by Max Monroe
Thankfully, I am trim, toned, and able to binge on buffalo wings whenever the fuck I want.
My cell vibrates across the table, and I snag it off the glass surface to see Incoming Call Cap flashing on the screen.
I sigh at the idea of listening to Caplin Hawkins’s bullshit before I’ve finished my first cup of coffee, but I answer it despite my better judgment.
“Harrison, you sly motherfucker, those stock tips you gave me last quarter have my portfolio growing green like I’m a damn cannabis farmer.” He forgoes a greeting and dives straight into what is most likely his selfish needs. “Should I be concerned you’re getting insider info?”
“Wow, it’s so great to hear from you too, bud.” I smirk and lick my finger to get traction on the thin paper and flip through the pages until I get to yesterday’s closing data for the Dow Jones and S&P 500. Quickly, I scan through the numbers. It’s only one week away from Christmas and a few weeks away from New Years’, and this month’s upward trend appears fairly optimistic for avoiding a choppy close to the year.
“Yesterday, HawCom was up five-fucking-percent. Seriously, dude, are you dragging me and my father’s company into some illegal bullshit?” he asks, and I look away from my newspaper to roll my eyes.
HawCom is the company I’ve been with for the past decade, and it just so happens to be owned by Cap’s father, Jared Hawkins. Financial management for a company of its scale has been tricky these days with the ongoing uncertainty of the market, but all in all, HawCom’s performance numbers have been stable and steadily growing for the last nine quarters. As a major media company with “silent” ownership in some of the world’s most relevant technology companies, it’s not completely unexpected, but it’s certainly not guaranteed.
“Is it difficult being the most ridiculous bastard on the planet?” I retort. “Because, fuck, I can imagine it gets hard coming up with new ways to be this insane.”
Despite this idiot’s stupid question, everything I do is by the book. No insider trading. No fraud. It all comes from a mind that’s been trained since childhood to be strategic and understand economic patterns.
And even if I shouldn’t, for the state of my motivation to maintain a certain work ethic, I do allow myself to take a little credit for HawCom’s success. I’ve been charged with a large job due to my leadership role in the company, but I cherish the opportunity. It’d be hard not to with an uncharacteristically kind and charismatic boss like Jared at the helm.
And for the last four months, I’ve made it a point to cherish everything.
See, I choose to be happy every day.
I choose gratitude and intention in my every action.
I choose the way my life plays out—all of us do.
It took me more than three busy, painful decades and the loss of both parents to figure that out, but now that I have, the freedom in it is impressive.
The truth is, until we die, all of us get to choose our own destiny—
“I swear to God,” Cap grumbles. “I will end you if I wind up in some kind of high-security prison for stock fraud.”
I laugh at the absurdity. “I help you grow your portfolio—without commission, mind you—and you’re threatening murder?”
“Are you deflecting, son?” he questions, always the fucking lawyer. “Because I swear on every-damn-thing, I will—”
“Relax.” I snort. “The only thing illegal about the stock tips I gave you was the fact that I handed them to you on a silver-fucking-platter without asking for anything in return.”
“Speaking of handing shit to me on a silver platter, let’s do that again,” he says, a cunning smile apparent in his voice. “Who is looking profitable for the first quarter of next year?”
“And why should I give you anything, you prick?”
“Because you love me. Because you don’t want to see me become a vagabond, living on the streets.”
“You’re one of the most successful corporate lawyers in North America who already has some of the world’s best advisers handling his money. I’m pretty sure a lack of financial investment advice from me isn’t going to break your bank.”
“Minor details.” He chuckles. “C’mon, dude. Help your best friend and his sweet, lovely, beautiful wife out.”
“Now you’re bringing Ruby into this?” I tsk. “For shame.”
“You and I both know, shameless or not, I’ll do whatever it takes to get what I want,” he retorts, and I laugh outright.
