We take Ash’s car to her sister’s—partly because I don’t want to ride my bike there and partly because Ash couldn’t wear the tight, yellow dress that drives me wild. So wild that I fuck her in it twice before we finally get going—the first time ‘cause she looks so good, the second because I still don’t feel great about going.

I feel like I’m being driven to jail as the imposing white structure looms up at the end of the long road.

“There it is,” Ash says.

“I thought you said it was a house?”

“It is.”

“That’s not a house. That’s a mansion.”

Ash laughs, then looks from the road to me.

“Relax,” she says, reaching over to squeeze my thigh. “It’s gonna be fun. Just think about barbecue. We don’t have to stay for the whole thing.”

I shrug and look back at the large entrance, intricate wrought iron gates wide open. We pass through and Ash guides the car down a driveway long and wide enough to land a small passenger jet. She stops in front and before I can open my door, the dark-suited valet has it open for me.

“Good day, sir,” he says as I get out, feeling awkward for not opening my own door, and for being called ‘sir’ for the first time in my life.

“Cheers, buddy,” I say, feeling suddenly like I’m in a movie, surrounded by people acting parts, reading from scripts.

I’m still taking in the giant mansion, as white as bedsheets, when the car spins away and Ash comes up behind me to lock her arm in mine.

“Impressive, huh?” she says.

“Yeah,” I mutter. “Does anyone actually live here?”

Ash laughs and pats my chest.

“Only my sister, her husband, their three kids, and the help.”

“The help?” I say, turning a shocked face to her.

“Yeah. The nanny, the housekeeper. A chef—though he doesn’t actually live there.”

I stare at her, waiting for her nonchalant face to break into a smile and for her to tell me it’s a joke, that she’s just playing on my preconceptions. Except she doesn’t, and I feel some part of me sink even lower.

A guy in a white suit gestures for us to walk around the building toward the back, and I struggle to find some sense of reality in the clusters of well-dressed people around us. This is nothing at all like the laid-back, casual backyard barbecues I’m used to.

The men are all stiff and upright—even the portly ones. There’s not a t-shirt in sight, and I’m glad I listened to Ash when she suggested I wear a button down shirt. They carry themselves with confidence, the arrogance of money and power. Not so much swagger, but a stiff, raised head as if looking down their noses at everything in front of them. Listening to each other’s stories with a deadness behind the eyes, a distant judgment of everything around them. The weirdest thing is how they all look the same, no matter how old or young, like the same man at different stages of his life.

The women are the only color around, and as if compensating for the blandness of the men, they seem to make themselves look larger than life. Ruffles on skirts, wide-brimmed hats, unnecessarily flashy jewelry. Dressed in lurid pinks and greens, voices articulate and assured enough to ring like crystal, flinty, forced laughs that pierce the atmosphere like sirens. Faces made up to look constantly emotive, constantly engaged, even though their eyes scrutinize everything as if it’s happening a million miles away.

“Oh my God. There’s like a million people here,” Ash gasps beside me. I just nod.

I overhear conversations filled with small talk, short and brief, as if people are exchanging headlines, name dropping people I’ve never heard of, words that mean things I don’t know, a secret code as tight and exclusive as street slang.

Unconsciously, I start to roll down my shirt-sleeves.

“What are you doing?” Ash asks, noticing.

I look down at my arm as if surprised myself.

“I’m the only guy here with tattoos…” I say.

“So? Your arms are great. You don’t have to hide.”

I shrug half-heartedly and continue to pull the sleeves down.

“I know…I just don’t want it to be the first thing people talk to me about,” I say, as if I’m even considering entering into a conversation with any of these people.

Finally, we get around the house, stepping onto a gigantic lawn that feels like it’s the size of a football field, grass as perfectly clean and deep as a fine rug. A gigantic stone fountain stands in the middle, a string quartet playing in front of it. There must be a hundred people here, mingling in tight groups, between a couple of long tables filled with food. Waiters in white gliding between them effortlessly, offering giant silver trays to guests.

