Chapter 25
BEST DECISIONS AFTER MIDNIGHT
JOEY
Emerald Green by Port Noir
“Jesse,” I say between fits of laughter. “I can’t eat tacos if I’m dead from exhaustion.”
He turns, and before I can catch my breath, he’s scooping me up, arms sliding around my waist as he lifts me clean off the sidewalk.
I yelp, grabbing his shoulders as he spins me, the neon storefronts streaking into ribbons of color around us. My laughter rings off the buildings, startled and breathless.
“Jesse, you can’t carry me through Hollywood.”
“Don’t worry, it’s around the corner.” He presses a quick, fierce kiss to the corner of my mouth.
We round the corner to a converted food truck parked in a lot strung with lights and populated by the kind of people who make their best decisions after midnight. Salsa blares from a speaker near the ordering window.
Jesse sets me down on a picnic bench. “Don’t move.”
“Uh, couldn’t if I tried. I need sustenance.” My stomach growls.
He goes to the window and orders for us. When he comes back he straddles the bench beside me so our knees touch. He rests his hand on my thigh, tracing idle circles while we wait.
I press my hand against the bandage at my hip. “I can’t believe I got a tattoo.”
Jesse pauses his tracing. “Do you regret it?”
“No,” I say honestly. “It’s just I’ve never done anything like this before.”
“Spontaneous ink at midnight?”
“Spontaneous anything.” I gesture at the taco stand, the lights strung overhead, at him. “You make me reckless.”
He leans closer, mouth twisting into a smile. “Are you saying I’m a bad influence?”
“A very bad influence.” I grab the front of his shirt and pull him in, pressing my lips to his. He smiles against my mouth, his hand sliding up my thigh, and I’m about two seconds from forgetting we’re in public when the woman from the truck calls out our order.
Jesse pulls away with a grin and goes to grab the food, returning with a tray piled high. Carne asada tacos, extra cilantro, two glass bottles of Jarritos.
I take a bite. “Oh my god,” I mumble with a mouth full of food. “This is incredible.”
“Told you.” He’s already halfway through his, salsa dripping down his chin. “Best tacos in LA.”
I devour my taco in a way my mother would find appalling, but I don’t care. The food gives me a second wind, and I don’t feel like I could curl up on this picnic table and fall asleep.
“I wonder if Tommy actually got a tattoo.” I wipe salsa from my fingers. “Or if Stella talked him out of it.”
“Oh, he definitely got one. The question is what.”
While I finish my taco, Jesse launches into a story about Tommy’s other questionable decisions.
The way he tells it, hands moving, voice pitching higher with every detail, I can’t stop laughing.
He lights up when he talks about the band.
Even when he’s roasting them, there’s warmth underneath it, and I can tell even without spending much time with them how much they rely on each other.
He’s mid-story, arms sweeping wide to demonstrate something Tommy did before a show, and his knuckles catch the Jarritos. The bottle wobbles and he grabs it a half-second before it tips over.
I grab a napkin and mop up the splash of soda pooling on the table. “Were they always like this? Even in the beginning?”
His expression shifts. “The beginning was different. The crowds were cool, but you could tell they didn’t know what to make of us. Four people in masks playing original music in a warehouse. Half of them were trying to figure out if we were serious or some kind of ironic performance art thing.”
He taps his fingers restlessly against the table. “We played a lot of shows like that. Good energy, but I could see them watching me, trying to decide if I was for real or full of shit.”
“When did that change?”
“Lincoln Heights. Three hundred people, no AC.” His voice shifts, something softer bleeding through. “We opened with ‘Altar,’ and I could hear a pocket of them singing near the front. They knew the words.”
He stares at a spot past my shoulder, lost in the memory. Music has always meant so much to Jesse and the way he talks about it makes my chest ache.
“And the chorus hit, and more of them joined. And by the bridge, Joey, by the bridge, it was everyone. This wave of voices rising up, giving the song back to me. And I realized they weren’t thinking about the mask.
They weren’t trying to figure out who I was or why I was hiding. They were in it with me.”
He meets my eyes, and something in them has cracked wide open.
“The mask, the persona, it wasn’t some trick to get attention. It was the only way I could give them something real. And tonight they got it. They actually got it.”
His eyes glitter in the lights. He gestures as he talks, movements too expansive for the small table, for the quiet lot, and for the sleepy couples swaying nearby. Every part of him runs amplified, turned up past ten.
I finish my last taco and wipe my hands on a napkin.
“Hey.” I reach over and catch his hand. His fingers wrap around mine. “Are you okay?”
“What do you mean?”
“You seem wound up. I figured you’d be ready to crash by now. I know I am.”
His jaw tightens for a fraction of a second, a crack in the glow before he smiles.
“I’m just crazy fucking in love with you.” He lifts my hand to his mouth and presses a kiss to my knuckles. “And this is one of the best nights of my life. I don’t want it to end.”
I lean into him, pressing my face against his shoulder, breathing him in. “I’m crazy fucking in love with you too.”
He pulls back, eyes bright. “Come on. I’ve got one more thing to show you.”
“Jesse, it’s almost two in the morning.”
He’s already standing, reaching for my hand. “Do you trust me?”
I stare up at him. The lights from the taco stand catch the angles of his face, and energy pulses off him in waves, restless, electric, and consuming.
I take his hand. “Always.”
The Montage Hotel rises like a glass monolith against the night sky, its lobby still glowing at this late hour. The kind of soft lighting designed to make everyone appear wealthy and important.
“We’re not guests here,” I whisper shout.
“Minor detail.” He flashes a grin over his shoulder and pulls me through the revolving door before I can protest.
Inside, marble floors gleam beneath crystal chandeliers. A concierge in a crisp suit glances up from his desk, but Jesse doesn’t hesitate. He walks straight to the elevator bank with the confidence of someone who’s never been told no.
