Bright Lights: Book One of the Talia Shaw Series

by Darcy, Christine J

  “What?” he asked, concerned.

  I threw the test in the bin.

  “I got my period,” I answered.

  “When?” he asked.

  “Just then,” I answered. He furrowed his brows.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Pretty sure.”

  He furrowed his brows like he was annoyed to have been put through all this. Then he breathed in relief. Then he clapped. “Thank god,” he said. What a display, I thought.

  We both stood there awkwardly. All the energy between us was wrong. I thought he might come up and hug me as he started to lift his hands, but he moved to the kitchen.

  “Do you want me to cook dinner?” he asked, putting the groceries away.

  “I’m not hungry,” I answered.

  I watched him prepare dinner expecting enough silence would bring an apology. Maybe one wasn’t going to come. Maybe I couldn’t blame him for a bad reaction to news like this. I sat down and grabbed the remote and turned on the TV, not paying any attention to what was on screen.

  Whatever Laurie was cooking smelled incredible, but I wasn’t giving in and asking for some. I couldn’t stop thinking about how wonderful our time had been until this day.

  His phone rang as he finished up. He took his plate outside and answered it. He spoke quietly but I turned up the volume anyway. I wanted him to know I wasn’t listening. I couldn’t see his face through the window.

  The movie was finishing as Laurie came in. The characters had just gotten married and were driving in one of those cars with cans tied to the back. I never understood why people did that. Laurie came and sat beside me. He looked tired. He looked like I felt. I turned the TV off.

  “How was your dinner?” I asked.

  “Fine,” he answered.

  “Who were you talking to?”

  “Just a friend,” he answered. He scratched at his head and took a breath.

  “What’s going on with you?” I asked. If an apology wasn’t coming then we should at least talk about what had happened.

  “I’m thinking we should head back,” he started. What? I thought.

  “Don’t we have another week?”

  He nodded. It wasn’t as if I was desperate to stay there if this was going to be the energy between us. “But there is still stuff to work out before I leave, tour stuff…”

  I knew that excuse well enough to know that was exactly what it was. “This isn’t about the tour.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I shouldn’t have said anything. I’m never late so I was anxious. I didn’t mean to freak you out. But, you didn’t have to leave me alone all day. We could have talked about it,” I said, hoping to see him nod, some sign that it was all going to be okay.

  Instead, he shook his head before he said, “I think we need to take a break.”

  What? I thought, losing my breath a little.

  “A break?” I asked. “You want to break up?”

  He wasn’t looking at me. “I think we should.”

  “Why? Because of a little scare? These things happen all the time. I’m not pregnant. So nothing’s happened,” I argued.

  “Something did happen and it’s too fast and I just think we need to stop seeing each other. Maybe see some other people for a bit.”

  He was so firm. So sure. “What are you talking about?” I demanded, feeling an anger rise up over any kind of sadness.

  “I’m sorry,” he said, reaching for my thigh. I shifted my feet to the floor, taking my leg away.

  How sorry could he possibly be, I thought. It had been why I couldn’t tell him I loved him. I had dreaded what might come after I did that. It made me even angrier knowing that I had known, maybe subconsciously, that this wasn’t going to last. Never mind subconsciously, he had told me so himself.

  “If you’re going to do it then do it properly. Don’t dress it up just tell me the truth. You’re scared.”

  “I want to be young. I can’t be tied down right now,” he fought. What a cliché!

  “Tied down? How am I tying you down?”

  “It’s not about you. I--”

  “That’s bullshit. You’re dumping me.”

  “We talked about this. You knew we weren’t going to last forever.”

  “What forever? It’s been a few months,” I answered.

  He didn’t have a response to that. I wiped the tears that had gathered at my eyes. He wouldn’t look at me.

  “Why did you start all of this with me in the first place?”

