Always Box Set

by Ward, Susan

  I start to do my makeup and another knock on the door makes me jerk, totally messing up my eyeliner. Fuck, my room is like Grand Central Station today. It better not be the rest of the peckerwoods. Manny early is more than enough to deal with.

  “I’ve ordered us breakfast,” I hear Alan call from the bedroom.

  You did, did you? You don’t even know if I eat breakfast or if I’d be in my room when you came here.

  I have kept my personal life completely private. Alan doesn’t know anything about me or my background, none of them do. The last thing I want these jerkoffs to know is that I’m having an affair with Jackson Parker.

  I shake my head in aggravation and reach for my mascara. Affair. I don’t like the way that sounds. It’s more significant than that. Jack is right.

  “Would you prefer coffee or tea?” he asks.

  Duh, I’m American. “Coffee,” I say louder than necessary for my voice to be heard in the bedroom. “Black. No sugar. No cream. Just fucking coffee.”

  More laughter floats in from the other room. “You’re in a foul mood, aren’t you, Linda? You must not have gotten a minute’s sleep. You are very snappy today.”

  I grit my teeth as I touch up my blush one last time. I scatter the thoughts of what caused my sleepless night and I start to untie my robe. I freeze. Crap, my clothes are still in the bedroom.

  I step out of the bathroom and freeze again. Second shock in under twenty minutes. Where the fuck did all this come from?

  Alan is standing beside the table. “Why don’t you sit down and let me serve you? You deserve someone taking care of you for a change, Linda.”

  Both the subtle alteration of his voice and the scene in front of me strikes me mute. For a second, he sounded like a normal person. But there is nothing normal about this.

  The table has been set elegantly with a linen cloth, china, silver and even a dozen red roses arranged as a center piece. Next to it is a cart artfully displaying a wide selection of breakfast entrees and pastries.

  I move slowly across the bedroom and am startled again when Alan pulls back my chair for me. I drop into it, a little heavier than I wanted to, and am carefully eased forward.

  I stare up at him. “What is this? Some sort of attempt to romance me over Danish? Trust me. I’m not interested. I thought I’d made that clear.”

  He smiles, unruffled by my harsh tone, and lightly brushes my tense cheek with an index finger. “This is my apology for last night. It did not occur to me until I saw your face that I had made you uncomfortable.”

  Really? I shake my head. “That would have made anyone uncomfortable. There is something seriously wrong with you if you didn’t know that before you let me enter the room.”

  That intense black stare meets mine directly and his finger moves lightly to my jaw. The gentleness of his touch, the feel of his flesh makes my head spin. The expression on his face is puzzling, yet unthreatening.

  “There is nothing wrong with me.” His raspy whisper makes my heart leap against my chest. “I prefer group sex. Watching is part of it. Part of the thrill. You coming into my room added to the pleasure we were having together. I thought it was something you might be into. Might enjoy. And I was serious when I asked you to join us.”

  I slap his hand away. “Bullshit. You fucked with me last night and you are trying to fuck with me today. And I’m getting very tired of it. I need this job and you make it unbearable.”

  He turns back to the cart and doesn’t answer. He scoops small servings of each item onto a plate and then sets it before me. He fills my coffee cup.

  I focus on my meal as he prepares his own breakfast and then he settles at the table across from me. I feel the heavy pressure of his eyes.

  “I’m not fucking with you, Linda. You are one of the few people I like.”

  I look at him and tense. His eyes are smoky and amused, but hidden within their shadowy depths is something I’ve never seen before. A hint of kindness and sincerity.

  “If this is how you treat the people you like, I would despise it if you hated me,” I counter sarcastically.

  Alan laughs. Damn.

  “I admit I can be difficult at times,” he says conversationally.

  “Difficult? No, you are more like a flesh-eating bacteria that someone needs to invent a cure for.”

  His head goes back this time as he laughs, his dark waves dancing, his eyes flashing with shimmers. I drop my gaze and carefully fill my fork with eggs. He doesn’t insult easily and he does have a sense of humor. I’ll give him that.

