Chapter Twenty-Four

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Dominic

 

 

 

As I entered my mother’s house for the first time in over a year, so many things hit me all at once. The biggest was that absolutely nothing had changed, and that was comforting in ways I hadn’t expected. Even as my world was growing and shifting and turning into something I barely even recognized, my home had remained the same. The way it had always been. Even the furniture was the same. No one ever bought new shit or thought to rearrange. No one did more than a quick cleaning here and there, so there was always a mess. Mail ads that had fallen to the floor, Cory’s toys strung out everywhere, the kitchen sink piled high with dishes no one wanted to wash. This was my home, and for a second there, I honestly couldn’t remember why I’d once been so desperate to leave. Maybe it was just that everything had become way too complicated, but I sank into the familiarity of home with weary gratitude.

I wasn’t going to think about anything while I was there. Work, getting a new place, earning a promotion I definitely didn’t deserve, any of it. And of course at the top of the list was Leah, but that one proved kind of difficult. I thought of her every time my phone buzzed with a text. Every time my mom or her boyfriend asked about my job. Every time I passed by a tattoo place, or a pizza place, or really, any place. She was right there at the surface pretty much all of the time, and there was no getting her out.

The biggest thing I couldn’t get out, no matter how hard I tried, was the look on her face the last time I’d seen her. All the pain and disappointment she didn’t even try to hide, and the way it had been directly caused by me. Because I was an idiot who said all the wrong things, and pushed away anything that looked real because I’d learned early on that people were just temporary imprints on our lives. Getting attached to anyone was stupid because you’d only be left weak and open to pain once they were gone. Keeping my emotions and expectations in check had always felt like strength to me, but now strength was starting to look like something else: Leah, staring me dead in the eye as she laid herself open to me. Even as I’d rejected it, because that was my very nature, she’d held herself tall and walked out. She’d been fearless and open and completely absent of any bullshit, the way she always was, while I’d been left short of breath and reeling, and feeling like the biggest piece of shit in history.

Not think about it? Yeah, right.

But at least I had some distraction now that I was home. Cory followed me everywhere, sat right next to me on the couch and held my hand when we went outside. Thinking the world of me when no one else did. She talked constantly, and while she’d been doing that since she first started learning words, I was sort of amazed at how her babble was starting to take on an actual narrative. I was beginning to get glimpses of the person she would grow up to be, and it was pretty damn amazing.

I made the rounds and saw some of my old friends, including Travis, the guy I’d originally moved to New York with. He was an electrician now and lived with his wife and kids in one of those old neighborhoods that had been fixed up just enough to raise the property values through the roof. He seemed happy there, though. Once, as we were sitting out back having a beer, I asked him if he ever regretted not staying in New York.

“I miss it out there sometimes,” he said. “But I’ve never regretted moving back. My home’s here, always will be. Lucy’s here. Honestly I shoulda never left. It took her like two years to get over that.”

Lucy was his high school girlfriend, now wife, and it was during one of their many breaks that he’d decided to move to New York. When he moved back to Chicago a year later, I’d thought he was making a huge mistake, and maybe for some people it would have been. But he was happy with his life here. He loved Lucy and their kids. I’d always sort of pictured him out here hating his life because that’s how I would have felt in his shoes. But he had this calm sort of contentment that made me realize how wrong I’d been. His life was here. The decision to come back had been the right one, the only one.

Even as I settled into a relaxed routine in Chicago, enjoying the feeling of having nothing to do and nowhere to go, I started to feel antsy, like a race car waiting for the gun to go off. One of the last nights of my visit, I was sitting on the couch with Cory snuggled up next to me and Luke stretched out at the other end.

“I wish you could stay here.” This was from Cory, not Luke. Obviously.

“I’ll keep in touch. We’ll talk on the phone and Face Time, alright?”

“Okay,” she said with that drawn out, deeply disappointed tone she used to make you feel guilty. “Do you still have a roommate?”

That threw me off for a second, until I remembered I’d mentioned not having room for her to visit because of my roommate. “Yeah. I might be moving soon, though.”

“Will you have a roommate there?”

“I’m not sure yet.” It depended on how the job situation looked a couple weeks down the road.

“I hope you don’t cause I want to come stay with you. Lucas got to. It’s not fair.”

“I know. Someday you will. I promise.”

“Why you moving?” Luke finally took his attention away from the TV long enough to say something.

“My roommate’s getting married, and they’re keeping the apartment. I still have some time before I have to find a new place, though.” This was on the long list of things I did not want to think about while I was on vacation.

“You still talking to that girl?”

Startled, I glanced over at him. “What girl?”

“The one you were texting that night. I don’t know why you’re so fuckin’ secretive about it. You always do that.”

