Star Bright

by Shelly Greene

  A significant number of eyes turned their way. The DJ, admitting defeat, tapered off the music, and now they were the center of attention.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” Rafi said, “I haven’t known Julian Gault for very long, but the very first night we met, he gave me something special, something he’d…never given anyone else. Something he’d been saving for the right person.” He held up his hand, gold gleaming. “I’m talking about his bracelet, of course.”

  Laughter from the crowd. Julian’s smile was fixed and his nails on Rafi’s other wrist were going to break the skin any second.

  “He asked me to wear it always, so he’d be with me even when we’re apart. But while I’ve got Julian on my arm wherever I go, what does Julian have? Look at his wrist, doesn’t it look empty? I could never leave my sweetheart naked and lonely like this.” He pulled the velvet box out of his jacket pocket, and went to one knee in front of Julian—who looked like his eyes might pop right out of his skull. “So…wear this for me, Julian, as I wear yours for you. Be mine as I am yours.”

  The bracelet in the box was a loop of opals, all shifting rainbows and fire, strung together with silver. On the clasp were Rafi’s initials, R.R.

  Julian pulled off a glove and undid the cuff buttons he and Rafi had fought so hard with, baring his wrist. Of course he did, since it was either that or burn every bit of the good publicity he’d worked so hard to drum up. Rafi, grinning broadly, clasped the bracelet around Julian’s wrist, and bent to kiss his palm. Julian twitched and pulled his hand away, but it was easily disguised in the motion of Rafi getting to his feet and taking Julian in his arms.

  The crowd was going wild, camera flashes turning the dim room into a sea of sparkles.

  “This is a win for both of us,” Rafi whispered, far away from the microphone, as he stepped forward and began peppering Julian’s stunned face with kisses. “And now we match!”

  One good proper kiss, and Rafi lifted the microphone again to say, “It’s okay to cry, baby, I know it’s overwhelming.”

  “I’m going to get you for this,” Julian hissed, but weirdly enough he didn’t sound angry, and his fiercely delighted smile didn’t look fake at all.

  Chapter 4

  [YouTube video containing poor-quality camera phone footage of Rafael giving bracelet to Julian.]

  “Rafi Reyes basically proposing to Julian Gault at Gunpowder after party!!!”

  Posted by xXsquee-loveXx

  Published August 12, 2019

  Most of you guys already know that I won tickets to the Gunpowder premiere and afterparty CONSIDERING I HAVEN’T SHUT ABOUT IT FOR WEEKS but as excited as I already was, nothing could have prepared me for THIS!!!!! I’m still working on trying to transcribe everything they said, it was hard to hear and also every time I watch the video I faint so that makes it difficult!!!!!

  Top comments:

  JennyGreenteeth: This is the most romantic thing I’ve ever seen in my life.

  madamgault: Our Juju looks so happy! I srsly dont care what else happens as long as he’s happy

  testing123: I keep hearing what a jerk JG is but it’s hard to believe when you see something like this. I don’t figure you can be that big a jerk and still have Rafi Reyes look at you like that. Or if you can then clearly I am living my life the wrong way!

  Intotheblackhole: omg guys this is just a publicity stunt, they are so fake, there’s no way they’re dating for real. Julien looks like hed rather be anywher else and Rafi’s just tryin to stick it to Bo Thomas. THIS COMMENT HAS RECEIVED TOO MANY NEGATIVE VOTES

  * * * *

  It’s in your blood, it’s in your bones

  It’s in your glass house, throwing stones

  Do you remember why you let it in?

  Remember how it seemed important then?

  You didn’t think you’d lose your golden throne

  You didn’t think you’d miss it

  Blood and bone, blood and bone

  —“Blood and Bone,” by Distant Kingdom, unreleased

  * * * *

  By the time they left the afterparty, Julian had to tow Rafi along like a large, cheerful helium balloon, prone to bobbing off in random directions.

  “We should stay,” Rafi tried to tell him. “Party’s not over, ‘ey’re still serving drinks…”

  “You’ve had enough drinks.”

  “No I haven’t…which means I prob’ly have,” Rafi said with a heavy sigh. “But we could still dance!”

  “I’m tired.”

