Have you ever had a dream where you can only remember one element with nothing else around it? I woke up with the image of a top hat sitting on a cherry wood desk. No clue about anything else in the dream, just that. It is going to bug me. But for now, to the prompt!
I think that this might be a continuation of yesterday’s prompt. Or at least part of the same story. I ended up working on it yesterday for a couple of hours and I think it is still stuck in my brain. Not mad, just interesting.
Tuesday, March 5th: “You think this is my fault?”
“You think this is my fault?” she asked. His mouth thinned into a barely perceptible line.
She lifted an eyebrow, “Well?” she asked. “Do you?”
“Of course it is,” he spat out.
“Why?” she asked.
“Because you weren’t here.”
“It isn’t my business to be here,” She told him. “It is your business and you are supposed to run it.”
“You are supposed to help,” he told her.
“Why?” She asked again. “You don’t pay me. I don’t receive a share of the profits. I benefit in no way from it. I am not contracted to do anything so why am I supposed to help?”
“Because it is family business,” he told her. “All of the family works here. You know that. You put in the hours here as a kid too.”
“Yes,” she said. “When Dad ran it, I worked here. I received a pay check and I did the work I was hired to do.”
“See,” he said triumphantly. “But then you left.”
“Because Dad decided to give you the business and you decided that you didn’t need to pay family,” she replied. “So, in order to pay my bills, I had to get a job elsewhere.”
‘This place makes enough to support the family,” he fired back.
“Your family,” she said. “It makes enough to support your family. I do not get anything from it. Therefore I do not work for your business.”
He huffed and mumbled something under his breath.
“What was that?” she asked.
“It is still your fault. You know I’m not good with the details.”
“They are your details,” she told him. “Running this business requires that you run the business. It isn’t all smiles and meet and greets you know.”
“But that’s the part I like,” he said. His voice took on a whining note and she fought not to grind her teeth.
“Tough,” she told him. “It is your business and you need to run it, all of it.” She got up to go.
“Wait, you can’t leave, someone has to fix this,” he gestured to the pile of paperwork in front of him. Much of it had not even been opened.
“Not my business, not my problem,” she said. She started for the door.
“But,” he said. He looked around and his face hardened. “I’ll tell,” he said. She looked back at him. How many times had he used that phrase in their childhood? Too many to count. And it always worked. It didn’t matter the circumstances. He would ‘tell’ their parents on her and she would be the one in trouble. She would be the one to make things right. It was never his fault. He was the golden boy, the miracle baby. It was never his fault.
She saw the smile of triumph spread across his face. He thought it would still work.
“Incredible,” she said shaking her head. “You still think that works. Go ahead. Go cry to Mommy and Daddy about how you can’t run your own business without me to bail you out. Go ahead, tell them it’s my fault you are a failure.”
“If I tell them then they will …” He faltered as he tried to finish the sentence.
“Do what? Ground me? Yell at me? Cut me out of the will?”
He blinked as though he didn’t have an answer. Then his eyes narrowed. “They’ll make shure you are sorry,” he yelled back. She shook her head again and turned away walking out of the door.
Ten til Midnight 