A Light to Guide Me

"We've all known him for decades. Daisy and I have put a lot of thought into this. We think that there's a good chance that when he got out of the military and was first working private security, he fell for someone he feels he let down and lost while on the job. Probably someone he was supposed to protect. That's possibly why he was so willing to come work for Finn and run his security. Back into the protector role for a family that needed him. If we're right and this man died, we've sort of hit a dead end."

Finn pushed a folder forward. "I don't think that's an issue. It seems that George was as meticulous as Cynthia when it came to taking notes about his proteges. I found all of his old files and I've been going over them. He had file after file on Shiv and she's spent the better part of the morning crying. He was... well, let's stick with Jim stuff. Eight months before he came to work for us, he was part of a security detail for a man named Walter Iversonn. Walter was a programmer working in finance. I don't know, Jennifer can give you details. Anyway, he found and was able to track money that was being washed for a cartel.

"His uncle was rich. Very rich. When Walter went to the authorities, he agreed to testify. His uncle got him out of the country until the trial and hired private security that should have been better than what the feds could offer. Jim was with that private security. They had nine months together, and it seemed that it was enough to build a relationship. The end didn't go well. Half the detail was killed, Jim was shot up and Walter was also shot. Jim healed, mourned, and came to Montauk.

"What Jim didn't know was that Walter survived, testified, and had his name legally changed to avoid retribution. He moved from San Francisco to South Carolina and runs a small company that designs and builds websites. Walter is now known as Andrew Dorning."

I was gobsmacked. "That... Finn, how do you find these things out?"

He shrugged his shoulders. "It's what I do. After enough time, you learn where to look, who to talk to, and what's important enough to pay attention to."

"Well... that's amazing. I'm thinking my dad's schools need a new website. A whole overhaul. Or something brand new. We should probably talk to the best people possible, like maybe a small company in South Carolina."

Finn looked a little off. Still standing, I looked down at him. "What?"

"Nothing. It's just... It's good to see you excited. Happy."

I paused. "Yeah, sorta feels good, too."

*****

"Hey, Jim. I'm at the school in Riverhead. Can you do me a huge favor? I'm not feeling that great, but I really need to get another video done. Would it be too much to ask that you drive in here?"

"Hold on one sec. Let me check the coverage." I heard some shuffling. "No, I'm good. I'll be off in about an hour, and it'll take me about forty-five minutes to get there. Two hours okay?"

"That'd be great. Thanks. Lunch is on me."

I was so nervous that my palms were sweating. Andrew Dorning was flying into Islip/MacArthur airport and was due to arrive at the school by midafternoon. I had to wave some serious money under his nose to get him to come himself, but again, I had that whole rich wife thing working for me.

Jim arrived, and I had my go-to waiting for him. There was a Greek place a few doors down that had been in Riverhead for thirty or forty years. I had keftedes with tzatziki and two huge salads ready when he arrived. Drawing things out, I ate slowly.

He pushed himself back from the desk. "Nothing like those old school places, you know? They're not new, they're not exciting; they're just damn good."

"They've always been great. You bring a change of clothes?"

"Yeah, why?"

"I don't know. I thought you might want to work the bag or something when we're done. Just hang out. You're more than welcome."

He looked at me oddly. "Well, I pay your dad $109.99 a month, so I know I'm 'welcome'."

I laughed nervously and checked the time on the monitor. The plane should have landed twenty minutes earlier. "Okay. Let's get started."

Jim closed the office door and drew the curtains. I was sitting in my chair, and yes, I considered it my chair, and took a few seconds to center myself. Looking into the camera, I began.

"Hello girls. This video is called 'How to Talk to People'. Uncle Finn suggested it and I'm honestly sort of at a loss. You may not know this, but he's not always comfortable in groups or crowds. He has to force himself to appear at ease and happy to meet new people. Uncle Finn thinks that I'm... weird, I guess. In a good way.

"I never have problems talking to people. I know some people do, but I've never seen that in either of you, but he thinks I should cover it, so I'll try. If you find yourself having problems with this someday and I'm... I'm not around... Yeah, sorry. It gets to me sometimes. Okay, if I'm not around and you want to pick someone's brain, talk to William. He's a lot like me that way.

