32. Brooke
32
brOOKE
The alarm next to my bed goes off, and I sit bolt upright and throw my arm out in a panic, feeling around for Lucas.
Yesterday was terrifying. I half remember being trapped in Susie’s head to the point that I didn’t know who I was, for a solid day and night and the next day. I don’t even remember everything I said or did. There are blank patches in my memory.
“Lucas, wake up!” I yell. “Lucas, I’m serious!”
The door bangs open, and Tara walks in. Tara, my roommate. Tara, with her streak of pink hair and her black leggings with the holes in them, with fishnet peeking through.
“What the hell?” she laughs.
I look around the room and suck in a startled gasp. I’m back. I’m in my room in my two-bedroom apartment in Manhattan.
There’s no one in bed with me.
“Dang, woman, you must have had one hell of a dream.” She’s leaning on the doorframe and holding her favorite coffee mug, the Nightmare Before Christmas mug that I got for her last year. “Do you realize you just yelled out your hot boss’s name in your sleep? Busted,” she smirks.
I sit up and frantically scan the room, my heart thudding in my chest. All the cutesy country touches have vanished.
The walls are exposed brick. There are pictures of my family on the wall, and framed posters of plays that I’ve seen. My curtain is a colorful shawl that I bought in Chinatown, and my window opens to a view of the brownstone next door. It’s definitely my room.
“Did I?” I push my comforter back and swing my legs off the side of the bed. “I don’t remember doing that.” I stifle a yawn. I’m both panicked and exhausted. I feel like I just came out of a very heavy sleep.
“Don’t shoot the messenger, but I always thought you had a crush on him. There’s a thin line between love and wanting to boink your boss, as they say.”
“I don’t think anyone says that.” I swallow hard, trying to orient myself.
Tara is not freaking out. Tara is not crying with relief at seeing me. She’s not demanding to know where I’ve been. That means I haven’t been missing for weeks.
“What day is it?”
She looks at me oddly. “You mean what time is it? Nine a.m., so you must have slept in. You usually get up early on Saturdays. I didn’t know if I should wake you, but then I thought, the hell with it. You deserve to sleep in, and maybe if you’re late to work, he’ll fire you.”
She sighs and shakes her head. “I know it’s selfish of me, but he’s just such a tyrant. A sexy tyrant, but still, you have no life and it’s all his fault.”
I feel a sudden rush of protectiveness. She only ever got to hear one side of the story—my side. “Oh, he’s not so bad.”
“I’m sorry, what? Lucas Sheffield isn’t so bad? What in the pod people is going on here? You’re not Brooke Langley. ”
I shudder. She has no idea how close that came to being true.
“Just joking. I’m not fully awake yet.” I stand up and clutch at my bedstand. “Uh, today’s Saturday. Of course. I knew that.” So I’ve only been gone for a day. “What time did I get home last night?”
“Not sure. She shrugs. “I didn’t see you come home. I got home at eleven and went straight to bed.”
She never knew I was missing. My parents never knew I was missing. A huge weight lifts from my shoulders, and I take a deep breath and let it out in a whoosh of air. “Oh. I see. Uh, I’d better get ready for work.”
“Or quit,” she suggests hopefully, for the millionth time.
“We’ll see,” I smile faintly.
“Yeah, yeah, sure. You and Lucas are going to have adjoining beds in a nursing home and he’s going to be barking orders at you when you’re a hundred years old.” She looks disappointed. “See you later. I’m going to the theater. I’ve got a potential new director to interview.”
“Bye.”
After she leaves, I grab my cell phone off my nightstand. I kiss it. “I missed you,” I tell it, and then I quickly dial Lucas.
The phone goes straight to voicemail, which, given the circumstances, is more than a little odd.
You’d think he’d be waiting by the phone, or calling me, to say something like “Holy hell! We’re back!”
I get dressed quickly, pulling on a pink Alexander McQueen pantsuit that Lucas’s stylist bought for me. As I do, I see it in a new light.
