35| Wasabi Gods
AXEL
She was gone and in a way, it was all my fault. I had this uncanny ability to push away the people I loved and cared for most. My caring nature, my will to always hold things together and be there for everyone sometimes turned toxic, just the way it did this time. Now all I was left with were pictures of her on my phone and the memory of her in my head. Her scent still lingered in the guest room and although I wanted to immerse myself in it, I decided it would be easier to just forget it. That night when we got home I made sure to wash everything so her trace wouldn't be there anymore. It was easy that way, at least I thought it would be easier that way.
But nothing truly made it easier!
The dull ache was still there even after a week. We spoke once, very shortly. She was tired from a long day of work and I didn't want to be a pest and keep her up. That five seconds of hearing her voice ignited those feelings that I thought I could get over. I always knew she was the one for me but at the same time, I couldn't force her to stay with me so she became the one who got away.
I sighed, kneeling back in my office chair. The monitor in front of me played security footage from the past year. My eyes were tired from staring at the screen for three days straight but I had no choice. Well, actually I did, I just didn't want to take legal action against the person who could be stealing from me so I decided to investigate myself. Turned out, this was a lot harder than I had expected.
The bookkeeper Macy had hired to do my books had noticed some inconsistencies and when he did the balance sheet for my accounts he noticed that the bakery was missing some money. That surprised me considering only a few people handled the finances; if Claudia wasn't handling the finances then it was me. He also said that someone could easily be shaving a few euros off the top before counting the money from the till. The little they must have taken every day could have dented my income by a marginal amount.
I obviously wasn't happy to hear this news. Each person that worked for me had background checks done on them. I trusted them enough to leave my bakery in their hands but slowly I was beginning to regret that. My decision to stay behind was turning out to be a smart one.
The door to my office burst open and in came my sister. Pausing the monitor, I shifted my attention to her smiling face. In her hands were two take out bags. She kicked the door close with her foot before giving me a beaming smile. I took in her attire. She wore blue skinny jeans and a black tank top. Hair open in its natural waves and vans on her feet.
"I bring food," she beamed, holding the food bags up in either hand. I watched as she placed the food on my small table, grabbing the chair that sat opposite my desk and dragging it so she could sit beside me. The chair made a screeching noise as she did so, but she didn't seem to care.
Groaning, I brought two fingers to my temples on either side and began massaging in small circles, "Why are you here? Don't you have to help dad or something?"
"He will be fine for about an hour or two. You don't eat much recently so I decided to bring you a little something," she grinned, pulling out sushi from one bag and different types of noodles from the other, "I may have forgotten our drinks in the car though," she said after a few short minutes, scratching the side of her head innocently.
Rolling my eyes, I grabbed my phone, "It's fine, I'll just ask Claudia to get us something from the bakery." Once I was done sending the text, I put my phone on the other side of my desk and away from my fingers. If I kept my phone with me there was a strong possibility that I would be going through the photos of Macy and me. If I did that then I would bring myself to call or text her. But she needed space and maybe I did too.
A minute later Claudia came into the room with two cokes in her hand. Her head remained down as she left the cokes on my table before scurrying away.
"Well she's acting weirder than usual," Stephanie murmured, picking a seaweed and rice roll using chopsticks and dipping it in soy sauce before adding wasabi. I was about to tell her that she added too much wasabi but she had already stuffed the roll into her mouth. "Holy wasabi Gods," she cried, tears began to stream down her cheeks, "This is so bad, my ears are ringing!" Grabbing the coke, she opened the can and began chugging the contents.
I chuckled, grabbing a bowl of noodles and a fork. No matter how many times I tried in the past, I could never learn how to use chopsticks. Eventually, I just gave up and settled to use something I could use, "Who asked you to add so much wasabi? It's not like it's running away from you."
"Bloody hell, you sound like mum every time I had hiccups from eating too fast," Stephanie groaned, opting to take a bowl of noodles this time instead of another sushi roll.
Sighing, I said, "I miss her."
"I know little brother. I miss her too but she wouldn't want us being depressed about it so I'm choosing to go on with my life. You should try to do the same. You can't change what happened in the past and no one expects you to. All that matters is that you learn from it and move on to not make those mistakes again."
"I'm trying to do that," I affirmed, stuffing chicken noodles into my mouth.
