Once again, I make a big show of picking one up. “Well?” I challenge, waiting. There’s no way I’m going to let him stand there and watch me do all the work.
He glowers off into the distance with a stubborn, pinched expression. A gust of wind whips his hair from his forehead, and he holds out long enough that it flops right back, all mussed and agitated. With a grunting breath, he stomps over and takes a scraper, and even though he’s holding it the wrong way—like a serial killer stalking someone with a knife—I’m appeased enough to get started.
My scraper makes moderately difficult work of the loose paint and dirt splashed up during the last hard rain. For a good five minutes, there’s nothing but the scratchy sounds of us working and the shuffle of the wind in the grass.
Suddenly, Hamilton yelps in pain.
“What?” I ask.
He snaps, “Nothing.”
I glance up from where I’m squatting, scraping the paint off the bottom of the ‘P’, and see a trail of blood dripping down his finger. That doesn’t stop him, although it should. He’s completely useless with the tool, still holding it down-fist and allowing his knuckles to bang against the concrete wall. I spend a long-suffering two minutes weighing the pros and cons of coaching him through this.
Before I can even come to a decision, he shouts again.
“Dammit! This fucking thing doesn’t work!” He kicks the wall then hurls the tool halfway across the parking lot. His tantrum doesn’t end there. He lunges for the box, lifting it over his head and tossing it down the sidewalk. Supplies bounce and scatter everywhere.
“Dude!” I shout, “Are you an actual toddler? What the hell are you doing?”
Rollers spin down the slight incline headed down toward the parking lot, while the lid off a can of turpentine pops off, and the fluid gushes all over the ground. Hamilton does nothing to stop this of course, just curses and kicks the wall again. I race over to keep the environmental damage to a minimum.
“A little help would sure be nice,” I snap, trying to sop up the turpentine with a bunch of rags. He just nurses his finger, frowning down at it with an expression so intense, I almost fear for the fate of my own scraper. I mutter, “Or not. Whatever. I’ve got it, you gigantic baby.”
I do the best I can at mopping up the liquid, but I don’t have nearly enough rags for such a task and my hands smell terrible. I shake my head. “Seriously, Bates, have you ever done any kind of hard work? Did those seven minutes of back-breaking scraping actually bring you to ruin?”
All that crazy-eyed focus shifts from his finger to me. “I’ve done hard work before, Adams. Two summers ago, I had to clean my father’s entire fucking yacht after Heston and I threw a party.”
I stare at him blankly. “Let me get this straight.
Your one notable moment of manual labor was cleaning a yacht. With Heston Wilcox.”
“What?” he asks, as if there was nothing ridiculous about that entire summation.
“You really do have a negative sum of self-awareness, don’t you?”
His lips twitch in a sneer. “And what exactly have you done?”
“Well for starters, at my house we all have chores. That’s what happens when you have a lot of kids and no maid—”
“Bullshit!” He has a smug gleam to his eye. “I know you have a nanny. I’ve seen her.”
I narrow my eyes. Has he been watching me? How does he know about Debbie?
“I don’t deny that we have a nanny. My parents both work. They’ve had five kids. Of course, they need help. But even so, it’s not like we have a staff or anything.”
“So you sort your own laundry. How heroic.” He turns to address a fake crowd. “Get a load of Mother Theresa over here! She probably washed a fork once.”
“Two years ago,” I begin, teeth grinding, “while you were throwing parties on your yacht, my whole family went to Puerto Rico on a humanitarian project to help clean up after the hurricane.” I hurl the wet rags into the box and start picking up the other supplies scattered all over. “We helped rebuild a school for a community ravaged by the storm. We brought medical supplies and books for the children.”
He stares at me for a moment, eyes hard and unreadable. The lines of his face are a dichotomy of harsh and beautiful. The lure of the Devil. His long lashes flutter when he rolls his eyes. “This is why people hate you, you know.”
“What?” I ask, taken aback. “Why?”
“Because of shit like that.” He gestures to the air between us. “That doesn’t make you better than anyone else.”
“I never said it did!”
He shrugs. “You sure act like it.”