chapter six

 

I thought about calling the buddies I haven’t seen since I moved to Vegas or the women I used to have on speed dial.

But ultimately, I’m too disappointed with my current standing in life to call any of them. I have nothing to show for my thirty-two years except a famous brother. I’m just not in the mood to answer the inevitable questions about him and his padded bank account, flourishing career, and picture perfect family when my own success is nonexistent.

Instead, I hang out with my mom on the couch until she falls asleep to the Food Network, and then I stare blankly at the screen and think about all the things I’ve done wrong with my life.

Everything is broken.

My heart.

My friendships.

My company.

My bank account.

The only thing I have right now is family, but for how long? My dad made it clear I wasn’t welcome to hang around here too long wallowing in self-pity. As much as I want to hate him for it and do it anyway, I know he’s right. I need to fix it all...I just haven’t the first clue where to even begin.

I think what I need is a fresh start. Getting away from the reminders of everything I’ve lost is a step in the right direction. There’s a difference between getting away and running away, and the difference is bigger than just semantics.

The constant reminders at home of Vivian laughing here or opening her legs for me there are still too fresh and overwhelming. Every time I see the famed Las Vegas Strip, I’ll think of the view from the corner office I specifically chose for my business—one I’m no longer a part of.

I know I can’t stay here, but I certainly can’t go back there, either. I’m not ready to face the daily reminders of everything I fucked up.

And it’s with that thought in mind I call my realtor first thing in the morning right from the comfort of the guest room bed as I look up at my high school football jersey. I clutch Vivian’s sweater in my fist and breathe in the scent again. I brought it with me in some weird moment of needing her with me despite everything. The scent is starting to fade already in heady contrast to the tight pain in my chest every time I think about her, but it’s still comforting to have it here with me—and I’m not sure why. I’m the one who ended it after her big confession.

Calling my realtor certainly won’t fix my problems, but selling my house will help pad my bank account and get me out of the atmosphere where I allowed everything to spiral out of control.

I’m not sure where I’ll go just yet, but putting my house on the market doesn’t have to mean anything. I can take it or leave it if I get an offer. I can make the decision then.

My realtor asks me about a million questions and tells me she’ll get the paperwork started, and I want to feel sadness I’m possibly giving up my home...but I don’t. In the end, it’s just the place where I live. No, the home isn’t what’s making me sad. It’s the combination of everything else.

And, maybe worst of all, it’s coming to the realization that I’m simply getting what’s been coming to me my whole life.

I can’t just start over by moving out of my house.

I need to start over by becoming a completely new person. I need to own every lie I’ve ever told, to face the people I’ve hurt, to dig deep and genuinely apologize from the bottom of my heart.

Maybe an apology will patch things with Becker and Jason, but that still leaves a hole where Vivian took up residence in my heart.

Even if she somehow came out of this and chose me in the end, I don’t know that I’d be able to take her back. The cut of being put in a position where I’m essentially the other man ruining a marriage is pretty heavy to overcome.

I push Viv to the back of my mind. I need to tackle one problem at a time, so I pull open my notes app and draft an email. I pour every ounce of my heart into it and hope for the best.

 

Jason and Ryan,

I’m sorry. Really, genuinely, honestly sorry.

I wish I could say those words to the two of you in person. I know I fucked up this time. I should have been honest with you from the start so we could have put our heads together and created a solution—the way co-presidents should operate. I didn’t do that, and I’m not sure I have a bigger regret in my life than keeping the truth from the two people who most deserved it.

I miss FDB already and I’ve only been gone a day, but it’s just a company. In the end, your friendship means more. I’ll find something to do to earn money, whether it’s selling socks instead of solutions or data entry instead of programming. But I’ll never find friends who can replace the two of you.

Beck, we’ve been friends for over twenty-five years. We’ve been through everything together, confided firsts and lasts and problems and victories in each other, and I can’t truly believe we won’t find our way past this.

And Jason, we’ve been friends for a decade. We’ve played wingman, we’ve drank a lot of whiskey, and we’ve been there for each other through it all. You deserved the truth in all of this, and I acted selfishly and without thought to the consequences. I should have known what I was doing was wrong when I felt the edge of guilt in my stomach, but I opted for instant gratification instead of doing the right thing. That was wrong of me, and I’m sorry.

It may not mean a single thing to either of you, but I vow today I won’t operate on that system any longer. I won’t choose myself over my friends. I won’t choose lies over truths.

I truly want the best for FDB. If the two of you believe the company is better off without me, I promise to go quietly. I’ll hand over the nine percent of the company I have left to you. It’s the least I can do after my mistakes. But I also want you to know that if you ever find yourselves in a position where you need me, I’ll come running. I’ll always be the “F” in the company’s title, and I’ll always be the other third of our triangle.

Sincerely,

Brian

 

I read over the email. It’s impersonal when I should be talking to them in person, and I’m telling them in writing I’ll go quietly when I’ve always been a fighter.

But as I sit in a room that isn’t mine in my parents’ house, I don’t know my place in the world anymore. It’s time to find it, and it starts with giving my friends what they’re asking for in an attempt to start patching all the things I’ve broken. I copy the words from my note and paste it into an email. I send it to the two of them and cross my fingers. I know they’ll both read it in the next hour or so as they get to work and start their days, and I feel a twinge of anxiety in the pit of my stomach as I await their response.

