Loyalty
December Napa Valley, California…
It was the day after Christmas, and the night air carried a slight chill, but Tele and his brothers had gathered around a fire in their mother’s backyard with a cooler of their favorite craft beers nearby. The fire crackled and hissed, its orange flames glinting off the brown and green beer bottles in their hands as they sat in bright red Adirondack chairs, just beyond the stone patio of their childhood home––beyond the far reaches of the soft light that spilled across the lawn from the kitchen.
They’d been in Napa for a week now, and for Tele, each passing day had felt like a fresh betrayal.
“Tomorrow,” he told himself as he pushed a log further into the stone firepit with the heel of his boot. “I’ll tell him tomorrow.”
For the last fifteen minutes, he and Raph had been listening as Neo aired his latest relationship problems. Their brother, who could quote Shakespeare’s sonnets, and watched romantic comedies with their mom, was in the throes of his own personal drama, and preparing to end things with Marianna, the woman he’d been seeing for the last three months.
“She’s just too young,” Neo said, cracking open his second beer.
“What are you talking about?” Raph was already well into his second. “She’s twenty-two.”
“But she’s still in college. She sees me—sees my apartment, the cars, the staff—and it’s like she’s already planning our lives––no, her life as an Upper Eastside wife. You know she skipped a career fair last month to go to some stupid luncheon with me?”
“So?” Raph shrugged and crossed his legs in front of him.
“So, she’s risking her entire future on a guy she just met. She may be too young to know better, but I sure as hell do.”
“You don’t need to fall on your sword, bro.”
Neo exhaled heavily, rubbing the back of his neck with one hand. “I’m not playing the martyr. I just don’t want to be held responsible for screwing up her last year of school when things don’t work out down the road.” He raised the bottle to his mouth and glanced off across the lawn.
That’s my brother, Tele thought watching the firelight dance across Neo’s face––his jaw tight with conviction. Neo was always thinking of others before himself.
Tele ran his hand through his hair, feeling like he should offer some insight or even a joke to lighten the mood. But he wasn’t really present. His mind was on Helena—the weight of her name, the secret of what they'd shared, the confession he owed Raph. He reached into the cooler and pulled out his second beer, popped the cap, and took a long pull, hoping the cold liquid would wash away the knot of guilt tightening in his chest.
“So, when are you going to let her go? Don’t you have New Year’s plans with…”
The low murmur of his brothers’ voices faded into the background as Tele’s mind drifted. He had originally planned to tell Raph about him and Helena the weekend after she’d come to Denver. He’d booked his flight to San Francisco just hours after dropping her at the airport, and had even started rehearsing what he’d say to minimize the shock and hurt.
But when Helena had called him late that night, in tears, and told him that Raph had come to see her, Tele had waivered. Before she’d left Denver, he and Helena agreed not to take things any further until he’d spoken to his brother, but in light of her news, Tele had come to the cold realization that no matter what he said, or how he said it, Raph would be devastated.
The memory of that call was still fresh. He and Helena had spent nearly six hours on the phone that night, trying to talk themselves out of love, but it was no use. They couldn’t imagine living the rest of their lives with regret, knowing they’d had a chance at real love and let it slip away. Tele had promised to talk to Raph at Thanksgiving, but once he and his brothers were all in Napa, and Raph had told them all that had happened from his perspective, fear of ruining his family’s holiday, of adding insult to his brother’s still freshly injured heart, had proved stronger than his resolve.
Once again, he’d been determined to walk away from Helena––deciding that no woman was worth the risk of breaking up his family. He’d tried to stay away from her, busying himself more than necessary with work, chasing his high snowboarding the back-country slopes of Colorado and, pushing himself to the limits at his building’s climbing gym. But every morning, it was her face he longed to see. Every night, it was her voice he wanted to hear.
Tele scrubbed a heavy hand across his chin. He’d had no clue that Raph still loved Helena, and even though she’d told him, in detail, what had transpired in front of her apartment building, he’d doubted it had been so serious, and had thought that perhaps her guilt had caused her to amplify Raph’s emotions. But once he’d seen him in Napa, Tele had known then that she hadn’t exaggerated at all.
Raph had been a wreck the entire week of Thanksgiving, moping around the house, hardly eating, despite their mom and Georgia’s best efforts in the kitchen, and Tele was sure he’d heard him crying in the shower one morning when he’d gone into his room or borrow some aftershave.
Every time he looked at Raph, all he could picture was his vulnerable brother, standing on the street, laying his heart bare to Helena just hours after she’d pledged her love to his brother.
His characteristically guarded brother had given no indication that he had been pining for her all those months. He still loved her, had gone to therapy in a bid to win her back, and she had rejected him. If Tele had known how committed Raph was to her, he never would have let things get this far. If he had known, he wouldn’t have invited her to Boulder. He would have treated her to lunch and gone back across the street to his one o’clock meeting, bottle his feelings for her like a good brother should. Like Neo would have done.
He looked at Neo now, a man who was about to end things with someone he liked, not only because he believed that’s what was best for her, but also because he avoided unnecessary complications at all costs. He should have taken a page out of his books, asked himself “WWND?” But it was too late for that now. He’d acted rashly, and it was time to pay the price.
“At Christmas,” he’d told Helena on the phone last week. “I’ll tell him at Christmas.”
And he meant it this time. The gifts had been exchanged and opened, the Black Forest cake from Lou-Ellen’s had been eaten, and end-of-year G3 business had been finalized. All that was left to do, was tell him.
“Rapheus,” he would say tomorrow morning during coffee, as they took in the sunrise over the Vacas Mountains from their mother’s screened-in porch. It was their ritual to have coffee together in Napa, rising hours after Neo whose internal clock was set to Eastern Standard Time. “I have to tell you something, and you’re probably going to hate me for it, but you have to know…”
Have to know what? That he didn’t mean to hurt him? That if he’d know how he felt about Helena, he wouldn’t have even taken her call?? That nothing had happened…yet?
Tele inhaled sharply and took a swig of his beer as Neo eyed him suspiciously.
