15. Wesley
Wesley
W hen I asked her to come to the party I was expecting to spend the night with her.
Not with her, with her. But maybe sit by the fire.
If she got cold, I’d take off the sweatshirt I specifically grabbed in case she needed to borrow it.
And I don’t know, tomorrow she might walk into rehearsal wearing it.
Yeah. No luck on that front.
She’s talking to her drummer, a guy named Warren. And sure, it’s great that she’s comfortable with the members of her band but I could live without her hand playfully landing on his bicep.
“What about you, Wes? Would you be down?”
“Huh?” I ask, the sound of my name startling me back in the conversation I was only sort of having with a few of the dancers on the crew. “Sorry, I was spacing out.”
“There’s a party up in the Hills tonight my friend can get us into.
Well, I doubt you need an invitation but the rest of us would.
It’s one of those themed things that is bound to get crazy.
Want to come with us?” says Emory, a tall blond dancer wearing a cut off tank that shows off his lean physique.
“Probably not. I want to be on time for tomorrow’s rehearsal. I’m planning on heading out soon. And I’m Avery’s ride.”
“I bet Warren will give her one if she needs,” another dancer says, voice silky with suggestion, and it takes everything in me not to snap at them.
I look back toward where Avery is standing but now, she’s alone, and Warren is walking to the cooler a few feet away from us.
Leaving the group and their dreams of Hollywood parties, I get to the beer cooler just as Warren’s pulling out a drink. The half-melted ice inside sloshes as he forces the lid closed.
“Is that for Avery?” I ask, indicating with my chin.
His brows raise with apprehension “Yeah? I was just grabbing it for her.”
“Thanks, but I’ve got it.” My fingers wrap around the cool base of the drink and tug but he holds on.
“She asked me for it.”
“Only because I wasn’t there. You know I’m right.” I wink. There’s another second of resistance before he lets go. “Good man,” I say, slapping his shoulder as I walk past him.
Sand crunches under my bare feet as I approach. All around us, the rush of waves mixes with the pop music throbbing from a speaker set on a log by the fire.
“What are you drinking?” Avery asks.
“Nothing tonight, or really anything much these days. This is for you.” It’s something I’ve talked about with my therapist, Dr. Davis.
How I used to avoid alcohol, partly because of Mom and my anxiety that her cancer would come back or she’d need me, and I’d be unable to help, and partly because of how I enjoyed being present.
We discussed how having a sober lifestyle could be a good choice for me, since a majority of my current goals are centered around making the most of the time I have left with Avery.
“I’m pretty sure I asked Warren to get this for me?” Still, she grabs the can and cracks it open.
“Who?” I feign ignorance causing her to glare.
“We were talking.”
“He was flirting with you.”
“Maybe I liked that he was,” she challenges, standing taller and taking a step toward me so we’re nearly toe to toe.
The air between us vibrates. “And it’s not your business who I flirt with, is it?
I thought there weren’t any strings attached to our little arrangement and all you cared about was that I got what I wanted.
What if I want to kiss someone new? Would you help me? ”
She’s fucking right. I told her I was just here to support her. I hate feeling like a liar, but it’s not like I anticipated watching her get up close and personal with someone else. I should have guessed, seeing her with Jamie…shit Jamie.
The realization hits me like a punch to the gut. “The last person you kissed was Jamie, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, and I hate it.”
“You don’t need someone else for that. I’m right here.” I intend for the words to come out light-hearted, but they sound rough and husky. Needy. So fucking needy for any attention she’ll give me.
“You’re assuming I want to kiss you.” Her eyes flick to my lips for a fraction of a second, and I know she does.
“Did you forget how much you used to enjoy it?” I step closer and her breath hitches.
We’re far enough from the scattered groups that no one can hear us, but I tilt my body so no one can see when my fingers brush against her throat.
“Or am I misremembering the sounds you used to make when I put my mouth here?”
Her nostrils flare on a sharp inhale taking a step back, putting a foot of space between us. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She walks around me, maintaining a wide berth.
“Liar.”
Her footsteps halt and I wait for her returning shot, but she just keeps going, right back to Warren. My stomach plummets. I wish I could blame the alcohol, but I haven’t had any. I’m sick at the thought of them together.