One approaches us with a tray stacked with wine glasses, and we both take one. Ash smiles at me questioningly.

“Wine?”

“I’ll take whatever they’re handing out right now,” I say, downing the glass like it’s a shot of cheap vodka.

We move into the crowd, and I start thinking about switching to Plan B. Plan A was to find another schmuck who would rather be anywhere but here, another poor guy dragged here by a girlfriend or wife, and then use each other to fend off conversation with anyone else while we get hammered enough to forget the whole thing. But the more I look around me, the more I realize that everyone except me wants to be here. Plan B is to find the grill and be one of the ‘grill guys,’ watching whoever’s turn it is to flip the burgers and sausages. Grill guys don’t need to talk much. Entranced by the meat, hooked by the smell, there’s little room for thinking of anything else. It won’t last, but if I can get to the grill, it’ll be like touching base for now.

Except I don’t see it. All I see are long tables with pastries as detailed and delicate as ornaments, tiny cuts of cheese and meat, sushi and elaborately sculpted vegetables.

“Hey,” I say, getting Ash’s attention from scanning the crowd, “I thought you said this was a barbecue? Where’s the grill?”

“It’s here,” Ash says, looking around, then pointing at a plume of smoke in the distance. “Over there. Grace likes to put the grill far from the guests—you know, so they don’t end up smelling like smoke.”

I look over at the two guys in white chef hats working the grill, so far away it’d take a minute to walk there.

Shit. I didn’t come up with a Plan C.

Suddenly, there’s a scream so shrill it makes me wince, and a stunning woman in a white pantsuit comes barreling toward us like a linebacker for a tackle.

“Ash!” she shouts, arms wide.

“Grace!” Ash screams in reply, as they smash into each other happily, Grace’s wide-brimmed hat flopping about.

Her outfit has a silvery, glittering pattern all across it—to me it looks like the kind of thing a middle-eastern dictator would use for curtains, but then again, this whole place feels like another planet to me.

“I’m so glad you came!” Grace says.

They pull apart, and suddenly Ash’s older sister turns her beaming, political smile to me, offering her hand.

“And you must be…”

Her eyes go straight to my neck, where my fire tattoo is.

“Teo,” I say.

“Teo,” she repeats, looking thoughtful. “Such an odd name…but it sounds sort of familiar.”

Ash glances from me to her, then quickly says, “We went to school together.”

“Oh, I see,” Grace says. “Well, I’m eight years older than my sister, so forgive me if I don’t exactly remember you.”

“It’s fine,” I say, trying my own version of a political smile.

“So what do you do?” Grace asks.

I open my mouth, but stop myself before saying ‘tattoo artist,’ seeing a whole load of awkwardness, of stupid questions, of uncomfortable smiles ahead that way.

“I own a business,” I say, then quickly add, in my best impression of the other clowns here, “Congratulations on three years. Very impressive.”

“Well thank you,” Grace says, satisfied enough to turn back to Ash. “How long have you two been…”

“A few weeks,” Ash says, after glancing at me.

“Well, it’s good to see you out with somebody for once,” Grace says. “Nice to meet you, Teo.”

“And you.”

“I’ve got some great news, Ash,” she goes on, beaming.

“Yeah?”

“Daddy’s here!”

The words drop like an anvil, making me freeze.

“Really?” Ash says, her smile faltering. “That’s…a surprise.”

Grace nods.

“Apparently the bill got pushed back, so he took an early flight home this morning. Come on,” Grace says, stepping away already. “You can introduce your new ‘Teo.’”

Ash looks at me, half a step away already.

“Um,” I say, pointing in the other direction toward the buffet table, “I’d like to get something to eat first, before we start mingling and…you know. I didn’t eat all morning so…”

“Oh,” Grace says, looking both disappointed and confused. “Sure. Well, we’re over here, by the fountain. Just come over when you’re ready.”

