by Maxene Novak
Max nodded slowly. He called Izzy into the kitchen and handed off the bowl of yogurt. “I appreciate your advice, though, Gabby. I would’ve gone crazy trying to deal with this all on my own.”
A silence washed over the kitchen as Max began preparing breakfast for himself. He was torn between minding his business and asking Louisa what was going on. He’d seen it with his mother how people shrugged off their situation and explained away something as heinous as abuse. He didn’t think he could stomach seeing Louisa try and brush off the fact that the person she cared about had left such ugly marks on her.
At the same time, he knew what silence could do to something like this. If he kept this to himself, his complacency would further lead Louisa down a pathway of loneliness. As much as he hated feeling like he was overstepping boundaries, he hated the idea that he was turning a blind eye to abuse even more. Reluctantly, he made up his mind. He’d have to talk to her, for his own sanity if not hers.
Lunch with the Nannies was more of the same old routine. Since he’d moved here almost two months ago, he’d come to really appreciate the company of some of the women. Standing up to Claudette had earned him a loyal friend in Shelby, and with Megan and Yolanda in his corner, he didn’t actually hate going to the café with them nearly every morning. This morning was different, though.
He smiled at Louisa as she pulled up a chair beside his, determined not to look down at where he’d seen the bruises. “Hey,” she said breathlessly.
“Hey! Glad you’re here today,” he smiled. They gave the waitress their orders and got caught up with the other ladies there. Claudette was notably missing, and when he asked about it, her close friend Joan told him that she’d gotten sick and Joan had volunteered to take her kids to school.
When Joan brought out her phone and began showing everyone a funny video she’d seen on Facebook the night before, Max excused himself. He motioned for Louisa to follow him. With a confused look on her face, she stood up and made her way to the back of the café with him. “What’s up?” she asked once they were alone.
Max looked around nervously. “I didn’t want to bring it up with the girls around, but…”
“But?”
“But when you came over to the pool, I saw something that made me uncomfortable.”
“It’s the way I eat, isn’t it? I’m a messy eater, I know,” she laughed.
He shook his head. “No, it’s not that. I mean, yeah, messy eater, but that’s not what I wanted to talk about. You were leaving, and I saw these bruises on your arm. I didn’t know what they were, and I wanted to ask if you were okay. Is anything going on?” Max tried his hardest to play stupid about the situation. He figured if he came right out and asked if Hector had been hitting her, she’d react negatively. At least this way, she’d be the one taking the conversation towards abuse.
“Um – what bruises?” she asked. She smiled at him and looked away, focusing on the women crowding around the phone in Joan’s hands.
“They were right here,” Max said, reaching out to lightly brush his fingers over the spot on her forearm. She pulled away and looked at him suddenly.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m fine.”
“Louisa,” he sighed. Clearly this wasn’t getting him anywhere. “I know what I saw. I saw marks that looked like someone had grabbed you by the arm. Hard. Hector isn’t hurting you, is he? Because if he is, you can tell me.”
“Look, Max, I appreciate what you think you’re doing, but this really isn’t any of your business. I told you my situation with Hector is complicated for a reason. I don’t need you butting in and making things bigger than they really are. We got into a heated discussion and I said something I shouldn’t have. He reacted the way he did because of me.”
It hurt Max’s heart to see that she blamed herself for his reactions. This wasn’t okay to him. She wasn’t at fault because he couldn’t keep his cool. “No, Louisa, he reacted that way because he doesn’t know how to talk to people without putting his hands on him.”
She narrowed her eyes. “You don’t even know what you’re talking about, Max. You’ve never met him, you don’t know what he does and doesn’t know how to do. And to bring this up to me in public, when we’re with our friends—”
“I’m sorry,” he said, shaking his head, “I should have waited to get you alone. I should have approached this a different way, but I didn’t know how to tell you without upsetting you! I may not know Hector, but I do know that it’s never acceptable for him to do what he did. If you did this to him, I’d be telling you the same thing.”