  He moved his head a little side to side. He shook his head a little. “I didn’t realise how much I’d like you. We need to end this before we’re in too deep and it’s too late.” He seemed to be pleading then. Though still not looking at me. It already is too late for me, I thought.

  “You can’t treat people this way,” I argued. “You made me fall for you.” All his charms, his kisses, the way he looked at me. He led me here, I thought.

  He fought back. “I didn’t make you do anything. I care about you. I just can’t have this right now. My life is too complicated.”

  “I don’t want to complicate your life!” I yelled before bringing my voice down low. “I just want to love you.”

  And, there it was. The words I couldn’t bring myself to say before and the look on his face when I said it. He barely flinched. And I realised I’d been convincing myself that he felt much more than he did. Maybe he liked me. Maybe a lot. But not as much as I liked him. And that was the problem. No amount of time or effort would fix it.

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” he said.

  “You are hurting me.” I was crying now openly. And he was still barely looking at me. He didn’t want to see what he was doing. Then he shouldn’t have been doing it.

  “Did you ever love me, at all?”

  He turned his head all the way away like he the question made him tired. Like I’d asked it a million times. I hadn’t. I hadn’t even told him how I felt. But he knew it. I knew he knew it.

  “You didn’t. Did you?”

  “I care about you so much. More than I’ve ever cared about another girl.”

  I wanted to shout, ‘that’s love! You love me.’ But maybe he didn’t. Maybe he truly didn’t. But how could I feel it so thoroughly, so certainly, when the object of my affection didn’t?

  “I really don’t want things to end this way.”

  I scoffed. “There’s no other version of this.” I felt so used. I could never do this to someone, I thought. I could never lead someone into love when I knew I couldn’t or wouldn’t love them back. Was it just who he was? Or had he become this over years of getting all the things he wanted with no consequence?

  “I’m so tired,” he said, pulling the hair on his head and scratching at the back of his neck. His face and neck were red. He’d been outside, wandering around all day. Avoiding me. “Can we sleep? Keep talking tomorrow?”

  I nodded. He held out a hand. “No,” I said. “I’ll sleep in another bedroom.” I knew there were three more of them that we never walked into.

  “Talia. You don’t have to do that,” he said but I was already walking upstairs and grabbing my things. He followed me.

  “Let me do that,” Laurie said, reaching for my luggage.

  “I’m fine,” I assured him. He followed me back down the stairs.

  “Good night,” he said as I reached the door.

  “Night,” I said, without looking behind me. I walked into the room and closed the door.

  The room was beautiful. Just as lavish and just as light but it felt small and airless. I sat in bed, feeling hot. I turned the fan up to the highest speed. I felt like I couldn’t breathe. I got out of bed and sat on the cold tile floor. It felt relieving. I lay down, pressing my cheek against it. More relief. I started to cry.

  The conversation hadn’t felt over but I knew our relationship was. I was already grieving for it. I was grieving for the person he’d grow into and I wouldn’t get to know. I was grieving
for the person that I thought I’d become being with him. And, all the things I thought we’d get to do together. All those imaginings were becoming impossibilities.

  When I noticed I’d stopped crying, I decided I needed a plan. I had wanted to escape to the island, now I wanted to escape from it. Laurie had organised everything to get us there. I had no idea where we were or how to get away. I called Manny around 2am. His 11pm. He answered, wide awake.

  “Where are you? Are you okay?” He sounded nervous. I had told him I was going away but ignored his requests for more information.

  “I’m on an island with Laurie. I need to get out of here.”

  He switched into management mode. “What’s the island called?”

  “I don’t know. It’s owned by his friend.”

  “Drop a pin on your phone. I’ll track it.” I did as he said. Within minutes he knew where I was and was organising a speedboat to come get me. “It should be there in three and a half hours.”

  “Okay. Thank you,” I said.

  “You’re welcome, Talia. I’m glad you’re okay.” He hung up. Our relationship had always felt strange. Sometimes it seemed like he cared so much about me. Other times he was all business – on the label’s side. But at that moment, I was so grateful to him.

