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“Babe, I’m home.”
He didn’t get a response. He could hear the television was on in the living room and there was running water upstairs. Instead of being greeted by his wife, he was greeted by their two orange tabbies. A cacophony of meows echoed through the foyer as Serena and Mac both started to climb his pants.
“Damn, what is up with you two today,” he laughed.
He scooped them both up, cradling the two affectionate and eager cats. They continued to meow and squirm as he made his way to the kitchen. He saw the empty food bowls. Far too clean to indicate that they’ve been fed dinner. Looking at the clock he was able to identify the source of the incessant meowing. Dinner was supposed to be an hour ago. Not the end of the world, although the two drama queens certainly cried like it was.
”Mama fall out of her routine again?”
He set the tabbies down so he could reach into the cabinet and grab their tins of food. They raced to their bowls faster than he’s ever run across the football field back in his heyday.
He made his way to the living room next. His face grimaced at the sound of a familiar voice. Carson Hayfield, somehow still alive and somehow still running for office and somehow winning the polls. The bastard was giving an anti Super speech yet again. He shut the TV off and tossed the remote on the coffee table next to a cold and untouched plate of salmon and rice.
He finally made his way upstairs. Past the wall of happy photos of their family, friends, and their wedding. Some were from before she changed. Some, like their wedding, were from after. At some point Zion and Peggy-Sue stopped being in the pictures. At some point the pictures stopped completely and abruptly.
When he got to the bathroom he knocked on the door.
”You okay in there?”
No response. He sighed and leaned his forehead against the door.
”You missed the gremlins' dinner time. I got attacked on my way in.”
He was glad they took in the stray kittens she came home with on that cold winter night. They’ve always been a bit of a handful but they grew on him. After the accident it was proven that the cats were good for her. She hated being alone and they loved attention. And feeding time gave her a routine to follow which helped her on bad days. But some days were worse than bad. Some days were so hard he didn’t know how to help because some days she wouldn’t even let him in.
“You gotta talk to me babe.”
Still he got nothing but the sound of the shower.
”I’m coming in, alright?”
He turned the handle and opened the door and his heart ached. There she was, standing underneath the shower head, fully clothed and sopping wet. He shut the water off and sat on the edge of the tub with a towel on his lap. She was shivering, having been standing in this cold water for who knows how long.
“Phinnleigh, you with me?”
With the water off she slowly but surely became aware of her surroundings again. She finally heard his voice.
”Rodney?” Her voice was quiet and raspy, he had to strain to hear her.
“Yeah, I’m here.” He gently grabbed her cold, wet, trembling hand, rubbing circles over her knuckles with his thumb, “Want to tell me where you at?”
”My skin felt dry,” she croaked.
“That’s okay. We can fix that out here.”
”I’m cold.”
”I bet. C’mere.” He stood up and unfurled the towel and held it open for her to step into. She shakily made her way out the tub and allowed herself to get enveloped. Rodney rested his chin on top of her head, something he couldn’t always do. She used to be bigger than him, and her head was often blocked by the glass helmet she had to wear. Now she’s smaller and fits back into his arms. Her wet ginger curls clung to her face. Rodney shifted the towel up over her head and gently wrung out her curls.
“Let’s get you changed before you get sick.”
He guided her down the hallway to the bedroom. He helped her change into one of his biggest shirts. He always loved the way she looked, just absolutely swimming in the fabric. Any other day when the vibes were different he would’ve relished in it. But not a day like this. He continued to towel dry her hair. She sat quietly at the edge of the bed and let him work his magic. Little paws bounded down the hall and into the room as Serena and Mac both appeared. Mac pawed at Rodney’s pant leg while Serena climbed into Phinnleigh’s lap.
“Hi baby.” Her voice was a little stronger now.
“They were worried about ya.” He picked Mac up and sat on the bed next to her.
“I messed up the schedule.” She laid her head on his shoulder, “I’m sorry.”
”It’s okay. It happens.” He moved his hand from petting Mac to hold his wife’s hand. She traced her finger around his wedding band.
“I won’t let it happen again.”
“Phinn, it’s only been a few months. You’re gonna have bad days. I still have bad days.”
A teardrop fell to the back of his hand.
“I’m tired of feeling this way.”
“It’s gonna take time. We’ll tackle it together.”
Her shoulders shook with the barest amount of laughter, “Football terms? Really?”
“You’re a linebacker through and through.” He wrapped his arms around her waist.
“Am not.” The frown was back, “I can’t tackle you anymore like I used to.”
