738 Days: A Novel

by Stacey Kade

  “So I guess you’re back in the headlines again. What’s it feel like to relive the glory days for a few minutes?” He sighs, stretching his legs out in front of him. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. It’s a smart play. Maybe I just need to find some famous, damaged girl with a pretty face who’ll let me—”

  I turn and lash out with my foot, kicking over his chair with him in it. He hits the ground with the crack of wood and a satisfying thud.

  But it’s not enough to sate the blood thundering in my veins, demanding that he pay.

  Wrapping my hand in the front of his shirt, I drag him up from the ground. Distantly, I hear gasps from the various cast and crew who are watching, but it doesn’t really register.

  He doesn’t get to talk about her like that. Ever.

  But as I draw back to hit him, I see the flicker of a smirk on his face and Amanda’s words echo in my head: He wants you to break.

  It sends a shock through me, to realize that she was right. I don’t need to do this. It’s letting him control me, just like everyone else. He’s pushing my buttons to get a response, and if I hit him, I’m giving him exactly what he wants. The same way I caved to Elise, when she told me she knew better and I wanted the promised results so badly I didn’t care if what she was suggesting felt wrong.

  But I know better than that now.

  I let go of Adam, dropping him onto his broken and splintered chair. Then with my heart pounding and my hands shaking from the excess adrenaline, I turn and walk away.

  “Hey, fucker, come back here and finish it!” he bellows, and I hear him trying to scramble to his feet out of the wreckage.

  It would be so much easier, more familiar, to turn around and hit him, but I keep going until I find Emily huddled under one of the heat lamps.

  “Can you find out where Leon is?” I ask. I’m no longer cold, at least.

  Her eyes are puffy from lack of sleep but still capable of projecting intense wariness. She nods quickly and points across set to where Max and Leon are deep in conversation.

  “Oh.” Awesome. Max. I’m sure he has plenty to say to me. “Thanks.”

  I hang back a few feet, waiting until Max finishes talking to Leon before I approach.

  “Great work tonight, Chase,” Max says, beaming at me as he passes.

  I stare at him wordlessly. Tonight, of all nights, he chooses to praise me?

  Then he leans forward and says in a confidential tone, “Look, I know I gave you a hard time about … you know, but with this extra attention…” He grins. “We’re already getting calls about distribution.”

  Shame wells in me and I look away, studying the ground in the distance until he pats me on the shoulder and strolls away, whistling.

  When he’s finally out of hearing range, I risk glancing up at Leon, who’s watching me with an impenetrable expression.

  Swallowing my pride, I ask, “Have you heard anything from Amanda? I’ve tried to call—”

  “No, I haven’t and I don’t expect to,” Leon says. His bald head wrinkles with a frown. “You shouldn’t, either.”

  “I just want to make sure she’s okay.” I stuff my hands in my coat pockets.

  He looks at me incredulously. “Do you think she’s okay?”

  I shut my eyes. “No, of course not. That’s not what I meant. I just—”

  He pokes a finger in my shoulder, and I open my eyes.

  “I’m not sure what you expect, son. But you’re damn lucky that she’s not going public with her side of this. She could destroy you.” He shakes his head in disbelief. “All those people who are clapping you on the back now would turn on you so fast you’d feel the breeze. Better to leave well enough alone and pray she doesn’t change her mind. You hear me?”

  I clamp my jaw shut and give a tight nod. “Do you know anything more about Sera?” I don’t like the idea of her out there, especially when I don’t know if Amanda is safe and taking precautions. The chain Sera sent threw me, not just because of the message it carried, but because it was the first time she’d ever attempted contact with someone in my life instead of me directly.

  Leon sighs. “They’re getting closer. I don’t think they were real motivated until this afternoon. Evidently, she knows about your little escapade with law enforcement here. Someone threw a lit book of matches in the open window of a squad car while the officer was inside a Starbucks grabbing coffee.”

  I grimace. Sounds about right.

