He frowns. “Jolene…”
I close my eyes, irrationally embarrassed by this thing I have no control over. “Bad day, is all.”
“What can I do?”
I shake my head—or that’s the intent; it ends up more of a floppy roll of my head side to side. Like Westley after Miracle Max brings him back from being Mostly Dead. “Just…try to not bump me or jostle me too much.”
“Is there…” A pause. “Is there any, like, medicine?”
I huff, something like a laugh. I forget he knows nothing about this part of my life. “I have some pills, but…” I swallow, wince as a rolling wave of pain sends shockwaves through me. “They’re a last resort. I hate taking them. They knock me out and make me feel like…” I make a face: eyes crossed, tongue sticking out, jaw slack. “I’m okay for now.”
“You just look like you’re in so much pain.” He’s sitting upright, facing me, cross-legged. Naked, the flat sheet draped over his hips and legs. “I just wish I could help.”
I reach out a hand and find his, hold it. “This is what you signed on for, buddy. Welcome to the shitshow.” I wince. “Sorry, that came out kind of bitter. I’m used to this. It hurts, and I won’t be able to travel. Not today, at least. Maybe not for a few days. Unfortunately for you, there is nothing you can do.”
His frown deepens, becomes not just a frown, but an expression of deep sorrow, angst, and worry. “So I just…have to…I have to just sit here and watch you suffer?”
I smile. “Yup. Welcome to loving someone who’s dying of cancer!” I close my eyes. “God, I’m not handling this well. I get kind of morbid when I’m like this.”
“Please don’t apologize.”
“I just…it’s my way of coping. Sick, dark, disturbing jokes. Sarcasm to hide my bitterness.”
“And you…you don’t want to take the pain meds?”
I shake my head carefully. “No, not yet. I have a limited supply, for one, and I want to save them for when it gets really bad.”
“This isn’t that yet? Really bad, I mean?”
I shake my head. “No, not really. So far this is—” I cut off, grimacing and rolling over as a sharp lance strikes my joints, sending waves of pain radiating through the rest of me. “This is within the range of what I’m used to.”
He hangs his head, hands raking down through his hair to cover his face. “Fuck.”
When the sharpest spike of the pain has dulled to a rolling ache, I roll back toward him, take his hands. “Wes, listen.”
His eyes rise to mine—his are…not quite damp, as in he’s not outright crying, but they glisten with overwhelmed emotion. “I’m listening.”
“I know you didn’t really understand what you were agreeing to, before. You couldn’t. I looked okay, right? On my feet, smiling, all that.” I swallow hard, gulping around the emotional burn of what I’m about to say. “This is the reality, and if you…” I pause, start over. “I’m telling you right now, Wes, it’s not going to get better from here. I’ll still have good days. We’ll have fun. We’ll do more like we did last night. Which was—last night was the best night of my life, bar none, and I could die right now, today, a blissfully happy woman. You gave me such a gift, Wes. You’ll never understand what you gave me, last night.” I blink away tears. “What I’m saying is, you don’t owe me anything further. I know what you said yesterday, but…you have an out, okay? I’m giving you the out. You don’t have to…stay. I know—your pride and your human decency won’t want to let you give up. So I’m not saying, like, just leave me here. But I’ll call Dad and they’ll come get me and take me home, okay? This is more than you could ever be expected to stick around for. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone. Much less someone as amazing as you.” I taste tears on my lips. “So take the out, okay? You don’t deserve this. What we’ve had so far has already been more than I could have dreamed of. I’m not greedy.” I squeeze his hand, pat it. “You can go, okay? It’s okay.”
He laughs, a bitter bark. Stands up, paces away. Grabs his jeans off the floor and stabs his feet into them, hikes them up, buttons them. Yanks his shirt on, arms and head appearing through the sleeves and neck hole at the same time.
“I’m not leaving.” He has his hand on the doorknob. “I just…I need a minute. To think. To process. To figure out…god, I don’t know. Everything? But I’m not leaving.”
He flips the latch so the door won’t lock him out as it closes, and strides outside barefoot. Hair a mess, eyes red.
