Only One Night (Only One 3)

I’m expecting Murielle to walk to the other parents like she usually does when she shows up for a game. Nothing like basking in the glory of your son. She gets it at the hockey games with me, and then she gets it here, too. It strokes her ego more than anyone knows.

“Why are you sitting here?” I ask, and she just stares ahead. “I thought you had such a busy day that you couldn’t come.”

“I’m sure you would have liked that.” She glares at me now, her voice low. I stare at the game, and then I see movement from the side, and I look down the ice and see that Evelyn is back sitting next to Tim.

I try to get her attention a couple of times, but she never looks down this way. Her eyes never leave the ice, and when the game finishes, she is the first one out of her seat. She doesn’t move from beside Tim.

“I have to go,” I say, getting up. “I want to get a nap in before the game tonight.”

“I’m bringing Jaxon tonight,” she says from her seat, getting up at the same time I get up. “When do you leave?”

“Monday morning,” I say. “Back on Wednesday afternoon. Are you going to wait for Jaxon?”

“He is my son,” she snaps, and I just look at her.

“At least you remember sometimes,” I say and don’t wait for her to answer before walking out of the arena. I sit in my car for longer than I need to, checking to see if she walks out. I know that I’m chancing it by sitting here, but something in me won’t leave.

It takes twenty minutes, but I see her walk out with Tim as she holds Caleb’s hand, who smiles at her. She is so fucking beautiful. I can’t breathe when I look at her. I spot Jaxon coming out next, no smile on his face as Murielle walks beside him, letting him carry his own bag.

Pulling out of the arena, I call Becca. “Manning,” she says my name as she answers. “My favorite client.”

I laugh at her. “You mean the one who makes you a lot of money.”

“That means the same thing.” She laughs now. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Becca, I’m losing my mind.” I start to say. “You have to tell your guy to speed shit up.”

“Manning, how do you want him to speed things up exactly?” she asks me.

“I can’t take it much longer,” I admit. “I can’t.”

“You’ve lasted four years,” she reminds me, and I want to tell her I lasted four years because I wasn’t living. I want to tell her that the only reason I lasted that long was because I didn’t know what I was missing. I knew nothing. “You can last a couple of more weeks.”

“A couple of weeks?” I shout. “Fuck, no.”

“Let me call him and see what he has for me,” she says, and she hangs up. I get home and walk up to my bedroom, and my nap is nonexistent.

When the alarm rings, my eyes are already open. Getting up, I shout down the stairs for Jaxon, and he runs up to my room. He sits in the middle of my bed as I get ready. “So how do you think you played?”

“Good,” he says. “The other team was bigger.”

“And?” I look at him. “What excuse is that? You’re faster than them.” I slip on my pants while I talk to him. “They get in your head. You have to think that you are ten feet tall. That is what I do.”

“But you’re huge,” he says, and I laugh.

“I wasn’t always huge. Where is your mom?” I ask.

“She went out when she dropped me off,” he says, and I stop dressing.

“What do you mean?” I ask him, my heart beating fast. Yes, I was home, but my door was closed. Had I known, I would have left my door open.

“She had an appointment to do her glam,” he says, and then the front door opens and closes.

“Hello!” she shouts up the stairs. “Jaxon. Manning.”

“I’m in Dad’s room!” he yells, getting off the bed and going out of the room to the railing. “I’m here.”

“Do you want a snack before I go and get ready?” she asks, and I slip on my shoes as Jaxon walks down the stairs to the kitchen. I slip on my cuff links and my Rolex watch. Running my hands through my hair, I walk down the stairs. I stop in the family room, first seeing him sitting there eating a snack while he watches some cartoons.

I walk into the kitchen, grabbing a water bottle, and I see Murielle sitting at the island. I look at her and see that there is no fucking glam done to her face; she looks like she did the last time I saw her. Her hair isn’t even done differently. “I thought you went to get ‘glam’?” I ask her, closing the fridge, turning to look at her.