The Facade by Judy Corry
Mack
“You begood for the Hastings, okay?” My mom pulled me into her frail arms for one last hug. She and my dad were about to leave for the hospital in New York where my mom would be receiving some experimental treatments for her glioblastoma multiforme brain tumor.
My parents’ things were already packed into the Bentley behind us, and in just a few minutes, I’d be rolling my suitcase to my best friends’ house where I’d be staying for two weeks.
“I’ll try to stay out of trouble,” I said, hugging my mom tighter and resting my cheek against her scarf-covered head—her beautiful, long black braids a thing of the past. My mom was tall for a woman at five-foot-ten and had always been a little soft around the middle when I was growing up. But lately, it always caught me a little off guard whenever I hugged her and could feel her ribs.
My mom wasn’t supposed to feel frail.
Mom pulled away from the embrace so my dad could hug me next. At six-foot-seven, he was two inches taller than me. Even though my dad was white and I had more of a light-bronze skin tone since my mom was black, most people didn’t seem too surprised that we were related because we were giants compared to most people we met.
My dad had been on his way to the NBA before my mom’s first brain tumor took him from that path right after college and had led him toward becoming one of the best neurosurgeons in the country instead.
Yes, my dad was a neurosurgeon but his wife was dying of the kind of brain tumor that was, so far, considered incurable—the white shark of brain tumors as they called it.
I’d probably say it was ironic that one of the best neurosurgeons in the world couldn’t heal his own wife, if it didn’t piss me off so much.
My dad patted me on the back. “Have a good two weeks, son. Hopefully, we’ll be back with better news soon.”
I nodded as we pulled away from the hug. Even though I knew my parents needed to get on the road so my mom could get a full night’s rest before her treatments tomorrow, I didn’t want to say goodbye quite yet.
So before my mom could walk to the car with assistance from my dad, I gave her one more hug and said, “Get feeling better, Mom.”
“I’ll do my best, Macky,” she said, using the nickname she’d given me when I was a toddler. “And while I’m doing that, please try not to tease Cambrielle too much while you’re living over there. She already has three brothers; she doesn’t need another.”
“But Mom,” I whined. “That’s what I’m supposed to do, isn’t it? I’m supposed to treat them like we’re really family, right?”
Mom gave me a warning look, the look I’d seen hundreds of times when I was trying her patience. “Joel and Dawn have enough to handle with three teenagers of their own. If I hear that you caused any trouble while I’m away…” She held up a bony finger. “I’ll kick your butt when I get home.”
“I’m counting on it.” I shot her a mischievous grin.
Of course I knew she’d never kick my butt in reality, since she barely spanked me more than a handful of times as a kid—and only after I’d really earned it. But if she came back with the energy to kick my butt after spending two weeks at the hospital, then it would mean that the treatment was doing something.
And with Thanksgiving coming up in just a few weeks—which was when the doctors had initially predicted would be a day she’d be lucky to survive past—I was desperate for this new treatment to buy her more time.
I knew saying goodbye to my mother was inevitable, because so far, my dad and his colleagues hadn’t figured out how to use voodoo magic to treat patients. But having months or even years versus weeks and days would at least make it so I could breathe again.
I hadn’t felt like I’d really drawn in a full breath since her diagnosis last year.
My dad and I helped my mom into the car, and when she struggled to buckle herself in—a sign of the paralysis slowly taking over her left side—my heart squeezed in my chest.
This new treatment needed to work.
My dad walked around to the driver’s side of the silver car, and when he noticed my mom still struggling with the seatbelt, he reached over and helped her.
My parents waved goodbye to me one last time. After I watched them drive down the driveway, I swung the garment bag with my school uniforms over my shoulder and gripped the handle of my gray suitcase and wheeled it down the paved sidewalk we had put in years ago that served as a shortcut between our house and the Hastings family’s estate.
A minute later, the huge stone country house came into view through the mostly bare trees. Even though I’d gotten used to climbing up the big tree by Cambrielle’s balcony and sneaking into her room last month, I made my way to the front door like a normal person, since I was actually invited here by her parents this time.
“Hey roomie,” Carter said with a smile after he opened the door. “Come on in.” Stepping back, he gestured for me to walk inside the mansion that he and his family called home.
