Center Courtship (4 page)

“I wasn't planning on recording the inside of your home.”

“It's ok, let's do the tour. Brandon will like it, right?”

I nodded and exhaled loudly as I slowly placed everything back on the island with Elsu's help. “I'm only staying because Brandon will like it. Not because I like it. Or you.”

Elsu appeared to glare at me for a moment but then smiled. “You're rather spunky, aren't you?”

“Spunky? Nah, just slightly annoyed.”

He smiled again and held out his hand to me. “What?”

“Your phone, Carl can record the tour.”

“Oh, I thought
I
was recording it.”

“Nope, you're Brandon. You get to play the part of a 12-year old boy.”

“Woo…hoo,” I forced a smile and handed him my phone.

He quickly brought up the camera and handed it to Carl who grumbled at both of us. “This is a waste of my time, Elsu. I was here to get pictures of you and this boy for the webpage. I'm not here to follow
her.
”

“You think this is what
I
want to be doing right now?”

“I'm still not sure,” said Carl.

I rolled my eyes at him and we followed Elsu down a hallway with Millard following cautiously behind us.

Elsu stopped at a wooden door, turned and smiled into the camera. “Brandon, this is your tour, when you come to visit, you
can do it live! This is my theater room.” He opened the large door and motioned for me to enter.

I stepped in and my eyes were forced to adjust quickly to the blackened room. Dark red material covered all four walls and ceiling. The front wall housed a humongous movie screen. The seating was theater style with each row containing four recliners with a love seat recliner in the center. All of the seating was in black leather. The floor was red carpet and the steps were illuminated for easy navigation in the dark. “Wow,” I whispered. The feeling of being in an actual theater even affected the way I spoke.

“This is one of the reasons I bought the house,” he said to my phone in Carl's hand. “It came with everything except…I added these,” he walked over to the wall adjacent to the screen and slid open a secret door revealing shelves of video games of all kinds, and every kind of gaming system you could imagine. “When you and your brother are here, you can pick whatever games you want to play, and we can play together!”

I stepped out of the way as Carl took a sweep of the room using my phone. He pushed a button on the screen and dropped the phone to his side. “So now she knows what's behind your magic door? She's just making a list of all the things she's going to break in and steal.”

“Really?” I asked.

Elsu ignored our conversation, pulled two controllers off the shelf and handed one to me. “Do you know how to play Mario Kart?”

I raised my eyebrows. I was a master at Mario Kart. My hours spent babysitting Brandon and Mitchell had their benefits. “I've played a few times,” I lied.

Elsu motioned for me to sit in the second row. “I find it's easier to play when you're a little further back,” he said.

I took a seat on the loveseat and Elsu sat in the recliner next to me. After several races, we were tied on wins. Carl had started recording on our tie breaking race and in the last second, I beat Elsu out with a cheer. “YES!” I shouted.

“Oh, man! You've played more than a few times,” he said as he leaned back in his chair.

“I'm the aunt to a 12-year old, of course I know what I'm doing,” I said.

“You're a fibber, is what you are!” he laughed as he took my controller. He brushed a finger across the back of my hand and I pulled away quickly. Elsu returned the controllers to the shelf, turned off the screen and shut the cabinet door.

“I didn't lie, I just said I had played a few times. ‘Few' is a term left up to personal interpretation.”

“Few equals three.”

I rolled my eyes and followed him to the room's door. When Elsu opened it, Millard was standing with his back to us. “Keeping us safe from attackers, Milly?” asked Elsu.

“I'd really like to have had a chance to do some background on this woman, sir. Like we did on the parents. You can't be too careful.” His tone was flat and stern. We followed Elsu back down the hallway from which we had come and back into the great room. A woman wearing an apron was now standing in the kitchen with her back to us, working over the stove. The glorious scent of a marinara sauce filled the room.