God, Wes. I should never have involved him in this. I’m so selfish.
Once he’s gone, I close my eyes and let myself wallow in the agony, emotional and physical. It hurts too much to even move. Breathing hurts. My phone is in my bag, so I can’t even call Dad—I’d need Wes to get my phone for me.
I doze.
I’m woken by a racket, a ruckus of voices overlapping and shouting. I hear Wes’s voice mixed in among them. “One at a time, please. Back up—please back up, give me some space. I’ll sign everything, just please…back up. Okay, yeah, you, miss. What’s your name? Rachel. Hi, Rachel. Here you go. Micah, got it…” and on it goes.
How many people are out there? Sounds like a lot.
“Wes.” I try to raise my voice, but it comes out weak. “Wes!”
I should never have done this.
I try again, but as loud as my voice will go isn’t loud enough to be heard over the clamor of shouted questions and requests.
Finally, after twenty minutes, I hear him raise his voice, sounding panicked, if not quite angry. “I’ve signed everything. I have to—I have to go.” He’s trying to keep his cool. “Thank you, all. Please understand, I have to go, now.”
Instead of Wes coming inside, however, the noise fades, moving down the hallway.
A few minutes later, he bursts through the door in a rush, moves the latch, closes the door with a slam, and locks it. Falls back against it.
“Lost them, finally,” he pants. “God, that was dumb of me. I should know better.”
“What happened?” I ask. “Are you okay?”
He nods, rubbing his face. “Yeah, I’m fine. I’m just a dumbass. I walked straight into the lobby in the middle of the continental breakfast rush, and I got mobbed. I managed to lead them away from the room.” He marches toward the room phone. Dials the front desk. “Hi, this is, uh…Room one-twelve.” A pause, as he listens. “Yeah, it’s really me, which is why there was the commotion a minute ago. I just need to make sure you don’t tell anyone which room I’m in. No one, for any reason. Don’t put any calls through, either. Just play dumb, say you don’t have a guest by that name, or something…Great, thanks. I appreciate it.” Another pause. “Yeah, I’m actually going to need another night. Perfect, thank you.”
He hangs up. Braces his hands on the edge of the nightstand. “That was the last thing I needed. I was just…I was thinking I’d bring you a bagel or something, and I just…I wasn’t thinking.”
“I couldn’t eat anyway, but thank you for thinking of me.”
He pushes away from the nightstand, perches carefully on the edge of the bed. “I want to help you, I just…I don’t know how.”
I smile and pat his knee. “I told you—you can’t. I’m going to be okay, all right? Short term, I mean. I’m not…I’m not going anywhere today, literally or metaphorically. I’m going to need to rest for right now. I may be hungry later, but don’t not eat on my account. You just do whatever you want. Watch TV, or something.”
He hesitates. “I wouldn’t want to disturb you, if you’re resting.”
I wrinkle my nose at him. “By resting, I just mean laying here enduring the crippling agony.” I sniff a sarcastic laugh. “You know, as one does.”
He stares at me. “I honestly have no idea how to respond to that.”
I close my eyes as another piercing wave of aches and throbs surges over me. “Nothing. Just ignore me, mostly. If I need anything, I promise you, I’ll let you know. You don’t have to tiptoe or whis
per or sit in the corner in silence or pray for the next six hours. You can talk to me, you can watch TV, make phone calls, recite lines…whatever. I just won’t be very good company, is all.”
“I should go over the script,” he says.
“If you have an extra copy, I can read for you, or something.”
He smiles at me, but it’s faint and sad. “For right now, I’m still just reading it a billion times. I’m not at the stage of memorizing or blocking or anything.”
“I have zero clue how you can memorize a whole movie.”
He laughs. “Oh god, you don’t. For one thing, the script changes constantly, especially once filming has started. Scenes change, things get cut and added, and usually this goes on the whole time you’re filming. So basically, I read the script a bazillion times, until I’m familiar with it. I couldn’t recite it off book as if I was onstage in play, but I know the plot progression and the characters and such, to the point that I’m familiar with the various sections. Then, once filming starts, I’ll memorize the part we’re filming. Also, you don’t usually film in chronological order. Like, what you’d see as the opening scene we may not film until the very end. How they determine what gets filmed when is something even I’m not entirely sure of. Set and location availability, costuming, crew needs, a whole slew of factors, probably.”