“If I wanted to talk to you about it, I would have brought it up during the many times we’ve hung out together. I don’t know if you can pick up on social cues or not, but I’ll be more blatant for your sake. I don’t want to talk about this again. Not with you, not with anyone else. This is my business, and I’d appreciate it if you kept your nose out of it.” Louisa folded her arms and looked back at the girls, a scowl on her face.
Max took a deep breath and dropped his eyes. She wasn’t going to listen to him. She’d made it loud and clear that she didn’t want his help. He wanted to reach out and hug her. He wanted to fix her problems. He wanted to shake her hard and make her see that what she was going through shouldn’t have been happening to her. Instead, he nodded slowly.
“I’m sorry. It wasn’t my place to bring it up. I won’t talk about it again,” he said softly.
“Thank you. Can we go back to eating now?”
He nodded. Louisa eased the anger on her face and smiled as she walked back to the women at the table. They questioned where the two of them had been and Louisa quickly covered for them, informing the ladies that Max had some girl questions about a woman he’d met. Despite his sour mood, Max appreciated her lie. He didn’t have the energy to come up with something on his own.
He picked at his food silently, working through everything that she’d said. In Louisa’s eyes, this was something that Hector did because of her. He couldn’t wrap his head around the kind of mental gymnastics a person would have to go through in order to rationalize something as crazy as that. It wasn’t that hard to believe, though. His own mother had fallen victim to that mentality. To this day, he wished he’d been able to keep Renee safe.
But what could he do all those years ago? With his parents’ divorce and his mother’s struggle with her new boyfriend Javier, he had been a complete wreck. He felt powerless to protect the one person he trusted more than anything else. Thankfully a friend had come to her rescue and helped kick the man out.
Louisa had told him to mind his business, but he couldn’t. This wasn’t a normal situation. She wasn’t dating an emotionally unavailable man that would let her down hard. This was someone who hit her and left bruises on her when he lost his temper. This was an abuser so good at his job that he’d convinced his victim that she’d done this to herself. He couldn’t sit quiet and watch her blame herself. His mother had needed a friend, and it was becoming clear to Max that Louisa needed one as well. He was up for the task.
Twelve
By the end of the week, Max wasn’t in any better of a mood. He’d been around Louisa every day, and though she didn’t act like it, he knew she was still mad at him. He tried his hardest to keep their conversations light and far away from Hector and that entire ordeal. For a moment, Max had hope that they might actually be repairing what he’d broken, but this morning, she’d declined his offer to go out for dinner and he was certain that was only because of what he’d done. He knew her schedule. She had nothing to do after her bosses got off work.
He opened the front door for Izzy and followed her in, drained from the day. She made up for his lack of energy by running straight for the kitchen and grabbing a cheese stick from the cooler. She began opening it and telling Drew all about her busy day.
“Wow, it sounds like you had a lot of fun at school today, huh?” he said, glancing up at Max as he took a seat at the bar.
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��Oh yeah! Me and Trinity got to be the line leaders and everyone had to follow us. It was the coolest ever.” She smiled at the memory and tore pieces of cheese off. Drew chuckled at her enthusiasm and pecked her on the head.
“What about you, Max? How was your day?”
He looked up at Drew and shrugged. “It was… pretty bad, if I’m being completely honest.” Drew’s brows went up.
“Bad? What’s going on?”
“I can’t really talk about it with, y’know…” He looked at Izzy. She was completely unaware to the conversation, happily munching on her snack. Drew nodded.
“Hey, Izzy Bear, can you go play in the living room? Max and I need to talk about grown up stuff, okay?”
“Okay, Daddy!” She hopped up and ran to the living room. Drew waited until he heard the TV turn on before he said,
“What’s going on?”
