I was starting to think I knew exactly where all of my commission projects came from.
“You’re outstanding. You’re working on a piece for me currently. I’m Peter Simmons. We’ve been emailing back and forth for a while,” he said. “That was Damian’s Christmas gift to all of his employees—custom pieces from you.”
“How many people work for Damian?”
“Just five of us.”
Five. As in the five commission pieces I’d received in one day months ago.
Damian, where are you?
“Oh, my goodness, yes. I’m sorry about the delay—things have become a bit tricky in my life.”
“It’s okay. I’m patient. Besides, great art takes time, right?”
I smiled, still feeling overwhelmingly uneasy. “I’m sorry, is Damian not here? Has he been in yet? I haven’t been able to get in touch with him for a while now.”
Peter’s brows knitted. “That’s so strange. Normally, he’s here before me, but I haven’t seen him yet. I can ask around and let you know when he makes it in.”
If he makes it in.
My mind was going to the worst places, and I couldn’t stop it from happening.
I grabbed a piece of paper and scribbled down my information. I held it out to Peter, and he once again told me he’d reach out as soon as he heard anything.
I headed back to my car to drive back to the hospital to wait on information on Grams. As I sat in my car, trying my best not to fall completely apart, I began texting Damian.
Stella: Where are you?
Stella: Grams is in the ICU. She’s unconscious.
Stella: I’m freaking out. Are you okay? Please call me. Or text. Anything.
Stella: Please, Damian, I need you. I can’t do this alone.
Stella: Call me.
Stella: I love you. Please call.
37
Damian
* * *
“Will you check that for me?” I asked Catherine, speaking about my unattended cell phone.
I’d already spent one too many seconds with Rosalina, and now it was my time to have a whirl with Catherine. They’d been feeding me and giving me water as if I was a toddler unable to eat on my own. What was even worse was the piss bucket they’d made me use. Lucky for them, I had not had to shit yet, but when I did, I had visions of rubbing their faces in it.
“Why?” she responded, flipping through her own phone. Probably staring at photographs of herself in a vain fashion. Never in my life had I seen someone so obsessed with their own reflection. “You know it’s just messages from needy Stella.”
“She’s not needy, bitch,” I snipped at her.
She glanced my way with a wicked grin. “For someone who wants something from me, you sure have quite an unkind approach to getting my help.”
“Excuse me for not being polite when I’m tied to a chair due to a group of psychopaths.”
“Sociopaths are more likely. At least for Denise.”
“Is this funny to you? Is this shit really getting you off?”
She shrugged. “Kind of, actually. You don’t understand. The one man I loved left me—twice—because of that bitch of a wife of yours. Stella ruins everything. Kevin never had a shot at happiness because of that brat. And I’m sure you don’t either, if you stay around her.”
“She needs me.”
“She doesn’t.”
“She does.”
“Doesn’t.”
“Does.”
“Doesn’t!” she shouted, tossing her hands up in frustration. “God, what is it with you men and that mediocre girl? How does she have your balls wrapped in her corrupt little hands? She is not a good person.”
“Says the person who literally has me chained to a chair.”
“Because of her, you idiot. Don’t you see? She ruins everything.”
“What did she do to you, Catherine?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“What did Stella do that was so evil to you? You knew her, what? When she was five? Six? Then again in her teens? Please, by all means, tell me how she ruined your life.”
“You wouldn’t understand.”
“Sounds like a cop-out.”
“Well, it’s not.”
“Or, it is.”
“It’s not.”
“It is.”
“He wanted us to be her!” Catherine finally snapped. She tossed her hands up in frustration and let out a deep growl of annoyance. “He wanted us all to somehow step into the shoes of Sophie. The woman who he talked about like she was the sun. Do you know how hard that is? To live up to the image of his dead best friend? To be compared to her by the way you did any and everything? When we first broke up, it was around the time Sophie had passed. I figured Kevin was mourning. Then when we reconnected, it was the same thing. Sophie this, Sophie that, all the time.”
I narrowed my eyes. “I’m sorry, what does this have to do with Stella?”
She released a weighted sigh. “She has her eyes,” she whispered, growing more somber. “She had her heart. She was the world of his world, his sunlight, and everything always orbited around her with him. Because she was the carbon copy of the true love of his life. Do you know what that does to a person? Falling in love with a man who never truly had the ability to love you back the way you hoped for?”
“Catherine…”
“I just wanted to be her, you know?” Tears rolled down her cheeks as she showed more emotion than I’d witnessed from any three of the women. “I wanted to be his best friend. But that role skipped over me and went straight to Stella due to association with Kevin’s truest of love.”
I didn’t know what to say.
It was clear that she was seconds away from falling apart.
I hated those parts of Stella—her goodness—were beginning to live within my soul because there was a tug at my heart for Catherine that would’ve never been there before.
“You know why I think he died?” Catherine asked. I didn’t respond, but I didn’t think she was looking for words from me as she continued. “Because he realized he’d never find her in anyone else. He’d never find that true love in another. He died because broken hearts can only remain shattered for so long before the beats just stop beating.”
I grimaced. Sure, I felt a slight tug at my heart, but at the end of the day, I was still me. Plus, Catherine’s words were still missing the point. “It sounds like the whole situation had a lot more to do with adults who didn’t know how to process their own fucked-up emotions and less to do with a little girl who was tossed into that world. Stella didn’t have shit to do with all your problems. She didn’t make Kevin fuck all you three women at the same time. She didn’t force you to marry him. She didn’t make Kevin fall in love with her mother. And she didn’t do anything to warrant the cruelty that the three of you monsters placed on her shoulders. You fucked up a child’s mind and emotions because a man didn’t love you. Don’t you see how pathetic that is? You should be embarrassed and ashamed that you took your insecurities out on her.”