I nod. “We will.”

I move toward the buffet, mind racing, chastising myself for the stupidity of even coming here in the first place.

“Teo…Teo,” Ash hisses beside me, as she struggles to catch up. “Is something wrong?”

I stop to grab another wine glass from a passing waiter and look at her.

“It’s nothing. I’m fine,” I say, wishing I could sound a little more convincing than I do. “I just want to ease in, you know? A little more slowly.”

Ash gazes up at me, searching my face for clues.

“You could have just said hello to my dad first. Gotten it out of the way? He doesn’t bite. And I’ll be right by your side. I know we didn’t plan it this way, but…”

I sigh a little and try to keep myself from downing the wine in one gulp again.

“Look, why don’t you go ahead. I’ll just hang back for a few,” I say. “Take all of this in a little. I’ll find you, don’t worry.”

“Teo…I’m not going to go off on my own. We’re here together. I’m not going to just abandon you.”

Another waiter passes, this one with glasses of gin, and I down the wine to quickly grab one.

“Look,” she says, “I know this is a little more…fancy than you expected, probably.”

“Fancy? I feel like I just stumbled into a period drama.”

She looks at me with bemused, almost pleading eyes, and I realize I’m stuck. “An hour, maybe two max, is that too much to ask?”

I nod.

“I can manage that. It’s just, I thought it would be your sister, her family…you know, informal. Now I’m suddenly meeting your dad? I didn’t think I was biting off this much.”

She laughs and hooks an arm in mine.

“My dad’ll love you,” she says. “He’s been nagging me to settle down for years.”

“What if he recognizes me?”

Now she turns that smile into a confused frown.

“Recognize you? Why would he recognize you?”

“Well, we did grow up in the same town, remember?” I say, covering my concern with sarcasm, but it lands flat. She only twists that perplexed frown a little harder. I look at her and realize the full extent of her obliviousness, the full extent of the truths I didn’t tell, building into a wall that’s bearing down on me now.

“My dad barely had time to pay attention to his own kids—let alone every random teenager in town,” she says, as if I’m being silly.

To Ash, her father was just a strict, overprotective patriarch who wouldn’t like a teenage dropout dating her daughter. And now that that’s all in the past, and we’re both grown up, she can’t see the problem anymore. She can’t see how much more there was to it. Why would she? I never told her.

She breaks that frown into another relaxed smile, stroking my arm like I’m a horse she’s trying to stop from bolting.

“We’re not teenagers anymore, Teo, and you’re not a dropout,” she says, mirroring my thoughts back to me. “There’s no need to hide anymore. Trust me, my dad’s not as overbearing as he used to be. He knows I date—and you’re far from the worst guy he’s met, anyway. You’re a business owner, he’ll love that.”

“I don’t know…”

“Just come and say hi. Give him five minutes. And once you do, we can grab something to eat and leave—I’ll say I have a migraine or something.”

“Ok,” I say.

“Ok?” Ash asks, to be sure.

“Ok,” I say, easing up a little. “Let’s go.”

She takes my arm and leads me to the fountain, as if instinctively knowing where her father will be. When we get there the group reshuffles automatically, so it’s just me, Ash, Grace, a guy who looks like every other mid-forties male here, and her father standing with one another. He eyes me with a relaxed smile, but his eyes can’t hide their shock and distaste.

Ash’s father’s a big guy, a little bigger than me, even, though he’s less muscle and more just big. Dyed black hair swept back, a youthful face betrayed by a droopy jowl that makes him look permanently angry. He looks exactly as I remember—like he’s always posing for some expensive portrait he’s planning to hang above the fireplace.

“Hey again,” Ash says to Grace, laughing gently and then looking at her dad. “This is Grace—whom you already met—Jared, Grace’s husband, and…this is Edward, my dad. Guys, this is—”

“Matteo,” Ash’s dad says, offering a hand.