Serena and Mac both yowled indignantly when Rodney pulled Phinn onto his waist, displacing both cats from their resting places. He buried his face in the crook of her neck, beard tickling her collarbone.
“You didn’t seem to have any trouble tackling me a couple nights ago.”
Phinnleigh blushed red hot.
“You dirty dog! Oh my god put me down”
Rodney laughed while she squirmed out of his embrace.
“This dawg is gonna go fetch you some dinner.”
He pulled a blanket up onto her shoulders, placed a kiss on her forehead. The gremlins took their place back on the bed and kept Phinn occupied while Rodney went downstairs.
He came back a few minutes later with two plates of reheated salmon. Still her favorite to this day. They spent some time eating in an easy silence.
“How you feelin’?”
“Not cold anymore.” Phinnleigh curled up on the bed, laying her head in his lap. “But still generally…bleeegh.”
“Yeah,” he ran his fingers through her hair. “You know, it’d probably help if you got out the house more.”
She rarely leaves for anything but work. And even then, on the bad days she answers emails from home. There’s been times the board had been left to run things without her input for days at a time because she just couldn’t bring herself to get out of bed. She’s barely seen any of their friends or family in a few weeks. The survivor’s guilt has been unbearable. First it was just grieving the loss of her parents. But at some point she also started grieving her old body. She told him that if she was still her old self she could’ve saved them. She’d stare at the mirror saying her skin was the wrong color, or her hands were too small, or that her fins were missing.
“Probably. It’s just…hard.”
“You could talk to someone about it. I mean of course you could always talk to me. But you’ve got a support system. Our friends and family are here for you too.”
“I’ll think about it.”
She hated talking to her siblings about it. She told him they didn’t understand how she felt. Which left her team. A lot of her old team was unreachable. Penny was gone. Phebe had disappeared overseas. North and Adianna…had different priorities. But Temple. Temple was still reachable if you could catch her in between the mountains of paperwork and board meetings. So he sent Temple Grubb, founder and CEO of RegentCorp, a text message.
Hey, I need a favor. For Phinn.
Temple
Trouble in paradise?
She needs a friend.
Temple
What do you need me to do?
Talk to her. Get her out the house. Today was a bad day. She needs more than me sometimes.
Temple
Heard. I’ll see what I can do.
He expected Temple to maybe give a phone call in the morning or encourage her to go out for coffee later in the week. He did not expect the doorbell to ring at 9:17 pm. But then again, it was Temple.
“Orchard.” She was still in her work clothes, the latest jetpack model strapped to her back. “I am here for Phinnleigh.”
“I didn’t think you’d come tonight.”
“Your text sounded urgent. May I?” She nodded her head to ask for entry and Rodney obliged, stepping aside to let her in. “How bad of a day?”
“When I came home she was just standing in the shower. I think she misses the water.”
“Hmm. That’s unfortunate.” She took a moment to observe Rodney. The bags under his eyes and untamed new growth in his hair was a clear indication that he had begun to neglect some of his own needs in favor of caring for his wife. An admirable act, but one Temple would like to avoid having the couple repeat over and over again.
“You look like shit.”
“Thanks Grubb. Miss you too.”
“You’re welcome.” Temple started making her way up the stairs. “Go take a break, your wife and I are going out.”
“Now?” He followed after her, unsure.
“You asked for help. I’m helping.”
Temple had her hand lifted and ready to knock but the bedroom door was already open. Phinnleigh laid trapped under their two tabbies, Serena curled up on her chest and Mac splayed out on her stomach.
“So this is what you’ve been doing while your assistant reschedules our meetings?”
Temple walked to the closet and began rummaging through clothes.
“Tem? It’s like 10pm, what are you doing here?”
“It’s 9:19. And I am here to get you out of the house.” Temple tossed an outfit onto the bed. It didn’t really match, but it also wasn’t horrible. The pastel shade of the purple shorts only partly clashed with the bright orange sweater.
“And go where exactly, Ms. Temple ‘buried in her lab’ Grubb?” Phinn chided but still put on the clothes provided. She knew it was futile to try and fight her on the matter.
“We, Mrs. Phinnleigh ‘hypocrite’ MacMoam-Rocksworth-Orchard, are going to go get buried in my lab.”
And about 30 minutes later that’s where the two friends/business associates sat in Temple’s basement. Phinnleigh fiddled with some loose screws while Temple tinkered with the coding on a watch. To many people the sight of the two CEOs working together in a lab was a rare and coveted experience. To them, it was just another Tuesday. Albeit the NemTec CEO was noticeably not participating, which wasn’t routine for the duo.
”So why’d you drag me here again?”
“To improve your mental state.”
