I’ve never been a quitter, but sometimes you have to accept that it’s time to give up on something. Today was one of those days. Everything that could possibly go wrong had happened, and I was at the end of my rope. It was time to call it quits.

I scrubbed my face with my hands and sighed as I looked at Layla. She was just as beautiful as I remembered, and just as bad for me, like a rose with a stem full of thorns. Maybe I was expecting too much from an assistant, but she clearly did not have the skills or experience I needed. It would probably be a lot easier to find someone who did than to train her. But I needed someone now, and there was no one else available.

Plus, I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of her. I’d been infatuated with her even when she was cruel to me. A little ignorance was nothing. The truth was, I wanted her around.

It was foolish, I knew. The level-headed, successful businessman inside me told me I was the idiotic one, but I’d never been able to think rationally when it came to Layla. I would do anything to have her attention, even if it ultimately caused me grief.

“Listen, I’m done for today. I need to decompress. Since my meeting with the inspector is off, I’ll sit with you for a while tomorrow and go over some of this stuff, give you a crash course, okay?”

She gave me a heart-melting look. “That would be really helpful. Thanks for giving me another chance.”

I started to walk out, but Layla’s voice stopped me. “Would you like me to take that suit to the dry cleaners?”

I chuckled and turned around to smile at her. “That’d be great.”

I climbed into my Maybach and headed to my temporary Sweet Bay apartment, thinking about flying back to my house in Silicon Valley where I could soak in the hot tub, open the nicest bottle of wine in my collection, and smoke a cuban cigar. It was cliché, but they really were great ways to relax.

But before I had a chance to decide if it was worth the time it would take to fly there, my phone rang, jolting me out of my daydream. I cringed at the name on the screen.

But he rarely, if ever, called me, so I assumed it was important. I sighed loudly, voicing my complaints to my empty car, then answered. “Hi, Dad. What’s up?”

“What’s up? Are you so important that somethin’s gotta be up for me to call you? You don’t have time to talk to your own father?” His gruff, whiskey and cigarette scarred voice invaded the tranquil cocoon of my car and grated against my skin, making me feel raw and exposed.

I winced and squeezed the leather-wrapped steering wheel till my hand ached, then I rubbed my pounding temples. “I’m happy to talk to you any time, Dad. I’m just surprised to hear from you. You don’t call that often.”

“The phone works two ways, boy. I don’t hear you callin’ me none, either. And when was the last time you stopped by? You move back home, yet you don’t got time for your own family?”

I wanted to tell him that, unlike him, I was busy making a decent life for myself, but I knew it would only stir up a hornet’s nest of an argument. I didn’t have the mental energy to deal with that tonight. “I’ll try to stop by and visit sometime, Pop.”

“Why not tonight? You got something more important you gotta do?”

The tension headache throbbing in my temples swelled to fill my entire head just thinking about going over there. A visit with my family was the most stressful thing I could imagine. “I’ve just got a lot going on right now, trying to get the resort ready.”

He snorted. “That highfalutin’ resort that nobody in this town wants. You think you’re gonna impress them folks, flashing your cash, blocking their view of the bay with some big ol’ monstrosity? Yer gonna waste all that money you made on something stupid. Why don’t you come over here and see your family before them townsfolk run you out of here?”

I didn’t know why he was so adamant about me coming over, but when he wanted something, there was no getting around it. He wouldn’t let it go till I did what he wanted. It would probably be less of a headache to go and get it over with than to argue with him about it.

“Fine, I’ll stop by for a bit. I’ll be there in a few minutes.” I promised myself I’d only stay long enough to satisfy my dad, then I’d order in a lobster and steak dinner and go to bed early.

“Sounds good. We haven’t eaten yet, and I ain’t got nothin’ to serve company, so why don’t you bring something with you when you come?”

I choked back a snort and a laugh. I was company, but yet he wanted me to bring dinner? I was sure even fast-food would be more edible than whatever he would scrounge up if I didn’t bring anything, so maybe it would be better if I did.

But I resented the fact that he assumed I should buy food for everyone just because I had money and they didn’t. I’d worked hard for my money and earned every dime of it while he and my brothers did next to nothing and complained that they had nothing. It wasn’t that I minded buying them dinner, it was just the principle of it.

