1. Ryan #2
Fuck my mouth, Jesus. I’m gonna have to make this work with my eyes and forehead. A slight widening of my eyes smooths out the perma-line between my brows and opens up my expression a little. The muscle strain is minimal, and I look sort of pleasant that way.
I try to build some muscle memory by forcing myself to maintain the expression while I finish up in the shower. It’s not easy. My mouth keeps wanting to get involved, and every time I catch a glimpse of myself, it feels fucking hopeless.
Afterward, I lotion up my two sleeves of tattoos, the ink on my torso, and the intricate design on my thigh.
It’s been about six months since I got a tattoo, and I’m feeling the itch again.
I’ve been wanting to get started on my back, but until I’m making some serious coin, it seems dumb to spend so much money on something I’ll only see when I twist around to look in the mirror.
Still, the burn of the needle is a craving—an addiction I can’t quit.
My stomach growls as I’m getting into bed, and I think about Deacon’s bananas, but in the end, I don’t have the energy to get up and grab one.
I’m like—completely in love with you.
I wake up coughing, like I’m trying to choke the words back into my throat the way I wasn’t able to when I said them ten years ago.
The worst fucking mistake I ever made and not—I repeat— not— the thing I need to be thinking about when I’m headed to the most important opportunity of my life.
But that’s the problem with recurring dreams—they tend to pop up in times of stress.
It doesn’t take a psychoanalyst to decipher what the dream means.
It was my most embarrassing moment, and I’m afraid of embarrassing myself today.
It makes sense, but still, I have to pat my body down to remind myself I’m not fourteen anymore.
Kids are stupid, and they fuck up bad sometimes, and I’m not that kid.
The hair on my legs proves it. I didn’t get that until I was sixteen and had already learned my lesson.
Over and over again, I learned the damn lesson.
I get out of bed as quick as I can in case I start to dwell on stupid shit I can’t change, and head for the shower.
After an hour of painstaking self-care—hair styling, a close shave, a nail trim, and a lot of expression training, I’m on my way to the Marks & Baker building in downtown San Francisco.
I’m wearing my nicest gray suit, brown leather shoes polished to a fine gleam, and my late father’s watch fit snugly over my wrist.
My phone rings, and a small smile makes its way onto my face when I see it’s her . She can say what she wants about boundaries and student-teacher relationships, but she and I both know we’d work. “Hey,” I answer.
“Hey! Are you excited? Nervous?” Norah’s voice is on the lower side of feminine without being husky.
“Yes,” I tell her, catching a reflection of myself in the window of a building I pass.
“It’ll be great. You’ll see. I’m still friends with the people who were in my internship.”
“Did you forget I don’t have friends?”
“You have me, don’t you?”
“Ouch,” I say, smiling again.
“Ugh…you’re killing me , Ryan.”
“Me? I’m not the one with all the prissy rules.”
“Prissy? You could have just as easily gotten a job in Seattle.”
“You told me not to,” I don’t hesitate to remind her.
“Well, I was stupid. ”
I laugh, and she does, too. Then, with a sigh, she says, “One day…”
“Maybe…”
“Wanna tell me about what you’re wearing?” she asks.
I shake my head. “No. But you’re welcome to tell me what you’ve got on.”
“I’m still in bed…”
“Must be nice.”
“Just a tank and panties.”
“Okay, that’s enough,” I cut her off. “I can’t be thinking about that right now. I have to practice being friendly.”
She laughs, and I picture her rolling onto her stomach, her ass covered in black satin underwear. “Bye Ryan, have an amazing day.”
“Bye. Norah .”
She groans again and hangs up.
I grin as I pocket my phone. She and I were never like this in person, but since she moved to Seattle and decided she wanted to keep in touch with me, things have shifted. I don’t hate it.
What I do hate is being this nervous. The Marks & Baker skyscraper is all white concrete and glass, glittering despite the fog rolling over the bay.
It’s windy, cloudy, and cold as usual. I heard the sun is planning to make an appearance later this morning, which I have to admit makes today feel auspicious and promising.
I had my appointment with building security last week, so the man at the front desk has my new badge waiting for me. It’s only my fourth time in the building—two interviews and the background check, but I know where I’m headed. Tenth floor—progressive investments.
The elevator is loaded with a wide array of people encompassing various ages, genders and ethnicities. I’m the young white guy with the nearly black hair and disappointed smile .
Marks & Baker is a top ten company, known for the diversity of its work force, which it’s not shy about crediting for its massive success in the investment world.
They hire from everywhere on the planet, and it doesn’t matter where you went to school.
They look at your transcripts and grades, but they’re more interested in what you did while you were there—the ideas you had, and the mark you want to make on the world.
While I do want to be rich beyond reproach, I also want regular people to stop suffering over money so much the way my parents always seemed to. Wealth should be accessible to anyone who wants it.
In college, I started a club to help demystify the stock market for people who wanted to make some extra money.
If anyone thought “this guy doesn’t act like someone who’d start a club,” they’d underestimate my desire for this internship in particular.
I’m capable of coming out of my comfort zone in pursuit of a goal—especially one I want this much.
This internship is my ticket to some of the best jobs in the country. Wall Street…or Seattle.
