He’s hurt that I didn’t tell him sooner, like I’ve been going behind his back or something. “Uh, let’s see, tomorrow will be,” I make a show of counting things out on my fingers, “Five days since I met her. If you count the first day. We’re around eighty hours in right now.” I only know because she made the comment this morning about it not even being seventy-two hours. “Dating or whatever we’re doing started yesterday morning.”
“Wait, what? Seriously?” He smiles, realizing that I wasn’t hiding this from him for as long as he assumed. “Alright man, spill it. Don’t skip shit either, I want the full artist in love breakdown.”
I can’t help but smile. A warmth I’m not used to runs through me, I feel it every time I’m around her or thinking about her. Which is near constantly. I tell him about the coffee shop meeting, the weirdness of the club, and the beach, and he listens intently, like it’s the best story he’s ever heard. I avoid personal matters, and unlike Steve, I don’t discuss intimate details.
“She’s a designer, and a damn good one. She’s got some mixed media pieces in her apartment that are just…they’re amazing. You should commission her to do one for you. It would look epic in your place.”
“Amazing, huh? Like her.”
Blush creeps up my face and I nod, biting my lip. “I feel like a fucking teenage idiot. She’s just, I dunno, incredible.”
“Downsides?”
“Crazy parents. They already both hate me, but it’s a mutual feeling. They fucked up her confidence, probably more. Culty nut jobs in my opinion.”
“Well, look at you go, Romeo. Wait.” He glares at me and I can’t hide from what’s coming next. “There’s something else, isn’t there? Does she have like eight kids? Two heads? A tail? There’s something, otherwise you’d be gushing more about her. I’ve listened to you in love before. There wasn’t enough prose and flowery words in your description for me to fall for it.”
“Well, we already had a fight.”
“Oh, shit…that’s quick.”
“Elle texted me. She’s following her, or me. Probably both of us.” I take a drink while he lets out a whistle. “She sent a picture of Lexi and I in a…compromising position. Threatened to send it to Lexi’s family and our boss. Said she’d post it online. I hadn’t told Alexis about her yet, so it kind of blew up in my face.”
“That’s rough, man. Elle’s a fucking bitch and a half.”
“Yeah, except we talked through it. I mean, I had an anxiety attack and fully freaked out, but Alexis stayed.”
“That’s actually healthy, shit. As for Elle, dude, you need a lawyer.” He finishes his beer and pats me on the back. “Did you tell your new lady about your family yet? Show her what you’ve got in common?”
“A little about when I was a kid, all vague stuff. I told her about you, too. She hasn’t pushed and I’m not ready to go deeper into that.”
“She sounds amazing, man. It’s good to see your happy grouch face back, and I can’t wait to meet her.”
“You already have, technically. She waited in a four-hour line for your dumb ass autograph.”
“Oh fuck you, man! You know how nuts that shit makes me! Tell her I’ll sign anything she wants and I’m so sorry she waited so long.” He pushed my arm. “Speaking of signing, did you open the envelope of doom yet?”
“No. I’m thinking about signing the papers and just being done with all of them, though.”
My father’s death was hard enough to deal with, so my surprise when my estranged sister and her lawyer showed up at my door the day before the funeral was palpable. The deal sounded straightforward enough until I realized she was lying about everything just to get me to sign the papers. My father’s art is worth a small fortune, maybe a medium-sized fortune now that he’s dead, and he left it all to me. He left me the house and shares in a company I didn’t know about—enough shares for majority control. Majority control over my mother’s company.
My mother and sister are both terrible human beings, but they’re not dumb. The problem is, neither was my dad. I always thought his income was from the art, but it turns out, he was living off his shares of the company and giving his art away. So, now I’m in legal limbo, I’m broke, and I’m trying to figure out how to handle all of this without letting go of dad’s art. If I take the company, I relinquish all rights to my father’s art, his name, all of it. If I keep my dad’s art and give up the company, I give up a four million dollar and counting trust he had set up in my name that I’d inherit as the main shareholder.
I’m not a numbers guy, none of it makes sense to me and the only person close to a lawyer that I know is Steve. He went to law school until he burned out, then became a personal trainer. He checked out the paperwork and said it ranked in the top five craziest contracts he ever read.
The paperwork mainly involves my parents, but Elle also has a stake depending on my choice. If she doesn’t get the company, she gets dad’s art. If she gets dad’s art, she’s going to destroy it. If I pick dad’s art, she’ll have enough money to make my life hell. I know why dad agreed, so I can’t pretend to be clueless, but that doesn’t mean it sucks any less.
They’ve made counter offers, all of them worse than the last. I haven’t even bothered to read the latest one. There was always one part of the contract Elle focused on most. In the event of my death, Elle gets everything. I don’t think she’d outright kill me, but she doesn’t have too far to push me before I’m at the end of my rope. With dad gone, I’ve taken a few steps closer to the edge. All that changed on Thursday morning, though.
“You won’t sign, you can’t.”
“If I don’t, she’ll go after Lexi.”
“If you do, she’ll fucking ripyouapart. There won’t be a need to go after Lexi because there won’t be a Jamie. You know I’m right.”
There’s laughter and the sound of plastic cups clattering to the floor as Steve and Becky make their way back out of the supply closet and over toward the table. Chase leans in closer. “Stop fighting this alone and let me help. I’ll call some people. I’m sure my agent has contact with some decent contract lawyers at this point.”
“Even the really bad ones cost more than I have. I had to fucking get a loan on the house already just to pay the funeral expenses and other shit. I couldn’t even go through the bank for that.”