“Jesse.” I keep my voice low as he punches the call button.
“The rooftop bar closed hours ago. No one’s up there.” The elevator doors slide open and he guides me inside, pressing the button marked R with absolute certainty. “There’s something I want to show you.”
His fingers drum against my hip as the elevator climbs, his reflection bouncing in the polished doors—a blur of sharp edges and restless energy.
The doors open onto a rooftop garden straight out of a magazine. String lights drape between potted palms and flowering jasmine. An infinity pool glows turquoise against the darkness, its surface mirror-still. Beyond the glass barriers at the edge, Los Angeles sprawls infinite and glittering.
“Wow,” I breathe.
Jesse positions himself behind me, arms wrapping around my waist as I take in the view. From up here, Hollywood becomes a heartbeat of neon. Downtown’s towers stand like sentinels. The 101 carves a glowing artery through the landscape.
“How do you know about this place?”
“Dylan.” His lips brush my ear as he speaks. “He’s bougie as hell. Loves taking meetings at hotel bars where a single cocktail costs more than most people’s grocery bill. I do session work for some of his other artists, so I get dragged along sometimes.”
I lean into his chest, letting the city wash over me. “It’s incredible.”
“It is.” His arms loosen around my waist, and he steps away from me toward the edge. He grips the glass barrier, staring out at the skyline like he’s having a conversation with it that I’m not part of. “You know, some nights I can’t tell if any of this is real.”
Before I can respond, he’s moving—swinging over the barrier before I can grab him—and the ground tilts beneath my feet.
“Jesse, what are you doing?” I reach for the railing and peer past him—the city drops away far enough to make my stomach flip. “Get down.”
He doesn’t answer. The wind catches his shirt, pressing it flat against his chest, and he tips his chin toward the sky.
“This is what it’s like for me on stage, Joey. Up here, it feels like anything is possible.”
“Jesse, what are you talking about?” He’s three feet away from me and it might as well be a mile.
“Have you ever wondered what it would be like to fly?” He closes his eyes, chin lifting. “To let go?”
“No. No, I haven’t, and neither should you.”
I don’t understand what’s happening.
“Jesse.” I step closer. “You’re scaring me.”
He doesn’t respond. His gaze stays fixed on the darkness beyond the barrier, and I’m not sure he hears me at all.
“Please.” My voice breaks open on the word. “Jesse, please.”
He turns to face me.
“Joey?” He asks as if he’s not sure it’s me or even where he is. His brow furrows and his gaze drifts across the rooftop before settling on me.
“Come down.” I hold my hand out, fingers trembling. “Right now.”
He stares at my hand for one terrible, endless heartbeat. Then he steps over the barrier and drops onto solid ground.
I crash into him, fisting his shirt, pressing my face against his chest. The tears come before I can stop them and I hate it. I hate that I’m shaking and I hate that he scared me and I hate that I can’t let go of him.
“Hey, hey.” His arms fold around me, his mouth pressing into my hair. “I’m sorry. I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere.” His thumb catches the tears sliding down my cheek.
I shove against his chest. “You scared me.” My palms stay flat where I’ve pushed him. “What the hell was that, Jesse?”
“I’m sorry.” He draws me in despite my resistance, kissing my forehead, my cheek, the corner of my mouth.
“I got carried away. I didn’t mean to scare you.
I would never—” He pulls away enough to meet my eyes, and he’s Jesse again.
His ocean-blue eyes search mine, soft and devastated and fully present. “I’m so sorry, Joey.”
He kisses me, and I let him. I let the warmth of his mouth replace everything else until my hands stop shaking.
A door slams somewhere behind us near the stairwell entrance on the far side of the pool deck.
“Shit,” Jesse whispers.
He grabs my hand and we run to the elevator, taking it down to the lobby. We don’t stop running until we’re outside on the street.
I pull him to a stop. He grips my hips, fingers tracing the bandage of my tattoo. Permanent.
He kisses me and I fist his shirt, dragging him closer.
His tongue sweeps against mine and a sound escapes me that I don’t recognize.
He walks me backward until my spine meets the cool stone of the hotel wall, his body pressing flush against mine—solid, warm, everywhere.
I want to dissolve into him. Melt through his skin and live between his ribs where nothing can reach us.
When we finally break apart, his forehead drops against mine. We breathe each other in, ragged and raw, the city buzzing somewhere beyond us.
“Let’s go to Vegas.”
I blink, certain I’ve misheard. “What?”
“Vegas.” His eyes lock on mine with an intensity that steals the air from my lungs. “Right now. We could be there by dawn.”
“Jesse.”
“Marry me, Joey.” The words tumble out of him.
“You’re insane.” A laugh spills out of me even as my eyes sting. He means it. He actually means it, and I love him so much it threatens to crack me open. “I’m not going to Vegas tonight.”
I close the distance between us, hooking my fingers through his belt loops and pressing my body flush against his.
He’s intoxicating—the scent of him, the heat radiating through his shirt, the way his hands can’t stop moving across my skin.
I press onto my toes and kiss him, slow this time, deliberate, pouring steadiness into his mouth until I feel his breathing even out.
His arms tighten around me and I sink into him, letting the warmth replace the cold still lodged beneath my ribs.
It almost works. But the image won’t fully dissolve—Jesse on the wrong side of that barrier, chin tipped toward the sky, eyes closed like he was listening to something I couldn’t hear.
The way he said my name when he came back, like he wasn’t sure I’d be there.
I hold him tighter and let it go. I’m not ready to look at it yet.
“Jesse.” I pull his face to mine, our breaths mingling, and hold him steady. My thumb traces the line of his jaw, settling against the pulse hammering beneath his skin. “Take me home. Take me to your bed.”