by N J Adel
I could feel the blood slipping away from my face, tears clouding my vision. Kyle’s knee found the floor, and my heart found it, too.
As he opened the box, the dazzling sparkle of the very expensive rock on the ring blinded me. He swallowed hard and smiled. “Maggie Carolina Dawson, will you make me the happiest man in the world…and marry me?”
Scene 31
Mike
Mike felt something twitch inside him, something intense, something that sent him spiraling.
A victorious smirk covered Andrea’s face as she tapped him on the shoulder and strutted away. She was enjoying this.
He spun around and stared through the dark glass until he found Maggie and the asshole who was about to steal her from him for good. Except Maggie was never his, and he’d never told her he wanted nothing more than to be hers.
This can’t happen. I have to tell her.
He stalked forward as Kyle went down on one knee, ignoring everything that once mattered, ready to unleash hell. A fist grabbing his arm made him flinch and stop midway.
“Where are you going?” James’s voice interrupted the madness coursing through him.
Mike just stared at him.
“Are you…crying?” James asked, taken aback. “What happened?” His eyes darted around. He must be checking if someone could see or hear them.
Mike touched his eyes. Shit. He was crying. “He’s marrying her. I have to…”
“Who…? You know what? Whatever it is, no one can see.” He pulled Mike’s arm, dragging him away to a darker spot.
“I don’t care. Let me go.” Mike cast another look at Maggie. “I have to let her know.” He stared at his manager. “Everyone has to know.”
James glanced through the glass. “No, Mike. You can’t do this. Look at me. Don’t screw this up, for her sake. No one can know. Not like this.”
“I can’t just watch,” Mike hissed, his chest heaving.
“C’mon, man, get a grip. People are starting to notice.”
Fighting for control, Mike hid his eyes with his hand. All his years of experience didn’t know how to stop the tears. All the faces he had learned to wear failed to mask real pain.
“Think, Mike. If you go out there now, it’s going to be a scandal, for her before it’s for you. Look around you. The people from her movie are here. Her first gig. Do you want this for her?”
Mike stepped back, trying to compose himself. A flicker of sanity burned its way into his mind. This, right here, was his worst nightmare. Hurting Maggie. Telling her how he felt now or at any given time meant hurting her. And not just because it was going to be a scandal. “Fuck. I’m just… You’re right. You’re fucking right. I’m gonna ruin everything for her.” He pushed his hair off his face with one hand, the other wiping away the last of his tears. “I can’t… I…I’m gonna go.”
“You can’t go now. What will she think when she knows you came and didn’t even say hi?”
“Tell her anything. I can’t just look her in the eye and say congratulations.” He winced, reaching for the inside pocket of his jacket. “Here.” He placed a jewelry box in James’s hand. “It’s her birthday gift. Give it to her on my behalf.”
The glass door opened and Maggie faltered inside.
“Too late now,” James mumbled. “Get it together, Mickey.”
Mike’s heart, ripped to shreds, skipped a beat. His gaze followed her as people surrounded her. They must have been dying to know if she had said yes. They must have been admiring her ring by now, secretly envying everything about her and her fiancé. Where the fuck is he anyway? Why didn’t he come inside with her?
He peered back through the glass, and he could see Kyle from behind, hunched over the railing.
“She’s coming your way,” James said.
Mike jerked his head toward her. Piece by piece, he traced every detail about her as she approached, the burning in his heart growing by each step she took. Her new hair color gave her a beautiful glow. The dress couldn’t fit anyone else better. Her simple makeup must have been perfect before tears smudged her cheeks—tears of joy, of course.
As she faced him, he froze, unable to bring himself to say anything. Whatever strength he had left was dedicated to prevent his eyes from crying.
“Mike,” she whispered.
He looked down, feeling weaker. “Happy birthday…and congratulations,” he finally said, wondering how convincing he sounded. His gaze wandered over her finger and stilled.
His heart skipped another beat.
No ring.
When he stared up at her, she whispered again, “Get me out of here.”
Scene 32
Maggie
It was Tony’s Christmas party all over again. The same panic. The same guilt. The same guy to run away to. The same reason.
Mike.
The man who had never, not once, patronized or degraded my thoughts, opinions, dreams or crazy whims. The only man that made me feel worthy and loved. The only person I could be myself with and not feel guilty about it. The man I loved more than anyone else.
We were in the backseat of some car that I didn’t know how I got in, or how long it’d been roaming the streets of L.A., and he hadn’t said a word since we left. He just stared back at me. Waiting.
I glanced at the paper bag in my hand with no recollection of how it wound up there. “Did I have a panic attack?”
“Yes,” he answered.
I took a long breath. “You don’t happen to have a party going at your place now, do ya?”
He shook his head.
“Too bad.” I bowed my head, self-loathing spreading through my heart and mind. “I could really use a joint right now. Not a good time to stay sober.”
“How about a party for two then?”
You and me. Alone. Getting wasted. Danger. Catastrophe. “Sounds good.”
He leaned forward, holding the back of the driver’s seat. “Jason, take us to Bel Air, please.”