“Are you wanting stock tips or to get me into bed? Because, truthfully, it feels like it could go either way at this point.”
Of course, he doesn’t miss a fucking beat. “I’ll even toss in a candlelit dinner and champagne if that’s what it’s going to take.”
Just for the sake of ending this insanity, I start to open my mouth with a few companies that are worthy of investments in the upcoming quarter, but a shrill voice on the screen of the TV steals my attention. I wouldn’t normally refer to any woman’s voice as shrill because I find it incredibly sexist and demeaning, but I’m telling you, for the sake of painting an accurate description, this particular voice, regardless of its bearer’s gender, is like the distress call of a wounded rabbit. I couldn’t miss it if I were in an underground bunker with six feet of sound-dampening dirt between us. And somehow, somehow, she still made it on TV.
“Thanks, Chris,” she continues, her voice still painful to my ears. “Today is anything but business as usual in sunny Southern California. It seems, folks, that the impossible has happened. Hollywood is abuzz this morning with the most infamous immaculate conception since the Virgin Mary herself.”
My eyebrows pinch together at the ridiculous drivel as I lift the spoon to my mouth. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph must be rolling over in their graves.
“Twenty-nine-year-old famed virgin sexpot, Raquel Weaver, was photographed leaving Beverly Hills Obstetrics today with a noticeable bump front and center on her normally trim figure.”
Brakes squeal to a stop inside my head.
What the fuck? Did she just say Raquel Weaver?
I gape at the television, trying to make sense of why that name of all names just came out of Screechy’s mouth, but the instant a photograph pops up on the screen and all-too-familiar violet eyes stare back at me, I have my fucking answer.
Holy shit. It’s her.
The function of my right hand rendered suddenly useless, the spoon drops from my mouth and splashes into my leftover cereal and milk with a crash.
My shirt is splattered, but I can’t do anything more than wipe at it with a shaky hand and stand, a puddle of spilled fucking milk coating a square foot of surface area on the top of my table.
“Uh…hello? You still there, fucker?” Cap’s voice is a shock to my ear, but I’m too busy scrambling for the remote to register what he’s saying. I thumb the toggle for the volume up button until the voices on the TV are unmistakably clear.
This…the rest of this…I cannot miss.
“Raquel’s team couldn’t be reached for comment, but an inside source believes the actress to be about four months along.”
Whaaaaaaat? Four months along?!
I count back the months in my head.
November…October…September…August…
August fucking fifteenth, to be exact.
Like a NASCAR driver hitting the gas on the green flag, my mind races with memories of that very specific night that happened exactly four months ago.
My lips on hers.
Her hands sliding into the waistband of my jeans.
Her perfectly beautiful violet-colored eyes as I slipped inside her.
I swallow hard.
The last time I saw her—or talked to her, for that matter—was four fucking months ago, and now, Raquel…my Rocky is pregnant?
And she’s fucking famous?
Jesus Christ. Could I be any more out of the loop right now?
Apparently, disdain for television being drilled into your head at an early age
is good for business but not so good for your personal life…
Holy. Fucking. Shit. This can’t be real.
Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it appears the odds are ever in your favor, you no-condom-wearing idiot…
My heart pounds in my throat, and my breaths come out in erratic pants.
I feel railroaded. Like a man who’s trying to work his way upstream in a canoe without a fucking paddle and against a tsunami-like current.
“Dude, why are you breathing so heavy?” Cap, the fucker, he just won’t go away. “Are you getting a morning wank session in while you’re on the goddamn phone with me?”
“N-no,” I stutter, too damned shocked by today’s news to even know what is happening right now.
“Whatever. I don’t care. You can blow your fucking load for all I care as long as you stay focused on the important shit.” he replies, completely unfazed. “My investments. Who should I be buying into?”
Important shit? Yeah, I’m pretty much drowning in important shit of my own over here.
