49. THE ONE WITH THE ISAKSONS
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
THE ONE WITH THE ISAKSONS
Comment: We’ve never even seen them kiss. You’re letting them play you like fools while sitting high on the hog
Comment reply: SHE SPIT TEQUILA IN HIS MOUTH! HE LICKED IT OFF HER BODY! If y’all don’t think they’re doing more in private you’re insaneeee
Comment reply: You couldn’t pay me enough to let someone spit in my mouth! Disgusting!
WestParkerComedy comment reply: And I would’ve done it for free
Tomorrow’s the last stop on tour.
West’s hometown show in Traverse City. Apparently, he grew up outside the town limits and even had to go to a school over an hour away to play hockey. I’ll never understand small town living…
We ran into traffic today and my hotspot decided it would be the perfect time to stop working. I still have so much to do, worried I’ll never have enough time from now until tomorrow night to wrap everything up.
My flight leaves just before midnight, getting me an hour and a half outside of Gatlinburg at the nearest airport around 6:00 a.m. after a brief layover.
I should be excited. I am excited. I love holidays with the Sullivans. And with tour over, I have a big girl job to go back to.
But leaving this tour behind means leaving West behind, and with that comes the uncertainty of what my life’s supposed to look like when he’s not in it anymore.
I fight thinking about it all day long.
By the time we get to Traverse City, we immediately head to the local news station for an interview, and I’m attempting to catch up on everything I’ve fallen behind on with their speedy internet.
I glance up to find West pacing the dressing room. “West, chill.” I chuckle, my head following him back and forth while he bounces from one end to the next.
“What if I say something stupid?” he asks, biting his lip.
“You always say something stupid.” When he snaps his head towards me, I shrug my shoulders.
He stops pacing at least, letting out a huff. “Not helping, Joey baby.”
I uncross my legs and stand, and even though they’re covered by my jeans, I can feel West’s gaze on them.
I meet him in the middle of the room, my hands naturally reaching for him.
They run up his forearms, up his biceps, and slow once they reach his shoulders.
“You’re going to do fine,” I assure him.
The worry scrunching his brow softens, and he slips his thumb through a belt loop, tugging me against him.
So much has changed since our first night in Boston. I hadn’t known what I was going to get out of this, hadn’t even known what I wanted, but as I stare into the ocean eyes of a man I once thought was hollow as a fucking drum, I realize I got something I never expected.
I found myself. Not only did I do that, but I let someone else help me do it.
Somehow, without realizing what I was doing, I’d let West in. He weaseled past my air tight defenses and made himself at home in a place I don’t let people get anywhere near.
I can’t go back to the Jo I was before this. I can’t let the fear of never being good enough stand in the way of my own happiness anymore.
West’s touch makes warmth radiate through me, but along with it brings a sense of dread.
Slowly, I’m healing the forgotten pieces inside my heart, but I’m not ready for what West is looking for—what he thinks he’s looking for.
He’s twenty-five years old with an incredibly successful career ahead of him. I’m about to dive head first into a new company.
It wouldn’t work.
It won’t work.
It can’t work.
“What are you thinking about?” West asks quietly, his eyes scanning my face for an answer like he always does.
His question stops my spiral. “What a crazy two months this has been,” I reply with a softness I hadn’t expected.
West cups my cheek, and I nuzzle into it like I always do. “Joey, I need—”
The door flies open, and a voice I recognize follows. “Surpri—oh!”
I take a quick step back, but West doesn’t move, only looks over my shoulder to who I already know is standing behind me. His face cracks into a smile, and he does a much better job at hiding his emotions than I do.
What was he about to say?
Fuck. Fuck… I think I know. No, I know I know.
I steal a peek over my shoulder. West’s mom is a tiny thing, at least five inches shorter than me with dark brown hair and deep chocolate eyes to match.
She’s absolutely stunning, wearing a nice pair of jeans paired with an off-white sweater.
Light makeup brightens her cheeks and darkens her lashes, and her thick hair is held back in a clip.
West has her nose, but I think that’s where the resemblance ends.
