by Reiss, CD
Laughing with happiness bordering on delirium, he hugged me so tight that his gold rope chain pressed into my chin. His joy was so contagious I put my arms around his waist and my palms on the curve of his lower back, swaying with him as I surrendered to his moment.
My eyes were open, and over his shoulder I could see Evelyn and Eddie laughing. She seemed relaxed and chatty until she saw Justin hugging me and she put her hand over her mouth.
This looked weird. Everyone was going to think we were together. Kayla the Nobody and Justin Beckett—who was either loved or reviled by anyone with an internet connection.
Not the way I wanted to start fresh.
When I released him, he unwrapped himself. I thought it was over. We could just sit, and he could tell me what he was so happy about.
But he wasn’t done. He bent over and scooped me up, one arm under my knees and the other holding up my torso. I sucked in a breath, and he spun me around like a cyclone, whipping my head to the right, then the left when he changed direction.
“Hold up!” I shouted as he was about to change direction again.
He stopped. Smiling at me in a way that wasn’t rehearsed or manipulative. My arms were around his neck for leverage, but damn if it wouldn’t look like affection.
“You,” was all he said. “You did it!”
“What did I do?” I asked, letting my curiosity get the better of my desire to be put down.
Instead of answering, he looked around at his friends, as if realizing they were there for the first time. A sea of faces stared back at us with wide eyes. A bubble of humiliation welled up from my chest, as if I’d left the house without pants and didn’t notice until I was between stops on the subway.
He put me down, and I assumed he felt the same shame at his naked emotion.
I was wrong.
“Problem?” he asked the strangers circling us with his palms out at his sides, looking at each of them in turn with a challenge.
Shamelessness and entitlement had its advantages.
“What just happened?” I demanded.
“Come on.” He took my arm and tried to pull me away.
“Where are we going?” I leaned in the opposite direction. He took the hint and let my elbow go. I was afraid he was going to pick me up again, but he just smiled and spoke softly in my ear.
“The Emerald Room.” He nodded as if I was supposed to know what he was talking about, and I shook my head to let him know that not only had I never heard of the Emerald Room, I wasn’t going anywhere without a full description of his expectations.
“It’s fine,” he said.
“I’m not going into some strange color-coded room alone with you.”
He held his hands up, laughing.
“It’s not that. We can talk.” He tilted his head to the crowd that was breaking up but standing close to see if he lost his mind again.
“Don’t pick me up anymore.”
“Okay. Sorry.”
“And no touching.”
“No touching. Really. You can trust me.”
He went around the table and looked back at me to see if I was following. My clunky yellow shoes were rooted in place, and everyone was pretending to pay attention to something else.
I picked up my bag and walked beside him to yet another roped-off door.
The Emerald Room was pretty cool. Smaller than the VIP room, with soft lounge music and curved tufted booths tented with deep-green velvet curtains, it was quieter and less crowded. Some of the curtains had been drawn over the couches to hide the occupants. A slim white woman with penciled-on eyebrows led us to an empty booth.
“Can I get you something to drink?” she asked as we slid in.
“Club soda for me. She’ll have—”
“Same.”
Eyebrows started to draw the curtain.
“No,” I said.
“Leave it open,” Justin added, taking my signal. The woman nodded and left us sitting on opposite sides of the circle, my phone glass-up between us. Justin leaned forward without his usual slouch. He bounced his knee fast enough to make the heavy tabletop vibrate.
“So,” I said. “That was embarrassing.”
“Really?”
“You’re that unaware?”
He shrugged, glancing at the door.
“Sorry,” he said. Whatever elation his text had brought on had drained out of him.
“You’re forgiven.”
“What do I owe you? For everything you’ve done for me.”
“An explanation.”
He fiddled with the phone, spinning it on the tabletop before stopping it with a flat hand.
“I can’t.” He pushed it toward me.
“Look, it’s obvious what’s going on.” I left the phone there. “I just want you to say it.”
“Oh, really?” He looked more alarmed than curious.
“Sure. You’re half–bad boy, half-heartthrob. If America knew you were gay—”
“What?”
“Chad’s your lover. Right?”
He laughed and leaned back.
“It’s okay,” I said quickly. “It’s not like I care. And I know how people are. Your secret’s—”
“Hold on there.”
“—safe with me.”
“I’m not gay, and if I was . . .” He leaned forward again and folded his hands on the table. “I wouldn’t be banging Chad.”
It was my turn to fiddle with the phone, turning it glass-side-down and mirroring his knotted fingers.
Our drinks came. He sipped his. I put mine to the side.
“You going to drink it?”
“I hate club soda.”
“You’re a weird girl, you know that?”
“Yeah.”
“Okay.” He rubbed his thighs. “You want me to tell you everything? That what’s on your mind?”
“Yup. From the beginning.”
He looked around the room.
“I shouldn’t trust you.”
“You already did. Might as well finish the job.”
He chuckled, rubbing his palms together.
“Arright. Yeah.” He cleared his throat, and I let him stall. “I guess I owe you that.” His leg shook again. “From the beginning.”
