Page 69 of He Falls First

My laugh sounds like a cough, and it feels as dry as one, too. “Didn’t you know better, Dad? When you were having your own relationships with subordinates?”

He recoils like I just slapped him in the face, and part of me feels a twinge of guilt for the outburst. Someone looking in from the outside might see me going after a frail old man, but I know better. And now, my anger’s too big to contain.

“Elizabeth, I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He sounds defensive, and I can see the unease in his gray-blue eyes.

“Really? You don’t remember all those young assistants you had affairs with while you were married to Mom?”

He straightens up in his seat, chest puffing out. “Watch it, young lady. Now, I- I made some mistakes, yes. I’m not proud of them. Hell, I never said I was perfect.”

“I never said you had to be. But there’s a long way between ‘perfect’ and what you did. Did you ever think about Mom? About how she felt?” The questions spill from me, raw and unforgiving. “What were your assistants to you? Just distractions? Playthings?”

“What I did is not the point,” he insists, but his voice lacks the conviction it once held. I see it then as he blinks away—the flicker of shame in his eyes. He knows he’s lost the moral high ground, but like a gambler down on his luck, he doubles down.

“Believe me, Lizzy, a man like Hendrix…” He trails off, swallowing hard before continuing. “They look down on their conquests. You’re just a thing to him. I don’t want that for you.”

It cuts deep, confirming my worst fears. I stand up abruptly, my chair scraping loudly against the floor.

“Good talk, Dad.” I stride toward the door, leaving him alone with his old-fashioned, self-serving views.

As I slam the door behind me, the cool outside air hits my face. I take a deep breath, trying to shake off the conversation, but the sting lingers, festering. Dad’s words paint ugly pictures over the canvas of my relationship with Hendrix. It’s a portrait I didn’t ask for and one I desperately hope isn’t true.

What if he’s right? It’s hard to believe Hendrix would see me like that, with the way he touches me. The way he looks at me.

But maybe I’m just kidding myself? He said it himself the other night—he hasn’t fallen for me. I’m the only dummy making this about real feelings.

I can’t go back to the office after this, so twenty minutes later, my knuckles rap against Marianne’s door—three quick, anxious beats. She swings it open and looks at me closely.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Can I come in?”

“Of course, weirdo,” she says, but her voice is soft, laced with sisterly love.

The door to Marianne’s apartment clicks shut behind me, enveloping me in the scent of old books. My sister’s cat, Purrlock Holmes, eyes me from one bookshelf with the sort of indifference only cats can muster. I drop onto the couch, its bohemian throw pillows already absorbing my sighs.

“Rough day?” Marianne asks, emerging from her kitchen with two cups of herbal tea that smell like they might solve half of my problems. The easy half, anyway.

“Understatement,” I say, accepting the mug and cradling it for warmth. “I stopped by Dad’s place and he tried to play judge and jury on my love life.”

“Ah.” Marianne settles beside me, tucking her legs beneath her. “The irony is not lost on me.”

I take a tentative sip, feeling the tension in my shoulders ease slightly. “He thinks Hendrix sees me as nothing more than a conquest or something. Like I’m disposable.”

“Is he right?”

“I don’t know,” I confess. “But what if he is? What does that say about me?”

“Don’t do that. You can’t let Dad’s mistakes color your own relationships. His affairs had nothing to do with you.”

I set the mug aside, feeling the truth simmering within me, ready to boil over. “Ever since Mom and Dad divorced, I’ve felt bad about it. Like it was my job to keep them together. Like I was the glue or something.”

“Elizabeth.” Marianne’s hand finds mine. “You were a kid.”

“Exactly! That’s how they saw me, so they’d stop fighting every time I was around. But then I left for college, and suddenly they split. Part of me thought maybe, maybe if I’d stayed, if I’d still been there to keep the peace, then maybe—”

“Stop.” Marianne’s voice halts my ramblings. “You think you had that much power?”

“Didn’t I?” I don’t really mean it, though. She’s right, now that I think about it, but it’s hard to look back and see myself as some blameless kid. Not when I’ve been blaming myself for so long.

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