The Offer (31 page)

Now with
working full-time, I’m not sure I’ll have that much time to myself
anymore, let alone Ava. But I know the right and responsible thing
to do would be to accept it without question.

Still, I find
myself saying to James, “Do you mind if I have a day to think about
it?”

He seems
caught off-guard. “Okay, sure. Take the whole week. Just…well, it’s
not my business…”

And whatever
he was about to say, I can tell it’s not his business.

I prod him
anyway. “What?”

James shrugs,
his pretty boy face blasé. “I think you could have a lucrative
career here. And I know things are all cruisey at the moment for
you, but eventually…that could change.”

He’s basically
hinting that I can’t have a free ride forever and I hate to admit
that he’s right, because he has such an annoying way of offering up
his opinion when it’s not needed, but he is right. I just don’t
tell him that.

“Well, I
better go pour alcohol down some people’s throats,” I tell him,
getting out of my seat. “And thank you. Really. I’ll let you know
tomorrow.”

The night
doesn’t end up being as busy as we anticipated. Steph and Linden
get there just before James says I can go home, but I’m too tired
to stick around. There’s a lot on my mind.

I get home
just after midnight to an empty apartment. Ava is spending the next
two nights with my mother in Livermore because it was just easier
that way. Part of me is surprised that Bram isn’t in my apartment
waiting for me like he usually is, but it could be he wants me over
there for a change.

With that in
mind, I pour myself a glass of pinot gris, enjoying that first cold
mouthful. Nothing could be sweeter. Then, once I remember to
breathe a little, something I think I’m doing a bit less of lately,
I go into the bedroom and change. I throw my homemade top and
skinny jeans to the side and slip on a lacy red camisole with
matching short shorts. Since I’m only going over there to screw,
why dress up?

I go back into
the kitchen and while I’m finishing up my glass of wine, I hear the
strangest sound coming from Bram’s apartment.

Yelling.

Then
crying.

Two voices,
one that must be Bram’s but the other is female.

My blood runs
still and my heart kicks down a few gears.

What the fuck
is going on?

I head out
into the hall and now I can hear it more clearly.

A woman yells,
“Don’t you throw that back in my face. You could have been
there!”

Then Bram
yells back, “I tried to fucking be there!”

“Well, it was
too damn late.” A pause and it sounds like she’s crying. “God,
Matthew doesn’t need to hear this.”

Who the fuck
is Matthew?

I try to
swallow the brick in my throat. Things seem safe out here in the
hallway. If I knock on his door, everything is going to change. I
just know it. This woman, that voice…it all means something, it all
means too much.

Part of me
just wants to go away. And I should. Go back in the apartment and
drown out the voices the way I used to drown out Bram when I first
moved in.

But I don’t do
that. I knock on his door instead.

“Fuck,” Bram
growls.

I hold my
breath.

The door
opens.

Bram’s face
falls at the sight of me. In his eyes, I can read everything. I can
read the change.

I can read the
end.

“What’s going
on?” I ask, barely able to speak.

In the
background, I see a woman with long dark curly hair appear. She’s
tall, on the curvy side, maybe a bit bigger than me, and pretty,
with smooth honey skin. Her dark, dark eyes are tinged with
red.

Taylor.

In an instant,
I know it’s her.

And she knows
something about me. It probably helps that I’m wearing
lingerie.

“Nicola,” Bram
says. “This isn’t a good time.”

I jerk my head
at the woman. “Who is she?” I try really hard not to sound like a
jealous bitch but I’m totally failing.

Bram’s face
falls even more. “She’s the woman I told you about. Taylor.”

I cross my
arms, trying to act stronger than I am, trying to pretend that the
name doesn’t shatter me. “The one that got away?”

The woman
frowns and then steps forward.

“Hi,” she
says, looking me up and down. “Are you his girlfriend?”

I look
at Bram.
Am
I your girlfriend?

Was
I?

“I live next
door,” I say by way of explanation. “And heard yelling so I thought
I’d come over.”

