5. April 7, 2023 #2
“Spring fever?” Gem asked before taking another bite of her leaf.
“People always seem so much twitchier this time of year.” A noise off camera caught her attention, and she nodded to whomever was talking to her.
“I have to go, ladies. Duty calls. Cherry… don’t beat yourself up.
Flame knows you don’t really mean it like she’s taking it.
She’s hormonal right now. By tomorrow, she’ll have called you to tell you she loves you, and it’s forgotten. ”
She nodded. “Thanks, Gem. Be safe.”
With a salute, Gem disconnected the video feed, and the screen went back to its wallpaper.
Cherry couldn’t bear to look up at Kubrick. She’d fucked up. Again. She’d hurt Flame’s feelings completely unintentionally, but she’d done it all the same. “Kubrick, I?—”
Kubrick slammed a container on the table.
“Enough is enough, Cherry. This shit with Demon is infecting everything you touch. He will not change. He is who he is, warts and all. You need to let it go. You want to spend your life miserable without him, fine. That’s your choice.
But your attitude toward him is causing you to say shit that’s hurting Flame, and that I will not stomach. Nor will TB if he hears about it.”
“It’s stupid. I know it is. My mouth just says things, and my brain can’t seem to hop in fast enough to slam the lid on it.”
It was more than that, though, and she knew it.
In truth, it had little to nothing to do with the drugs, although that concerned her.
However, many people functioned just fine in all aspects of their lives despite being addicted to things.
His illegal addiction, however, wasn’t the reason for her anger.
Even that was a lie. She didn’t feel anger toward him.
She felt anger at herself, and her pride was refusing to allow her to back down.
Tensions in the office were at an all-time high, and it was completely her fault.
No one said anything, but Demon had been right.
Everyone was second-guessing her now because of all the secrets she’d kept.
Waters was talking to her, but it was all professional, and he never hung out at her desk to chat anymore.
TB tried, but his paranoia over Flame and the baby coming to any harm was almost comical, and it was as if he felt just talking to Cherry in the office put them at risk.
The man had even double-checked and triple-checked all the security protocols himself at lunch today to ensure no one could get at the women in the conference room.
Nemo probably would have been the same with her, but Nemo wasn’t here.
He was with Gem. Midas kept himself in his office almost twenty-four seven, 365, and what about Steel?
Steel had never talked to her much to begin with.
Now he just stared at her like a cobra waiting to strike.
Kubrick had tried to ask her what the hell was going on.
Unfortunately, she couldn’t tell Kubrick what it was really about—Demon’s accusations regarding putting the team and their significant others in jeopardy for her personal wants—and the drug use was all she could come up with as a reason why she was keeping him at arm’s length.
It had become an all-consuming excuse. So much so that she was at a point where she’d tricked her own brain into being unable to get past it, and she was the one who manufactured it as a reason.
Her pride wouldn’t let her let it go, either, because that meant admitting she was in the wrong.
Everything was so fucked up.
“I don’t understand it. His issues have been going on longer than you’ve known him.
You never cared before. Everyone knows—has known—he’s a functional addict with an on/off switch.
You hired him knowing that. Now, suddenly, you’re being a right fuckwitch and judgmental about it. What the ever-loving fuck?”
“Do you need to swear that much?”
“See? That! Right there! Now you’re doing it to me! You used to find my filthy mouth charming and unapologetic. Called me a boss bitch babe with a smile. Now? You chastise me like a grandmother.”
Cherry pushed all her lunch paraphernalia toward the center of the table, and then she placed her forehead flat on the tabletop, arms outstretched straight in front of her. “I don’t know what’s wrong.”
There was a pause. “Are you pregnant? Because being all hormonal would explain a lot of things.”
Lifting only her head, Cherry looked up at Kubrick with a frown. “I am not pregnant.”
Kubrick snorted. “So what’s the deal? Why are you going so hard at this? You’re miserable. He’s miserable. You could both be ‘miserable’ together if you’d just let it go. Is it some sort of test you’re putting him through?”
