Chapter 28
28
Chiptunes sounded like a drunk person stepping on a child’s light-up soundboard. Alex found, to her dismay, that not only did Viola and her friends make music by remixing video game sounds—club beats cut with blaring clangs and whooshes and beeps—but they insisted on playing this music for unsuspecting guests.
“This song is sick, right?” a white guy with dreads yelled from behind the makeshift turntable in the corner of the midcentury modern mansion.
Alex offered a weak thumbs-up as vibrations from the subwoofers blew back her hair.
She’d never gotten into video games. She lacked the hand-eye coordination. Also, they made you do battle too much when she just wanted to romance the fussy bisexual vampire.
And yes, she understood the hypocrisy of judging anyone for their niche media interests when she herself had once dedicated an entire eight-week period to cataloging the backstory of a tertiary character who appeared onscreen in The Arcane Files for a total of 234 seconds.
What could she say? Fandom was everything when you were in it and embarrassing as hell when you weren’t.
Alex was too old for parties with kegs and no food. She made her way out to the back deck overlooking the swimming pool, hoping to escape both the music and the crowd. A cool breeze raised goose bumps on her bare arms as she leaned against the wooden railing. She wished she could text Cam and Eliza about this spectacle. If things were normal, she would have captured an audio clip inside and made them try to guess where she was. But Alex had lost that privilege.
The still water of the pool glittered in the falling darkness.
“Let me take him off your mind,” Viola said, propping her elbows up beside Alex’s. “Devin Ashwood, right?” The other woman had on a V-neck denim jumpsuit that showed off her long legs. The sun slowly sinking on the horizon cast a soft glow over her heart-shaped face.
“I saw you guys leave together after the game,” she explained.
“Oh.” A flush crept up the back of Alex’s neck. “Yeah. He’s a menace.”
“I mean, I get it.” Viola took a sip of her beer, leaving a ring of purple lipstick on the rim. “I used to have it so bad for Colby. That bomber jacket? Whoooo.” She fanned herself. “It’s funny, isn’t it? A show ends and all the oxygen gets slowly sucked out of a fandom. Until one day you wake up and the fever dream is over. I was such a hard-core Nolby shipper, I’d get heart palpitations just thinking about them. But now?” Viola shrugged. “I mean, sure, I still got a twinge of fondness seeing Devin Ashwood at the game, but I’m not sick over it the way I would have been back in the dog days of 2018.”
Alex wished she could say the same. Devin Ashwood had been the source of her constant suffering since she had braces, and she still couldn’t quit him.
“Besides, I don’t mean to be rude,” Viola said slowly, cautiously, “but isn’t he kind of a dick in real life?”
Cicadas sang in the early evening air almost loud enough to match the whir of the pool filter.
Alex didn’t know how to answer. Yes, Devin Ashwood was a dick. Totally. Presented with the chance to dunk on him a month ago, especially armed with the kind of fodder she had now, Alex could have done some serious damage. She would have made this pretty woman laugh. And never thought twice about the real person behind the straw man she was tearing down.
“Ahhh,” Viola said in the face of Alex’s silence. “You like him anyway.”
And there was the rub.
What could Alex possibly say? How could she explain to a stranger that it was worse than that. She didn’t just like Devin Ashwood. She understood him.
As much as she wanted to pretend her affection for him was a weakness, a naivete left over from girlhood, she couldn’t. Over the last month, she’d seen the good and the bad and the ugly of Devin Ashwood. The way he thought he had to be a flawless vessel for other people’s fantasies, to make up for the fatal flaw of wanting to be loved.
The first time Alex fell for him, it was because of that performance. His face, his voice, his smile. Everything the wolf stole.
Alex had seen what was left when the supernatural carved to the core of Devin Ashwood and found he wasn’t at all what she expected. Who knew that under all that self-serious bravado was someone playful and affectionate, wary but hopeful? Someone protective and stubborn. And tougher than anyone, especially Alex, ever gave him credit for.
His parents brought him here, to LA, when he was seven years old and told him their livelihood and their love depended on his ability to get cast. Alex, of all people, should recognize regression. Was it such a surprise that he’d backslid from the second he decided to return to LA?
But she couldn’t say any of that to this nice stranger.
“Unfortunately, I don’t think I’ll ever be normal about Devin Ashwood.”
In the near dark, Alex couldn’t tell whether that was a tragedy or simply fact.
The door slid open behind them and two guys walked out to share a joint, the glow of the cherry lighting their faces, one and then the other, as they passed it back and forth.
Alex’s phone buzzed in her pocket.
“Sorry,” she told Viola, her stomach swooping as she pulled it out. Alex was shaping up to be a real flop of a party guest.
The other woman waved her off. “I hope that’s him and he’s groveling. I’m gonna go grab another beer.”
Music blared and then faded along with the opening and closing of the back door as she rejoined the party.
