32. Marco
Marco
Brin navigates to her messages and then scrolls up, reading as she goes. She pales, and her eyes get watery. My stomach feels like lead.
Brin hands me the phone, and I read the messages from Greg. And they’re bad.
Really bad.
Unhinged.
I can’t believe that my friend would send anyone this shit.
It started out with not even a kiss goodnight? and I guess you wanted an extra incentive.
When Brin didn’t respond, it escalated.
The only thing worse than a slut is a cocktease.
Quit whoring yourself on this app if you’re not gonna suck a dick.
Brin’s face is pale and her eyes are welling up. “Hey.” I drop the phone and take her hands in mine. “It’s okay, come here.”
“Why would he say those things?” Her voice is small as I tuck her into my chest. “I didn’t even do anything.”
“I know you didn’t. That’s not what this is about.”
I hold her close while she takes deep steadying breaths. Inside, rage boils. I want to rip into something; I want to scream at Greg; I want to scorch the earth.
But this is not about me, so I take deep breaths and focus on Brin. I hold her for a few minutes until she pulls away.
“What can I do for you?” I ask.
She rubs her forehead. “I’m not sure. I’m tired and I smell like garlic and butter and I’d like to shower and go to bed.”
“Totally valid. It is late. Let’s talk in the morning about making a plan, okay?”
She nods and gets up to shower. Later, we both lie in my bed, neither of us sleeping, but at least I can hold her close.
In the morning, I sit up in bed on my phone. I barely slept last night, still shaken about Greg’s behavior. While Brin sleeps, curled up on her side, I do some light cyber stalking, reading back through my texts with Greg, scrolling his Instagram.
It’s disturbing how none of it raises red flags, but I know bad people are good at hiding things. Does Greg even see his actions as bad?
Brin’s alarm goes off. She reaches out to shut it off, and rolls over. “Hey.” She gives me sleepy, happy eyes as she stretches. “Did you run already?” she mumbles. Brin wriggles over until her head is resting in my lap. I let my hand rest on her head and gently stroke her wild red hair.
“No run today.”
She hums a deep sigh. “Lazy.”
“I know. Don’t fall back asleep.” I shake her and she groans. “I’ll make you coffee.”
“Yesssss.”
Brin gets up and shuffles to the bathroom.
She leaves the door open while she showers.
“Brin, you want me to toast a bagel?” She’s got a sleeve of them on the counter.
I hear what sounds like a yes so I fix breakfast for her and have it ready when she comes out of the bathroom, a turban around her head.
She eats her breakfast and then sits back, sipping her coffee. Then she blows out a breath. “So. Greg.”
“What do you want to do?”
“I don’t know. It’s been a while, I’m not sure I can even do anything.” Her eyes are on her coffee. “What would you do?”
When I hesitate, she looks at me. “I know you think you’re an asshole.
But Greg is really, truly, a bad man. It .
. . it helped me to tell you. To see you get angry.
You’re the only person that knows about those messages and I don’t want to let him get away with saying those things to me—or anyone else. ”
I fold my arms and rub my hand over my mouth. “You could report him to Sugary—I bet they have an anti-harassment policy, and I’m sure you’re not the only one he’s done this to. But the repercussions would be pretty light. I don’t think he’s using the app anymore anyway.”
“I want there to be repercussions,” Brin says firmly.
“You could go to the police.”
She shakes her head. “What would they do? It’s just a few messages, albeit they’re threatening and scary.
But he’s not stalking me and he doesn’t have any other way to reach out to me.
Although now that he knows we’re roommates, he knows where I live.
I don’t want to wait to see if he does something else. ”
I feel a pang of guilt. Greg helped me move Brin in here, for fuck’s sake. And now she’s going to feel unsafe in her own home? Greg needs to know that he’s fucked up, and I want to make sure he gets exactly what he deserves.
“Another option is to approach his boss,” I say.
Brin’s eyes widen. “Get him fired?”
“Yeah. He probably has a morality clause in his job, because people like William don’t want someone who’s so close to them behaving in a way that makes them look bad. This is a perfect example. Ishimoto is a public figure.”
Her surprise turns to determination. “Yes. That’s what I want to do. How do we do that?”
I explain what I want to do and why. A hint of a smile shows on Brin’s lips for the first time since she got home last night, and she nods eagerly. “If you think it’ll work, let’s do it. I don’t want to see him again, I just want him stopped.”
I hold out a hand. “Open up Sugary and give me your phone. I’ll screenshot everything and send it to myself.”
Brin follows my instructions. I text myself the images and hand her phone back.
I spend a few minutes crafting an email.
The trickiest part of this is making sure Greg’s boss sees it.
If I emailed the contact I have for him, Greg would probably get the message first, and it’s unlikely it would ever get to Ishimoto.
I hit send, and then make the call on speakerphone.
William answers on the fifth ring. “What is it?”
I have never called William on vacation, not even in my early days of working for him, and I’m thankful for that because William is going to take this seriously.
“I’ve never asked you for a favor, but I’m asking you for one now and I want you to act on it today.”
William is quiet for a beat. “Go on.”
I explain the situation. “I’ve sent you an email so you can see for yourself. I want you to contact Ishimoto personally—not through Greg—and make sure they see what Greg’s done. If they don’t fire Greg, I want you to never buy another of Ishimoto’s work again, and sell all the ones you own.”
