Page 16 of Bending The Rules

“Fine, then we’re talking about Justin. I can’t believe you’re still mad at him for signing with Lion. Stop being a hater and let that man make his money.”

“It was never about money!” I bellowed, instantly infuriated by the suggestion. “Not forme, that is.”

“That sure is what it looked like from my end.”

“Then maybe your ass needs glasses,” I shot back, crossing my arms. “Or a hearing aide, or whatever. But if you’re trying to tell me I have no right to be angry, I’m telling you that you’re full of shit.”

Aviva laughed. “I’m just tellingyouwhat everybody said when you up and left, right after the news broke that Justin had gotten that big book deal. It sureseemed likeyou were mad about that.”

“Well, that wasn’t the case. At least… not entirely. It wasn’t that simple.”

“You sure? Cause you being petty and staying mad at your best friend for seven years because he chose a bigger book deal over what your small press could offer at the time seems simple as hell to me.”

“You’re acting like I don’t have a right to be mad at him backstabbing me!”

“Not for seven damn years!”

“Ohplease.If your best friend decided to marry a man who’d screwed you over, you’re telling me you wouldn’t be done with them?”

“It’s not the same thing.”

“Itisthe same thing. Now imagine your friend didn’t even bother to tell you – you found out from the internet.”

We pulled to another red light, and Aviva raised an eyebrow as she turned to me. “You found out about his deal on the internet?”

“Yes.I’m not just mad for the hell of it – there arelevelsto this shit. Justin was my best friend, and I’ve never been anything less than supportive. I published his first book, and that shit didwell.So well that he’d already agreed to me publishing his next project, but we hadn’t signed a contract or anything for it yet, because it was early. I was getting that experience with the authors Ididsign, after him, so we were just going with the flow. I was flying all over the place, meeting people, making connections, I had international authors interested. Scattered Seeds was…blooming. And then, I’m onBookPlug, just browsing their articles, and I run across a list of new contract announcements. Guess whose name I see?”

“Justin Wright.”

“Justin Goddamned Wright. Supposed to be my best friend, yet hadn’t said a single thing to me about even pursuing a contract with someone else,especiallynot for the book we had a verbal agreement about. It wasn’t like he’djustsigned it either – those lists aren’t made in just a night. He hadn’t even bothered to tell me!”

Aviva sighed. “I guess I can see being pissed, but that just sounds like a major miscommunication, at best. Not a reason to end a friendship.”

“Maybe not to you, but to me, it says a lot about what our friendship means. We had aruleabout it!Rule #32: If you screw over somebody I care about, I can’t fuck with you.I thought Justin and I were on the same page, but he broke that rule without a second thought.”

“You don’t know that, Toni. You weren’t in his head to know what factored into his decision.”

I scoffed. “Oh please. As soon as I saw that shit, I went to him to talk, to figure out what happened. He was all “it’s just business” and “I thought you’d want to see me succeed”, as if he weren’t signing to a company that tried to ruin me.”

“But itwasbusiness, wasn’t it? You may have put him on the map, but his work at Lion is what shot him through the stratosphere. You have to at least admit that.”

I threw my hands up. “I’ve never said anything otherwise. Yes, he became big,fastbecause of Lion, and I’m not mad about his success, in the least. He’s immensely talented, and it’s not just lip service when I say I’m happy for him – proud of him. But it’s not about him succeeding with someone else. It’s about him blindsiding me. It’s about him getting into bed with a company that hired me just long enough to sign the authors that wanted to work with me, and then fired me and didn’t honor my contract.”

Aviva gasped. “You never told me that!”

“Because it’s embarrassing! They’re the reason I had to start Scattered Seeds from ashes, because theyscrewed me, no lube. And all the righteous anger Justin had for them went out the window for an advance check. It’s about him not even thinking enough of me totell mehe submitted something to them. That he was thinking of going to a bigger publisher. That he wanted more money. That he wasn’t just thinking about it – that he wasdoingit. That he’ddoneit. Maybe none of that is big to you, but that wasn’t the type of thing we did. We didn’t sneak around, we didn’t keep things from each other. And I’m sorry… I don’t know how to look past this, and be friends.”

Aviva pulled into a spot at the restaurant, but I didn’t unclip my seatbelt. I kept my head down, and closed my eyes, trying not to burst into tears after dredging up things I would have much rather left buried.

“Hey,” Aviva said, putting her hand over mine. “So… I get it now. You’re usually on your “strong black woman” thing, so I haven’t heard any of this before, Tee.”

I nodded. “I know.”

“But listen.” She squeezed my hand. “You can’t keep holding on to that anger. It’s beenseven years.”

I sniffled. “But my anger is new,” I said, with a dry laugh. “Every time it subsides, and I start missing my friend, wanting to just be over it, so I can call him, and laugh… I just get pissed at him all over again for putting us in this place, when he could’ve justtalkedto me.”

“So he hasn’t tried to reach out, in all this time?”

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