I call Mark next.

“What?” he hisses when he answers.

“I need to apologize to you,” I blurt.

“For calling me at five in the fucking morning? Good idea.”

I glance at the small clock. “It’s seven.”

“Not in Los Angeles. Where the hell are you?” His voice is low, and I hear some rustling.

“Home.”

“Chicago?” he asks.

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

I blow out a breath. “Just wanted to get out of Vegas for a bit.”

“Running away?” It sounds like he’s walking.

I shrug even though he can’t see it over the phone. “I guess.”

“So why are you calling me so early?”

“I’m sorry for all the lies I’ve ever told you. I’m sorry for spending your money frivolously and assuming the well would never run dry. I’m sorry for telling you when you were in tenth grade that Lydia Bradley told me she didn’t like you. It was a lie. I liked her and wanted you to turn your attention to someone else.” The words tumble out of my mouth. “I’m sorry for the lies about women, for acting out of revenge, for thinking you owed me something just because you’re my brother. And above all else, I’m really sorry for what I did to you and Reese, for keeping the two of you apart when I knew how you felt about her. You’re a good brother, and you deserved better than what I did. She’s one in a million, and she deserved better, too.”

I can’t believe I’m apologizing when a part of me still feels the bite of betrayal all these years later. Reese slept with Mark when I was on a business trip in Germany. The two of them had no idea I was just using Reese to get back at Mark at the time, so they willingly slept together behind my back. Yet I’m the one apologizing.

Mark is silent when I finish rambling. “You done?” he finally asks.

Anger grates at me that he has nothing to say to the words I just poured out of my heart, but I shove it aside in my new attempt to be a better person.

I blow out a breath. “Yeah.”

“Brian, it’s all in the past. Every single one of the things you just said. You don’t need to apologize to me for any of it. I’m where I’m supposed to be, and I appreciate you owning up to the things we’ve already buried in the past, but you don’t need to bear the burdens any longer.”

A lump forms in my throat at his unexpected tender tone. I don’t deserve his forgiveness, yet he’s already given it to me. I’ve spent so much time being jealous of all the things he has in life that I never stopped to look at the kind of man he’s become. As his words sink into my conscience, I realize he’s the kind of man I want to be like. Someone who can forgive, someone who loves deeply and works hard, a family man with a wife and a child who still has his own identity in the world.

That’s all I want, too. Someday I might be ready to try for it again, but I think that day might be quite far down my road. Maybe I’ve patched things up with my brother. Maybe I’ve attempted to reach out and patch things up with my friends. But my own heart needs a good slice of time before the cracks there can be patched back together again.

I don’t reply to his words because I can’t think of the right thing to say. Instead, he speaks again. “I’m glad you called. Not at this hour, of course, but you caught me when I was sleeping, so I guess that’s better than when I’m busy.”

I chuckle. “I’m sorry for waking you up.”

“I already told you. Stop apologizing. Anyway, I was thinking about using FDB for web analytics. Our IT department is great at web design and implementation, but we need someone who can study traffic patterns and make recommendations to our marketing department based on what you see. Instead of hiring FDB outright, I’d like to offer you a position at Ashmark.”

“At Ashmark?” I ask stupidly. It’s clear he’s read FDB’s bylaws or he’d ask me to come on as a consultant. This is a way around the no-compete clause.

“Yeah. I think you’d make a good fit.”

“In Los Angeles?” I’m not sure where my words have gone, but I’m sort of shocked at his offer. And not just that—but I don’t really believe things are over between FDB and me. I’m not ready to start looking for a new job yet. It hasn’t even sunk in yet that I lost my old one.

“Yes. I can have HR draft a contract this afternoon if you’re interested. You can stay with me and Reese until you get on your feet.”

“St—stay with you?” I stutter. But he has a wife. A baby. A life that doesn’t include me.

“Dude, pull yourself together.” He laughs. “This is what brothers are supposed to do, right?”

“Right,” I echo hollowly. I clear my throat. When it comes to business decisions, it’s mostly instinctual. My gut is telling me I’ll go back to FDB, but I have no idea when. Would it be the end of the world to do something on the side while I wait for the call to go back where I belong?

When the decision in front of me isn’t instinctual, I’ve been known to spend days thinking things through meticulously, looking at every angle and analyzing every possibility.

“So?” Mark waits patiently before the sun has even risen in Los Angeles while I try to figure out if this is the right thing to do from my spot in his childhood bedroom. When I realize I don’t have days to come up with a decision, I go with the impulsivity of what feels right.

“Okay,” I say. “Yes. Let’s do it.” I don’t even know the terms, but I know Mark will pay me a fair wage and offer me benefits. We’ve talked at length in the past about the structure of his company, and if there’s one thing I know as a business owner—or former business owner, as the case may be—I know he takes care of his employees.

“Then get the hell out here today so I can put you to work tomorrow. I’m going back to bed.”

I let out a laugh when he hangs up, and for the first time in the past two days, I feel a tiny spark of hope for the future.