The Boss & The Assistant - Rewritten Edition of "The Boss"

Chapter 44: Lafayette

My mother gave me an old photo from my seventh birthday when I left her place. This was before we had started staying at Father Jamison's house. The photo had me behind the homemade cake Mom baked, the candles freshly blown out. All of us were in the photo because my grandmother had taken it. Mom was smiling down at me. Dad, who I remembered being sober that day, was mid clap, smiling as well. Claude was holding Clovis on his back. Axelle was sitting next to me, posing for the camera with her hand up and pursing her lips. Delphine was sitting next to me, so young, smiling up at me. Then there I was - a big smile on my face. It was a photo full of so much joy and love. It may have been one of the last times I was genuinely happy, at least until recently.

I was happy. My inner child was happy. I loved my family. I wanted to be around them more. Their presence didn't depress me anymore. I wanted to love and be loved. I was in love with Emerson and I wanted to tell him, but I was scared. When he looked at me, I did feel loved. I was getting much better at silencing the hurtful voices in my head. I was not perfect. There was still a lot to work on. I still got irritated quickly and sometimes wanted to shut down, but I was still doing my best.

I arrived back to the office Monday morning. Everyone except for Emerson returned to the office. He was going to take the week off to spend time with his family. I was glad to be back in the office. I liked the routine of going to work, even though I missed Em. I sat at my desk and logged onto my computer, which had to restart because it had been so long.

Michael walked in. "Good morning," he said.

"Good morning," I replied. "What's up?"

He crossed his arms and tilted his head. "So, how long have you and Emerson been screwing?" he asked.

"What are you talking about?" I asked. I stood up to go make some espresso.

"Well I just so happened to stop by the office when you two were fucking on the couch. You slept with each the entire time we were traveling didn't you?" he asked.

"What does it matter to you?" I turned to him. This is where I needed to work on getting irritated so quickly. I guess Michael was good practice, but I was not doing a good job.

"For a few reasons," he said. "For one thing, you cannot hurt Emerson."

"What makes you think I'm going to hurt him?" I snapped back. "This is none of your business either way."

"I don't think you are going to intentionally hurt him, but I know you well enough to know that you might get scared and push him away, which you cannot do. It will break his heart. This probably means something to him, you know?"

"It doesn't mean anything!" This was a lie, but it was almost a habit to get defensive against anything Michael said. "We were just having sex. We agreed that that was the last time and then things were going back to normal. It was just sex. We said that in the beginning." The last part was true at least.

"You are such a pig," he said, rolling his eyes.

"This isn't any of your business," I said again. "I never want you to bring this up again. It's a thing of the past and it doesn't concern you at all. We were going to act like it never happened so you need to as well."

He shrugged. "Fine. If it doesn't mean anything, then it doesn't mean anything."

"Good. Now why don't you get back to work?"

Michael looked at me, disappointed, and left the room.

I grabbed my espresso and blew on it. Why did I just say all that to him? Michael was annoying, but there was a reason he was also one of my best friends. He was annoying because he cared. He was terrible at showing it, but I knew him well enough to know he wanted me to be happy. Maybe he wanted to confirm that what Em and I had was real.