“That makes sense.”
He retrieves his script from his bag and heads toward the bed, intending to sit on it, then halts. “I’ll, uh, sit on the couch.”
I wriggle to the side of the bed. “No, sit with me. Please?”
“You’re sure?”
I nod. “I don’t want to be alone.”
Moving gingerly, he settles onto the bed, props a pillow behind him, wiggles a few times, and then the only sound is the occasional rustle of paper.
“Is that for Singin’ in the Rain?” I ask, after a few minutes.
“Mmmmhmm.”
Slowly, I roll so I’m facing him. I have to rest for a moment, breathless from pain. I don’t think he can tell, though—I’m good at keeping the pain off my face unless it’s really, really bad. “Can I see it? I’ve always wondered what a real movie script looks like.”
He hesitates, then extends it to me. “Not really supposed to let this out of my hands, but I don’t see what it would hurt to let you look at it. Just don’t steal it and sell it on the internet, ’kay?” He says this last part with a smirk, making it a joke.
“Yeah, I’m gonna just jump up and go sell it to my secret contact in the paparazzi.”
He arches an eyebrow. “Hey, you jest, but this would be worth a fortune to the right person.”
I take it from him—it’s kind of anticlimactic. Just a stack of regular old printer paper, old school typewriter-style font. The only interesting thing about it is the formatting, and the fact that Wes has written all over it in red ink, making notes on lines, usually to emphasize a certain delivery, or a pause or inflection. I flip a few pages, taking care to not lose his place, scanning the dialogue—which is intimately familiar to me, as it’s one of my favorite movies. It doesn’t look like they’ve changed it too much, just updated it in places to sound more modern, but the best lines remain unchanged.
I hand it back.
Doze for a while, slipping in and out of near-sleep. I hear him set the script aside. I think he’s on his phone.
Eventually, boredom overcomes the pain, which is duller, now, less sharp, and more of a slow, deep, dull ache than the lances of raw agony that it was at the beginning.
I open my eyes and move to something akin to sitting up—reclining, sort of. He’s got AirPods in and his phone held landscape in one hand, watching something. When he sees that I’m awake, he pauses what he’s watching and removes the earbuds.
“Hi,” I say.
“Hey.” The phone goes off, and he slides the AirPods back into their case. “Feeling any better?”
I nod. “A bit, yeah.”
“Good, that’s something at least.”
I hear his stomach growling. I frown at him. “You haven’t eaten anything, have you?”
He shrugs. “I’m okay.”
“Wes, come on.”
He sighs. “I didn’t want to leave, and if you’re not feeling well enough to eat, it seems rude for me to.”
I shake my head and roll my eyes. “I get how you would think that, and I really appreciate that you’re thinking of me that way. But you need to take care of yourself. You need to sleep, and eat, and do work stuff. I can’t be your whole life, when I’m sick, and you can’t get so focused on me that you’re neglecting yourself.” I take his hand. “Caring for an invalid one-oh-one, Wes: you have to be well enough to care for your patient. If you’re sick, you’re not the caretaker anymore; you become the patient.” I squeeze his hand. “Now, order a pizza or something.”
He sighs. “Options are kind of limited, so I guess I will.”
I laugh. “You sound resigned.”
“I’ve been dancing hours a day every day for months now, so when it’s time to start learning the choreography, I’ll be a decent dancer and not just a newbie. And let me tell you, dance is a hell of a taxing sport, so my nutrition has had to be spot on.” He laughs. “Meaning, I don’t really eat pizza, normally. It’s not exactly good fuel for an athlete.”
“I guess I can appreciate that.”
“But like I said, options are limited, so pizza it is.” He pulls out his phone and locates a place that delivers, calls in an order. When they ask for a name, he hesitates.
I get his attention and point to myself.
“Jo,” he says, finally.
Order placed, there’s an awkward moment of silence.
