Quadruple Duty

I frowned. So much for the perfect evening.

Before I could say another word she thrust a second photograph my way. I was already looking down this time and I saw him… dark hair, brown eyes. Beard. His hairline, his jawline… it was all the same.

Almost exactly the same as mine

“Gabriel Murillo,” she said without being prompted. “He’s 52. He lives only ten miles from where you grew up,” she said. “Over in—”

“What part of this do you not understand?” I sneered. “How many times do I have to tell you I DON’T. FUCKING. CARE.”

I was breathing fast now. I hated that. I happened whenever I got angry, and I hated getting angry.

It made me angry to get angry… if that made any fucking sense.

“Look,” she went on, “I understand that you’re hurt. Or pissed. Or you think you really shouldn’t give a shit.” She took my hand again. “But take it from me, Ryan. Family is important.”

I shook my head. She wasn’t getting it.

“You’re my family, Sammara. You, and Kyle, and Dakota, and Briggs.”

“Yes,” she said. “Yes we are. But—”

“But nothing.” I shoved the photos away. “I couldn’t care less if—”

“Ryan look at him!” she cried, holding up the photo of my father. “He looks like you! Don’t you want to know what his life is like? What he’s doing? How he lives?”

“No.”

“What if you have brothers?” she went on. “Or sisters? Wouldn’t it be nice to connect with them?”

Do I?

I wanted to ask it. Suddenly I wanted to know very badly. She had it all there, in her little folder. The dossier of my old life.

No, NOT your old life, I corrected myself quickly. The life you could’ve had…

“If you have siblings, they never wronged you,” she was saying. “They never did anything. You could—”

I pounded my fist on the table. I must have done it way too hard though, because people all over the restaurant were suddenly staring.

“Who did this for you? Briggs, right?”

She said nothing. It was all the answer I needed.

“He’s an asshole,” I said. “He should’ve refused you, no matter how much you did to… persuade him.”

She frowned visibly. It was a cheap shot and we both knew it.

“He should’ve known enough to leave this alone.”

“Ryan listen to me carefully,” she said. All the compassion was gone from her voice. Now it was just stern. “I never had the chance to know my parents as an adult. That opportunity was taken from me. All I have are fleeting memories, moments that have grown dimmer and further away every passing year.”

She looked troubled by her own statement. I could see the pain there.

Shit.

I wanted to reach out to her. To assuage her, and make her feel better. To tell her everything was going to be alright.

But I couldn’t.