by Daryl Banner
I smile for the first time in hours. I don’t quite know when it happens, but I shut my reddened eyes, and suddenly I’m falling asleep against Elijah’s chest, letting go of my living nightmare and desperate for a sweet dream to replace it.
When the morning finds me, I open my eyes to discover Elijah gone and a cloud of indistinct murmuring and crowd noise in his wake. I blink a bunch of times, confused, then push myself out of bed and stumble out of my room to investigate.
Elijah is fully dressed and ready for his day, but he’s frozen by the front door, wide-eyed.
I rub more sleep out of my eyes. “What’s wrong?”
“Dude …” Elijah faces me. “Paparazzi, everywhere. Reporters. Journalists. The whole fuckin’ city.”
I’m wide awake in an instant, rushing to his side to look out the peephole in our door.
To my terror, he isn’t lying; there are reporters, cameramen, photographers, and journalists crowded right outside our door and pouring into the street.
I pull away to gape at my roommate. “You are not going out in that.”
He nods quickly. “Agreed. I’ll be eaten alive.”
“And I’ll be dessert.”
He frowns. “But I want to be the dessert.”
I’ve made my way to the couch to flip on the TV, then get the pleasant experience of reliving all of yesterday’s nightmares right before my sleep-deprived eyes. The news channels have censored versions of the photos and videos blasted everywhere. Cameramen are posted just outside of Benjamin’s building, the front of which I recognize all too well. There is crew at the Gage Communications building too, but none are able to get any comments from the people inside.
“What … a … shit show,” moans Elijah, having joined me by the couch.
“I’m at a loss for words. What the fuck do we do? You can’t go to work.”
“Me?” He shakes his head. “You’re not going to just sit here all day feeling sorry for yourself, Trevor.”
I lift an eyebrow. “Um, yeah, I am. I can’t go back into that office. Sorry. There’s no way I can face anyone there ever again. My career there is over.”
“But what about Ben?”
I bite my lip and glance back at the TV. What about Ben? The more I watch the coverage on the TV, the heavier my feelings become. I must be kidding if I think I’ll ever get any career again after this. The bigger picture begins stretching itself over my eyes, darkening my mind to the point that I can’t close my mouth. How can I ever dream to be taken seriously for the rest of my life? Every boss in the world that could hire me would laugh at me, or wait for me to make a move on them, or downright turn me away. No coworker would ever trust me, figuring me to just be an opportunist who screws his way to the top.
I’m ruined in every way possible.
And I think I’ve lost Ben despite it all.
Elijah gets up to check the kitchen windows, which face the front of the apartment. When he pokes a finger through the blinds, he instantly regrets it, the crowd of reporters outside coming to life with shouts and questions and demands. Elijah backs away from the window so fast, he trips over Salamander and crashes onto the floor, the ugly orange creature hissing and tearing across the carpet toward the bedrooms.
I grab the remote and mute the TV, unable to hear any more of it. Then I turn to my roommate, who’s finally managed to peel himself off the floor. “I’m sorry,” I mutter to him. “For all of this.”
“Nah, don’t go taking all the credit for this performance,” he teases me. “Mr. Gage’s ass gets a supporting actor nomination at the very least.”
I stare at my phone, wondering if I should dare try to call Ben. I haven’t heard a peep from him. I wonder if I ever will again.
“You should go to work,” I decide, lifting my gaze to Elijah. “Those vultures out there aren’t here for you. I’ll stay here and try to sort through everything and figure out what I want to do.”
Elijah shakes his head. “Not sure how I feel about that.”
“Go on with the internship, Elijah,” I insist. “Be both of us.”
He glances back at the door, considering it. Then he gives me a confident smirk. “I’ll call you on my lunch break. Then, when all of this dies down—and it will—you and I are going to go out and get some really, really hard drinks.”
I smile, despite my desire to stay in this apartment for months and hide from the world. “Sure,” I force myself to say, my heart not in it. “Really, really hard drinks.”
