met some nice people. But now it’s good to be home.”

“It’s good to have you back,” Christine said and she pinched my cheek. After another bottle of

champagne was emptied, Juliette and Christine went inside to look at pictures of wedding dresses online.

Brad and my dad were still deeply engaged in conversation.

“Do you want to play some basketball?” David asked. I knew that he was asking because he wanted

some time alone with me.

“Of course, but I’ll beat you, you know that.”

“We’ll see about that or have you been practicing your skills in Paris?” he laughed.

When we started playing David clearly had the advantage. I hadn’t been playing basketball in over a

year and I was wearing new Italian shoes with narrow noses that pinched my toes. He took of his

sweatshirt. Underneath he was wearing a black sleeveless T-shirt. I watched the muscles ripple

underneath that shirt as he worked hard to beat me completely. When we’d played for thirty minutes, I had

to sit down.

“These shoes are fucking killing me,” I moaned.

“Excuses. I beat you fair and square,” he laughed.

“Yeah you did,” I said and I punched him on the shoulder playfully. We sat down on a little brick wall

that separated the driveway from the lawn. It was almost dark now and a bright light illuminated the

driveway. In the distance I could hear dad and Brad laugh about something. My heart was pounding as I

looked at David. He was anticipating my move and quietly waited for what I would do. I moved closer to

him and put my arm around his shoulder. It felt like electricity was crackling beneath my fingers where I

touched his bare skin. His body relaxed in to my touch. He put his head to one side so that it rested against

mine.

“I’ve missed you so much,” he said and then he turned his body so that he was facing me. He wrapped

his arms around my waist.

“I missed you too,” I said hoarsely. I pushed a strand of hair away from his face and then traced the

bridge of his nose with my hand. I brushed my fingers across his lips and he tightened the grip on my

waist. Then he leaned forward…only to stifle when we heard footsteps on the gravel path and we quickly

let go of each other. It was Brad who’d disturbed our little reunion. “Your dad asked if you want to join

us again.”

“Sure,” I said and I looked at David. “Of course,” he said. “We were just playing around a bit.” He

gave me a wicked little smile when we walked behind Brad back to the terrace. My dad handed us both a

glass of wine.

“Boys,” he said. “I’ve just asked Brad to come and work for the firm too.” My dad looked really

cheerful. “He’s going to be family and since you and your brother both work for the firm it seemed logical

to ask Brad too.”

“And have you accepted the offer?” David asked Brad.

“I have, but one the condition that you both agree with it too. I mean the firm is going to be yours in a

couple of years.” He was looking at me and not a David. “I don’t want you to think that I’m just barging in

on things, I know you don’t know me very well yet.”

“Michael is not going to think anything like that,” my dad said. Actually it was exactly what I was

thinking. I would have preferred for my dad to wait with hiring Brad until I knew him a bit better.

“If you think it’s a good idea to work with your father in law and both your brothers in law then go for

it,” I said.

“Are you okay with this too David?” “Yeah sure,” David said but I could see a look in his eyes that I

did not recognize; I think it was jealousy.

25. Office disasters

On Monday I started working for my dad’s firm again and it only took me a couple of weeks to

completely screw things up with David again. Within weeks we went from ‘all over each other’ to ‘at

each others throats’ again and like always, it was completely my fault. It was just that working together all

the time was too much for me to deal with.

When I came back to the firm, my office was still intact, everything kept exactly the way I left it a year

ago. The first case I helped a colleague with was a pretty boring property settlement for a bitchy fortyseven

year old client whose husband had cheated on his wife with a twenty-two year old intern. I had

several meetings with her and was thankful afterwards that my dad had married a nice stepmother and not

a witch like this. During the final hearing of the court proceedings, the court accepted our evidence as to

the husband’s assets and what we believed were our client’s entitlements to a property settlement. I was

completely drained after this case, working my ass off for an ungrateful rich bitch.

Brad had started working for dad as soon as his contract with the other law firm could be ended.

Working with him went surprisingly well. He was levelheaded and concise and generally a nice guy to be

around. My dad liked Brad and trusted some important cases to him immediately. He won those cases,

impressing my dad and his new colleagues.

I was happy for Brad but felt bad for David too; although David was a good lawyer, he and dad now

clashed frequently about the way cases should be handled, which prevented my dad for giving him any

high-profile cases. To be honest, David was such a good boy sometimes that it was a pain in the ass to

work with him. Ethics always came first for him, even if it meant that he had to lose a case over a minor

thing. He always worked exactly by the book. Not that my dad would ever do anything which wasn’t

legal, but he liked to seek the boundaries of the law to win a case. David would never do that, he wasn’t

as creative as my dad and he wasn’t a great rhetoric either. Brad and me were more like my dad,

persuasive and dashing in court cases, charming a judge or jury over in no time. David wasn’t like that;

his strength lay with researching cases not with presenting evidence.

My dad started to think that David didn’t have what it took and gave him the most boring civil law

cases to work on. Sometimes I agreed with my dad. I knew that David was smart but he would get on my

nerves so bad that I treated him poorly at work. I always felt bad about that afterwards…

I worked long hours, like I’d always done. Most of the evenings David stayed in late too, even long

after my dad had left. He came to check on me every hour or so if it was getting really late; bringing me

coffee when he thought I needed it or ordering some take-out. I never showed him how much I appreciated

all this because by now my feelings were really getting to me. I felt constantly watched by my dad and by

Brad and it made me even more chagrin than I usually was.

During one of the firm’s strategic meetings I really snapped at David in front of everybody for the first

time. He was going on and on about some about the way we had procured some evidence for a case until I

told him to “Please shut up and listen to dad for once!”

My dad had figured out a way to present the evidence, which normally wouldn’t have benefitted our case,

in a new light that was way more favorable.

“It just doesn’t feel right presenting it like this when we know that… ”

“David if you want to drink tea and babble like an old maid you should have stayed with your human

rights buddies in New York,” my dad said. “I just want you to keep your mouth shut for once and let us

win this case!”

“If you don’t like the way we handle things here, feel free to find another job,” I added. “You would

like that wouldn’t you,” he replied.

Brad looked at us squabbling and I’m sure he didn’t understand; who were these guys that were normally