  “I’m not tired,” Rafi said sulkily, and immediately fell asleep on Julian’s shoulder in the car.

  Two attempts to wake him resulted only in Rafi mumbling and burrowing deeper into Julian; he gave up. Of course Rafi would be a cuddly drunk. A mellow, sleepy, cuddly…possibly adorable drunk.

  Julian watched the light of passing streetlamps flare and shimmer in the opals circling his wrist. He’d always particularly liked opals, though he didn’t wear them often. They didn’t go well with his coloring. Had he mentioned that in an interview somewhere? Was that how Rafi had known to get him opals?

  Julian tipped his head back against the seat, Rafi’s hair brushing his cheek, and smiled wryly. The bracelet thing had been nicely played—and went over well with the crowd. He hadn’t expected something like that from Rafi. He ought to be furious at being outmaneuvered, but knowing Rafi wasn’t quite as simple as he seemed was…intriguing.

  Sexy, insisted the part of him that was always mercilessly self-aware. The word you’re looking for is sexy.

  It wasn’t a word Julian was accustomed to applying to people, not in any kind of earnest. He knew an aesthetic success when he saw one, but that flicker of fire in his gut that other people seemed to experience constantly, effortlessly, that was…rare, for Julian. And not entirely welcome.

  Though he couldn’t deny it had been amusing, and a little gratifying, to see Rafi get all flustered about helping him dress. Not that such feelings were nearly as rare for Rafi, of course. He had all manner of romantic history—Bo Thomas, Cory Goldenbloom, a handful of casual flings.

  Julian looked down at the peaceful face resting against his shoulder, the presumptuous arm snaked around his waist, and thought about Cory Goldenbloom’s potentially distasteful situation. And Rafi offering to help him escape it. He might not be as simple as he seemed, this Rafi Reyes, but it wasn’t because the simplicity was an act. It was just that being forthright and honorable wasn’t the same as being stupid, however much Hollywood wanted to conflate the two.

  Rafi was the kind of man who would make sure a vulnerable ex was okay, and snap at an A-list film star for being unprofessional, and coax his fake boyfriend to eat because otherwise he might not take care of himself. The kind of man who had interfered with his uncle's pressing attentions at the Gala, when he and Julian were all but strangers.

  That heart-on-his-sleeve quality made him an excellent movie viewer, too—very responsive, very willing to fall into the story. It had been a surprisingly nice feeling, having his performance praised by someone like that.

  He would be a great father, Julian thought, with a peculiar wistful pain at the idea, if that baby did turn out to be his.

  He was getting too caught up in his thoughts, and that seldom turned out well. Julian shook it off and pulled out his phone—prompting an irritable snort from Rafi, who wrapped himself even tighter around him—and checked a few hashtags on Twitter. Fans from the red carpet were already talking about how nice Julian had been to them, just as Rafi predicted, and there’d be no living with him if he found out. The truth of the horse story was already starting to spread, too, with most people seeming to think Julian’s rant had been justified.

  Uncle Eddie had taken a bad approach with that situation, it seemed obvious now. Incompetence, or deliberately punishing Julian for refusing to follow orders and apologize to Cassie?

  At least he hadn’t had to speak to his uncle any more after the bracelet incident; the man had evaporated, caught
off-guard without a canned response. Julian had known it would be like spending the evening with a genial, well-dressed bear trap, but he’d made it through. Only now that they were safely away did Julian notice his hands trying to shake. That was irritating.

  So far Uncle had not taken any direct action against Julian, giving him a chance to get over his tantrum and come crawling back. That wouldn’t last much longer. He’d made that clear with his little threat; “One horse is much like another. It can be replaced.” Replaced by Aaron, by Christian, by any of a dozen others in Uncle’s stable. If Uncle Eddie wanted it to, Julian’s career could disappear without a blip.

  Perhaps even Julian himself.

  * * * *

  At the hotel, Julian managed to pour Rafi into the elevator and thence to their room. It was the Executive Suite, which came with only one king-sized bed; Julian had assumed that was best for preserving the fiction of their relationship. He had planned to sleep on one of the many comfortable sofas in the suite, but when he dragged Rafi to the bed, the man fell into it without bothering to detach himself from Julian first. Julian was pulled down into a tangle of pillows and cuddly-drunk limbs.