But it wasn’t worth arguing about. They would never understand my point of view. My family was always looking to get something for nothing. That was how my father made a living, if you could call it that. He salvaged junk from wherever he could find it, legal or not, and sold it wherever he could. He earned the nickname Junkman Montgomery and a reputation for being a swindler and a thief.

My brothers’ social standing wasn’t much better. They’d earned a reputation for troublemaking as teens that hadn’t improved much. They had real jobs, at least occasionally, but they jumped from one dead end job to another whenever they got bored or ticked off or fired for being unreliable or stirring up trouble.

They never asked me outright for money — they were too proud for that and embarrassed that they hadn’t achieved any of the success I had. But I knew they thought I ought to be sharing my wealth with them. I might have considered it if I thought they’d put it to good use, but knowing them, they blow anything I gave them on stupid stuff and end up worse than they started. When I lived in San Fransisco, it was easy to forget all about them, but now that I was back in Sweet Bay, their lifestyle was a glaring reminder of the disparity between us.

I was always different from them in every way possible. I thought staying out of trouble, going to college, and building a successful empire would be enough to prove that. But in this town, it didn’t matter what I did. I would always be a Montgomery.

There was a row of fast-food restaurants on the way to my father’s house, and I thought about bringing burgers or tacos out of spite, but my palate had grown too accustomed to fine dining. I couldn’t stomach greasy junk food anymore. Instead, I called the nicest restaurant in town and ordered four steak dinners.

When I got there, the food wasn’t ready yet, so I took a seat on one of the leather benches in the lobby. While I waited, the hostess came out with a chalkboard that she set up on a tripod. It said, “Welcome Sweet Bay Society Club,” in decorative cursive.

I snorted to myself. I’d made Time magazine’s list of the top 100 most influential people, but I still didn’t get invited to the Sweet Bay Society Club meetings. I was almost positive my name would come up, though. I could feel my ears burning already with the defamatory comments.

To take my mind off of it, I Googled Layla. Her IMDb page listed a handful of roles, mostly uncredited parts in movies I’d never heard of. Her bio picture looked like the same headshot she’d flashed around at school back when she’d had her first one taken. I felt a twinge of pity for her. She’d been the brightest star in this town, but her spark had gone unnoticed in Hollywood. It must’ve been a hard fall for her.

I was staring at her picture when the hostess stuck a plastic bag full of food containers under my nose. “I heard she moved back. Guess she couldn’t cut it in Hollywood.”

I glanced up at the girl who was probably too young to have known Layla before she moved away. Why did everyone in this town insist on spreading hurtful gossip? Even though it might be the truth, and Layla had done more than her share of the same type of gossiping, it irritated me.

I took the bag and frowned at the hostess. “Actually, she came back to work with me. She’s assisting me on the resort project.”

The girl raised her eyebrows so high, they got lost in her hair line. I stood up and walked out before she could ask any questions, leaving her to speculate. I was sure half the town would hear the news before the night was over, especially if the Society Club was having their meeting there that night. But I didn’t feel the least bit guilty about it. I liked the idea of people thinking Layla had come back specifically to work with me, and it made her look a little better, too, to be coming here for a purpose and not just because her acting career had failed.

I carried the food out to my car then drove to the house I grew up in, a ramshackle, old bungalow a little ways past the edge of town. It might’ve been cute at one point, but now, scraggly, overgrown bushes hid the wide porch, and the grayed, wooden siding was peeling, revealing several layers of different-colored paint. My father had painted it a time or two in the half century he’d lived there, using whatever paint he could scrounge up for cheap, but it had needed another paint job since before I moved out, over a decade ago. Faded shutters that used to be navy but now looked like acid washed denim dangled crookedly from the dormer windows, threatening to come crashing down in the next storm.

I parked my car at the end of the cracked and heaving driveway, behind my father’s battered old pickup, Jeremy’s primer-spotted Camaro, and Steven’s rusty Grand Am. Then I thrashed through the tall weeds in the front yard to the front of the house. The cement stairs threatened to crumble under my feet as I climbed onto the porch. I pulled open the wooden screen door with a loud screech then rapped on the front door.

“Come in!” My father’s voice bellowed from inside.

The door stuck a bit, so I rammed my shoulder against it to open it. It creaked open to reveal the exact same living room I grew up in — brown carpet that hid who knew what kind of stains and beige walls that displayed a lifetime of them, a television as deep as it was wide with long silver antennas pointing off in opposite directions, a few crooked pictures of us on the walls, leftover from before my mother took off.