I always joked that my family’s modern-style home seemed like a shack compared to the Hastings’ estate, which most people found ridiculous since my parents had the second biggest house in our small town of Eden Falls. But this house was just massive with an indoor pool, basketball court, conservatory, ballroom, theater, bowling alley, and basically every amenity a person could ever dream of having.
My dad was a neurosurgeon and my mom had been an interior designer before she got sick again. But their couple million-dollar net worth had nothing on the billions that Carter’s family had as the seventh richest family in the United States.
Thankfully though, the Hastings were all pretty down to earth…for the most part.
“Marie said dinner will be ready in about fifteen minutes,” Carter said as he led me up the grand staircase with marble floors and an intricately designed handrail. “So that should give you some time to get settled before we eat.”
“Sounds good,” I said, sniffing the aroma of the sweet pork burritos cooking in the kitchen. Cambrielle had said that their chef, Marie, would be cooking my favorite meal, and so I’d made sure to save lots of room for dinner.
Carter led me down the hall past his and Cambrielle’s rooms to the room that was across from Nash’s bedroom.
The Hastings family had plenty of guest bedrooms in their mansion, but Carter had told me I’d be staying on the second floor with the rest of the family so I wouldn’t be off in the west wing by myself.
My mom and dad had warned Mr. and Mrs. Hastings about the sleepwalking episodes I’d had the last time they’d gone out of town, but it was probably a good idea that I would be sleeping near everyone else.
I just hoped my subconscious would do what it did those nights I’d stayed in Cambrielle’s room and realize that I wasn’t all alone in their house, so I could just stay asleep in bed.
I really didn’t want to wake up soaking wet after sleepwalking to their pond again. It was late October and long past the time when anyone would believe I was just going out for a refreshing midnight swim.
“Here you go.” Carter swung the door open to his older brother’s room, revealing a very minimalistic interior with only a king-sized bed, a small couch, a bench at the foot of the bed, and a dresser in the large space. “Ian just moved into the pool house over the weekend, so I think most of the drawers in the dresser should be open for you to use if you want.”
Ian was the oldest son of Mrs. Hastings, coming from her first marriage. He’d recently graduated from Yale and had just moved back to his family’s estate to help Mr. Hastings manage the many investment companies run by Hastings Industries.
“Nice,” I said, plopping my suitcase and garment bag onto the navy-blue duvet. I’d only packed enough stuff for a week—I figured I could just run to my house next door if I needed extra clothes. But having a whole dresser would be an upgrade from having my deodorant and toothbrush stuffed in the back of one of Cambrielle’s bathroom drawers.
“I’ll see you downstairs when you’re done, okay?” Carter said. “I’m supposed to help set the table tonight since Dawn and Dad think we need to learn to take care of things like that before we go off to college.”
“Ah, so you have to start doing what I’ve been doing since I was three,” I teased, unable to keep a smirk from my lips.
“Yeah, yeah.” Carter made a face like he knew how ridiculous most people would find it that he and his siblings were only just now learning to do the household chores the rest of us commoners had been doing our whole lives. “I told her I’d be fine since I helped Señorita Silvia with chores all the time at the orphanage. But Nash and Cambrielle didn’t think it was very fair for me to get out of helping, so I have to pitch in, too.”
Carter had lived in an orphanage in Guatemala for a few years after his mom disappeared and before his dad found him. He joked about it now, but I knew from the various stories he’d told me through the years that his life there had been hard in ways I could never imagine.
“Well, while you’re setting out the dishes, could you make sure to put my plate next to Cambrielle’s? I don’t want to accidentally play footsie with your mom when I’m trying to flirt with your sister.”
Carter’s eyes widened for a moment, like he thought I was serious about playing footsie with his little sis. Then he narrowed his eyes again and said, “Yeah, pretty sure I’ll be putting you two at opposite ends of the table. The last thing my sister needs is to be one of your weekend flings. She doesn’t need to be tempted by you.”
“Kind of like how you’re seducing Ava?”
“Pretty sure Ava is the one who likes to tempt me.” Carter shook his head, a hint of a smile on his lips at the mention of his girlfriend.
“Well, you know she’s my sister now, so maybe I should start pulling the ‘I’m your girlfriend’s older brother’ card on you, my friend.”
“That’s still so weird, isn’t it?” Carter leaned against the door frame. “That Ava and Elyse are your half-sisters?”
“Yeah. It’s definitely not something I was expecting when they first showed up at school.” I unzipped my suitcase, remembering how shocked I’d been when my dad had told my mom and me that he’d gotten the twins’ mom pregnant way back in the day and I had two half-sisters that none of us had ever known about.
