Page 239 of Darling Venom
I pushed back at the false equivalency. “So, you did the guy a favor?”
“Hey, I wrote The Imperfections, too,” he protested. “The edits I did were heavy. Twenty-fucking-thousand words. So damn heavy, I think it fucked with his head. I changed so much of the original manuscript, it made him second-guess every word he wrote after that.”
“So, you didn’t do him a favor.”
He scooted his chair back. “I don’t have to sit here and deal with this.”
I stopped the stool with my leg and held still, even when the impact stung my shin. “I think you do, Terry, because it seems to me that this is the first time you’ve ever been honest about the plagiarism. About your mistakes, in general. How does it feel to be honest for once? How does it feel to confront your struggles head-on?”
His fingers reached for the broken pen, pulling back when one of the jagged edges pinched his skin. Ink stretched across his fingertips like zebra stripes.
He rubbed at the raw flesh. “This isn’t an episode of 60 Minutes.”
No, but I felt like a knockoff Lesley Stahl, Oprah, and Dr. Phil rolled into one. I intended to do what I could for Terry.
Not for him, but for his sons.
By some stroke of magic, some wild miracle, he managed to father two incredible people. I had to believe Kellan was watching us, witnessing the effort Terry put into Darling Venom, and feeling some vindication.
But Tate?
Terry had given up before he even started, and I refused to accept it.
“You scared a newbie author into never publishing again.” I stood, rounded Terry’s chair, and forced myself into his line of sight. “There is a weight on you. I see it every day. If you want to lift it, you need to make amends. I think the author you stole from is a good place to start.”
And then maybe you can try with Tate before there’s nothing left to salvage.
Terry shook his head. “It’s too late. What’s done is done.”
A wall slammed down in front of him.
I’d pushed too hard.
Disappointment sank into my skin like claws. I returned to my seat, giving up… for now.
I guess moments like this were why people said you should never meet your idols.
“Well, that’s a damn shame. The Imperfections…” I closed my eyes, recalling every night I’d spent pouring over the book after my parents died. For most of the past decade, I had nothing to turn to but its pages. “It’s a gift to literature. To humanity.”
“Isn’t that the fucking truth,” Terry muttered.
He moved to the fridge and dug around before I could continue hounding him. I pulled up my phone, emailing Helen to inform her we finished the manuscript.
Thoughts of Tate consumed me. We never put a label on our relationship, and I doubted he would feel comfortable with one if I broached the subject. This was the same man who refused to touch Kellan’s room for over four years.
I toyed with my phone, wondering how to approach this.
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A heavy breath rushed out of me.
“Can you do me a favor?”
Terry turned. A stick of string cheese dangled from the corner of his lips like an oversized cigarette.
He spoke around it, “Another one?”
“Can you keep the fact that we finished to yourself?”