I am in charge of my own destiny, I remind myself and try to steady my voice as I ramble off some bullshit to keep Cap from realizing I’m awfully damn close to a nervous breakdown.
“Amazon, Google, Apple, those are always safe bets.”
“Oh, gee, thanks for the information that pretty much everyone on the face of the fucking planet knows,” he retorts.
I am in charge of my own destiny, I mentally repeat.
Because I am in charge of my own destiny, but at the current moment, my control feels remarkably like the scene in Top Gun when Tom Cruise flies the plane through the jet wash and sends himself into an I’m so fucked tailspin.
I grab at the knot of my tie and yank as hard as I can. It’s fucking hot in here. Did my Nest lose its mind and set the temperature to surface of the sun plus a couple degrees?
My hands settle on top of my head, and I force myself to take a deep breath. When I look down at the mess on top of the table, out of pure instinct, a laugh bubbles out of me from all those years with my mother.
“Yeah, funny ha-ha.” Cap’s stupid voice fills my ears again. “Come on, Harrison. Give me the good stuff.”
Okay. Okay, relax, I coach myself. The timing is suspicious, but there’s no way to know that this baby is mine, right? I mean, who knows—
“As Hollywood’s longest-reigning virgin,” the shrill voice on the television continues and snags my attention once again, “Raquel Weaver is the last celebrity we expected to see sporting a baby bump. Fans have immediately started speculating the date they first noticed her purity ring missing was sometime in mid-August, and they think it’s a big clue to the exact time of conception.”
Purity ring? That’s a thing that still exists?
A memory hits me hard, right in the gut.
Ah fuck.
I take off at a sprint for my bedroom and pull open the top drawer of my nightstand with no finesse whatsoever. Barren of contents other than one book, mints, and a mocking brand-new pack of condoms, the drawer leaves little question whether the item I’m looking for is a figment of my imagination or not.
The ring she left on the nightstand that night twinkles in the morning sunlight like a beacon.
Gingerly, I pick it up and toy with the small band between the tips of my fingers. Simultaneously, I work hard to remember how to breathe.
It’s a simple, thin, white-gold band with tiny pavé diamonds around the outside. Delicate, beautiful—a perfect figure of symbolism for Rocky.
I flip and twist the tiny metal around to inspect it further, but it isn’t until I turn it all the way around and flip it over that the engraving on the inside of the band stands out.
True Love Waits
“Oh, holy shit,” I mutter, the shock of it all tightening my vocal cords.
“Harrison, I gotta tell you, man, this is the weirdest fucking phone conversation I’ve ever had with anyone…”
Christ. Why is he still on the phone?
I stare at Rocky’s purity ring clutched in my hand and think about how one night has altered the course of my entire fucking life.
One night. Four months ago. And now there’s a woman out there carrying my baby?
Lord Almighty. What is happening right now?
“Between the heavy breathing and shit”—Cap keeps fucking chattering, but I couldn’t give two shits what he’s saying—“I’m a little weirded out, but I shall forgive everything once you give your favorite best friend in the whole world some quarterly investment advice.”
Visions of everything related to babies start to fill my head.
Bottles and pacifiers and…
“A stroller,” I mutter. “A goddamn stroller.”
“A. Stroller?” Cap questions. “Is that a new tech company?”
Jesus Christ. I sigh and run a hand through my hair.
“Calm down, bro. Don’t get frustrated with me. What’s their ticker?”
And diapers. Fucking hell. I’m so out of my league here.
“Diapers?” Cap asks. “Like for babies?”
“Yeah, like for babies, you fuck.”
“Good God, chill out, man. It was just a question,” he mutters. “But there’s a ton of companies that make diapers. Huggies…Pampers…Fucking Luvs… How do I know which one is the best?”
“Fuck if I know,” I retort. I’ve never had a baby before. Never really been around babies. Honestly, I can’t remember the last time I actually held a baby…if ever.
Christ, this is not good.
