Hardest to Love

by Sidney Ivens

  “It’s all you. Not him, you.”

  “Wait. I’m getting to that.” Chris traced the watery glass ring on the countertop with a slow finger. “One thing guys can’t put up with, and that’s feeling sad. We’ll do almost anything to avoid it. We’ll joke, get mad. Drink. He’s sad because he’s afraid he’ll fail. Maybe he thinks he already has. I know how that feels.”

  “You haven’t—”

  “Don’t.” He lifted a hand. “Don’t rush in with reassurances. It makes it worse like momma’s going to make it all better. A man’s got to feel like a man. Not half a man. Nick would hire me in a heartbeat if that place was kicking ass.”

  Her phone chirped. Although turned over on its back, the light glowed at the edges.

  He rested an elbow on the counter and raised an eyebrow.

  Another round of chirps vibrated her cell.

  He took another sip of Coke. “Could be Auntie Rob.”

  “We both know who it is.”

  “For the love of Pete. Answer the damn thing, before I do.”

  She flipped it over to several light blue text balloons from Tiffany. She started scrolling.

  First one:

  CALL ME

  Second:

  ELENA, R U THERE?

  Third try:

  WE MUST TALK. URGENT.

  She texted back.

  WHAT’S UP?

  The reply text:

  CALL ME NOW

  Elena excused herself and went to the women’s restroom, where she closed the mud-brown stall door with a clatter. Why she did this eluded her; the space was narrow, unpleasant. Probably because the conversation that was about to take place felt secretive. Elena stared at the painted-over cement block wall, at the milky residue streaking the black lid of the toilet. She shuddered. When had any of these surfaces last seen an antiseptic?

  Tiffany answered on the first ring. “Thank God. I can’t talk any sense into Nick, and I could barely hear him. He’s at his father’s loud-ass bar, and by the sound of it, they’re about to sacrifice animals.”

  “He’s at the new place?”

  “No. Downtown. Said something about the prodigal returning.”

  Cold prickled up her spine. Prodigal, that meant a humbling. A return. Lexi still managed that location. God knew what might happen.

  “I pulled off a miracle. I got him into NEW EATS.”

  The contest tomorrow night. Elena’s head spun. Today had been such a rollercoaster. “How?”

  “One of the finalists was disqualified.”

  “Disqualified? Why?”

  “Lexi’s behind it, that’s what I think. Anyway, I remembered what you said, about Nick taking on his father. So I pitched it to the producers, and they love the idea of father versus son.”

  Oh, God. No. No.

  “It’s a reality show format,” Tiffany continued. “And they need to ramp up the conflict to make it more interesting. More watchable.”

  His father could be setting some kind of trap, a way to publicly humiliate him. Certainly Lexi was capable of it. “Tiffany. He’ll hate this.”

  “Uh, yeah. He told me as much. Using several colorful words, as only he can. It’s too bad because they’ve added fifty thousand as an incentive to the winner and a vendor’s offering an additional ten thou in new restaurant equipment. More sponsors have jumped aboard, and it’ll be televised on local cable. Any person with half a brain would jump at this chance, but Nick’s being an idiot. Marc’s always got excuses for him . . . “

  Marc, Marc. Who was Marc? Oh, yes, Cos.

  “The only reason I’m trying to help is because of my husband. He thought you could go over there and talk some sense into him.” She let out a long breath. “Elena?”

  “We had a fight.”

  “Oh.” A pause. “Is it another girl? I told Marc it would only be a matter of time.”

  That hurt, and she wasn’t sure why, that Tiffany would assume the worst of him. “No.” The alarm went off her phone, the alert about the taxi. “I’ve got to go.”

  ”What should I do? I’m not sending Marc over to that nightclub brothel to talk sense into him.”

  “I can’t. I’m flying out tonight on a business trip. He shouldn’t be there, either, because he’s opening Monday.”

  “Right, I’d forgotten, and he didn’t even mention it. Well. His loss. Guess they’ll have to get another substitute.”

  They exchanged goodbyes and Elena pressed “end.”

  She rejoined Chris and the other men in the main section of the VFW hall, feeling oddly defeated. Her brother looked up from his drained Coke.

