“A file?”
“I’ve filmed some interviews with people you know.”
Fucking fuck.
“And I want you to watch the Exchange that includes them,” she continued. “Because you need to watch it. And then I’d like you to let me know if I can air it.”
Rix stared at his desk, feeling a lot, including shock she was reaching out for permission.
“John?” she called.
“Rix,” he grunted.
Then he didn’t let this gesture of good faith slide.
He gave her his email address.
“Got it,” she replied, all business. “It’ll come through in the next few minutes. Thanks for your time. Take care.”
And that was it.
The woman didn’t say, Sorry I made it so, even local, you and your girl can’t go out for a beer without at least one person giving you the once-over. Or, Sorry for dragging Alexandra’s sister when she might not have found her way yet, but she didn’t deserve to have her breast exposed to fifty million people and then that exploding to fifty million more. Or a couple dozen other things she could apologize for.
Just Thanks for your time. Take care.
“Christ,” he muttered, put the phone back in its cradle, and when his laptop indicated he had a new email and it came from [email protected], he checked his mail.
He clicked the link, downloaded the massive file, and as the download was rolling, he got up to close his office door.
Then he sat behind his desk, pulled up the .mov file and watched it.
Elsa was in her trademark pastel green velvet chair, and opposite her, in another one, the velvet a peach color, sat Peri.
“God fucking dammit,” Rix swore.
“We have with us today,” Elsa began to introduce, “a woman who once bore the ring of our current, but very taken crush, John Hendrix, the beau of Alexandra Sharp of the New York Sharps and the Coddingtons of Somerset. Peri Poulson.” She twirled her chair to Peri. “Peri. Thank you for reaching out to us.”
She’d reached out to Elsa.
Whatever the fuck this was, it was Peri’s doing.
Rix clenched his teeth.
“Thank you for having me,” Peri replied, looking her normal tan and fit, but he knew she’d had her hair and makeup done professionally and her outfit wasn’t the normal active mountain girl gear she wore, and it looked new.
“Now, what do you have to share with my wonderful watchers?” Elsa oozed.
“I just wanted to, you know…” She was off, nervous, maybe intimidated by where she was, maybe some part of her knew she should never in a million fucking years be sitting right there. “I just wanted to say that Rix and I were engaged.”
“Rix?” Elsa queried.
“Rix. John Hendrix, but no one calls him John.”
“And you were engaged?”
“Yes. Very engaged. At the time he had his accident, we were supposed to be married a few months after that.”
Elsa said nothing.
“We…I think it’s important to know, you know, I think people out there should know that when something like that happens to someone…I’m talking about when Rix lost his legs, it isn’t just the someone it happens to that it happens to.”
Elsa eagerly leaned closer to her and noted, “This is interesting. Please explain.”
“I mean, Rix lost his legs, but I lost the man I was going to marry.”
The camera closed in on Elsa as she appeared confused. “And now you’ve lost me. Unless I have the identity wrong of our John Hendrix, it’s my understanding he’s very much alive.”
“I don’t mean that,” Peri said quickly.
“I see, you mean, he was, and I would contend it’s justifiable, even if it might not be easy to deal with as a partner, but due to his loss and having to deal with it, his personality changed. For instance, perhaps he lashed out at you?”
Rix tensed, hoping like fuck to make herself look better, Peri wasn’t going to lie.
Peri adjusted herself in her chair. “No, what I mean is—”
Elsa cut her off. “He didn’t lash out at you?”
“No, what I’m trying to say is—”
“He was cruel to you? Cold to you? Distant? Lost? Recalcitrant?”
Peri shook her head, her shining blonde hair gliding over her shoulders. “No. None of that. What I’m saying is, as his partner—”
Elsa again interrupted.
“He fought treatment? Rehabilitation? He gave up and it was difficult to try to re-engage him in activities that would help him to lead a full life?” Elsa paused, but not long enough for Peri to answer. “Which,” she glanced at the camera, “and I’ll make it clear, my wonderful watchers, I truly know nothing about this,” she turned back to Peri, “however, I would think those would be natural responses. Depression. Grief. And the behavior that comes with both.”
“No, he wasn’t like that. Rix was never like that. I mean he had his times, but he’s always been the kind of man who faces things and then gets on with it. It happened. He faced it and he got on with it.”