I quickly sketched out the details of the argument with my mother, leaving out the more intense, personal parts. Sunny kept quiet until I finished.
“So you quit? What does that mean for us?”
I appreciated that Sunny didn’t try and pry more intimate information from me, and because I’d never been anything less than honest with him, I said, “I’m not sure. I’ll need to talk to them.”
“Dude, I know you’re upset, but don’t make any snap decisions. Your mother intimidates the shit out of me, and that might be the worst fucking thing I’ve ever heard someone do to another person, but I know she loves you.”
My throat swelled shut, and I dropped my gaze from his. “How can you love someone yet be so disappointed in their behavior, it makes it impossible for you to trust them? I don’t think I can ever believe a thing she says to me. Not anymore.”
“You’re gonna have to figure it out sooner rather than later. I have a feeling your mother isn’t going to sit around and wait for you to decide. She’s gonna confront you.”
“Well, good thing three thousand miles separate us.”
Sunny arched a dark, well-groomed brow at me. “Dude. There’re not enough miles in the universe to keep her away from you.”
“You’re supposed to be on my side,” I growled, flinging the empty espresso cup into the wastebasket.
“I’m always on your side, Ezra. That’s why I want you to be prepared.” He walked out, leaving me to contemplate his words.
The rest of the day I read through contracts, answered emails, and made appointments several weeks in the future. My hope was to have this mess in my life figured out by then. Either my parents would admit they were wrong, apologize to both Roe and myself, and we’d figure out how to make amends, or the freeze-out would continue, which would be hard on all of us. My parents and I had rarely gone more than a few days without speaking.
As if on cue, the phone rang, and I recognized it as the agency’s California number.
“It’s them, Roe,” Sunny belted out from his office.
“Very professional. Did the intercom break?” I grumbled and blew out a tense breath before hitting the Speaker button. “Hello, Ezra speaking.” Another coffee was most definitely necessary, and I might dump some alcohol in it. Desperate times and all that.
“Hello. Am Ipersona non gratatoo?” My father’s gruff voice, roughened by years of cigar smoking and whiskey, filled the room.
“Dad. It’s not a joke.” I poured the grinds into the machine and hit start. “Did you know what was going on? Were you aware of what Mom did?”
“Your mother sat up crying all night because of the way you spoke to her. She doesn’t deserve that.”
I’d always admired my parents’ singular devotion to each other, but at this stage I’d hoped my father might’ve seen my point. I should’ve known he wouldn’t.
“Did I deserve to have a relationship sabotaged? Did I deserve being lied to all these years? And you even dragged poor Marguerite into this farce.”
“Your mother warned me you’d be stubborn. Did it occur to you that she might’ve been right? I know you said that man wasn’t interested in you for money, but everyone wants something out of someone. It’s the way of the world, Ezra.”
“Not my world.”
“That’s bullshit. How are you as successful as you are, being that naïve?”
“I guess I deal with people who have a conscience, or who are decent human beings.”
“You always were a bit of a bleeding heart.”
I pressed the pads of my fingers to my forehead to stave off the beginnings of a massive, thumping headache. “You say that as if it’s a contagious disease. If it means I care about people’s feelings, then yeah, I am. But I prefer to think of myself as having faith that ultimately people will do the right thing.”
“And your mother and I did what we thought was right. She wanted to protect you, and I thought about your future and the business.”
Of course he did. It was all he ever thought about. It was why he’d missed more-than-could-be-counted baseball games I’d played in and even came late to my graduation. The Business. Always with a capitalB. It was the fourth person in our family dynamic.
I took a gulp of coffee, damning myself for not having a bottle of whiskey at the ready, and dragged my mind to the conversation at hand. “Which would all be fine if it was your life, not mine.” All pretense that this conversation could remain civilized vanished. “Mom burned personal letters between Roe and me and lied to my face when I asked if he’d ever called. How can you now sit here and tell me it’s okay? You fucked up my life, and you don’t have one damn regret, do you?”
“I don’t regret making sure my only child wasn’t going to be taken advantage of because he was in his first love affair. When you listen with your cock, you tend not to make the best decisions.”
Heat swept through me, and sweat broke out under my armpits. “That’s not what happened,” I mumbled. My father and I never had that sex talk, and he wasn’t home often enough to pay attention to who I was dating.