“Mr. Carter,” I say as I take it, shaking while Ash and Grace look confusedly at each other. He doesn’t tell me to call him Edward, not that I would anyway.

“You know him?” Grace asks her father, while I exchange another little shake and a nod with Jared.

“Sure,” Mr. Carter says. “You went to school with my daughter, didn’t you?”

It sounds like an accusation.

“Yes I did,” I say, firmly.

“My daughter’s told me nothing about you. How long have you two been together?” he says, darting a suspicious glance at Ash, and I can almost hear him leaving out the word ‘again.’

“A few weeks,” an unperturbed Ash replies, happily clutching my arm and pressing herself against my side. “We bumped into each other again—really funny coincidence.”

“I’ll bet it was,” her father says, still staring daggers at me.

There’s a soft silence for a moment, probably caused by the fact that Ash’s father and I are staring at each other like cowboys at the OK Corral, suddenly aware of the guns at their sides.

“So…” Grace interjects, “Teo, you mentioned that you owned a—”

“Do you like whiskey?” her father interrupts Grace to ask me, as if not even hearing his daughter.

I shrug nonchalantly.

“Absolutely.”

“Good,” he says, stepping forward. “I brought a single malt I wanted to share. Why don’t you join me in the study.”

It’s a command, not an invitation, and I nod. He steps away, and I move to follow him. Jared makes a move too but is stopped by Ash’s dad gripping his shoulder.

“Not you, Jared. Just me and the new boy—talk man to man,” he says, slapping me a bit too hard on the back before moving away to stride toward the house.

I swap a quick glance with Ash, who’s making an apologetic face, and then take a deep breath and follow. I’m never one to back down from a challenge, and I might as well get this over with as long as I’m here anyway.

We step inside the house, into an echoing, marble-floored hallway too big for anything but a rock concert, even the groups of guests and waiters moving around not enough to make it feel small. Ash’s father leads me off to a closed door and I step through, slightly surprised at how the old man can treat Grace and Jared’s home like his own—then realizing that he probably bought it for them.

“Shut the door,” he says, moving to an old mahogany cabinet between the large windows with drawn curtains.

I oblige, reminded once again that I’m in completely foreign territory. The room is cast in dark, aged wood. Bookshelves line the walls all the way up to high ceilings, high enough to require a ladder. Bear rug, oversized desk, the smell of a million forgotten cigars, a landscape painting that makes nature look as tamed and ordered as the uniform of the soldiers in it. I’m a long way from Ginger slapping his belly and belching Lynyrd Skynyrd songs.

“I thought you left,” he says, putting the cap back on the bottle.

“I did. Sir.”

He turns in my direction and eyes me for an uncomfortably long beat. “And yet here you are.”

I don’t break eye contact. “Here I am.”

He slowly comes close, as if he thinks I’m about to run, and then hands me a whiskey glass, though I can tell it pains him to make even this small friendly gesture toward me.

I take a slow sip of the drink.

“What do you think?” he says.

“A little too smooth for me.”

He laughs, a low, mean cackle.

“That’s four hundred dollar scotch.”

“You must know it’s not that good either, if you have to tell me the price.”

His smile turns meaner, dismissive, and he turns away to move behind the large desk. He flips a box open and pulls out a cigar, offering me one. I shake my head and he lights it as he stands behind the desk, me standing in the middle of the room like I was brought here to be judged.

He waves the flame away from the match and looks at me like I’m a stain, cruel eyes burrowing their way into me.

“So is this your idea of revenge?” he says. “Did you plan this day for all those years? That you’d come into one of my family’s houses on a day of joy, and stink the place up like some unflushable piece of shit?”

I sip a little more of the whiskey, if only to ease the tension caused by being in his presence without the option of putting my hands around his neck.

“I’m not a kid anymore,” I say, after enough time has passed to let his anger fester. “You can’t scare me with the ‘power broker’ routine. You did it once, and it was the biggest mistake I ever made.”