  I set my alarm, grabbed a pillow, and lay back down on the floor. I cried a little more, I couldn’t help myself, and then fell asleep.

  * * *

  It was pitch black when my vibrating alarm woke me up. I dressed quickly, brushed my teeth, packed my bag and carried it quietly through the house. I walked out the door, closed it gently and saw the speedboat, a different one this time, idling at the end of the dock. I walked down the beach to the dock.

  “Hi,” I whispered as I handed over my luggage. I didn’t need to whisper, we were too far from the house. I looked up to the upstairs level. I could see the light of the moon reflected on the glass of the bedroom window. I imagined him fast asleep, carefree.

  The captain helped me into the boat. “Ready to go, Miss?”

  I nodded.

  “Quietly, please,” I asked. He seemed confused, but he complied. We drove quietly away from the island. He looked back at me for permission to pick up speed and I nodded. Dawn started to break. I imagined the light coming into the bedroom back on the island. Laurie would wake up and I’d be gone. I wondered if he’d be happy about it. He didn’t have to deal with me anymore. I hoped against hope that it would make him the littlest bit sad but knew it would be nothing compared to the weight on my chest.

  * * *

  The journey home was awful. Not just the planes, all three of them, but the hours. My lack of sleep the night before. My eyes had stayed swollen the whole time. I wore sunglasses between planes and stayed as hidden as I could in the first class lounges. Manny had talked to Mom. She messaged me to say she’d be at the airport to get me. And there she was standing with the airport liaison as I got off the plane. I crushed her with my hug. I cried under my sunglasses. She brushed my hair as I buried my face into her shoulder.

  “Let’s go, sweetheart,” she said, ushering me to the cart before the rest of the plane disembarked.

  The liaison was taking us through the airport to avoid the paparazzi who somehow knew I was arriving at that moment or maybe they were just always there. Waiting. The cart looked like the one that had taken me to the private plane on that fateful day. And the day I saw Laurie. I tried not to think about it as the liaison collected my luggage from the carousel and drove us to Mom’s car. It wasn’t the same as her old dodgy Kia. It was a Prius.

  “What’s this?” I asked as she drove us home.

  “Well, with the house all paid off, your father and I have had a little extra money.”

  “That’s great, Mom,” I said, glad that she was able to do that for herself.

  We arrived home to an empty house. “Dad’s on a fishing trip but he’s on his way back.”

  “He didn’t have to do that.”

  “He wanted to. We’ve both been missing you.”

  Mom was walking to the spare room but I started up the stairs. She followed my lead. I opened the door and everything was just the way I’d left it. It was exactly the same but it felt so unfamiliar. Like it was someone else’s room. All the pictures were still on the walls. My best friends. I walked over and looked at them. I had forgotten how beautiful they were. Mom put down my bag by the door.

  There wasn’t a bit of dust. Mom must have kept on cleaning in there, I thought. “Do you want some tea?” she asked. I nodded.

  I started to unpack my things as Mom came down the stairs. I looked at my phone. Still no calls or texts. He’d woken up and I was gone and he had nothing to say about it. Mom came back up with two teacups and a plate of biscuits. We drank our tea and ate our biscuits. Mom knew not to ask about what had happened. We didn’t talk about Laurie or Easton. Mostly she told me what had been happening at home. How Dad had only just discovered X-Files and been watching the whole series. How she had decided to learn Mandarin.

  When we finished our tea, we decided to go downstairs and clear out the spare bedroom, bringing back my things. I opened the door and saw my bear. I wasn’t feeling spiteful when I took it outside and put it into the garbage bin. I just didn’t want to see it. I couldn’t imagine a time when I would. And where else would it go?

  Mom didn’t mention it though she eyed me when I came back in. We carried my things up and put them away in my room. Mom looked at the photos on my walls. “If you want, we can take these down. Maybe make an album?” Mom asked.