Elijah slaps me on the back, then picks up his backpack and heads for the door. The moment he opens it, an explosion of noise meets his face, then seconds later is immediately quashed out by the door slamming shut—which I promptly lock behind him.
With the news on mute and the house otherwise silent, all I hear is the distant humming and buzzing of reporters outside. I have to laugh to myself, wondering what the hell their questions could possibly be. “How did Benjamin Gage’s ass taste?” “Was his butt as warm and inviting as you dreamed it would be?” “Does he use Dove soap up his crack or Irish Spring?”
Really, am I that interesting? Is this whole story even that worth the time and attention of all these reporters who could be investigating homicides, kidnappings, corner store shootings, or even what Ms. Becky Buttersworth made for the PTA bake sale?
I stare down at the floor and find Salamander sitting there staring up at me. “Just you and me,” I mutter to the feline, who just twitches his tail, irritated, eyes half-lidded.
Just you, me, and a million vultures at my door.
And Ben … who-knows-where.
45
Benjamin is now his own scandal.
I stare through the car window at the crowd in front of my office building, numbed.
It doesn’t matter how many pretty words I string together, or how I can possibly manage to own the chaos I just inflicted on my company and my poor, unsuspecting coworkers, or what the world must think of me now.
None of it means anything if I can’t get Trevor back.
He isn’t answering any of my texts. He won’t pick up the phone, either. For all that I know, he’s already hightailed it out of town, unable to handle the stress of the invasive cameras. I can’t blame him, either. I brought this on him.
This is my fault. All of it.
How can he possibly forgive me for all of this shit I’ve put him through? It was my idea to pull him into my office. It was my dick that kept pushing us together, even when I’d promised myself to behave. It was me who pursued Trevor, who ignored the email that the Jersey boy Hawk would be arriving several hours earlier than planned, who accidentally hit the button that flipped open the blinds and unveiled us to over a million and a half viewers on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook—all the social media sites.
A million and a half.
Those are numbers that, in any other circumstance, I would frame and slap onto a wall.
But I don’t feel like slapping anything except myself today. I always have things under control, no matter the situation. I’m not the guy who hides to lick his wounds; I stay in the thick of it and suffer under the pressure until the problem is solved.
Yet here I am, clueless as ever, lost in a fog of doubt.
After the whole situation went down and Trevor ran out of the office, the employees were all sent home except for all of my department heads, who gathered for a meeting. Facing them was both easy and difficult—easy because I’d worked with these same people and suffered many missteps and awkward situations with them before, but difficult because I had no answers.
When we realized the media outlets had all been hit with a few videos and pictures, despite Rebekah’s efforts in confiscating and checking phones, it was deduced that the only person who could have been responsible—due to the particular camera angle of all of the leaked media—was Brady, whose efforts were likely intended to spite Trevor. I didn’t waste any more time on him than necessary, assigning the dealing of him to Rebekah and moving on to more important matter
s.
Namely, what this would do to Gage Communications, how to handle the employees and their feelings, and what steps we could take to control the “conversation” on social media. We discussed, we brainstormed, and we made a few decisions. Statements were sent out to the same media outlets that first debuted the material. We apologized, insisted that the scene was not a reflection of how we handle our clients, and the circumstance of the videos was pulled entirely out of context—which hopefully would debase the immediate reaction to the articles and instill doubt in the viewers’ and readers’ minds.
The effect, if anything, backfired. The comments sections filled up with some of the nastiest things that can be said about a person. My business was likened to a whorehouse of boys, all of whom are required to sexually please me or be tossed to the curb. My character has been mocked, spat on, and slathered with exaggerations of what really happened, with misquotes of things I apparently said in some past interview, and with outright lies.
Now I’m really in the game of salvaging a ruined public image. This time, it’s my own scandal.
“Are you ready?” asks Ian from the front seat.
I shift uncomfortably, then give him a curt nod.