“So, um. I…” I sigh, hating this part. “I need some help.”
He tosses his phone onto the bed. “Anything.”
“It’s going to be weird and awkward. But I need you to help me to the bathroom.”
I never dressed after last night, so I’m still naked except for my underwear. I’ve been covered by the blankets thus far, having been too weak to move much more than rolling from one side to the other. Now, however, I have to leave the bed and traverse the room. Weak, shaky, nauseous…and basically naked. Now that the heat of the moment is long passed, I’m far less confident.
Wes, bless him, finds my tank top and hands it to me, and then is polite enough to turn around. His thoughtfulness in this makes my throat tight.
“I’m ready.” Still weird, being in panties and a tank top with a relative stranger.
I have to remind myself that last night was real, and it happened, and there’s no reason to be embarrassed or feel awkward.
Yet, I do.
He stands in front of me. “Okay, how do you want me to help you? Carry you? Help you stand up?”
I’m dizzy as I move to sitting on the edge of the bed, feet on the floor. Brace my hands on my knees, breathe through it. “Just…just a minute. Need to catch my breath.”
I can tell he’s shocked that I’m this out of breath and weary just from sitting upright. Reality sucks. I liked it better in the cocoon of heat and sexuality, last night. That was way better than feeling like this.
I hold out my hands. “Just help me stand up.” I take his hands, and he gently helps me to my feet. I let him pull, just bracing my feet on the floor until I’m upright. “Okay, now just walk with me like I’m your old grandma who might fall over any second.”
He stands beside me and I grip his bicep with both hands. “Funny thing is, my great-grandma actually did live with us when I was younger. And I actually did help her around like this. So, you know, I’ve got practice.”
We shuffle slowly to the bathroom, and once I reach the toilet, I let go. “Okay, I’ve got it from here.”
He hesitates. “You’re sure? There’s…there’s nothing I won’t do to help, Jo. Nothing.”
I smirk, a wrinkle of my nose and a scrunch of my eyebrows. “I can manage this part. I would like to leave a little
sexiness and mystery in this relationship, for a while at least. For a full seventy-two hours, at least.”
He nods. “Okay. Just yell if you need me.”
Once I’m done, I work myself to my feet on my own—it’s a long, laborious process, and hurts like anything, but I manage it. I even wash my hands. At some point last night or this morning, he got out his toiletries, and I spy a little bottle of mouth wash. I pour some into my mouth and rinse; at least my breath is minty fresh, now. Open the door.
“And back we go,” I say, reaching for him. He sniffs as I lean against him. “I used your mouth wash. Hope that’s all right.”
“Nope,” he quips. “That’s far too much of a liberty. My royal mouthwash is sacred, and not for the use of mere mortal peasants such as yourself.”
“Ah, forgive me, your majesty. It won’t happen again.”
It’s good to laugh.
He helps me back to the bed, and I crawl in, but instead of lying down, I prop up against the headboard.
“You want to find something on TV?” I suggest.
He ends up paying almost thirty dollars for us to watch one of the newer Mission Impossible movies, which seems absurd, but he insists he doesn’t care.
My favorite part of the movie is when I get tired and he helps me to lie down on his lap, and he plays with my head, fingers tracing in my hair and around my ear.
I can’t help but be aware of how close I am to a part of him which I’m fiercely curious to see and touch. If only I didn’t feel like a dumpster fire.
The movie ends, eventually.
I’m not quite dozing, and the pain has subsided to a distant but constant all-over ache. Experience tells me I’ll need to rest again tomorrow, but I should be back to something close to normal the next day.
Basically, I’m counting the hours until I’m feeling well enough to…well…what do I call what we did? Making out? Fooling around? It wasn’t sex, exactly. Sexual, but not sex. Whatever you want to call it, I want more.
A lot more.
As much more as I can get, before the bad days start outnumbering the good ones.
Ohhh boy, there’s a thought that puts some pressure to not take this whole thing with Wes too slowly. Ha. I met him two, now almost three days ago, and he’s already given me my first orgasm. I think that’s quick by any measure.
Wish Upon A Star Page 13
