My Girl

“Nate. Nate! NATE!”

Samuel was waving his hand in front of my face but his voice seemed like he was a mile away.

“Don’t freak out. You promised!”

My blood pressure was skyrocketing and I couldn’t think clearly anymore.

“NATE!’ Samuel shook me. His voice was crystal clear.

“I’m going to kill him. I’m actually going to kill him.” I got out of my chair and headed toward the door.

“NO! You promised!” He was pushing me away. Samuel was a little bigger than I was but I was filled with too much anger to let him push me away.

“Do it for Lily,” Samuel said.

“What! DO what!” I yelled.

I’m sure the whole floor could hear, but I didn’t care.

“Keep your voice down!” Samuel begged.

“Why!” I yelled. “I was serious when I told you before that I didn’t care if I got fired.”

“Just sit down.” He said in a calm voice.

Maybe I need to think about this. But I couldn’t. Mike violated her. Mike fucking forced himself on her. On my Lily! I’m going to kill Mike.

“Nate. For fuck sake, just sit down.”

I sat down and started to control my breathing. My breath started to go back to normal but my heart was at a whole different speed.

“Can we talk about one thing at a time?” Samuel said.

He knew there were a thousand and one thoughts running through my head.

“How long did you know?” I furiously asked him.

“Since Saturday.” He sheepishly said.

I turned my head toward Samuel. “You knew since SATURDAY and you didn’t tell me!” I started to raise my voice again.

“She told me not to tell you!”

“This is something I need to know. This is something that needs to be reported to the police. Mike can’t get away with this!”

“Lily didn’t want to involve the police. She made that very clear.” Samuel went back to his calm voice. “I told her the same thing, but she made it very clear.”

“Why?” I started to think about Mike having his way with Lily. Shoving his disgusting tongue into her perfect mouth.

FUCK! I should have been there!

“She said that he was so drunk he didn’t know what he was doing.”

“Bull. Fucking. Shit. He probably knew exactly what he was doing. He had it for her since the first day. FUCK!” I slammed my fist on my desk as hard as I could.

The bang of my fist echoed throughout the whole office. We sat in silence for a little while.

“Why didn’t she want me to know?” I looked over at Samuel.

“She- she just didn’t want you to worry about her.”

I let out a harsh laugh, “Great.” I shook my head and hid my face in my hands.

Lily’s so angry with me that she couldn’t even ask me, her stepbrother, for help. God. Dammit. I fucked up so hard.  

“She misses you,” Samuel confessed.

I looked up at him with a little bit of hope in my eyes.

“She started using the new phone after what happened with Mike.”

I let out a sad smile. At least she was finally using one of the gifts I got her.

“It’s all my fault. If she never came to live with me she would have never met Mike and this would have never happened.”

Samuel looked at me with his tired eyes. “It’s not your fault. You know that. It’s Mike’s fault.” Samuel clarified.

There was still a part of me that wanted to blame myself. I should have just left Lily alone. I should have never brought her to Chicago, but I was selfish. There was a long silence as I tried to keep my emotions on track before I went up to the meeting.

“Were you serious about this job?” Samuel asked.

“Yes.”

Samuel looked my way with worry in his eyes.

“I really like her,” Samuel admitted.

I chuckled. “I thought you didn’t like her.”

He shrugged his shoulders. “She grew on me.”

“Yeah. She does.” I looked down at my phone. I wanted to call her and text her to see if she was okay, but I can’t.

“You need to control yourself when we get to the meeting.” Samuel changed the subject. “You can’t do anything irrational. Nothing that can burn your bridges. You can’t do anything stupid. You promised me.”

I chuckled. I don’t even know what will happen when I see Mike again.

“I don’t know if I can keep that promise anymore.”

***

“As you can see on the screen, our software is in high demand in Asia as well as Europe. We are still trying to improve our numbers in both North and South America-”

I zoned out as Samuel’s presentation droned on, and focused on the door. The conference room was made of frosted glass so I couldn’t see anyone outside. I looked over at Samuel who was keeping an eye on me. He knew I was looking out for Mike, who was 30 minutes late.

“Now let’s talk about the changes we can develop for the software to make it more profitable in these other countries.” He pointed at the projector screen.

“Nathaniel Atom, head of the Software Development, will be filling us on with the potential changes to the software.”

I stood up and headed toward the front of the room. Samuel sat down next to me to change the slides.

“As you can see our software is run on the older programmed computers which are why they are fav-”

Mike walked into the room. My heart started to beat a hundred times in the span of a second, everything started to become foggy. I looked over at Samuel who was giving me strong eye contact as if he was trying to speak to me. I cleared my throat. My only focus was on Mike now. Him and his busted-up face.

“-which is why they are favored in Asia and Europe mostly. If we just change the codes to support the different platforms of the-”

Mike started to whisper something to his Dad while gesturing his face. He chuckled thickly. My nostrils flared and I started to feel a little light headed. I loosened my tie and unbuttoned the top button of my dress shirt.

“Are you feeling alright Nathaniel?” One of the older gentlemen asked. I cleared my throat.

“Yeah. I’m just feeling a little light headed.” My eyes focused only on Mike.

He had a smile spread across his face. I hate that he thinks he got away with it. I cleared my throat again. I looked at the power point and went back to my slide.

“If we just change the codes to support the different platforms then we can improve the software. Here are the booklets for the new programs we need to improve the coding and software overall.”

I grabbed the booklets and started to pass them to each individual at the table. My heart started to pound rapidly the closer I got to Mike. He was all the way at the end of the table.

I skipped over two people.

“Nate, you skipped-” One of the gentlemen said.

I dropped the booklets in front of Mike. The paper smacked the table leaving the room speechless.

“You went into the bathroom for Lily.” I snapped.

“What?” Mike’s eyes widen.

I couldn’t tell if he just remembered the truth or if he genuinely didn’t remember anything from that night.

“Do you remember? You went into the bathroom to find Lily. To-” I couldn’t get the rest of the sentence out.

“Dude. I- I was drunk. I didn’t know what I was doing.” He smirked. “No one got hurt. Don’t worry-”

His smirk was my last trigger to apply the final blow. My fist connected with his face and his chair tipped backwards, dumping him on the floor in a heap.

I heard Samuel’s faint whisper, “Fuck.”

No one in the room said anything. Mike’s dad was looking at me with anger on his face but didn’t say anything.

“WHAT THE FUCK,” Mike yelled as his face was dripping with blood.

“YOU TOOK ADVANTAGE OF HER!” I yelled. “AND YOU TELL ME NOT TO WORRY. LILY IS MINE. LILY IS MY GIRL! NOT YOURS OR ANYONE ELSE'S!” I roared at him

Mikes eyes widen as he opened his mouth in disgust.

“Nate. I think-” Samuel tried to reason with me, but it was too late.

The front of Mike’s shirt was covered in blood, but I felt nothing toward him. My eyes darted to Mike’s dad who was probably wishing that would I drop dead.

“I quit.” I calmly said while fixing my tie.

Mike’s father slapped the table as he pulled himself to his feet. “NO! YOU ARE FIRED! You will NEVER get to get a job in this company or any other company as long as I live! DO YOU HEAR ME? You’re DONE in this city.” He slammed the table again.

He went over to help his son.

“Good.” I gave him a little smile and headed toward the door.

“Lily-Lily’s your sister and you’re fucking her???” Mike yelled in disgust as I opened the door.

“Stepsister,” I smirked at him as I walked away.

I heard muffled noises from inside the conference room, but it wasn’t my problem anymore.

I didn’t turn back. I was never going to turn back.

Now, it was time to get my girl.