by Stasia Black
“Charlie, use your words with me. You know my expectations. We respect each other and the things around us. When we don’t, there are consequences. If you don’t stay in timeout, timeout starts all over again. You have choices and you need to make the right one.”
“No! No! No!” As soon as I put him down in timeout, he’s out again.
Charlie and I fight the timeout battle for more than half an hour, God, I lose track of time. But then he starts the ultimate freakout, banging his head against the ground so violently that I grab him up.
Dammit, I’m out of options. I flip him so that his back is to me and wrap my body around him, arms like a straightjacket over his, legs spidering over his so that all of his limbs are held down with all of mine. I have no idea how this looks to the psychologist monitoring us but I don’t fucking care. The bastard would’ve just stood there doing nothing while my child injured himself.
“Shhh, shhh, Charlie, it’s okay,” I whisper in his ear, rocking him back and forth. “Mama’s here. It’s okay. It’s okay now.”
Charlie struggles and keeps wailing for about thirty more seconds, but then finally, finally, he relaxes into me and his cries turn into hiccups and gasps.
“It’s okay, baby. Shh, it’s okay,” I keep cooing in his ear, relaxing my hold slightly so that now it’s just a full-body hug. I move one of my hands so that I can run my fingers through his curls.
“Shhh, Mama’s here.” I can’t stop saying it. Tears flow down my cheeks. Charlie shifts so that he’s sideways and his head lies on my breast, so reminiscent of when I used to nurse him.
Within moments, his whole body goes completely lax. I keep running my fingers through his hair and rocking back and forth, back and forth. I hum some small broken melody, I don’t even know what song, but it does the trick. Charlie’s soft snore is the best music in the world. I hold him and tears continue down my cheeks in an endless silent fountain.
For a while, all is quiet. I calm down too and then just focus on the feel of Charlie in my arms. This beautiful little person who grew in my belly. He’s got a big, long future ahead of him. And it’s going to be a future full of bright things and happiness, I’m going to make goddamn sure of it. I want to squeeze him harder, but don’t dare since he’s sleeping so peacefully.
Instead, I inhale his little boy scent. At least they’re keeping him bathed. My fingers clench a little and Charlie shifts, nuzzling into my neck.
“Shhh.” Shit. It’s something I vowed when David came back into the picture—that I would never let Charlie see my fury at his father. All the books say it’s important for the child never to see the fighting between the parents but after today’s display, it’s going to be more difficult than ever.
My son is not okay. I don’t know if he’s getting the care he needs there or if it’s just because he misses me or what. That’s the bullshit of all this. I don’t know anything. I’m his mother and I know nothing about my son’s life other than this paltry two hours a week. One hundred and sixty-eight hours in a week and I’m only allowed two hours of my son’s time. It’s barely a blink and then it’s over.
As if proving my point, right as Charlie settles back down, a loud, beeping alarm goes off.
Incompetent Shit ignores the furious shake of my head and how I’m gesturing at my sleeping toddler.
Instead, he says loudly, “Your visiting period is over. Time for the exchange with Charlie’s legal guardian.”
And then the fucker actually has the audacity to come over to where I’m sitting and physically pry Charlie away from me. There’s a moment before Charlie is awake where I try to hold on. “You kidding? He’s sleeping,” I hiss. “You never wake up a sleeping toddler if you can help it.”
The man’s face goes hard. “Are you refusing to surrender your child? Because I know that your trial is upcoming and I’m happy to make note of your refusal—”
Fucker!
I let go of Charlie, hating myself as I do it because in this moment, the fucking system is forcing me to be a bad mother and I’m allowing it.
Exactly as I expect, Charlie’s eyes pop open as soon as the stranger has hold of him. The wailing I managed to stop starts right up again. Except this time, Charlie’s desperately reaching for me.
“Mama! Mama!” he calls, confused from just waking up. He catches on pretty fast though when the psychologist starts walking with him out of the room and I stay behind. His cries become shrieks. “Mama!! Mama, I want Mama!!”
