Authors: Stacey Kade
“You don’t need it?” I ask, taking it from him. It’s soft, well-worn cotton. Not a dress shirt, but probably something he wears over jeans.
He shrugs. “Not today, and there’s laundry service here. I’ve already got a bag started.” He jerks a thumb over his shoulder to a plastic drawstring bag on the floor, workout clothes—the edge of a T-shirt and the blue leg with white stripes of athletic shorts—hanging out.
I slide my arms in his shirt and then flip my hair out so it’s not tucked underneath. His shirt smells good, but what I like most are the worn parts on the cuffs and edges, threads coming free, as if it’s been washed, dried, and worn dozens and dozens of times. It has history.
The shirt is loose but not swimming on me, and I immediately feel better with it on. After folding up the cuffs, I button most of the buttons and tie the two sides in the front into a loose knot at my waist.
Chase nods. “Yeah, that.” He steps back and gives me a professional look from head to toe. “Pink is covered, and it’s definitely not tight.” That hint of teasing in his voice from earlier makes a brief reappearance, and I nod like a pleased idiot.
“Give me your shirt from yesterday.” He holds out his hand.
I return to the pile of clothes on my bed to pull it free.
When I give him the shirt, he puts it in the laundry bag on top of his clothes, pulls the drawstring tight, and drops the bag on the table.
“It’ll be ready for tomorrow, okay?” he asks.
I bob my head. “Thanks.” I hate that I need to be coddled like this, but I’m grateful that he’s treating it like something semi-normal instead of asking me twenty times if I’m okay.
Of course I’m not okay. Some part of my brain is convinced that picking the right shirt will keep me safe. And the reverse also: that picking the wrong shirt is somehow tempting fate to strike twice in the same place, like lightning. If that’s not crazy, it’s knocking distance.
But Chase just shrugs. “No problem. You want to go out this way?” He gestures toward his hall door.
“Yeah.” As we pass his mirrored closet doors, I catch a glimpse of myself. He’s right; the pink is reduced to a narrow V at my chest, and the white fabric is loose around my shoulders and blousing outward until it reaches my waist, where I’ve tied it off.
It is very clearly not
my
shirt.
But I like the way it looks. In my reflection, I don’t see the innocent child my mother is trying desperately to revive in me, or the girl who’s hiding beneath miles of flannel or old college T-shirts from a school she didn’t even go to.
This person, the one in the mirror wearing
this
shirt, looks like someone who has a connection to another person. A connection that might be intimate or just friendly, but definitely personal. I might not have that yet, but it feels good to see myself as someone who could. It’s like a peek into a hoped-for future.
I touch the collar gently, feeling the softened and curled nubs of the formerly pointed edges.
But I have to warn Chase, because the image in the mirror also screams something else.
“This might start rumors,” I say, gesturing down at myself as he pulls open the hall door.
He stops so suddenly I almost collide with his back. Then he turns with a frown and looks at me, his gaze sweeping me up and down. After a moment, the muscles at his jaw tighten and jump, like he’s grinding his teeth.
Uh-oh.
My heart sinks for reasons I’m not sure I want to identify, and I take a quick step back.
Before I can say anything, his frown vanishes beneath a smooth, empty expression. “I don’t care if you don’t.” His tone is carefully neutral, a little too much so.
I don’t know what I expected him to say, but that doesn’t stop the swell of disappointment in me at his response.
“No,” I say. Because I don’t care. Not in the way he means. But what I’m thinking is maybe that’s not quite the same thing as not caring at all.
Chase
Amanda is quiet in her corner of the elevator, studying her clasped hands, peeking out from the cuffs of my shirt, or the tiles on the floor. I can’t tell which.
I drag my gaze away, only to find myself staring at her reflection in the shiny gold-tinted doors before us.
I like that she’s wearing my shirt. It looks good on her. And it sets off this greedy sense of
mine
in me.
It sounds caveman, but it’s more like pride.
Look, this girl who is strong and fighting so hard—she trusts me.
Watching the tension roll out of her shoulders when she pulled my shirt on made me feel stupidly like a hero.