"I've had to put some thought into it, and I've come to a few conclusions. First off, you can't fake it. You need to truly be interested in people. You need to be curious about them, their lives, and how they see things. If you're faking that, they will know in a second. You also have to respect how other people are. That's not really eloquent. Sorry. It's just that some people are sort of reserved, and you have to respect that. Don't try to force things.

"Try to feel them out and figure out what they want to talk about. What's important to them? Why is it important to them? I'm going to go back to something I said in another video. Be kind. Let that be your guiding principle. No one goes to a party or... I don't know, other event wanting to feel awkward. Be friendly, be open, be curious, be patient.

"Okay, I'm going to wrap this up by saying that being kind and being open doesn't mean that you owe anyone anything other than basic decency, and more importantly, they have absolutely no right to any part of you that you don't want to give them. This will make more sense when you're older. Again, talk to William. Here's an important call-back for you. Boys are disgusting. Stay away from them until you're forty. Okay, maybe not forty. Your cousin will help.

"I love you girls. You're my everything. I'll always be proud of you."

I waited for a count of five. "Jim, can you, uh, can you maybe give me a minute?"

He paused. This big hulking alpha guy looked like he was tearing up. "Sure. I'm gonna grab my bag from the car and get changed."

"Thanks."

I didn't cry. He left the office, and I just sat there staring at the wall. I thought of the births of my daughters, their first steps, the first days of school, and every other milestone in their young lives. I thought of all of the rest of the milestones that I might miss. I also thought of the video I was going to have to make that I was dreading. Somehow, the one about accepting death wasn't the worst. I made it through that one okay.

Explaining how some people might hate my babies because of the color of their skin was going to be impossible. Things were so much better than they had been, but there had still been times when I had to talk Daisy down. We'd run into situations where she was going to beat the hell out of someone who obviously didn't care for the fact that a white woman was married to a black man or people who assumed that she had adopted our daughters.

How do you really, truly explain racism to a ten and seven-year-old? How could I prepare them and protect them if I was in the grave?

I wasn't sure how much time had passed when a student knocked on the door and stuck his head in. "Mr. Olivieara? A man's here to see you. He said he has an appointment."

"Thanks, Tim. I'll be right out. Hey, your sister okay?"

"Yeah, they said it was just a bad sprain. She'll be good as new in a month."

"Great."

I spent ninety minutes with Andrew, drawing the meeting out as long as I could, hoping Jim would come back to the office. It was hard for me to judge, but Andrew seemed to be a good-looking guy and he absolutely looked like most of the men that Jim had dated. He was clearly well educated, and a bit closed off, but an excellent salesman. Getting the new website had been a pretense, but now I was thinking that we really needed it.

He noticed me looking out the office window and into the gym. I could see my friend hitting the bag and talking to someone he often sparred with. Come on Jim! Work with me here! It was incredibly frustrating. I didn't want to just say "Hey, your old lover is out there punching a heavy bag. Wanna hook up?"

"Mr. Oliveara?"

"Yeah, sorry. Everything sounds great. Please, call me Tommy. Listen, my friend Pete owns a distillery and potato chip company as well as some restaurants and a car restoration business. He needs websites. Yeah, new websites. For all of them. Can you stay an extra day?"

Yup, that was going to cost me a lot more. Screw it. Rich wife.

"I suppose. Do you have the names of the businesses? I can pull up their existing sites."

He sounded suspicious, and I didn't blame him. Thankfully, I really did have friends who owned lots of businesses. When we were done, I walked him right by the ring. Right by the ring! He didn't notice Jim and Jim was too busy getting hit to notice Andrew. It was insanely frustrating.

"If you don't mind, can we meet in Montauk tomorrow? Have you heard of Finn and Jennifer Corrigan? They have a place there. Google them. Two PM?"

"Montauk is near here?"

"Sorry, yeah. A bit east."

"That would be fine, but I have to fly back tomorrow night."

"Understood. Thank you, Andrew."

"Um, you're welcome, but... did you have any thoughts on what we discussed?"

I felt like an idiot. "Oh, of course. Sorry. Yeah, you're hired. Get started as soon as possible. Send me your bill and we'll get you the money immediately."

"The... Just like that? The full package with individual landing pages for each location?"

"Yeah, the whole thing."