  “Then she smashed the windshield with a crowbar and ran.”

  Holy shit. “That’s new.” Fire, yes. Direct violence, no.

  “He lost her in a crowd. She’s good at blending in when she wants to. And now that we’ve locked down security for you here and at the hotel, they’re having a hard time drawing her out.”

  “You’re sure she’s still here for me? She won’t bother Amanda?” I persist.

  He shrugs. “I notified the PD in Springfield. Even offered to send Amanda home with an officer, but she wanted to wait for her sister.”

  Liza or Mia? I wonder which one came and how Amanda felt about it. I want her to tell me, to talk to me.

  “That’s all?” I ask Leon. It doesn’t seem like enough.

  “Miss Grace is not my responsibility. The people on this set are,” he points out. “Don’t worry about it. Just keep your head down and don’t go making yourself a target. We’ll take care of the whackjob. You just keep doing what you do.” He jerks his head in a dismissive gesture toward the cameras.

  Then he walks away, leaving me fuming with impotent fury. The thing is, if I do what everyone is telling me to now, I win. I’m the good little actor who played my role in the scheme and got everything I wanted.

  But if I accept the rewards as my due, then there’s no difference between me and Elise. Or Adam and me.

  But at least the two of them are deliberate schemers. I just followed blindly, hating every second of it but doing nothing to stop it. That’s worse.

  I need to do something else. I need to change, or I’m going to end up back here, hating myself again in six months, a year. Or maybe I won’t be that lucky.

  A flicker of an idea, something Leon said, tickles the far reaches of my brain.

  I can’t do anything to take back what I’ve done. But maybe I can fix things going forward. Maybe I can still try to be the person I should have been all along.

  If I follow through, it’ll destroy everything I’ve done this week, every bit of career advancement gone. Forget the Besson audition, or any audition for a while after this. It might well land me back in Tillman on my knees, with a manure shovel in one hand and a groveling apology in the other.

  Even worse, it’s possible that Karen’s right, and Amanda will hate me even more for making her humiliation greater and her pain worth nothing.

  But just considering the idea makes me feel like I can breathe again, like I might be able to cough the water from my lungs and stop drowning. Which also makes me think it’s possible Amanda might understand exactly what I’m doing.

  Breaking free.

  35

  Amanda

  “What are you doing?” Liza asks, sticking her head in my partially open door before I can pretend to be reading or doing anything other than staring into space.

  Technically, I’m staring at the torn-out pages I swiped from Liza’s discarded college brochures and taped to my walls years ago. All of them portray happy people in various stages of crossing the green open space of a quad. Sometimes they’re lying on blankets with books. Others are obviously in the middle of a (staged) Frisbee game. One of them, my favorite, is taken at dusk with the sky turning pink behind an enormous chapel, and a pair of students holding hands are cast in silhouette.

  I think I could do that now, be one of those students. Suddenly, it just seems more possible. Before, I’d stalled out on progress to the point of no advancement at all. But I just spent five days, give or take, away from home and once I got past the rough start, I was mostly okay.


  I’m not done, I know, working through the issues from being taken. But now, it seems like maybe the light at the end of that endless tunnel could be sunshine instead of another fluorescent light illuminating the tracks disappearing into nothingness.

  But when I should be celebrating that fact and trying harder to push forward and make decisions, part of me now just wants to sit on the tracks and stay in the darkness.

  “Nothing,” I say to Liza finally. I’m wallowing today, with self-indulgent abandon. But I’ve decided I’m allowed to for one day. Then, starting tomorrow, I’m going to figure out what comes next.

  But that’s tomorrow.

  Liza frowns. “Are you going to get up?”

  “It’s only ten thirty in the morning,” I point out. “And for what? Mom’s not here.” She fussed repeatedly last night about canceling her dentist appointment to stay home with me. But Dad, in a rare moment of solidarity that I hope will become more frequent, backed me on my ability to stay home by myself.

