Ecstasy

Honesty

"You heard?" I asked Dominic after realizing that he had been quiet for too long after my question. He was staring at the bar table in front of us both.

His lip lifted, a smile coming to his face before he chuckled, the situation complex for me to understand what he found funny. Did he find it hilarious cheating on his wife? That was not much of a good response after being asked why he cheated.

That question was asked by Ashley more times than I could remember. She asked herself and felt worthless by the second. I was being tempted to punch Dominic across the face but held myself back. I was sober so I had to control myself.

"That question follows me everywhere", his smile dropped. "My response was always 'I don't know'. That made more sense".

"But it's not the truth, is it?"

"But it makes much more sense", he faced me, his face hard and voice stern.

"It doesn't have to always make sense. As long as it's the truth, it could be silly but it's what happened", I explained. He took a sigh of surrender.

"I was happy", he muttered.

"Sorry?"

"I was happy, Xavier", he spoke, the first time he said my name ever since we met. He usually referred to me as detective, boyfriend or something I was sure came from pure hatred that I did not know of. "It was two weeks after Ashley agreed to marry me, I was going to meet her and her family the following week. That would be the first time we would meet, and I had never been to London specifically. It was dumb honestly".

I noticed Mike, Dominic's friend standing at the far end of the bar room, his eyes like lasers and sending pure hatred my way. I was wondering if he hated me more than he should have because of how I was the one trying to find and imprison his cousin or because I was getting close with his best friends wife.

Possibly both.

Dominic continued to speak, unaware of his friend marching towards us. "I went to New York with my dad for a business meeting. It went splendid, brought in much help for the company. The final night in the city, my ex girlfriend just heard about the engagement, obviously she wasn't happy about it. If I were an idiot, I would tell you that she come onto me and seduced me, but I take full responsibility and say I didn't tell her to stop. When she kissed me, I kissed her back and one thing led to another. The following morning I told her to never contact me again, even offered her money, but little did I know she took a tape of everything".

"Which later fell into your mothers hands and long story short, Ashley saw it. Then yet again, you cheated on her with the same woman", I added, saying the little I knew from Ashley.

"I never cheated on Ashley after we got married. I had  kept myself for her for six years, I screwed up in New York. Back in Jamaica I was drugged, but I guarantee you I never touched Veronica", he made sure to clarify the word never. I looked at his hands that rested on the table, still and yet not too firm. His eyes looked at nothing but me, all the signs I looked for to see if he was not telling the truth were not there. He was being honest.

"Dominic, I think that's enough, let's go home", Mike said, grabbing him by the arm and out of the chair. Dominic tried reaching for his wallet but seemed to dawdle at it until his friend took out more money than he was supposed to and placing it on the counter.

"Good night", I said to them as they left, Dominic staggering and losing balance but still not meeting the floor because of his friends support.

"Why'd you take me?" Dominic cried as they were out of reach yet not low enough.