  “Rafi. Rafi, let me up.” Julian’s voice came out almost affectionately exasperated, which would have been a surprise to them both if Rafi had been awake to hear it. Probably just as well that Rafi’s only response was a light snore.

  Ugh. Julian was tired, so very tired, and he just wanted to sleep. Perhaps it wouldn’t be so terrible if he just…stayed like this. On the nice, soft bed, being determinedly cuddled by a warm piece of beef. No, it wasn’t so terrible.

  Julian squirmed around enough to kick his shoes off, at least, and pull down his hair. That disturbed Rafi into opening his eyes a slit and making a quizzical noise.

  “Oh, hey, Jules,” he said thickly. “Na na na na na na, na na na, heyyy Jules…” His voice drifted off as his eyes closed again.

  Julian snorted, surprised to find he was smiling, and his last thought before he fell asleep was that maybe the nickname ‘Jules’ wasn’t so terrible either.

  * * * *

  He woke with a start just before dawn, gasping and panicked and fighting free of whatever was restraining him—

  Rafi. It was just Rafi.

  Julian stood beside the bed, shaking, struggling to keep his breathing quiet enough not to wake the man in the bed, who had rolled into Julian’s empty warm spot with a murmur. The idea of being here when Rafi woke was intolerable. What might he say, what might he ask? What would he think about the fact that Julian had slept in the bed with him? Why on earth had he slept in the bed with him?

  Julian closed up his suitcase and left without so much as brushing his hair.

  * * * *

  When Rafi woke at the hotel in L.A., Julian was gone, leaving a message with the concierge about unexpectedly needing an earlier flight but here was Rafi’s ticket. Since then he hadn’t heard from Julian directly, but he’d liked a photo on Rafi’s Instagram—the ethereal fairytale shot from the after party. He hoped that gesture at least meant he hadn’t done anything rude while he was drunk. He didn’t really remember.

  Hungover and exhausted from the late night, Rafi hadn’t done much but fall back into bed when he finally got home. It was probably time to get up now, he thought grudgingly, squinting at the sunlight through his bedroom window. Amber would be here soon, to update him on all the legal nonsense and have “a big-picture talk,” whatever that meant.

  He pulled his phone off the charge cord. Somewhat to his surprise, he had post alerts from Julian’s Twitter—pleasantries about the premiere and how pleased he was to have worked with so many talented people on Gunpowder, a few words of gratitude for the support of his fans and his wonderful boyfriend, Rafael. That was shocking enough—Julian calling him wonderful—but it was the tweet after that that made Rafi sit up in bed and rub his eyes.

  A fan had tweeted him about Cassie Bayles.

  Is it true Cassie killed a horse? Is that why you hate her?

  To be fair, Julian had replied, Cassie meant no harm to the horse. Incompetence, not malice. Not sure it matters to the horse, tho. Yes, that’s why I hate her.

  Rafi let out a low whistle. Telling the entire internet that he outright hated a co-star. What happened to softening your image, Jules?

  Before Rafi could decide whether to talk to Julian about it or just let him handle the fallout of his own actions, an incoming text took over the screen. From Ollie Peters—wow, Rafi hadn’t seen him in a couple years now. They’d been pretty tight in college, fellow musicians cheerfully competing for local performance opportunities.

  Holy crap, dude, are you having a kid? said the text, accompanied by a link to a soundbite from the red carpet—the reporter asking Rafi if Bo’s baby was his.

  No, Ollie, I’m not. My brother is. With my fiancée.

  He didn’t answer Ollie’s text, instead flopping back onto his pillow and staring at the ceiling.

  Maybe it shouldn’t have mattered, finding out that Bo and Carlos had been knocking boots for that long. Maybe it should have been obvious, when Bo told him she was marrying Carlos instead of him, that they must have been sneaking around behind his back. Somehow he hadn’t thought of it in those terms. Somehow he’d thought that Bo, like any person with decency and honor, had broken up with him as soon as she knew her feelings had changed. Why wouldn’t she? Why hadn’t she? Why the game? What, did she need to do an extensive side-by-side comparison before she could make up her mind? Was Carlos better in bed, was that what it boiled down to?