  “We’re going to get along just fine, Linda. You’ll see.”

  I reach for my coffee cup. “I don’t think that we need to worry about getting along. The tour is over in two weeks. Once it’s done, I don’t ever have to see you again.”

  His eyes fix on mine and my insides begin to shimmy.

  “You won’t have to see me again, but you will. You’ll see me again because you’ll want to.”

  I shake my head. “Aha. So you are not just a twisted motherfucker, you’re a fortune teller, too.”

  His lips quirk up in a half-smile.

  “You are a bit of a paradox yourself. What are you doing in England, anyway?”

  I roll my eyes. “Nothing shocking, I assure you. Sandy Harris gave me a job. It was the only one I was offered after college, and it has the added benefit of being where I was accepted into graduate school or I wouldn’t have taken it. I’m just here trying to make a buck to put myself through school. End of story.”

  Alan lights a cigarette and sits back in his chair. He studies me. “No, I don’t think that’s end of story. You didn’t run to England toward something. You ran from California away from something.” He inhales and then exhales very slowly another long puff of smoke. His gaze sharpens. “Someone, I think. You ran from someone.”

  Startled, I stare, battling to keep a reaction from my face. Oh God…how can he see that? It is not even a truth I admit to myself. And as painful of a thing to know something, it is crueler to hear it.

  “I’m right, aren’t I?” he says softly, confidently.

  I ignore the question.

  “You left behind in California someone you love. For some reason you thought you had to. What was he, Linda? Married? Unfaithful? Or just unable to commit? You’re here because you’re running from him and hiding from yourself.”

  Scrambling in an emotional tidal wave, I snap, “I’m not running from anyone. You are wrong about almost everything. But there is someone in my life. We are still together. I love him with all my heart. When I finish school, I’m going home and marrying him.”

  His calm in the face of my welling panic is humiliating. “I don’t think so. You’re here because for whatever reason you can’t let yourself be with him. Oh, you love him, but you’ve run from him all the same or you’d be there with him still. It’s also why you fight this intense physical attraction between us and won’t fuck me. Some quaint lower class notion of morality. Keeping yourself for some guy who didn’t care enough not to let you go.”

  I don’t know what to do with this or how to manage Alan. Lower class nothing of morality? What an arrogant prick.

  “Fuck you,” I hiss. “I want you out of my room. Now.”

  “I don’t do bullshit, Linda. I may not always be kind, but I always tell the truth.”

  “You are confusing being truthful with being mean. God, you are a fucked-up kid. That’s all you are.” I stare at him, simmering with rage. “What happened to you, Alfie Wells? Did Mommy fuck with your mind in between the beatings and now you go out of your way to prove to every woman on the earth what an asshole you can be because she made you hate us all?”

  Oh shit, why did I blurt that out?

  The change in his face, the way he stares at me is terrifying.

  Dammit, I’ve just cost myself my job. Never repeat this. Never repeat he is Alan Wells, aka Alfie Wells. I can’t even count the number of
times the execs at the label said that before they gave me the reports on Alan.

  His brows slowly hitch upward as his eyes widen. “My, you are a vicious little girl, aren’t you? You fight like a gutter cat.” His black eyes lock on mine. “Did Daddy not love you? Is that why you’re a bitch and a tease to men? Is that why you ran from a man you love? Daddy didn’t love you so no man can?”

  My hand suddenly is burning and in horror I realize I’ve slapped him, so hard that my own palm feels like it’s already swelling. The large red print on his cheek fills my vision. Damn. Damn. Damn. He’s got a television interview in an hour. I’ve fucked up again in record time.

  I spring from the table and start to take my clothes from my suitcase. “I want you out of here. I want you out of here now.”

  My body is shaking so badly I can’t move. I breathe in. I breathe out. Fuck, I’ve just screwed up my entire life. Sandy is going to fire me if I don’t fix this quickly.