My mom had her first brain tumor when she was twenty-two. She’d been dating my dad ever since high school, but when she’d gotten the first diagnosis, she’d freaked out and broke up with my dad without any explanation.
Heartbroken and confused, my dad ended up rebounding with Mrs. Cohen at their high school reunion. She’d gotten pregnant and told him about it. But my dad ended up having a mental breakdown from the stress of everything with my mom and the unplanned twins. So when Ava and Elyse’s mom realized my dad wouldn’t be much help with anything, she had faked a miscarriage and cut all ties with her past.
It was only after the girls showed up at school in September that they started putting the puzzle pieces together. Then just a little over a week ago, the truth all came out and I found out that I’d almost asked my own sister on a date.
So even though things sucked with my mom’s tumor right now, my being distracted with everything going on had actually paid off in that regard since it had kept me from making out with one of my sisters.
I shuddered just thinking about how bad the gossip at our school would have been if I’d found out a week or two later.
“Do you think Elyse knows you were planning to ask her out?” Carter asked.
“I hope not,” I said, pulling a stack of T-shirts from my suitcase and setting them in the dresser behind me. “I mean, I’m sure it was pretty obvious that I liked her since I flirted with her while you were flirting with Ava during our study sessions. But I just hope everyone interpreted it as me just being nice to the new girls.”
“Yeah, not sure that’s likely with your reputation.” Carter chuckled. “But if anyone says anything, I’ll tell them that’s all you were doing. Kind of like how you’re always just being nice to Cambrielle and don’t really have plans to ever take her out.”
“Your sister is pretty hot,” I said, only because I knew how much Carter hated it every time I mentioned how pretty Cambrielle was. “And she’s just down the hall. It would be kind of convenient.”
Carter folded his arms across his chest and gave me a challenging look. “Almost as convenient as me living just down the hall from you and being able to tell everyone that the reason you stopped showing up at school is because you caught a cold and not because I dismembered you in the night.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “Well, it’s a good thing I’m not actually planning on taking advantage of your sister then, isn’t it?”
“Yes, it is.”
And from the fierce look on his face, it was probably also a very good thing that neither Cambrielle nor I had slipped up and told him that I’d already snuck into her room several times.
I shook my thoughts away before Carter could ask what I was thinking about.
“Anyway,” Carter said, pushing himself away from the doorframe and standing to his six-foot-three-inch height. “I’m gonna head down to the kitchen. I’ll see you down there.”
“Okay,” I said, grabbing a handful of the black socks that I wore with my school uniform to stuff into the dresser. “Just remember to put me by Cambrielle.”
Carter rolled his eyes. “Not happening.”
Once he was gone, I made quick work of hanging my school uniforms up in Ian’s mostly empty closet and shoving my toiletries in one of the bathroom drawers.
I was just on my way downstairs to give Carter some pointers on how to set the table—thanks to my lifetime of experience—when I heard Nash teasing Cambrielle in her room about her crush on Ben Barnett.
“You know that one way to get Ben to notice you would be to actually talk to him, right?” Nash was saying just before I took a detour into Cambrielle’s room.
“Yeah, yeah,” Cambrielle said. “I’m working on it.”
“Remind me how just staring at him when he’s studying in the library but never actually walking within ten feet of him is working on it?” Nash teased.
Cambrielle chucked a light-pink pillow to where Nash sat on the chair in the corner beside the gas fireplace.
Nash, used to getting pillows thrown at him by his siblings, just took it in stride. “Thanks, my head was getting tired.” And then, he promptly slipped the pillow behind his head.
Cambrielle shook her head at her brother, her back still turned to me as she stood beside her bed. “You’re one to talk. I mean, haven’t you wanted to ask Elyse out since the beginning of the year and yet all you’ve done is friendzone yourself?”
“It’s completely different,” Nash said.
“And how’s that?” Cambrielle crossed her arms.
“Well, you see, I actually do talk with Elyse on a regular basis.”
“But that’s not—” Cambrielle started but Nash held up a finger to continue his thought.
“I’m just taking things slower because I have plans.”
“And what are those plans?” Cambrielle asked, unconvinced.
“Well, you see, I had wanted to let my buddy Mack here have a shot at the beauty first.” Nash glanced behind his sister to where I stood, a smirk on his lips like he’d just been waiting to say that in front of me.