But letting myself feel that, just like wanting her smile last night to be something I deserved, is dangerous. I’m navigating a fine line between truth and a convenient fiction, and my conscience is threatening to throw a rod.
Elise will love that Amanda’s in my shirt, which means I probably should have taken it back once Amanda pointed out the implications, but I couldn’t.
I wanted her to wear it. I wanted to help.
Even now, when I should be focused on locking in the scene and Smitty and preparing for the first day of shooting, which never runs smoothly, I can feel Amanda’s nervousness rising with every floor we descend, and I want to fix it, though I don’t know how.
I know better than to ask her if she’s sure she wants to do this, because she’s made that pretty clear. But that doesn’t stop me from feeling the need to do something.
I clear my throat, and she looks up at me. “So, it should be pretty easy,” I say, my mouth absurdly dry.
She nods, though I’m not sure if that’s agreement or simply encouragement to continue.
“We’ll have transport to location. A van.” I had the identifying information in an email on my phone from the driver, a guy named Ron.
“There might be a couple of photographers waiting outside the hotel or when we get to set,” I continue. “So we’ll stop, let them get a few shots, and then move on. Five minutes, tops. Simple, no pressure. Okay?”
Amanda nods again, mute.
I desperately want to see a flash of the girl who stood in my doorway this morning, turning six shades of red, and still held it together enough to be smart with me.
Unfortunately, I suck at this kind of stuff in real life. “So it’s my turn to ask questions, right?” I ask.
She frowns at me.
“The car, last night,” I prompt. “You never told me what your favorite color is.”
Her eyebrows lift in amusement. “And you know that’s still the lamest possible question you could ask, right?” she asks.
I grin. Better. “I’ll work on it,” I say.
The doors open, revealing a lobby bustling with activity. A group of businesspeople in suits are gathered around the check-in desk, their rolling briefcases lined up around them with the pull handles extended, like an impromptu cage.
I step out, Amanda just behind me, and head for the hotel turnaround, where the van is supposed to be waiting.
“Mr.… uh, Dean? Mr. Dean?” A balding man in a dark blue suit coat behind the registration desk—the manager, presumably—calls out as soon as he catches sight of us.
The muscles in my neck tense, shooting pain down to my shoulders and up into my head, and I ignore him, heading toward the glass lobby doors.
“Don’t you think you should—” Amanda begins.
“No,” I say. “He just wants to apologize again.”
Amanda looks up at me, waiting for an explanation.
I sigh. “The room service guy.”
“Because he banged on the door?” Amanda asks. “That was my fault. I didn’t—”
“No, because he signed a fake name to the receipt. The wrong one,” I add when she opens her mouth to point out the obvious. “And he tipped himself anyway, thinking we wouldn’t notice because we’re probably throwing money around like crazy.” I pause. “And yeah, because he scared you.” Mostly because of that.
Amanda stays silent.
Slowing down, I say, “Look, I know it sounds like some kind of star temper tantrum or whatever, but people who don’t see you as a real person, for whatever reason, are dangerous.” Especially when they have relatively easy access to your room.
“Did they fire him?” she asks quietly, stopping next to me.
“Yes.” Theoretically. I was assured that it
would
happen.
“Mr. Dean?” The manager sounds breathless now, and his hurried footsteps echo in pursuit of us. He’s left the counter to chase us down.
I start walking again quickly.
Not now.
It shouldn’t have taken me pushing that hard to get the manager to take action, and I don’t want to hear any more excuses.
“Good,” Amanda says at my side, surprising me into glancing down at her.
She gives me a tight smile. “Makes me a bad person, right? Admitting that I wanted him to be gone?” She shrugs. “Guess I’m not the virtuous, selfless victim everyone makes me out to be.” Her tone is light and breezy, but there’s a thick layer of guilt underneath.
“Nope,” I say. “Makes you human.” I nudge her side gently with my elbow. “They can always hire him back next week.”
She nods, relief playing across her face, and then, as we approach the tinted glass doors that will let us out, she loops her arm through mine, resting her hand on my bicep.
It’s a friendly, maybe even playful, gesture, but the jolt of it runs through me.
Her hand is small and light on my arm, and I can’t believe it’s there.