“Yes, Mr. Gennaro.”
“Your house?” I inquired. “Why not the AKA?”
His jaw flexed. “We kinda ran away together in front of a hundred people after you turned down your boyfriend’s marriage proposal. I’m guessing there will be paps at the AKA.”
My head spun. “Oh my God… Fuck… I’m so sorry, Mike.”
“Hey.” He held my hand. “I don’t care about any of this shit.”
My free hand checked my phone. “Oh God. Forty-seven messages. You?”
He got his phone out of his pocket to check. “Um…fifty-two.”
“Fuck. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck, FUCK.”
He squeezed my hand, laughing. “C’mon. It’s gonna be fine.”
“How? Everything is ruined. I ruined everything. Now they’re gonna say I’m the girl you’re…”
“In love with?” He finished my words. “And you finally left your boyfriend for me?”
“Mike, please. This is a disaster. How’s that not bothering you?”
“What kinda man would be bothered if you left your boyfriend for him?”
“For fuck’s sake, this isn’t a joke. They’re gonna say I did it for the movies.”
He stared at me for a moment. “That’s what you care about?”
“Yes!” I looked down. It’s the only part that’s not true.
The car turned and slowed down. Mike glanced at the window. “We’re here.” The window rolled down a little, and he showed his face to the gateway security and collected a key. Jason pulled over at the mansion front entrance, and opened the door for Mike, who offered me his hand, and I took it.
“I haven’t come here in a very long time.” Mike turned the key in. “More than two years.” He placed his hand on the small of my back and let me inside.
As he turned on the lights, I noticed nothing had changed since the last time I was here. Cream porcelain tiles. Double height ceilings. Floor-to-ceiling windows. Enormous staircase. Open living and dining rooms dressed in well-matched shades of brown
and blue.
“Four years for me. I came to see Uncle Frank after he got sick.” My hands wrapped around his arm. “He was a wonderful man, your father. So kind and funny. I’m so sorry he passed.”
“You and me both, Kiddo.”
I unlinked my hands from him and stepped back, the word Kiddo disturbing me more than usual. My face must have shown my irritation because Mike turned to me with concern in his eyes.
“What?” he asked.
“Is that the way you’re gonna see me forever? A kid?”
He chuckled. “It’s just a word, Carolina.”
“Is it?”
His humor was gone when his gaze, suddenly, bore into me. “It’s more of a reminder.” Then he turned away and headed for the staircase. “Weed stash is up there.”
I nodded, confused as fuck. “I’ll get the booze.”
“Bene,” he said, his feet eating up the stairs.
Awful flashes of tonight accompanied me to the kitchen. The look on Kyle’s face when I refused him. How he tried to hold his tears. How he held my hand for the last time before I ran inside. They would haunt me for the rest of my life. Blubbering, I opened and slammed more cabinets than necessary for finding a couple of glasses.
Scene 33
Mike
Lying on the floor, jacket and shoes off, Mike exhaled the last of his joint. Maggie’s head rested on the couch behind her, her feet stretched on the floor.
She let out a shuddering groan. “I’m a terrible…terrible person.”
“No, you’re not,” he said.
“Yes, I am.” Her voice cracked. “But I swear to God, I tried. I did everything to make it work.”
“I know you don’t wanna hear this, but it was never going to work. He wasn’t right for you.”
“I should’ve broken up with him earlier, though. Before all this.”
“Why didn’t you?”
She shook her head, like she was disagreeing with what she wanted to say.
“Talk to me, Carolina.”
“Well, in case you haven’t noticed, I’m terrified of making decisions unless the situation is irreversible and…I’m also terrified of being alone. I’d rather have the illusion that I could still make it work or wait for him to break up with me than to do it myself. I know it’s awful. I’m awful.”
“You’re not awful. Stop saying that about yourself. All this is…” Courtesy of Andrea. Mike’s heart burned, scorching from the inside out, as he pondered how that awful woman had managed to spread her toxicity onto Maggie like that.
A trail of blue smoke came out of her lips. “You know even after I said no, he asked me if there was any chance I was gonna say yes later. He said he could wait till I was ready.” A tear dropped onto the back of her hand.
“Are you ever gonna be ready for this? With anyone?”
Her eyes rolled up to him. “I can’t believe you right now. You think this was a Maggie Moment?”
“A Maggie Moment?”
“That fuckin’ moment when I realize this was never what I wanted to do. When I’m afraid to commit. When I falter and hesitate and turn my life upside down, then disappoint everybody I know.”
He scratched his forehead. “Uh…it wasn’t?”
“Fuck no.” She scrambled to her feet. “You know what? I’m going for a walk.” Stumbling on her boots on the way, she grumbled.
“Wait.” He got off the floor and grabbed both their shoes and his jacket. “I’m coming with.”
He made her put on her ankle boots, draped the jacket on her shoulders, and stayed one step behind as she staggered down into the garden. He fought the urge to spin her around and tell her how he couldn’t stand to hear another word about her ex-boyfriend, how glad he was she wasn’t gonna marry someone else, and if it weren’t for the comment she’d made about the movies, he’d be confessing his love to her right now.