Cambrielle turned around, her bright blue eyes wide, surprised I had overheard their conversation.
Nash continued, “And now that Fate has intervened and shown me to be the better candidate…” He winked, obviously teasing me about the fact that fate had a twisted sense of humor since Elyse was my half-sister. “I’m now just waiting for Fate to play her next card by placing Elyse and me as the leads in the winter musical. Then once she’s playing the Christine to my Phantom, I expect for the chemistry to show itself on stage.”
“So you’re hoping for the on-stage romance to carry off stage?” I raised my eyebrows.
“I don’t usually like to mix my personal life with my art, but if something happens naturally, then who am I to go against Fate?”
“And you think Fate would have plans for two of my best friends to both end up with my half-sisters?” I asked, skeptical about Nash’s belief in Fate.
Because if Fate was real, so far I wasn’t a fan of her interference in my life. In fact, if I was to meet Fate someday, I was pretty sure I’d punch her in the face and tell her to mess with someone else’s life since my family had had enough of her interfering ways.
But Nash must not have known about the beef I had with Fate right now because he just shrugged and said, “Why not? Makes sense that Ava’s twin would be attracted to a similar look as her sister.”
And yet, I was pretty sure Elyse had had a crush on me until last week. And I couldn’t look more different from my blond-haired, blue-eyed friends.
“I guess we’ll just have to see if this play goes the way you hope. Who knows, maybe Fate will interfere, and Miss Crawley will put someone else as the lead.”
Nash’s jaw dropped, and ever the dramatic, he put a hand to his chest and said, “How dare you speak such blasphemy in my presence.”
Yeah, Nash was a weirdo when he got into character.
I shrugged. “I’m just saying it might be a good idea to have a backup plan in case things don’t go your way.”
I had certainly learned that if anything was sure in life, it was that you could make all sorts of plans for how your life was going to go but you better be prepared to come up with a whole new set of plans at a moment’s notice because sometimes all it took, like in my mom’s case, was a really bad headache or a seizure to change your life forever.
Feeling my chest tighten as my mind started to think about what was coming for my family in the next months, I drew in a deep breath and tried to bring myself back to the present moment.
Tried to remind myself that as long as my parents were still seeking treatments, it meant there was still a chance of my mom watching my basketball games this year or seeing me graduate in June.
Cambrielle’s room was decorated in light pinks and golds. I stepped inside, hoping it would help my overwhelming thoughts disappear. Cambrielle’s decorating tastes were definitely a lot more girly and whimsical than my black and white room at home, but I’d always felt a sense of calm in here.
After staying in Cambrielle’s room for a few nights and receiving the best night’s sleep I’d had in the months before and several weeks since, I came up with the theory that just like how some humans had comfort animals, this place served as my comfort room—a sanctuary of sorts. Every time I stepped into her room, a sense of calm would come over me—like a shelter from the anxiety that usually plagued my mind way more often than I’d like these days.
I was just laying myself along the foot of Cambrielle’s bed when Mrs. Hastings’ voice sounded over the intercom system. “Dinner will be ready in five minutes. Please come down before it gets cold.”
“You don’t have to tell me twice,” Nash said as he lifted himself out of the cozy, cream-colored chair that I’d enjoyed sitting in on those few nights Cambrielle had let me stay over. “I’ve been craving Marie’s sweet pork burritos all day.”
“Me too,” I said as I rolled onto my back, about to get up from Cambrielle’s queen-sized, four-poster bed.
But once Nash left the room and was out of earshot, I couldn’t resist teasing Cambrielle a little. I rolled back onto my side, propped my head on my hand, and looked at Cambrielle with a half-smile on my lips. “Your bed sure is comfortable.”
“Yeah?” she asked, her expression wary as if she was worried about where I might be going with this.
“Yeah.” I smoothed my palm along the ripples of her white comforter. “I mean, I only lay down on Ian’s bed for a minute before coming in here, but I can’t help but feel that as your family’s special guest, it’s only right that I stay in the most comfortable bed in the house.”
“And you think that’s my bed?” Cambrielle raised an eyebrow.
“Definitely.” I moved up so I could lie back against the stack of throw pillows she had at the head of her bed. “I think you should trade me.”
“What?” She pulled her head back in surprise.
