Wish I Were Here

Chapter 28

A fter coffee with Melanie, I walk into the lobby of the DeGreco to find Luca sitting at the front desk, flipping through his phone. Mrs. Goodwin must have headed over to the community center to order everyone around in preparation for the fundraiser.

Luca’s head pops up, and a smile spreads across his face. “Hey, how did it go with Melanie?”

“It went well.” I hesitate, remembering my mother’s warnings about Luca, and Dr. Gupta’s instructions to get another draft of my outline to him by the end of the week. “I’d love to tell you all about it, but I really should get some work done.”

“Sure.” His shoulders drop.

I press the button to the elevator. “What are you doing here?” I thought he’d be at the community center, too.

“Waiting for you.”

“Oh.” My heart clatters. I drop my gaze to the vine peeking out of the V-neck of his T-shirt. It’s Sunday, and Luca has the day off. Suddenly, the last thing I want to do is work on that research paper.

“I don’t want to keep you from your work.” Luca gives me that small, just-for-me smile, and I get the feeling he absolutely wants to keep me from my work. “You have a big week coming up.”

That’s right. So, what am I doing standing here?

But instead of pushing the button again, I turn away from the elevator. Maybe I can just hang out in the lobby for another minute or two. I’ll check the mail. That’s something productive to do.

I round the corner to the mail room, and—maybe as a punishment for stalling—I immediately crash into a bike that’s parked in front of the mailboxes. The pedal slams into my shin, sending pain up my leg. “Ow!” Knocked off-balance, I reach out for something to hold on to. My hand closes around the bike seat, but instead of steadying me, the bike starts to topple over. The handlebar swings, taking down a pile of mail that hasn’t been sorted yet, and the bike, the packages, and I all go sprawling on the floor in a heap.

At the commotion, Luca comes running. “Catherine, are you okay?” He crouches next to me.

“Damn it.” I push myself up to a sitting position and shake out my limbs. Nothing is broken, but the bike pedal tore my pants, and my shin is throbbing. A drop of blood trickles down my leg. “Why is this here? Don’t we have a room specifically for bikes?”

Luca takes a look at the offending object. “Oh, that’s Mr. Winthrop’s. He has trouble maneuvering it through the storage room door, so he leaves it for me to do.”

“Well, why didn’t you?” I snap. “It’s dangerous. And against building rules.”

Luca sits back on his heels. “Are you hurt?”

“I’ll be fine,” I mutter, shoving a UPS box off my foot.

He lifts the bike off me and wheels it out into the lobby to stash in the storage area. I limp around the room, picking up the packages scattered across the floor and making two neat piles on the table next to the mailboxes. When I do one last sweep of the room, I find a white corrugated US Mail bin shoved up against the wall, filled with smaller mail items—mostly envelopes and leaflets.

I sigh. These should really go into people’s mailboxes. What if there are bills or important papers in here? I pull a stack of envelopes out of the box and begin sliding them into the mailboxes labeled with the corresponding names. I recognize many of them from around the building or the community center, and I’m struck by how many people I’ve met in just this short time.

There’s a small package for Walt Offerman that I’m willing to bet is The Highlander’s Baby , the next book club pick. He’s probably been waiting for that. Next, I set a parcel from a store called Good Vibrations into Mrs. Goodwin’s mailbox. I don’t want to know what that is. And then, underneath, I find a letter addressed to me.

In the top left-hand corner is the logo for my bank, and in the top right, a postmark dated several weeks ago. I do a double take. Has this been sitting here for weeks?

Scanning my memory, I search for what I was doing on August eighth. I’ll have to check my calendar. Nothing specific stands out, though something feels familiar. Important.

Wait, no. The date I’m remembering isn’t August eighth, it’s the seventh.

That’s when I had my first meeting with Dr. Gupta at the café. This letter is postmarked the day after.

I tear into the envelope. And as I begin reading, my stomach churns.

