Adding Heat

Reflections: Adding Heat

I wasn't waking up. The nightmare wasn't going away. I kept waiting and waiting and waiting, but the hole just kept getting deeper and deeper and deeper. If I didn't find a way out soon, it was going to consume me. I'd be left at the bottom, the dregs, neck deep in shit.

What was I doing? What had I done? I was back in the group home crying into my fucking pillow, waiting for an aunt that would never come. Meanwhile, that big fucking prick – Teddy Vendez – was beating on me over and over and over and over and over...

Only this time, it was a five foot two inch red-head kicking me in the balls; her and her five foot ten inch auburn haired brother. This had to be a nightmare, right? This didn't happen in real life. I was young and successful and I doted on my wife and child. I was the good guy here so why did it feel like I was being slit open? Why was I getting pushed down into the shit?

I loved her. Still. Always. I couldn't get her out of my mind. I remember the first day I saw her, I remembered that frat party I had no business at. I remember that night, holding her, feeling her warmth. Taking care of her.

I had always done that, hadn't I? I had always taken care of her. Since the moment I saw her I was taking care of her. The knight in shining armor, always arriving on his white steed, always coming to her rescue.

I was tired. The armor no longer fit. She had removed it, piece by piece, over the past 5 years I'd known her. There was nothing else left to give; she'd taken it all. I was done ... broken ... empty of any more compassion. Instead, only the white hot rage was left. The rage of being there for her over and over and over again only to find she'd never really been there for me. I couldn't deny it any longer. This was real. She'd fucked me over and nothing she or I would ever be able to say could change that.

The sky through the taxi window was blurry but whether it was due to the rain or my tears was anyone's guess. I had made a life for Amber. I had given my life for her. She was my life. We'd had it all: money, friends, a wonderful child. How the hell could she do this?

I'd fucking had so many opportunities to get some anonymous woman in bed. Waitresses, business associates, interns and employees for the companies I'd contracted out to. Hell, even some of my own employees made it pretty clear that they were available; my admin, Jeanie, for example, with her red hair down to the crack of her ass and those emerald green eyes that looked so innocent and yet so damn naughty. You can't tell me that bending over the desk to point out contract details with the top three fucking buttons of her blouse undone wasn't a pretty blatant message.

Maybe that was it. Maybe, being out of town week after week gave Amber the idea I was cheating on her. Maybe she figured it was okay because I was doing it.

But I fucking wasn't and she fucking knew it! She KNEW she was everything to me. GOD. I was going round and round in my head, looking for some fucking answer and it was driving me fucking crazy. I kept bouncing around in there, my thoughts careening off my freaking skull, pounding over me. I. JUST. COULDN'T. DO. THIS. ANY. MORE.

I kept making excuses. I kept trying to figure out what I had done to cause this. I kept pinning this shit back on me ... but the truth was that it wasn't me. This had been going on long before I came into the picture. She'd fucking said so ... but I didn't want to hear that did I? No. I fucking didn't want to believe that anyone I loved could fucking rip my fucking guts out and watch me slowly bleed to fucking death.

As always I was willing to bear the brunt. I was willing to be the fucking doormat that the whole goddamn world could walk right over. Welcome, just dry your fucking feet off on the Marc. Don't mind him, he can carry the weight of the whole fucking world on his shoulders.

Well, you know what? Even fucking Atlas had to take a day off, didn't he? Where the fuck was my day off? When the fuck was my turn to be loved and cherished and not abandoned like a piece of fucking shit? When was it my goddamn turn? Cause I was getting awful fucking tired of doing this every fucking day.

I'd made her goddamn life. I'd given her everything. I don't think I should go back to work, Marc. I think I should stay home with Mikey, Marc. Don't you think it's better if our little baby grows up with a loving, traditional mother, Marc? I'll go back to work after he starts school, Marc.

I'd rather be fucking my brother instead of working, Marc.

FFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUCCCCCCCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKKK!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Sir? Are you okay?" the cabbie looked at me in his rear-view mirror in concern. It wasn't until then that I realized that I'd screamed that last out loud.

"Yeah, I'm just fucking peachy." I didn't recognize the voice that came out of me. That wasn't my voice. That wasn't the calm, rational voice that I used every day. This voice was dark and primal and dangerous.

And all of a sudden I REALLY fucking liked it.

"You know what, fuck the office," the new darker voice said from my mouth. "Find me a fucking bar."

The whiskey didn't burn so much this time. Instead, I just felt a long, slow heat simmering inside of me. I liked that feeling. I liked the heat, the tension, the way my stomach tightened for just a moment as it made its way down. It fed me, fed the new primal, darker me.

I stopped at two shots. I wasn't going to start that long descent into the bottle. I wasn't going to give her the fucking satisfaction. No, she wasn't winning this. She wasn't going to get away with this. She wanted to stab me in the fucking back? Fine. Stab away. But she made a big fucking mistake ... I wasn't dead yet.

I started dialing my new divorce attorney to tell him what he could do with my settlement proposal ... but I stopped. I was a business man. I was really good at negotiating. In my haste to make this whole thing go away I might have just started a strategy for winning. In business, sometimes you had to show one open, friendly hand so you could sucker punch them with the other.

I was done as the doormat for the universe. If this nightmare wasn't going to end, then I was going to tilt the fucking thing in my favor. Let her have the house and the car. Let her fucking have the money. I could always make more.

What she couldn't have was my dignity. Maybe she thought she'd taken that long ago. Maybe she fucking thought that I would just roll over like a goddamn dog. Maybe she could get away with laughing at me behind my back as she fucked Dave. Maybe she had a rude fucking awakening coming.

I didn't walk down that street towards my office. I stalked down it. The universe wanted to fuck with me? Well FUCK IT INSTEAD. I wasn't putting up with this shit any more.

One of the guys I'd been in that last halfway house with had become a private detective. I'd heard he was pretty good; I'd heard that he, like me, was the person to call when you wanted something found ... or found out. I guess I'd see just how good he is.

"Hi, I'd like to speak with Johnny Diamond," I said into the phone. I'd paused just inside my office building.

"I'm sorry, sir, but he's out," the soft voice replied. "May I ask what this is about?"

"Yeah," I said, my voice almost a snarl. "I need to hire him."

"Oh, well..." I heard paper shuffling as her voice trailed off. "I have an appointment for tomorrow morning at 8am. I won't have anything after that until next week, next Wednesday at 10am."

"Tomorrow morning is fine," I replied. "I'll see him tomorrow at 8."

"WAIT! Sir!" she called as I moved to turn the cell phone off.

"Yes?"

"Who can I tell him the appointment is for?" she asked in relief.

"Davison," I replied after a moment's thought. Johnny and I had shared a room at the Davison halfway house. "Just put down Mr. Davison."