  She briefed him on what Tiffany had said and decisively tied the ends of her scarf. “C’mon. I’m cutting it close.”

  He wrinkled his nose and narrowed his eyes. “Wait. You’re not going to get him?”

  “I can’t risk my job.”

  “He’s got a shot at the one contest he came up with, the contest he wanted so bad?” He yelled over to the bartender. “Which route is quickest to downtown?”

  Her breathing felt constricted as though big fists had closed around both lungs. Her brother couldn’t go. Michigan Avenue traffic on a Thursday night? Horns honking, all the lights, careless people ignoring crosswalk signals and walking into turning vehicles. He couldn’t navigate that mess. “All of this stinks, Chris. Lexi and his father might be setting some kind of trap for him with that contest. A way to make Nick look bad.”

  “All the more reason for him to enter.” Chris pushed his hands through his camo jacket sleeves. “He can prove to himself he can compete.”

  “His father owns hundreds of hotels and restaurants. He knows that business inside and out.”

  “What are you saying, that Nick has zero chance?” He flapped up his collar. “Sure, this will test him. Either he believes in his place and food, or he doesn’t. Nick believes, doesn’t he?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do you believe?”

  I don’t know. I don’t. Her throat felt parched. If she spoke, she’d croak like that Pacman frog.

  “Are you the fair-weather girlfriend, Leen? Only stick around when he can wine and dine you, when it’s easy?”

  “That’s not fair.”

  “Nothing’s fair. Nothing.” Chris shrugged deeper into his coat and zipped it up. “He can’t go back to his dad. That’s like us going to live with Mom. I understand you’re happy about your new job and you’re doing great. But he’s been side-swiped. Decimated. In my unit, one of my guys gets into trouble, I’m right there, I’ve got his back. I don’t need to think about how it’ll impact my journey. When you serve, you’re all on the journey together.”

  “It’s different between men and women. And I have had his back. Has he had mine?”

  “Now you sound like those women in your class. Sometimes you give more, sometimes he will. You’re too careful, Leen. Too goddamn careful. Sometimes you gotta be the one to hold out your hand first.”

  Chris headed out the door, and she chased after him, her coat whipped open by the wind, March roaring in like a lion.

  Division One greeted her with the noisy teeth of a casino ready to consume her. Every sense was assaulted—the thick smell of competing colognes and sweat, pulsating music, lights. The surfaces gleamed, from the shiny counters to the glittery girls to the gold money clips in the hands of young men peeling back twenties and hundreds.

  Elena wanted to press her hands to her ears. How different she was from this hookup hub, in her plain coat and mittens. She felt like the last piece of straw moving through tinsel.

  There he was, in a corner booth with cognac-colored leather seats and a dark table. Two women flanking him. He’d changed clothes, going back to his sleek player attire, expensive suit, white business shirt open at the throat. One of his long legs hung out from underneath the table, sheathed in crisp slacks. His pointed dress shoe contrasted with a silver stiletto belonging to a redhead. He looked Mad Men rumpled, very sexy. His arms extend
ed across the back of the seat, around both women, fingers absently playing with long strands of red silky hair.

  His natural habitat.

  In the wool coat, she overheated, face and neck burning, stunned he could do this to them. Still, she kept her feet anchored to the floor.

  “Elena, darling,” Nick said, a little slurred. His eyes were hooded, and a scruff of a beard darkened his jaw. In front of him sat a Jameson bottle and tiny metallic purses belonging to the women.

  “What are you doing here?”

  His eyes sobered for a moment. “I thought I was making things better for us.”

  Making things better with two girls? Elena strove for calm, when she wanted to reach for the bottle and strike him over the head.

  He took another sip of liquor. “Obviously you disapprove.”

  “You open Monday.”

  “I don’t possibly see how. Hagin turned me down.” He winked and bit back another drink. “You’re going to miss your plane.”

  “Hire someone else.”

  “Futile. As Lexi the conqueress says, the match bell’s gone off.”

  “Is she going to be your boss now?”

  “Ah-ah-ah, sarcasm, Elena. No. First she’s making the contest folks miserable.” The green bottle made a clonk as he sloshed more whiskey into an old-fashioned glass.