“This is Magdalena,” he said as we walked towards the set of stairs to the right of the large room. There was another, fancier set of stairs on the opposite side of the room that appeared to lead up to the second and third floors. “Those steps,” he pointed to the grander staircase, “are weird, they go to the second and third floor, but not to the master suite.” He began ascending the stairs and Millard, Carl and I followed him.

At the top, we were on a balcony-like level overlooking the grand room below. The more I looked around the more I felt that this house was very oddly put together. Elsu opened the first door, “this is the office slash library slash leave-me-alone-if-I'm-in-here room,” he smiled.

“Elsu, this is your private office,” warned Millard.

“I'm well aware of which room of my own home I'm in, Milly.”

Millard stood guard outside the room as Carl and I followed Elsu in. Carl scanned the room again with my phone. A clear plexi-glass desk sat in the center of the room with a closed laptop, some pens and a calendar perched neatly on top of it. Behind the desk was a single bookshelf with a scant amount of
books on each shelf. Basketball-themed knick-knacks filled in the gaps. There were a few mismatched wingback chairs sitting facing the desk. I looked at Elsu curiously, but didn't know if it was my place to ask him about the lack of furnishings in the house.

I noticed the large windows on either side of the bookshelf and walked to one to look outside. This would be the same view from the windows in the main room a floor below. The back yard contained a basketball court, a small patio with a grill on it and a fire pit with Adirondack chairs surrounding it. I wasn't overly impressed but didn't want to upset Elsu by stating my opinion. “There's a surprise,” I said as I looked out the window.

“What's that?” he asked as he stepped beside me.

“A basketball court,” I said.

“Never used it, I'll show you why in a minute,” he said as he gently placed his hand on my back to guide me from the window. I stepped away quickly.

I followed Carl out of the office and down a few doors. I looked over the edge of the walkway at the room below as we walked. Magdalena looked up from her work in the kitchen and smiled at me. I smiled back. That poor thing had to work for this man.

We stopped at the next door and Millard stepped forward to state his concern.

“Milly, enough! It's ok,” said Elsu.

“No, it's not. My job is to keep you safe.” He stepped closer to his boss. “This isn't safe,” he said as he nodded his head in my direction.

“I don't
have
to be here,” I said. Millard looked at me as if he were surprised I had heard his comment. “I don't
want
to be here.”

“Elsu, can we get this over with? I need to leave soon,” said Carl as he eyed his Rolex.

Elsu continued to ignore everyone and looked to me. “My mom taught me to never take a woman to my bedroom that I didn't want to marry. If you were Brandon, I would let you come in, but you aren't, so I can only show you the room from out here.” It took me a moment to comprehend what was just said, but then the French doors were opened and I saw six steps in a
narrow hallway that led up into a bright room where a four-poster bed made in white and hunter green stood at the center of attention. Light from unseen windows flooded the room and the place seemed to have a glow all its own. “There's a bathroom, and a walk-in closet. But there is a second door to the closet, so I can take you there.”

He turned and I followed him to another door that opened into a room of every sports fan's fantasies. One whole wall was floor to ceiling shoes. Mostly tennis shoes, but some dress and even some cowboy boots were on display. I had never been a fan of fashion, but I knew from Brandon's obsession, that these tennis shoes were special. Different colors, brands and styles were lit from behind the shelves. In the center of the room was a tufted bench for putting on shoes even though none of these seemed to have been worn.

I walked into the room and followed the line of shoes around a corner where I was confronted by two walls of clothes. A number of basketball jerseys from different teams were hung on a wall for decoration, and two dressers sat beneath them. The other side of the wall had suits and coats. A separate rack stopped me in my tracks. Dresses, blouses, skirts and dress pants were hung neatly in a row. Beneath the women's clothes was a shorter rack of high heels and other women's shoes. I eyed them suspiciously and looked at Elsu.

He rolled his eyes at the clothes, not at me. “Those are Saraya's, for when she stays over. But she never does, never has. She doesn't like it here, so she usually stays at a hotel.”

The mysterious Saraya. “Who is Saraya?” I feigned curiosity.