Only now, the man in the recliner looked more like a grandfather with graying hair and deep wrinkles, and my two brothers sitting on the frayed, plaid couch and propping their boots on the scarred, wooden coffee table were grown men. By our features you could tell we were brothers, but that was where the similarity ended. They both wore faded tee shirts and jeans that looked grungy even though I doubted they’d done any work that day, while I was in a suit that still looked crisp and neat despite a long day, thanks to the high end, luxury fabric it was made of.

They didn’t bother turning their heads towards me when I came in, just kept staring at the fight on the TV, drinking cans of Budweiser and grunting at the painful sounds coming from the television. The room had the same smells as I imagined the fight arena had — sweat, warm beer, and too many bodies crammed into a small space.

Coming there always felt like coming home, but not in a good way. All my success disappeared, and my childhood angst came rushing back to me. My shoulders hunched under the weight of it, turning me back into the insecure teen who used to slump around there, feeling rejected and insignificant.

“I brought dinner. Steaks from The Sweet Bay Table.” The bell rang, signaling the end of the fight, and my words and the smell coming from the bag I held up finally got their attention.

“Alright! They got the best steaks there.” My younger brother, Jeremy, hauled himself off the couch, and my older brother, Steven, grabbed a hold of Jeremy’s belt to pull himself up, knocking Jeremy off balance. They traded slugs while Dad dropped the footrest on the recliner then pushed himself out of it with a loud groan.

I led the way into the kitchen and put the bag of food on the speckled formica table. Dad plopped down in the nearest chair, Steven set scratched, melamine plates over the worn off spots on the table in front of each seat, then Jeremy tossed some silverware into the middle.

Steven dug into the bag and handed out the styrofoam boxes. They definitely weren’t the best steaks, as Jeremy said, but they were thick and juicy with a soft, pink center and a nice, peppered char on the outside. Their meaty scent covered up the odor of my family and the musty, old house. My family dug in, hacking off huge chunks and shoving them in their mouths. I sliced off a thin sliver and savored it while I cut open my baked potato and spread on the butter and sour cream they’d included in small, plastic containers.

My family had always cared more about food that talking, so we ate in silence for several minutes, the clink and scratch of silverware the only sound. Eventually, Dad asked, “So, you gotta hire a bunch of people to work at that resort, huh? You bringing in your own people from the big city?”

“No, I plan to hire locals. I want this project to boost the local economy.” I didn’t mention it was a requirement of the town council. I figured that would only invite negative comments.

“Good payin’ jobs?” Steven asked in between chugs of beer.

I stiffened, worried about where his question might be leading. The last thing I wanted to do was hire family. “Most of them are entry-level — housekeeping, kitchen staff, customer service.”

Steven’s shoulders slumped, and Jeremy rolled his eyes like he was too good for a job like that, even though any of those would be a step up from most of the jobs he’d had.

Dad snorted. “So, not that good for the economy, then. You giving good benefits, at least? Insurance and whatnot?”

His question surprised me. My father had never held a real job as long as I’d been alive, let alone one with benefits. He’d gone to the doctor twice in my life — once when he almost sliced a hand off on a rusty saw blade and again when the stitches got infected because he didn’t keep the wound clean.

“Most of the jobs will be slightly less than full time, so those positions won’t include any benefits.”

“So yer cheatin’ people out of hours and benefits.” Steven glared at me as he gnawed on a mouthful of steak.

I looked down at my plate to hide my wince. I knew a lot of people saw it that way, but that was how things were done in big corporations. It was too hard to turn a profit, otherwise. “Things like insurance can get really expensive for a large company. It’s common practice.”

Jeremy slathered his roll with butter and shoved it in his mouth. “So, if you ain’t offering nothing better than any other job, how you figure you’re helpin’ the economy, then?”

I resisted the urge to roll my eyes at my younger brother. Hadn’t he learned anything in school? I gave him a highly condensed version of basic economics. “An entry level job with limited benefits is better than no job at all, and right now Sweet Bay has very little to offer people looking for work. The positions will be good for people who need to earn a little money and don’t want to commute out of town for work. And there will be some full time positions with benefits, just not a lot of them. But the increased revenue the tourists will bring to the local businesses will boost the overall economy, and that will lead to more opportunities for everyone.”

Based on the look on Jeremy’s face, I wasn’t sure he understood, but Steven changed the subject before I had a chance to explain it better. “So, what are some of the full time positions you’re hiring for?”