  “They’ve added fifty thousand to the winnings. Equipment, too. Equipment you could use. You can pull it off. Both the contest and the opening on Monday.”

  “I met my quota for humiliations, thank you.” He raised the glass to his lips and drank, his Adam’s apple moving with one clean gulp. Ice cubes clinked as he returned the glass to the table. “I’m cutting my losses while I can still liquidate and get some of my investment back.” His bloodshot eyes fixed on her. “Isn’t that what you’re doing? Mulling over our little separation time?”

  “That’s not your wife, is it?” The blonde seated to his right cocked her head. She wore a leather jacket and a neon green halter. Her breasts looked like cantaloupes spaced wide apart on the shelf.

  “I’m allergic to the term,” he said. “Allergic to her cat, too.”

  “He burned all her photos.” Elena yanked off her plaid scarf to release some of the trapped heat around her neck. “He’ll erase you, too.”

  “Erase me. That’s a little Lifetime Channel, isn’t it? For fuck’s sake, take off your coat already.”

  “I’m not staying. I don’t fit in here. You don’t, either. Not anymore.”

  Laughing, he leaned back against the seat and curled a blond hair around his finger. “Then you’re not getting the message.”

  “Not impressed with the act, Nick. Not at all. All this—crap.”

  “Is she calling me crap?” The redhead balked.

  “Shh,” Nick said. “The nice lady’s pleading her case.”

  Obnoxious, stubborn—He wanted her to lose it. Shaking from adrenaline, she gulped down her fury and hurt. “Not impressed. Wasn’t fazed by the Bond car. Or that almighty Z.”

  “That Z’s a Goliath logo.” He nodded up at the wall, at the Zaccardi symbol lined in gold. “And Goliaths rule business.”

  She moved toward them, fanned out both hands on the table and leaned in. ”Then get your sling. Find it.”

  “Oh, now that’s her schoolmarm’s voice. Elena’s prim and proper. A lady. Except with me.”

  Instantly she knew he meant their sexual tempest hours ago. He’d picked her up and thrown her over his shoulder, fireman style, and tossed her onto the bed, her landing with a bounce, him laughing and climbing on top of her. Then, his mouth and hands and tongue were everywhere, and her resistance dissolved. She’d drowned in a liquid fire, her legs falling apart in spasms. She could feel him inside her, thrusting, moving, the exquisite friction. They were too different, and yet that made them so right, so exciting.

  His eyes burned into hers.

  A giggle came from one of the women. “I’m no lady.” The blonde snickered. “And men love that about me.”

  Nick broke their intense eye contact. “Good for you.” He turned to tap the end of the blonde’s nose. “Good that you’re better than us. Be tougher. That outlook, hey. I love it when girls buy me drinks. When they show the initiative and don’t expect flowers or candlelight . . . or heroes. Hookups. Tinder. Suited. Me. Fine. But she’s one of those sensitive types. The caring type. Wears it right here.” He tugged at his sleeve. “Cares about her aunt. Cares about her brother getting a job. Cares when I don’t give him one.” He wiped a careless hand across his mouth. “And I made a mistake.” Shoulders hunched forward, he gripped the glass, and his dark head lowered. “I started to care back.”

  “Nick.”

  He stared at her, glassy-eyed. Waited. God, he wasn’t making this easy, sitting between two gorgeous girls, one practically gluing her breasts to his arm. But he was acting, Elena knew it.

  Sometimes you’ve got to hold out your hand first.

  “I—I—” Care, too. I love you. I love you so much. Too much. She was choking on it, all the words she planned on saying, do you believe, yes, I believe, answering what Chris had asked. She was going to make stirring proclamations, that she had his back, that she’d be there, but the words wedged in her throat. Two strange girls like harem bookends to his arms, how could she? She wrung her hands, twisting the ends of her scarf. The weight of her purse straps over her shoulder seemed heavier. And then she swallowed, relieved she’d kept control. She hadn’t said anything stupid or lost her temper and leaped for his throat, to claw at him, scream, what the hell are you doing to us?

  She exhaled a ragged breath. She hadn’t, though. Hadn’t lost anything. She hadn’t sacrificed her pride by telling him she loved him, when he didn’t want to hear it, and this was the last place to say it.