  I stare at my hands, choking down my pride, unable to look at Alan. “I apologize for what I said and for slapping you. I would appreciate it if you didn’t let Sandy Harris know about this.” I look at him, wide-eyed and pleading. “I really do need this job. That wasn’t bullshit, Manny. I’m broke.”

  Those penetrating eyes are stripped of expression. “I would never tell Sandy Harris about this.” His voice is breathy and his gaze wanders over me in a leisurely way that is tender and oddly comforting. “I’m a lot of things, Linda, but spiteful I am not. I would never take from you a job you need.”

  I exhale a ragged breath. “Thank you.”

  He crosses the room, hovering over me, watching my unchecked relief while I squirm. “You can say anything you want to me, Linda. I’d rather you always speak what you believe to be truth than to lie to me. The only thing I can’t stomach is a liar.”

  I am too weak to remain crouched before my bag, and my legs give way and I sink to sit on the floor. “You should put some ice on your cheek.”

  A small smile teases the corners of his mouth. “Don’t worry about it. It’s not the first time I’ve been slapped. It won’t even show in half an hour.”

  I decide to make a feeble attempt at a jest. “Oh, you’ve experienced this before? You mean all women don’t find you irresistibly charming?”

  Alan laughs and settles on my bed, reclining on a hip. “Regrettably not.”

  I drag my gaze away from him because the way he’s arranged his body is unforgivably suggestive and appealing. Fuck, why does he have to be so beautiful, so sexually tempting in every breath, even when he’s been an asshole and I am pissed at him?

  I start rummaging in my bag for my shoes to keep myself from looking at him. I dig deeper through my clothes for a belt.

  He is silent, and I can feel him watching me. My hands start to tremble. I suddenly feel painfully awkward and too aware in my flesh of him.

  A knock on the door saves me from this extremely unpleasant moment.

  “Do you mind getting that? I’m not dressed yet.”

  Alan lights yet another cigarette. “It’s probably room service come to collect the carts. Who cares if you’re in your bathrobe?”

  He makes no move to assist me. I make a face at him, jump to my feet, cross the room and open the door.

  Len tugs on the tie at my waist. “Luscious Linda, you’re not dressed yet. Long night or are you trying to tease me again?”

  I glare at him in a fuck-off kind of way as the band brushes by me through the door. They get halfway into the room and freeze in unison. Oh shit, this is all I need. Their expressions say everything. Me in my robe. Alan on my bed. The breakfast remains. They think he’s won the moronic bet I’m sure they made about which one of them would bag me first.

  I slam the door.

  “Give me five minutes. I need to dress,” I say calmly, and rush toward the bathroom. Inside I sink down on the counter and drop my face into my hands. Damn. I can hear them laughing. My circumstance just dropped one level lower than intolerable. I don’t want anyone to think I’m just a piece of ass for Alan Manzone.

  “If you fuck with Linda, you are fucking with me now,” I hear Alan’s voice float through the door. “So all you wankers back off and leave her alone.”

  Four

  The minutes drag at the television studio even though everything around me is moving at breakneck speed, and the guys won’t settle down long enough to finish the segment.

  I never knew so much went into taping a thirty minute interview. I thought they’d plop down in their chairs, be asked some questions, hopefully return amusing and charming—semi-coherent, would be nice as well—answers, and we’d be done in an hour.

  But no, there was a long stint in makeup, made extra-long to cover the handprint on Alan’s cheek, and a never-ending series of start, stop, roll tape, antics, aggravations, cut, touch up makeup, start, and stop that’s taken us half a day.

  “Len Rowan, can you tell me what your musical influences are?” I hear the interviewer ask through the headphones on my ears.

  Shit, why did the interviewer ask Len a question? And why can’t he just answer it without acting like a fool? Fuck, this is for American TV. The big banana. Suck it up for thirty minutes and try to act like normal human beings.

  Thank God this isn’t going out live and it’s being taped, and hopefully Arnie can get the station to leave on the cutting room floor the less flattering moments caught by the cameraman.