Fighting through a crowd of snapping cameras, accusations, shouted questions, and screams is something I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy. And there is no way to shield your ears from the onslaught of terrible names, ridicule, and scathing mockery. And there is no way to shield your eyes from the looks of disgust, from the hardened eyes of greedy reporters, from the large circular eyes of cameras as they aim, focus, and flash.
Then it’s over as quickly as it started, the door to the building closing at my back.
Today is a day I am not looking forward to.
But when I step into the main office, I’m taken aback by what I see. Hawk, the Jersey boy himself, is sitting on one of the desks in the center of the room with one leg hanging off and the other hugged against his chest. He’s talking to everyone in the room—interns, employees, all of my supervisors—and making them laugh, making them listen, and speaking with an unexpected eloquence about his words. I almost don’t recognize who he is for a while as I stare and try to make sense of the scene.
He spots me, then interrupts himself to shout, “Well there he is, the boss man Benjamin himself! Give your boss a big round of applause, folks.”
Everyone in the room is led into loud, excited applause, all their eyes on me. I blink, completely confused by the scene before me. Why does Hawk have all of my employees gathered, why is he still here in town, and what the hell is he telling them?
I clear my throat. “Would anyone like to explain to me what this is all about?”
“You,” answers Hawk simply, crossing his arms.
I lift my eyebrows patiently, then spread my hands. “Can we elaborate a little more?”
Hawk turns to the others in the room, cocky as ever, his eyes bright and his chin lifted with authority. “Can anyone tell me what the first thing is that comes to your mind when you think of the great and infamous Benjamin Gage?”
For a moment, the office is silent. Then, like a bird chirping in a nest, tiny, almost not there, the intern Ashlee speaks up. “He’s bold. He’s confident. He makes no apologies.”
“Fuck yeah!” agrees Hawk. “Anything else?”
One of my guys at the computers, Rob, speaks next. “He is unconventional in how he deals with celebrity scandals.”
“His methods are unpredictable,” puts in Lacy, another office worker, an inspired smile on her face. “He is brilliant. He is sharp. He is relentless.”
Hawk nods. “That’s right. You got it.”
“He’s a bad ass motherfucker,” shouts one of the interns, inspiring a tittering of excited laughter in the room. “He doesn’t answer to anyone. People answer to him.”
“And,” Hawk puts in, “when photos of his ass—which is a really beautiful ass, by the way, it’s like a fucking Rembrandt—make headlines twice in the same week, what does a bad ass motherfucker like Benjamin Gage do?”
“Sends them a third,” calls out another employee.
“He posts his workout routine and tells the world what kind of beef you gotta eat to get an ass like that,” states Julian, his voice deep and masculine, inspiring a wave of laughter.
“He owns the fucking web!” throws in Samantha, then lifts her eyes, surprised at her own outburst. “Wow. He really does own the web.”
Hawk faces me finally, a proud smile spreading across his face. “That sounds more like the Benjamin Gage I know.”
I purse my lips, studying the faces in the room as they look back at me. After skimming so many ugly posts and comments and remarks overnight, the effect of seeing so many friendly, warm, hopeful, inspired faces is humbling.
“Well then,” I say, straightening up my spine and taking a cue from Hawk as I address the room. “What’re we doing sitting on our asses when we got work to do?”
The room cheers, erupting into a wave of enthusiastic banter as everyone starts splitting off, asking the supervisors questions, consuming the computers and the boards and the desks. Life and morale is restored to the office in an instant, and I feel the first flicker of hope burst inside my heart. Maybe everything isn’t lost.
Except one thing.
Hawk struts up to me, proud of himself. “I couldn’t leave town after seeing your pitiful apologies online,” he explains. “I may not have the expertise and the finesse that you do, but I have more to thank you for than anyone else in the world. You’re the only person who puts up with my shit. I figure the least I owe you in return is my support.”
I nod appreciatively. “Thanks a lot, Hawk. But this still doesn’t solve the fact that I’m a—how did they word it?—power-toting monster who took advantage of an innocent waif who worked in my office, abusing my authority.”