“I’m so sorry
about that,” Bram says. “I’ll talk to you later.”

I stare at him
for a moment and I feel a world pass between us. Maybe time speeds
up or maybe it slows down, but I feel myself clinging to the idea
of what we were together.

I love you
, I
think.
What
are you doing? What is this? Please let there be a perfectly
rational explanation for everything. Make me believe it.

“Mom,” a young
boy’s voice says, and before it can really register, a little boy
about six or seven in shorts and a t-shirt appears between Taylor
and Bram.

“It’s okay,
Matthew,” she says, putting her hand on his head. The kid stares at
me with tired eyes and he yawns big and loud.

There’s
something so damn familiar about this kid that I feel like I’m
barely holding onto reality. Though his skin is darker, his eyes,
his brows, the shape of his jaw, even at a young age, are all too
similar. He’s even got on the same socks as Bram. Yellow and brown.
The Loch Ness Monster.

I look at Bram
and realization slowly falls on me, like those first falling stones
from an impending rockslide.

“This is
Matthew,” Taylor says to me. “Bram’s son.”

And now the
rest of the earth gives way.

I’m falling on
the inside, down, down, down, buried by the truth.

On the outside
I am frozen solid.

I take in a
sharp intake of air and can’t seem to let it go. It freezes in my
lungs, burning liquid nitrogen.

“I was going
to tell you,” Bram says, rubbing his hand over his face, his voice
strained. “But I didn’t know when. It’s so damn complicated.”

“Bram,” Taylor
warns him. “Not in front of him.”

I can’t even
form words. My mouth opens and closes like a stupid fish until
finally I burst out, “You have a son?”

“Nicola,” he
says, shooting Taylor and Matthew an apologetic look before
stepping out in the hall and closing the door halfway. “I can
explain.”

How many
breakups have started with “I can explain”? How many times has the
explanation never really mattered?

“Why did you
lie?” I croak, shaking, feeling like I’m being fileted.

“I didn’t
lie,” he says. “I just didn’t tell you…I didn’t bring it up, I was
going to but—”

“But
what?”

He swallows
hard and lowers his voice, “Because I did to Taylor and Matthew
what Phil did to you and Ava. Because I wanted you to trust me
before you knew about things I’ve done and the person I was.”

I suck in my
breath, trying to find an ounce of strength to turn away.

“I did trust
you,” I tell him. The words crumble out of my mouth. “But I don’t
anymore.”

I step
backward and he grabs for my hand and I’m ripping myself out of his
reach. I run right into my apartment and slam the door, locking it.
Bram knocks on it viciously, calling for me, but I don’t want to
see him, I can’t see him.

And I can’t be
in here.

I yank on a
pair of jeans and a t-shirt, grab my purse and I’m opening the
door. Bram stands there, a face etched with panic, pain, and I push
him out of the way.

“Don’t,
Nicola!” he yells at me.

But I’m
running.

I’m already
gone.

***

I have nowhere
to go.

I’m on the
street, walking fast, trying to get to the nearest bus stop while
texting Steph with shaking hands.

I need to talk to you now. Something
happened
.

What?
Her
response is immediate.
I’m still at the Lion.

I’ll come
there. Catching the bus.

I’d come get
you but I had too many beerz. Is this about Bram?

I don’t answer
that and the minute I walk into the bar, she sees it on my face. I
haven’t been crying though. I’m not exactly even sure what to feel
except that terrible, dreadful realization that your life, the one
you were starting to love, will never be the same.

All of it,
wiped away.

“Oh, honey,”
Steph says, getting off of her barstool and wrapping her arms
around me. “You’re shaking, what happened?”

Beside her,
sitting down, is Linden, staring at me curiously. Sometimes he
looks just like his brother.

All of a
sudden a wave of rage washes over me.

I point my
finger at him. “Did you know?”

Linden looks
bewildered. “What? Know what?” He looks to Steph for help but she’s
just as confused.

“Did you know
about Bram?”

His eyes
narrow. “What about Bram? What did he do?”

