No More Confessions

by Louise Rozett

  I don’t realize Peter’s standing next to me until he speaks. We haven’t talked much since my hot-mess performance at the art opening. I’ve been avoiding him because I don’t want to hear the lecture about the evils of alcohol that’s always on the tip of his tongue. Even if he is right.

  “Your set was really good.”

  “Thanks, Pete.” No matter how crazy he’s driving me, Peter’s opinion always means more to me than just about anyone else’s. Except for the year where he sort of lost his mind, he’s always been my biggest defender and champion. It’s hard to overestimate the importance of that in my life.

  “I think you could really do this, if you want to,” he says. “You just have to be careful.”

  “Of what?”

  “The music industry is crazy—partying, drugs—”

  “Pete. Seriously. I’m in high school. This is all normal for someone in high school. Remember?”

  “Listen, I know what I sounded like that night you came home drunk. I know this is annoying. I’m just going to say this one thing, and then I won’t bring it up again unless you do. Okay?”

  I drop my head back and sigh dramatically. “Okaaaaay.”

  “What I was trying to say last week is, addiction is genetic, and you and I, we get it from both sides of the family tree.”

  I don’t know what he’s talking about for a second, and then I remember—our grandparents. Peter and I never knew them—all four were gone before I was born, and he was too little to remember the short amount of time he’d had with them. When Peter was first in rehab, our mother told us that her mother had been an alcoholic, and so had my dad’s mother. She sounded embarrassed, like it was her shame, somehow, and something she’d never planned to tell us.

  My parents drank wine or split a beer at a restaurant, but they never had anything stronger than that in front of us, and they never kept alcohol in the house.

  I eye the empty bottles of whiskey and tequila on the counter, wondering what my grandparents and parents would say if they could see the kitchen right now.

  “I won’t let it get out of hand. I promise, Pete.”

  “I just don’t want you to screw up like I did. You have cool things ahead of you if you want them. Don’t waste time getting kicked out of school or worse, going to rehab.”

  It’s hard to hear Peter talk like this, like he’s ruined his life. “Come on. You’re going to graduate a year later than you were supposed to. That’s the only thing that’s different.”

  “That, and I have to go to meetings for the rest of my life and say, ‘Hi, I’m Pete, I’m an addict.’ That’s never going to change.”

  Angelo’s playlist is now blasting “The Seven Deadly Sins” by Flogging Molly, and the floor beneath my feet is vibrating. Peter crosses to the counter and starts clearing away empty bottles.

  I don’t like seeing my brother with whiskey bottles in his hand.

  “I’ll do that,” I say, taking them from him as something crashes to the ground in the basement and people cheer. “Will you go downstairs and make sure no one is bleeding?”

  He raises an eyebrow. “Is there usually blood at your parties?”

  “Sometimes,” I grin, not bothering to tell him that this is the first party I’ve ever thrown. Maybe there’s a part of me that likes having my brother worry about me.

  Peter goes to the basement door and stops. It takes him a second, but he finally says, “It’s not just you I’m worried about. Be careful, okay, Rosie?”

  There’s another crash, and more cheering. “Go,” I say, impatiently.

  He disappears down the steps.

  I finish clearing away the empties, taking a bottle of flat champagne to the sink to pour it out. As I look out the window into the backyard again, Jamie reaches inside his jacket pocket.

  “Paradise,” Ghost Stories, Coldplay

  _______________________

  Chapter 10

  “Dad, do we have a fire extinguisher?!”

  Dirk leaps up from the couch, dropping his cocktail napkin, sending two pigs-in-a-blanket down the front of his crisp white shirt. They bounce off his pressed jeans and land on the floor. He dashes into the kitchen—where Holly is allegedly taking a roast out of the oven—looking like an overly tanned Clark Kent.

  “I feel like I’m watching a sitcom,” Peter whispers.

  “You are,” I grumble.

  My mother is too concerned about whatever’s going on in there to shoot us a look telling us to cool it.

