Man Detox: A Novel Page 15

  “This may come across as heartless. Never accused of being too sentimental here. I suggest you minimize contact until we clear the situation completely.”

  “I appreciate it, Rob.”

  After ending the call, Ethan sat at his desk looking out at the tall redwood tree partially blocking his view. He has had an ongoing battle with his neighbors who had consistently refused to either cut the tree or at the very least trim it. When he was faced with intractable challenges, the approach he had taken had always been about going back to the basics, the fundamental elements undergirding all conflicts.

  The basic facts, as Ethan assessed them now with a fresh perspective, were that he knew very little about Irene. Sure, she looked like Rose. From there, most of what he knew were at best superficial.

  Could he trust someone on such limited data? The answer was no if he didn’t let his judgment be clouded by infatuation. What he needed to think about now was how to build resiliency into the management structure of his companies. He had never had to consider his mortality. That consideration was kept for the after the age of thirty before the crisis of the weekend.

  A floor above, Irene had settled into her bath and dozed off, mesmerized by the ease of this kind of life. How nice would it be to have this sort of comfort? She could see how her body would be rejuvenated after a twelve-hour shift in the hospital. She wondered too if someone who has it all would seize to appreciate the small pleasures of life.

  The unsettling answer to her puzzling over Ethan was if their lives were incompatible. Was she the sort of person who is driven by ambition? Did she know how to relate to someone who is walking and breathing fire? Was it true that opposites attract? Deciding to study Ethan further, she got out of her bath, put on a robe and settled on the bed. There were still a few more hours to kill before dinner.

  When Irene woke up at 6:50 PM, panicked she might have missed her dinner appointment, she was greeted by silence in the room. It was the sort of silence she might have prized when she was immersed in a hectic work environment. The whole place was eerily quiet.

  She put on a dress, the same formal piece she had bought for the wedding, and walked down the stairs holding her high heels in hand. She felt the coldness of the floor tiles and hardwood floor. There was no sign of Ethan. She called out for him. There was no response.

  As she took the last step down to the second floor, she saw a white piece of paper on the granite island in the kitchen.

  Hope you rested well.

  I’m sorry I had to leave. Work emergency.

  Dinner in the fridge. Don’t wait for me.

  Ethan

  All the hope Irene had about the dinner conversation illuminating into the nature of Ethan and their situation sublimated in an instant. The message felt impersonal and perfunctory. Wasn’t this what she worried about all along? That they were simply not compatible. She set her shoes on the floor and walked to the fridge holding the note in hand.

  It was the biggest double door refrigerator she had ever seen. From prepared food to fresh fruits and vegetables to mineral water to sports drinks, it was the epitome of healthy living. It was clean and fully stocked, too orderly for a bachelor’s lifestyle. Soon, hunger overrode all other considerations and was transitioned to plating a substantial amount of food, a mixture of stir fried veggies, quinoa, grilled potatoes, and salmon.

  Ethan sat at his office desk and monitored all her actions from the surveillance camera. This was among the many tests he had decided he would deploy before making his final decision. To what extent would she be unsettled by the sudden change of plans? How adaptable was she to change?

  The surprising answer to his questions was there was no sign of distress in her. She seemed as settled and at home as one might expect for a routine life. The problem was, of course, the situation was far from routine. This was happening in the aftermath of a crisis that should have shaken any mortal being.

  There was only one likely answer that was starting to form, taking root firmly in the suspicion Rob implanted in his analytical brain. Irene was at ease taking her bath, sleeping peacefully, and now casually enjoying her dinner because she wasn’t rattled by the crisis.

  The simplest explanation is always the one with the most profound truth, he reminded himself. She was not rattled because there was no element of surprise. That was the key. At that very instant he decided to severe all contacts with her. He had already done enough damage, and prolonging her stay in his house was inviting more trouble.

  Only after finishing her dinner did Irene feel guilty about the situation. How stressful a life it must be for Ethan to have to get back to work soon after all that had happened? Was she callous for not being more understanding? Maybe the best answer was giving him the space he needed to take care of his work.

  Thank you for dinner. Hope work was manageable. Will I see you later this evening?

  She sent a text message to him. Only after staring at her phone for a full thirty minutes with no reply to her message did she contemplate the one possibility she hadn’t considered until then. Was he keeping his distance from her on purpose? Work might be busy, but could it not wait until the next morning? What sort of emergency would require him to leave home on Sunday evening?

  I’m afraid not. Please go ahead and rest up. See you in the morning.

  That was the final nail in the coffin. So cold and heartless. She was crazy to assume everything would magically align for all her problems in life to be solved at once. There was not going to be a relief from her detox, and she would soon go back to her ordinary life of putting up with egoistic surgeons. That was her fate, and she was deceiving herself to believe anything would change.

  The rest of the evening, she paced around the house nervously, scanning through the book shelve, picking and reading one book after another before losing interest and retiring to her bedroom to try to sleep. She tried to pay attention for any sound hoping to catch him returning from work. She waited in vain until she was overtaken by sleep.

