Chapter 26 #2
“Ya know, that’s not a shot you’re ordering.” Mitch stood next to me. My eye roll earned me a smile out of him. “Evie let me know a bit of what’s going on. You OK?”
I figured his question was rhetorical and continued working on my drink, which I did not chug this time.
I remember last year, early in Gage and Harper’s relationship, she took off to Florida when they had an issue.
Gage was a mess. Personally, I didn’t understand his issue with her needing time and space.
Sometimes space with couples was a good thing.
But Gage said it was how she took off, without a word, no idea where she was, that was the problem.
The feeling of being abandoned.
He and I knew that all too well. And although I understood, this felt different.
With Maryellen, it felt as though she was scared and didn’t trust me. And trust issues were hard to fix.
“Hey, your brother and Harper are talking to the crowd, you should probably pay attention,” Mitch said.
They looked so happy up on the steps, with their arms around one another as Harper thanked everyone for coming.
Gage could only look upon her with loving eyes.
I may have, back in the day, cracked a joke about how lovesick my brother was when it came to her.
But now, I felt so lost without Maryellen at my side, and seeing him only made me sad.
For myself.
“I need to go find my father.”
I wasn’t sure if Mitch even heard me when I told him I was going in search of my dad. Figuring he was listening to Gage and Harper’s speech, I snaked through the crowd toward the steps. Sara and he were standing to the side of the room, near the cake.
Cake time already.
“Dad,” I said as I walked up behind him. “Can we have a word?”
Sara turned to me first, though. “Chase. It’s nice to see you, I’ve been looking for you all night. Where have you been?”
“Hi, Sara.” I tried to be cordial. She was great for my dad, and I loved that he found her. Right now, I just needed to talk to him. “It’s great to see you.”
The pursed lips as I said it didn’t convey the same message as my words, and she saw that. She turned to my dad. “Rob, why don’t you go with Chase toward the back?”
Following behind the man I’d spent most of my life being angry at, I noticed a few things.
First, time was catching up to him. As he walked, I noticed he wasn’t as steady as he used to be.
His light hair appeared even lighter with streaks of gray layered in.
As we reached a quieter part of the restaurant and he looked back at me, his eyes had a softness to them I wasn’t used to seeing.
He started pulling some unused chairs from the side of the room for us to sit on, but I stopped him. “I got it, Dad.”
Once we sat, staring across at one another, he spoke first.
“I’m assuming you want to talk about Maryellen?” he asked.
Leaning forward on my knees, I stared at my father as the pit in my stomach dropped, making me feel sick.
“Dad, what do you have to do with all of this? I’m not understanding.”
He seemed uncomfortable with my question as he wiped at his chin and mouth, thinking how to proceed. “Listen, son, I don’t know if what I’m about to tell you is what she’s upset about. To be honest, it’s not even my story to tell. She should be telling you.”
I flung against the back of my chair, my impatience getting the better of me.
“Well, she’s not here now, is she?”
“When your mother left,” he started. That startled me.
I was not expecting his story to start with that.
At all. “There were so many parts of life, our lives, that changed. I was not good at being a single dad, I knew that. I do owe you and your brother an apology for that, but I did the best I could at the time. I had a huge corporation I was responsible for as well as two young boys. Splitting my time between the two became impossible. That’s a story for another time…
“This story is more about me as a single man. There were a lot of things that came along with the career path I’d chosen that were made more difficult being single, at least back then.
It was easier when I had your mother to bring to events, for example.
She was so good at socializing and helping bridge the gap between the people we were meeting for the first time. Better than I was.”
The pause in his story, his talking, made me wonder if he was going to continue. He looked around the room, but not once at me. He cleared his throat, eventually.
“Keep in mind, this was almost twelve years ago. You were young.”
Another pause.
“And so was Maryellen.”
My eyes widened. My stomach dropped.
“I was na?ve. When I researched how to hire an ‘escort’ I literally thought it was simply a person who could ‘escort’ me to an event.”
I shot out of my chair. My heart pumped out of my chest as my hand pulled at my hair. This could not be happening.
“What the fuck!” I shouted. “How old was she? Was she even eighteen?”
“Chase,” my father said, calmly. “Sit down, let me finish.”
He came to stand by me and put his hand on my shoulder. Even as I tried to shrug him from me, he wouldn’t allow it. He pulled me back to my chair and sat me down.
“You need to hear the entire story,” he said. “There are many reputable escort companies out there, but she wasn’t with one of them. When she showed up at my doorstep to come to a work event with me, my heart sank in my chest when I saw her, and how she was dressed. She was just a baby.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose as he sat and stared straight ahead. Shaking his head, he looked at me before continuing.
“I canceled my plans that night. You and Gage were upstairs and I had no idea how to handle it, but I knew I couldn’t go out with this young lady.
I brought her into our kitchen. And I remember, as soon as I did, you and your brother came down for some chips because you were both playing video games and wanted a snack.
So, you actually met her when you were twelve,” he said.
I remembered that night. We thought he had gotten us a babysitter, and Gage and I went upstairs complaining that we were too old for one. We decided we would be jerks to her, so she’d never want to come back. By the time we went back downstairs she was gone.
“I offered her something to eat or drink but she declined. She was so nervous because she thought she’d done something wrong since I canceled our plans.
That made me feel even worse. So, I took some cash out of my wallet to pay her for the night, and I offered her double what her company planned on paying her. ”
He shook his head.
“She grabbed the money and ran out of the house.”
Right then, Gage and Harper found us. They stepped into the dark space, unsure if they should be interrupting.
“Hey, guys,” Harper said. “Sara told us we could find you back here.”
I stood and faced the back of the room, unwilling for them to see the unshed tears in my eyes.
“Most of the guests are heading out, we wanted to let you know in case you wanted to see anyone before they left,” Gage said.
It was not perfect timing; this story was far from over. But there was no way my father and I could finish talking here or now. He came to my side.
“Son, how about I come by later tonight or tomorrow?”
I nodded as the first tear fell. He gripped my shoulder before walking away with my brother. But I could still feel Harper’s presence.
“Chase,” she whispered behind me. “I have no idea what’s really going on, but I need to tell you I know where Maryellen is.”
Spinning on my heels to face her, her eyes widened when she saw my face.
“Where is she, Harper?” My voice was a ragged version of itself. “Please, I have to get to her.”
“Gage and I arranged for a car to take her to our shore house on Long Beach Island in New Jersey. I knew she needed a place to be alone, so I gave her a key.” She paused and stepped closer.
Her hand came to my face. “I also know I wouldn’t let her do to you what I did to Gage.
You should go to her. I know she won’t think she needs you, but she does. And I know you need her.”
I wrapped her in a hug as a sob escaped from deep within. She held me as I let some of it out.
And my father was right.
This was Mare’s story to tell.