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My father was a strong, intimidating man who commanded every room he entered. He demanded respect and he earned it–a natural born leader whom everyone around him chose to follow.
But he was nothing without my mother.
She was his strength. His heart. His everything. Because while everyone who knew him leaned on him, followed him, and came to him to fix their problems; he went to her. I used to sit in the hallway outside of their bedroom when I was a child and listen as she advised him, consoled him, and encouraged him.
There is absolutely nothing he could have done in life as well as he did if he didn’t have my mother. She was also his drive, his passion, and the reason he worked as hard as he did. There is no good king who does not have a queen to hold him steady. Just like in chess, if you take out the queen, the king is as good as dead.
Men have a biological drive to protect and provide. To care for and defend. It’s in our DNA. And we can become lost without thatsomethingto do it for. We either become animals or waste away and never reach our full potential.
A king needs a queen.
“Such revering thoughts for such hypocritical actions.” Dorothy, Wicked’s nana, stares me down, her eyes gleaming with judgment and…something else. She’s a tiny woman, even smaller than Wicked, yet she has a presence about her that demands the sort of respect that you generally reserve for those of higher importance.
“Am I not important enough for you, boy?” Her hands are planted on her hips in a challenging pose, daring me to say otherwise.
I feel the sharp spark of anger alight inside of me at her implying that I’m something akin to a child. She has absolutely no idea who I am. What I’ve done. The things I’ve been through just to get to where I am now.
“Well, from where I’m standing,kid, you’re not behaving like a man at all.” I choose to say nothing to her, ignoring her now outright debasement of me. If she thinks for one second that she can undermine my view on myself, she’s dead wrong.
I know who I am. What I want. And no one, not even her, will ever plant a seed of doubt in my mind. I can’t be stopped.
“And what is it that you want?”
My eyes instantly flick to Wicked where she’s sitting on the ground without a care in the world, her face angled down towards Gizmo and Snitch as she gives them tummy rubs and sneaks jerky from her pockets to feed them. The sun shines brightly on her dark brown hair as she plays at not paying any attention to what’s happening, but I know it isn’t true. She has her nose scrunched up in that adorable way she does when she’s concentrating.
“Oh really? Is that all you want?” My eyes return to Dorothy and I scowl at the tiny woman with a big attitude. Yet, I can’t look her directly in the eyes, my gaze stopping just shy of her jawline. “Yeah, I thought so. What will you do to get it?”
Anything. Everything.
I don’t know.
“Is that right? And what about Kai and Ezra?” My gaze is pulled to the two other men to find them both staring me down with their arms crossed over their chests. They don’t even bother to hide the fact that they are both daring me to try and unseat their positions in Wicked’s life.
Kai is smirking, his arrogance as obvious as his dedication. Ezra’s face is decidedly blank, but his eyes seem to crackle with intent and purpose. I remember very well the words he spoke to me while I was drowning my woes in an expensive bottle of scotch at the wedding. The onehegaveto me.
And now I suddenly feel as if I’ve been played.
Frustration rises within me, and my spine–that I didn’t even know had started to sag beneath all of their gazes–snaps straight as I flick my wrists out to adjust the cuffs on my neatly pressed shirt. My suit jacket is currently in the car, now shredded to pieces by the raccoons that Wicked is still doting on as if they’re innocent little bunny rabbits.
“Oh, I see. You’re still operating under society’s illusion of monogamy and relationship guidelines. You’re…what?” She pauses and I watch as she puts a bony pointer finger to her lips and taps them lightly in thought.I’m not giving anything to you, woman. Give it up.“You silly, stupid man. You don’t have to. I can already seeeverything.”
I step back without realizing I’m making the movement, horror flooding through my system at the absolute honesty and confidence in which she speaks. She says it with intent, and I know without a shadow of a doubt, she’s telling the truth.
It’s an instantaneous reaction, something I’m ashamed to even feel, but…I suddenly want to run.Flee.
Like I’m fourteen again and my life depends on it.
Sweat beads on my forehead as my eyes seem to flick everywhere around me, my subconscious brain no doubt searching for what it is that has my entire being on edge and in fight or flight mode. But it doesn’t understand, the only thing I need to fear right now is the tiny, unassuming, old woman right in front of me. The one who stares at me as if she can see straight through my soul. The one who probably knows everything about me.Everything.
Even the things that no one but me knows.
Like a movie reel, the images flash through my head as if they’re being pulled to the surface and the play button has been pressed. Each one as vivid as the last. Each one more devastating. I can’t breathe, I can’t think. My chest feels as if it’s being stabbed, or smashed. It’s caving in.I’mcaving in.
¡Dios, no!
“Calm down,guerreropequeño.” The rough feminine voice is soft and comforting, the name she uses combining with the tone and pulling my attention from my inner terror. For just a brief moment–one so small I’m barely able to recognize it–I could have sworn it was my mother speaking to me, but when my gaze finds the source, it’s only Dorothy standing before me once more. My eyes are drawn to her hazel ones, as if magnetized and unable to be pulled apart. They swallow me–hold me captive–as if by magic.
The sorceress of the mind.