Cherry put her head back down, this time with one cheek to the tabletop, her face turned in Kubrick’s direction. “Maybe?”
“So you’re never going to let yourself love him unless he never takes an oxy again?
Because if that’s what this is, that’s just bullshit.
That would be like Waters saying he’s never going to bend me over his desk again until I give up chocolate.
Sister, we know neither one of those things is ever going to happen. ”
“Is that why he keeps the desk in his office? He doesn’t use it for anything. He works at that stupid table now because of you.”
An evil smile formed on Kubrick’s face. “It’s the best reason to keep the desk in his office. However, that’s not the point here. The point is, you’re asking Demon to do something he’s never going to do unless you get to the root of what the addiction is all about. Do you even know?”
In truth, she didn’t know the circumstances behind why he chose drugs as his coping mechanism.
Since it didn’t start after any major sort of trauma in his history, she just assumed it was a habit he’d picked up somewhere along the line, working as a doctor.
He used prescription pain meds for patient treatment plans, so they would have been easy to obtain.
Now he didn’t have the normal channels to get prescription medication, so he was buying it illegally somewhere.
In all their conversations, she’d never asked him the most important question. Why?
“Of course you don’t.” Kubrick sighed, then stood, shaking her head.
“I’m not even going to bother with trying to talk sense into you because you’re not ready to hear it yet.
” She stood and crossed to the conference room door.
“Look. Don’t worry about it, Cherry. As far as Flame’s concerned, Gem’s right.
It’s not worth beating yourself up over.
Flame knows you don’t mean it that way, but being pregnant is stressing her out on multiple levels.
I think there are some complications with the pregnancy, so both she and TB are worried about that.
Plus, she has a deadline coming up, and according to her, her main characters are currently sitting in the corner because they’re not talking to her.
She’s due in a month and absolutely terrified he’ll be on a project somewhere when she goes into labor.
More importantly, though, is that she’s worried about how this is going to affect TB’s work at Tribe, and I can’t say I wouldn’t be worried too. ”
“Nothing changes for TB on Tribe’s end. They’re having a baby, not becoming the king and queen of America. She’s a borderline recluse, anyway. They’re worrying for no reason.”
“If they were worried about physically having a baby, that would be fine. They’re looking at his situation through a whole different lens.
Being a deadman is fine when you’re single.
It’s slightly worrying if you try to maintain a romantic relationship that’s open and not necessarily monogamous.
Add commitment to it? More challenging. But a child you can’t openly acknowledge?
” Kubrick shook her head. “No… there are a bazillion fucked-up issues there that make it a genuine worry. In all honesty, I’m surprised he hasn’t up and disappeared already. ”
Cherry frowned. “You really think he will?”
“I think it has a high level of possibility, yes. My guess would be that you have until Ka-Bar’s found. After that? Who knows? Between that project still being open and Nemo leaving, he doesn’t want to leave the guys hanging.”
“God and I were talking about bringing some new blood in?—”
“It’s not about the deadmen body count. It’s the fact that TB wants to be a parent in reality.
Having been an orphan, he doesn’t want his child to feel abandoned like he did, even if that abandonment wasn’t his parents’ choice.
He’ll miss everything—all his child’s firsts, all the school shit, all the rites of passage—because he can’t publicly be a part of that life.
TB starts showing up to things on the regular, people put a face to the father of the child, then they’re going to want a name, and soon it will be impossible to be ‘dead’ anymore.
It’s one of the things God worried about, I’m sure, and why he said that since Waters and I became a couple, it made it so things would never be normal again.
We changed a core dynamic of the company. ”
“You know he’s not mad about that, right? He loves you,” Cherry said.
“He can like me and still be pissed at me. The two are not mutually exclusive. Doesn’t matter.
Waters and I were the catalyst, and he knew that would happen.
The dynamic has changed. Three members of the team have hooked up with someone permanently, and then one of them left the corporation because of it.
You and Demon, once you figure your shit out, will eventually make four members.
