Page 39 of Tear Me Down

Damien

Damn right

I shake my head and turn my attention back to Zeke.

“So how is she with all of this? I don’t remember any of the other ladies saying anything about her,” I say, genuinely curious.

“She does okay with it. I try to keep her as far away from it as I can, though.”

“Yeah, I caught on to that with your shitty comment,” I side-eye him.

“Hey, I apologized for that,” he spits out quickly and points his finger at me. “It’s no offense to you and Damien, I just couldn’t handle it if what happened to you, happened to her. I'm not Damien. I can kill people, but that's after he tells me where to go. I can't do half the shit he does.” His voice trails off with an emotional response I haven’t seen from him yet, making me believe we’re actually getting somewhere.

“Maybe not, but he has your back, you know? He doesn’t want anything to happen to Tay either.”

“I know,” he looks around the aisles, seemingly avoiding eye contact with me.

“Does she have family? Friends?” I try to steer the conversation.

“Her mom lives in Texas, and she has work friends, but she says she doesn’t like to hang with them outside of the office. The poor girl is a bit of a loner.”

“Well, in it or not, maybe you should introduce her to some of the other ladies, you know? They’d understand how she feels. She could talk to them. It’s hard. You don’t get used to the possibility of the person you love dying.” I look back to him and watch as he nods again, obviously considering it. “Bring her to the house one day. I promise to buy everything prepackaged.” Thankfully, that makes him laugh. “Or bring her tonight. We’ll all be there, and it’s a public setting.”

“Alright, I'll think about it.”

“See, there’s the spirit.” I nudge him playfully and we keep walking, stepping along in a less hostile silence until he speaks up again.

“I like you just fine, by the way.” I look at him, noticing his indifferent expression and taking it as a win. “I think you're good for D.” I’m not sure why my chest inflates the way it does at that statement, but it definitely adds to the fullness in my heart.

“I like you too, though I haven’t decided if you’re good for him or not.” We laugh, and I’m thankful that he caught on to my joke. “So, since you don’t completely hate me anymore…”

“Jesus.” He scoffs and rolls his eyes, and I can’t help but laugh.

“Tell me about yourself. You know, since we’re obviously going to be spending sooo much time together.” He playfully rolls his eyes at me again. “Do you have any friends outside of ‘work’? Any siblings? Special hobbies?”

He chuckles again, seemingly starting to loosen up.

“Damn you’re nosey, how does D handle it? Normally I'm way more patient than he is.”

“Well, he loves me enough to put up with me, I suppose.”

“Yeah, that must be it,” he replies jokingly. “No, I don’t have any other friends, my special hobby is killing people, and I don’t know if I have any siblings.”

I look around the aisle, making sure no one heard about his ‘hobby,’ and then look back at him, caught off guard by his reply.

“What do you mean you don’t know?”

“I was adopted.”

Well, I suddenly feel really stupid.

“Oh, I'm sorry. That was a dumb question to ask.”

“No, it's a normal question, it just doesn't pertain to me.”

“You don’t know any of your real family?” I ask, genuinely curious. That’s a pretty intrusive question, but I had to ask. I didn’t have a choice on whether or not I knew my parents, and I’ve heard some stories of adopted children meeting their biological families. Some of them are good, some are bad, but I’m starting to wonder more about him. What makes himZeke. He shrugs his shoulders and shakes his head a little, clearly not really caring one way or another about the topic.

“My parents are my real family. I don't think of them any other way, but no, I don't know anyone from my birth family. I was curious at one point, I even wanted to find them, but then I realized there wasn’t any point. It wouldn't change anything.”