"Do you think staying here and giving up something, someone you love is moving on and not making those mistakes because I assure you it isn't. When dad kicked you out we all knew it wasn't the right thing to do but dad is dad and like you he is stubborn. I know we ended up pushing you away but when mum tried to repair whatever damage was done, you ended up pushing her away. Now you're living with that regret daily. Don't do the same with Macy." Stephanie placed a hand on my shoulder, patting it lightly before returning to her meal.
"I told her she could stay. She refused outright. Her life is in California and she doesn't want to build a new one here. She doesn't want a new life with me and I can't force her so I'm letting her go. It's not pushing her away if I'm giving her what she wanted in the first place," I defended, the topic irritating me.
Out of everything we could have discussed, why did she choose this?
"I say it is pushing her away. It's not only her life that's in America. Yours is too. Don't get me wrong, you're more than welcome to stay here but it's not what makes you happy. You can amend your relationship with dad and me but you don't need to stay. On holidays you can make a trip to England to be with us and visit mum like every normal person out there when they live away from their family. You have your own apartment, a job, a car, a life all there and you're leaving it to move in with your widower father and divorced sister. Don't be stupid little bro," her eyes shifted from me to the monitor, "Anyway, what are we watching?"
Pressing play on the footage, I fast forwarded the video so I could see the end of the working day. My attention was mainly at the end of the day because that was the only time anyone could open the till to take money without anyone noticing, "Security footage for that past year. I'm almost halfway through."
"What are we looking for?" She asked, sitting up straighter on her seat. This obviously piqued her interest.
"Anything strange really," was my simple answer, "that new guy Macy had hired has a suspicion that someone is stealing money from me. He could be wrong but there's no harm in looking to make sure. I'd be very disappointed if it were true though," I mused, opening my coke to take a drink.
"It's Claudia," Stephanie piped.
Shaking my head, I glared at her, "Look, I know you don't like her but I trust her. She wouldn't steal from anyone, especially not me. We've known her since childhood, how could you even assume she could do something like that?"
Stephanie hit me over the head, then pressed the pause button and pointed and the screen with wide saucer-like eyes, "Oh, I don't know Axel," she sarcastically began, "MAYBE BECAUSE I'M LOOKING AT HER DO IT ON THIS SCREEN!"
My head whirled toward the screen, eyes taking in every detail. Claudia stood behind the open till inside an empty bakery. Her hand had money it that she was busy stuffing in what I assumed was her bra. I pressed play to watch the rest, slowing the speed of the video so it could be clear. She counted the notes before putting them in a bag to keep in the safe but she took a few notes out of every lot.
I watched a few more days and realized that she wasn't alone in this plot. For a few days one of my male bakers, Johnathan, would be doing the same thing. Of course, he would stash the money in his pockets like a fool. I couldn't believe my eyes. Claudia was the one person I thought I could trust with my life growing up and she turned out to be my enemy.
"So you're going to turn her in right? I mean she did steal from you and you do have proof same goes for this other guy," Stephanie said in an alarmed tone. She sounded more stressed than I felt.
"I-I don't know," I honestly answered, "I didn't want to take any legal action against them but I'm not so sure anymore. I would like to know why they stole from me though. I mean, Claudia of all people? She's probably the highest-paid here and if she was unhappy she should have said something."
"Oh my dear brother, so young and naive sometimes. If there's money in front of you and no one to stop your greedy little hands from taking it then this is what happens. I swear she's a kleptomaniac, always has been," Stephanie muttered with sympathy coloring her tone.
"What, since when?"
"You didn't know?" She asked bewildered, "Come on, how could you miss the signs. Okay, remember that one Christmas dad bought mom this shiny new bracelet. Dwayne and Claudia where there as well and all of a sudden that bracelet went missing. Claudia was having a phase with shiny things so she took it. Dwayne eventually found it and ledt it under the tree for someone else to find so that dad and mum would just think they misplaced it. There was also this time she took the Herbie replica mum has gotten me. Tobias had to pay her off to give it back to me. How did you not know all of this?"
I shrugged, "I guess I don't pay that much attention to Claudia but you guys could have warned me before I hired her." A part of me wanted to pick on the fact she managed to utter her ex-husband's name without falling apart but I thought it would be better if I let it slide. She finally gathered up the courage to move on with her life and I didn't want to set her back.