At some point, Steel will find someone, I’m guessing.
And then Midas will find his… whatever. I don’t know if he’s into girls, guys, his AI, his rubber cats, or what.
TB and Flame are having a baby. Who knows what any of you will create when your turns come around? ”
There was a lingering note of sadness in Kubrick’s voice.
The woman tried to pretend she was tough, but truthfully, she was probably the most vulnerable of the women.
Even more so than Flame. Cherry walked over to her at the door, a hand on her friend’s arm.
“He’s not mad. And he loves you unconditionally, from the moment you called your executive producer a ‘jizzmop.’” The two women shared a rueful laugh.
“There’s no blame. You know how the no-relationships rule came about, but he also told you that even he knew the rule was ridiculous.
People are not meant to be alone. We both knew that these days would come, and we’ve discussed what would happen when they did. ”
“And what will happen now?”
Cherry smiled. “Don’t worry. We’re not burying them soon.
There’s time yet, but eventually, the deadmen will be just that.
It was one reason Nemo had to follow Gem and not the other way around.
I certainly didn’t picture him being the first one out the door, but sometimes, the universe gives us a giggle.
I honestly thought Waters would disappear the moment God told him to come home while you were working together, but he refused to force you into a life on the run, which it would have been. ”
The deadmen couldn’t marry, yet TB had collared his romance novelist, Flame, as his submissive. Nemo had left his twin and his teammates to follow Gem around the globe for her company. Two couples were settled, but Kubrick and Waters were not.
Despite being the first to meet and become a couple, they kept their own residences—Kubrick’s house and Waters’ apartment here at Tribe.
Both had their own cars—her Corvette and his company-owned pickup truck.
Deadmen couldn’t own anything, so everything the guys had was in Tribe’s name.
Even Scheherazade’s puppy came via Nemo and was very much hers and not theirs.
He never told her she couldn’t do something, and he never questioned if she left town for a meeting, a research trip, or a film shoot.
She never complained about his long hours or the rare times he disappeared, sometimes with no word other than a text of “Had to go out of town,” their code for him going on a project.
If ever a deadman was to have the perfect partner, she was it.
But what if her comfort with everything wasn’t how Kubrick was really feeling? Was she feeling as if Waters wasn’t making some sort of commitment to her?
“Kubrick? Are you okay?”
The film director smiled, but Cherry could tell it was fake by the slight hitch before it slipped into place. “I’m fine.”
“Waters is right. You can’t lie for shit. Is everything okay with the two of you?”
Kubrick’s eyes were glassy. “Waters and I are great,” she chirped. “Told you. Never better, and no worries about half measures.”
“Stop redirecting. Something’s not right. Did he fuck up? I have access to over fifteen poisonous chemicals in the supply closet alone, some of which will dissolve a small planet, let alone a human being.”
Kubrick laughed through a strangled tear. She bit her lip, then lowered her voice to barely above a whisper. “That’s not how TB got rid of Stapleton, is it?”
“I can neither confirm nor deny that anyone used chemical cleaners at any point in time to dispose of a body.”
“Shit.” Kubrick’s face seemed to turn a little green.
“Relax,” Cherry reassured. “No one will ever find even a single strand of DNA from something that should have been swallowed, not birthed. Seriously though.” Her voice returned to normal.
“I am well-versed in body disposal, so I can definitely make it happen. I know a guy,” she teased. “So what did he do?”
“Nothing,” Kubrick admitted. “It’s… it’s stupid.
It’s stupid, girly, wh iney, and pushy, along with being totally unnecessary.
” She gathered herself back into her director persona and reached out to hug Cherry.
“Thank you for caring.” When she pulled back, her expression was serious. “Talk to Demon, Cherry.”
“Maybe. Go on.” She jerked her head toward the door. “Go collect G.I. Joe, but please sanitize the desk afterward. Be safe next week and beyond.”
“Always. Email me. I’ll answer when I can.”
A squeeze of her arms later, Kubrick was out the door and calling out for Waters.