Stalker Problems - Chapter 43 - Son of a Dick
This year I didn’t bring the cupcakes. But I still went to the lake. The grass was slick with dew so I laid out a beach towel and plopped myself down.
I stared at the castle for a while, thinking about when Rosalie had tried to convince me to sneak in after dark and sleep there as if it were our house. I pulled my knees into my chest. I’d been too lame to do it. Now I really wished I had.
I rested my chin on one of my knees and I blinked, trying not to cry.
I felt like I should be telling a story about her, but there was no one to talk to. So instead I decided to talk to her.
“Hey Ros,” I said to the air. “I miss you.” I paused, choking back the tears. “I miss you so much.”
Stop. I shouldn’t cry. As her older sister, it was my job to be her shoulder to cry on. Not the other way around. And with all the boys she always had chasing after her, she frequently needed a shoulder to cry on. She’d know what to do about my current boy situation.
“So I need your advice,” I said. “I met this amazing guy, but he claims it would be too dangerous for us to be together…”
“Sounds complicated,” said someone behind me.
I looked over my shoulder and saw Joe standing there, holding a box of Dickson & Son’s Sugarcakes. What the hell? He was the last person I wanted to see ever. And today of all days? I was grieving.
“Mind if I sit?” he asked. But he didn’t wait for my answer. He just sat down next to me. On my beach towel.
“Yes, I do mind if you sit,” I snapped, yanking the towel out from under him.
I stomped across the clearing and sat down in a new, Joe-free spot.
Maybe someone else would find it sweet that he’d remembered how important today was to me.
But that someone wasn’t me. I hated him.
And he had no right to interrupt Rosalie’s birthday. I just wanted to be alone.
He followed me. “Ash, don’t be like this.”
“Go away.” I hated that my voice quivered. Because I really could use a hug. Don’t you dare think like that, Ash.
“No.”
“Why are you here, Joe? Would it kill you to not be an asshole for a single day?” He knew what today was. He knew how much I missed my sister. Why the hell did he have to pick today of all days to show up in my life again?
“I know we didn’t end on good terms…”
“You think?” I scoffed.
“…but I thought you might need a friend today. Someone to talk to.”
“You’re not my friend.” But there was a small part of my heart that thawed. Just a little.
“Fine. A person.”
“You’re not a person. You’re a monster.” Just because a small part of my heart had thawed didn’t mean the rest of it didn’t hate his guts.
Joe sat down next to me. “I deserve that. Want a cupcake?” He pushed the box toward me.
I shook my head. “You mean a cupcake made with the recipe you stole from me?”
He stayed silent.
“God, I wish I had listened to Rosalie about you. She always knew you were an asshole.”
“I thought she liked me?”
“No. She hated you.”
“More than Madison hates me?” asked Joe.
“God no. By the way, you should keep an eye out for her. She’s been lobbying hard for me to cut your dick off.”
“Maybe then she’d like me. You know…since she hates penises.”
I laughed. “I’m actually not sure about that. A few weeks ago she got super drunk and admitted to wanting, and I quote, ‘The biggest, blackest man.’ ”
Joe laughed too. “Are you kidding me?”
“I swear.” I couldn’t help the smile on my face.
“Well I’ll be damned.” Joe shook his head.
I started to laugh more but it got caught in my throat. What the hell was happening? Was I seriously sitting here with Joe making lesbo jokes about Madison? It felt so natural. I looked down at the grass so I wouldn’t be tempted to look at him. “What happened to us?” I asked.
Joe sighed. “I don’t know, Ash.”
“Was it this?” I asked. “Rosalie going missing? Chastity says I kind of changed after that.”
“You want the truth?”
“Yes.” I looked back up at him. “God, yes.” I needed to know why I hadn’t been good enough.
Because I wasn’t sure how to move on when I felt so…
unwanted. I hated that feeling. Of just being stuck.
And ever since Chastity had brought it up, a piece of me wondered if that was why I was chasing Tanner.
Because he swore he couldn’t be in a relationship with me for my own safety.
We’d never move forward. We’d always be stuck. I swallowed hard.
“That might have played a small part. But we were doomed before that. I’m not sure we were ever really right for each other.”
“Then why’d you propose to me?”