  ∫---∫

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  In the morning, Irene woke up in panic. In the nightmare that terrorized her, she was forced to choose between saving her life and Ethan’s. She was handed a gun and was about to pull the trigger when she woke up soaked in sweat. She had fallen asleep in her dress. Her watch indicated it was 6:45 AM. She didn’t know what to do with herself. There was no call or message from Ethan.

  After washing her face, she walked down the corridor to the stairway. Turning around, she noticed the double door to what she assumed to be the master bedroom was open. She was tempted to turn around and head in that direction when Ethan appeared. He was looking as flawlessly handsome as he did the first time she saw him amidst the chaos of the car crash. He must have something for navy blue suits, she noted.

  “Good morning,” she said nervously.

  “Good morning! Sorry about last night. Hope you slept well.”

  “Yes, thank you. I’m sorry if I’m getting in the way of your work…”

  “Don’t bother. That’s life.”

  Too awkward a conversation, Irene thought. If she had woken up hoping for the best, this moment proved to her she might as well get back to her old life as soon as possible. She had no business being here.

  “I think I should get back to Denver soon…”

  “I’ve actually arranged for a flight for you. It leaves at 11 AM. That hopefully gives you enough time…”

  Irene wanted to cry. He talked to her as if he had no feelings for her. He was pushing her away. She held herself together.

  “Thank you,” she said as he walked toward her and past where she was standing leading her to the second level. There was no magnetic pull between them. As much as she wanted to reach out and hold him, she couldn’t. He was literally too far out of reach for her. It was a pipe dream not to be.

  “I hope you are not mad at me, Ethan,” she said finally gathering herself for one last conversation.

  “Don’
t worry about the weekend. Crazy things happen. No point dwelling on the past,” he said, opening the fridge inspecting the content with detached interest.

  “I feel really guilty I brought all this chaos into your life. Don’t know how I can make it up to you,” she said, sitting on one of the chairs in the kitchen.

  Ethan listened to her attentively. This was a confession, he thought. Some kind of guilt-ridden confessional about her role in what happened over the weekend. Wasn’t this the proof he was looking for?

  It was a battle between his emotional response to how vulnerable she looked to him and the gravity of the situation. Could she have been a target of manipulation? Dragged into a scheme the complexity of which she didn’t appreciate fully? The longer he looked at her, the longer he studied her, the more convinced he became he couldn’t deal with this situation in her presence. He needed the distance to think clearly.

  “You don’t have to do anything, really. Look, I wish we could chat more.”

  “Are you sure you’re not upset with me, Ethan?”

  “Not at all. I’ve arranged for someone to drop you off at the airport. Let’s keep in touch.”

  “Okay. I can’t thank you enough for everything you did for me,” she said wiping streaks of tears from her cheeks.

  If she could, Irene would want to throw herself at him, kissing him until he forgave her completely. Was there anything she wasn’t considering that could help ease the tension between them?

  Ethan, meanwhile, had come to a rapid conclusion that he needed to get away as quickly as possible. If he stayed any longer, he would lose all his focus and dismiss all the evidence before him. It broke his heart to see her cry. If it was genuine feeling, and this was a big if for he knew determined foes can use emotion to manipulate others, it would soon destroy all his defenses and put him at risk of making another terrible decision.

  Ethan walked up to her, peeling a banana in hand. This was to be the final goodbye. As he leaned in to kiss her on her cheek, she held him. She wouldn’t let him go. She started crying. Terrible complication, he thought.

  “I wish… I wish we could go back to…” She was trying to say something, and he was starting to fall for her. More so than he did before.

  What if he was wrong about her? A question arose in his mind. He dismissed it immediately. This was his emotional brain thinking. What he needed was detachment and space. He has too much on his plate to worry about her now.

  “Such is life, Irene,” he said, dismissing the idea to kiss her. They parted ways unceremoniously. It had to be done, he told himself as he gathered his briefcase and walked toward the exit. He couldn’t stay in that house any moment longer.

  Irene sat in the same chair and wept continuously. How cruel can life be? When she thought everything was pointing in the right direction, how could everything come crashing down like that? Can she blame him for being careful?

  What brought the misery on her was how careless she was. Would any of this have happened if she had kept her mouth shut in the plane? Would Roger have known where she was staying had she not told him? Wasn’t she the target after all? How could anyone have known about Ethan’s plan?

  So many questions that kept pointing the arrows of responsibility directly at her. For someone who professed to declare her independence from men, she had allowed herself to be affected by the recklessness, basking in the unwanted attention to edify her own sense of self-worth while not appreciating all that could go wrong. She deserved everything, Irene concluded, sobbing uncontrollably when she heard a car engine rev up and disappear gradually.

  Ethan was gone, and she was left alone. She deserved everything, she affirmed again. Including what Jared did to her. Everything came from her recklessness, and the only appropriate consequence of that was isolation and retreat to her meaningless life.

  How fitting it was that she would be introduced to this place, this beauty and life on a hill, this generous of a man, before it was all taken away from her.

