Love Broken

by J. D. Hollyfield

  “Nothing, just want to make sure you get home okay. You’re a celebrity now. Don’t want my best bartender getting snatched.” He puts his hands in his pockets, his big form stepping from foot to foot.

  “Awe, well, aren’t you sweet.” I go and lightly punch him in the chest. “But, I’m good. For real. I’m sure I look scary enough after tonight that I’ll frighten people more than I’ll appeal to them.”

  “I doubt that, Beller.”

  Okay, weirdo Dex. I think he’s the one who’s wiped out. Leave for two weeks and my hard-ass boss gets all soft on me.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow,” I say, giving him my model wave and head toward my apartment. As I walk home, I do the one thing I’ve been trying to hold off on doing, which was easy since we were swamped, and that’s to check my phone. I will be totally okay if he didn’t message me. It’s actually not even a big deal. No sweat.

  I pull my phone out of my purse and slide on the screen. I don’t have one message. I have seven. My heart summersaults in my chest. Speed punching in my password and fucking it up three times, I go and lock myself out of my phone.

  “FUCK! You have to be kidding me!” Of all the times! I’ve never had anxiety. Because why would I? I’m an easygoing, go with the flow kinda chick. But right now? I have just diagnosed myself with the worst case. My heart is no longer doing summersaults, it’s banging on my chest. Seven messages! What could he say in seven messages?

  Get a hold of yourself man.

  It’s five minutes.

  I take a deep breath and continue walking home. It’ll go by fast. I’ll be reading his love/hate texts in no time. A few more minutes and I look back at my phone. “Oh, come on!” It hasn’t even been a full minute! The universe is against me. It’s mad because I’m putting a stop to hookups. I’m being punished.

  I complain the whole way home, and by the time I make it to my building the five minutes have passed and I’m entering in my password and bingo. I’m in.

  I start with the first one that looks like it came through around eight o’clock tonight. It’s a photo of Ellie. The message reads:

  Bates Motel: Ellie wants to know what Gerdie is up to. She’s horny.

  I laugh to myself as I slide my key in my door. I scroll to the next text that came at just before nine. It’s another picture of Ellie who seems to be sleeping on her pink flower pillow. The message reads:

  Bates Motel: She decided she had a headache and went to bed.

  At a quarter to eleven, I received a photo of a slice of pizza, the message reading:

  Bates Motel: Wish you were here.

  The next two to follow are pictures of the disappearing pizza. The sixth one is of Chase’s finger pointing to his bare chest reading:

  Bates Motel: Full belly.

  I roll my eyes with a smile at the fact that his hand is pointing to his abs and not his actual belly. The last one, which came in about ten minutes ago, is of him reading my book. The message reads:

  Bates Motel: It’s okay. I’ll just help Ellie figure out a way to find a companion. I know a girl who wrote a book about it.

  It makes me smile that he has a copy of my book. By the time I get through all the messages, I’m in my apartment, have discarded my purse, and am lying on my bed. I decide to be bold, and instead of texting back, I call.

  The phone rings twice before he answers.

  “Katie Beller.” His voice is deep and hoarse. Like he’s been sleeping. Shit! I totally forgot what time it is.

  “Oh, I’m sorry I woke you. I forgot what time it is. I’ll let you go.”

  “Don’t you dare hang up on me, Katie Beller.”

  Summersaults.

  “I just got all your texts. How’s Ellie doing?” I ask, kicking off my shoes.

  “She’s not great. Really wanted to talk to Gerdie. Missed him. At one point she thought to maybe stalk his Facebook page hoping for an update. But he doesn’t seem to have one.”

  I laugh. “Gerdie doesn’t believe in social media. It’s killing the world of real conversations.”

  “Ahh, yes. Social media is ruining the world, one love story at a time. Abby proves it in chapter ten when she experiments with her fake date, Henry.”

  I still can’t believe he’s read my book.

  “I’m still not sure how you read that. Did you have your fan club read it out loud for you, during a model shoot?” I tease, but then want to claw the image out of my head of him and his fan club.