"Well, all right then. I look forward to meeting with you and Pete tomorrow."

*****

I wasn't doing a lot of driving at that point, and I'd had one of my cousins drop me off at the office that morning. Picking up the phone, I called Daisy.

She was too excited for preliminary hellos. "How did everything go? What did he look like? Did they recognize each other immediately?"

"I... no, they didn't even see each other. It was so insanely disappointing. And I'm sort of using more of your money."

"Our money." She made a weird noise of dismissal, like pffft. "Spend it. It's just sitting there. For most of our lives, we live like middle-income people. Go crazy. That's what it's there for. So, what now? Is he heading down south? Can we get Jim to his hotel or something?"

"No, I promised him more work. We're getting together for lunch tomorrow at your brother's. I just need to call and clear it with Finn and have him make sure Jim is working physical security tomorrow. They won't have a chance of not meeting if Jim has to check him through the gate."

"Oh, you're a genius, man of mine."

"Yeah. Some genius. Daisy, I walked him right by Jim and nothing. Am I doing the wrong thing here? What if Andrew is dating someone? What if they just aren't interested after all this time?"

"You're absolutely doing the right thing. You're just opening the door in case they want to walk through. If they don't, that's their choice."

I was silent for a moment. "I guess. You think your mom can take the girls tonight?"

"She'd love that. Can I come pick you up now?"

"Please. I... Daisy, I need you tonight, okay?"

She whispered. "Since when do you have to ask? I'll be there in under an hour."

I was outside the building talking to two pre-teen girls when she arrived. "You have my card. Show it to anyone who bothers you, but you've got to be done by nine, okay?"

"Yes, sir."

"Don't call me... well actually, you don't know me, and your parents might want that. Fine. I have water in my office and the bathrooms are immediately to the right. Good luck, girls."

I lugged the boxes over to the car and Daisy popped the trunk. As we drove away, she gave me a look. "What was all that about?"

"Girl Scouts. They were selling candy. In this crazy heat, what's up with that? And I have no idea where their parents were."

She smiled. "How much did you buy, Mr. Softy?"

"A couple of boxes."

"Cases or boxes?"

"Okay, a couple of cases. We'll give them to William and Grace. College kids will devour them in minutes."

She reached over and stroked my cheek with the back of her hand. "You're a good man, Thomas Oliveara. And you're my man and you're not allowed to leave me."

Taking her hand, I kissed her knuckles.

We spent the night making love. The world started and ended with my wife.

I woke up the next morning feeling strong. It was one of my good days. Suddenly realizing I hadn't spoken to Finn, I immediately called over. He didn't answer. I called Jennifer and thankfully she picked up.

I tried to be nonchalant. "Morning, Jen. You guys have plans for today?"

"I need to talk to my finance people and whip them into line, but I'll be doing that from home. Finn's on the phone with a Senator from Wyoming, but nothing after that. What's up?"

"I, um, sort of volunteered your house for a meeting with Andrew, Jim's ex. And I was sort of hoping you could make sure that Jim was working the gate? And I'm sort of your best friend and you sort of love me, and you're sort of not pissed off?"

She laughed. "We'll make it happen. What time?"

"He should be there at two. I could get there around 11:30. That work?"

"That'll be fine. Bring the girls."

"They're with Deb, but sure. She can drop them off."

Pulling into their driveway at 11:15, I didn't see Pete's car. I did see Deb's, however. She was probably regaling the security with tales of how she saved William. I was in the kitchen helping Finn prepare lunch and I kept nattering on and on about how this might be a mistake.

"Tommy, stop. You need to calm down. Whether they work something out or not is up to them. You gave them the tools and as a friend, that's all you can do. And you put in twice as much mayo as you should."

I looked down into the bowl of tuna. He was right.

"Throw three more cans of tuna in."

Pete arrived with his six-year-old son and had me explain everything again.

"I need new websites?"

"We'll pay for them."

"Nah, it'll be fine. Can we work out a swap?"

"What sort of swap?"

He put his hand on his son's shoulder, and I thought of what a miracle the little boy was. Pete was approaching sixty and his son kept him young.

"Stan's been talking about taking classes. With you guys. Maybe you can find some time for some one-on-one training?"

"Of course, but... Maybe Daisy would be better, because... well, you know."