“I’m not exactly secretive,” I said with a frown. I sort of was, though. I didn’t talk about stuff like that, not to Luke. Not to anyone, really. I guess it went back to my perceived feelings of weakness, in letting my guard down and letting people in on the fact that I was human. In some defiance of my own self, I said, “I was seeing her. Sort of. But it’s over.”

“You fuck it up?”

Annoyed, I said, “Could you watch your mouth around Cory?”

“Lucas and Momma say the f-word all the time,” Cory said, like she was patiently explaining a basic fact of life. Luke laughed in response, and I shot him a glare.

“Yes,” I bit out. “I fucked it up. That’s what I do, alright?”

“That’s not what you do,” Luke countered, like he thought the idea was ridiculous. “You’re the anti-fuck up. With your fancy as fuck job and tricked out mobster car. You probably just thought you were too good for her like you do everyone.”

“When have I ever acted like I’m too good for you?”

“Pretty much like always. That’s what you do. You look down on everyone who doesn’t want your shitty life, and everyone who’s not exactly like you.”

“That’s in your head. I don’t look down on anyone. If anything, it’s the other way around.” I could still hear Leah’s accusation ringing sharp in my ears. You don’t think enough of yourself, and you don’t think enough of me. Maybe it went both ways. Maybe I was just a cynical bastard all around. “Look. I promise I don’t look down on you. I want you to achieve things because you’re my brother and I love you. I’ve seen too many people waste their entire lives in this neighborhood, and I don’t want that for you. You don’t have to have my life. I just want you to have something more than hanging out on the corner with Kevin Wanek, smoking weed and acting like you don’t care about anything.”

“He cares about me,” Cory said, in a way that made it clear she’d really only caught the last part of all that and had responded automatically. But, okay, she had a point.

“Yeah. I know he does.”

“See?” Luke said with a raise of his eyebrows. “Maybe Cory knows me better than you do.”

“Probably true,” I conceded, leaning back against the couch, drained of all desire to argue.

“In fact, maybe you don’t actually know half of what you think you do.”

“Also probably true.”

“He does, too! He knows a lot, Lucas.”

I couldn’t help but smile at my sister, amused at the way she came to my defense even though I didn’t really deserve it. But I guess that’s just what family did.

“He knows my ass,” Luke said.

I shook my head. “That doesn’t even make sense. Work on your insult game, Luke.”

“Lucas says bad words all the time,” Cory put in. “I don’t, though. I would say ‘butt’. Not the a-word.”

“Good. Please don’t repeat anything your brother says.”

“What if he says something nice?”

“Just between you and me, that’s probably not going to happen.” I smirked when Luke flipped me off over Cory’s head, and I returned the gesture. It was weird but I felt lighter than I’d felt in days, trading grade school insults with Luke while Cory snuggled up next to me and tried hard to remain active in our conversation. Even hanging out with my mom later that night was something I was surprised to enjoy. I mean, she had her faults. But I couldn’t change her, and maybe finally accepting that lifted some of the strain from our relationship. Or maybe I was just in a strange, almost homesick mood. Maybe I was still feeling the pain of having my guts kicked in and was feeling a lot less judgmental than usual. Whatever it was, I felt a kind of peace being with them that I hadn’t ever really felt before. And when it was time to go home, I felt a lot more centered and ready to face the consequences of my actions.

 

 

Two days later, I gave a quick tap on Thomas’ door and then pushed it the rest of the way open. “You got a minute?”

He nodded, looking from his computer monitor to me. “Have a seat. What’s going on?”

I’d already emailed him to let him know I wanted a word with him, so I went straight into it. “Yeah. The thing is, I think I’m going to have to pass on the promotion.”

He stared at me blankly, like he didn’t understand anything I’d just said. After a moment, he said, “Why?”

“Let me rephrase that. I’m not passing on it. I just don’t think the offer will still be on the table once I come clean about a few things.”

“What things?” His face was still blank, but his words were getting flatter, a sign that he was approaching the state of Not Happy.

“That’s what I’d like to speak to Mr. Bertelli about.”

His eyebrows shot up over an otherwise unmovable expression. “That’s not possible, he’s in meetings all day. I’m your manager. If you’re unable to talk to me about something, you can go up to Human Resources…”

“No. This isn’t an HR problem. This is a problem with me, okay?”

“Can you elaborate on that a little?”

“Leah,” was all I said, all I would say. But it was enough. I saw the dawning in his eyes almost immediately, as he sat back in his chair and regarded me somberly.

“Something happened between you and Leah. At the festival?”

“Yeah. But our relationship was inappropriate before that. I was unprofessional. I can’t in good conscience accept this position, and I’ll understand if I’m let go completely.”