The shock of her voluntarily touching me is quickly surpassed by that same warm burst of pride and the squeezing, conflicted feeling of having earned trust that I don’t deserve.
But I don’t get a chance to feel too guilty about it. Because as soon as the doors open and we step out, flashes explode around us, dozens of them. It’s blinding, disorienting.
I throw my free arm up instinctively, though that will make most of the photos unsalable.
What the hell is this? Way more than the photographer or two Elise had mentioned. This is a fucking mob scene.
The air is full of shouting and the hiss-click of digital cameras.
“Amanda! Amanda, look this way!”
“Chase, give us a smile. Are the two of you together?”
“Chase, any truth to the rumor that you’re quitting the business?”
“Amanda, baby, you’re beautiful; just give us a smile. Show everybody how you’re doing.”
Amanda’s hand tightens into a claw on my arm, and my heart is pounding like it wants to run away without me. I forgot this. How quickly exhilaration at the attention converts into panic, especially when you’re not expecting a barrage of it.
Like when you feel like shit after your second attempt at a thirty-day dry-out and the cameras are there, waiting to capture you at your worst.
Like when your former costar is arrested on drug charges, and the paparazzi show up outside your gym to make sure you know about it.
Suddenly I want a drink. I can feel the burn of it down my throat and into my gut and the smooth confidence it would provide. It would make this situation so much easier, just like it did before. I’d have the right thing to say, a cocky smile to give, or I just wouldn’t care if I didn’t.
But that is not an option at the moment. Next to me, I feel Amanda shaking. A glance down shows her dark eyes glassy with panic, not unlike yesterday morning at the grocery store.
Shit.
I loop my arm around Amanda’s shoulders and turn her around with me toward the hotel. Her hand clutches hard at the back of my shirt, pulling the fabric tight.
Once we’re far enough into the lobby again, the glass doors slide shut behind us, muffling the noise.
Amanda releases her grip on my shirt and slowly moves to the nearest pillar, pressing her back against the side facing away from the doors. Then she sinks to her knees.
“Are you okay?” I ask.
She nods, her head down. “Yes.” But her breathing, artificially slow and steady, says differently. She inhales through her nose and exhales through her mouth, in a controlled manner. Her face is pale, and her hand is trembling when she pushes her hair back.
I fidget, wanting to help, but in this case, there’s no one to punch. Or too many of them, depending on how you look at it.
“Are you sure?” I ask gruffly, my hand in a fist at my side.
“Just took me by surprise,” Amanda says. “I wasn’t expecting that many of them,” she says, glancing up at me. “I kind of froze. Sorry.” Her face tightens with regret.
“Nothing to be sorry for. I wasn’t expecting that, either.” Fucking Elise. She’s behind this, I’m sure.
Footsteps approach from deeper in the lobby, and I pivot, moving to block Amanda, crouched low, from view.
But it’s just the blue-coated manager. “I’m sorry, Mr. Dean,” he says, his gaze darting to Amanda and then back to me quickly. “I was trying to catch you to warn you. They got here a few minutes ago, and our security—”
“It’s fine,” I say, fighting the urge to yell at him. They’re not used to this kind of thing in middle-of-nowhere Wescott any more than they would be in Tillman, and he did try to warn me. “Can you just get us out another door?” I ask. “I can call Transportation and have them pick us up there.”
“Of course.” The manager nods so rapidly his double chin wobbles with the motion. “If you’ll follow me—”
“No,” Amanda says.
I turn to look at her. “What?”
“No.” Amanda pushes to her feet, one hand pressed to the pillar to steady herself. “This is what…” Her eyes shift to me, and she gives me a significant look.
This is what we came for.
That’s what she’s trying to say. And she’s right, to some extent.
But I never thought we would be dealing with it at this level. And beyond that, following through with the plan suddenly doesn’t seem as vital as it did yesterday.
I shake my head. “Amanda—”
“This is important,” she finishes instead, her chin tipped up. “I’m not going to let those assholes tell their version of me, selling pictures of me running away. No.” She folds her arms over her chest.
Amanda might be feeling bold, but I’m not. I’m responsible. For her, for the situation, and for whatever the combination of the two brings about, and the weight of that is making me a little panicky.