  I’m still not the biggest fan of my mother’s movie-star boyfriend. Everything is a huge production with him, unlike with my dad, who could have handled this particular situation without jumping out of his chair and spilling his food even if flames were actually shooting out of the kitchen.

  Dirk came back to town for a few weeks after the holidays, and Holly temporarily moved into a condo with him in New Haven. It’s a furnished corporate condo so there isn’t a piece of furniture in the entire place that Dirk or Holly would have actually chosen for themselves, which makes the whole thing feel like a set, which is appropriate. I figured Dirk would just stay with us, but things have been weird since Mom came back from her trip to LA, and I wonder if she’s thinking about breaking up with him.

  A girl can dream, right?

  The thing is, my mother is the last person who should date a movie star. She doesn’t like being the center of attention—I still don’t think she’s recovered from the premier she went to with Dirk in the fall where he expected her to walk the red carpet with him and she vigorously declined in front of the cameras, which got her more attention than if she’d just gone ahead and walked on the damn thing.

  Also, I wonder just how helpful Dirk has been during this whole video fiasco. I honestly have no idea—my mother doesn’t really talk to me about him. Maybe he’s being great about it, or maybe he’s being a clueless idiot about it—Dirk can be full of surprises in either direction.

  There is definitely tension in the air, and Mom is trying to pass it off as concern about the snow that’s coming, and the fact that Steph, Holly and I are supposed to take the train into the city tomorrow and spend the night with Tracy at her aunt’s. My mother doesn’t like anyone traveling in the snow, but it’s going to take more than snow to keep me from getting on that train—if the train is going, I’m going.

  I’d say we have an hour before my mother starts talking about heading home to avoid the bad roads. And if things are truly weird with Dirk, more like 30 minutes.

  She hovers about an inch out of her chair as the commotion in the kitchen increases—she’s probably trying to decide if she should help or leave them with their dignity.

  “They’ll call us if they need us, Mom,” Peter says. She sits back down.

  The smell of charred meat wafts in along with a haze of smoke, making the colorless furniture look out of focus.

  “Should we just order vegetarian from Claire’s? It’s right down the street,” I add, my stomach growling.

  “Dirk is paleo,” my mother says absently. I roll my eyes at Peter. She stands up and goes toward the kitchen. “Dirk? Can I help?”

  “Nope! Totally fine in here!” he calls with false cheer, unsuccessfully masking how pissed off he is. “Holly will be right out with more appetizers!”

  “How about Naples? Is pizza paleo?” I ask, knowing full well that it is not.

  My mother ignores me. “Okay, Dirk, just let us know.”

  We sit in the living room for 10 more minutes, finishing the last remaining, now-shriveled pigs-in-a-blanket, which, come to think of it, couldn’t possibly be paleo. Holly comes out with a plate of hummus and carrots, and she seems stressed out. I raise my eyebrows and she just shakes her head and disappears back into the kitchen.

  When we’re finally called to the table, our plates are already full of food. I can see where Dirk shaved off the burnt edges of the roast. But aside from that, I have to hand it to him—he saved dinner. Everything looks pretty good. Peter
and I dig in like we’re starving. Because we sort of are.

  “So, Rose,” Dirk says jovially, as if the past 20 minutes never happened. “I hear you’ve got a big show coming up?”

  “A show?” I ask, feigning confusion, knowing exactly what he’s referring to.

  “A gig, Dad. Rose and Steph and Angelo are playing an industry showcase on Valentine’s Day,” Holly explains.

  “That’s a big deal!” His voice is too loud. There is definitely something going on. “Are you ready for it?”

  “The food is really good, Dirk,” I say, not interested in discussing with him—or anyone else—the fact that I still haven’t been practicing and I have no idea why and that Angelo is probably going to kill me before we ever get to the gig.

  “Is it? I’m so glad,” he says, beaming at my mother who doesn’t look up from her food.

  Peter and I exchange a puzzled look.