  “Nope, I read it all by myself while taking a shit every morning after leaving your room. I didn’t want you to know I pooped, so I always waited.”

  “Oh my God! Okay, TMI, Green.”

  I hear him yawning into the phone.

  I look at my clock glowing on the nightstand, and it’s almost three in the morning. “Seriously, sorry, I forgot how late it is. I’ll let you go.”

  “Please. Don’t. I want to talk to you.”

  More summersaults.

  My heart is soon on its way to the Olympics if he keeps this up.

  I kick my socks off, getting comfortable. “Okay, so what would you like to talk about?”

  “You. Anything you,” he responds.

  I’m not sure what he wants to know. My life is about as exciting as watching paint dry. I keep it basic. Little details about the bar. My favorite color.

  I make him fork up some information as well, and I’m shocked at how willing he is to open up to me more on his personal life. I learn he has two younger sisters, which he seems to love deeply. His parents, who sounded like the perfect family, both live in Duluth, Minnesota, which is twenty minutes away from his place. He still attends Sunday brunch when he’s in town and his mom still sometimes does his laundry.

  He explains in more detail about his hockey career. He’s played hockey his whole life. And it’s his passion. Since they just wrapped up pre-season training, the team is heading on tour for promos soon and he’s going to be traveling right up until he breaks for the next signing tour. Listening to him talk about the sport, I can sense the change in his voice. His excitement for it. Passion. I get the feeling the modeling gig isn’t as glorious as it seems. I guess being man-handled by women all over the universe can get old.

  We both go back and forth sharing stories of Ellie and Gerdie. When the clock hits five in the morning we decide to call it quits. “Well, make sure to get some sleep so you don’t zombie out and get whipped in the face by a puck at practice,” I joke, now yawning myself.

  “I will. Make sure to give Gerdie a long, wet kiss for Ellie. She misses him, you know.”

  “Well, I think Gerdie might miss her too.” We’re both met with silence, the sound of our soft breathing humming through the phone.

  “Well, good night, Katie Beller.”

  “Nighty night, Chase Green like the color.”

  Fucking summersaults.

  Fucking Chase Green.

  Fuck.

  I’ve been home under a week and my simple life has turned into a whirlwind. Work isn’t about serving people the ‘talky juice’ so they spill their beans anymore. It’s turned into more questions than answers. More suggestions than opinions. People don’t want to sit there and just talk. They want to diagnose love with me.

  It’s absolutely miserable!

  I wrote a book about a girl who wanted to prove a point. And in the end, she did. She showed that love is not about the outside person. It’s about the inside person. A girl who faked who she was and watched all these people fall for her. Abby, who is not me, found men on Facebook. Gave them the virtual words any man would want to hear while they stared at the cliché fake photo she posted. Then, Abby went out and met these guys in person. Pretending to be a stranger, just in the way, a simple girl asking if that seat was taken, or just simply a human asking to have a conversation. Every time, those men turned her down. And every time it proved Abby was right. Men nowadays wanted the looks. Not the brains, or the insides. It was a sickness in society no one was willing to cure
. It was the reason why Abby was destined to always be single.

  Again, disclaimer, I was not Abby.

  I wasn’t worried about being Abby. I was worried about the single population of women out there throwing the wrong vibes out into the lion’s den just to get a bite. I didn’t want to be the love whisperer and offer sessions in the back room and tell every single woman who walked through those bar doors how to handle love. I just wanted someone to realize they were worth more than just a pickup line. More than a free drink, a pointless game of flirting, darts, and a one-night stand.

  But people just wanted to analyze. In life, it’s natural to take sides. Everyone does it. People were on one side or the other. They agreed or they didn’t. It was when Chrissy fucking Baker walked into the bar that really set the lines.

  “Oh, look who it is, The Doctor Phil of Ohio,” the Witch of the West says walking up with her butt buddy Stacey. Lucky for me, they take the two open stools in front of the bar. Right in front of my section.

