She looks at me with a mixture of empathy and confusion. “Marc, you’re not going to lose me,” she says, reaching out to brush my cheek. “Are you sure you’re feeling all right?”
I swallow and feel her one last time. Breathe her in one last time. But I’ll remember these moments forever. Even if she leaves for good, they’ll be tattooed to the front of my brain.
“Yeah,” I say. “Just a little stressed.”
She leans forward to kiss me. It’s the best kiss in the world, slow and meaningful. “Look,” she says, “I’m going to ask my friend if she can take Sammy for the night. She’s got a few kids of her own, and they’re near enough to her age that it won’t be a problem.”
I’m staring at the only person I’ve ever loved, knowing I won’t have her tomorrow. What a fucked up predicament. “Who is it?” I ask.
“Amanda, the teacher you met,” she says.
“The woman who watched us collide,” I correct her.
She bursts out laughing. “Aw. I miss that.”
It feels like I’m blushing. I hope it’s not too bad. “Me too.”
“So, can I call her?” she asks.
I’m nodding, but my brain is screaming no.
“Definitely.”
Hours later, Ali’s teacher friend Amanda arrives to pick up my daughter. The first thing she says to me is, “You look like shit.”
I shake her hand, head bent with confusion. “Why does everyone say that about me?” I ask. It’s supposed to be a joke, I think. I hold out my hand and introduce myself. “I’m Marc Wylan.”
She laughs and smacks my arm a few times as if we’ve been buddies for years. “I know who you are. You’re dating my friend.”
It’s weird I was single for so long. I’m not a promiscuous type of person. For a while, I thought I’d never find someone worth locking down. The word dating makes me feel pretty fucking good, but it’s not exclusive enough. I want the whole thing. “Dating. Is that what she called it?”
She shrugs. “More or less.”
This woman is something else. “Okay, well, forgive me for looking like shit.”
“It’s just that I know that look,” she says. “You’re worried about something.”
“There’s no look,” I say.
She narrows her eyes. “There’s a look.”
Of course, I start to worry she can see right through me. She knows I’m full of shit. She’s probably trying to find reasons to put a target on my back. I deserve it.
“We had a big night,” I say. “Plus, my house is pretty messed up, so I’m just trying to deal with this right now. Sue me for feeling a little tired.”
She meanders up the first few steps of my porch before sitting down. “What’s really wrong?” she asks.
I try to find Mount Ranier in the horizon, but I’m not high enough in the sky, and the fog is too dense. It doesn’t make sense to spill my guts to her friend, but I have some time until I need to pick up Ali. She’s got a very give-no-fucks attitude, so maybe she’ll end up giving me some sagely advice.
“I’ve got a lot of stuff to take care of,” I say.
“Ali related stuff?”
“Work related stuff. I got myself in a pretzel of bullshit,” I say.
She nods. “As one does. You own Momma Bear Magazine, right?”
“Yeah, among other publications,” I say. That ownership meant something to me at one point. “Why?”
“I never understood what happened to it. You guys got some real good interviews,” she says.
I look her up and down. Her clothes look like they’ve been assembled at one of those outlet stores on the way out of Washington. It’s not a diss at her. She’s just our prime readership base. “You were our target demographic,” I say. “Let me guess. You bought the dollar organic soap.”
Laughing, she pats her thigh with force. “Every freakin’ month. I ordered so many patchouli bars, my house smelled like Woodstock ‘69.”
That’s pretty funny. It’s even funnier that she still smells like patchouli. I guess people don’t really change. It’s a slow evolution until you find that special someone, the person to end the torment of habit. “The shareholders want to can it for good,” I say. “They say it never generated enough money, and they’re unsure I can get the advertisers on board.”
“I guess money rules the planet, right?”
I chuckle. “You’re asking me?”
“You see, this is part of your problem,” she says. “You’re used to swimming against the tide. It’s probably how you made it big in the first place. You’ve got lucky this far, but keep trying to fight it, and someday you’re bound to get caught.”
I grin. “By the Momma Bear?”
“You laugh now, but you know I’m right.”
Listening to my inner voice is what got me here in the first place. Everyone tried to warn me about my big, dumb brain. I should probably listen to her.
“Problem is, I’m tired of swimming. Period.”
She looks at me like I’m crazy. “You’re a billionaire. Just quit your job and live a real life.”
“It’s not the simple. People depend on me to pay their bills. I could quit, but then thousands would be out of jobs,” I tell her.
“Good point,” she says. “Never thought about that.”
It’s an unsolvable problem. Besides the obvious motives, one major motive being greed, that’s the sole reason why so many CEO’s stay with the ship.
“So what’re you going to do?” she asks.
I raise a brow. “About Mamma Bear?”
“Sure. It’s a simple equation,” she says. “If they’re trying to cancel it, how are you going to revive it? You need a plan.”
The answer is not to use Ali without asking. It’s a little too late now.
I shrug. “That’s what I can’t figure out.”
She snaps her fingers. It was a trick question. “Wrong,” she says. “You move on.”
Sammy comes to the front door. “Move