“Hold on,” he said, putting up a hand. “What happened, exactly? No, I don’t want to know. What I want to know is, is it still happening?”

“No. Not at the present moment.”

“Oh, for Christ sake,” he said then, harshly and almost to himself. “You’re being serious.”

“Yes, I’m being serious. And this is why I want to talk to the boss.”

After a heavy pause, he snapped, “Wait in your office. I’ll be in touch with you.”

It was amazing how fast meetings could clear up in certain situations. Not even twenty minutes later, I was invited up to Mr. Bertelli’s office on the twenty-seventh floor. I’d been up to this floor a few times in the past, and it was understated and elegant, making it clear this was where the power lived. I’d never been in the boss’s office, though. It was huge, with a full furniture set, a long mahogany desk, fancy curtains over the windows, and a door that I was pretty sure led into an entire bathroom. Normally I would have been a bit awed by it all, but as I walked over to where the boss sat, I barely noticed any of it.

He didn’t bother to stand as I approached, didn’t make any polite greetings or gestures. He just stared until I took a seat across from him, intentionally trying to intimidate me, which may have been working just a little. I wasn’t sure what Thomas had told him, if anything.

Just after I sat, he said, “How can I help you, Mr. Weber?”

“Well, first of all, I want to thank you for seeing me today…”

He interrupted me with a slice of one hand through the air. “Let’s skip all the bullshit. You’ve been promoted to Senior Security, a position previously held by Victor Davis. Mr. Reed has informed me you’re not accepting the promotion, and the reasons for this are something you want to discuss with me only. Am I correct so far?”

I nodded. “You’re correct.”

“Alright. So get on with it.”

I didn’t let my eyes waver from his, because I knew he would pounce if I did. “I’m not accepting the promotion because there are things that have taken place while I was on the job that I need to come clean about. I didn’t conduct myself professionally while your daughter was under my watch. Our relationship became personal. She became more than a client to me.”

His face didn’t change, but there was a barely discernable sharpening in his eyes. “She never said anything to me about that.”

“No, but she wanted to. I didn’t agree at the time, and that’s something I regret. This job means everything to me and I’m incredibly grateful to be here. But I can’t move forward if it means lying about what she means to me.”

His eyes narrowed, honing in like I was a bug he’d just caught creeping up on his breakfast. “You’re saying this is on her, as well?”

I was careful in how I responded to that. I was walking a fine line here, not wanting to expose too many details and betray Leah’s privacy, all while being up front about what had happened between us. “None of this is on her. Our feelings were mutual, and I never took advantage of her, but she didn’t want to lie. She wanted to tell you. I stopped her. That’s all on me and I know it was a huge mistake on my part. Now that I’ve had time to think, I can tell you there’s no way I can take this promotion after what’s happened. I’d always be carrying it, and I can’t live like that.”

He nodded once, almost like he agreed or saw my point, but something tingled up the back of my spine that said differently. Sitting forward and setting his elbows on the desk, he brought his hands together, fingers interlacing. “You were right to come to me. Thank you for that. I wouldn’t want to find out years down the line that I’ve been leaving my daughters in the care of someone untrustworthy. We’re obviously going to have to have a serious overhaul of our security team, between Isaacs and Davis and now this. It’s completely unacceptable. I haven’t been working this hard to keep my daughters safe just to have them preyed on by the men who are being paid to protect them. This meeting is over. Mr. Reed will meet you outside this office and escort you out of the building. And just so we’re clear, Mr. Weber? You don’t have permission to go near her again. Try it, and this situation will escalate in ways I don’t think you’re prepared for.”

Well, there it was. It was pretty much the exact way I’d pictured this going, except maybe with less violence. All I could do was nod and accept that my job was gone. “Thank you for the opportunities you’ve provided me here, and I want you to know I’m sorry…”

“I don’t want to hear it, Mr. Weber, and frankly, I don’t give a shit. Please remove yourself from my office.”

I climbed to my feet, but I wasn’t going to let him shut me up that easily. “What I’m saying is that I won’t fight this. I’ll leave quietly. But with all due respect, I wasn’t asking for your permission in anything regarding Leah. My purpose here was only to come clean with my behavior on the job, and I fully expected to be fired. I’m at peace with that, because losing my job is preferable to keeping it under dishonest circumstances. But Leah’s an adult, and she’s fully capable of making her own decisions. I don’t know if she’ll want me to come near her after all this, and I’ll respect that. Her decision, not yours.”

And finally he exploded, rising from his seat just as I heard the door open behind me. “Get the fuck out of here, you slick piece of shit! You’re out now! If I see you again you’ll be lucky if you end up in jail!”

From behind me, I heard Thomas’ quiet but steady voice. “Come with me, Dom. It’s over. I’ll walk you out.”