Against the Rules

by M. E. Montgomery

  Gene spoke. "On behalf of the hospital and myself, we appreciate the time you've taken to hear us out. As you know, the Kidz Korner is a non-profit organization currently hosted by the hospital to offer services and programs to give our youth a place to go after school or while a parent receives care during an appointment or counseling group. Not only is the current building in poor shape, but it's also become too small for the growth we've experienced. The mental health department of the hospital has created a new position to help at-risk kids. This would include substance or sexual abuse, depression, bullying, and many other problems that affect our community's youth. I've been named the first to be the head of this new department. I hope to create a program that not only provides on-site counseling for the problems I listed but also to create a fun environment that will help pull kids who are bored and stirring up problems off the streets. We'd create youth lead programs such as dances, plays, poetry slams, concerts, or whatever they brainstorm and can coordinate. It's a unique way to discover and build leadership skills."

  I watched as several council members sat up and took notice as Gene described his vision. Even I was impressed.

  "That sounds innovative and appealing, Dr. Carlin. However, it also sounds remarkably expensive. How do you propose to fund this, and why do you want this particular building?"

  "While many of the staff will be volunteers, there will be some paid positions. We've applied and received several grants and will continue to do more fundraisers. Miss Grace Hart has volunteered to continue to help us create innovative ideas for raising money after the initial recent success of one nearly three weeks ago that raised half a million dollars." He turned to Grace and smiled, who smiled faintly back. "As for the building, we originally wanted the Press Building because it's cheap. Or, so we believed. It's also in an area where it would get noticed and is on the bus route, so kids without rides would potentially still be able to get to it."

  Gene cleared his throat. "However, it's our understanding that Mr. Carter had previously inquired and had a tentative agreement with Mr. Phelps for the building. We know we cannot outbid JAC Enterprises, and therefore we've begun to explore alternatives. Miss Hart has been diligently looking into other options and has found that there are still some storefronts on the edge of town that are smaller and more expensive than we'd hoped for, but she's promised to help find more donations. Once we find the rightful owners, we'll work on negotiating the price. It might take us longer to obtain the funds, but we respectfully ask the Council to consider extending the bus service to expand to that block should this take place. Therefore, we withdraw our offer for The Press Building, and fully press that JAC Enterprises be given the right to purchase it with all haste."

  Several mouths, including Alan's, dropped open. Most everyone's eyes were surprised. John turned to me with stunned eyes, but a victorious smile. He shook my hand. I breathed a sigh of relief while I took it all in.

  Sheila once again spoke into her mic. "That's certainly understanding and generous of you, Dr. Carlin. Are you sure of this decision?"

  Gene's demeanor grew more relaxed. "I am. Logistically, it's much easier to find a place for our needs than it is for a parking garage. They don't fit just anywhere." Several of the members chuckled along with him." As Mr. Blackburn pointed out, we need the professionals to fill our office spaces and run profitable businesses. That's good for all of us. After all, how can Miss Hart hit them up later for charitable donations if they can't get clients in their doors?"

  This time, even John and I managed to smile. Grudgingly, my respect for my former stepfather grew, at least in this matter. He had every right to fight for the building that could house his dream, just as I did. I leaned back in my chair to try to see Grace's expression. I wondered how much, if any, influence she had on this decision. I could tell she sensed my attention by the stiffening of her shoulders, but she refused to look at me. Instead, she focused on her friend as he continued to speak.

  "What you may not know, is that Alan is my former brother-in-law. While I don't condone his secrecy and scheming to hold Mr. Carter and his company from outright buying the Press Building while we worked to raise money, I do appreciate his support for our cause. He recognizes how beneficial it will be to our community. I hope the Council will as well, and in the future, support our goal to help our kids." He sat down. Grace leaned into him and spoke in his ear while there was a smattering of applause from the Council members.

  With little fanfare, Sheila dismissed the hearing, and John began to gather up his papers. "Well, that was easier than we expected."

  "Almost too easy," I commented. "It's not like him." I recalled how he'd begged my mother to give him another chance once she decided to end their marriage.

  "You know him that well?" John sounded surprised.

  "I do. Or at least I did." When he saw I wasn't going to elaborate further, he shook my hand. "I'll be in touch once I have the paperwork signed. I suspect the Council won't hesitate in moving forward, although we'll still have to negotiate the final details. That'll be a walk in the park after this."

  I slapped him on the shoulder. "Good luck with that. Embarrassed or not, Alan's still going to try to squeeze every penny he can in his favor."

  "All part of the fun." John laughed and headed out as a couple of council members made their way to me to shake my hand and tell me that they would have supported the parking garage had it come to a vote.

  Minutes later, feeling much less stressed than when I'd walked in, I turned to leave only to find Gene still at his table, shuffling papers back and forth with no real purpose. It was just the two of us left in the room.

  Sometimes, the best thing was to leave things be. I turned and headed down the aisle without a word.

  “Jaxson.”

  Fuck!

  36

  Jax

  I was tempted to keep walking, but I wasn’t going to let him be the bigger person. Not this time. I turned.