  I’ve never broken up with anyone before, never had my heart shattered, but I’m inclined to think that solitude is one of the recovery requirements.

  “You’re hiding,” Liza accuses.

  “No, I’m brooding. There’s a fine difference. Please note the chocolate-covered pretzels.” I shake the foil bag that I dug out of the pantry this morning at six when I couldn’t sleep anymore.

  Liza rolls her eyes. “I have to leave for study group,” she says. “I just wanted to make sure you were all right.”

  “I’m…” Empty, angry, lonely. Sad. “I’m here,” I say finally. “I’ll be better tomorrow.”

  “Do you still want me to keep this?” She pulls my phone from her pocket and holds it aloft.

  My heart leaps, and I curl my hands into fists to keep from reaching for the phone. In the car on the way home, I shut it off and gave it to her before Chase might even have a chance to text or call. If he even would attempt it.

  “Did you turn it on?” I ask.

  She frowns. “You told me not to.”

  “Oh.” In that moment, I’m kind of wishing I’d given it to Mia or held on to it myself. My resolve would have weakened and I would have powered it on to check for messages. Now, I have to ask for it from Liza, who, despite her best intentions, will totally judge me for it, in true big-sister style.

  “Do you think—” I begin.

  The garage door goes up then, with a distant rumble, and a second later, the kitchen door bangs open.

  Liza and I exchange confused glances.

  She leans back into the hall. “Mom?”

  There’s no answer but the sound of feet pounding through the kitchen and then up the stairs.

  I tense.

  “You aren’t going to believe this,” Mia crows breathlessly, pushing past Liza and throwing herself onto the foot of my bed.

  “What are you doing here?” I ask, pulling my legs back before she crushes my kneecaps with her elbows in a further fit of enthusiasm.

  “It’s Friday. You’re supposed to be in school,” Liza says, folding her arms across her chest, my phone still in hand.

  “It’s just gym.” Mia waves her hand dismissively. “Everyone knows that’s optional.” She frowns at me. “You have chocolate all over your face.”

  I swipe at it immediately with the back of my hand, guessing at its location.

  Liza’s mouth pinches tight in disapproval. “Gym is not optional. Mia, you can’t just—”

  “What aren’t we going to believe?” I ask, to prevent the fight that’s brewing.

  “This.” Mia holds up her phone and presses a button. On the screen is a video beneath a huge headline: “Chase Henry Speaks Out on Amanda Grace, #AMASE, and the Future.”

  “It’s all over everywhere. As of twenty minutes ago. I came home as soon as I saw.”

  “I don’t want to see it,” I say automatically, my hand moving to cover my heart. Where it used to be, anyway.

  “Yes, you do. Trust me.” Mia pushes the play button and scrambles to the head of the bed to shove in next to me, taking most of my pillow for herself.

  “I’m going to be late,” Liza says, but she doesn’t move.

  The video loads slowly, and for a second, I think I’m going to be watching that spinny circle and holding my breath forever.

  But then the dark screen clears, and I recognize the turnaround in front of the Wescott Inn immediately. The crowd is still there with their signs, but Chase is the center focus, standing in front of the glass doors with the barricade up in front of him, holding everyone back.

  The image is slightly blurred until the video starts to play. There are other cameras, professional setups, closer in, but this is someone in the middle of the crowd, holding up a cell phone and recording it.

  “Thanks for being here this morning. For letting me talk to y’all.” His accent is back. He looks tired yet determined, and it makes my heart hurt. I want to reach through the screen and hold his hand.

  “We love you, Chase,” someone near the camera holder bellows.

  “Shhhh,” the camera holder hisses.

  He looks up directly into the camera phone, and even with the distance, between us and between Chase and the lens, it’s electric. He’s staring straight into me, it seems, and I feel it like a kick to my ribs.

  “I’ve been told not to do this by pretty much everyone I know,” he says, his gaze steady and defiant. “But we all know how good I am at following directions.” He pauses. “Actually, I’ve been better at it than you think. Not anymore, though.”