“Mistake?” he says, poking his head forward, then turning down to gaze at the end of his cigar. “You know, I wonder if it was a mistake myself, sometimes. Then again, you’d probably have knocked her up eventually—and then we’d really have a problem.”

I down the rest of the whiskey and slam the empty glass hard on the desk.

“Thanks for the drink,” I say. “I should really get going, though—I hate to keep Ash waiting.”

I walk back to the door but stop halfway when he says, “I kept tabs on you, you know.” My blood runs cold. I turn back around. “After you left. Wanted to make sure you wouldn’t come back like this.” He turns his eyes up at the ceiling. “Last I heard you were involved in some shady business down in Florida. Had to leave the country. Funny—how you always end up having to leave things behind, how you always run away from your problems, isn’t it?”

“Don’t get your hopes up,” I say. “This time I’m staying. This time I’m not letting Ash go.”

That laugh again, harder, louder, uglier.

“Oh I don’t doubt it! You must feel like you’ve hit the jackpot with her, am I right? Certainly a cut above the usual low-life trash that you must feel comfortable among, yes?” He wags his finger at me as he steps around the desk. “The question you need to ask yourself, Teo, is how long until Ash gets bored of you? How long until she finds out who you really are?”

“Ash knows all about my past,” I shoot back through gritted teeth.

He shrugs, gestures out at the curtained windows. “You’ve seen all this, haven’t you? There isn’t a person on these grounds who isn’t incredibly successful at what they do. Politics, entertainment, finance—it’s all there, out there on the lawn. People who’ve gone to the finest institutions, who make the decisions that keep the world ticking over. Fine people.

“And then there’s you,” he says, looking me up and down as he shakes his head, “with your neck tattoos and your caveman build. Your lack of basic politeness and appreciation for anything fine. A dropout. Trailer trash. Look, I don’t blame you, Teo. You were fucked from the start—growing up with that criminal of a father, what else could you be? But you’ve got to at least know your place—and it isn’t here. It isn’t with Ash. You can’t do anything but bring her down.”

Now I’m the one laughing at how ridiculous this all is.

“You don’t even know your own daughter,” I say, starting to look at him with a strange sense of pity at his cluelessness.

“Oh yes I do,” he says, with that smug self-assuredness that makes me want to slap him humble. “I know exactly what she’s doing with you. See, you’re a cliché, Teo. A ‘rough and ready bad boy.’ Nothing but a little adventure for her, a rebellious ‘walk on the wild side.’ A little vacation from the pressures of the responsibility and demands of the kind of life she’s meant to lead. A taboo, a way to get back at me. Let me guess, you still ride that motorcycle, right? See, that’s what my mistake was, Teo. I should have let her get you out of her system. It would have saved all of us a lot of trouble.

“Ask yourself, Teo, why would she want to be with you when there are men right here with fantastic careers, who know how to present themselves, who know how to treat a girl from a good background? Then ask yourself, how long until she gets bored, until she wants more than you’re capable of giving her? You’re just a novelty.”

I let the silence linger, wondering if it’s even worth the reply. Then, half knowing it’s a lost cause, I say, “You should really give your daughter a little more credit. Maybe try actually listening to her once in a while. Maybe you’d understand why she rejected all of your ‘fine’ suggestions up until this point and decided to go her own way.”

That riles him up, and this time he starts poking his cigar at me as he speaks.

“You think Ash would be fucking around on some third-rate gossip show if she didn’t have me? If she wasn’t sure that when it all goes to shit and she’s had her fun, daddy will swoop in to pick up the pieces? What can you give my daughter? Apart from a sense of danger and excitement?”

Through gritted teeth I say, “I will give Ash whatever she wants.”

“Oh, please! Tell me, what do you do now? Are you still driving trucks? Is that what brought you back to L.A., wheedling your way back into Ash’s life?”

“I own my own tattoo shop,” I say, angry at myself for even feeling that I need to justify myself.