“This feels like a fucking stock ticker scavenger hunt, you bastard. I think—”
Overwhelmed and terrified and pretty damn close to puking up the cereal I just ate, I abruptly end the call with a simple “Gotta go, Cap,” toss my phone onto my bed, and put both hands behind my head.
Forcing deep breaths in and out of my lungs, I struggle to calm myself enough to find my center again, but when I finally do, I relay what I know.
One, we’re all in charge of our own destiny—we are. And apparently, Rocky made a huge decision to change the course of hers that night without telling me.
Two, I somehow managed to impregnate the most famous virgin in Hollywood in one, unplanned night—and I didn’t even know I was doing it.
Three, Raquel Weaver was anything but famous when I left California at ten years old. She was knobby-kneed, cute as a button, and five or six years old. She had the sweetest gapped baby teeth, and she was tougher than half the boys I knew. Her purplish-blue eyes always held something special, but I never imagined she’d charmed anyone other than the people she came into direct contact with. Now, she and her baby—wait, scratch that—she and my baby are the only things anyone can seem to talk about.
All this time, I was fucking oblivious. A contemptuous laugh escapes my throat with dramatic flair. Frankly, Harrison, you couldn’t have been less in the know if you’d spent the last twenty years in a medically induced coma.
How could she have kept the fact of her virginity from me that night?
Why would she have kept it from me?
God. If I’d known, I probably wouldn’t have even gone there. I wouldn’t have—
I jerk my internal monologue to a sudden halt as it all comes into focus. That’s why she didn’t tell me. It might have been years since we’d seen each other, but she knew me well enough to know I wasn’t cavalier enough to go around devirginizing women with one-night stands.
I reserve drive-by behavior for women who know the score—women who are looking for the same from me.
At least, I did.
I lift my hands to my head and scrub at my face.
What am I going to do?
How in the hell am I going to handle this?
How do I take the right steps, plan the right path—do the right thing?
My mom’s voice sounds in my head like an old, beloved record—Never cry over spilled milk. And then, shortly after, a single word said with the glee of a woman wh
o lived her whole life with laughter—Grandkids!
The image of how my mother would have celebrated the news makes a small smile settle into the dimple in my cheek, but the mental picture of her contrast in every way—her nearly lifelong companion—is too strong to let it last.
My dad.
The image of him, of course, begs an entirely different question altogether.
How do I find the way to being a father—a good father—when my revelry on the day I buried my dad is the thing that got me here in the first place?
The day of August 15th, 11:30 a.m.
Harrison
It’s the perfect day to bury a villain.
Honestly. If I were a writer, that’s exactly how I’d start this story.
Rain soaks my clothes and bleeds into the bottom of my socks from the soles of my shoes, and a general feeling of gloom blankets the city—a parting tribute to the personality of my dad.
Ironically, I have no trouble calling him that—Dad.
Most people who’ve had the kind of relationship with him I’ve had would avoid the affectionate term altogether, preferring the distance of a more technical patriarchal word—something formal, like Father. But I’m not one for overly complicated emotional statements.
He was what he was—the complete opposite of me, his fun-loving, quick to smile, big-hearted son.
Domineering and oftentimes mean-spirited, Hall Hughes was a man many feared. He was brisk and frequently harsh, but he never saw it as a fault. He spoke his mind—always—even if it might be to the emotional or physical detriment of those around him.
And yet, he was also very nearly omnipresent.
I can’t recall a time when he wasn’t around. He never missed a game or a milestone, showing up for me both physically and financially, no matter what. I shake my head slightly, an unwavering stare lasering in on the ornately carved mahogany casket.
He was always there, all right—disapproving vocally of my hobbies, choices, and performance.
Always fucking critical, that was my father.
Still, I guess in some simple way, I’ll miss the idea of having someone unabashedly present. My mom passed nine years ago, shortly before my twenty-fifth birthday, from breast cancer, and he’s been the only family around ever since.