“He was worried about me?”

“Oh, come now. Your brother cared about you. He wanted you to come home. He had a temper, yes. I know the two of you were like oil and water, but he had a vision. He wanted to talk to you about it in person. I thought it might be better to at least bridge some of the specifics with you over the phone, but he was adamant that once you got here, the two of you would go out, have a brotherly chat, and then take on the world.”

“Is that so?” And all I can think of is the last thing I said to my brother before I hung up the phone: Why don’t you fuck off and die?

I don’t think Art knows I wasn’t planning on coming home, nor do I think he knows how shitty he’s making me feel right now. If I’d been here, maybe I would have been the one driving. None of this would have happened to begin with. Everyone would still be alive. But no. I had to put my own wants and desires before everything else. I mean, acting that way has always served me well before, but now, right now, it appears that it’s backfired horribly.

“I’ve been in touch with the only living relative of the man driving the truck. His name was Vaughn Floyd. His sister’s name is Essie Floyd. I did a bit of investigating. Seems it’s been just the two of them for a while. They were struggling to make ends meet,” Arturo says. “I called and offered to take care of the funeral expenses on behalf of the family. I knew you wouldn’t mind.”

“How generous of you.” When he says on behalf of the family, he means on my behalf. I’m such a fucking waste of oxygen that I didn’t even think of that myself, and yet I’m mad that Arturo chose to speak for me.

Arturo shrugs. “Maybe by covering the funeral costs, we might avoid any potential lawsuits this young woman might want to pursue. That’s just one headache we don’t need to deal with right now.”

How very fucking pragmatic of him. Buy off the poor woman who’s lost the only family she had. “So she accepted?”

“Yes.” He gives me a tight grin. “Though…she was hardly happy about it. Furious is probably a better word to describe her temperament, in fact.”

“Can you blame her? I assume you told her who you were. I’d probably be pretty pissed too.” I think about the girl for a minute, whoever she is, and her brother, whoever he was. Like mine, her life is now irrevocably changed, and we’re all just expected to carry on.

My father’s most trusted friend sighs heavily. “If she can at least give her brother a decent memorial service, I think we won’t have to worry about her in the future.”

“Jesus. So glad to hear you’re thinking ahead.” I can’t hide the disgust from my voice. I rub a hand over my eyes. “Maybe I should go lie down.”

“Maybe. Yes. Well.” Art nods, glancing around at his overly shined Italian leather shoes like he’s trying to find something he’s lost on the floor. Eventually he says, “Yes. A nap would probably do you some good. Just one more thing before I go. You’ll be expected to speak at the family memorial service. Just a few words. All the other arrangements have been taken care of. Your mother had very specific requests.”

“My mother had her funeral planned?”

“You sound surprised. Your parents have always thought ahead. They were realists. They knew this day would come eventually.” Arturo looks at me. “When was the last time your father spoke to you about his will?”

“His will?” I laugh. “Never. If he was going to talk to anyone about that, it would have been Alex.”

A pained expression crosses Arturo’s face, almost like he feels bad for what he’s about to tell me. “The Callahan Corporation was to be passed on to you and your brother. Since your brother is no longer with us, you are the sole heir. The business is yours.”

“Excuse me?”

“The Callahan Corporation is yours. You’ll need to hit the ground running, Aidan. The company was going through major transition already. Everything’s up in the air. What the business needs now is a strong hand and guidance. Everyone’s...well, they’re reeling, of course. Many of your father’s employees are in a state of panic. People think they’re going to lose their jobs.”

“But…what about the board? Won’t they just manage everything from here on out?”

Arturo shakes his hand, sliding his hands into his pockets. “The Callahan Corporation never went public, Aidan. There is no board. You trying to tell me you didn’t know that?”

“No, I…” I feel stupid. I’ve never had even the slightest interest in what happened in that shining glass tower that dominates the Chicago city skyline. But to not even know how the company was structured? That’s madness. This whole situation reminds me of a movie. Something scripted. Completely untenable. This is just like fucking Batman, except Arturo makes a shitty Arthur and I am just about the worst Bruce Wayne ever.

Arturo speaks some more. I think maybe they’re coherent sentences, but I can’t decipher a single thing that comes out of his mouth. My parents are dead, my brother is dead, and now everything is mine.

Everything I’ve ever tried to free myself from is mine.

SEVEN

ESSIE

A handful of people show up to Vaughn’s memorial service. Mostly people he worked with from the bike shop. They say kind words to me, but I don’t hear any of it, much like I don’t hear a single thing the priest is saying. How is it this priest can be saying anything about my brother anyway, when he never even knew him?

The day is spectacularly cold but there isn’t a cloud in the sky. The sun is a bright hard, shining coin of silver overhead, radiating a brittle kind of light. There are flowers everywhere, flowers that are so beautiful in their explosive array of colors. Flowers that seem shocked to be outside, assaulted by the cold. I know who most of these flowers were sent by: the Callahans. More specifically, Aidan Callahan, who’s paying for the funeral. How can I forget? I feel a twinge of nausea every time I think of that fact. I try to just forget it, to just swallow my pride because all that really matters is that Vaughn is getting the memorial service he deserves, but it’s hard.

The funeral director asked me if I wanted to say a few words, but I declined, not trusting myself to be able to get a single word out without completely falling apart. And what was there to say, anyway? That none of this was fair? That for everything Vaughn and I went through, for it to end this way was a total and complete slap in the face? No one would have wanted to listen to me ask how a person is supposed to continue living and breathing when it feels like nothing will ever be good in the world again.

In front of me on this cold, cold day, waiting to be lowered into the ground, is my brother in his casket. The casket gleams—it’s mahogany, covered in a blanket of roses. Beautiful. It probably cost more than a brand new car. Max stands next to me, and he’s saying something, but I can’t hear him. All I can do is cry. All I can do is think that this is the closest I’m ever going to be to my brother again. This is the last time I’m ever going to see him, except I’m not even seeing him because he’s in that casket.

The priest finishes speaking. The casket disappears into the ground. People come up to me again, press my hand into theirs, look into my eyes, wipe tears from their own. I force a tiny smile and nod, though, again, I don’t hear a word they say. Finally, I am by myself. I stand there staring at that hole long after everyone has gone, after Max whispers for me to take as much time as I need and that he’ll be waiting for me in the car.

I stand there so long it’s like I’m frozen in place. When I do look up, across the cemetery a huge crowd has amassed. Were they here when we got here? I don’t know. I doubt it. It would have been impossible to miss such a sea of black. How many people? Hundreds. They start to file away as I stand and watch them. A few walk by me as they leave, shooting me steely-eyed glances, giving me brisk nods of their heads. Their conversations wash over me.