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“No.”
“Good. Now don’t talk to her again.” I nodded slowly, till he did the same. I looked past him to Scarlett, my latest paralegal. She carried both my coffee and my mail. Tommy looked at her, a small brunette with a top bun, white blouse, and a grey fitted pencil skirt. “Don’t look at her either,” I warned, redirecting him back to me. “She’s a professional. We all are.”
“Good morning, Mr. Jones,” she greeted, shifting around Tommy as if he were a pillar of sharp glass. I waved him off as Scarlett followed me into my office.
“Scarlett,” I returned kindly, lifting the coffee from her hand. “You know I can get this myself. You’re the best paralegal we have at the moment, not a receptionist.”
“I aim to please,” she said quietly, almost nervously as I made my way to the dark, quartz desk at the center of my office. I took a quick sip of coffee, always being too preoccupied to ever fully appreciate my corner view of West Forty-second Street and Sixth Avenue. Bryant Park sat outside like a tiny oasis, a small patch of green heaven in a sea of steel beams and grey bricks.
“Well, you’re doing great. I appreciate how thoughtful you are,” I assured, giving her my first true smile of the day.
“Hold your praise. The coffee is to wake you up.”
“For what exactly?”
“Quinn from Tri-Tech moved your meeting up from twelve to ten.”
“That’s sudden, but I can manage.”
“Well… that’s not what the coffee’s for,” she hesitated. “Lina Castillo is here to see you,” she gestured towards the hall.
“Lina?” I groaned, taking a longer sip of coffee, returning to the stack of mail.
I knew why she was here, arriving much sooner than the attorneys’ meeting we had scheduled for later this afternoon. This was about last night, about her client’s involvement with my Gemma, my best friend, my Butterfly. I was already shifting in moods. This was not thegood morningthat Scarlett greeted me with, this was an early chess match with a powerful legal savant.
“Strong enough?” Scarlett checked in, referring to the coffee, rather than my interpretation. I took it as a question to my preparedness for Lina, who was clearly desperate to either intimidate or smooth things over. I figured both would be attempted, neither of which interested me.
“Always,” I replied confidently, unlike Scarlett’s hands which wrung together. She was good at what she did, but was still young, still too inept in the skill of disguising the anxiety of inevitable conflict. She wasn’t like Lina, whose overwhelming confidence always rivaled mine. At times it felt as though we were more like bucks than people, our horns locked in either a gaze or a verbal joust, exchanging cruel, and personal jabs that others found overtly competitive. All Lina and I ever wanted was to win. “Give me ten, then bring her in.”
I sat down, sifting the mail, stopping at a particularly thick, cream-colored envelope. I peeled back its embossed enclosure, removing a matted brochure fromBelmont Hills. I didn’t expect it to arrive so quickly, having just requested Scarlett to retrieve it last night after ordering a pizza that Gemma and I never got to share. It was here now, reminding me of what I needed to do, of the promise I made as a child.
It was that promise to Claire that caused me to request this brochure in the first place. Above all else, who I was and what I was meant to do, was to keep Gemma safe.
But what did that even mean anymore?
I could feel my promise slipping, laboring like one sweaty hand grabbing onto another, struggling to keep myself from falling. The anticipation of losing her made everything feel so anxious, so urgent. I never felt more like a desperate fool, butdesperatenonetheless. Even if I left right now and ran to Gemma, what would I say to her? How could I ever put into words all the things I wanted to say in a single breath?
Gemma, I’m so sorry it took me forever to say this out loud, but I couldn’t help it. The boy you grew up with still lives in me, along with the fear he felt the day he came to see you, but instead found your mother. All I wanted was you, but all I got was the antithesis to what I wanted to say:
I love you.
I love you.
I love you.
And please let me say it again, because I could never get tired of saying it, and I could never get tired of the relief it gives my heart.
I want to run away, I want to find you and tell you how I feel, but I’m still there on that couch, waiting with Claire, my finger burning and my mind melting. I’m not sure if I could ever leave that place, especially now, since it’s been imprinted in my mind like a script.
All I ever wanted to do was keep you safe, and all I know, all I was ever told, was that my love for you—my truest and deepest love—was completely, fucking, nuclear.
I wish I could say that. I wish it were easy. The truth was, and what I could admit to myself, was that my life was the cumulation of tiny fires, all of which I would accept responsibility for, because, in reality, they were all my fault. Every piece of shattered glass, of webbing, and stone that plagued my life was there because of me and my fear. I knew that, I recognized that, but maybe there was still hope for change. I could still protect her, and I could start with the woman who we both shared in common: Claire.
I promised Gemma I’d take care of her mother, not once giving her details, but assuring her that she’d never have to return to Claire’s house again, or be bothered by her, so long as she wished; and that started with Claire’s unknowing admittance to Belmont Hills.
A knock at my door caught my attention, redirecting it to the arched brow of an unimpressed Lina.
“Mr. Jones,” she stuck her chin up, attempting to meet mine as I rose from my seat.