“I think I just got caught up in the moment. I was intrigued by your innocence. And your refusal to have sex until marriage. It made you kind of a forbidden fruit that I just had to pluck.”
I gagged a little. “Gross.”
“We were in college. We were young. I don’t know what to say.”
“Apologizing would be a good start.”
“I’m sorry. Rosalie was right - I’m an asshole.”
I laughed. Yes, you are. I considered asking about Sierra.
About him cheating on me. But what could I really say?
Do you love her? Were you really fucking her almost our entire marriage?
I knew the answers to both of those. Yes, and yes.
Hearing him say it would just make it more real. And I couldn’t handle that. Not today.
“Maybe I will take one of those cupcakes after all,” I said.
Joe smiled and put the box on my lap. “Be my guest. I even brought you a fork.”
I flipped open the lid and stabbed a delicious-looking banana protein cupcake (one of my best recipes, thank you very much).
I was about to take a big bite when I noticed a picture taped to the inside of the lid.
No, not just any picture. A picture of me.
Naked. Touching myself on our bed. It was a screenshot from the sex tape I’d made for him.
“What the fuck?” I said, slamming the lid shut in case any strangers happened to be walking by. My heart was beating so fast that it actually hurt. Or maybe it hurt because for just a second, I had thought Joe wasn’t actually the most evil person on the planet.
“What?” asked Joe, acting totally innocent.
“Don’t pretend like you don’t know what I’m talking about.”
“Oh. The picture?”
“Yes.”
He opened the lid and looked at it. “It’s a great picture. I’m thinking it’ll be what I use for the thumbnail when I post your video to Pornhub.”
My body felt like it was on fire. “Are you fucking kidding me? I gave you everything you asked for,” I hissed.
“You did. But then you stole my credit card and spent…“ He pulled a folded piece of paper out of his pocket and scanned down it with his finger. “…$213,436.”
“Dude, that wasn’t me. It was probably your instawhore.”
Joe glared at me. “How dare you talk about Sierra like that?”
“How dare I ? How dare you fuck her for four years behind my back. What’d she spend the money on? Another pair of fake tits? Or maybe more Botox?”
“ You spent the money on Odegaards. Chastity convinced you to go on a little shopping spree, huh?”
Oh shit. Tanner hadn’t used Joe’s card when we were together at the boutique. He’d said it was declined. But he’d never given it back to me. Was it possible he used it to buy me all those shoes later? I tried to hide my look of guilt, but it was too late.
“I knew it,” said Joe.
“Knew what? I swear it wasn’t me.” My voice cracked.
Joe laughed. “You’ve always been such a terrible liar.”
Asshole. “You know what I’m not terrible at?”
“What?”
“This.” I grabbed my cupcake and smooshed it in his face. God that felt good.
He wiped the icing out of his eye. “Real mature, Ash.”
I took another cupcake and did it again.
“You know what? I was going to give you two days to give me a refund, but you just cut that time in half.”
“A refund how? You took everything from me in the divorce. I’m barely scraping by.”
“If the money isn’t in my account by midnight, the sex tape goes live. Enjoy Rosalie’s birthday. Thank God she didn’t live long enough to see how much of a slut you are.” Joe got up and walked away.
For a second I just sat there, completely stunned.
Not that anything he’d done was surprising.
Joe had just acted completely like…Joe. I tried to yell something mean at him, but my mind was blank.
My body shook with a combination of rage and sadness.
I buried my face in the towel and sobbed. Big, fat, ugly tears.
I wanted to just crawl into the lake and drown.
How could I have fallen for Joe’s trick?
For a few minutes I had genuinely thought that there was some shred of decency in him…
that he had actually come here because he cared about me and didn’t want me to be alone.
But really he had just come here to shit all over me.
And to do it on today of all days? He wasn’t just an asshole.
He was heartless. He was the devil. How could I have ever fallen for a man like that? What did that say about me?
I could dwell on that later. But for now, I had bigger issues to deal with. Because if I couldn’t come up with $200K by midnight, then the most mortifying footage of me was going to be all over the internet. I’d never be able to show my face in public again.
“I’m sorry, Rosalie,” I said into the air. “But I have to go take care of this. And next year, after Marty finds you, we can come back here together.”
I took one last look at the castle and then typed out a text to Tanner. “Can you be at my place in ten minutes? I need your help.”