Page 84 of Emmett
“Whoa,” Mariah laughs, grabbing onto my shoulder. “Careful, bulldozer, you’re gonna kill someone.”
“Sorry.” I wrap an arm around her, offering her a squeeze. Lifting up the bag in my hand, I tell her, “Blinded by hunger. I missed lunch.”
Her palm skims across my chest in a way that makes me feel like shit about my decision to hook up with her again this last time, with a smile playing at her lips as she looks up at me.
“You’re coming this weekend, right, hon?”
“Not this time,” I tell her, matching her smile. “I’ll try to make the next one.”
“Promise you’ll come.”
“Next time.”
I give her one more squeezing hug, this time wrapping both arms around her with a kiss to her head before pulling away to head down the hall. She hangs behind, watching me until I round the corner and I finally feel her eyes leave the back of my head. I pass Dad’s office on the way and consider stopping in, but when I peek past the open door and see how focused he is on something on his computer, I decide against it.
I need to just get out of here.
My decoy bag meets the nearest trash can as I make my way out of the office, pulling my suit jacket tighter around me to fight off the sudden cold of leaving the building. A group of employees stand in the designated area just off the to side ofthe back exit, standing in a tight circle around a trash can topped with a built in ash tray, plumes of smoke rising from their cigarettes.
“Hey,” I say with a nod, “Can I bum one of those?”
Someone hands me a smoke and a lighter, and I hold the filtered end between my lips while I light the other. Harsh, bitter smoke immediately fills my mouth and burns down my throat and lungs, making me cough as I blow it out. I haven’t smoked a cigarette since I was sixteen, and now I remember why; they’re god awful. In spite of how much I hate it, I stand around the trash can with the people whom I should probably know; we keep the office small, only a few thousand employees. I should recognize them, but I don’t.
I make small talk with them, trying to learn more about them until the tobacco is gone and the cigarette has burnt down to the filter. One of them has three kids, another has a pet bird. Two of them have associate’s degrees. I never do catch their names.
Checking the time on my watch, I tell them goodbye and head back in to grab my stuff. When I pass Dad’s office, he’s standing this time, digging through the drawers of his filing cabinet.
“Hey,” I greet him with a rap of my knuckles against the door frame.
“Hey, bud. Are you heading out?”
I nod with a smile. Closing the space between us, I wrap him in a crushing hug. I know that he can smell the smoke clung to me, but he doesn’t say anything. He’s probably just glad that it isn’t liquor or pot that he smells. “Give those girls a kiss for me.”
“Come to dinner tomorrow?” He asks me as I pull away from the hug with a clap to his back.
“I have some things I have to do this weekend, but I’ll see you Monday. I love you, Dad.”
“I love you too, bud,” he tells me as he ruffles his fingers through my hair.
Normally it would drive me nuts that he did that to me, especially in public, but this time I just let out a chuckle as I smooth the style back into place on my way out of the door.
I hesitate when I step out of my car and onto my driveway; holding my breath and waiting for a few beats before I pull my phone from my pocket and dial a number.
“You’ve reached Nash,” the voice on the other end recites. I let the message play through until I hear the beep that indicates that I can leave him a message.
“Hey,” I say shakily. “I hope you’re not watching this go to voicemail. I…just wanted to hear your voice, I guess. Fuck,” I sigh as I hang up the phone.
It was stupid to try. I don’t know why I even want to talk to him; I really do want to fucking hate him…but he’s alsoeverything. He’s the answer to questions that I didn’t know I ever even had. I love him more than I knew I could love another person, and all that I am to him is aparasite.
He and my mom would get along great.
Clover bounds around my legs as I enter the house, greeting me with a wag of her tail and a high-pitched whine.
“Want a snack?” I head for the kitchen to fill one of her toys with peanut butter and a few pieces of her favorite duck jerky before leaving her to do her thing in the living room. “I’ll be out in a little bit. You stay out here and be good,” I tell her with a scratch to her head.
I close and lock the bathroom door behind me as I slip off my shoes and turn on the faucet. Letting out a shaky breath, I perch on the edge of the bathtub with my head in my handsand I try to send away the pain in my chest. The peace that I’ve felt all week is gone, now replaced with a sudden onslaught of doubt that wraps itself around me like razor wire.
I blow out another breath as I step into the water and lower myself, running through the mental checklist of tasks that I’d made for myself last week and ticking off the boxes as I go. My house is cleaned. Money’s set aside for the girls. I got a haircut.