Arrogant Bulge Dad

I’ve always seen myself as a hero. A savior.

The man in front of me now used to be a top litigator at the biggest firm in the city. Cold eyes, razor-sharp mind, zero heart. The kind of guy who’d gut you in a deposition and bill you for the pleasure. Not his fault. They made him that way. Society, ambition, expectation. Layer after layer of tight skin over his true self.

I peeled all that away.

Now he’s here on the worn leather couch, barefoot, belly full of cheap beer. Cigarette smoke hangs thick in the air. He’s got a three-day beard and a lazy grin that doesn’t calculate anything. His hand rests on the thigh of another man. They pass a bottle back and forth. When they laugh, it’s deep and real and stupid. Pure.

He doesn’t remember mergers. He doesn’t remember billable hours. All he knows now is the taste of smoke, the burn of whiskey, the heavy warmth of another man’s body against his. The simple things. The best things.

I crouch down next to him. He looks at me with those once-sharp eyes now soft and foggy like morning after rain.

“You happy?” I ask.

He blinks slow. Then he grins and grabs my face with both hands and kisses me hard. Beer breath, tobacco tongue, stubble scraping my chin. When he pulls back he says, “Never been happier in my fucking life, boss.”