  Third hideous surprise of the day was Arnie Arnowitz, the manager, making an appearance. What a fucking waste of space that man is. He sucks as a manager. He is never on the road with the guys. Never checks in on them. For all I know he doesn’t even talk to them, though that’s probably best because he sucks as a human being.

  How could Alan make such a stupid decision as to sign with him when everything Alan does is with such exceptional expertise? I definitely need to talk to him about that one. They should have run from Arnie on day one.

  I glance over at him sitting in the chair beside me and shudder. He’s eating a freaking scone, dripping crumbs down the front of his shirt and over his pants, and he looks like a pig at a trough. He acts like one, too. He’s not slick Willy, he’s sewer Willy.

  It is so strange that is he part of the tight circle Alan has assembled around himself? Two months has taught me one thing. There is nothing random in Alan Manzone’s life. Everything plays out as if perfectly scripted and choreographed. If Arnie is here Alan has a reason for it. Though for the life of me I can’t figure out what it is.

  I lean forward in my director-style chair and fix my eyes on the monitor. How is it possible that Alan looks even more gorgeous on screen? Perfect is perfection. That should be it. Done. No new level to attain, but the camera loves his face and somehow he transcends perfection into something even beyond description.

  I lean back so I can look at the guys on the set. If we were playing which one doesn’t belong it would definitely be Alan. I’ve never met anyone with a greater sense of self-awareness, of how to use their body, the presentation they could create, how to utilize the space around them and how to master it well. No wonder the cameraman adores him and Alan is getting more screen time than the rest of the band put together.

  Well, that’s probably a good thing. The only one visually appealing is Alan. Len is being his perfect, moronic, clowning self. Jimmy comes across just plain scary. And Kenny, he is a boorish gutter thug in even his best moments.

  I lean in again to watch the monitor, feel a jolt through my body, and jerk back from the screen as black eyes meet mine directly. Fudge, how did Alan do that? Know exactly how to look into the camera to directly hit my eyes, and damn, if his gaze is not flickering with amusement and those shimmers he has that makes everything inside me start to twirl. It’s almost like he knows he caught me studying him, eyes locked on eyes through the television monitor.

  I shift my body in the chair to look at him on the set, and he adjusts h
is posture in an elegant, subtle flow of movement so that briefly his eyes lock on me again.

  Aha, so the camera trick wasn’t an accident. How the fuck did he do that? A barely contained smile is teasing the edges of his lips. Fucker.

  The action on the set changes and the crew starts unclipping microphones from the guys. Alan rises and the female interviewer rushes to stand a touch too close to him. Ah, another victim. Spend five minutes with him and it seems every female on the British Isles becomes possessed by Alan fever.

  She tosses her head, fingers in hair, laughing. Jeez, she couldn’t be more fake in her flirtatiousness if she tried. He touches her cheek lightly with an index finger, the gesture so similar to how he touched my face this morning that my body has the insulting audacity to feel it.

  Crap.

  Well, Alan definitely has plans tonight, and it is not my problem to keep a watch over him for the next four days. I’m out of here. Finally. No need to stay and witness this.

  I spring from my chair and start gathering my things.

  “Since they’re done, I’m assuming I can cut out,” I say to Arnie.

  Arnie looks at me, startled. “Sure, Linda. I wasn’t expecting you to even be here.”

  My brows hitch upward. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me that when this started? I could have been on my way back to London hours ago.”

  Something in his eyes makes my stomach turn. “I thought you wanted to be here. You seemed enamored by the process.” He says that in a way that leaves little doubt what he means by enamored.

  I internally contain a shudder and pull on my coat. “Tell the guys I’ll see them next gig.”

  I quickly head toward the door and out onto the sidewalk. I search the street, looking for Phil and the car. Shit, not here. Somehow in two months in the UK I’ve managed not to have to take any form of public transportation. But today it will be cab then train to the city.

  Do they call it a train? No, something else. Not subway. How am I supposed to find it if I don’t recall what they call it? Why is everything called something different in the UK? What is it they call the bathroom?