RING OF POWER

Chapter 2 Her Mind Already Made Up

His hand stopped an inch from the pen.

Alphonsus stared at the blank signature line, then at Vivian's decisive cursive written in blue ink above it.

The pen was waiting. Everything was waiting for him to finish what she had started.

He picked it up. His fingers felt numb as he uncapped it. For a moment, he simply held it above the paper, staring at the space where his signature was supposed to go.

Then he looked at the name printed on the form again.

Alphonsus Mark Jameson.

His full name, formal and final, like something from a legal notice or a court summons.

He couldn't do it.

He placed the pen back on the table, picked up the envelope and walked to the bedroom. He laid it on the nightstand on his side of the bed before lying down on top of the covers, still fully clothed.

He stared at the ceiling, listening to the apartment settle around him.

The refrigerator hummed. Traffic moved in the distance outside. The silence where his wife used to be seemed louder than everything else.

He didn't sleep.

At some point, though he couldn't tell whether it was midnight or three in the morning, he heard Vivian's car pull into the parking lot.

His body tensed.

He waited for the sound of her key in the lock, for her footsteps, for her to come into the bedroom and discover that he was awake.

The front door opened quietly.

Her footsteps moved through the apartment, light and deliberate. She was trying not to wake him. He listened as she crossed the living room, heard a drawer open in the kitchen, and then heard the rustling of papers.

She was looking for something.

He remained still, listening.

A few moments later, the front door opened and closed again. Her car started, and soon the parking lot was quiet.

Alphonsus got out of bed and walked into the bedroom's doorway. He looked toward the nightstand.

The envelope was gone.

She had taken the divorce papers with her.

He stood there for a moment, then returned to bed. He sat in the dark for another hour before finally getting up to shower and dress.

By the time he drove to work, he had barely slept.

His warehouse shift started at 6 AM. He arrived at 5:50, clocked in at 5:55, and reached the loading dock by 6:02.

Fluorescent lights hummed overhead, casting everything in a gray, sickly tone.

Around him, workers moved boxes from pallets to trucks and from trucks to pallets, depending on whether it was a shipping or receiving day.

Today was receiving day.

Marcus Webb, the warehouse supervisor, was a thickset man in his fifties who had worked his way up from the ground level and made sure everyone knew it. His face was almost permanently red, and his voice seemed designed to carry across the entire building.

"Jameson!" he called as Alphonsus headed toward his station. "Come here."

Alphonsus changed direction.

The other workers continued moving boxes and pallets. Nobody looked at him. That was how things worked in the warehouse. When Marcus called someone over, everyone else learned not to pay attention.

"You were supposed to move pallets seventeen through twenty-three to the north section yesterday," Marcus said.

He wasn't holding any paperwork or showing Alphonsus anything specific.

"They're still in the south section," he added.

"I moved pallets seventeen through twenty-two," Alphonsus replied carefully. "I ran out of time before my shift ended, so I left a note on the dock for the night crew to move number twenty-three."

"I didn't see a note."

"I left it on the supervisor's clipboard."

Marcus's face grew redder.

"Don't tell me what you did or didn't do. I'm telling you what didn't get done. Pallet twenty-three is supposed to be in the north section, and it's not. Now it's taking up space where it shouldn't be, and we're behind on inventory."

The workers nearby had grown noticeably quieter. They continued pretending to concentrate on their tasks, but Alphonsus knew they were listening.

"I apologize," he said. "I'll move it right now."

"You're damn right you will."

Marcus stepped closer and lowered his voice.

"And you're staying late to finish the work you didn't do yesterday. No overtime pay. You'll count it as your shift time."

Alphonsus knew he was being asked to work beyond his paid hours. He also knew that arguing with Marcus could cost him his job.

He couldn't afford that.

"Understood," he replied.

He walked over to pallet twenty-three and began moving it toward the north section.

The pallet was heavy, weighing at least four hundred pounds. His body was already exhausted from the sleepless night, and the work only made it worse.

His shoulders began burning after the first fifteen minutes. By the twentieth, his back was aching.

Nobody offered to help.

That was another unspoken rule. When Marcus decided to punish someone, the other workers kept their distance.

At 2:30 PM, Alphonsus's phone buzzed inside his locker.

He had left it there because Marcus didn't allow phones on the warehouse floor. It buzzed again at 2:45, then a third time at 3:00.

During his ten-minute break, he went to check it.

Vivian had sent a message.

"Call me when you get a break."

Another followed.

"It's important. Call me."

He also had two missed calls from her.

His heart began beating faster. Something was wrong. Had something happened to his mother? Was his sister in trouble?

He called Vivian immediately.

"Why didn't you answer?" she demanded. She didn't even wait for him to greet her.

"I was working. What happened? Is it...?"

"We need to talk tonight. Come home at six o'clock."

"Vivian, what's wrong? Is my mother—?"

"Nothing's wrong with your mother. I called her this morning, and she's fine. But we need to finish this. Sign the papers, Alphonsus. Stop making this difficult. Come home at six. Let's get this over with."

"I can't leave work at six. I'm staying late today. I won't be done until—"

"Then I guess you need to work it out with your supervisor."

Her voice was steady, controlled and completely without sympathy.

"Six o'clock, Alphonsus. Be there."

She hung up.

He stood in the break room, holding his phone and staring at the screen.

It was 3:07 PM.

His shift was supposed to end at four, but Marcus had ordered him to stay late to complete a task he supposedly hadn't finished the previous day.

Alphonsus looked at the clock again.

He had fifty-three minutes until his scheduled shift ended, and he still needed to get home by six.

He slipped his phone into his pocket and returned to the warehouse floor.

Marcus was near the loading dock, reviewing a clipboard.

Alphonsus approached him.

"I need to leave at four."

Marcus didn't look up.

"I told you to stay late."

"I have an emergency. I have to leave at four."

Now Marcus looked at him. His expression darkened.

"So that pallet wasn't actually an emergency when you were responsible for putting it in the wrong place?"

The other workers had stopped moving. This time, nobody bothered pretending not to listen.

"I need to leave," Alphonsus repeated quietly.

"Then leave, and don't come back tomorrow."

Alphonsus stared at him.

"You want to be unreliable? Fine. I'll find someone who actually needs the job."

Something cold settled in Alphonsus's chest.

He needed this job. He needed the money. His mother needed treatment, and his sister still depended on him.

Walking away meant risking the only steady income he had left.

But Vivian had insisted that he be home by six. He still didn't know why she was so determined to finish the divorce that evening, or whether something else was behind her urgency.

He looked at Marcus, then at the clipboard in his hands.

The warehouse seemed to have gone completely still around him.

He could stay and keep his job, or leave and face whatever consequences followed.

Alphonsus took a breath.

"I'm out of here."

He turned and walked off the warehouse floor without waiting for Marcus to respond.

He had just walked away from the job he desperately needed. And with Vivian waiting at home, he had no idea what else he was about to lose.