“It’s this situation with my friend Louisa. She’s part of the Nannies, and she’s the one I have the closest friendship with. Well, the one I had the closest friendship with. She’s pissed at me for something I said on Monday and I just want to fix it all. I feel like an idiot, and I’m also mad that she’s even mad at me in the first place.”
“Well, what did you say?” Drew asked.
Max debated retelling the story to Drew. Louisa had specifically told him that she didn’t want anyone else talking about her business. At the same time, Drew and Louisa had never interacted. There was no way she’d find out that he even talked about this with someone. He sighed.
“She’s got a boyfriend that roughs her up. I don’t know how badly he does, but I saw bruises on her arm a while ago, and on Monday, I asked her about it. Gabby told me it was best to just be upfront and ask her what was going on. I thought that was best too, but apparently not, because Louisa told me to mind my own business and stop worrying about something that has nothing to do with me. And she’s still mad at me for bringing it up.” Max couldn’t help but notice how silly this all sounded. She’s mad and I’m mad that she’s mad, he said to himself. Still, it upset him that she was acting this way.
“That sounds… messy as fuck,” Drew said finally, the corner of his mouth pulling up into a smile. “I mean, I can understand why she’s mad that you asked about it, but you clearly weren’t doing it for any other reason than to be a good friend. If she was being a good friend too, she’d recognize that you were only ever looking out for her.”
“That’s what I’m saying!” Max exclaimed, trying to keep himself from shouting.
“I honestly don’t know what to tell you, Max. I would say give her time, but I’m assuming you haven’t brought it up since then and she’s still mad at you. Maybe give her some more time to work this out? Who knows, maybe you pointing it out will help her realize that she can’t hide this and she’ll finally do something about Hector.” Drew sounded hopeful, but Max was skeptical. His situation didn’t have an easy way out, and he hated that fact.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” Max sighed. He put his face in his hands and sighed once more. This was too much for him. He wasn’t the kind of person that could let conflict linger in the air. All his life, he’d been the person to step up to the plate and make amends with someone else, even if he were in the right. Louisa wasn’t looking to make amends just yet, and anticipation and anxiety bloomed in Max’s stomach because of that.
“It may not be a solution to those problems, but I have an idea on how you can relax,” Drew shrugged.
“What do you propose?” Max lifted his head from his hands.
“Well, Gabby has a conference that she needs to attend out of town, and Izzy and I are going with her. We thought, if you wanted, you could come with us. It’ll just be for the weekend. We’re leaving tonight once Gabby gets home from work. It’ll be like a break for you since I’ll be looking after Izzy while we’re there. If you’re not into road trips, though, you can just stay here. You’ll have the house to yourself that way.”
Max thought over his options. While it would be nice to have this huge home all to himself, he’d certainly miss spending time with Izzy and the Nobles. The decision was clear. “I’d love to go with you guys. Should I go start packing?”
“Probably,” Drew grinned. “I meant to ask you earlier, but it slipped my mind.”
“It’s no big deal, just give me an hour and I’ll be good to go.” Max stood up and headed for the door. “Thank you for inviting me, by the way. I appreciate the offer.”
“It’s the least we could do.”
Max smiled and walked up to his bedroom. He grabbed one of his empty duffle bags and began sorting through his closet looking for three outfits for the weekend. Packing wasn’t his favorite thing, but if it meant he’d get to spend the weekend by the pool with someone else washing the sheets, serving the food, and taking care of the hotel room, he’d gladly suffer through packing for that.
As he zipped up his bag, he heard the garage door open. He walked to the window and looked out to see Gabby pulling into the garage. He slung the bag over his shoulder and headed down to greet her.
“Hey!” she said, smiling when she spotted him coming down the stairs. She gave him a quick hug and took note of the bag. “Glad you’re coming with us.”
“It was too good of an offer to resist,” he chuckled. He followed Drew out to her car and began filling the trunk with all of the bags. In a matter of minutes, they had everything stuffed inside. Max closed the trunk door and looked up at Drew, his head tilting.
“We make a good team.”