The last thing I see is him twisting and kicking in the man’s arms, fat tears rolling down his cheeks as he reaches for me with every ounce of his little might.
And all I can do is sit there and sob, knowing that if I go with my instincts, run and rip my own child out of that incompetent idiot’s arms, I’m the one who’ll be called the criminal.
I stay sitting on the floor with scattered toys all around me until long after I’m sure David or his wife have picked up Charlie. Meeting them in the lobby would not have done good things for my court case next week.
The psychologist doesn’t come back either. Or maybe he took one look in the room, saw me still here, and hightailed it out of there like the coward he is.
After enough time, the fury burns away and I’m left with the absolute raw gulf of pain left behind after seeing what’s happening to my child without me in his life. It’s not just me selfishly wanting my son back.
He needs me. I’ve read the reports Jackson’s lawyers have gotten me from his daycare teachers. His acting out is getting worse. He cries a lot and they’ve noted that his sleep schedule seems off. I’ve tried to tell myself over and over: if we can just hold on a little longer until the trial, we’ll make it. Charlie’s still young. He’ll forget and everything will be okay. It’ll all be okay.
But the truth is, I don’t know if David and his wife are providing the stability Charlie needs at home or not. Maybe they don’t know how or even want to deal with him when he’s a handful like tonight.
Or maybe all of Charlie’s behavior problems are a reaction to feeling abandoned by me—something I had absolutely zero control over, but how is a two-and-a-half-year-old supposed to understand that?
Bottom line: Charlie is not doing okay without me. He needs me.
My phone beeps in my pocket and I take it out to check my messages.
My phone beeps three times signaling a text right as I’m about to ring the bell.
GENTRY: Where is my prototype? We meet on Monday or I send this video wide and you lose your son in court on Thurs.
Mother fucking son of a bitch cunt—
I breathe out and count to three.
Double bottom line: I have to do whatever it takes to get my son back. Jackson’s face flashes through my head. Him telling me he loves me. But it’s quickly drowned out by the image of my screaming child being torn away from me. Jackson’s a grown man and Charlie’s two and a half. Just a baby, really.
There’s still time to fix what I’ve broken. And yes, I might be damned to hell for it, but one thing hasn’t will never change. I’ll always do whatever it takes for my son.
My thumbs don’t even fumble as I text back a quick message
My phone beeps three times signaling a text right as I’m about to ring the bell.
ME TO GENTRY: Done.
Twenty-Three
CALLIE
Which is how I end up in Jackson’s office a little after midnight on Saturday night. I shut the door behind me and squeeze my eyes shut.
The thing is, I didn’t even have to covertly steal his access card or anything like in the movies. Jackson gave the seven of us on the team working directly with him security clearance to come and go from his office since his terminal is the only one where the actual source code is kept. This computer is off grid, not connected to the internet so it’s unhackable. It’s the only real way to keep secrets secure these days.
Unless someone like me on the inside steals them.
The lights in his off
ice are motion activated, so as soon as my converse-clad foot takes a step onto the plush carpet of his thick, ornamental rug, his whole corner office lights up.
I pause like I’ve been caught at something. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
Stop panicking. I’m only feeling like this because I am actually doing something wrong. To the outside, I look like I do every other time I come in here to tweak something on the code. If anyone knew why I was really here tonight, though…
If Jackson knew…
Nope. Can’t think about that. Charlie. There’s only Charlie. He’s being threatened.
Mothers make sacrifices all the time. Sacrificing my happiness is nothing. Nothing.
And Jackson? What about his happiness? What will this betrayal do to him?
CHARLIE, I shout internally back at the other stupid voice. Charlie’s an innocent. He hasn’t been touched by any of this and he doesn’t deserve to be.
