True North

by Liora Blake

  “Did I say any of that?”

  “I think ‘matriarch’ says it all. I’ll call you after it airs. We’ll decide then how to address your descent into the bargain book bin.”

  Stephen hangs up loudly and I relish every bit of it, despite how his slamming the phone down makes my ear hurt.

  Once I sufficiently rile Stephen up into an unnecessary tizzy and tackle a monotonous run on one of the hotel treadmills, the rest of the day opens up before me. Without a better idea in mind, I buy an expensive bikini and suntan oil in the hotel boutique and spend a few hours out by the pool, a fruity drink in one hand and a trashy magazine in the other. Despite the idle luxury of the experience, I can only stand it so long before boredom gets the best of me, so I make my way back up to my room. If I’m lucky, there will be another fat piece of chocolate cake and a classic movie in my future. We had Audrey Hepburn last night, so maybe it will be Katharine Hepburn tonight. The Philadelphia Story would pair perfectly with cake.

  Just as I toss my bikini top off to enjoy a warm shower, the phone rings. Figuring it’s Stephen again, intent on giving me another ration of grief about using the word “matriarch,” I answer and launch in without glancing at the display.

  “I’ve been thinking about this all day, Stephen. What exactly would ‘sexing it up while being witty and provocatively coy’ even look like? Did you expect me to spend the entire interview batting my eyelashes at Hal Abrahms and dragging my finger seductively across his desktop? I can dole out the snarky witticisms, but you should have given me some tips on the sexing-it-up part.”

  There is nothing but silence. Which isn’t good, because Stephen doesn’t do silent. He does everything but silent. Slowly, I pull the phone away from my ear and peek at the display.

  Definitely not Stephen.

  There is a brief, low-pitched chuckle from the caller. “I don’t know, I think you nailed the sexing-it-up part. Mostly because of those shoes and that skirt you were wearing.”

  Oh, crap. Male voice, unrecognizable but oddly familiar.

  “Fuck if I know what provocatively coy is supposed to look like, but that wink-smile thing you do is probably pretty damn close.”

  No. Just, please . . . no.

  Silence again, until the man I’m hoping isn’t who I think he is snorts a more pronounced laugh. “You still there, Kate?”

  I actually consider saying no. No, I’m not here. In fact, I just crawled under the bed so I might cringe in complete privacy. Instead, I mumble a small affirmation. As much as I probably don’t want to know, I stammer quietly, “Who is this?”

  “It’s Trax. Well, my real name is Trevor. Trevor Jenkins.”

  Dammit all to everything. For the first time ever, I wish it were Stephen, calling me to grumble complaints or demand my firstborn or condescend my country roots. I don’t care, I would take any of the above over the reality of a sexing-it-up discussion with Trax. Or, apparently, Trevor.

  “Hi.” I reach over to find a shirt, covering up my bare breasts, as if he can see me through the phone. “Why are you calling me? How did you get my phone number?”

  “I called my manager, he called your agent, your agent gave him your number, and my manager gave it to me.”

  Of course. How very Hollywood. Stephen is probably unquestioningly agreeable to handing my phone number out to a complete stranger. It’s comforting to know I can count on him to pimp me out in any conceivable way that suits him.

  “I’m calling to see if you want to go to dinner tonight. With me.”

  I raise my eyebrows and hesitate, thinking this must be some passive-aggressive punishment Stephen has concocted. I furrow my eyebrows together, perplexed.

  “If you’re busy, that’s cool, I just figured . . . well, I thought it would be nice . . . or something.” His voice wavers and trails off at the end until there is only silence. I realize I haven’t said anything since I asked how he got my phone number. I’ve only been breathing heavily into the phone like a wacko. I know I should say something but this strange turn of events has sideswiped me. Sitting down on the edge of the bed, I can hear Trevor clear his throat, and despite the bravado he possesses onstage, nervousness tinges his voice now. Since we both need a little reprieve, I relent to the awkwardness and decide to say yes. A girl has to eat, after all.

  “Sure. Dinner would be great. I’m a big fan of dinner.”

  “Yeah? Good to hear. What kind of dinner would you like? Anything you’re not a big fan of?”

