Chapter 13
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For the sake of the babe, I hope my trust issues aren’t genetic.
Crisis
Potato floats, tail occasionally flicking as he meanders about his tank, slipping past leaves and algae. Joyous, I refrain from pressing my nose against the glass while I watch him, eyes a-sparkle. “Hello, baby,” I whisper. “Did you miss me?”
“This is…something,” Crimson murmurs, braced against my dresser, looking like a model angel. Because she is one. Since Viktor was acting weird, I forgot to tell her I’d be by this morning to check on my fish myself, so we have collided.
Hehehe. What a shame.
“You’re so pretty,” I babble. “Yes, you are. Yes, you are. A very pretty boy.”
“I have only seen this level of baby talk commitment with dogs…and vowed never to mirror it with General.”
“Crim hates her puppy wuppy. Yes, she does. No love for the big buppy duppy doberman. But you? You’re not a puppy wuppy. You’re just a lil guppy. All the love for you, President Potato, who outranks the general.”
I can feel Crimson’s eyes roll behind me, which is beautiful, because she is normally ever so proper . Furthering her release from elegance, she drones, “This is probably a disorder of some kind.”
I sniff, indignant. “Ye shan’t toot upon our love.”
Her laughter chimes, filling my bedroom with light. “I thought I was your love. I’m heartbroken. You’re leaving me for a fish.”
“Don’t be gross.” Pouting, I shoot a look back at her. “You are my lover . Potato is our child .”
“I don’t remember approving to name our child ‘Potato.’”
“That’s because you didn’t. Canonically, I carried him for nine months in my womb, and therefore had the last say on his name.”
“Canonically,” she echoes, dry smile tooting all over our love.
Forcing myself away from my lil guy, I cross my arms. “Your ire is breaking our son’s heart. He needs to know his father loves him.”
Her perfect brow arches. “Never being certain of that builds character. Makes kids funny. Do you think you’d be funny without trauma, Cris? Not a chance. Do not deprive our son the same opportunities you had in youth.”
My youth is a bad example; I did not have parents.
Bolstering, I plant my hands at my hips, but Crimson tuts before I can respond.
“Now, Cris, remember our rule.”
I think. I ponder. I say, “What rule?”
“We don’t fight in front of our kids.”
I don’t like that rule. How does she expect Potato to learn how to argue responsibly if we never exemplify the proper procedures? This is why he’s a solo puffer. He’d bite any roommates, because his failure parents never taught him how to use his words .
Now that I think about it…maybe that’s why I’m a solo human.
Shifting genres, Crimson purrs, “Soo…”
“So what?” I ask, plopping myself onto my bed and sighing against Crimson’s shoulder when she seats herself beside me.
Arms wrapping around my waist, she kisses the top of my head. “How are things going at writer camp?”
I broke Viktor for a day, then I broke a chair, then we started bed sharing, then I had a meltdown, then I attacked some guy, then I got a prank letter. I chirp, “Fine.”
“Fine?”
“Totally fine.” I snuggle my adoring husband. “There’s a workshop tomorrow. I hope all the newbie authors destroy Viktor’s will to live, and I watch him crumple into a little depressed ball in the aftermath. I might shout, Yeah, that’s how it feels! and he might be incredibly confused for the rest of his days.”
Crimson goes unnaturally still. “Viktor? Since when do you call Mr. Bachelor …Viktor?”
I do not like the way it sounds like she’s grinning. Not one tiny bit. “Since he asked me to. Don’t you know I am nothing if not a good little assistant who follows all the rules and never threatens to tattle to other authorities whenever I don’t get my way?”
“Mmmhm,” she murmurs, probably convinced. She’ll likely drop this conversation in about five secon— “After two years hearing you say Mr. Bachelor , why would he ask you to call him by his first name now?”
I lean back so I can look at her enigmatic smile. “Why is your tone funny?”
“Whatever do you mean?” she asks, funnily toned.