I grew up in a suburb of San Francisco, so Marks & Baker has been on my radar since my teens.
I’ve known what it takes to get hired here since I was signing up for classes my junior year of high school.
AP Econ, Calculus, fucking golf, which I have a stupid knack for.
Whacking a tiny ball with a metal club turns out to be directly in my internalized rage wheelhouse.
The only reason I don’t play anymore is because the sun is bad for my tattoos, but I have no doubt that with enough sunscreen and motivation, I could pick it back up and not make a fool of myself.
Three other people get out with me on the tenth floor. They disperse while I approach the receptionist.
Her large, dark eyes take me in from head to toe. Her thick black hair is styled in long waves. Makeup is precisely applied, and her white, sleeveless dress sets off her rosy brown, South Asian skin. She notes my badge and smiles, crimson painted lips revealing dazzling teeth.
“Ryan Vale?”
“Yes ma’am.”
“You’ll be in the east conference room.” She points east, I guess. “Second door on the left.”
The progressive investments offices are open and collaborative.
There aren’t any cubicles. It’s set up more like a community coffee shop with one long wooden table where people are working on their laptops and sipping lattes.
In another area, couches circle low tables, but there are no individual desks in the primary workspace.
All the actual offices are enclosed with glass, reserved for the senior investors.
They line the back wall and feature a broad view of the Bay.
The hallway I’m being pointed toward has a chic, rustic sign signaling there are restrooms, conference rooms, and “The Lounge,” which is half coffee bar manned by a barista with basketfuls of free snacks and half break room equipped with refrigerators for employees next to a countertop covered with microwaves.
I was told lunch would be provided today, so all I have in my messenger back is my laptop, a notebook, and an aluminum water bottle.
I fix my face as I approach the conference room where the door is already open. Low chatter comes from inside, and I have a brief moment of panic that I’m somehow late.
I step into the doorway, and four pairs of eyes land on me. I force my mouth into a smile with no teeth, which I remember too late is the one that makes me look annoyed, so I stretch harder to show teeth.
A curvy Black woman rises from the head of the table.
She’s a head shorter than I am and wears an amethyst-colored pantsuit that’s doing its level best to contain her ample bust. She holds out a hand, and a woven Pride bracelet slides out from under her sleeve.
“Georgie King,” she says. “Pronouns they/them.”
I mentally correct myself for misgendering them in my brain and apply the new filter layer to the shaky, newly assembled one I worked hard to put in place this weekend.
I shake their hand. “Ryan Vale. He/him.”
“Pleasure. We’ll introduce ourselves again once everyone arrives, but this is Piper, Miguel, and Bailey.” Georgie points out the three others seated at the table.
Piper is a young white woman in the lethally good looking blonde category with high cheekbones, and an oval face.
She’s wearing a pale silk blouse buttoned all the way to the neck.
Miguel looks to be on the shorter side. He’s thin with bronze, hairless skin.
He’s sporting a sleek man bun over tender brown eyes.
He’s dressed as I am, in a well-tailored suit, though his is a deep forest green with a floral pocket square. A statement.
For me, Bailey stands out the most mainly because she doesn’t stand out at all.
She’s also white with dark, frizzy hair pulled into a bun, thick eyebrows and no makeup.
She’s wearing a suit jacket, but I get the immediate impression she’d rather be working from home in sweatpants.
Her expression is as sour as I’m afraid mine is.
There aren’t any more pronoun surprises—Bailey’s a she/her who I don’t think cares much for he/hims. I sit next to Miguel, opposite the women and a seat away from Georgie, who says, “We’re expecting four more. Feel free to be thinking of any questions you all might have for me or Jonathan.”
Normally, I’d use this time to scroll my phone.
I’m not here to ask questions. I’m here to listen and learn, but instead, I take out my notebook and pen.
Next into the room is Jia pronounced with a long I.
She looks mixed to me, Black and white with pale brown skin and natural curls piled high on her head.
She’s pretty with minimal makeup—her eyes are fringed with long, dark lashes.
She has a bubbly laugh and a big smile. Her slender body makes her seem taller than she is when she sits next to me and gives me an excited grin.
I do my best to smile without looking like a serial killer.
I’m writing down names, and it helps that everyone else comes in one at a time.
Nathan is next. He’s gotta be at least six-five.
His suit is off-white, which I could never pull off, but he’s a Black man with a shaved head, and so it works.
He seems a little thrown off by Georgie’s pronoun intro, which makes me wonder what part of the country he’s from, but he’s a good sport about it when Georgie laughs and tells him he’ll get used to it.
The last two people to enter the conference room come in together.
It’s rarely a relief when I see someone I know.
I burn bridges like they’re meant for kindling.
But it’s not the cute redhead Lisette who’s got me immediately turning my head back to my paper and pressing a thumb beneath my watch on the pulse point of my wrist in an effort to will myself to remain seated and show no fear—no emotion of any kind.
Because it’s him . The golden boy of Thousand Oaks High. The best friend I couldn’t keep. The bully of my worst nightmares.
The man I swore I’d move heaven and earth never to see again. Definitely not the love of my fucking life.
My former stepbrother.