Chapter 39
Shay
The worst part of sleeping with your ex-boyfriend who was a celebrity?
You couldn’t simply wallow in self-pity for your bad mistake.
You were forced to see him everywhere you went.
On billboards, in movie trailers, in the checkout line at the grocery store.
The checkout line was the worst place to see him, too.
Because on those magazine covers, Landon was never alone.
There was always some drop-dead gorgeous model or actress attached to his arm.
He always looked dapper as ever, smiling from ear to ear.
The next few days, I tried to keep myself busy even though my mind was looking for a million reasons to think about Landon. I avoided social media for forty-eight hours to avoid seeing Landon’s face plastered all over the internet with photographs from the party.
Temptation was the devil. There were so many times in those forty-eight hours that I wanted to type his name into a Google search just to read the most recent articles about him. But I wouldn’t, because that would be opening myself up for more pain and hurt.
I didn’t have time to hurt over that man; I did enough of that in my past.
I busied myself with writing. Creating fictional worlds was my favorite thing to do when my reality felt too heavy.
I loved writing love stories because it took me away from the fact that I didn’t believe in true love anymore.
At least in my stories, true love was a real thing.
And in those stories? True love always won.
Outside of my own writing, I’d been mentoring a special teenage girl through her own exploration of creativity.
Teaching writing turned out to be almost as enjoyable as writing itself, to me.
“How did you get so good at this?” Karla asked as she read over a few of my manuscripts with a look of awe in her eyes.
I wished I could’ve had agents look at my words with such amazement, the same way that fourteen-year-old girl stared at them.
To be fair, my newest work from the past week did feel like the best I’d written in a while.
Unfortunately, Landon was the muse behind the written words.
I hated that he inspired me even in the slightest amount, but Karla was right—I loved the words I’d written out of my spite for my evening with Landon.
The words came to life as they spilled out of me.
Karla was Greyson’s oldest daughter. She’d been through a lot of emotional and physical trauma after a massive car crash that took her mother’s life and left Karla battered and bruised.
She walked with a heavy limp due to the accident, and her face and arms had scars all over.
She dressed in all black and wore her hair over her face to hide a few of the scars, but I was trying my best to convince her that her scars were beautiful.
We’d met a few weeks ago when Greyson invited me to join the girls and Eleanor for a baseball game.
Karla and I clicked, which seemed like a big deal, because Greyson said his daughter had been antisocial for a long time running.
Ever since the accident, Karla lost a lot of her friends.
They mocked her for her appearance and called her Hunchback due to her posture.
I remembered high school being cruel when I was there, but I couldn’t have imagined being in school with today’s technology. The things Karla had told me people had said and sent to her via social media made my skin crawl.
How did we develop into a world where children had no morals? When did they become so cruel?
Once Karla learned I was a writer, she asked if I could look over some of her stories.
“You don’t have to, because I’m sure you’re busy, and wouldn’t want to waste your time with my stupid work,” she’d said, putting herself down—something I was certain she learned to do from others. “I don’t want to waste your time.”
I hated how low her self-confidence was, and I wanted to help her build it up as much as possible, even if it was through her written word. Plus, I enjoyed her company. She was a good kid with a damaged heart who just needed to be told she was enough.
I once knew a broken boy with his own set of scars who’d needed to be told of his worth, too. What could I say? I had a type.
I smiled as Karla’s eyes moved back and forth over my manuscript.
“I’ll never be this good.”
“No,” I corrected, taking the papers from her grip. “You’ll be better. You’re already better. So let’s get back to work on your manuscript. We can plot out some of the major scenes and go from there.”
She nodded with a frown, almost as if she was afraid to dive deeper into her story. I placed a comforting hand against hers. “You know you’re good enough, Karla, right? You are a beautiful girl with beautiful stories living inside of you. You’re allowed to let those stories out.”
She lowered her head. “You don’t have to do that.”
“Do what?”
“Call me beautiful. I know it’s not true and that you’re trying to be nice, but you don’t have to lie.”
I placed my finger beneath her chin and raised her stare to lock with mine. “You are beautiful, Karla. Every single piece of you. And the parts that you think are ugly are truly the most stunning parts.”