  He looked old. Now that I could see him up close, I saw gray hairs dominated his temples. There were more wrinkles on his face than I would expect for a man his age. His shoulders were more stooped, and if I hadn’t known him, I would have thought he was a man close to twenty years his senior.

  We stood just staring at each other. Gene was the first to break the ice.

  He stepped to the aisle. " I wish Alan hadn’t made such a mess of things. His heart was in the right place. He was just trying to do something to help me out after…well, it doesn’t matter. It was never my intention to hurt you, Jax. And it wasn't Grace’s either."

  "I wish a lot of things were different, too. But 'if wishes were horses, beggars would ride.'”

  “True. But not everything is always as black and white as we’d like to make them out to be either.”

  “Feels pretty black and white to me. Every time you come into my life I get screwed. Literally and figuratively.”

  He paled.

  Yeah. I figured you wouldn’t have anything to say about that!

  “Grace is really upset. Please talk to her. Don’t let your issues with me get in the way of a good thing with her.”

  I took a step closer. “Stay out of it, Gene. Who are you to give advice anyway?”

  “Fair enough. I guess this has been a long time coming.”

  I glared at him, but he didn’t flinch. “I’d have rather it not come at all. How long have you lived here? Does my mother know? Where’s Mallory? She’s not here, too, is she?”

  Gene handled my rapid fire with amazing calm as if he’d anticipated my questions. It only worked to piss me off further. I stood and began to pace the small space behind me. I’d had years to think of the questions I wanted to ask him, the threats I wanted to throw at him. But I hadn’t ever figured I’d get answers; hadn’t had time to assimilate that by some chance of fucking fate that I’d be here.

  “I’ve been here for about five years. I didn’t know at first, of course, but after a couple of years, I knew you�
�d moved here also because your name has become practically synonymous with the revitalization effort. Passion is big enough that there’s been no reason for our paths to cross. Until now. And I can’t tell you how sorry I am that it did.”

  “You’re sorry?” I threw my hands in the air. “You have a lot to be fucking sorry about, don’t you? That’s all that exists between us, but ‘I’m sorry” doesn’t come close to fixing this.”

  His eyes filled with remorse. “No, it doesn’t.” His lack of excuses cooled some of my anger.

  “Does my mother know?”

  “She asked me not to contact her. Out of respect for her, I haven’t. So, no, I don’t think she does.”

  “Respect?” I sneered and turned my back.

  “Whatever else you believe, I did love your mother. I couldn’t repair the damage, so I did the only thing I could. I moved away and tried to rebuild my life. Our lives.”

  “And Mallory?” I spoke over my shoulder. “What happened to her? My mother kept your secret, so your daughter wouldn’t lose both of her parents, but sometimes I wonder if that was a mistake.”

  He flinched. Good.

  I’d hoped that would be a conversation ender, but no, he seemed determined to talk. “I found an inpatient program in the Midwest that had a good reputation. It was difficult being separated, but I knew it was for the best.”

  “And afterward?” I pressed. I’m not sure why I cared; I think I hoped some kind of justice had prevailed.

  “Things were good for a while. But after a couple of years, she spiraled downward. I don’t think she ever got over what happened. She got caught up in some group, became addicted to drugs, and every effort I made to reach her and get her help failed. She was an adult by then, so I had fewer resources. But I never quit trying.”

  He blinked rapidly. “One day I got a call from the police. She was dead from an overdose.” His voice choked. “I had to go to the mortuary to identify her. I almost didn’t recognize her—my beautiful baby girl. I’d failed to protect her, over and over again.”

  I fell back into the chair. My stomach churned. I’d lived with nightmares and guilt for so many years; I’d always hoped they did, too. Now that I knew they had, I found it didn’t make me feel any better. Not worse, but not better either.

  “So that’s why you’re trying to establish the teen center, complete with counseling. Because she was an addict.”

  Gene nodded. “That, and because she’d been through so much as a child as well. I learned a lot during our time out west. If I can help even just one kid, keep one teen and their parent from experiencing what she did, what you did, it’s a start. I know it sounds cliché. It doesn’t make it any less true. You and Mallory—you’re my motivation.”

  I snorted. “Still using me, huh?”

  “Not you, but our shared memory.” He blew out a long breath. “Jaxson, you can believe me or not, but I never meant to hurt you—then or now. I can’t change what happened. But I’m hoping I can influence your future when I tell you—"

  I stood and took a step toward him. “Oh, you’ve already influenced my future more than enough, thank you. Do you know how many times as a young boy I thought about hurting myself? How many nightmares I have so I can’t sleep? How much guilt my mother has had to live with and how much she sacrificed because of what happened? How I can’t even tell Grace that I love her because that word was used as a weapon over and over?”

  He hung his head, looking like the broken man I wanted him to be. Feeling hardened, I crossed my arms. Why should I be the only one who suffered over the years?

