by Nella Tyler
I glared at him with disbelief but was too angry to think of anything to say.
“Look, after I thought about what I said, I felt bad. I mean, we’ve known Mazie all our lives and like it or not, you two should’ve gotten together a long time ago. Now that you’re together, I haven’t seen you this happy since your mother passed. Your old man isn’t the only one who closed himself off after you mom died.”
“What the hell are you talking about? How is this about my mother?”
“It’s not. The point I’m making is that you haven’t had a real relationship with anyone since before your mother passed…not until Mazie. I see that now, and I want you to be happy.”
“Well, I’m miserable…”
“No, you’re not!” he spat, “Get your head out of your ass! My point is that she was excited enough and proud enough of your accomplishment to tell her father about it and isn’t that what you want? You’re always striving to get everyone’s approval, but when you finally get someone who genuinely cares, you act like an ungrateful dick.”
I scoffed at the comment, but in my head, I couldn’t help thinking that perhaps he was right. I did see his point, but I was still far too upset about the situation to warrant an affirmation of the validity of his assessment.
Therefore, I simply remained silent.
Chapter 24
Mazie
Instead of waking up wrapped in Dexter’s arms, I awoke to Mittens annoyingly pawing at my pajamas.
I groaned and tried to push the cat away, but she was persistent and hopped right back to the same spot, this time meowing louder and adding a little bit of claw to her morning ritual.
“Leave me alone, Mittens,” I grumbled, attempting to grab the cat and cuddle with her, trying to assuage my instantly aching heart, but it was to no avail.
Mittens quickly backed out of my embrace, yelling out as though I were trying to kill her.
Instantly, I released her, and she jumped down off the bed, grumbling at my lack of attentiveness.
I knew now I had a few minutes before Mittens would try to get me to wake up again, but it was too late. She had already woken me up enough to fill my head with dreadful memories of the night before.
I felt my heart pound while a nervous lump in my throat formed. I was angry at myself, frustrated and overwhelmed. I didn’t want it to be over between Dexter and me, especially not after the romantic connection I felt between us before my stupid confession.
You should’ve just kept it to yourself, I thought, tossing and turning as though the motion was going to physically shake the thoughts from my mind.
It was no use, however, and the more I thought about it, the worse I felt.
When I heard Mittens coming back to try her luck again, I knew I needed to get out of bed, but I still didn’t want to. The bliss of sleep was still preferred to the guilt I felt bubbling up inside of me.
However, as I felt the slight shift in the weight while Mittens hopped effortlessly onto my bed, I got up before the cat could try to persuade me any further.
“Alright, alright, I’m up!” I groaned, catching a glimpse of the clock. The time was much later than I normally woke up, which made sense as to why Mittens was being so insistent. “I’m sorry,” I told the cat, who was now purring and nuzzling under my chin after coming to the realization she was finally getting what she wanted.
After getting up and feeding Mittens, I started my morning routine of picking up the house and cleaning up.
About halfway through my routine, there was a knock at the door that startled me.
With a fluttering heart, I hoped that it was Dexter, coming back to work things out.
Hurriedly, I ran to the door. My stomach was churning nervously, and my heart was about to leap out of my chest, but I was willing it to be Dexter so much that when I opened it, I could feel the disappointment cascade through me.
“Hi, Laura,” I droned, failing epically at hiding my discontent.
“Umm…hi, I was coming to make sure you were okay. I missed you at yoga yesterday,” she replied cautiously, following me into the house as I turned to get back to my cleaning. “Were you expecting someone else?”
“No,” I sighed, “Not really.”
“Dexter?” Laura surmised.
The sound of his name reverberated through me as though shooting a fresh stake of guilt through my heart.
“Yeah,” I answered, trying to hide the lump of emotion that was forming in my throat, “I think it’s over between us, Laura.”
As I said the words, I turned around to face her, genuinely looking at her for the first time since she arrived.
“Why do you say that?” Laura inquired as a grin of disbelief spread across her features.
With a long sigh and aggravated expression, I focused on keeping my emotions together while I explained what had happened the night before.
As I was telling her all of this, Laura’s face grew more disgusted by the moment.
“Wow…he left and you haven’t heard a thing from him since?” she didn’t give me anytime to respond before she added, “I guess he’s more like his father than he’d like to admit. Don’t worry,” she replied, stepping toward me with an understanding tone in her voice, “He’s a dick. He shouldn’t have got so mad that he left. That’s stupid! What a child!”
“Well, I mean, I did betray his trust,” I replied, not feeling comfortable with her bashing him like that. I certainly didn’t think that his being angry was unwarranted.
“No, you didn’t,” Laura retorted without a second thought, “You had no idea he didn’t tell his father. He didn’t tell you not to tell anyone, did he?”
“Well, no…”
“Then, how were you supposed to know he was only going to confide in you? I mean, getting the biggest deal of your life isn’t exactly information that people tend to keep to themselves. It’s not like you told his father anyway. You told your father.”