“I call all the other Bachelors by their first names.” Viktor’s argument is as good as any for me to use now. I’d rather not deep dive into the guilt that compelled me to adhere to his inane request. All things considered, I already regret it. After the way he treated Little Red Riding Hood yesterday, he doesn’t deserve any consideration. Not from me.
Because, the way I see it, there are only two ways to cut this cake.
Either I’m the terrible person, and he just knew when he read my book that I wasn’t worth his time. Or he’s a monster who felt like destroying one poor girl’s self-esteem, knowing there were no repercussions like staying eleven more days in close proximity to them .
One of us has to be the problem.
And, let’s be honest, it’s probably me.
But while both remain feasible, I’m gonna stew in the feeble sensation of plausible rightness.
“I don’t know why you put up with me,” I murmur, curling back up against Crimson’s side, fighting to bury myself in her warmth and safety.
She squeezes me, tight. “How many times do I have to tell you? I don’t put up with you . I enjoy being around you.”
“Lies.”
“Truths.”
“Can’t be.”
“And, yet, it is. Even Viktor enjoys being around you, and you aren’t even a little bit in love with him.”
That’s for sure. I wouldn’t suggest he enjoys my company, though. I’m useful. Let’s be blunt—drinking green smoothies, humoring my health schemes, and tolerating the minor inconveniences I prompt is a small price to pay for someone who has doubled your multi-million dollar income in a matter of years.
Viktor’s not a total moron .
He’s not a moron at all.
I mutter, “It’s kind of weird that he’s never been married before. He’s not terrible to most people, and he’s—what?—tall? I think women prefer tall guys. Six foot four is nothing to sneeze at. That is to say, if you try to innocently sneeze on him, and you are a tiny five-foot-three being, you miss, succeeding only in crop dusting yourself.”
Gently, Crimson combs her fingers through my hair. “I don’t know how to explain how worried about you I am, Cris.”
I smile. “Then do not try.”
She sighs. “Viktor…” She hesitates, shakes her head, starts up again. “All those boys…they didn’t have a sunshine and rainbows childhood, Cris.”
Yeah. I know. The poor dears lost their parents seven years ago—and as far as I can tell not a single one of them still mourns. Which is maybe normal. I came in after five years of mourning could have passed. But I also never hear a single thing about their parents. It’s like those people didn’t exist. “Did Mommy and Daddy Bachelor not get poor lil Vik a pony for Christmas before they died?”
“It’s not all about money, dearness.”
I flinch. “Right. I didn’t mean… I’m…” I close my eyes. “I’m sorry. That’s not what I meant. You’re right. You’re completely right. How…” I clear my throat. “How bad of a childhood are we talking? They all just seem so well-adjusted, you know?” Except Lukas. But Lukas is an outlier and should never be counted for anything.
“We were all trained from a very young age the consequences of failing to put on the correct masks in public. Let’s just say that the scar on Viktor’s brow was done at his father’s hand, and I’m sure the rest of those boys have others in places that are easier to hide. I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s the reason we never see Zakery in anything but a long-sleeve jacket.” She rubs my arm, then falls back against my bed, staring at my dormant ceiling fan. Her long red hair pillows around her freckled face, waves a million times shinier and brighter than Little Red Riding Hood’s curls. “I met their family probably about a dozen years ago. I was young. Hormonal. And, wow. Them. They were like princes from fairytales. They were kind. They were…in no uncertain terms…the only men I had ever met who treated me like a person.”
I settle down beside her, propping my head against my hand. “Can’t relate.”
“You’ve never connected with someone like that? Trusted someone with hardly any reason to?”
I laugh, lie myself down when my chronic sore neck asks me what in the world I’m doing in this position. “Um. Besides you? No. You know how some people say they have trust issues , but then you see them doing all sorts of things that beg to differ?”
“Yeah.”
“I genuinely, truly, and deeply have trust issues.”
“But you trusted me,” she offers.