  Not likely, snarked a little voice in the back of his head, which was probably all kinds of arrogant. But Rafi had always made a point of pleasing his partners, finding all the little ways to drive them crazy. Cory liked to be taken care of and treasured; Bo liked to be in charge, to make her own rules. Everyone had their particular buttons, and Rafi wasn’t satisfied until his partner was satisfied, even for a one-night stand.

  Considering what some of Carlos’s departing girlfriends had written on the mirror or carved into the side of his car, Rafi theorized that his brother had never quite gotten the knack of that ‘partner satisfaction’ thing.

  It didn’t matter, Rafi told himself. The heart wanted what it wanted and all that. He didn’t have to understand why Bo had chosen Carlos, or why Carlos had chosen Bo over his brother. Rafi just had to…deal with it anyway, somehow. It didn’t have to make sense.

  And it didn’t make sense, because when he first saw the picture of Bo’s pregnant belly, his heart had tried to leap into the clouds. Some part of him still expected to start a family with Bo, have a future with Bo. Some part of him saw that Bo was having a baby and thought, We’re having a baby!

  And even now, knowing that trying to co-parent with Bo and Carlos would be messy and painful and terrible, he wanted that baby to be his.

  He picked up the phone again, started a text to Bo—and couldn’t get past the first word. Typed a dozen first words, in fact, and deleted them all. What was there to say?

  He started a text to his father instead.

  I need to talk to you, he typed, but didn’t send. I want to be a dad, that was what he wanted to say. I want to love somebody who will love me back. That’s all I ask. One person I can trust to love me and not hurt me, like I would never hurt you. Like I would have never hurt either of them.

  He couldn’t even say his father had never hurt him—but he’d never meant to. He’d made mistakes, but he’d never stabbed Rafi in the back. He’d done the best he could in an impossible situation, trying to raise Rafi—and it wasn’t fair for Rafi to pull him into another one now. Ted Reyes loved both of his sons equally (however much Carlos liked to moan about favoritism when he didn’t get his way), and a parent couldn’t be expected to take sides in his sons’ insane love triangle.

  Maybe it was funny that he always thought of his father as his only parent. He had a stepmother, certainly—Minnie had always been there—but, well. Minnie had never bee
n terribly interested in mothering Rafi. Speaking of playing favorites.

  “This is useless,” Rafi announced to the empty room, deleting the unsent text. “Talking to Dad won’t solve anything. Talking to Bo won’t solve anything.”

  It didn’t feel like anything would solve anything.

  Rafi had learned there was only one thing to do when he felt like that. He got up and put on his workout clothes.

  * * * *

  The housecleaning staff had kept any dust from gathering in Rafi’s home gym, one of the first things he’d splurged on when Distant Kingdom hit it big. Ideally Rafi preferred to work out with a trainer or sparring partner, but he liked being able to exercise at home, too. He forced his body through a short warm-up with the jump rope, so he wouldn’t injure himself in his enthusiasm, then attacked the punching bag. It didn’t take him long to work up a sweat, channeling all the thoughts he didn’t want to think and all the feelings he didn’t want to feel into his shoulders and fists and the occasional kick.

  “That bad, huh?” Amber walked in without knocking, carrying a bag of breakfast burritos and two cups of coffee.

  Rafi wiped sweat from his eyes. “Pretty much. You’re gussied up,” he added, eyeing her magenta cold-shoulder blouse and pendant necklace.

  Amber grinned. “I hit that place with the gorgeous butch barista. Uh-uh!” She backed away as he reached for the burrito bag. “You’re gross. Take a shower.”

  “The food’ll get cold!”

  “Better be quick, then!”

  Rafi grumbled and marched off to the shower. By the time he came out, Amber had his table set with plates, burritos, coffee, ice water, and napkins.

  “How dare you try to civilize me,” Rafi said, taking an enormous bite.

  “It’s a losing battle, and yet I fight on,” Amber said dryly. “Are you ready for legal stuff, or do you want to eat first?”

  Rafi sighed. “Might as well get it over with.”

  “Okey-dokey. Item the first: Carlos and Bo are claiming ownership of ‘Blood and Bone.’”

  Rafi nearly choked on his coffee. “How—they can’t—that’s my lead vocals, right there, what makes them think they have more ownership—”