She stopped before an oak tree for a few moments, and then she turned to face him. “I need to tell you something.”
“Sure,” he said.
She murdered one of her fingernails. “But you should know I don’t expect you to say or do anything in return.”
He smiled. “In return?”
“I didn’t say no to Kyle because I panicked or hesitated. And not just because he wasn’t right for me. I did it because…I’m in love with someone else.”
His smile vanished. “Che cazzo? No. No! I can’t… I don’t wanna hear this.” Had he hidden his feelings from her that well that she couldn’t feel him at all? Now she was going to blurt out about another fucker?
Bellowing screams raptured inside him. Yes, he had, and he’d waited too long—for reasons that didn’t seem to matter anymore when he almost lost her to another man tonight. He had no right to feel like this, but he did. And it hurt like hell, now he’d lost her all over again.
“Yes, you do,” she said.
He brought his hand to his chin, scratching it until it hurt. “No, Maggie, enough. I will not just stand and listen to this shit again. I—”
“Shut up and listen!” She drew a breath from the joint in her hand, looking him straight in the eye, taking a step forward. “I’m in love with you.”
He froze. Every muscle. Even his heart seemed to have ceased beating.
She took another step toward him. “Like I said, I don’t expect you to say or do anything. I just needed to say it out loud.” Her lips sucked on the last of the joint before she threw it away. “God, it felt so good to finally say it.”
He staggered in place, a sinking feeling in his stomach. “What do you mean finally?”
“I mean…I have been…in love with you for a while now.” A sheepish smile drew on her face.
Slowly, he raised his eyebrows, cursing himself to hell and beyond in his mind for being such a cowardly idiot. “Why?”
Her lips parted and let out a short sigh.
“Why, Maggie?” he shouted.
“Why what?! Why am I in love with you?” She shook her head. “I don’t know why. All I know is that for once in my life, I’m hundred percent sure about something. I’m not confused or anxious anymore. There’s no room for maybes or what ifs. I just know.”
He moved closer, holding his eyes on her. The past eight years of WHAT THE FUCK opened a deep crack that ran to his bones.
“I’m sorry. I know the position this puts you in. I mean after tonight, and we’re gonna work together, and the fucking tabloids.” She threw her hand in the air. “I know it’s wrong, but I just don’t care if it’s right or wrong anymore.” She cursed. “Obviously, you’re upset, so I’m sorry. But that’s the only thing I’m sorry for. I’m not going to apologize for being in love with you because I’ve never—”
“Why, Maggie?” he interrupted, his voice coming out scratchy. “Why haven’t you told me this before?”
She blinked. “What difference does it make?”
The air felt too heavy in his chest. “You could’ve saved us a lot of time.”
It was a long moment before she spoke. “What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean.” He loved her. He fucking loved her. All the boundaries that stopped him from telling her how he felt, that condemned their love before it started, wouldn’t have mattered if he’d known she loved him, too. He’d have destroyed his career, spent every dime of his fortune and killed every person who dared stand in their way to be with her.
Her soft eyes became scrutinizing. “No, I don’t.”
“Yes, you do. You know exactly what I mean.” His lips shivered into a smile. “I’ve said it a thousand times before, but you never heard it. Now, I don’t need to say it for you to hear it.”
She said nothing for some time, leading to an uneasy silence. “Impossible.”
“It’s more than possible. And for a long time, too.” He took her shoulders in his hands. “Remember when I said if I ever told her you’d be the first to know?” His breath trembled in his chest. “Now you know, Maggie. Now you know.”
> Scene 34
Maggie
My feet wobbled, and I almost fell down. Swiftly, Mike’s arms held me and prevented the fall. “I need to sit down. I think I’m gonna pass out.”
He helped me down and perched next to me. “You okay?” he asked with worry.
I stared at him for a few seconds. “No.”
“Should I get you some water? Call a doctor?”
I shook my head. “Just hold me.”
His tender smile folded me before his arms. I exhaled a long sigh as I felt his heartbeat banging in his chest. It reminded me of the time when he asked me to go to Japan with him; his heart was racing just like now. I gasped as my mind leafed through all the signals I’d missed. That moment in the limo when he was warm all of a sudden, and what he said when I told him what Kyle thought. That dinner when he thought I was hot and didn’t tell me. That kiss on the neck. Oh God.
I drew back, wondering if it was just my mind playing tricks on me. “You’re not lying to me, are you?”
His eyes tightened as he held my hand and placed it on his heart. “You tell me.”
Just like I was certain of my feelings for the first time in my life, the way his heart was beating and the look in his eyes left me doubtless. Each of us had spent so long struggling to hide our love, bottling it up, and all the while, not knowing that the other person was doing the exact same thing.
“I’m so stupid. So fucking stupid.” I said. “How is this possible? Not feeling each other?”
“I have no idea. For me, I guess, my love for you is just too much. There’s barely any room to feel anything else.”
“Why haven’t you told me?”
“I tried, but I always backed down at the last minute. I was afraid.”