I clench my jaw and sit down at Jackson’s desk with renewed determination. Last night I went into the machine shop after hours. I’ve been spending so much time in there, no one even batted an eye. Nor did anyone notice when the big purse I always carry around had a slightly larger bulge as I left with one of the out-of-commission prototypes.
No one realized that all week I’ve been working on said out-of-commission prototype, switching out parts to make it work again. So that now it’s a perfectly functioning prototype. I walked right out of the building with it, no one the wiser. They’ll miss it eventually, but I imagine it won’t matter by then. I’ll be long gone.
The pang that hits my chest feels like a physical stab. I even put a hand over my heart and look down.
But there’s no blood. No wound.
Not on the outside at least. I type in the password Jackson shared with me out of trust—what at first appears to be a completely nonsensical series of letters and numbers but is actually the consonants of his father’s name, a mixture of asterisks, exclamation points, and the first letters of whatever song happens to be charting on the top 40 that week since he has to change it so often.
I type in the first letter of the Twenty-One Pilots song lyrics and then look back down at my chest.
It still aches like a bitch. But God, I don’t even have the right to be hurting. I’m not the one who will really be left bleeding when this is all said and done.
I grit my teeth and forge on anyway.
I click on the encrypted file with the firmware to the prototype and you guessed it—I have the password for it too. I keep waiting for a password to be different. In the end for Jackson to have not trusted me. But the bastard fucking did. Goddamn idiot. Why would he make himself so vulnerable? Just because sometimes I’m his Domme? Stupid fucking bastard.
As I pop in the several terabyte memory stick and click copy, I’m struck by the extreme urge to throw up. Because here I am, what a bitch, trying to blame Jackson for being a good guy—the best guy.
His only flaw? Trusting me, a super fucked-up girl.
If there were only some other way…
There is no other way.
I stare at the comfortable carpet under my feet, only glancing up every once in a while to watch the status bar of the copy process. Sixty percent.
Jackson’s face flashes through my mind. His many faces. The stoic one that seemed like his permanent expression when I first met him. The first time I saw him smile and the appearance of the dimple. How even then I knew I was in trouble.
Seventy percent copied. Eighty. Eighty-five—
I love you. I can see it so clearly in my mind’s eye, the way he dropped to his knees before me. Offering me everything. And later, how vulnerable he made himself, looking at me with those eyes that pleaded as much as they demanded.
Ninety percent.
“Goddammit!” I whisper, fighting indecision. Am I going to go through with this or not? Fuck. How many times am I going to let myself be backed into a corner where I feel like I have no choices and get myself into something I regret forever?
“What are you doing in here, Callie?”
My head jerks up in guilty astonishment to see Jackson standing in his office door. He— How did he— I didn’t even hear the—
“I’m… I’m just,” Shit. Fuck. Think fast. “Um.” Shit. Think faster. “I couldn’t sleep and couldn’t stop thinking about the project.”
I glance at the screen. Ninety-five. One hundred percent copied. How am I going to explain this? I’m not, that’s how. I click to shut the copy window, try to scroll to the section of code I’ve worked on before, and swivel the monitor for Jackson to see the now-innocuous screen. At the same time, I slip the memory stick out of the side port in what I hope is a distract-and-swap measure worthy enough for any amateur magician act.
“This part of the code here,” I point with one finger while pocketing the drive with my other hand. I hop up on his desk and give the code my complete attention. Oh wow. In my crazy scrolling through the code, I actually landed near the part I was aiming for.
“I know that we reduced our calculation time from the initial model by a factor of three, but I wonder if we could push it even more. What if we considered the flight as a set of temporal marked point processes, constrained of course by the direction of travel. Then we could reduce the overall computation to a handful of functions.”
My heartbeat thumps a mile a minute in my ears but I keep talking, almost as fast as my heart is racing. “Which we could learn through maximum likelihood estimates of the historical trajectories.”
Jackson glances at the code on the screen but then his eyes come back to me. “It’s a good idea.”