Hawk tilts his head. “Well, he’s not just some little ‘innocent waif’, though, is he? Hell, you took him to Mexico. You worked together for weeks here. There’s a fuck of a lot more going on between you two. I heard the story from your supervisors when you gave them the 4-1-1 yesterday after clearing the office.”
I nod. “The last thing Trevor is to me is some kid I dicked with. He means … everything to me.” I can’t believe I’m speaking so openly about all of this to a cocky teenage pop star, who pays me to babysit his image.
“Then the world needs to see that,” Hawk states. “What the hell did I just get done proving to your whole staff? Own it, Benny. Own all of it. Own this business, own your brand, and own what you got going on between you and this Trevor kid.”
I give Hawk an assured nod, feeling more motivated now than ever. “You may have just saved me, Jersey kid.”
Hawk chuckles at that. “After how many times you came to save my ass after I kept pissing on your advice? I owe you.”
The electricity of inspiration rushes up my veins. With a glance over my office, watching all of my employees hard at work and brainstorming new, brilliant ideas, I dive right in, answering questions and getting straight to work on managing the situation. Instead of burying myself in my office, I’m on the floor fielding the activity and engaging with my staff more in the space of two hours than I do normally in a whole month.
I’ve never felt more alive.
But there is still that hole in me that no amount of work can fill. I have to come to a decision about what I’m going to do about Trevor, and I think I know what it is.
When half the interns are at lunch—including the one I need to speak to—I make my way for the break room. The conversation they’re all having across the tables, however, brings me to pause at the entrance.
“I mean, it’s not that I think less of Trevor necessarily, but if I knew that Mr. Gage was fair game, I might’ve flirted a bit harder this whole time,” teases Brandon.
“Agreed, me too,” shoots out Isaac, inspiring a couple of the other guys to laugh. “I mean, I don’t swing that way, but hey, f
or a little recognition from the boss, I could stand taking a trip to Mexico and playing the role.”
“At least Trevor was smart about it and did everything behind the scenes,” Caleb throws in. “I had no idea. None.”
Quite suddenly, Elijah slams his hands down on the table and rises from his chair. “None of you know what the fuck you’re talking about. None of you!” he shouts, silencing the room at once. He takes a deep breath, then goes on in a calmer voice. “Trevor doesn’t have a mean or manipulative bone in his whole skinny-ass body. Trevor met Mr. Gage before he even knew who he was. Their connection was real, and it tormented Trevor for weeks when he found out who he really was. I can’t imagine it was any easier for Benjamin himself, who had to hide his feelings too. Who the hell are we to judge what’s going on between them? Maybe you all fail to notice the intern who is not with us today—the former intern named Brady who wouldn’t think it’s beneath him to seduce Mr. Gage, to ruin Trevor and compromise this business by publically humiliating him, and to leave the office with a smirk on his face. Rest assured, he just buried his own career too, and if you want to sit here and mock Trevor and Benjamin instead of supporting them, then you’re no damned better than Brady.”
The silence in the room is thick after his spiel, an air of deep thoughts cutting through the minds of the other interns.
Finally, Elijah picks up his lunch, then leaves the room. On his way out, he almost crashes into me, not having seen me around the corner of the doorway. “M-Mr. Gage,” he murmurs, surprised.
I nod. “Elijah. How are you?” I ask stiffly.
He gives me a tight-lipped smile and an awkward shrug. “I’m alright, Mr. Gage. Thank you for asking.”
I glance back at the break room, noting that all the employees have gone back to chatting amongst themselves. No one else is around us, so I figure it’s safe enough to be candid with him. “You and I should talk.”
His eyes gloss over. “Us? Why us? What’s wrong?”
I go for humor. “Other than everything?” After a chuckle that earns me nothing, I straighten my face. “Nothing’s wrong, Elijah. But you, most of all, I think I owe an apology to.”