“We do,” he smiled. He considered leaning down to kiss Max but held back when Gabby and Izzy came out of the house. He rubbed Max’s side and headed to the driver’s seat. Max climbed into the backseat with Izzy, amused at all the toys that she’d brought with her. The backseat was going to look like her bedroom in no time. Gabby pulled her seatbelt across her chest and turned to Drew.
“All ready to go.”
The trip to Vegas wasn’t bad at all. Max much preferred flying places, but this road trip was actually pretty pleasant. He and Izzy took turns playing games on his phone while Gabby and Drew put on episodes of their favorite podcast to pass the time. They made it to Vegas just before ten o’clock. The hotel they’d reserved was beautiful, and Max took a moment just to look up at it in awe. In all the times he’d been to America, he’d never been to Las Vegas. He’d have to come back more often if it was always this gorgeous.
They checked into their rooms, and to his surprise, Max had his own room with a king size bed. He’d been expecting to share a bed with Drew to save money, but it was clear that they’d been planning ahead just in case he wanted to come.
Max put his bag on his bed and walked to the window to look out at everything. The lights were almost blinding but he loved them all the same. He pulled his phone out and began snapping pictures. His fingers poised themselves to send the pictures to Louisa. He grit his teeth and put the phone away.
Rather than letting the sourness take over, Max opened the door joining his room and the Nobles’ room and walked to Izzy’s bed. She sat with her dolls in her hands, making them fight to the death. “Where’d your mommy and daddy go?” he asked.
“Daddy’s in the bathroom, and Mommy went to go get dinner. She said we get to have burgers!” Gabby was normally quite picky about what Izzy ate. It wasn’t hard for Max to imagine that burgers and fries were like Christmas morning to the little girl. Before he could say anything, Drew opened the door and motioned for Max to join him. He excused himself and hurried over to see what Drew wanted.
Drew closed the door once they were both inside the steamy bathroom. Max tried his hardest but couldn’t resist looking over the man’s damp body. A white towel hung loose around his hips, and his skin glimmered with drops of water that he’d missed.
“Um… what’s up?” he asked. Drew didn’t say anything. He stepped forward and pressed his lips to Max’s, one hand sliding around his waist to pull him close. With all the stre
ss he’d been going through, Max allowed himself to enjoy this. He’d spent the past week walking on eggshells and trying not to upset Louisa. The least he deserved was a few moments with Drew, hungrily kissing him.
“I’ve wanted to do that for the past five hours,” Drew said once they parted. He pressed his forehead to Max’s.
“Why?”
“Something about you, Max… You’re kind. You want to do good. And that’s so fucking hot to me.”
Max blushed and dipped his head, pressing kisses along Drew’s shoulder. They remained this close until the door to the hotel room opened and Gabby returned with dinner. She began handing out the food, smiling as the boys exited the bathroom together. That night, Max ate and watched a movie with the Nobles. Izzy fell asleep the moment she ate her last French fry. Drew paused the movie to tuck her in, then returned to his spot. Max lie between the two of them, nothing on his mind but the happiness and peace he felt.
It felt nice to be between the two of them. Between two people he knew that cared about him and that he cared about as well. When the movie ended, he was a bit reluctant to return to his room. He pecked each of them on the lips and dragged himself back to his bed. Once he put his head down on his pillow, though, he was out cold.
In the morning, Max woke to complete silence. It was a strange feeling. Usually he woke to his alarm, or on the weekends, the sound of Izzy and Drew loudly playing out in the backyard. Instead of all of that, he sat up and rubbed his eyes, the silence of his room calming. He wrapped a robe around himself and knocked on the door to Drew and Gabby’s room. He heard Drew tell him it was okay to come in.
He found Drew on the bed in a pair of underwear, a book in his hands. He put the book down and looked up at Max. “Good morning.”
“Morning,” Max said. He crawled across the bed towards Drew. “Where are Gabby and Izzy?”