Now Town, Thurlow Industries
Shannon Thurlow gazes down at the delicate rose gold Tiffany’s HardWear watch on her left wrist. It feels heavier than when clasped it on this morning, but it’s not the weight of the watch itself that’s causing the heaviness. Instead, it’s the ticking away of time that seems to be weighing her down.
She stands on the ground level of the massive building, somewhere at the center of the Gardens just off the main entrance. The exhibit was built into the building sometime in the last decade, a gift from an environmental philanthropist as a peace offering to the Thurlow clan for their groundbreaking endeavors into clean energy. Each season, much like a similar exhibit in Las Vegas, gives life to a new artist interpretations and the money raised goes directly to the environmental foundation of that artists liking.
When the grounds aren’t a complete tourist trap, Shannon, finds herself roaming them as a way of collecting herself.
The bluetooth attached to her ear, however, has been combating the peace of mind she tends to find near the florals of the season; Manzanita shrubs and Marigolds bring a bright and fiery color palette to the expansive space.
“Mother, listen to me,” Shannon says, “I know that it’s been a few weeks since we last checked in. Things should have moved a lot quicker than they have… Aidan should be getting ready for a visit, but, we need to keep focused…”
She lets Anita air her worries, her mother’s voice seems hoarse, as if she’s been talking herself in circles. Shannon thinks of the times when she was younger and how Anita would get so wrapped up in these passion projects. Her mother would create these massive projects with thorough plans and end up in a fit of nerves; the project would be shelved, locked away and forgotten.
“Are you listening to me?” Anita blurts from the speaker.
“Mother,” Shannon responds, she turns on her heel and finds herself looking at a display, a mantel near the far left of the room, with a grand bouquet of marigolds splaying out into a river against it. “I am listening to you.”
“It surely doesn’t sound like you are.”
This gets a grumbled from Shannon, who hopes between the crowds forming around her — get’s drowned out.
“I heard that!”
Shannon winces. “I’m sorry, I am. I think I am just exhausted from this week. It’s been a long one.”
“Says the one who hasn’t been teaching their grandson how to sift through red tape while trying to make haste. Do you know how stressful it has been to stay on target?”
“And you’ve been a huge help, especially where Aidan is concerned.” Shannon replies, trying to offer her mother as much support as possible from a million miles away.
“Don’t patronize me.”
“I’m not!” Shannon shoots back, finding others listening in on her conversation, she smiles to keep the tourists from forming a circle around herself instead of the art pieces. Instead of digging herself into more of a hole, she decides to switch things up. “How is my son doing with everything?”
“Why don’t you ask him that?”
Shannon has no idea why everything to do with her mother has always been this difficult. Sometimes she wishes she were James with his simplistic way of conversing with Anita.
“I’m asking you, as his mentor — not his grandmother!”
“Well,” Anita starts, then she pauses, as if to be thinking the world over, “… he’s your son, so there is a lot to teach him. But Aidan is a smart young man. He’s catching on.”
Shannon listens intently, carefully analyzing every word. She doesn’t miss the way her mother says, He’s your son but she’s also wise enough not to let it bother her. At least not externally. So Shannon tucks it away, for now.
“Shannon, I have to go.”
“Mother!”
“I have to go!” Anita repeats. “This empire isn’t going to run itself."
The call ends with a click.
You shouldn’t be the one running things in Paris, anyways. She thinks to herself. Feeling as if she’s gathered enough intel for now, a small bit of her is satisfied, which keeps her from dialing her son’s number and badgering him for a sense of peace.
“There you are!” Isabelle Wilkinson-Rhodes calls from a few feet away. Her friend stands tall, her blonde hair sits higher on her shoulders — a trip to the salon seems to have taken place in-between the last time they had seen each other. Shannon smiles back, meeting her half way and into a tight embrace.
Isabelle pulls back. “You’re giving me a vibe…” she says, moving her hands in the general direction of Shannon, “were you just on the phone with someone?”
“My mother.” Shannon blurts.