  “Wow, you two look great! I’m sorry, though, I didn’t know it was eighties night. I would’ve dressed up for it,” I comment back, grabbing for the beer spout and pouring a draft.

  Both girls look at one another clueless and back at me. “What are you talking about?”

  Clearly, I’ll keep the explanation to myself.

  “Nothing. What can I get you, girls?”

  “I’ll take a Cosmo.”

  “I’ll take a lemon drop martini.”

  They both spit their fancy orders at me like they’re on the set of a Sex in the City episode. Not that we don’t serve that fufu shit, but if you read the sign outside, we’re a dive bar and as I know how to make martinis, you’re just in the wrong place for those.

  “Super, coming right up,” I chirp, walking away, grabbing for the cheapest vodka we have.

  “So, Katie, do tell, how did you pull this one off?”

  I turn my head, pouring the vodka into the shaker. “Pull what off?”

  Both giggling, Chrissy sticks out her shoulders, responding, “This whole book thing? I mean, come on, no one believes you actually wrote it, do they? You’re clearly some sort of decoy for a bigger author trying to keep in the dark.”

  I turn away, clenching my fingers around the vodka bottle. My eyes close, taking a deep breath, before I slap my fake smile on my face and face them again. “Can’t say I know what you mean?” I return, finishing and bringing both drinks in front of them, tempted to knock them over into their laps.

  “It’s just that… You’re not really a, how do we say… a dateable person. I don’t mean to say it in a mean way, but come on. You don’t date. No one has seen you with a guy. And if so, nothing they would take serious. So, there’s no way you could write a book on it.”

  Her evil eyes meet mine. I do my best to show nonchalance, but her words struck home. I’m not one to deny or make excuses for my track record. Or lack of. It’s life, obviously. But when someone throws it in your face, then tries to then stomp on the dirty already in your eyes, you tend to kind of… well, slip.

  “Oh, I agree. I have absolutely no track record with love. But when I was making all this money I had no idea what to do with, I was also having a ton of animal sex with a book model. Charlie Bates? Not sure you know the name, I barely did, but shit, he sure knows how to make music with my labia. I’m talkin’, like humming and buzzing all over that shit until your insides start vibrating. Any who. Yeah. Love? What’s love? Nowadays I only know about vibrating vaginas.” I smile widely and turn to Stacey. “But, Stacey, you and Brent probably know about vibrating vaginas, right?” I offer her my biggest wink and turn, walking down the bar. I don’t turn to witness the questions or the blowout. I walk all the way down the bar, past the eyeing Dex and past Randy, who I let know I’m taking a break, and as cool as a cucumber go back to the office and hide until I stop shaking.

  By the time I make it home I’m half dead. For the past week, it’s been the same song and dance. I work. I black out until I get home, then I pretend I’m not hurrying into my bed to check my phone and see all the messages from Chase.

  It’s been the same every night since our first call. I send him the teenage “are you awake” text and he calls me. I answer on a whisper, because I’m a school girl, and he replies purring my name.

  I don’t know whether all the personal talks we’ve had should freak me out or comfort me. I can’t say I have ever had a guy who wanted to hear the sap and gore of my childhood and upbringing. But he pushes and I slowly tell him. He never seems to pull away, and with that I tell him more.

  I wasn’t raised as your typical Brady bunch child if that isn’t obvious. My mom and dad died in a car accident when I was super young and I was left with my aunt and uncle. They were definitely what you call stellar step-in parents, minus the stellar part. Meaning I basically grew up on my own. I didn’t have the mom I’m sure Stacey Wright had, which braided her hair, while telling her all about the birds and the bees, or Chrissy Baker’s parents who fed her diet pills and told her exactly how to snag a husband, hook, line and sinker.

  I went to high school and kept to myself. I graduated with flying colors and those flying grades landed me in a pile of nothing. Mainly because my new stepparents couldn’t afford college. Mind you, the money they got from my parents’ insurance settlement, I saw nothing of. But that’s life and the system.

  The adults always win.