She huffed. “Tell that to the boys at school.”
“Lucky for us, the boys at school do not get to define what beautiful is. We do.”
She narrowed her eyes and tilted her head toward me, as if she was trying to figure me out. “How did you get so confident?”
“Easy.” I shrugged. “I stopped saying mean things to myself.”
“I can’t even think of a mean thing you’d ever say to yourself. I mean, look at you. You’re perfect. If I looked like you, I’d have every guy in the world wanting to look my way.”
“You don’t need boys to look at you to be worthy.”
“Says the woman who probably has every man looking at her.”
Before I could reply, Karla’s phone went off. I saw “Uncle Landon” flash across the screen before she scrambled to answer it.
My stomach knotted up from seeing his name on her screen. I knew Landon had been close with Greyson’s two girls, especially after the accident, but seeing the word uncle next to his name made it clear that he was a lot closer to the girls than I’d even known.
“Hi, Uncle Landon. What’s up?” Karla asked, holding the phone against her ear. She turned her back slightly toward me, but I didn’t miss the small smile that spread across her lips as she spoke to him. “Yeah, I know.” Her smile deepened. “Yeah, I know.” Then she laughed.
She laughed! The broken girl with such low self-esteem laughed at the words Landon was giving her through their call. That made my heart warm up. Even though I had my opinions on Landon, it made me happy that he was able to make Karla smile and laugh, because I knew she did both things so sparsely.
“OK, OK!” Karla laughed, shaking her head. “Fine. I’ll say it, but only because you’re being annoying about it. I love you, too. There. Happy?”
She kept smiling, and the grin must’ve been infectious, because a smile landed against my lips, too.
Karla cocked an eyebrow. “Wait, what?” She stood to her feet. “Really?!”
I stood, too, confused by her sudden movements.
“OK, yeah. OK, bye.” Karla hung up the phone, and that smile stayed planted against her lips.
She looked my way and combed her hair over her face.
“Um, sorry, Shay. Is it OK if we cut today’s lesson short?
My Uncle Landon is in town for a lot longer than he thought, and he wanted to take me out on a date. ”
The doorbell rang as her words settled into my mind. She began limping out of her room with her shoulders hunched and her eyes staring at the wooden floorboards. She always walked with her eyes glued to the floor as if she was too afraid to look up.
I followed behind her, trying to control my heart, which was currently losing its mind.
As Karla opened the front door, she crashed her body into Landon, who pulled her into the tightest embrace. He bent down to hold the young girl against him and whispered something into her ear that made her laugh again.
That laugh.
What a beautiful sound.
As she pulled away from him, he combed her hair behind her ears so he could see her face. The way he looked at her, as if he only saw perfection as opposed to her scars, made every piece of resentment I held for him momentarily melt away.
Then he spoke the words that sent my soul into a tailspin.
“How’s your heart, Karla?” he said, his voice low and controlled with such tenderness and care.
She shrugged her left shoulder before letting it drop heavily down. “Still beating.”
Tears welled up in my eyes as the familiar saying left his lips. I blinked away the emotion the best I could before swallowing hard and clearing my throat.
The two looked over to me, and the shock that rocketed through Landon’s eyes from seeing me made me feel as if I was invading a very private moment. Then his eyes softened as if he was pleased to see me there.
I stuffed my hands into my jeans pockets and awkwardly swayed back and forth.
“Oh, Uncle Landon, this is Shay! She’s Eleanor’s cousin and is teaching me how to be a writer.”
“You’re already a writer.” I smiled at the girl who hadn’t lost her grin since Landon arrived.
“But I want to be great like you,” she commented. She turned back to Landon. “She’s an amazing screenwriter, Uncle Landon. You should be in one of her movies. She’s the best.”
“I believe it,” he said, his stare still on me. He blinked a few times and parted his lips as if he had something more to say, but then he turned to Karla. “Maybe you should go get your coat and shoes so we can head out for the day.”
“OK,” Karla agreed, starting toward her bedroom. “Shay, maybe we can make up for the stuff we missed today and meet twice next week? If you can. I don’t want to take up too much of your time.”