“Yeah, but you know as well as I do that doesn’t matter.”
“But you’re his daughter. It’s not like you’re some snake employee that tried to screw him over. You told your own father because you were proud of him.”
“Yeah, but…”
“No!” she insisted, “There is no buts and no excuses. You didn’t do anything wrong. He’s a dick. End of story.”
I thought about responding but almost immediately decided against it. Instead, I sighed and shook my head.
I knew that Laura was only trying to help, but regardless of what she said, or tried to do to rationalize my actions, I still felt bad. After all, good or bad, I knew we weren’t supposed to talk to our parents about our relationship, and if I had kept that promise, I wouldn’t be in this mess.
However, I was certain that Laura wouldn’t understand that, so I kept it to myself.
“Come on! Let’s go out for some lunch. My treat!” she offered, obviously trying to change the subject.
I hesitated, knowing that I had no interest in eating and likely wouldn’t touch a bite of my food. However, before I could decline, Laura practically dragged me through my front door, toward the car.
“I know the perfect place,” she exclaimed as I broke away, fumbling with my key and finally locking my door. “Don’t you want to know where it is?” she inquired when she felt a though I was ignoring her.
I didn’t care, considering the thought of any sustenance churned my stomach but to save myself from having to hear her complain about my grumbling I pretended to be interested.
“There is this awesome little deli down the street! I’ve always meant to go but I’m usually coming or going and it’s never the right time to stop in. They just opened,” she insisted, genuinely enthused.
I agreed, trying to match her enthusiasm. I know I failed miserably but Laura either didn’t notice or didn’t acknowledge my reaction.
From the moment we were seated, I noticed that Laura’s attention was elsewhere.
Following her lusty gaze toward
a man sitting in the corner and eating alone, I wondered if her story about trying the deli out was a ruse.
Still, after a moment, I decided that I didn’t know him and thus, there was a good chance that Laura didn’t actually know him either. Although, she was often far more confident than I was when it came to making friends with strangers.
“Oh my God, he is so cute!” Laura finally insisted when her deviated attention was starting to stumble into the conversation.
I glanced over at him again, now gauging his aesthetics. He had a nice build, but he wasn’t exactly my type. There was something about him that made him seem plain.
“Yes, he is cute,” I offered, trying to be supportive.
“He has been eyeing us since the moment we walked in,” Laura informed, which caused me to chance another look, trying to find what made this man so intriguing to my friend.
After all, while Laura liked the attention she received for a body she worked hard to maintain, she was usually picky and only pointed men out if they were unbelievably handsome.
However, regardless of my earnest attempt to see something special in this man, I couldn’t.
Maybe it’s because he isn’t Dexter, I thought but tried to quickly shove the idea out of my mind. That’s ridiculous! I told myself.
Still, I couldn’t convince myself to have any interest in the man. I could see how he would be pleasing, but there was nothing all that special about him.
All I really wanted wants to apologize to Dexter again and try to figure out a way past this, without what we had started being obliviated.
“You haven’t eaten a thing,” Laura narrowed her eyes at me after peeling herself away from the hunky human to the left of our table.
I stared down at my sandwich, which only had a few small bites missing. I wanted to be indifferent, but instead of having questions to answer, I picked up the damn sandwich and took a bite.
Laura’s expression still didn’t seem pleased, but at least she didn’t comment on it again.
Eventually, after finishing her meal while I forced myself through my own, Laura got up to use the bathroom, and I went straight for my phone.
My heart sank when it was confirmed that I hadn’t received so much as a text from Dexter, but I decided that I was going to write an apologyin an effort to get any semblance of conversation flowing between the two of us.
Hi Dex, I began but quickly, erased it, to start again. Dear Dexter…
“No!” I grumbled and finally settled with a quick; Dex, I am really sorry for betraying your trust. I feel awful about it and would like the opportunity to talk it out. Please let me know. Talk to you soon.
I thought about putting an emoji heart at the end but stopped myself. I didn’t want him to think this was some kind of childish attempt to win him back. I wanted him to know that I was seriously contrite about my actions.
As I was about to hit send, I was caught off guard by a loud deterrence.
“I knew it!” Laura exclaimed, scaring me so much I nearly dropped my phone.
“What?” I demanded, narrowing my eyes at her.
“You’re texting Dexter, aren’t you?”
“No,” I answered, dumbly.
“Then why did you hide it?” she insisted, quickly swiping for my phone.
Before I could think fast enough to grab it out of her hands, she pulled it from my grasp.
“Give me that back!” I exclaimed in an indignant fashion, narrowing my eyes with aggravation as I unsuccessfully tried to retrieve it.
I watched her eyes move across the screen for a few seconds before she looked back up at me.
“Oh no! You are not sending this!”
“Why not? I want him to know that I feel bad.”
“No!” she snapped, “He was the dick, he’s the one that needs to text you back and hope you’ll take him back after the crap he pulled.”