He looks at me for a second, then breaks into the loudest, nastiest laugh yet. Stopping to say, “Tattoo shop?” and laugh even harder at the words. I say nothing, just stare him down.

“God! Are you serious? A tattoo shop? Well, I suppose there are plenty of morons like you, so there must be some money in it.”

“I make good money doing something I love. So does Ash. If you weren’t such a self-important, control freak excuse for a father you might understand.”

He straightens up a little, smirk gone and replaced by a sneer.

“I want to know something: Where do you see yourself in ten years, huh?” He lets the question hang there just long enough to confirm that I don’t have a ready answer. “You don’t know, do you? You don’t think that far ahead at all—you never have, and never will. As far as you’re concerned, you could be down and out in Alabama again, or hiding in the mountains of Colombia, right? Do you have plans to expand your business? Of course not.

“I’ll bet you hire people you regard as your ‘friends,’ and it’s all chummy-chummy. And I’d also wager that your little enterprise will be dead and gone in five years.” He leans close so that I can smell the evil on his breath. “What happens when your business fails, Teo? What if…let’s say…something should happen to it? A little fire, perhaps? A lost business license, a small mix-up with the tax board? Think you could overcome that? Or would you be back on an illegal construction crew? And who’s gonna take care of Ash if I cut her off?”

The restraint I’ve been maintaining for this long snaps hard and fast. I step forward, close enough to see every wrinkle in his face, close enough for him to see the anger in my eyes.

“Fuck you,” I snarl. “And don’t you ever threaten Ash or my business again.”

He squirms a little, backing up against the bookcase, but beneath the bravado of his hard, disgusted face I can sense his fear.

“You know I’m right, Teo,” he says, a little quiver in his voice, but his arrogance too pervasive to stop himself. “That’s why you’re angry. You got lucky, with her, with whatever this business is. But the truth is, when all’s said and done, you can’t give Ash anything. You’re a parasite, a loser destined for a correctional facility—just like your father. You stay with her, she’ll end up with nothing. From me or from you, you lowlife piece of—”

I grab his shirt and pull my fist back, breath steaming from my nostrils, body poised and ready to sink my anger into his skull.

“That’s it!” he says, his voice desperate once again, grasping at words as if to save himself. His eyes focus on my fist with heavy panic. “Do it. Hit me! Show everyone who you really are. Show Ash the truth.”

My heart pounds, every fiber of my being arguing against rationality, urging me to hit him. I close my eyes, and only then can I pull back, let him go and turn around to walk away.

That’s when I see Ash standing there. Right in the doorway. Her hands over her mouth, her eyes large, deep brown pools of shock.

“Ash,” I say, suddenly feeling like I’m running out of air. How much of that did she hear?

I step toward her and she backs away as if frightened. Hands going in front of her, showing me her palms. My heart breaks as with every step I take, Ash flinches back.

“Don’t come near me!” she says, looking at me like I’m some kind of monster.

“Ash! Listen! If you’d heard what he said just a minute ago you’d understand! He was threatening my business! Threatening us!”

“Stay away from me, please,” Ash says, through hitched breath, tears welling up in her eyes.

“Listen to her, Teo,” her father says. I try to stop myself from gritting my teeth and flashing hatred at his voice, but my emotions are too close to the skin now.

“He’s the reason we’re not together, Ash! It’s because of him! The thing that—”

“Just go!” Ash screams suddenly, loud enough to be heard throughout the house, to bring others peeking in beyond the open door.

The hurt and distress in her voice is too unbearable. It hits me too deep to even try and explain. I don’t ever want to be the man who makes her sound like that—and if that means leaving her like she’s asking me to, I’ll do it. It wouldn’t be the first time.

“I’m going,” I say, stepping toward the door.

I step outside and push through the crowd that’s gathered, glancing back despite myself one more time. Ash is crying into her father’s chest, his arm wrapped protectively around her. His eyes look straight at me, his gaze hard and victorious. Again.