Everything he ever bought for me fit perfectly, flattered me perfectly, and was in a style that I loved.
He made a big deal about how I needed to project a certain image if I was going to work for Sheffield Properties, but he never bought work clothes for any other assistant. Or for anyone else who worked for him.
He wasn’t doing it because of the company’s image. He was doing it for me.
He’s done so many things for me.
And now, I have to go to work, and it’s going to be awkward because he and I have been shaboinking like animals for the past few weeks, and we left everything very up in the air.
I try to call him again as I hurry down the steps, and again after I wave down a cab.
Voicemail, voicemail, voicemail.
I text him half a dozen times. I can’t stop staring out the window as we drive.
We’re home.
We’ve left everyone behind, and I’m going to miss them so much, but I think we left them all in a great place and they’ll go on to have happy lives.
We’re weaving through Manhattan traffic, people are honking and cursing the way they always do, and I want to roll down the window just to inhale the exhaust fumes.
I’m home, I’m home, I’m home.
But why isn’t Lucas answering me? I’m honestly starting to get worried as the cab pulls up in front of the Sheffield Building.
Worried and mad.
What if for some reason only I made it home, and Lucas is still stuck there? What would I do?
And if he is home, he damn well should be answering my calls and texts.
Also, now that I think of it, where is Serena? I hope she’s here too. I’ll have to find a way to get ahold of her.
I rush into the lobby and see Mario walking by me, holding a package. “Mario! You’re here!” I cry out, and impulsively, I hug him. He goes rigid with surprise, then pats my back awkwardly. I step back.
“You’re very strange, Brooke,” he says, and just to hear someone saying my actual name makes me want to cry with relief. “But you’re a nice lady. Why are you here? Lucas said he wasn’t coming in to work till Monday.”
“What?” I stare at him in shock. “When did he tell you that?”
“He texted me about an hour ago.”
An hour ago? So he texted Mario but not me. Lucas’s phone is working. He’s not answering my texts or calls.
I don’t understand.
My elation fizzles and I shake my head in confusion. “Uh, thanks,” I mutter, and I turn to leave.
I try to call him several more times, but he doesn’t answer, so I try to look up Serena’s number, but of course it’s unlisted.
I find her email address on her website and send her several urgent emails, including my cell phone number. Every time, I get an auto-response about how she gets many emails and wishes she could answer each one of them personally but if she did, she‘d never have time to write books, and thank you so much for emailing.
I wish I knew where she lived, but given that she’s a famous author with a lot of rabid fans, she’s not going to be that easy to find.
She’ll email me back, though, once she gets my message. I think. Unless she wants to pretend this whole thing never happened. And also she probably has a personal assistant answering her emails, so who knows when she’ll actually get back to me?
I’m suddenly feeling very, very alone.
I grab my phone again, and this time I call my mother. I get to see my father tomorrow, so that’s something.
When she answers, it’s like a warm hug .
“So sorry I rushed you off the phone yesterday,” I tell her. “That will never happen again. By the way, will you teach me how to make chocolate chip cookies?”
“What? Haven’t we done that together before?” she laughs.
“If we have, I’ve forgotten how.”
“Well, sure, sweetie, maybe after we visit your dad tomorrow. You really don’t know how to make chocolate chip cookies?”
I shudder at the memory. “Trust me, I don’t.”
I spend a good fifteen minutes chatting with her, and I feel better after I hang up. I’m so, so relieved that my parents weren’t going crazy with worry for the last few weeks. What a horrible burden that would have been for my mother.
With no work to do, I head to my favorite bougie deli, and even though it’s only mid-morning, I order my favorite mac and cheese, but Lucas’s disappearing act has kind of killed my appetite.
I sit at a table by the window, pick at my food for a while, and finally give up.
With nothing else to do, I decide to head downtown to Tara’s theater. I don’t even know what play they have in the works right now, but maybe I can hang out with the set designers and breathe in some paint fumes to make myself feel better.