“Yeah, well, I did go against him. I knew I shouldn’t have told my father and I did.”
“So, what? In my opinion, you did him a favor. It wasn’t bad news, and sure, it wasn’t your news to tell, but he sat on it for way too long. How were you supposed to know he hadn’t given his father the news that was supposed to save his job? He’s a dumbass.”
I wasn’t sure that I agreed entirely, but I was willing to heed her warning since I did feel she had a point.
For the rest of the day, I tried to forget about Dexter and enjoy hanging out with my friend.
Chapter 25
Dexter
When I woke up, I felt like shit.
However, considering I hadn’t gone to work in a few days by this point, I knew I should probably stop being spiteful and return to weather the storm that awaited me.
I knew I had a fine line to walk between being an asshole, projecting that I don’t give a shit and I can do what I want and looking like I was hiding.
I certainly wasn’t hiding.
Nevertheless, I was sure that I had an infinite number of left-handed compliments accompanied by an inevitable professional flogging coming to me and I wanted it to be over with.
I knew, especially considering how I had handled the situation, my father wasn’t going to let this go easily.
After all, it promised to be far too much fun for his annoyingly large ego, and the longer I stayed away, the longer my torment would last.
So, the sooner I showed up, the sooner it would be over. The only hope I had left was that I could refrain from killing the old man after, yet again, not being able to get the recognition I deserved.
I groaned as I rolled out of bed, shoving my feet into my slippers, taking my frustration out on them and shuffled my way across the bedroom, toward the bathroom.
I didn’t know why I felt so undeniably shitty considering I hadn’t drank all that much in the past few weeks and I had avoided everyone, including Garret.
It wasn’t that I was all that upset; I simply didn’t want to have to deal with the countless insinuations and aggravations that came with not talking to Mazie.
I dressed myself in my normal attire, though I found the regularity repulsing, and headed off to work.
Upon pulling into my parking spot, one of the few, aggravatingly minimal things I had ever received in the form of appreciation, I regretted going inside for the hundredth time.
I closed my eyes and drew in a deep, aggravated breath before letting it out slowly while my hand reached for the door, opening it before I could stop myself.
With a fake sense of confidence bolstering my swagger, I entered the office as I normally did. I pretended that there was no reason for anyone to say anything and acted as though I had already assumed my rightful place as head of the company.
“Good morning!” Jen exclaimed as I passed the receptionist’s desk. “You’ve been gone all week, Mr. Myers…it’s good to see you,” she offered easily with a large grin.
I had no idea, nor care whether it was genuine or not, but what did bother me was the perfect reincarnation of Mazie that I saw when I looked at her. I nearly stepped back but refrained from reacting any more noticeably than simply blinking as I stared at her.
Once I was sure I couldn’t interact with her, without the fear of slipping and calling her Mazie’s name, I simply nodded and walked past her, into my office.
I felt her eyes as they followed me, but I was far too concerned with my fast-paced heart and the fact that my mind was playing tricks on me to worry about hurting her feelings.
When I finally made it to my office, actively trying to avoid everyone I came into contact with, I closed the door and locked it before thrusting the chair out from my desk and dropping into it.
Burying my head in my hands, trying to somehow reign in the fact that I missed Mazie, I knew that I had to put all of this aside so that I could have a talk with my father.
There was no way I was going to let this get any more complicated than it already was.
After all, I had come to work with one purpose today, and therefore, I
figured that I might as well get it over with.
I grumbled at the thought but instantly pushed myself away from the desk so that I could force myself toward the door.
When I walked into my father’s office, I was struck by the same sight that I had received upon entering this office my entire life.
My father, sitting in his chair, behind his desk, paying no mind to my presence. Privacy blinds were always closed, but the light was always bright. However, with the stark tension that was always present in the room, the office always remained daunting.
I cleared my throat, hoping to get him to look up for his work so that I might look him in the eyes as I told him the biggest news of my career, even if it was a little late.
“Hello, Dexter,” my father answered evenly, without looking up from his paperwork. “You’ve been gone all week. I thought you might have finally quit. Although, if that is your present intention, I am pleased to see that you have the balls to face me in person.”
It had always aggravated me how he always gave the impression that what I had to say was never worth his undivided attention.
His insult was superfluous and egregious, but because I expected there were far more to come, I didn’t allow it to bother me.
“No. That’s not what I want,” I answered, trying to keep an even tone, even though I could already feel myself seething from his lack of attention.
“Then, what is it that you need?” my father asked, still unwilling to turn away from his precious work.
“I wanted to personally let you know that my trip was successful and I locked down the deal,” I replied with a grin playing at my features and pride swelling inside of me. There was still a part of myself that had no idea how I had pulled it off, and that was something to revel in.
“Obviously, you had no care to tell me first. The whole damn world knew before you decide to tell me,” he muttered, “But nonetheless, your little sabbatical has cost us precious time.” With this, his eyes finally glared at me from his work. His face was angry, without a shred of pride inherent in it.