  The air was thick, and she blinked several times to clear her eyes.

  The raw fatigue on his face went right to her stomach. The pain he’d hidden came up to the surface for only seconds before retreating to its reliable crawlspace under that handsome facade. No cracks, just smooth, practiced arrogance.

  A chill ran down her spine. Maybe she’d lost everything.

  From her purse pouch, her phone screen lit up. She pulled it out. Dustin’s number.

  “Go catch your plane, Elena.” His eyes widened, in a moment that seemed to sober him up, as bracing as a hard slap. Eyebrows drawn together in a scowl, he grabbed the bottle by its throat, clanked the neck against the rim of the old-fashioned glass, pouring more whiskey. “It’s okay,” he said quietly. “Some of us get used to wire monkeys.”

  The airport taxi idled in their drive. The driver loaded Dustin’s dark green luggage into the trunk. Her carry-on was next.

  “Elena Glynn,” Aunt Robbie called out, running from the porch, so distraught that she hadn’t zipped her navy puff jacket. She stuffed her bare hands under her armpits and bobbed on her slipper-covered feet. “What on earth is going on? Chris is upset and won’t talk. You’re leaving without saying goodbye.”

  Elena brushed aside a few gray hairs and kissed the curve of her aunt’s forehead. “I’ll explain after I check into my hotel room.”

  “It’s Nick, isn’t it?”

  Her breath hitched in. Can’t cry again. Won’t cry. Won’t. She’d fixed her eye makeup twice already. If she didn’t get into that taxi, she’d start to blubber, and she would not risk her professionalism in front of her boss. She’d put it into jeopardy being so late.

  “The neighbor’s daughter dropped by. Did Chris tell you?”

  The horn beeped.

  “She brought a box of Nick’s mother’s things.”

  “I’ve got to go.” With a final wave, Elena got into the mid-row seat next to Dustin and snapped on the seatbelt. She kept her head still, eyes straight ahead, refusing to look back at her aunt.

  The driver wasted no time maneuvering the van around the streets and then merging onto the expressway. Thankfully the commute to O’Hare shouldn’t be too d
ifficult, since most of the rush hour traffic had cleared. Even the slightest delay could make them miss their flight.

  “I’m so sorry I was late, Dustin.” He and the taxi driver had waited forty minutes.

  His face was tight as he tapped fingers on the armrest. “Once we check in our luggage and clear TSA, we’ll be good.”

  The taxi driver wove around a box truck decorated with a sombrero, a hot sauce ad. More cars and trucks chugged ahead.

  Dustin stuffed his gloves into the top zipper pocket of his small canvas carry-on. Lifted his rear-end from the seat and brought out his wallet from his back pocket. “I’ll cover his tip.”

  “Okay.” Outside, she caught a glint of silver, headlights behind them hitting the guard rail.

  He withdrew a five and some singles and raised up again, about to return the wallet to its pocket, but the taxi swerved, and he braced himself on the back of the driver’s seat. The plastic wallet insert fell from the wallet, and out tumbled an accordion of photos.

  She picked it up from the floor, glancing over the grinning faces and family poses. “How many?”

  The skin around his eyes crinkled, and he slipped the photos and wallet back into place. “Third’s on the way. A boy. We’ll never sleep again.”

  “Do you have a name picked yet?”

  Again he smiled. “Something has to be a surprise for the grandparents.”

  A newborn. Was there anything more heavenly than baby skin, soft and sweet, their wispy hair and pudgy little fingers? She remembered Nick’s expression when she held Tiffany’s little girl, a mix of terror and shock and maybe a little awe.

  It was quiet in the taxi, a blessed contrast to Division One’s noise. She loathed the idea of him in the loud bar, his head lowered like that, the hollow rings under his eyes. Others would congratulate her on her independence, putting her career first. Show him what you think of him, sandwiched between those girls. Rather than feeling exhilarated or empowered, she’d felt callous leaving him there.

  She massaged her temples. It’s your turn now. For years, she pushed aside her career to help her aunt and brother; she wouldn’t sacrifice this job. Smart women lived on their own terms. Their men supported them, they didn’t get drunk or flaunt other women.