  Wasn’t it the lesson she deserved? Did she stop to think for one second? Did she consider her actions carefully instead of being driven by momentary impulses? That was the difference between her and Ethan.

  His life had more structure and focus. He was changing the world and disrupting old industries, and she could barely change her own life. The one commitment she made, she couldn’t even keep. Lauren had a point, she thought.

  The idea of a separation from men was laughable precisely because she had no clue how to deal with men. She has now officially squandered the best opportunity she had at securing the affection of someone she didn’t deserve by all counts. And now she would go back to her life, back to being nothing more than a bimbo in the minds of the egomaniac surgeons who saw her for nothing more than a piece of meat.

  When Irene settled into her first class seat a few hours later, she was acutely aware this might be the very last one of her life. The seat next to her was empty. How symbolic she thought, pulling out the magazine she hadn’t looked at since Mexico. She needed to reread the gushing profile about Ethan with the full knowledge of how much she missed out on. She hadn’t eaten anything since she woke up and she wasn’t about to start eating now.

  Feeling hungry and malnourished, she took bites of plain bagel and sipped on her coffee as she absorbed the magnitude of Ethan’s accomplishment anew. In less than thirty years of life, he had probably done five lifetimes worth, if not more, of work. Was it any wonder that things didn’t work out between them? What a heartbreaking and definitive conclusion to a weekend of an unbelievable adventure.

  ∫---∫

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The next three days were hazy for Irene. What was left on the bruises on her face, she covered by layers of makeup and sank her attention to work picking up additional shifts. She couldn’t stand being in her apartment alone unless she was dog tired and needed to crash on her bed for a much-needed sleep.

  The only highlight had been how happy Lauren seemed about her honeymoon. Irene had lost track of how many text messages she received from her gloating about the incredible time the two were spending together. The credit, predictably, had all been given to Lauren’s tireless effort. She had to sacrifice so much, and it needed no part of Irene’s encouragement to firmly assert that point.

  “I’m so happy for you,” Irene said to her when they finally got to talk for the first time since the wedding.

  “What can I do? It is not like anyone is thinking about me. I have to do what I can. I knew he would come around. I mean, once all the distraction and drama were eliminated, I knew I could get him to see me,” Lauren said.

  Irene knew what distraction and drama meant. It was a dagger pointed directly at her heart. Wasn’t it true that she hadn’t been a positive influence in her friend’s life? She didn’t dare ask what had happened in the aftermath of the kidnapping. She could only imagine how much chaos she must have caused in the compound and how much it must have ruined everyone’s vacation plans.

  “I’m sorry, you’re right,” Irene said, wanting to end the call and go back to focusing on her microwaved packet of readymade lunch she picked from the frozen isle at the grocery store.

  It was tasteless. But wasn’t it a reminder of where she belonged? Having seen the other side of existence, the slimy texture and mushiness of the food were all the more starkly apparent to her now. The saving grace was she wouldn’t have much time to think about all this. She would soon get back to her work and keep busy helping ungrateful patients.

  “God! I have waited for this for so long,” Lauren said.

  “What?”

  “That was the first time you apologized to me… I mean, I am forgiving and don’t hold grudges. But it is kind of interesting it took you almost a week to think about something other than yourself… It was no big deal. It was only my wedding that was ruined…”

  Irene wanted to be angry. She wanted to scream at her supposed best friend and tell her she never wanted to talk to her eve
r again. How could someone be so self-centered?

  “You’re right. I need to get back to work. Let’s talk over the weekend.”

  “See, that’s what I mean. You don’t talk to me for all these many days, leaving me all alone here. And when we finally get to talk, what do you do? You run away. It’s no big deal… I will be okay here, in case you are wondering…”

  Irene simply hung up the call. It was intolerable to continue to listen to Lauren. She could never say enough to appease her. It was all futile. Her own life was ruined, and she didn’t need additional toxicity to destroy what was left of her self-respect.

  Hundreds of miles away, Ethan was reviewing the final report from Rob on what had happened and the sort of precautionary measures implemented to minimize risk in the future. Everything seemed plausible. He was happy to be assured of no further escalation in the conflict with the Mexicans.

  To keep the peace, he had spent 1.5 million dollars as a reward for the effort of Rob and his team in successfully extracting him alive and to the Mexican officials to keep quiet about his involvement in the incident. A small price to pay for his life or the close to 100 million Roger had demanded of him.

  The solution to all problems in Ethan’s life had always been work. And there was plenty to occupy his mind in the days following up the incident. More meetings than he has time for, deep dive into the long-term strategic plan for his second company while ensuring IPO readiness is on track for his first company, which stands to make him one of the richest men in the world under thirty. His phone rang while he was getting ready to leave his office. A direct call to his phone from UCSF.

  “Is this Mr. Ethan Anderson?”

  “Yes,” the voice didn’t sound familiar.

  “This is Dr. Ward, from ED. We spoke last weekend.”

  “Oh, yes…” Ethan said, sitting back down in his chair. He was surprised how little he had thought about anything outside of work for the past many days.