  My saying yes, and doing it in a supremely dorky way, seems to have helped Trevor recapture his swagger. So much that he’s poking fun at me now. Which happens to be a little annoying and slightly charming.

  “A steak would make me happy. Just no vegan places or those raw-diet joints. Oh, and no juice bars. That’s not a meal.”

  He snorts into the phone. “I can work with that. LA isn’t all kale and quinoa.”

  Immediately, I think that I may have sounded too butch, demanding red meat like a rabid dog or something. I try to say something feminine in order to temper it. “What time? I’ve got to take a shower; I was lying out by the pool like a tourist.”

  “Like a tourist?”

  “Overpriced hotel bikini. Suntan oil with very little SPF. Frozen daiquiri. Cosmo magazine.”

  Trevor lets out a distracted-sounding groan. “What about seven? Does that give you enough time?”

  “Perfect. I’m in room two nineteen at the W Hotel.”

  He says good-bye and I set the phone down on the receiver and look out the window blankly. I allow myself a few minutes to comprehend what’s just happened. Evidently, I now have a date, or something, with Trax. No, wait, with a guy named Trevor.

  Bullshit, he isn’t just a guy named Trevor: he is an insanely well-known musician named Trax. Before I can process the dilemma any further, I know there is only one person who can help me in this kind of a situation. I dial my cell phone and wait for the Katy Perry ringtone on the other end to cease.

  “Hello, Kellan? It’s Kate Mosely. . . . Yes, yes, the show went perfectly. But I need your help with something else.”

  “I am the Glinda to your Dorothy. The Great and Powerful Oz. Tell me what you need.” Kellan’s voice is serious, which is good since I’m growing more panicked by the second.

  “I think I have a date.”

  “You think you have a date? If he did it so badly that you’re not sure, you should skip it. I’ll take you out on the town and we’ll find you a man clear on his intentions. I can’t guarantee how honorable those intentions will be, but—”

  “No, I just don’t know if it’s a date, date. Or just dinner with, like, a business acquaintance. I’m not sure what to wear given the situation.”

  “Who’s the guy? Where are you going?” I picture Kellan wrinkling his forehead in thought, preparing his mighty fashion superhero powers for whatever I’m about to throw at him.

  “Trax. I mean, Trevor. That’s his real name. Trevor.” I silently repeat it to myself a few more times so it will stick. “I told him I wanted a steak.”

  Kellan laughs so loudly I have to pull the phone away from my ear for a second.

  “Only you, you gorgeous little thing, all fresh-faced and backwoods sexy, could wander into LA and land dinner with Trax in less than forty-eight hours.” He emphasizes the name Trax so theatrically that my pulse starts to pound painfully. “Give me an hour and I’ll be there with an ensemble he’ll want to tear off you.”

  I start to protest that I’m not trying to seduce him, just to avoid looking like an idiot in his presence. Kellan brushes off my claims and after I hang up, the air-conditioning in the room whooshes across my skin and covers it in goose bumps. Stripping off the bikini bottoms, I start the shower, hoping the steam and heat will calm my nerves.

  5

  Kellan arrives with a petite, olive-skinned guy named David, who is wearing purple square-rimmed glasses and an orange-green paisley shirt that one would have to be majorly confident to pull
off. He pronounces his name Dah-veed, instead of plain old David, and he gives my hair a blowout that turns it into the softest, silkiest mane I’ve ever had. Then he stares at my face with a kind of serious attempt at objectivity that one usually reserves for art openings and political roundtables. Once he assesses me fully, he rolls out a kit of brushes and implements that cover the entire bathroom counter.

  As Dah-veed does my makeup, Kellan keeps saying Dah-veed is his full-time hair expert and part-time mojito maven. I’m not sure exactly what he means, but the way he occasionally pinches David on the butt offers a small clue that it isn’t always good clean fun between them.

  I shimmy myself into a pair of jeans that Kellan insists are definitely not too tight for a date with Trax, then slide the black silk-and-sequin tank he brought over my head. As I slip on a pair of high-heeled charcoal ankle boots, Kellan layers a few artfully arranged gold chokers around my neck.