“My time is yours.” I smiled. “I love doing this together, Karla. You let me know when you’re free, and I’ll make it fit into my schedule.”
She thanked me again before heading off to get ready for her date with Landon.
I stood frozen in the foyer as Landon stuffed his hands into his pockets.
“Hey,” he whispered.
“Hello,” I replied, trying to keep myself cool and calm. Cool as a cucumber.
Luckily, I wasn’t drunk off whiskey with this interaction; therefore, I’d be better at biting my tongue.
He stepped toward me and raked one of his hands through his messy hair.
His hair, along with his appearance, wasn’t as perfect as it had been at the whiskey party.
He looked like your everyday person—a really attractive everyday person—but still.
He looked more like Landon Harrison and less like his actor persona.
I liked it more when he looked a little more human. Not that I was in the arena of liking much about that man.
“I was hoping to talk to you again at the whiskey party, but everything kind of went crazy toward the end,” Landon mentioned.
“I know.” I nodded.
“Listen, I’m in town for longer than I thought. I’m taking a mental health break from work. Maybe we can meet up for coffee.”
“I don’t like coffee.”
“You used to like coffee.”
“People change.”
“OK. Maybe tea.”
“It gives me gas.”
He shook his head. “Tea doesn’t give people gas.”
“What are you? The tea police? Mainly what I’m saying is, I don’t want to see you, Landon. The other night was a one-time thing. A mistake of the highest proportions. We were drunk and made a mistake.”
“It wasn’t a mistake to me, and I wasn’t drunk.”
Sigh.
Neither was I. I knew what I was doing. In the moment I craved what I was doing. I leaned into the terrible decision that felt so right. The act wasn’t the issue; it was the aftermath that did me in.
“Well, it doesn’t matter. We’re both adults, and it happened,” I said. “And now we’re allowed to just leave it in the past.”
“I don’t want to leave it in the past.”
“Yes, well, it isn’t like we are ever going to have a future. So again. Let’s keep it easy, OK? I know I said some things at that party that were heavy, but I was honestly not myself,” I lied. “I didn’t mean any of it.”
“Really?” he asked, his brows lowered. “You meant none of it?”
“Not a word.”
“Even the part where you said you hated me?”
I snickered a little and rubbed my hand against my neck. “Of course I don’t hate you, Landon. I reserve my hatred for people I actually know.”
A flash of despair passed through his eyes as he nodded slowly. “That makes sense. OK, well. Maybe we’ll cross paths and can exchange a few easy words.”
“Yes, of course. If we just so happen to cross paths, we’ll do exactly that.”
He blinked a few times as if trying to push away the moment of sadness in his stare. “Sounds good. And Shay? Thank you for what you’re doing for Karla. She needs someone in her life who believes in her. You’re good for her.”
“She’s a good kid. She’s just a little broken, but she’ll find her way.”
He gently laughed and brushed his hand against the back of his neck. “We’re all a little broken and trying to find our way, I suppose.”
I wanted to smile at him, but he still looked a little sad. Nothing like how he appeared in the magazines.
“She adores you,” I commented, wanting to give him an olive branch. “She really looks up to you. When you called, she lit up, and it was the first time I heard her laugh.”
“Like you said, she’s a great kid who was dealt a shitty hand in life. I’m just trying my best to remind her that this world has a place for her and that she belongs here. I know her, though. I know how her thoughts can get very heavy and dark. I worry about her every single day.”
“Well, if there is anyone who can help her out of the darkness, it’s a man who found his way out of his own.”
“You think I found my way out of the dark?” he asked with a low, smoky tone. His words shot straight through my chest.
Of course he’d found his way out of the darkness. For years I’d watched his light and happiness unfold against my computer screen.
“Are you ready, Uncle Landon?” Karla asked as she emerged from her bedroom. She came right before I could respond to Landon’s comment, which was a good thing.
I hadn’t a clue what I would’ve even said in reply.
The two both said goodbye to me as we walked to our cars to leave. As they drove away, I took a few seconds to sit in my car as the engine ran. I took those few seconds to remind myself how to breathe.