The notification was an email rather than a text—to her archive inbox—a Google Alert so long dormant that for a second Alex couldn’t process the headline.
brIAN DEMPSEY ANNOUNCES PLANS FOR THE ARCANE FILES MOVIE
Mortifyingly, her fangirl heart soared. Alex found herself grinning into the night. It figured that Devin could act like a total clown for the last forty-eight hours and somehow miraculously still pull out the win.
God. She couldn’t believe she was gonna devote more precious hours of her life to watching The Arcane Files , but it was inevitable. It was like when your ex posted vacation pics with their new partner. It didn’t matter if you told yourself you weren’t gonna look; sooner or later you caved.
Alex held the phone to her chest and closed her eyes for a minute, letting the nostalgia crash over her like a wave. TAF back on the air. When she was younger, when life was simpler, she would have dined out on this feeling—new content, new storylines, the return of her favorite characters, the return of this fandom —for a year. Maybe more.
If the last month had never happened, she would have stayed up all night, flipping between the group chat, Tumblr, Discord, and whatever last vestiges remained of Twitter. People were probably already posting predictions. She could almost guarantee someone had started new fic.
Knowing Dempsey, they’d play up the potential for something with Nathaniel in promos, then ship in another blond woman as Colby’s latest love interest. But now, instead of rolling her eyes in frustration or silently fuming, Alex would watch Devin kiss someone else knowing exactly what it felt like. She imagined holding her breath, waiting to see if he cupped the back of their neck or kissed their jawline. She’d never enjoy TAF again purely as a (reluctant, long-suffering) fan. Not now that she knew what it was like to be Devin Ashwood’s…someone.
He must be ecstatic. She could picture him getting the call in his kitchen: the wild spread of his grin, the inevitable fist pump. Everything he wanted, everything he’d worked for, what they’d all told him was an impossible pipe dream, finally, finally won.
Gladness spread like warmth in her chest. She wanted him to be happy, even if it meant he’d never belong to her.
She made herself actually read the article, expecting to see a projected filming schedule or release date, a timeline of how long she’d have to prepare herself.
Only…
Dempsey shocked fans, revealing the recently green-lighted script does not include a role for the series’ longtime star, Devin Ashwood.
A white-hot blinding rage burst from behind Alex’s eyelids, making the text on the screen swim.
…even costars caught off guard. “What do you mean Ashwood’s not in it?” said Oscar winner Gus Rochester when called for comment. “We’re talking about The Arcane Files , right?”
Alex let out a screech so terrible, it scared a nightingale out of one of the property’s palm trees.
The couple to her side threw their still-smoking joint to the ground and scampered back inside.
Was this a fucking joke? Why would anyone continue The Arcane Files without Devin Ashwood? How could they, after everything he’d given them?
Sources close to Dempsey hinted that the showrunner had concerns Ashwood’s recent “lowbrow” antics in the press would upstage what he hopes will be a more “prestige” reboot of his debut franchise. “Brian doesn’t want anyone thinking this is the Devin Ashwood show.”
Of all the asinine, out-of-touch, self-important delusions. Objectively, Devin Ashwood—Colby—was TAF . The reason the fans who’d grown up watching supported the story long after the writers room jumped the shark. This was an overt slap in the face to Devin, but it was also a slap in the face to the fans. To the thousands of people so invested in Colby that they’d kept that ridiculous show on the air for so long.
Alex didn’t give a shit if Gus Rochester had grown into his sideburns and learned how to do a British accent; he didn’t love the show, or the audience, the way Devin did.
Brian Dempsey had always been a piece of garbage, but this was a whole other level of pettiness and self-importance.
That asshole had waved to them in the parking lot of the basketball game earlier, calling out, Y’all have a great night .
He must have known Devin looked up to him, that he trusted him implicitly. Even someone who hadn’t followed the life of Devin Ashwood religiously could see that the showrunner had been a kind of mentor to him. Apparently, Alex thought with a sinking heart, just like Devin’s parents, he’d only ever seen Devin as a product to be sold.
Devin Ashwood was selfish and shallow, but even as a werewolf, he was more human than the people he trusted.
He’d be crushed when he saw this, and he was already vulnerable tonight because of the full moon.
Oh god.
The full moon.
And she’d left Devin alone.
FUCK.
With shaking hands, Alex tried to call him.
“Hey—”
“Thank—”
“—you’ve reached Devin. Leave a message. And if it’s interesting enough, I’ll return your call.”
No, no, no. Alex looked around helplessly. What could she do? With less than a half hour before the moon rose, she was at this horrible party on the other side of town. It might be her first time in LA, but even she knew traffic on a Saturday night was unlikely to be kind.
Alex had no other choice.
She made a hasty apology to Viola and ordered another car. In the back seat of yet another Prius, she crossed everything that Devin could hold back the wolf until she got there.
If he lost himself tonight, Alex feared they’d never be able to bring him back.