  “Perfection. Absolute perfection. You may need to order room service instead.” Kellan and David admire their work then prompt me to twirl for their final inspection.

  Once they finally leave, I’m suddenly so nervous I consider leaving a note on the door for Trevor that references a raging contagious disease of some kind. Anything that might make him turn tail and run down the hall instead of taking me out for a steak.

  No. No. No. I steel myself and look in the mirror that hangs above the dresser. Why am I freaking out? This is just a guy. I’ve been on enough dates, or whatever this is, to know my way around a little awkward dinner conversation. Before and after James. With James. He was the only one ever to give me butterflies anyway.

  It can’t just be the famous thing making my head spin. That’s a downside, really. Along with the whole angry, misogynistic music aspect, I wonder why I said yes in the first place. Ah, of course, there was the heady eye contact onstage, the carnal stare in the greenroom, and those sexy lips he kept smirking at me with. Thinking about it makes my heart tumble, so evidently, that’s why I said yes.

  A quick rap at the door nearly sends me out of my skin, causing my knee to bang against one of the dresser drawer pulls. I stifle a groan and a few curse words, shaking my leg out to quell the sharp pain.

  When I open the door, he’s flipping his key ring around his index finger nonchalantly. He looks me over and the key ring snaps into his fist. I want to kick him in the shins for an instant because it appears he may be wearing almost exactly what he did yesterday.

  No frantic phone calls to a flamboyant stylist for him. No holding his tasty little mouth still while a perfectly coiffed man named Dah-veed dabs on lip gloss. No, he just pulled on another pair of Dickies, a tight long-sleeved thermal shirt, and another short-sleeved T-shirt over the top of that. The sleeves of the thermal are pushed up on his forearms just enough that I can see part of a large tattoo on the inside of one arm, and his pants are loose without being juvenile or ridiculous, hanging around his waist in a way that makes me relatively sure everything underneath is rock solid. His light blond hair is already short, shaved as close as possible to his skull, so no styling required. Clean clothes, clean body, done. Ready to make a girl hold her breath and pant all at the same time.

  “Hi, Kate.” He smiles and gives my body another leisurely once-over. “You look beautiful.”

  I immediately want to order room service instead. Apparently, that is all it takes: a well-placed compliment from a man whose pretty face is making me goofy.

  “Hello, Trevor.” I emphasize his real name so he will be sure to notice.

  “Why are you saying my name like that?”

  “So I get it right.”

  “I guess you can call me Trax, if you want.” He grimaces a tiny bit. The expression reads like a concession on his part, although I can’t understand why, since people are always calling him Trax. Usually, shouting and screaming it at the tops of their lungs.

  “No, no. I don’t want to call you that. It’s weird. Like calling you by a nickname or a pet name or something. We don’t even know each other. We certainly don’t know each other well enough for pet names.”

  “True. Not yet.”

  I swallow at his choice of words and gesture out into the hallway. “Ready?”

  In the time it takes to go from the hotel hallway to the restaurant, he compliments my shoes, my outfit, my hair, my jewelry, and my smile. I lose count at a certain point and wonder if this truly is an elaborate prank on me set up by Stephen. This Trevor character is being far too attentive. Something is definitely up.

  Steak dinners in California are different from those in Montana. I expect a choice of sides with my steak, like mashed potatoes, flavorless rice pilaf, gelatinous creamed corn, or maybe a vegetable that is deep-fried. Instead, I get a plate with stuffed zucchini blossoms and polenta. There are no iceberg lettuce salads gleaming with ranch dressing, no starchy white dinner rolls, and no baked potatoes. Although I can appreciate the finest food around, something about steak demands the kind of down-home approach that the Crowell Steer Stand usually takes.

  “How’s your steak? Does that fit the bill?” Trevor works away on his grilled salmon, glancing at me for a reaction.

  “It’s very good.” I say, still happy to be gnawing on a slab of red meat. There is the awkward silence then, between two people who don’t know each other. To make it worse, strangers surround us who know him, don’t know me, but seem immensely interested in who I am.

