Page 300 of The Bonus

“Tired from what?” my mother snaps. “From all the work you’re doing at 2 a.m.” She screams, “Who the hell is she?”

“Go to sleep,” my father demands. “I’m not in the mood for this shit.”

“You’re not in the mood for this shit?” my mother explodes. “Maybe I’m not in the mood for your shit.”

“Then don’t put up with it,” he yells. “If you’re so unhappy fucking leave.”

“Are you or are you not having an affair?” my mother yells.

“If you even have to ask that then you don’t know me at all,” he yells back.

“That’s the point,” she screams. “I don’t know you at all anymore. You’re never home, you’re always working late at the office.”

“To support you and this fucking family!” he cries. “I’ve just worked a seventeen-hour day and now I come home to this fucking bullshit. I’m sleeping in the spare room. I’ve had enough of you.”

Shit.

I duck around the corner and hide and he comes marching out with his pillow and disappears down the hall.

I wait until he’s gone and I walk back to peer into my mother’s room, she’s sitting alone on the side of her bed crying. I watch her for a minute, unsure what to do, but eventually I walk in and sit down beside her and put my arm around her shoulders. “Don’t cry, Mom,” I tell her. “It’s okay.”

“I’m sorry to wake you, honey,” she whispers as she wipes her eyes to once again act brave. “Everything’s fine, go back to bed.”

I nod, but I don’t leave. And she doesn’t make me, and we sit in the silence together.

Both lost in our own thoughts.

Gabriel - Aged 19.

I open the email and I hear the voices coming, I glance up just in time to see. “And you know what that means?” My father playfully winks as they walk past my desk and she laughs on cue.

“Can I see you in my office for a moment?” he asks her.

“Of course, sir.” She gives him a sexy smile and they disappear into his office and close the door behind them.

It’s just another day in the office.

I work at Ferrara Media now. It’s always been my dream to work here alongside my father. To learn the ropes and to make my family proud.

Now…. Not so much.

Feeling the love and respect you had for your father slowly gurgle down the drain is as depressing as it gets, and just when you think that the knife can’t cut any deeper, in it goes.

I stare at my computer and I hear her giggle, my stomach twists with jealousy.

My father is fucking his PA.

The worst part about it is that he doesn’t try and hide it from me. He doesn’t care if I know or not. We’ve never had the conversation but there isn’t a doubt in my mind about what’s going on.

I die a little every time I watch my mother beg for his love. I hear her cry late at night when he doesn’t come home and I listen to him lie to her every day.

His trips to Italy are becoming more and more frequent, and longer each time. It’s ramping up, I can feel it coming to a climax and he doesn’t care anymore.

He wants out.

He’s going to leave us…some days I wish that he would just fucking go and be done with it, put us all out of this misery.

To watch your family slowly disintegrate before your eyes is painful.

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