Dear Ms. Lipton,

This letter is to inform you of fraudulent activity within your Charter Bank checking and savings accounts. Our Fraud Services Division has discovered that the Social Security number used to open the account does not exist. Therefore, this account will be closed in two weeks unless further action is taken to register a valid Social Security number. Please call…

Oh my God. This is the letter the person at the bank referenced when I called last week. The letter I never received. It’s been sitting here in a pile this whole time. I drop the letter on the table and dig through the box until I find a similar envelope, this one with my credit card company’s name in the return address area. It’s postmarked on August eighth, too.

Dear Ms. Lipton,

This letter is to inform you…

I think I’m going to throw up. I lean back against the mailboxes, taking deep, shaky breaths. The banks did send letters letting me know my accounts were about to be shut down. If I’d gotten these letters, I would have called right away, and that would have led me to discover the mix-up at the Social Security office in early August. Instead, I didn’t know anything about it until I showed up for orientation— weeks later —and got kicked out by Helen. I didn’t know anything about it until my bank accounts had already been shut down, my credit cards closed, my access to my money gone.

I didn’t know anything about it until I was dangerously close to losing my job and the life I’d worked so hard for.

Luca strolls back into the mail room. “Catherine, I’m really sorry about the bike. Mr. Winthrop broke his hip a few months ago, and he’s just getting back at it…” He stops, probably taking in my pale face and hunched-over posture, and he hurries toward me. “Shit, are you really hurt? I didn’t realize that bike was quite so heavy…” He reaches for my arm, but I yank it away.

“Please don’t touch me.”

He backs away, his gaze roaming over my face, which I’m sure is rapidly going from ghostly pale to bright red. “Is this about the bike?”

“No. It’s not the bike.” I pick up the letters and hold them out to him. “It’s about these.”

Keeping his eyes on my face, he reaches out and takes the letters. Turning one over in his hand, he glances at it, and then back up to me. “So you finally got the letter from your bank.”

“Finally?” I choke. “Look at the postmark.”

He flips over the envelope again. “August eighth. Why does that date ring a bell?”

“I have no idea.”

“Wait.” He squints. “It’s August ninth that I’m remembering.”

I press my hands to my face. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is that the letter has been here, in the back of the mail room, for weeks .”

Luca’s gaze slides from the papers in his hand, to the bin on the table, to my face.

“What matters,” I continue, my voice strangely calm, when inside I’m screaming, “is that you left it here, in a bin, instead of putting it in my mailbox, where I would see it. When I would still have time to do something about it before my accounts were shut down and my job put in jeopardy.”

Luca swears under his breath. “I’m so sorry, Catherine.”

“Just like you’re sorry about the bike in the mail room? And the lost dry cleaning? And…” I wave my hand. “All the other rules you break and ways you’re completely, utterly irresponsible?”

Luca stares down at the envelope. “Look, Catherine. I know what this looks like. But that date—I think I know what happened. This letter arrived on August ninth. I was sorting the mail, and there was an emergency…”

I cut him off. “Why do I feel like everything to you is an emergency if it means not doing your job?”

“Okay.” Luca drops his hands to his sides. “This is really unfair. I may not always follow your precious manual of rules and regulations, but I’m good at my job. I’m great at it.”

“A doorman’s job is to be at the door .”

“Only if you look at everything from your narrow view of the world.”

I take a step back, away from him. “This”—I wave a finger between us—“is never going to work.”

“Catherine, wait. Let’s talk about this.”

“This is all just a game to you, but this is my life .” I shake my head slowly, realization dawning. “Melanie was right about you.” With that, I turn and push past him, stalking out into the lobby and banging my hand on the elevator button.

Luca trails after me. “What do you mean Melanie was right about me?” He takes my arm, turning me around to face him. And I hate that even now, after all this, my heart tugs in his direction. I hate that his face is creased with worry, and I just want to put the smile back where it belongs. Thankfully, the elevator arrives, and I hop on, quickly hitting the button for my floor. “You’re just like my dad.” I give the button another push for good measure. “That’s what I mean.”

The elevator door begins sliding shut. And at the last moment, right before they close completely, I hear Luca call, “I consider that a compliment!”