"No, I don't know. Not unless you're going to say something stupid like you're not going to be here. And you're not going to say that, right?"

I smiled. "No, I guess not."

"Good. It's settled." He put his hands over little Stan's ears. "And maybe Deb could be around sometimes? I think Stan has a crush on your daughter."

My smile grew wider. "I'll see what I can do."

We sat. We waited. We ate. We waited some more. Time stopped and left, only to come back and restart. We ate again. Some chopped vegetables and a dip Finn made. We waited. With the hectic speed of a glacier, 2:00 PM arrived and... nothing. Absolutely nothing. We remained where we were, waiting for the doorbell. A bunch of middle-aged suburbanites peeking around a corner was too undignified, even for us.

We waited some more. Pulling out my phone, I was about to call Andrew when Jennifer spoke. "Is that him? With Jim? He's cute."

She was looking out the back window. The two of them were on the dock leading to Finn's oyster farm. The five of us stood almost shoulder to shoulder, staring at them.

I cleared my throat. "Maybe we should give them some privacy."

Jennifer replied. "Yeah, you first."

I kept staring.

When they suddenly started walking towards the house, we all scattered, found our seats and tried to pretend we hadn't been watching their every move. Jim opened the back door, and they walked in. He was trying to hide a smile, and Andrew looked happy but embarrassed.

Jim looked to Finn and Jennifer. "I'm going to need a week off. As soon as possible."

Jennifer spoke up. "You're already off. Kate is picking up your hours and will handle the scheduling and logistical stuff."

"Oh. Okay, what about the other stuff?"

"The jet will leave within an hour. Yekong will be here by tomorrow morning."

Daisy snorted, as if it was an insult that they were bringing in Yekong. There was still something between those two, a professional rivalry that became a deep friendship.

Jim looked at us all, moving from one of us to the next. "I... I don't know what to say. We're going to see if... I'll be back in a week. I'm not... Thank you."

For Jim, that was effusive. They left, together, and Jim came back a happy man. They began alternating time between Long Island and South Carolina and I'd never known Jim to be so at peace.

*****

I hated this, absolutely hated it. His shoulders tightened and his eyes widened as I walked into the rectory. My house had plenty of mirrors. I knew what I looked like, but seeing the reaction of others still freaked me out. Father Chakowski looked like he might start crying, but like me, he plastered a smile on his face and moved on.

I was down to a hundred and thirty pounds from my walking-around weight of one-eighty-five. My appearance screamed "ill" and I knew that I looked frail. For someone who spent the majority of his life fighting, that was almost unacceptable. The problem was that I knew it was likely going to get worse.

Being a Catholic, it was difficult avoiding the priest that was almost a part of our extended family, but he was more than just a priest to Siobhan. He was a father figure, a confidant, an advisor and one of the few people allowed to call her Daisy. She needed him, and I didn't want to intrude on that relationship. She was dealing with me, the illness, the kids, the extended family, and all of our friends. She deserved him. Daisy deserved her oldest mentor.

That being said, we were getting to the end of the road, so I intruded on their relationship and set up a meeting. If she knew I was deliberately avoiding talking to Father Chakowski she'd have raised hell and told me how silly I was being. I was her husband. I had the right to be silly if I thought it would help her.

Unlike many people, his smile seemed genuine. I guessed that in his line of work, he spoke often with people who didn't have that many tomorrows left. He hugged me and then stepped back.

"Let's go to the den. I'm alone today, but I've got some casseroles from Finn in the freezer. You hungry?"

"No, thank you Father. Not much of an appetite these days."

"It's Jesse, Tommy."

Smiling, I nodded.

I wasn't sure what I was expecting, but it looked like any other house. There was a step down into the den and I was about to enter when I noticed a small array of photos on the wall to my left. There were four of Daisy competing, two of us at our wedding, one of the two of us with Father Chakowski, again at our wedding and a bunch of photos of the girls. I was struck by how lonely his life must be at times. My girls were the closest thing he had to grandchildren, and Daisy was the daughter of his heart.

We spoke for more than two hours, covering everything from the afterlife to my legacy here on Earth. It wasn't jiu jitsu, and he convinced me that it wasn't just my family. I'd had the great blessing of having many friends. Those relationships would be part of what I left to the world, and I was happy about that.