Isabelle gives a knowing nod. “How is Anita doing in Paris? I can’t imagine she’s been pulled away from managing everything over there?”
“Worse.” Shannon scoffs. “I think she’s started to work herself to the brink of insanity.”
“Ah, well maybe we can check her into a facility and she can finally have a rest after all these years.” Isabelle bites back with a snicker, she falls in line with Shannon and they find themselves near a secluded bench.
Their friendship spans farther than either would admit. With both their families having had a long history of allyship through the generations. Sometimes, Shannon can recall a time when Isabelle, a few years older than herself, felt like a distant friend. Memories of High School flash before her. A time when Shannon fell into the intoxication of Patrick Sutton and Isabelle warned her away from him. A shiver runs through her body, and her blood runs cold.
“Shan,” Isabelle says, pulling her back to reality, “are you sure that you’re okay? I just want to let you know that if there is anything you have reservations about, I am here for you.”
Shannon nods. “I’m fine. I guess I do have so much on my plate with Jon being back in town, and the merger constantly catching a snag, or three… but, I’m fine.”
She can feel her friends’ hands grasp her own. “As long as you’re telling me the truth, then I’m okay with that.”
“How are you?” Shannon asks. “Have you spoken with Ivan lately? You know, since he decided to go back to Colorado.”
Isabelle pulls her shoulders up to her ears, resting the bob of blonde hair upon them, and then she shrugs. “I don’t truly know where we stand, but I don’t know if I care, If I’m being honest. We have been together for decades. Yet here we are… I don’t want to apply any pressure… but I also don’t know if that’s because I want us to work things out or if I just want him to move on and forget all about me.”
They sit in a silence for a few seconds before Isabelle sighs. “That sounds so awful, doesn’t it? I sound so awful.”
“No, no no,” Shannon assures her, “I think you’re allowed to feel this way. Like you said, you have been together since longer than I can even remember. At some point it’s either you’re together or you’re not — and for what it’s worth, you’re a catch! He should be the one doing the begging and the groveling.”
“What if he doesn’t?”
Shannon sighs. “Then throw him back into the waters.”
The two share a chuckle at the thought.
---
A few floors up from where the two women sit and talk, Bentley Wilkinson is going over his end of the week checklist. Members of his team have come and gone throughout the morning, but they are aware of how serious he takes this process and avoid causing him any unnecessary stress.
Bentley, however, is not burdened by the usual stress of projection plans or deadlines. He had spent the early hours of the morning in bed with his partner, Olivia. It feels almost surreal how good their relationship has been lately. When only a few years ago, they weren’t even on speaking terms. He had always admired Olivia Joplin’s dedication to her career, even after they ended things. He would find himself scrolling through her Instagram and rooting for her from afar. It took the two of them a long time to overcome the baggage that had built up between them, but eventually, like water against a dam, they erupted into each other’s orbit.
And into each other’s beds, over and over again.
A knock at his opened office door causes him to lose concentration, he lifts his gaze to meet eye-to-eye with Vinessa Torsney, the mediator between Thurlow Industries and SRQ Industries merger. The older woman offers a kind smile before letting herself into the space.
“I didn’t have a meeting on the schedule.” Bentley speaks first, he straightens himself in his chair, and then, he lifts himself up to greet her with an outward hand.
Vinessa takes his awkward hand with a chuckle. “I didn’t think I would be needing a meeting, however,” she hands over a few papers, “it seems that there are a few things you forgot to fill-in about your active projects.”
“You could’ve emailed a copy to me.” Bentley frowns.
She shrugs it off. “That is true, but Emmet has been on my ass about making sure the litigation paperwork is sound on the T.I. side of negotiations and your office was on the way to the elevator. I’m in need of another round of caffeine.”
He begins to look over the paperwork and sees the errors of his way. It wasn’t like him to forgot something so important so he moves back to his desk and begins to examine the pages with a much more careful eye. “You don’t have a coffee pot in your office?” He states. A question that is birthed out of habit and distraction.