“Anything else?” William asks dryly.
“We’ll see how Ishimoto responds.”
William is quiet for a moment, but I can hear him moving in the background. I wait.
“I don’t like sticking my noses in other people’s business. Why should I?”
“Do it or find another assistant.” Brin’s eyes widen. I wasn’t planning on making the threat, but it feels right. If William isn’t willing to stick his neck out for me, why should I keep doing it for him?
William’s quiet again, and I think I’ve shocked him. “My, my,” he says. “You certainly have a taste for vengeance. Who’s Brie to you?”
All the screenshots of the conversation show her name as Brie. “Her real name is Brin.” I meet those sky-blue eyes with mine. “She’s the best thing that ever happened to me.”
Brin’s lips part in shock. She keeps her eyes on me until I get off the phone with William and then she crawls into my lap and kisses me, her hands on either side of my face.
When she pulls back, I tell her the truth. “Brin, I love you.”
She sucks in a breath. “You do? Even though I’m a hot mess?”
I pull back to really look at her. “Why do you think that?”
She laughs, self-depreciatingly. “This is my third job this year. I can’t even remember to track my period. I don’t feel like an adult, ever.”
“You don’t give yourself enough credit.” I stroke her cheek with my thumb.
“I don’t see someone who is struggling. I see someone who’s bright and funny and too kind for her own good.
Someone who’s spontaneous and willing to jump in to help anyone who needs it, like the mom upstairs or the roommate who suckers her into a multiday wild-goose chase around the city. ”
She looks away from me, the compliments hitting her hard. “There’s something you don’t know, though.” She swallows, and I feel it under my palm. “I have a lot of credit card debt. Like, a lot.”
“How much?” I ask.
A tear leaks down her cheek when she tells me. It is a lot; what a burden for her to be carrying.
“It’s bad, I know,” she rushes out. “I didn’t know what I was doing when I first moved here and my shopping snowballed.
For a while it was fine, manageable. And then my first roommate in the city suggested I sublet to them.
I thought that was what you were supposed to do.
And then they stopped paying and I couldn’t get them to move out, and I lost the security deposit because of them and the utilities weren’t getting paid. ”
She’s crying now, and I pull her into my arms.
“So I thought I’d learned my lesson, and the next place we were co-tenants.
But my credit score had taken a hit and so I took out a loan and then I still got fucking left in the lurch by my roommates.
When I couldn’t cover the rent, I had to take out two more credit cards or get evicted.
See?” she says through her tears. Her arm snakes out to point at herself. “Hot mess.”
I let her cry on my chest for a moment and then pull her back to look up at me. “A credit score is just one number. It’s not a pass/fail for life, okay?”
“Okay.” She sniffs.
“I do feel like there’s a power imbalance, though. I don’t ever want you to feel uncomfortable here, or that you have to stay with me because you can’t afford to live anywhere else.”
“Why do you say that as if it won’t last?”
Now it’s my turn to look away. “You saw me with Ash. You know what I’m like at my job.” I swallow. “It bleeds into my real life. Joe thought I was an asshole and someday you will too.”
Brin touches my chin, making me meet her eyes again. “I’ve lived with you long enough, Marco. I know who you are. And so did your brother. He loved you so much.”
I nudge her hand and kiss her palm.
“Today those qualities that you think make you an asshole made me feel protected. I wouldn’t have known what to do about Greg without you.
I’m also not in that place that I was when we first moved in together,” she continues.
“I mean, I still have a lot of debt, and I’m working on it.
Someday, I’ll have an emergency fund, for when I need to fly home or break the lease on an apartment.
And I have friends now too. I’m not alone. For example . . .”
She pulls her phone out of her pocket and taps the screen a few times. It rings on speaker three times until a female voice picks up. “Hey!”
Brin smiles. “Hey, Eva! Marco’s here too.”
“Marco! Are you calling with good news? Did you win the scavenger hunt?”
I laugh. “No, not even close.”
“I’ve got a question for you,” Brin says. “If I had to move out of my apartment with Marco right now, could I come stay with you until I find a new place?”
Eva’s tone sharpens. “What did he do? Marco, what did you do?”
“No, no, Eva,” Brin rushes to get out. “Hypothetically. He’s worried he’s taking advantage of me.”
Her voice softens. “Oh my god, of course! You can sleep on my pullout couch and we can walk to work together. We can make it a sleepover with the three of us. I have these new stick-on nails I want to try, and Shannon likes this expensive face mask and she lets me mooch off of her. Maybe I’d even kick Shannon out and you can be my permanent roommate. ”
We hear a muffled “hey!” in the background. “Just kidding,” she says, which is followed by laughter. Eva’s voice comes back on. “Do I need to go over to your place and kick Marco’s ass until he stops being so worried about you?”
I answer before Brin can. “Today is not that day, Eva, but hang on to that thought.”
Brin frowns at me but Eva laughs. “Don’t forget, babe: you are a kick-ass woman, and you aren’t going to ever let someone take advantage of you again. Got that?”
“Got it,” Brin agrees.
We thank her and hang up the phone.
“What now?” Brin asks.
“The only thing that changes,” I say, “is that we keep loving each other.”
“Epically.”
“And often,” I add.
“And maybe we get rid of my futon?”
I answer by pulling her face down to mine and kissing her hard. This was definitely the best Christmas anyone has ever had.