  People chuckle uneasily, not sure what he means or where this is going, given his reputation.

  “I want to start by saying I owe all of you an apology but one person particularly.” He stuffs his hands deep in his pockets, and in his pause, I hear the click-click of dozens of cameras. “There’s been a lot of, um, speculation this week about certain, um, aspects of my personal life.”

  Liza makes a face. “He’s ‘um’-ing too much.”

  “Stop,” I say. Because this is Chase as I know him, uncomfortable with the attention when he’s not acting or reciting someone else’s words. And I want to hear him. The real him, I hope.

  “Told you you’d want to see it,” Mia says with a grin, but she keeps her voice low.

  “It was, as many of you suspected, a publicity stunt,” Chase says, and the collective gasp from the assembly is loud.

  “Oh my God,” Mia squeals. “Here it comes.”

  “You’ve already seen this,” Liza protests. “Let us hear.” She leans closer so she can see the screen better.

  “Shhhh.” I wave my hands at both of them, my entire focus riveted on Mia’s phone.

  “—fake, at least, it was in the beginning,” Chase continues. “It wasn’t my idea, but I went along with it because I thought I needed it and I thought what I needed was more important than anything else. Than anyone else.” He’s looking at me again, and I want to turn myself inside out to escape the pain and I never want it to end, all at the same time.

  “Then it turned into something more, and I didn’t handle it right,” he says, the confession dropping his head low for a moment. Then he straightens his shoulders. “I wasn’t expecting to … feel what I felt, and when I did, I didn’t know what to do, how to tell the truth. But what happened was more real to me than anything, and I don’t regret that for a moment.” His expression is fierce, and it tears at me.

  The camera bobbles a bit as the girl holding it squeals under her breath.

  He shakes his head. “All of that is personal and more than I’m willing to discuss, but I want to apologize to y’all for the lies. That was wrong. You should decide if you like what I do without being tricked into it.”

  I think I might be the only one to hear the faint tremor of uncertainty beneath the determination in his voice. He’s putting himself out there, drawing a line in the sand, without knowing for sure if people will follow him across it. He’s been told for so many years a
nd by so many that he’s only worth what they find valuable in him, what they can use.

  Oh, Chase. I draw my knees up to my chest, hugging them to me. Hot tears roll down my cheeks to drip off my chin.

  “And to Amanda Grace, I’d just like to say I’m so sorry.” His voice cracks, and someone near the recording makes a soft “oh” sound. “I know you think I was pretending to be someone else. But I wasn’t.”

  Mia’s free hand finds mine and squeezes.

  “I was trying to be a better version of myself, the person you make me want to be.” His gaze catches “our” camera again, and I go still, watching his throat bob up with barely restrained emotion. “But I messed up. My fear got the better of me. I thought if I told you the truth, you’d leave, so instead I let you down in the worst way. That’s completely unforgivable, I know. But when I said I loved you, I meant it.”

  The crowd explodes with noise, and he waits until they shush themselves into something resembling quiet before he continues.

  “You told me once that we’re all on our second or third or fourteenth chances. And I hope … I guess I’m still hoping for another one, even though I don’t deserve it.” His smile is tremulous and uncertain. “I still need to know your favorite color.”

  He runs a quick hand under his eyes, which makes the camera holder tremble again.

  Then he shifts his gaze to the entire crowd, seeming to search for someone before nodding his head. “Thank you.”

  The screen freezes on him turning to go inside, and I want to push forward through it and chase after him.

  But then the image goes dark and vanishes, and Mia lowers her phone to tuck it into the oversized pocket of her jacket.

  Liza looks at her watch and sucks in a breath. “So late.”

  Mia takes advantage of her distraction and reaches up to snatch my phone from Liza’s hand. “Give me that.”

  “Wait,” I say.

  Holding it away from both of us, she powers it on, and it sings to life. Almost immediately, it chirps with voicemails and texts.

  “Chase … Mroczek?” She frowns. “Is that—”