“I don’t have an office.” Vinessa chuckles.
Bentley looks up at her. “My bad. I forget that you’re not going to be here for long. It feels like you’ve been here for long enough to acquire an office, at the very least.”
“That I have.”
He returns his attention to the pages before him, it’s mostly corporate jargon, boring phrasing and combinations of numbers and letters that could make each paragraph daunting to the untrained eye. Bentley didn’t take to corporate lingo for the first couple years of his transition from schooling to working for Thurlow Industries — he ended up sleeping with another intern — Celia Murphy, so that she could teach him what he was missing.
Celia eventually left to Paris for a year and then married a colleague of James Thurlow’s, respectfully, they lost contact after that.
“You really analyze everything throughly, don’t you?” Vinessa observes.
He half smiles, keeping his eyes on the page in front of him. “I like to make sure that I can digest everything before I sign something that I don’t understand. It’s a habit I picked up from an old colleague.”
Bentley looks up and notices Vinessa watching him, he can feel his cheeks flush. “I haven’t always been the hi-tech entrepreneur that you see here. I wasn’t the best in school.”
“Look at you now.” Vinessa states, there’s a sparkle in her eye. “You’re doing some amazing work here at T.I., I don’t think there’s a department in this building that hasn’t been improved through your environmental initiatives. I bet your entire family is damned proud of you.”
He would like to take the compliment, however, it feels unwarranted. He thinks about his father’s close friendship with James Thurlow and his aunt, Isabelle’s, influence in helping pave the way for him. Truthfully, there’s a part of Bentley that falls victim to imposter syndrome.
His mind immediately drifts back to the impromptu meeting he had held behind James’s back. It was a hasty decision that he now regrets and feels embarrassed about.
“Is your family not proud of you?” The question lingers between the two of them.
He can sense that he may have spent more time within the memory than he would like. Bentley gazes up at Vinessa and offers her a smile of gratitude. “They tell me every day.”
“Good.” Vinessa offers. “Somebody should.”
Bentley signs the last of the paperwork and turns each page back before closing the packet altogether and handing it back to Vinessa. For the first time he notices her in a different light. The entire time she has been hovering around it felt as if she were an old friend, and yet, a complete mystery.
He can see a familiarity in her eyes, calming.
“Thank you for completing the paperwork so quickly and thoroughly.” Vinessa smiles, then she tilts her head and points back to the scribbles and the checklist on his desk. “You sure do spend a lot of time here in your office.”
“Sometimes it feels like I never leave.” He admits.
“Well, then apologies to your fiancee.”
Bentley feels his blood run cold. “We’re not engaged.”
“Oh.”
“It’s not from the lack of trying.” He admits. “It’s more of an agreement between the two of us. We have a lot of trauma from that sort of commitment.” His mind flashes to finding his previous fiancee Emily Roscoe, in a pool of blood on their kitchen floor. “I don’t think the two of us are wanting to attempt fate like that again. It has given our relationship more room to breathe, ironically.”
“I’m sorry.” Bentley winces, he can feel his eyes water. “I don’t know why I went into such depths. Most people just course correct and move on.” He lets out an awkward chuckle. “Yet, here I am babbling…”
“It’s fine. I completely understand.” Vinessa offers with grace. “I should get these pages back to Emmet as soon as possible—.”
“And get your caffeine fix.”
Vinessa waves a finger his way. “Yes, my caffeine fix. I cannot forget about that.” She pauses for a moment and then offers him another of her captivating smiles. “You take care of yourself Bentley Wilkinson, and maybe, take a break at some point from all of this.”
“Thank you, I will.”
She swooshes out of the room, leaving him to his thoughts.
Now Town; Stone Creek Memorial Hospital
Maybe she should pickup a new hobby, it’s definitely a thought, with the way she has been spending her alone time now that her little family has grown from needing her for everything. Eric spends more time at soccer, or basketball, or whatever sporting practice has caught his attention, Megan is now living her own adult life stumbling around her newest career path. Her husband, Charlie, so secure with the success of the Lakeside Inn. It was only a matter of time before she had fallen back into Adrian Stone’s bed.