”I already have the most recent RegentWatch.”
”No, I’m not here to give you that. I’m not working and neither are you.
The watch on the table lit up and projected a hologram of Carson Hayfield.
’Hi, I’m Carson Hayfield. If you want an incompetent trust fund kid with daddy issues to run your country then I’m the candidate for you.’
Phinnleigh chuckled, “So you dragged me here to shit talk Hatefield.”
”I dragged you here to hang out. We are friends are we not?”
”Of course we are Tem.”
”Well friends don’t let their depressed friends rot away at home.” Temple gathered a bunch of scrap pieces and old prototypes. “Here’s a bunch of junk. You can mess with it, fix it, break it, I don’t really care.”
Phinn rifled through the pile and pulled out an old prototype of RegentCorp’s noise cancelling headset. They were big and clunky, and one side had exposed wiring. She set to work dismantling it, methodically unscrewing panels and stripping the wires until there was a carefully laid out deconstructed version.
“Very avant-garde.”
”I call it…I can’t hear you la la la la!”
“If we get it in the right gallery we could sell it for millions.”
“More money is the last thing that this Rocksworth needs.”
“But imagine, you could get a 9th car.”
”I don’t have 8 cars.”
”You bought 8 cars.”
”I bought cars for my family.”
”Okay, but my point still stands. I’ve only gotten two cars.”
”I give a lot of that money to charity. I don’t need all that.”
“Ah yes, Mrs. Rocksworth the philanthropist. The only multibillionaire in Palisade to contribute more than 10% of her income to good causes.” Temple made the watch project a hologram of Phinnleigh with money raining from the sky.
”Surely I’ve given more than that?”
“I’m guestimating a low number because your net worth is fucking insane.”
”I mean it’s high but it’s not….huh…” Phinn thought for a moment, “I don’t think I actually know what my net worth is.”
”MONARCH,” Speakers around the room chimed to life as the AI activated, “calculate Phinn’s net worth.”
”Phinnleigh MacMoam-Rocksworth-Orchard’s net worth is approximately 206.8 billion dollars.”
The voice of the AI was young. It spoke with the same cadence Temple did. It was a constant reminder of her failure. Temple never let her brother go.
”Does he always call me by my full name?” Phinnleigh asked, choosing to ignore the fact that she didn’t know the number was so high, and mentally making a note to increase future donations.
”It calls you by the name you have. But you can change it if you want.”
”Hey Monarch, just Orchard is fine.”
The system gave an affirmative chime, “Understood, Phinnleigh Orchard.”
The two continued to tinker for a couple more hours. Their conversations were light, neither of them bringing up the reason they were there. Distraction was the name of the game. But the more Phinn listened to the AI, the more she remembered Samson, and the more she thought about the possibilities.
“Tem, what did you do with Samson’s old data?”
Temple, startled by the question, lost her grip on a screwdriver. The sound of it clattering to the floor echoed through the laboratory.
“Well…naturally all of my old logs are saved on an encrypted backup. Why?”
“Did you ever figure out what went wrong?”
“No.” Temple’s response was sharp and blunt. “I ask again. Why.”
“Just curious. Maybe if we put it together with NemTec’s data we could find something.”
Temple studied her friend for a moment. It’s not often that Phinnleigh lies. Mostly because she doesn’t like doing so. She prided herself on being an honest woman. She’s also embarrassingly bad at it. She can never look you in the eye and she’ll start tapping her fingers. That’s how you know Phinnleigh Orchard is lying to you. Temple wracked her brain trying to figure out what she could be after in the old data of a failed meta-genetic experiment, a topic her friend notably despised. But she couldn’t find one.
“I don’t think you’ll find anything worthwhile,” she finally answered, “that project is dead.”
“Yeah,” Phinnleigh relented, “you’re right, sorry. It’s uh…it’s pretty late. I should get back home.”
“I’ll fly you,” Temple offered.
“No it’s fine, the trains are still running.”
“Yeah, great idea. I can see the headline now. Multibillionaire and NemTec CEO Phinnleigh Rocksworth robbed while taking the train alone at midnight.”
“Alright, alright fine,” she conceded, “but only if you stop by the office for lunch tomorrow.”
“Oh? Will the prodigal CEO return?”
“She will certainly try.”
“Then it’s a deal.” Temple held out a hand and Phinn shook it.
“Pleasure doing business with you Grubb.” Phinnleigh turned the handshake into a hug “And thanks. For everything.”
Temple tensed up at first, but eventually relaxed into the embrace her friend very much needed.
“Of course Phinn. That’s what friends are for.”