I smile and hope he doesn’t notice how strained it is. At any other moment, I’d be proud of his praise. I came up with the idea during my sleepless night last night. I was trying to figure a way out of my real problem and boom, all my mind could produce was ideas for ways to improve the very project I wish I could instead sabotage. Fucking classic.
“But are you sure that’s all that’s going on here?” Jackson’s face looks troubled. “You could have talked to me about this on Monday. Besides, I thought you said you were tired and going to bed early. Isn’t that why you said you didn’t want to get together tonight?”
I feel myself twitch but force a smile. Shit. I thought I covered well enough. I walk around the desk and hop up on it. “I took a nap on the couch but then couldn’t fall back asleep when I transferred to the bed. Couldn’t turn my brain off.”
I bring my legs around Jackson’s waist. Oh God. I’m going to hell. It’s official. Seducing my boyfriend to hide the fact that the drive in my pocket could betray his company and everything he’s worked for. I force more brass into my smile. “Maybe I was hoping to catch you here because I know how much your head is on this project too.”
I put my arms around his neck and drag him down to me, enveloping his lips in a kiss that quickly becomes devouring. His arms wrap around my waist and he pulls me to him, murmuring how much he needs me.
That pain that felt like a stab in my chest earlier burns with brand new agony.
By the time Monday comes around, I don’t even bother eating lunch. Well, I mean I try, but after barely managing a few bites of a granola bar, I give up.
I step on the elevator I swore I would never ride again and hit the button for the top floor: the Gentry Tech offices.
My heart races like I imagine a rabbit’s might right before a hungry jackal clamps its jaw down on its neck.
But no. I’m prepared this time. I reach in my oversized coat pocket.
Taser? Check.
I glance down at my shin-high Doc Martins.
Hunting knife? Check.
I flex my hands in their patent leather gloves.
Unobtrusive brass knuckles? Check.
I will not be caught unaware this time. No matter that I’m walking back into the mouth of the lion’s den. I will never be a victim again.
The elevator opens to a familiar lobby. The receptioni
st desk is empty at this hour, though. A quick glance at my phone shows that I’m early. It’s about four minutes before eleven p.m. The overnight security guard downstairs waved me straight past just like Gentry said he would. But this all seems too… simple.
I’ve been torturing myself over this ever since that day two-and-a-half weeks ago when Gentry told me what he wanted and yet, here I am. The glass to Gentry’s office is clear instead of opaque. I can see that he’s alone. No one else is waiting to jump out at me for a repeat of my last scarring encounter in these offices.
I’m still cautious as I head toward his office though, the rubber of my Doc Martins squeaking against the perfectly polished floor. I would have come in the baggiest sweats I owned except I want to be able to move if I need to. I settled for black stretchy jeans, cut-off at the knees, and a fitted dark blue hoodie. No makeup, hair in a low ponytail. This isn’t a business meeting and I’m not going to try to pretty it up like one.
I shoulder the backpack I’m carrying with the prototype higher on my shoulder and push into Gentry’s office with little-to-no finesse. If the damn door didn’t have all kinds of mechanisms in place, it would have whacked into the opposite wall with a satisfying thwack. As it is, it only opens quietly and then hisses shut behind me.
Gentry’s thumbing at his phone, appearing totally absorbed as he completely ignores me. It’s such a petty power play, I just roll my eyes and cross my arms over my chest.
“Me and my prototype are happy to walk our asses right back outta this building if you’re too busy for us.” I toss a thumb over my shoulder in the direction of the elevator.
When Gentry continues staring at his phone’s screen, I turn on my heel.
“Show me.”
I allow only the briefest smile to flicker over my face before I make my features stone and turn back to face him. That’s right. I’m going to set the tone of this meeting from the beginning. I’m the one in control. Not him, no matter how much he believes he is.
Calmly, I walked toward his desk, unzipping my backpack as I go. I pull out the prototype of the drone and set it on his desk. Gentry immediately snatches it up. His eyes avidly devour every bit of the twenty-two-inch prototype.