Red Star

After The Fire Part 8

Frank has been biting his nails. Down to the stubs. His wife is not happy. She's even ordered a fancy serum that is supposed to prevent you from biting your nails. It's due to arrive tomorrow. 

It will be too late by then.

Today, Frank has three items on his agenda:

1. - Console Brandon for the fifty-seventh week in a row as he cries over a man who will not leave his wife. 

2. - Question Douglas on why he would keep Ralph's secret from Rosa.

3. - Tell Rosa that Ralph is alive. 

It's been three weeks since he met the man that should very much be dead, and being overly troubled by the way the whole turn of events went, he took a month off of work. 

He had been searching for Ralph ever since the phone call a few months ago, but he was in no way expecting or hoping to actually find him. Part of him hoped that Ralph had been dead the whole time and that he had dreamed the whole thing, but when he had looked down and saw that the phone call had gone through, everything had changed. He left a voice mail on the zombie's phone and had spent the last six months searching around for Ralph Castano. 

In the end, all it took was going to the bar that Ralph and Rosa used to frequent. Perhaps Ralph cares more for Rosa than Frank gave him credit for. 

How on earth is he going to break this news to Rosa? 

Brandon's session goes smoothly. Instead of crying over unrequited love, he tells Frank about this guy he has been seeing for the last couple weeks. He claims to be happy, but feels ultimately guilty for giving this guy 30% when the full 100% will always go to Douglas. Frank tells Brandon to give Douglas one final ultimatum, partly to torture Douglas for being a lying piece of shit, and partly to benefit Brandon. Brandon isn't sure if he can do it. He tells Frank that he will think it over for the week and discuss it with him in the next session. 

Then there is Douglas' meeting. 

"Hello." Frank's tone is clipped and clinical and he sees Douglas visibly stiffen. 

"Good afternoon, Frank, how's it going?"

"Oh, grand," Frank says, "other than spending all of my time wondering how someone so seemingly noble could do such a thing to someone like you did."

Douglas hasn't even closed the door and the knife has dropped. 

"Now listen here-" 

"No."

"Excuse me?!" 

"I have studied the human mind for many years," Frank says, his calmness surprising him, "and in all of that time, never have I been so baffled by someone's behaviour like I am with yours. Please close the door, sit down and explain how you have been able to fake your friend's death, knowing full well what it has done to Rosa."

Silently, knowing exactly that he is not in the most powerful position for once, Douglas does as Frank told him, sliding into the chair in a sulk, just like a child would. 

"I did not come to apologise." Douglas says slowly. 

"Then I suppose you should leave."

"I am not sorry for what I've done. I know that it has killed Rosa, and I suppose I am sorry for that, but you don't understand. If she had known..." 

"She can't go a week without screaming into the floor. You cannot tell me that it is better this way." 

"You do not understand," Douglas says, his head now in his hands. "She would have gone to the ends of the earth to find him. She would have gotten herself killed real quick. This is the safest place she can be right now. They are looking for her. They want to kill her." 

"But surely you could have at least told her that he was alive and kept her here?" Frank says, his voice sounding a lot more emotional than he was expecting.

"I didn't want to take that chance. I couldn't. But anyway, I didn't come here to justify this decision with you."

"Then why did you come?" 

"Ralph is dead." 

"What?" Frank is stunned. Dead. Ralph, the man who held a knife to his throat only weeks ago. 

"He called me yesterday, gave me an update. He told me that he took a risky-ass mission. He also told me that he made the decision after meeting you. I got a call this morning from the CIA and they told me he was killed in action." 

Frank stands, in shock, leaning on the desk for support.

"Why don't you seem more upset?"

"I've had to come to terms with him dying twice now," Douglas shrugs, breathing somewhat heavily. "I cried this morning, but obviously if I show any emotion out of the blue like this, people are gonna wonder why, and I do not want to answer those questions." 

"Did they tell you anything else about how he died?"

"No," Douglas says, shaking his head solemnly. "He was shot, but that's all I know." 

They spend the rest of the appointment discussing Douglas' feelings about lying and he helps Frank understand his reasons for doing it. 

When the appointment is over, Frank cannot decide. What is the point of telling Rosa, who is incredibly emotionally volatile, that Ralph was alive, and is now dead? 

He chews his nails a little more to ease the anxiety. 

"I wanna talk about my family today," Rosa says, finalising Frank's decision for him. "I think it's time."

"Alright," Frank nods, pulling out some paper and finding his pen to take any notes.  "Where would you like to start?" 

And they have their best session yet; Rosa describes her family and how they died, how she and her sister escaped the fire and found their way to a rough apartment building in New York, how Rosa didn't go to school so she could earn enough money to keep them afloat,  how her sister died, and how she came to be on the FBI, which actually happened on the same day.

"I had blood on my face, my hands were shaking, I had a gun in my lap and I wore oversized clothes. And a man called Douglas Washington came up to me and asked me for my name. I took one last look at my sister's lifeless body, and told him that my name was Rosa Waters. He also told me I was a hero. I always thought that it was weird. I had just killed eight people."

"You saved people's lives at the age of seventeen, Rosa. I think that's pretty heroic."

"Perhaps," She accepts, "But I didn't save the life that mattered the most." 

Frank sighs. He cannot even imagine the trauma that Rosa has endured to be at this point today, and yet there is still so much that he doesn't know. 

"What did you say your sister's name was?"

"Rosanna," Rosa says, and Frank finally understands. "Her name was Rosanna. Little Rosie." 

~

The song of the chapter is 'Wild Horses' by Birdy.