I can’t keep watching this. Not when I’m already toeing the line of screwing up the peace between Avery and I.
Emory and his friends are almost at the parking lot when I catch up with them.
Emory, as it turns out, knows everyone, but I’m not in the mood to socialize. No matter what I try, my thoughts go back to Avery and Warren.
If the next few months are going to work, I need to find a way to care less, because fixating on how his hands might be all over her at this very moment is killing me. And if I want to stay true to my word and help her, the best thing to do is nothing.
“My ex is always at these things. He’s like this huge secret fan of yours, though.
Not just the new stuff. The one time I went to his house, and he introduced me to his family as a friend, I found all of these rolled up Fool’s Gambit posters in his closet,” a woman named Charlotte says.
She’s been sitting next to me on a set of lounge chairs by the fireplace, a distance from the rest of the party, for the last half hour.
The upside of listening to her relationship with problems is that I haven’t needed to come up with anything to talk about.
“Oh, that’s cool.”
She leans over, placing her hand on my thigh. “Are you here with anyone?”
“Physically? No. Mentally? Pretty damn preoccupied.”
“Shame. Like the ultimate ‘fuck you’ would be to make out with you. It would really ruin his playlists.” Using one of her perfectly manicured nails, she traces a line up my thigh.
I jerk away as I stand. “What if I get you a drink instead, and we really make a show of me handing it off to you? How about that.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, I’ll be just a moment,” I say. I maneuver around the lounge chairs and into the heart of the party.
As Emory promised, it’s a spectacle. Servers are painted to look like marble statues, standing still as possible with their trays. Acrobats do tricks on top of columns draped in grapevines.
Some guests seem to have come with the theme in mind, clad in draped white dresses and linen. I guess they don’t give a fuck about what you’re supposed to wear after Labor Day.
Behind a strategically placed slab of marble, the bartender is showing someone who I think is a top rookie basketball player how to shake a drink.
Once she finishes, I flag her down and order a vodka tonic for Charlotte and a soda water for myself.
I pull out my phone to check the time. God. Have I really only been here for less than an hour? Maybe I’ll finish this and leave.
“Wesley,” says an all too familiar voice behind me. Dread forms a stone in my gut. “I heard you were around for that tour of yours, but this is the first time I’ve seen you out.”
My old manager, Maddison Baron, steps around me to lean against the counter.
If you were to ask around, people might say she’s the reason I had a successful solo career.
While Martin helped manage the band, Maddie approached me, saying she could help me on an individual level to open more doors professionally.
Though, our relationship wasn’t entirely professional. Or healthy. Maddie has always been friendly with her clients. Too friendly in my case, so I shouldn’t be surprised to see her here now that she’s working out of LA.
The ground under my feet feels like liquid. There’s a pounding in my ears, and the music muddles into a thumping, warping bass.
You have no power over me anymore.
But if the way my body’s screaming run is any indication, she does.
“It’s been too long,” she purrs.
“Not long enough,” I say with all the conviction I can muster. My gaze darts to the bartender who’s just starting to grab glasses for my drinks.
“C’mon. Our breakup wasn’t that bad. And after ten years, we can be civil, can’t we?”
“Oh, yeah. I had just ended my contract, and you decided to ruin my life. Not that bad at all.”
The moment I called it off, she reached out to all her media contacts and gave them free reign to post every picture she’d paid them not to print. Misleading things about me and actresses or models at events. Friendly exchanges that, out of context, painted me as a serial cheating piece of shit.
What use is your pretty face when you don’t know how to capitalize on it? You need me.
“Ruined your life? Look around. This all seems pretty great to me.” She laughs, a chiming deceptively light sound. “You have this, and the rest of those boys…well, it’s a shame they didn’t keep going for their own sake. But you’re here and they’re nowhere to be seen.”
“You made sure of that, didn’t you? Making sure I’d be as alone and miserable as you are.”
She purses her glossy lips. “Sure, there were growing pains, but it’s ancient history now.
Seems like you reconciled with that little reunion, and I got a nice little kickback from all that great press.
” Even though we haven’t worked together for years, she still makes a percentage off the revenue I make from anything I created when we worked together.
I’ve put time and distance between us, but I doubt I’ll ever be entirely free of her.