“A call came in. May I forward it to you?”
“Of course.” I’d quit asking the receptionist who was calling months ago. Mednex had a main line, but as we each had company cell phones, the CEO hadn’t put landline phones on our desks. She simply forwarded calls.
“Caroline Payne,” I announced at the click.
“Caroline? It’s Mat Hammond. I don’t know if you remember me from college, but—”
“Mat? Of course.” I felt myself straighten. “I remember you.”
Three simple words accompanied a complex picture. Mat Hammond. The Greek boy with the electric smile and the soft, dark eyes. Funny. Determined. Brilliant. Challenging . . . A close friend. Somehow I’d forgotten that last part, and it struck me with an odd note of longing.
“I wondered . . . I mean, I thought you might not.” He paused.
I waited, unsure how to step into the silence that followed his comment.
When it tipped toward uncomfortable, he rushed to fill it. “I’m working on a project for the Atlantic, and I need to ask you a few questions.”
“Oh. I’m sorry.” Oddly disappointed, I reached for a pen. Fielding questions about our company’s new immunotherapy drug was above my pay grade. “You need Anika Patel, but she’s unavailable today. Let me take your number and I’ll have her call you.”
“It’s not about your company; it’s about you. Well, about Caroline Waite.”
“Who?” Surprise arced my voice. I recognized the name, but it could have no meaning to Mat or anyone outside my family.
“Your great-aunt? Twin sister to your grandmother, Margaret Waite Payne?”
“I know who my grandmother was, but why are you calling about her sister?”
“It might be easier if we met in person . . . I’m in the lobby.”
“What?” I stood and looked over the cubical partitions as if, eight floors up, I’d somehow see Mat’s lanky frame leaning against a doorjamb.
“I didn’t even know we were both in Boston until earlier this week,” he continued. “Please . . . this is no good over the phone and email is no better. It won’t take long.”
I dropped to my seat. “I’ll be down in a minute.”
Caroline Waite. That was a name I hadn’t heard in years—twenty years, to be exact. I’d been named after my great-aunt. But once I’d learned that she died in childhood from polio, I’d lost interest in her. Even at a young age, I thought it felt wrong to be named after someone best known for dying young.
Mat Hammond was another name I hadn’t heard in years—six, to be exact. He was the first boy I met on campus my freshman year. We bumped into each other entering the dorm. He, buried beneath a box of books. Me, swamped by a down comforter. We became friends, good friends—at least from his perspective. I’d always hoped . . .
I stepped off the elevator and scanned the lobby. Mat was momentarily forgotten as my chest filled with the same expansive feeling I got every time I stepped within it. I loved our building’s lobby. My father always said it didn’t matter where you lived or in what type of building you worked, but I disagreed. Buildings bore personalities. They held our secrets and carried the weight of our lives, our families, our work, and our dreams. The grandeur and significance of Mednex’s lobby had become symbolic of how I viewed Mednex’s work and my place within it—something small participating in something grand.
Ours was the newest company fighting one of humanity’s worst foes—cancer—with a groundbreaking protocol that supercharged the body’s cells as our latest weapon. There was something so fundamental and old school, yet cutting edge, about the idea that we could equip our bodies to withstand and conquer this most invasive assault.
Our building’s lobby embodied that synergy. Its 1920s art deco designs and lines, the pink marble-patterned floor and the dark wood and gold filigreed interior storefronts of the shops circling it gave it a dignity and gravitas missing from steel, glass, and concrete. It exuded history, stability, and solidity, while offering the latest amenities, including a security system that worked on a biometric scan . . . and the best coffee shop around.
It was next to this door I found Mat. He studied me rather than greeted me. I had anticipated a warm smile but banished the thought before my face reflected it. This was business. Friendship, it seemed, had died long ago.
Physically he looked the same, other than the slight curl to his hair around his ears. He certainly still had the same straight nose and jawline most women would die for—or pay thousands to obtain—and I knew full well his scruffy three-day shadow hid an equally chiseled chin.
That was one thing I hadn’t inherited from my grandmother—twin sister to the Caroline in question—her square jaw. With her dark hair, bright blue eyes, and that gorgeous Grace Kelly jaw, I saw her as the most beautiful woman in the world.
The saddest too.
As I crossed the lobby, Mat—looking every bit the academic I always suspected he’d be—pushed off the wall and met me midway. We stalled, side-shifted, then awkwardly stepped into a semi-hug and back-pat while our hands got stuck between us mid-handshake.
“You haven’t—”
“Wow. It’s been a lo—”
We stopped and started and sputtered to another stop. I opened my mouth to try again, but he stepped back and gestured first to my hand then to the coffee shop. “Your hand is freezing . . . Can I buy you a coffee?”
I nodded and rubbed my hands together, feeling both embarrassed and exposed. Within a few steps and no words, we stood in line. Two black drips later, we sat across from each other tucked next to a window.
“Okay . . . Where to begin.” He circled his cup with both hands.
It wasn’t a question, so I didn’t try to answer. It wasn’t congenial, so I didn’t start a round of “What have you been up to lately?” I simply sat and waited.
“I’m an adjunct instructor at BC, but I have a side job that, in the craziest of small world ways, leads me to you.”
He scrunched his nose. “That didn’t help . . . The humanities don’t pay much without tenure, so on the side I do research for families. I trace lineage, make albums, digital programs, anything they want to give Grandma for Christmas. It usually starts with 23andMe or something, and the wife discovers she’s German or English, and wouldn’t royalty be fun? Then a friend tells them about me because all these people seem to know each other, and I’ve been doing this for years. So I get hired to do a deep dive on the family and present their history with a big bright bow.”
Mat sucked in a gulp of air, as he hadn’t drawn a breath since “I’m an adjunct . . . ,” and I choked on my coffee. “Someone in my family hired you? How? Who?”
There was no way that could be true.
“No.” Mat watched as I swiped at the table between us with my napkin. “Your family name came up in my current project and . . . it’s an interesting story that, if I do it right, the Atlantic wants for a feature article. Not one about the Arnim family, who hired me, but about yours.”