  Luckily, I was able to get a job and attempt to pay for college on my own. But that only lasted so long when work intertwined with school and I couldn’t do both. I had at that point moved out of the relative hell hole and lived on my own. I chose to lose my education and pay for rent, then live in hell and get a nine-to-five desk job.

  Tonight, our conversation started off different. I was on edge after the fiasco with Chrissy and Stacey. It made me doubt what Chase and I have built, and I just didn’t want to be a blind victim. I worried they were right. There was no way I could know anything about love, or be anyone’s somebody.

  “Hello, Katie Beller, you’re a bit late tonight.” Chase’s deep voice rings through my needy ears, sucking up his vocal sound likes it’s a forbidden fruit.

  “Sorry, it was a late night. Tons of drunks, drama, and bad karaoke,” I reply, falling into my bed. I’ve gotten rid of my work attire minus my black-laced boy shorts and a tank top. I rest my head on my pillow, clutching my phone to my ear. “Please do enlighten me on what happened in the life of Chase Green today.”

  His chuckle is like a buzzing sensation I constantly want to press against my clit for release.

  “Ahh, well, it was very uneventful. Being in Canada for hockey, I spent the entire day at practice, then had team photos and interviews. Then I was forced to attend a horrible steak dinner that consisted of cold mashed potatoes and by the time I knew it I was begging to go back to my room, which I’m now at, wanting to order pizza but refuse because my guilt would literally kill me if I did it without a specific little firecracker in my room to share it with me.”

  And this is why Stacey and Chrissy shouldn’t matter.

  I sigh into my pillow.

  “I had a bad night,” I admit, which is unusual for me.

  “I’m sorry to hear that. Wanna talk about it?”

  As much as I want to swoon at the gentlemanly effort, I don’t. “No. It was nothing. Just a bad night I want to erase, is all.”

  I hear him shuffling, possibly getting adjusted in his hotel room bed.

  “Katie? I was thinking…” He pauses, his breath humming through the phone.

  “I’m glad you can think, Green,” I reply smiling, leaning more into my pillow. I don’t need to see him to know his smile is broadening across his face.

  “You know me so well, Katie Beller. But I think we should know each other a little bit better.”

  Hmmm, now he has me intrigued. The horrible night is slowly being pushed into the back of my mind, while I ponder his intentions. “Okay, Green, spit i
t out. What’s up your sleeve?’

  “Well, first off, I want to tell you something.”

  Uh-oh.

  “I miss you.”

  Uh-ohhh.

  “And I was thinking… That maybe we should FaceTime…”

  “FaceTime?” I bust out laughing. “You want to FaceTime?”

  “Yeah. I want to see your face. Your smile. Dammit, Katie, I miss you and I’m not afraid to admit it. I want to see your sexy as fuck eyes as they laugh or get defensive. I’m going through withdrawal.”

  I don’t know what I do first. Clench my legs together or gasp. I’m a lady always. Duh, I have a vag, but I have never been a swooner. It’s just not my style. But holy shit.

  “You want to FaceTime…”

  “Yes. If you don’t, it’s fine. I mean—”

  “Let’s do it.”

  “Yeah?” He sounds surprised I’m agreeing.

  “Sure, why not. But beware, Green, I’ve been slaving over a bunch of drunks all night. I might not be as appealing as you remember.”

  “Doubt that.”

  Before I have a chance to change my mind, my phone starts buzzing, Chase’s incoming FaceTime call coming through. I click accept and a few beeps later, his beautiful face appears on my phone. I semi panic, because I would have liked to take a preview of what I actually look like, maybe pinch my cheeks to get some rouge before he sees me. His face lights up my screen and instantly I notice his bare chest. Great. So not only do I probably look like shit, I’m now drooling.

  “God, you’re sexy,” he comments immediately, his voice hoarse.

  I throw my hands into my hair, trying to give it some volume. Or style. I catch a glimpse of myself in the corner and groan. “Sexy as a dead person. God, I look horrid. You can hang up any time now. I won’t be offended.”