  The rest of the conversation is totally stilted—most of it consists of reassuring Dirk that the food is good every three minutes until we’ve moved on to dessert. Just as I’m wondering again why Cal, Tracy and Jamie weren’t invited—Dirk apparently specified “just family” for this meal, although I’m about as “family” to Dirk as Cal is, technically—Dirk raises his glass, and my suspicion that something is going on is confirmed.

  “I’d like to make a toast.” We all pick up the champagne flutes of sparkling cider he poured for us. “I’m going back to LA next week, and I have to admit, I’m not looking forward to it. It’s hard to be there without my family. Which is why…”

  Holly stares at her father, her eyes widening with surprise. My mother has a deer-in-the-headlights thing going on, which means she knows what’s coming. She gives a little shake of her head—she’s trying to tell Dirk to stop, that she doesn’t want him to say it, whatever it is.

  “Sorry, honey, I decided to just go for it.” He apologizes with his patented smile that he gets paid millions for, that has probably gotten him out of every scrape he’s ever been in. I enjoy seeing how his smile has no effect on my mother, who angrily tosses her napkin down. Peter kicks me under the table. I don’t have to look at him to know what he’s thinking.

  Please, I think. Please, not yet.

  “I’ll just come right out with it. Kathleen and I have been talking about relocating the family home base to Los Angeles in June, after school’s out.”

  Not what I was expecting but equally as bad. Maybe worse, actually.

  Everyone, including Peter, looks at me. I wonder if they can actually hear me thinking, “Where does this guy get off relocating my family’s home base?” Or maybe they’re looking at me because I have the most to lose. Peter’s already living in Boston—it doesn’t matter to him whether he goes “home” to Union or Los Angeles. Holly’s lived in LA before and has plenty of friends waiting for her to come back. And my mother, well, Dirk is there. But me, my life is Union right now, for better or worse.

  Jamie is Union.

  The gears of my brain stop moving. “Are you seriously asking me to move before my senior year?”

  I want my mother to say no, of course not, it’s a crazy idea. But she just looks at Dirk with both eyebrows raised as if to say, This is all on you, buddy.

  The Beatles song “I Am the Walrus” is suddenly playing. It’s Dirk’s phone, vibrating in circles on the shiny sideboard that’s reflecting the too-bright overhead track lighting right into my eyes. Of course Dirk would be one of those people who has his phone set to ring and vibrate. He gets up, silences the call without looking at the screen and comes back.

  When he realizes he’s not getting any help from my mother in addressing my question, he turns to me. “I know it’s not ideal, Rose, but yes, I’m asking you to consider it. I don’t want to go another year without your mother, or Holly, or you.”

  This would be so easy if I could write off what he’s saying as total bullshit, but I know Dirk cares about me. Not as much as he cares about my mom or Holly, but he cares.

  Still, I’m not going to LA for my senior year. Not happening.

  I turn to my mother and address her directly so she can’t get out of answering me this time. “Mom, were you already planning on moving after I graduate next year?”

  My mother takes a sip of her drink to buy herself some time—I bet she’s wishing it were something a lot stronger than sparkling cider right about now. “I’ve been considering it. Depending on how things go over the next year and a half, ” she adds pointedly, with a look at Dirk that makes me think he did something he shouldn’t have done recently.

  Maybe something like telling her children about The Plan without her permission.

  “I just think, given everything that’s happened in the last two and a half years, that your mother could use a change of scene,” Dirk says to me. “And maybe you could, too?”

  Dirk’s phone buzzes once, probably to let him know he’s got a voicemail. He wisely ignores it.

  I give in to my urge to be as nasty as I can about this. “And by change of scene, you mean that you want her to leave the house and the town and the state where she was married to my dad, so you can erase him.”

