arthur Miller's name in thick black print on the cover. "It's by the same guy who wrote 'Tragedy and the Common Man.'"

The essay she referred to, he handed out at the beginning of the year. He was impressed.

"Plus it's American literature," she added with a wry grin. "So."

He laughed at that. "Your parents work early too?"

The smile slid off her face and the juice swished as her hand twitched, but she spilled nothing. "My parents passed away."

"I'm sorry." And because sorry seemed painfully inadequate, he added, "If you want someone to talk to—"

"It's been years."

"Well," he tried, "you and your brother must be really close."

She beamed with the ferocity of thunderclouds in a summer storm. "Yeah. He's really great." She brought the cup to her lips and bit the rim. "So, um, do you always get here this early?"

Not always. Always was a long time. "I try to beat traffic."

"I like the school when it's quiet," she said, hand smothering another yawn.

"Yeah?" He didn't in particular. But quiet at school was better than quiet at home. "Well, if you're here at this time again, you're welcome to stop by if you want. I'll provide…" he trailed off. There was not much he could offer.

"The orange juice?" Rebecca grinned.

"Cereal, too, if you let me know beforehand."

"Right," she said. She slid out of the chair and grabbed her bag. "I like Cheerios."

They both knew she wouldn't take up his offer. Still he penned down Cheerios on a Post-it and stuck it to the edge of his computer monitor, and Rebecca laughed which was what he hoped for.

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