“Well, I hired a full time assistant to help me in the office, and I’m looking for a general manager to run the day-to-day operations. I need an accountant, a marketing director, head of housekeeping.”

I wasn’t too worried about mentioning those positions. I knew neither of my brothers would have any knowledge or interest in any of them, but I cringed when Steven said, “What about maintenance? You need a handyman to fix stuff?”

“I’ll be hiring a few maintenance men, yes. I’m thirsty. Do you have anything to drink?” I got up and stuck my head in the fridge, avoiding the subject, but Steven didn’t let it drop.

“I’m good at that kind of thing. How ‘bout letting me be in charge of your maintenance? Would that job have benefits?”

I turned my back on him and filled a glass with water from the sink, trying to give myself time to think of an excuse. The best I could come up with was, “I thought you had a job at the auto parts store?”

“Nah, they got their panties in a wad when I missed a couple days. Fired me yesterday.”

So that was why my father had wanted me to come over. Steven had lost another job, and he thought I ought to hire him. How was I going to turn him down without starting a family fight?

I sat back down at the table and tried to appeal to his sense of logic, which was useless, since Steven had never factored logic into any of his decisions. “I need guys who know how to work on major utility systems. It’s not the kind of thing you have experience with.”

Steven huffed. “I can fix anything you got, big or small. They all work the same. You know I’m good with that kind of stuff.”

“That’s right. The boy’s got a knack for mechanical things.” My father pointed his knife at Steven then turned it towards me. “Plus, he’s family.”

Steven’s idea of fixing things was duct taping them together, but even if he was the best maintenance man around, I still wouldn’t want to hire him precisely because he was family. I knew he’d be angry if I said so, but I didn’t see any other way around it. They’d backed me into a corner.

I sighed and resigned myself to the coming argument. “It’s not wise to hire family. It can ruin relationships if things don’t work out.”

Dad’s face turned so red, I worried the steak had pushed his cholesterol level over the edge and he was about to have a heart attack. “Says who? Some big shot executive in the city with a thousand employees under him he doesn’t give a rip about? You make things work out because you are family.”

I shook my head, cringing. Why did they have to keep pushing? Anything I said at that point was only going to make it worse. But I had to stand my ground. “I’m sorry. Maybe if things were… different. But you’re not dependable, Steven. You’d miss work or show up late or drunk, or you’d get in a fight with someone. I can’t have that.”

Steven shook his head and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. “Naw, man. I don’t do that kind of stuff anymore. You don’t gotta worry about that.”

I couldn’t help but bark out a laugh. “Since when, yesterday? You just lost your job because you missed too much work! You’ve never kept a job for more than a few months, as far as I know.”

“It wasn’t like that this time. I was sick.”

My appetite gone, I shoved my plate forward. “Of course you were. Sick of working. That’s the problem with all of you. You’re too lazy to do an honest day’s work.”

“Don’t talk about your family like that! You sound like everyone else in this godforsaken town!” My father bellowed, pounding the table, rattling the plates and silverware.

I stood up and tossed my dirty dishes towards the sink. They toppled the pile already there with a clatter. “That’s because it’s the truth. This family earned our reputation as lowlife, no-good scoundrels by being exactly that. I’ve spent my whole life living under the shadow of that reputation, even though I’ve done everything in my power to rise above it. But I still get treated like dirt around here because of you all. This town is making it hard enough for me to get this resort off the ground; I don’t intend to sabotage myself by hiring any of my good-for-nothing family.”

I stormed off towards the front door. My father hollered after me, “If that’s the way you feel about us, then don’t come back here. You ain’t welcome!”

I hated my family in that moment. Hated them for putting me in that position and then being angry when I wouldn’t give them what they wanted, even though I had every reason not to. Hated them for making me feel guilty about it. But even though I hated them, even though I never felt like I belonged with them, I hated that what my father said hurt so badly. I didn’t want to acknowledge them as my family, but they were the only people in town who accepted me.

I looked back at the rundown house I’d been so desperate to get away from as a teenager. It was a shack compared to my mansion in San Fransisco or even my apartment in Sweet Bay. But it was the only place that felt like home.

Should I go back inside, apologize, and offer my brother a job? It might smooth things over for now, but in the long run, I knew it would end badly. I stood on the overgrown lawn for a long moment, debating.