I let silence breathe between us for a moment. “My soul knew you. And…you’re the only one I’ve ever felt this safe with.” My throat tightens. “I don’t know. You saw me, covered in coffee, grateful I hadn’t been burned, and you still said, yeah , that one; she’s friend material . I’m never gonna forget that. Even if you realize what a terrible mistake you’ve made someday and abandon me.”
Crimson’s hand latches around mine, clutching. “I will never abandon you. I saw you in business clothes, on your way to work, covered in something that stains. Instead of getting mad or panicking, you said, and I quote, Thank— ” she cusses, “— for creamer. Befriending someone like that could never be a mistake. Learning about your vendetta against Viktor later shocked me because I swore from the moment we met you were the calmest, coolest, least vindictive person in the world. People would mess up around you all the time, inconveniencing you and even injuring you, and you’d shrug it all off. Like mistakes happen. No big deal. People are people. Life is life.”
“Well, yeah. Mistakes happen. Especially around me. They’re probably even my fault, all things considered. My beef with Viktor is that his thing wasn’t a mistake. At all. Assuming he actually read my entire book, he premeditated the four-paragraph response for a minimum of several hours. He deliberated his critique, and said something just short of give up . He made decisions. He chose to be cruel to someone who was entering his giveaway every single day. It wrecked me. He was the last person in this world that I dared to trust, and he hurt me. I have always been vindictive toward those who intentionally hurt me. He put me through stages of grief, Crimson. I know I’ve stopped in anger , but I was in denial for months. It didn’t make sense that his books would be so full of everything that gave me life, while he wasn’t. I spent so long trying to figure out what I’d done wrong, how I might have offended him. I scoured the pages of my manuscript, looking for some horrid sin I’d missed editing out. But I never could find the answers. I never could discern what made me deserve his insult to all my efforts.”
“Have you ever considered asking him?”
A broken laugh leaves me. “I’m sorry, Crim. Are you suggesting I reveal my decade-long insanity plot to a man who controls my livelihood?”
“You’re answering the outcome, not the question.”
Fair enough. I blow out a breath. Have I ever considered walking up to my boss with the email I still have saved and saying, Why? “Yeah. Loads of times. Mostly whenever he’s so forgiving or kind that I don’t know how he didn’t have a single nice thing to say to me about something he has to know meant a lot to me. He’s a writer, too, isn’t he? Don’t writers understand that our work means something to us? It was just so… cold . I’ve been shivering ever since.”
To warm me, Crimson wraps her other arm around my shoulders without letting go of my hand. “I don’t have exact answers, but I do know that he’s not a bad person, and you definitely aren’t.”
“Care to say that in front of my murderboard?”
“I’m saying it in front of our son, and you, which is far more important. Let’s be honest with ourselves. Your revenge has been making crude comments that we both know Viktor’s not stupid enough to dwell on, causing trouble that is basic pranks, and force-feeding him healthy habits, which—while irritating—are good for him. The man doesn’t drink water unless you lead him to the trough and shove his head in it.”
I laugh again; it comes out wetter than I’d like. “I’d love to waterboard him.”
“I know you would.” She taps a kiss to my forehead. “And I know you could with a little planning. The point is, you haven’t. You haven’t, because you’re not evil. You’re just hurting. And you’re scared of the answers to the real questions you want to ask.”
“No, I’m—”
“You’ve made a man you hate millions, Cris.”
“Yeah. I know. I need to make sure I’m worth keeping around.”
“Yeah.” She crushes me closer as she squeezes my hand. “Or…you’re still afraid of the rejection he made you feel once upon a time, and you’re desperate for him to keep telling you in wordless ways that all the bad you bring…do esn’t outweigh the good. You wanted him to tell you that you had worth. Now, you’re making him do it.”
My eyes burn. “I don’t appreciate this, Crim.”
“Am I wrong?”
“I…don’t know.” I bury my face against her. “I don’t appreciate this, but I do appreciate you.”
“And I love you.” Her breath fans into my hair. “More and more each day. Because you are worth loving, no matter which draft you’re on.”
For a few short moments—in spite of the tears pouring down my cheeks—everything is fine.