He was really going to tell me. The enormous responsibility of my demand was dwarfed only by my desire to carry it.
“From the beginning.”
He shifted closer to me on the perimeter of the circle so he could talk at normal volume.
“Stop me if you know any of this.”
“I know nothing.”
He nodded once and began.
“I grew up in Echo Park. My parents were pretty strict about me and my brother doing sports or music and nothing else. I couldn’t hang with my buddies until I finished practice. So. One day . . .”
Justin Beckett was a good storyteller. He talked about his life without the thousand-watt charm or douchey dismissiveness. He wasn’t doing an interview for promotional sound bites or laying himself bare for the sake of fan sympathy.
“My dad has this sense of what’s gonna fly and what’s a waste of time,” he said, ring tapping his near-empty glass. “Like, no one, and I mean no one, thought Silver Lake needed a French restaurant. But they were wrong, and he was right. So when he heard us all sing together, he knew it was something. He’d spent years boozing up the right guys in the restaurant. Just in case. We were his just in case, I guess. He got in a coach. Hired a songwriter. Got releases from the guys’ parents.” He flipped his hand to indicate all the intermediate steps that weren’t interesting to him. “We went into Slashdot Records polished like Louise’s silver. I mean, we glowed in the dark.”
“I bet.”
“And I’ll say it again. These guys . . . you have brothers or sisters?”
“One sister.”
“So you know what I’m talking about when I say these dudes were my brothers.”
“Yeah. Sure.”
Technically, I did know
what it was like to have a sister, but I had the feeling Talia would never be to me what Justin’s three bandmates were to him.
“But. Okay, that was all background. This is the thing. It happened really fast.” He stopped himself and twisted his mouth as if blocking more words.
“Everything I say after this . . .” He pushed his index finger against the table. “It goes in a locked box.”
“My locked box?”
“My box to yours. It’s secret. You got it? You tell nobody. Not even your diary.” He held up his pinkie. “Swear.”
I hooked my pinkie in his, and he curled it around so tight it felt like a permanent chain.
“I swear,” I said. “Locked box.”
He pulled back, drawing me closer before letting go.
“All right,” he said. “Good.”
“Good.”
I had a secret with Justin Beckett. Almost as surreal as having his phone number.
“We were sixteen,” he said. “And after Boys on Valentine we were playing stadiums. It scrambles your head if you’re an adult. But we were kids. And Chad . . .” For the first time since he began, Justin faltered. “. . . he couldn’t deal. He kept disappearing. He always made shows and sessions, but, if we weren’t working, he was completely fucking off. A week would go by, then one of us would get a call from a police station in fucking Hemet or like . . . once he called me at four in the morning from a broom closet in Dodger Stadium. He was locked in and pissing in the . . . you know the yellow bucket with the mops that attach? And he was gonna wait until the janitors showed, but he had to take a shit, so . . .”
“What was he doing in there?”
He lifted his glass to his mouth and tipped it until a piece of ice dropped in. He crunched it against his back teeth like a walnut.
“He grew up in this building up in Elysian. Big yard they grow vegetables in. Apartments pretty nice. Kind of a commune. All hippies and conspiracy theorists. They don’t bother anyone, but it’s not like they’re bothered either. They just do what they want. Like smoke so much pot you get high sniffing the couch cushions.”
He let another ice cube drop past his lips and slapped the glass down.
“Did you know?”
He scoffed. “Sure. And it was fun until it wasn’t.”
“And his parents did nothing?”
“They gave him vitamin C.” He slapped his hand on the table and looked away. “They loved the hell out of him, and I’m not here judging . . . Club soda’s trash. I need a goddamn drink.”
He craned his neck around and waved at Eyebrows. Our server arrived with a smile, but telling the story had turned Justin’s joyful mood into surly agitation.
“Get her a—”
“Coke,” I said, too thirsty to waste a club soda and too intent on keeping my wits about me.
“Same but put Jack in mine.”
“One coke, one Jack and coke.” Eyebrows turned on her heel and left.
“So,” he said once she was gone. “Connect the dots.”
“Chad disappeared, and you were happy he agreed to come back.”
“Yup.” Elbows on the table, he rubbed his hands together. “You glad I dumped that on you?”
“Kind of.”
He had to look over his shoulder to see me. He regarded my face as if a two-word answer had illuminated me for the first time.
“What’s that mean?”
“You hated every minute of it.”
He pushed his body away from the table and twisted himself on the couch to face me, draping his arm over the back.
“Tell me how else I feel then,” he said.
“That’s cheating.”
“I’m a lot of things, but a cheater ain’t one.”
“You sure are a lot of things.”
“Such as?”
“A narcissistic egomaniac.”
“Ouch.”
“Enough about me.” I imitated his voice. “Tell me what you think of me.”
The drinks arrived. He took a quick sip from his and put it down, turning his full attention back to me, starting at my forehead, drifting down to my lips before meeting my eyes.
“Well?” he said expectantly.
“You want me to tell you about you?”
“Everyone does it. It’s a national pastime.”
