Page 109 of The Best Part of Breaking Up

I realize from the way his face twists that I’ve said this too loud. We have an audience. My face burns, and I set my jaw in a hard line. I watch the numbers of the elevator creep higher, but too slowly for my taste. I begin searching for the stairs.

“Can we talk about this somewhere else?” he pleads.

“No,” I say.

“What’s going on here?” Erving says. He has appeared beside us, drawn like a moth to the flame.

“As if you don’t know,” I say bitterly.

“You’re causing a scene.” He tells us this as if we don’t already know.

“You’d prefer we do this quietly?” I ask. “The same way you quietly voted your grandson into your position? The same way you quietly gave him hundreds of thousands of dollars in exchange for keeping quiet about the fact that your son is an abusive sack of shit?”

Erving stammers, and there’s genuine anger in his eyes. I realize I’m telling everyone their secrets. I don’t care. I just don’t care anymore. I want to drop a match in the middle of this and watch it burn.

“Did you have something to do with Melissa leaving?” Erving asks Quentin now. When Quentin doesn’t reply, Erving sighs. “Didn’t I tell you to stay out of this? It was a simple request! I don’t need you meddling in everyone’s personal matters.”

“Personal matters,” I snort. “Is that what we’re calling it? You do realize that if she went to the police, some of the things he did could be considered a crime?”

“Do not think you can lecture me about the law,” Erving says, pointing a finger at me.

Quentin steps between us with rigid posture. “Hey. This isn’t her fault. She didn’t do anything –”

“You care more about protecting your girlfriend than you care about doing the right damn thing!” Erving bellows.

I blink irritably at Quentin, wondering if my face could get any hotter. “You told him I was your girlfriend?”

“No, I didn’t –”

I jab the ‘down’ button again, willing the elevator to hurry the fuck up.

Henry edges into the mix now. “What’s all this? This is supposed to be a party.”

“Did you know, too?” I demand.

“Know what?” Henry says. As I glare at him, realization begins to dawn. His smile droops. He suddenly looks like an irritable child.

“I asked you not to get tangled up with this Maxwell kid, didn’t I?” he redirects. “This is what he does!”

“Oh fuck off,” I murmur. “You put him on this case with me. I didn’t want him on this case, if you recall. I practically begged you. And now you’re going to blame me for –”

“You’re right,” Quentin says bitterly. I can’t tell who he’s saying it to – Erving or Henry or me. “It’s like you said in the beginning. I’m a fuckup, remember? This is what I do.”

Erving and Quentin are engaged in a head-on argument now, and I see his dad attempting to edge into the conversation. The entire room is devolving into gossip and chaos. Finally, I give up waiting. I escape through the emergency exit, which sends an alarm wailing through the stairwell. Henry follows me. Between holding my skirt to avoid tripping and trying to block out the noise of the door alarm, I barely register any of his long string of commentary.

At some point, in the midst of Henry detailing his grand plan for me to issue an apology and request a meeting with the board, I start laughing.

“What’s funny?” he demands.

“This. The whole thing. I’m such an idiot,” I tell him. “They were never going to give me that partnership, were they?”

I know Henry’s courtroom face when I see it, the one he slips into when he’s about to craft a well-disguised half-truth. “We were working on –”

“No, Henry. Just stop. I shouldn’t have to beg for a promotion that I’ve earned. And I won’t. I’m done. With all of it.”

“Don’t say things you’ll regret.”

“I’m not,” I say. “You’ll have my resignation on Monday. I’ll give the standard thirty days so I can transfer my cases.”

---