  “I guess I don’t blame you for still being angry. I’d just hoped we could talk, man to man. I can stand here and tell you I’m sorry until I’m blue in the face, and I know it will never be enough. I’m not here to make excuses. I’m sorry our paths crossed again. It was never my intention. I don’t want to take more from you than has already been taken.”

  I snorted. “And yet, I seem to be on the losing end once again. I got the building, but I lost the girl.”

  “Losing the girl is on you, not me.”

  He had balls. “How do you figure? If you had just stayed out west, our paths would have never crossed. We’d have never been in competition, and Grace would have never chosen you over me. So here we are. We’re even. My mother chose me. Grace chose you.”

  Gene shook his head. “Is that how you really see it?”

  “It’s the way it is.”

  "Don’t be such a fool.” I was caught off guard by the anger in his voice. “Grace loves you. She's devastated at having hurt you. I won't stand here and pretend to understand all you've been through, how you overcame it, the battles you must still fight, but if you'll allow any fatherly advice, hear this. If you say the past shaped your life, warped it in some way, I beg you to consider how knowing Grace has shaped it. Has she tried to mold you like a piece of clay into what she wants, or has she been the iron to your steel, giving you strength to be the fine man you are? A woman, the right woman, will be that for you. I don't know if that's Grace or not, but I suspect she is. And trust me, that's not easy to find."

  His words hit me hard, but fuck if I wanted him to know it. "I know you and Grace are close, but that doesn't change that she chose her cause over me."

  Disappointment flicked across his face. I shouldn't care, but I found myself responding to it.

  "I'm sorry you feel that way, Jax. Most of all, I'm sorry the past made it so you can't think of anyone but yourself. If you choose to let the past keep influencing you, so be it. But this time, you can only blame yourself.”

  Stunned into silence, I could only watch as he turned on his heel and left the building.

  37

  Jax

  "So why are you here instead of with your beautiful girlfriend?" Noah asked, handing me a glass with a generous amount of Scotch.

  I swallowed the amber liquid, relishing its burn and the numbing effect it would have if I drank enough. I sat with my arms on my knees. "Can't a guy just want to get away from the rat race for a while and spend some time with his friend?"

  Noah lifted his bottle to his lips but paused before he spoke. "Are you saying your girl is a rat?" He took a long sip while he surveyed me over his glass.

  I stared at the ground and shrugged. "More like I'm not sure she's my girl anymore," I mumbled.

  Noah's legs fell from their perch. "What did you do?"

  "Why do you assume it's me?"

  "Because she's prettier and smarter than you. Plus, you're the one who usually ends things."

  "Well, this time you're wrong." I finished my glass in two more swallows and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. "She lied to me and made me look like a fool. And of all people she was working with, it had to be Gene." His eyebrows raised. "Yeah, you didn't see that coming, did you? I sure as fuck didn't."

  "What happened?" He replenished my glass while he listened without interrupting.

  "Wow. That does fucking suck." He walked to the edge of the porch and leaned against a pillar. He crossed his arms and faced me. "Well, congratulations, I guess."

  I choked on the sip I'd just taken. "Huh?"

  "On being right. She did what you expected, right?"

  I grunted. "I thought I could trust her. She kept something from me she should have told me. She chose her career over me."

  "Maybe. She's not perfect. Newsflash, no one is. If I know you, and I think I do, you're looking for any excuse to end this before she hurts you."

  I quickly stood. "Newsflash," I repeated, anger darkening my tone. "It's too late for that. In case you missed what I said, she ended it first when she hurt me. She lied to me."

  "Not really."

  "A lie of omission is still a lie."

  "Fair enough. But if the situation was reversed? Oh, wait. It is. You haven't been honest with her about everything either, have you? Not to mention you've already pushed her away, but for some reason, she forgave you and gave you another chance. Relat
ionships aren't about how perfect each other is. It's about how you work through the hurt and forgive someone, because I don't care who it is in a relationship, someone always hurts the other at some point. Besides, did she really hurt you? Or is this just your way of ending it so you can blame her instead of you being the bad guy when you want out?"

  "Wow. That's quite the lecture, coming from someone who doesn’t even have a girlfriend.” He looked away from me. He didn’t deserve me shoving his problems in his face when he was trying to be a good friend. I drew a deep breath and tried for a different tone. “You don't know what you're saying. I tried for more with her. I never thought she'd betray me."

  He lifted an eyebrow. "Didn't you?"

  I rested my elbows on my knees. The word 'no' died on my lips as I gave some thought to what he said.

  "Don't get me wrong. Maybe she should have said something to you. But at the same time, she didn't betray you."

  "Didn't she?" I said, twisting his words back at him. "I wanted her to put me first, to choose me. Is it too much to ask for her loyalty?"

  "Did she take her knowledge of what you want and turn it over to them to use against you?"

  "I don't know. I don't think so."

  "Yet you want her to betray something her work has revolved around for weeks, a cause she's dedicated to and believes in and allow you to destroy it? Basically, you're asking her to do the very thing you're accusing her of doing, only it's okay if it works in reverse. Instead, she decided to step back and let those involved work it out. She butted out, rather than using one side against the other or using you to get what she wants."