Triangles, Part Twenty

Lee winced as he lifted his duffel bag off the seat of his truck. The session with his one time martial arts instructor which had quickly escalated from a simple sparring match into an all out fight had left him with a few bruises and aches in addition to the pulled shoulder he’d gotten from that particularly well executed throw. A smirk replaced the wince, though, as he recalled why he'd been vulnerable enough for D.J. to maneuver him into that especially effective throw. To him, it was well worth the strained limb to have so thoroughly gotten the upper hand on his friend.

Lee shook his head as he walked gingerly up the three steps to his porch. "Really, that was a great way to end the evening," he informed the stone gargoyle that guarded his front door. The gargoyle grinned a toothy agreement, keeping his eyes as always on the approach to the large stone and timber A-framed house. The creature, a winged beast half lion and half monkey, had been a housewarming gift from his set builder that somehow made Lee feel just a little bit safer in his large home.

Lee gave the gargoyle a scratch on its stone head before he moved on to the front door. There, he lifted a very tired knee and pressed it against the door frame to support his duffel bag while he juggled his key clip one handed to retrieve the needed key from the assortment he kept there. He finally found the one he was looking for and was about to give his wrist a flip to clear the others away from it when the opening lines from Tears For Fears’ “Shout” suddenly emanated from his hip.

With a start, he reached for his cell to silence the loud song, forgetting for the moment that his shoulder was injured. The pain that shot down his back halted the movement, but also caused him to twitch away from the doorframe which in turn caused the duffel bag to start sliding off his leg. Lee snatched the phone from his hip and flipped it open. However, the motion caused his key clip to tangle in the handles of the sliding duffel bag and, in trying to catch them he dropped the phone.

“Son of a whore!” Lee swore as everything landed on the porch. “Shit, shit, shit,” he continued to swear, as he stared at his belongings on the floor. His shoulder and back now ached almost worse than they had when he’d first landed on the mat, and now he had to lean down and pick all his stuff up.

“Holy fucking gods,” he hissed as the blood rushed to his aching upper body when he reached down to retrieve the phone that had somehow landed open with the call still connected.

Though the ring tone itself told him the caller was someone he didn’t have in his cell’s phone book, he still glanced at the number. There were a few folks who called infrequently enough to not be in the address book but regularly enough that he recognized their number when he saw it. This time, though, the number was completely unfamiliar but undoubtedly out of Pittsburgh.

Maybe? Lee’s heart rate doubled, this time in hope and, perhaps, a little fear as he lifted the phone to his ear. “Hello?” he squeaked. When there was no response, Lee pulled the phone back and checked the display. The call was still connected.

“Hello?” he asked again, this time sounding more normal. Ya done scared her away with all that cursing is what, he silently berated himself.

“Umm,” an uncertain, young male voice finally replied. “Mr. Rorrison?” Lee sighed as disappointment and relief washed over him at the sound of the unfamiliar voice. Suddenly, he felt more exhausted than he had from the long sparring session.

“Yeah?”

“Oh. Hey,” the young man answered. “I wasn’t sure I got the right number.” Lee waited. This was certainly not the conversation he was hoping to have tonight. After a pause, the boy continued, “This is Rollin.”

Lee tipped his head back to regard the underside of the roof over his porch as he cast back into his memory to place a face with the name. The intern, that part of his mind that most reminded him of his mother helpfully supplied in the same instant that the boy inquired, “Hello?”

“Yeah,” Lee answered as he carefully crouched down to retrieve his keys. “I’m here.” With the phone propped against his good shoulder, Lee snagged the clip and brought it toward his face to jingle the collection. “Sorry,” he continued, “I just got home and was trying to find my keys.”

“Oh.”

“So, what can I do for you, Rollin? Is everything alright?”

“Uh, yeah,” the boy answered. “It’s all good.”

“Well, good.” With the phone still tucked against his shoulder, Lee unlocked the front door and, using his toe, pushed his duffel bag inside. He shuffled closely behind the bag and let the door close quietly behind him.

“I was just calling about next week. I wanted to make sure it was still okay.”

“Next week…” Lee repeated, bewildered. Leaving the bag by the front door, Lee headed for his den in the back corner of his house.

“Yeah,” Rollin replied. Lee remained silent, trying to figure out what he’d forgotten as he settled gingerly onto his desk chair. Rollin finally helpfully offered, “Spring Break.”

“Oh! Oh, right.” Lee rolled his eyes at himself. Moron. “You’re going home, right?”

“Not exactly,” was Rollin’s droll reply.

“Oh. Umm…” Lee frowned. It was like his brain was in molasses worse than it had been after the incident on the set.

“I’m taking my sister out to spend some time with our Dad in California,” he supplied. Then, in a quieter voice, he added, “We try to go home as little as possible.”

Lee’s brow lifted. “Problems?”

“Naw. Mom’s just not real stable. Y’know? It’s easier to stay away from her if we can.”

“Gotcha.” The blinking light on Lee’s desk phone caught his eye and his frown deepened. “Well,” he continued, distracted, “I don’t have a problem with you going.”

The intern’s relief was more than evident as he answered, “Okay, cool. I wanted to make sure it wasn’t going to affect my eval or anything. I really need this grade.”

“Oh, that.” Lee grimaced at himself. Duh. Is your brain on hiatus tonight? “No, it’s no problem. Pitt already accounts for that when they give me the availability dates for my interns.”

“Great.” There was a pause, then Rollin continued, “I wanted to check before I left, but you were in meetings all day and today was my last day before Break.”

“Right. Well, don’t worry about work for a few days and have a safe trip to California.”

“Great! Thanks.”

“No problem.”

“Okay, bye.”

“Bye.” Lee closed his cell and stared a moment at the blinking message light on his desk phone. He couldn’t decide whether to check it tonight or let it sit until morning. “Nah,” he finally muttered to the empty room as he pushed up out of the chair. “If it was earth shatteringly important, they woulda called the cell.”

With that decided, he left the den. Lee paused long enough to snag his duffel bag from where he had left it by the front door before heading up the stairs to his loft bedroom. Halfway up the steps, the chorus to Madonna’s old song, “Lucky Star,” began to float up from his hip.

~Continued in [an error occurred while processing this directive] Part Twenty-One~
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