Page 92 of Manhattan Bossholes

“The three of us should play together soon,” he boomed as I walked in. “I know you’re ridiculously busy, but you can make time for your old man, right? I’m not going to be around forever, you know,” he grinned at me mischievously.

“Dad, seriously? Don’t talk like that.”

“What? It’s the truth. At my age, you need to take stock of the time you have left and prioritize what’s important.” He snorted. “Learned that lesson the hard way. I’ve determined that what matters most is the relationships we have. Like you and Piper. Looks like you’ve figured it out for yourself already.”

I grimaced. I didn’t want to have the conversation now, but he’d given me no choice.

“Dad, Piper and I broke up.”

His cheerful expression shifted to shock. “What?”

I nodded. “Yeah. It happened the night of the launch.” Thankfully, Dad had no patience with social media, so he’d managed to miss most of the firestorm.

His mouth settled into a thin line, and I knew what was coming. “You’re making a mistake.”

“Says the man who cycles through relationships like Kleenex,” I retorted, then flinched. I hadn’t meant to say that out loud—it had just slipped out.

He watched me in silence for a few minutes, and the only sound was the steady beeping from the machines hooked up to him. “Do you know why I’m a serial monogamist?”

“Yeah, because you keep looking for the perfect partner, but that woman doesn’t exist. You’re chasing a fantasy and paying the price in alimony payments.”

He flinched, and I felt bad for being so blunt.

“You’re half right,” he began. “I have been looking for something. Something that got away.” He waited for me to look at him. “Your mother.”

I didn’t respond. I’d heard him talk about how wonderful my mom was many times before. This was nothing new.

“Every new relationship was my attempt to try to recreate the magic I had with her. And after the last relationship failed, I tried to fill the void in my life chasing thrills.” He paused. “I just wanted to feel something that was close to the sensation of falling in love with her.”

“Falling in love is easy,” I said dismissively. “It’s the staying part that’s hard.”

“It doesn’t have to be,” he replied softly. “How hard was being in love with Piper?”

“Who said I was in love?” I fired back.

He gave me a wan smile. “You didn’t have to. It was obvious.”

My father was wrong. Love? Me? Impossible.

“I could see it in both of you, clear as day,” he continued. “And now you’ve let it slip through your fingers, just like your ridiculous father.”

“What do you mean?” I asked. “As I recall, you’re the one who ended every relationship.”

“Numbers two through four? Sure, that was me. But the only one that mattered? Your mother made that choice, thanks to my mistake.”

I was in no mood to sift through the past. I’d heard his excuses before.

“Do you know that I begged her to forgive me? I literally got down on my hands and knees and told her I’d do anything she wanted, if she’d take me back.”

I frowned at him. “That’s not how Mom tells the story. She said you cheated, it was messy, and then you divorced. And then six months later you were dating someone new.”

“Revisionist history, plus the amnesia of time,” he scoffed. “Given what you’re going through, I think it’s important for you to know the truth. Yes, I made a terrible mistake on that business trip, but I confessed to your mom the minute I got back, assuming that it was something we could move past. I can still remember her face when I told her.”

I could’ve sworn his eyes brimmed, like the pain was still fresh for him.

“I tried so hard to win her back. Gifts, surprises, love notes…nothing worked. It was too little too late. The one thing she’d wanted from me was me, not all the stuff. And by the time I realized that, she was done with me. So I did my best to fill the void in my heart, thinking that if I could just fall in love again, I’d be fine. Then I tried to fill it with adventure. I was looking for that serotonin hit. That high. But nothing even came close to what I’d shared with your mother. She was irreplaceable.”

I shifted as the word echoed around my head.