  In an attempt to break the silence, I end up asking an obvious question. “So, what is this all about? Why did you want to hang out? You have friends, right?”

  Trevor makes a small choking sound, chasing it with a drink of his dark stout beer before narrowing his eyes in my direction. “Of course I have friends. I don’t know, I thought we had a thing yesterday. But you didn’t need to do me any favors. All you had to do was say no.”

  “Christ, I didn’t mean for it to sound as condescending as it did. It just seems odd. Did my agent sucker you into this? Some sort of make-Kate-pay-for-being-erudite scheme?”

  Trevor lets his fork fall to the edge of his plate and then leans back from the table.

  “No. I’m not in with your agent on any sort of crafty plan. I don’t even know what the fuck ‘erudite’ means.” He scrubs a hand down his face. “Yesterday, you were fierce out there. I was just trying to keep up. I called you because I couldn’t stop thinking about it. About you.”

  “Fierce? I don’t think anyone has ever used that word to describe me before.” I study on the concept in my head for a moment. “My agent always wants me to be, I don’t know, entertaining. On the show, it was easy with you.”

  “Because you’re looking for good PR? A girl like you with a guy like me?” He raises his eyebrows and cocks his head.

  “What? No. I’m not looking for anything.”

  “Why? Are you married? Boyfriend? Girlfriend?”

  “No. Why would I be here if I was with someone?”

  “You’d be surprised how people bend the rules.”

  He grabs his water from the table and takes a long drink. I’m not sure how we went from all those compliments he was dishing out an hour ago to this, where he’s questioning whether I’m a PR-chasing Hollywood social climber who may or may not have a lax attitude on infidelity.

  “I’m a widow.”

  “What?” Trevor looks up to face me again.

  “I was married. My husband died.”

  He shifts in his seat, the way everyone does when I knock them out with that piece of information. People usually look away and no matter how hard I try to draw them back in, it’s too much for them to look me in the eye again. He does, though. He rights his shoulders as if he might push through the awkwardness by force.

  “What happened? How long were you together? When did he die?”

  “Wow. Way to get right to it. Usually people just stammer out a sympathetic apology and then try to talk about the weather.”

  He shrugs but says nothing else. Looking down at my
napkin, I smooth it and wipe a few crumbs away. Despite how we were trading jabs less than a minute ago, telling Trevor about James feels perfectly OK. I used to wonder if it would ever get easier, telling people this story, if time would dull the sharp edges of my words so they wouldn’t stick in my throat or lead to tears. Usually, it feels as it always has. Painful and awkward. But when I turn my gaze to Trevor again he is simply waiting, without pushing or pressing, only waiting for me to tell him whatever I decide to.

  “James and I met when I was twenty-one. He moved to Crowell from Idaho, left a ranch up there to start working as a fly-fishing guide. I met him when he ran some ads in my dad’s newspaper for his guiding services. We dated for a year, got engaged, got married six months later, bought a house, picket fence, et cetera, et cetera.” I wave my hand into the empty space and then lean forward to slice another bite off my steak.

  “Were you happy?”

  “Definitely. I was lucky. No matter how short it was.”

  Trevor continues looking straight at me, so focused that I have to look away. It’s too much for a moment. I look down and grab my wineglass. Perhaps a bit more alcohol in my system will make this feel less overwhelming.

  “What happened?”

  I take another drink from my glass. Liquid courage, I tell myself. At this rate, I’ll be completely pickled by the time dessert arrives.

  “We had gone to Langston—it’s a bigger town about an hour away—and had dinner before we came home. We left the restaurant just as it started snowing and James had gotten up early to fish in the river, so I drove and then he could sleep. I hit a patch of ice and lost control. His side of the car hit a telephone pole.”

  I stop and glance at Trevor again, trying to gauge his reaction to this critical piece of information. That James dying was my fault. But it seems he isn’t judging or calculating anything; he’s only listening. Because of that unbiased expression, I suddenly don’t care if he knows too much or if he ends this dinner with a clammy handshake that shouts, “Never again!” Why feeling bare in front of him is so liberating, I don’t know. Perhaps it’s trust. Maybe it’s only misguided lust.