Elsu's eyebrow rose. “My girlfriend,” he said flatly. For someone who was talking about his girlfriend, I found it hard to make a mental connection between him and the girl in Steve's phone.

“She must be special if she gets a spot in your closet,” I said.

Elsu nodded and turned without saying a word. I must have struck a nerve. Maybe now we were even.

We walked out of the closet and back onto the overlook and back down the stairs. “Well, thank you for the tour, I'm sure Brandon will love seeing the video,” I said.

“Oh, I have one more thing to show you, I mean him,” he said as he looked at Carl.

“Elsu, I have to go. I have a meeting in Massillon with the coaches at eight,” he thrust my phone at me. “I think you should be done with the tour. Mr. Millard and I have both made it clear that we don't feel this is a good idea. She got to see your place. If she
is
Brandon's aunt she can give him the videos. I suggest having some backup here for the next few days just in case.”

“Seriously?” I asked.

“I've been looking forward to this for months. I'm going to do it the way I want to do it. If you two think it's such a horrible idea, turn your heads and walk away. Otherwise, follow me,” said Elsu as he looked to my eyes.

“I'll see you later, Elsu.” Carl stormed away from us and I looked to Elsu.

“He's pissy. Oh well, here…” he took my phone from my hand and gave it to Millard. “You can record, Milly.”

Millard rolled his eyes but followed as we walked along a hallway in the back of the house and stopped in front of a large trophy case. “Millard, can you get a good shot of this?”

“Yes sir,” said Millard flatly as he came up and passed the camera over the various trophies.

“This is my All-American Award from Ohio State,” he said with pride. “Good times, good times,” he said with a smile.

Millard was getting a good enough shot that Brandon would be able to read the labels on all of the trophies. For as grumpy as he was with my presence, his attention to detail was impressive. Thinking we were done with our tour, I started to turn back the way we had come, but Elsu stopped me, “that wasn't what I wanted to show you, come on!” his excitement was almost contagious, so we followed him down the corridor to a large metal door.

Elsu opened the door and inside was none other than a basketball court. While I wasn't sure, I was nearly certain it was regulation size. It was a huge room with high-polished wooden floors and a hoop at either end. The middle of the floor had a monogram of what must have been Elsu's initials EBE. The script seemed rather fancy for being at the center of a basketball
court, but it seemed to fit with the personality I had seen from Elsu so far.

“So this is why you've never played on the court outside,” I said.

“Yep,” said Elsu. “I spend a lot of time in here.”

“I bet.” Bleachers were situated on either side of the court for visitors and a bench for players was on each side too. I knew high schools that didn't have courts this nice. “I have to admit, this is rather impressive,” I said.

“Thanks, it's the only thing I did to the place when I bought it,” he said. “This used to be a garage.”

The mechanic in me shivered at the thought of giving up a garage this size for a basketball court, but to each his own.

“Come on, there's more,” he motioned for us to follow and we walked through a door near one end of the court to find a well-stocked weight and exercise room. “This is where I get my sweat on,” he said with a grin.

I walked into the room. One wall was lined with mirrors, the other housed racks of weights. Treadmills, stair climbers and different equipment that looked more like medieval torture devices than something to help get you in shape, were placed throughout the room. “I have no clue what most of this stuff is,” I said honestly, as I ran my hand along some sort of leather padding.

“Ha, neither do I, to be honest. A lot of the guys use this stuff.”

“So you have a whole room full of exercise equipment that you don't use?” I asked curiously.

“I use some of it, but not all,” he walked to one of the larger pieces. “I think I'm too tall for this one,” he straddled the bench and his knees came up past his stomach.

“Yeah, I think that one's a bit small for you,” I said, I couldn't help but smile.

Elsu stood up and walked to a door at one end of the room. “This is the sauna,” he opened the door and a cloud of steam billowed out of the door. As soon as the mist dissipated I was struck by the sight of an older man sitting on a bench, his towel open in the front leaning back against the wall with his eyes
closed, enjoying his time. He didn't even know we were standing there.