Now she is carrying his child.
The elevator doors open up into the familiarity of the maternity wing. Her OB/GYN has had her office here for decades. Dr. Harding actually delivered both of her children. If there was any sort of comfort, at least there is that.
“You okay?” Charlie asks, at her side.
Kirsten had completely forgotten he was there. Lost in her own thoughts, mixed in with the elevator music. She turns to her husband and nods. “I’m fine.”
Kirsten was not fine.
But the emotions were more complicated the more she thought about them, so instead she began to compartmentalize it all. At least she had built a bond with Dr. Harding, who had become like a friend to her after all these years.
A familiar face approaches the two of them, a face that is most definitely not a friend, at least to Kirsten. She feels her body stiffen in anticipation.
“Dizzy, hi,” Charlie replies, he goes to give her a friendly hug and then quickly pulls away, “how have you been?” He asks, oblivious to his wife’s distain for the woman.
Dr. Roberts broadens her lips, twisting them into a smile with glistening white teeth. “I’ve been great! I took a few weeks off recently and spent them getting a tan in Hawaii, it feels like that was a lifetime ago now, however.”
“You look great.” He offers.
Kirsten finds herself clinging to his side, a fake smile fixed on her face. “I’m sure you were missed.”
“I’m just grateful to have a job where I’m able to take time off whenever I am in need.” There’s a lingering weight to the words that feel directed at Kirsten. “But I am back!” She turns her attention back to the clipboard in her hands. “And it looks like the two of you are my next patients.”
The words feel even heavier now. “Excuse me?”
“Oh.” Charlie replies. She can hear him utter a couple more words but they don’t begin to register as her mind begins to vomit every thought, insecurity, and reaction she had bottled up over the last few hours. This is the worst case scenario. There’s a panic within Kirsten as she tries to come up with an excuse not to go through with the check-up but she keeps drawing blanks.
“Where’s Dr. Harding?” Kirsten blurts out.
The question comes out in a higher pitch than what is expected from her, she can tell that the two people in front of her have been startled. “I— I mean, we confirmed an appointment with her.”
Dizzy nods, understandably, “Dr. Harding had a patient go into labor unexpectedly and asked if I would fill-in on a few of her appointments today. I know that it’s such short notice, we can rescheduled if you would like to —.”
“Yes!” Kirsten snips. “We would like to do that.”
Kirsten reminds herself to smother her husband in his sleep in the near future, she adds it to the list. “I know that she is!”
“Then it is settled, let’s just get the exam over with and then we can go back home and finish planning the next steps for our baby.” Charlie says through a grin.
She steps back. There’s no way around this it seems. Kirsten takes a deep breath and reminds herself to control her emotions within the exam room. A million scenarios flashes before her. There’s no way that Dizzy can tell that the baby she is carrying doesn’t belong to her husband. There’s just no way. She’s not that professional. It would take a psychic.
“Sure.” Kirsten confirms.
The singular word is enough to get the ball rolling as they begin the process of moving into a private hospital room. The most important thing now is to not let anything slip. There’s no way that Kirsten can alert Dizzy to the fact that she is carrying Adrian’s child. Especially since Dr. Roberts’ best friend is Gail Schmidt, Adrian’s wife.
------
Luckily for her, they have a consultation with Dr. Bassey in her private office — and without her father, Patrick, in-tow. Gillian turns her body, her son Phoenix is on her hip and his body turns with hers. Phoenix rests his head on her shoulder as they do this. Behind them, her daughter Charlotte —hand clasped in her father’s, makes-up the rear of the group. She refuses to go any faster and definitely refuses to be picked up.
If Charlotte is already this stubborn as a toddler, she hates to imagine her as a teenager. Gillian makes mental note to ask Dr. Bassey for benzos to stash for later.