"I would have warned you if we were still speaking but you completely brushed me off when I came to the opening of your bakery so don't blame me," she rolled her eyes with a grunt, "And Dwayne just assumed to got help with it and changed or something. I guess all she did was move on to the stuff that can make you rich."
"You know, what if it's not the disorder? What if she planned it? The books were such a mess that I couldn't even make heads or tales of it," I mused.
"If that's true then you need to get her arrested. If she gets fired what's stopping her from doing something similar to her next employer?" Stephanie got up and grabbed my phone from the far end of my table, handing it to me with a reassuring smile, "Trust me, this is the right thing to do."
~~~
"The police arrested Claudia and Johnathan this afternoon," I groaned, shifting my position on my bed, "I still can't believe Claudia could do something like that to me, you know?" Quickly, I switched the phone from one ear to the other so I wouldn't miss what Macy would say.
"Why, because she's head over heels in love with you and probably thinks that you will be her knight in shining armor who will ride up to her on a white horse and whisk her away into the sunset?" Her sardonic tone let me know that she still felt a pang of jealousy when she thought of me with another girl. The sadist in me enjoyed that.
"No, don't be ridiculous!" I chuckled, "I don't know. I guess I trusted her to take care of my baby and I honestly thought she was doing a good job. At least, she made it seem like she was."
"I never liked her," Macy grumbled, there was a tinge of hate underlining her tone, "She didn't like me either so I guess the feeling was rather mutual. She's just damn lucky I'm not there because she would have the left that bakery with a black eye and handcuffs."
"Violence doesn't solve anything, Sunshine."
"That may be true but I could at least try knocking some sense into her. It is better to try and fail than fail to try," she sounded so enthusiastic about the idea that it almost scared me. You would think Macy's morbidity was something I would have gotten accustomed to but it wasn't.
"I don't think those words were meant for the concept you're using it in, Sunshine. And need I remind you that you two no longer need to hate each other because we're not dating for you to be this jealous and I don't even like her," I pointed out ever so subtly.
"Jealous," she scoffed, "Look here buddy, I don't know what you've heard but I'm far from jealous. I'm just a good judge of character and that girl has no character whatsoever. I mean I feel bad for her and all but she crossed way too many lines." There was shuffling on her end before she could continue, "I don't remember a Johnathan though, describe him?"
"Why? So you can make a hit list?" I joked but when I heard nothing on the other end I could feel the tiny hairs on my skin rising, "Sunshine, no making hit lists. Do I make myself clear?"
"You're cute, trying to order me around again. If I want to make a hit list I will but I don't. She's not worth my time, effort, or money. I just want to see if I remember this guy," I could practically see her shrugging a single shoulder even though we were on a phone call.
"Average guy, good looking, shorter than me but buffer and he was the only bald guy. Ring any bells?" I asked as a knock sounded at my bedroom door. Getting up to unlock the door and open it, I mumbled, "Give me a second would you."
All it took was for me to open the door slightly before Stephanie shoved the door open causing me to stumble back, "Can you believe this guy. He buys me chocolates, flowers, food, tries to take me for lunch or dinner but then just ends up buying me a coffee at work and I have no idea why he keeps doing this because I keep rejecting him. Which, by the way, I suddenly feel bad about. Anyway, he comes into the shop today with a whole orchestra band thing and roses to ask me to go on a picnic with him and when I reject him for like the hundredth time everybody starts making me the bad guy." She took a deep breath after her rant before glaring at me.
I stood there, phone held in hand. It was now on speaker so Macy could hear everything Stephanie had said. To be honest, my sister sounded like she needed female advice and not advice from her younger brother anyway.
"Stephanie, take a number and sit down, would you. I was busy talking when you barged in like a bull seeing red," Macy finally said causing the scowl on Stephanie's face to morph into a wide, lips splitting grin.
"Barbie!" Stephanie began jumping up and down like a small child that ate too much candy, "Oh Barbie, how do you get rid of a handsome stalker?"
"I'll answer you in a second, " Macy said slightly annoyed, "Axel, maybe you would have figured this out a lot sooner if I told you that I saw that guy and Claudia fighting once. I had asked him if the two of them were...you know...and if she finally moved on from swooning over you but all he said was, and I quote 'Moving on...she's doing something along those lines'."