I took a moment to sip my drink. It was cold and fizzy, and I was glad it wasn’t spiked with Jack Daniel’s.
“When my sister moved out here . . . I’m not saying it was this way for you with Chad, but it felt personal. Like I was dumped. I literally grieved. Then I got mad because our father left. Kind of. And she was leaving me too. Anyway. What I’m trying to say is I’d hate to go through it over and over. Not knowing if he’s coming back this time. So, I think you’re worried, for sure. But I also think you’re angry because he keeps leaving you. Which . . . you can’t be angry because it’s not his fault, and he needs you. So you pretend you’re not angry, which . . . you know . . . doesn’t help.”
“That’s not what I expected you to say.”
“Do I want to know what you expected?”
“I thought you were going to tell me to get over it.”
“What?” I laughed. “Why?”
“The tough-girl thing.”
“That’s what you need to get over.”
“Yeah, you’re almost kind of nice.”
“Me? Kind of nice?”
“Yeah, you. The mean one with the . . .” He pointed to my face as if looking for the right word. “Those eyes.”
“These eyes?”
“With the lashes that make you seem all girly and soft until you open your mouth to bite my balls off.”
“You’re the asshole who—”
“I know, I know. I’m the asshole who.” I thought he was reaching for his drink, but he picked up my phone and handed it to me. “Unlock it.”
“Why?”
“To show you something.”
“You know the code.”
“I want you to do it.”
I’d fallen into the trap of offering consent by curiosity.
“I should bite your balls off.”
“You’ll break your teeth. Come on. Open it.”
I pressed my thumb to the home button, and he turned the screen to his face. It lit up his cheeks, casting his skin in blue and his honey-colored late-night beard in black.
“What are you doing?” I slid into him to see him open text messages, and without either of us thinking, I was enfolded in his free arm with my shoulder against his chest.
“Putting my ass on the line,” he said. “They have audit access to my cellular.”
“Who’s they?”
—Dude. New number. 310-555-7161
Don’t call the other one.—
“Bunch of lawyers and guys in suits. They find out Chad’s calling my new digits and I picked up they’re going to break my ass.”
We watched, but no dots appeared to confirm Chad was answering. Justin lifted the arm that was flung over the back of the booth and put his thumb on my bare shoulder, drawing a quivering line down my arm. When I turned to look at him, he was an inch away, already facing me.
“Maybe he’s still driving,” I said.
“Probably.” His breath was still cool from the ice.
“You’re firing me.”
“Pack your things and get out.” His lips were just about to touch mine when my phone buzzed in his hand. We looked down.
THIS NUMBER HAS BLOCKED YOU
“Wow,” I said.
Moment broken, Justin took his arm from around me. I suddenly felt foolish for nearly kissing him and disappointed that we hadn’t really kissed.
“There you go.” He handed me my phone. “He’s probably going to call me in a few minutes.”
“That’s fine. I should check on Evelyn.”
“I’ll walk you out.”
“No, no, it’s fine.”
“Carter can bring you.” He snapped his fingers, and
like a shadow the handsome bodyguard appeared.
“Mr. Beckett?”
“Make sure she meets up with her friend, would you?”
Two feet tall and half-invisible, even in yellow platforms, I stood up. Having been encircled in his attention, moments before, I now felt shut out. This guy was giving me emotional whiplash, and I hated that I’d given him that power over me.
Carter nodded and motioned for me to go first.
“Kayla,” Justin called.
“What?” I snapped. He had no right to make me feel like this with his douchecore getup and stupid tattoos, and I had no business letting him do it. I was too good for his trash ego and his irritating entitlements.
“Thank you for everything.”
“No problem.”
“You’re amazing.”
“I know.”
“See you on set.”
The bar wasn’t as lively as when I’d gone into the Emerald Room, but Eddie was still there, alone. I thanked Carter and sat next to him.
“Where’d she go?” I asked.
“She just took off. Middle of her sentence.”
“What were you talking about?”
I sounded suspicious, because I was. Women didn’t just take off in the middle of a sentence without a reason.
“Something we had in common,” he said. “Is it me? Do I come off wrong?”
“Were you coming off or coming on?”
He held his hands up.
“There was no touching, I swear. We were talking about costumes.” He stopped himself and shook his head. “Putting them on.” Again, he second-guessed his words. “Separately.” His shoulders slumped as if he was giving up.
“Okay, okay. Stop.” I rescued him. “I get it.”
“Can you just make sure she’s okay?”
“Yes,” I said. “First thing. I’ll take care of it.”
“Thank you.”
He seemed genuinely relieved, but I wouldn’t give him any credit for being a decent man until I heard from Evelyn. I’d been fooled before.
CHAPTER 8
JUSTIN
The morning after Kayla met me at NV, I had a late call, so I slept in. Everyone thought I was some kind of man of leisure, but I didn’t get to stay in bed much. Getting up early to work my ass off wasn’t the brand. No one wanted to hear about that. They wanted their songs and their redemption story, not fourteen hours in the studio or the days in a room memorizing lines.