“
You
know, that he has a fucking
kid
!” I
practically spit out the words. They sound venomous coming from my
mouth, like it could poison me. “He’s a
father
.”

Linden’s eyes
go wide. Steph’s seem about to fall out of her head.

“So, did you
know?” I go on, feeling angrier by the second. “Was I the only one
in the dark?”

“Wait, wait,”
Steph interjects, putting her hand out in front of me. “Kid?
Father? Are you pregnant again?”

I glare
at her. “No! I mean Bram has a kid, a freaking
child
, with someone else. His name is Matthew. He looks
just like him. I just fucking met him in his apartment, visiting
hours with his mom or I don’t know what the fuck. What the
fuck?”

Linden is
slowly shaking his head. “No, that’s not possible. He doesn’t. I
would have known.” He looks at Steph. “We would have known.”

“Would you
have?” I counter. “Does anyone have any idea what kind of past Bram
had?”

“
His kid
and the baby mama were in his
apartment
?” Steph repeats, looking freaked out. “Why?”

I throw my
hands out. “How should I know? I thought maybe Linden would.”

“No,” Linden
says adamantly. “If Bram had a child this whole time, I would have
known about it. Are you sure he didn’t know? He could have just
found out.”

I want to
collapse onto the ground, but I manage to lean against the stool
instead. It’s only then that I notice the three of us are the only
people in the bar aside from James who was talking to our other
bartender, Sandra, in the corner.

“He’s known.
Oh, he’s known. He’s alluded to it before. He’s talked about this
girl, this Taylor, as the only girl he loved, a girl he made a huge
mistake with. Guess that mistake was Matthew…” My heart aches. “Or
the mistake could have been leaving her.” I close my eyes and take
a deep breath in through my nose. “Those damn stupid socks.”

“You mean the
Nessie ones?” says Linden.

I nod. “I had
no idea why he wore them, he just called them lucky.”

“That’s what
he said to me when I made fun of them.”

“Did he get
defensive?”

“Yeah, kind
of. But he sometimes does when you don’t really expect him to.”

I let out a
ragged breath and sit down on the stool. My legs just won’t stop
shaking. None of me will. My own blood feels rattled. “That’s Bram,
isn’t it? Does what you least expect him to. I saw those socks on
Matthew. There’s no way that was a coincidence. He knew about
Matthew from the very start.” His words run through my head. “He
said he did to them what Phil did to Ava and me.”

“What a
fucker,” Steph says, putting her hand on my shoulder. “I’m so
sorry, what are you going to do?”

I shrug. “I
don’t know. I don’t know. I just ran. I couldn’t be there.”

“I don’t blame
you,” she says just as James comes by.

“What’s going
on?” he asks.

“Nothing,”
Steph says. “But Nicola needs a shot of whisky and fast.”

“Make it two,”
Linden says quickly. He looks a bit shell-shocked. I guess it can’t
be easy knowing you’ve always been an uncle, you just didn’t know
it.

“And James,” I
add in. “If you’re still offering me that assistant manager
position, I want it.”

He smiles at
me as he pours the shot. “Good to hear.” But I don’t smile
back.

“I guess we
should say congratulations,” Steph says softly. “But it just
doesn’t seem right, right now. I’m so sorry, Nicola.” She searches
my eyes and they become sadder by the second. “I know how much
you’re in love with him.”

And
that’s what really stings. That I love him. That he doesn’t love
me. And that
this
happened.
One person’s love isn’t enough to keep two people together, I knew
that much already.

James hands me
the shot and Linden and I down ours at the same time. It burns but
not enough. I want it to burn away the gauze over this night.

“I’ll have
another,” I tell James and then Linden and Steph chime in with
their requests.

Suddenly,
there’s a knock at the door to the bar and we all turn around to
see Bram standing on the other side, looking pitiful.

“Don’t open
it,” I hiss to James. “Tell him you’re closed.”

James looks at
Linden. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing to
worry about,” he says and nods at the door. “Let him in. I want a
few words.”