"Do you think she stole money from me to get me back for not liking her or something. We aren't in fifth grade and that's absolutely stupid," I huffed.
"Stupid but not something she wouldn't do," Macy voiced, "Look at it this way, she probably started working for you to get your attention but when she realized she was failing at that she decided to take your money instead. It makes sense."
"It's one theory," I admitted with doubt, "But only she can tell us why she really did it so I don't want to waste my time coming up with useless theories when I could just ask her."
"Hey Shelby, give me a second or two okay," Macy's muffled voice said, "Axel, I've got to go. It's my lunch hour. It was... nice... speaking to you but let's not do it again any time soon, yeah! It doesn't really make this easy." She whispered, sadness tainting her tone. I knew she was frowning, resisting the urge to cry or allow a whimper to escape her.
"It was nice speaking to you too Sunshine," I breathed, "Sorry for the phone call. I just wanted to inform you of what happened before you probably heard it from my sister or something. I know how she was jumping for joy when Claudia was being dragged away in handcuffs. You people are crazy."
"It's not like she didn't get what she deserved now Barbie, the answer to my question?" Stephanie demanded, hands going to her hips as she shifted all her weight to one leg.
"I think Axel can help you with that. Trust me. I'll call you later Steph, please let me eat. You know I'm so thin it already looks like I don't eat enough!" Macy whined and the pang in my chest grew. I missed her so much. Missed her smile, her eyes, the way she felt, the way she smelt, the way her hair looked right after a shower. I missed every single thing about her.
"Fine," Stephanie relented, "Go and I'll ask my brother for relationship advice. God, I need to make more female friends." She groaned.
Macy snickered, "Maybe you should have made friends with Claudia when you had that chance," she teased, probably gnawing on her bottom lip to prevent her bubbling laughter.
"Haha, very funny. Goodbye," Stephanie grimaced, grabbing my phone from my hand, "You can count yourself lucky if I answer your call later on instead of sleeping." With that, Stephanie ended the call and threw my phone onto the bed, "As for you, what the hell do I do?"
I shrugged, walking over to my bed before flopping on top of it, "You know Steph, I never liked Tobias from the beginning, and when I tried to tell you that he is bad news you thought I had it in for you. Back then, all I wanted to tell you was that there are so many good guys out there. Better guys that Tobias. You could have your pick but you chose the douche."
"You don't need to remind me," she gritted, eyes lingering on her feet. She did that whenever she felt embarrassed about something but it wasn't her fault. There was no way anyone could fault her for loving him, no matter how much of a douche he was.
"Sometimes it's nice to have a reminder so you can understand the signals that someone else is giving of. You know what his type is like now so you know what to stay away from. You can't let one bad experience with someone affect your views on the entire male population."
"Really? Because the way I see it, minus the abusive nature, you're pretty much a douche too Axel." She chided, laying down beside me on the bed. Both of us had our eyes glued to the ceiling, "You miss her so why not got after her?"
"This isn't some fairytale, romance movie."
"If it were, you would have stopped her from getting on that plane but I'm happy you didn't," from the corner of my eye I noticed that she shifted her head so her gaze could face me. A proud look shimmered in her eyes but I chose not to meet her gaze.
"Why?"
"She needed to go back home, and you need to understand what if feels like not to have her around anymore. Not to be able to touch her, talk to her, love her the way you could have if you weren't so stubborn. That means no phoning her whenever you miss her. You know she misses you too but you're not helping her move on. If you refuse to move back to America and be with her at least give her the opportunity to move on," Stephanie perched herself up on her elbows, "With that being said, I should probably learn to give people a chance in my life. Maybe going out for one lunch or dinner with the guy wouldn't hurt. It's time we grew up and started handling situations better. We're adults and yet we still act like teenagers."
"In a couple of years you'll be thirty," I chuckled, "get ready for the gray hairs to start making their appearance."
"Don't talk too much, you're not that far behind me and you know men age faster than women little bro."
"Yeah yeah," I mumbled, "Hey Stephanie?" She hummed, a smile gracing her face as I uttered, "I love you, sis."
Bringing one hand to my hair, she began ruffling it, "I love you too, brother."
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