  First my mother is too stunned to come to Dirk’s aid, and then she’s furious, her cheeks going magenta all at once. “Rose Zarelli, that is the most awful thing you’ve ever—”

  Dirk cuts her off. “It’s fine, Kathleen. Please,” he says gently. He sounds genuine, which disarms us both. When it’s clear she’s not going to strangle me, he continues. “Rose, I can’t erase your father. And I don’t want to. I know you and your mother and your brother love him very much, and I respect that,” he continues. I have to admit he gets some points for talking about my dad in the present tense. “All I want is for your mother to be as happy as she can be, and it’s difficult for her in Union because of the memories.” He turns to my mother. “Sometimes a fresh start in a new place can help a person heal. Right, honey?”

  I want him to stop calling my mother “honey.”

  Apparently she does, too, because she doesn’t answer him. Having had zero success with the Zarelli women, he turns to his daughter. “How do you feel about it, Holly?”

  There’s a long pause as Holly spins her silver bangles around on her arm and looks nervously from her father to me and back again. “I guess I wouldn’t mind graduating with my friends there. And my agent has been emailing me, asking when I’m coming back,” she adds sheepishly.

  I didn’t even know Holly had an agent.

  “What about Robert?” I ask.

  “You mean Cal,” Dirk says.

  “Of course she means Cal,” Holly confirms too quickly, giving me a weird look.

  I know—because Robert told me—that Holly and Robert have been hanging out as friends since Operation Save Holly launched at the New Year’s party. But Holly doesn’t know that I know, and she doesn’t know that I had a hand in it.

  “Right, sorry, Hol,” I say, shaking my head like I made a dumb mistake. “Cal.”

  Dirk looks back and forth between us but decides to table the question of Cal versus Robert for now—there are more important things to discuss. “So what do you think, Rose?” he asks, his eyebrows raised all the way up to his hair plugs, hoping that I’ll say yes, I’m willing to give up senior year with the people I’ve grown up with so he can have my mom waiting around to spend time with him when he’s not on set for whatever vapid TV show or movie he’s making at the time.

  Ok, that’s not entirely fair. The guy has been nominated for a few Oscars. But he’s also made some super cheesy stuff, so maybe that cancels out the Oscars.

  I think of the Oscar ceremony, of the sleeveless dresses and the bright, hot, 75-degree sunshine in the middle of February, when we’re still in single digits in the northeast. I look out the window, at the snow falling thick and fast.

  Do they even have snow in Los Angeles?

  Dirk’s damn phone starts pinging like crazy—now someone is sending him multiple texts.
My mother shoots him a look and he stands and crosses to the sideboard, this time picking up his phone to turn the ringer all the way off. As he starts to put it back on the sideboard, he looks down and does a double take, pausing to read something. Then he looks at my mother, panic in those famous piercing blue eyes.

  “What is it?” she asks. “Dirk?”

  And then he goes green. Literally green.

  “It’s my manager. My publicist has been getting calls from a reporter from one of those trashy sites. She ignored it until he mentioned you.”

  My mother stands up as if she’s ready to make a run for it. “Me? What do they want with me?”

  “Well, you are dating a famous actor,” Peter says. “It’s sort of part of the territory, isn’t it?”

  Dirk glances guiltily over at Peter and me. Then he does something I’ve never seen him do before—he takes a deep breath, like he needs courage. “You’re right, Peter. This kind of thing does go with the territory. But I’m sorry, kids. These people, they got a hold of the video of your dad, and, uh, of course, they know your mom is dating me, so…they want a statement before they…”

  He pauses here, and then he throws the phone onto the sideboard. We all listen to it clatter on the shiny wood and then fall to the carpeted floor with a thud. It’s the angriest thing I’ve ever seen Dirk do, and when he speaks again, he sounds like a different person.

  “Before they go public with it,” he finishes.

  I didn’t see that coming. Neither did Peter, and neither my mother. This definitely goes in “cons” column on my having-a-famous-stepfather list.

  My mother is looking at him with horror, like the man she was just about to move across the country for has transformed into a monster in front of her eyes.

  I reach over, take her hand and say the only thing I can think of. “Let’s go, Mom. It’s really starting to snow out there.”

  “Empire State of Mind,” The Blueprint 3, Jay Z

  _______________________