“You can go ahead and we can catch-up.” Damien offers.
Gillian loves her husband, but she knows where this is going. If she accepts the offer then that means they would more than likely make a detour to the cafeteria or nearest vending machine. She refuses to let her daughter believe that compromise has a winning outcome.
So instead she narrows her eyes at the older, blue-eyed man and shakes her head in disagreement. “Don’t even think about it. We go as a family or not at all.”
“I take it I’m not off the hook yet?”
Gillian scoffs. “Between you and my father, half the nurses in this place have begun to place bets, no doubt. It was humiliating, the display you made measuring each other’s you-know-what’s.” She states, carefully not to say too much around the children.
This garners a chuckle from her husband. “We weren’t measuring.”
“We both know that’s not true.” She turns them down a hallway that is a direct shot to Dr. Bassey’s waiting area.
Gillian turns sharply, her son swinging with her — their weight nearly toppling them. But she steadies herself. “I am not some damsel in distress, Damien. I knew exactly what I was getting myself into. The only reason we weren’t able to gain back control of the company was because they were working alongside that soulless muncher of a woman! But I have a better plan this time, I promise, nobody will get hurt.”
“Like hijacking the Gala?” Damien suggests.
She grovels. “We aren’t hijacking your precious Gala.”
“It’s a Charity Gala, need I remind you.”
“Why not… you’ve already mentioned it about a thousand times already, let’s add another for good measure.” Gillian snips back, she takes a deep breath and then remembers where she is. Her eyes dart in either direction to make sure they haven’t caught the attention of any other nosey nurses. “Let’s just get the consultation over with and we can discuss this later, okay?”
“Sure.”
“Damien Crenshaw.” The voice belongs to a man, one that Gillian hasn’t had much interaction with as of late, but one she knows well. It doesn’t go unnoticed that he greets Damien before he does her, even though he has known her, her entire life.
Damien nods in Dr. Jeremy Joplin’s direction before moving closer and shaking the aging man’s hand. “It’s nice to run into you today.”
“Is it?” Gillian asks, she moves over to Jeremy’s side and greets him with a kiss to the cheek. “I didn’t think you would be roaming these halls like some sort of uncivilized doctor.”
Jeremy huffs in amusement. “I am an uncivilized doctor.”
She rolls her eyes and readjusts her son who sits on her hip with much more weight. “Haven’t you started retirement yet old man? You’ve been here longer than I can remember.”
“You’re so kind, Gillian.” Jeremy chuckles, he turns to Damien. “Your wife, she’s very kind to her elders.”
“Not all of them, you should be so lucky.” The sarcasm is evident. “But I do mean it, I am happy to see you today Dr. Joplin. My assistant was supposed to send you over the details of the charity auction that pertain to the Hospital —.”
Damien puts a hand to Jeremy’s shoulder. “After the endorsement you gave for my second term as Mayor, I think I still owe you Dr. Joplin.”
“Please, call me Jeremy.”
At their side, Gillian grumbles.
“Like a child this one.”
Through this, Jeremy must’ve noticed Phoenix’s arm because he reached into his coat pocket and like a magician produced a lollipop for the tyke. It’s not something that Gillian endorses herself, but she also knows taking the lollipop from her son may erupt in a tantrum and getting him into the hospital room may prove impossible.
So she lets it slide.
Charlotte takes notice of this and grumbles from her spot next to her father. Gillian turns her head and shakes it at the young girl. Who in turn begins to erupt, herself.
“I have another one.”
“No.” Gillian instructs. “Neither of them should be getting a treat right now for what they’ve put me through. But, especially Charlotte since these are the consequences of her actions.”
“I want one!” Charlotte shouts.
Damien crouches down. “We can go get ice cream.”
“Damien.” She can’t believe that he is doing it again.
“They don’t stay young forever.” Jeremy advises. “They grow up so quickly.”
Gillian turns back to face the men. “Here’s to hoping so. They have already given me more freights than I can handle.”
.:On Concrete Shelves:.
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