  Would that be disrespectful to their memory? Or was it just time passing? I nodded. Together we took down the photos. Mom grabbed an empty shoe box and we stored them there till we had an album for them.

  “Where’s my girl?” Dad’s voice came booming up the stairs. I smiled. I walked out past Mom and rushed down the stairs. He was waiting at the bottom, in his khaki fishing uniform including an unfortunate bucket hat. He was unshaven and with tired eyes but he looked so lovely to me. I fell into his arms just as easy as Mom’s. “Oh, I’ve missed you, sweetheart.”

  “Same here, Dad,” I said as I slid back down to the floor.

  “You’re a sight for sore eyes,” he said, tugging on one of my blonde curls, so much longer than it was when I first left. If I straightened my hair, I thought, it would reach the bottom of my back.

  Dad got himself showered and changed as we cooked dinner. He told us stories of gigantic trout and icy cold showers as we ate.

  After dinner, we set up a movie. Mom and Dad argued over the options as I searched the cupboards for snacks. Then there was a knock on the door. I heard Mom get up and got to it. I heard her voice blend with someone else’s and then Dad’s too. I walked out to see who it was.

  Saffy stood there smiling at my parents, looking every bit like the girl I’d known and loved for so long. The girl who I used to walk through the hardest things with. She saw me and tilted her head a little to the side, as she’d done a million times before. I ran to her and wrapped my arms around her petite frame and pushed my head into her dark curls. I started crying.

  “Oh, Talia. Where have you been?” she asked, sadly.

  Thirteen

  Saffy and I rushed upstairs, as we’d done a thousand times before. Like we were school girls running to tell secrets. She walked into my room and looked surprised at the walls. She ran her fingers over the marks where the tape used to be. “They’re here,” I said, handing her the box. She breathed in relief. “I’m glad you’re back in your room.”

  “Me too,” I answered. “And I’m glad to see you.”

  “Really?” she asked.

  “Of course. But surprised. I haven’t been a great friend.”

  “You’re my best friend. Even when you’re a million miles away and ignoring my calls. I love you. I’m always going to be here for you.” I grabbed her again in a hug. “Okay, okay,” she said, rubbing my back.

  “I’m sorry,” I s
aid.

  She nodded. “Just tell me what’s going on?”

  We sat down on the bed and I spilled my guts. “Since Ash and Kelly… I hated being home so much. I didn’t want to go to LA in the first place out of respect for them but then I got there and… I used it to distract me from their loss. I pushed you and Mom away because you were attached to home and the thought of them. I realise how stupid that is. I realise that it’s been almost a year and thinking about it still hurts so badly. Keeping you all at a distance didn’t help. And, going through all of this other stuff without you and without Mom. I’m an idiot.”

  “Yeah, you are,” Saffy said, looking at me sadly. “I wanted so much to be there for you. But, I started thinking that this is what happens when your best friend becomes famous. They just disappear from your life. That you’d made all these cool friends and you didn’t need me anymore.” Saffy was starting to cry and it made me start again.

  “That’s not it at all. It was that they were friends who didn’t know anything about Ash and Kelly. They never mentioned it all.”

  “Am I never supposed to mention them?” Saffy asked, defensive.

  “No,” I argued. “I want you to mention them. I want us to think about them and talk about them. It was stupid to let myself be distracted. To be glad of being distracted.”

  She took a moment. “I can understand,” she admitted. “Sometimes being here, driving past their houses or places we hung out together, it keeps everything so fresh. I would’ve been happy to be taken away from all of it, too.”

  “It hasn’t been all rosy, though,” I replied.

  Saffy nodded. She knew what I was talking about. “Tell me,” she said.

  We talked till the early hours of the morning. About Manny, who I could never be sure was on my side, Easton, who’d humiliated me, and Laurie who broke my heart. I told her about the good things, too. Teddy and Lucy and Leif and the fans and the music.