“I know how much you pride yourself on being a good hostess,” I said, placing my hands behind my head as I leaned back even farther. “And we don’t even need to make a big fuss about it to the rest of your family. Your room and Ian’s room share a balcony, right? We could just use that to do the switcheroo and no one would be the wiser.”
“But I like my bed,” Cambrielle said. “And my room.”
“Me too,” I said, glancing around at the feminine decor. “I’ve actually been considering having my room done the same way.”
“You want a pink and gold bedroom with frilly throw pillows and white furniture?”
“It’s nice.” I shrugged. “And we already know how well I sleep in your room.” I winked.
Her cheeks flushed, and I loved the way the slightest mention of those few forbidden nights caused her to get in a tizzy.
She looked toward her open door, as if checking to make sure no one was there, and then in a hushed tone she whispered, “You need to stop saying things like that. Everyone’s going to find out about what we did, and then we’ll get in huge trouble.”
“But nothing happened,” I said, matter-of-factly. “And everyone knows you like Ben and that nothing would ever happen between us.”
Her eyes widened in a warning look, like she was still worried someone might hear our conversation from all the way downstairs.
“I’m going to be sleeping in my room, okay?” she said, closing the subject of switching rooms.
And I knew I should probably stop teasing her. That I should do what my mom had said and not give Cambrielle a hard time for once in my life, but the devil in me just couldn’t help himself. So I said, “Well, if you’re in love with your room so much, I guess we could share.” I pressed my lips together and studied the spot beside me. “I already know you don’t snore, and I think this bed is big enough for both of us. Especially if we cuddle.”
“Shhhh.” Cambrielle flung herself across the bed and covered my mouth with her hand to silence me. “What don’t you understand about the words ‘stop saying things like that?’”
I wrapped my long fingers around her delicate wrist and removed her hand from my mouth so I could speak, and whispered, “If you wanted to cuddle with me before we go to bed, all you had to do was ask.” I looked pointedly at the way her body was pressed against my side after her attempt to shut me up.
She looked down at our bodies, let out a surprised squeal, and was just trying to scoot away when Nash’s voice sounded from the doorway. “Um, so is this the real reason why you haven’t been talking to Ben?” His blue eyes were wide with shock as he stared at the compromising position his sister and I were currently in on her bed. “Was he just a decoy?”
“No, of course not,” Cambrielle said as she clambered to the side of the bed and away from me. “Mack was just being stupid, and I had to resort to physical force to shut him up.”
When she got to her feet on the floor, she smoothed her fingers through her long, light-brown hair and straightened her pink blouse as if she was afraid to look like we’d just been in some sort of romantic tussle.
Nash narrowed his eyes at his sister and then at me, as if trying to decide whether she was telling the truth. Then with a shrug, he said, “Just don’t let Carter or Dad see you flirting like that.”
“We weren’t flirting,” Cambrielle insisted. Then she glanced at me, her expression telling me I better back her up. “Tell Nash that you were just being a butthead and that it’s not what it looked like.”
I lifted my hand to my mouth, cleared my throat dramatically, and said, “I was being a butthead. And even though I’m sure Cambrielle would be fun to make-out with, we were not and nor have we ever done anything remotely close to that.”
“Thank y—” she started.
But before she could finish thanking me, I added, “Though since I am under oath, I cannot, of course, testify as to whether Cambrielle has ever thought about kissing an amazing specimen of a human such as myself. But I will say that if she has, I wouldn’t hold it against her since many girls have been susceptible to my tall, dark, and utterly handsome looks and—”
A fuzzy white pillow hit me in the face before I could finish my sentence.
“Hey,” I said, pulling the pillow away. And when I looked to the side, Cambrielle was already grabbing another pillow to launch at me.
But before she could, I got to my knees and snatched it from her hands, tossing it at her instead.
It hit her on the side of the head, messing up her hair again. Fire instantly showed in her aqua-blue eyes as she reached for another pillow and yelled, “Take this,” as she hit me with it repeatedly.
It didn’t hurt, of course, but it did have me rolling to the other end of the bed so I could take cover on the floor.
I’d always thought Cambrielle had twenty different throw pillows on her bed because she had a weird addiction to them, but maybe she actually had so many because they doubled as ammunition against all the teasing she received from her brothers, and now me.
“Well, I was just grabbing something from my room to show Mom and Dad,” Nash said, losing interest now that Cambrielle and I were about to have a full-blown pillow fight. “But you should probably head downstairs before they send Carter up to get you.”