“My god, sorry I should have knocked!” She stands at the door, one hand still on the knob, the other on her heart, while a man who gives me a glimpse into the future looms behind her.
“I told you,” West’s dad mumbles. His hair’s a couple shades lighter than his son’s, peppered with some gray, and besides his mom’s nose, West’s a spitting image of his dad. All sharp-jawed and dimpled.
She ignores her husband and crosses the room to West, instantly being pulled into a hug. “Hi, honey. Oh, you smell good.” Her voice is muffled against his chest. “She’s even prettier in person, West.” She thinks she’s whispering until West and I laugh at the same time.
West’s dad steps in, letting the door shut softly behind him. “Please excuse Melanie. You see where West gets it from?” He holds his hand out. “Ben. Nice to finally meet you.”
I shake his hand, giving him a smile I hope doesn’t show how truly uncomfortable I am right now. It feels like I’ve been put under a microscope because I know these two aren’t just looking at me like I’m their son’s social media guru.
I don’t have parents to care about what I’m posting on the internet. West does.
Somehow, I’d never stopped to wonder what they think about me being the one to push that on their son… But suddenly, it’s all I can think about.
Melanie pulls away from West, turning around to face me. “I don’t need my husband to apologize for me.” She glowers at Ben in a way I’ve done to West at least three hundred times this week. “I said what I said.”
I’m panicking, heart beating erratically.
I try to rationalize with myself, to get my heart rate to come down, but no matter how many times I remind myself that West and I aren’t together and his parents don’t need to like me, I see the memory of Dylan’s mom meeting me for the first time—the utter look of disgust as she eyed my tattoos.
West’s face softens when I catch his eyes, and before I know it, he’s standing beside me, throwing an arm around my shoulder.
“Mom. Dad. Joey.” He squeezes me into his side, and once that might have made me more uncomfortable in a situation like this, but it doesn’t anymore.
Actually, I find myself calculating my next move to get closer to him.
Melanie looks like she’s about to implode, gently bouncing between the balls of her feet. She kind of reminds me of Frankie a little… and I know exactly what she’s hoping for.
Stepping out of my comfort zone, I leave West’s side, and the second I open my arms, Melanie pulls me into a gentle hug filled with love—I don’t know how to explain it, but I can feel it.
“It’s nice to meet you.” I’m not the least bit surprised I mean it either.
“Thank you. For everything you’ve done for West,” Melanie whispers where only I can hear.
I almost thank her for everything her son’s done for me but don’t get the chance. The producer we’d met earlier knocks on the door, sticking her head in. “Hey, West. They’re ready for you on set early if you’re okay with starting now?”
He nods, and the room explodes with energy.
West is swept away, and I clock in as the employee I’m meant to be—for only about another twenty-four hours.
Hiding behind a work mask is the easiest way for me to let everything else go. I don’t have time to think about the tiny voice in the back of my head screaming to stay if I have a job to do.
I sneak a few pictures and videos as they mic West up, and then make sure he doesn’t forget his HOTSHOT hat. Of course, he flips it around backwards and then lets the woman in charge of hair and makeup touch up whatever she needs to before he’s escorted to a chair in the center of the staging area.
There’s something new in him too—a lightness behind his eyes that wasn’t there at the beginning. I’m not the only one who’s come out of this experience changed.
Kell and Enzo walk up on my left side, keeping a small gap between me and Melanie on my right. “In three… two…” The camera man folds his last finger down and points.
The lady leading the segment introduces herself as Savannah, and West’s dimply smile takes over as she shifts to him.
“Welcome home, West Parker, and thank you so much for rushing to get here. I heard you ran into some traffic coming in?” The blonde smiles, tucking her short, bleached bob behind her ear.
West morphs into character so well it’s hard to tell he’s done it sometimes. It’s been a facade he’s worn since the moment he stepped on stage for the very first time in London, and I know it felt good to get lost in something else, to feel like someone else when it was too difficult to be himself.
I know what that feels like—to want to escape so badly, you learn to become someone else entirely.
HexedHeroine is my West Parker.
“Nothing can keep me from Traverse City, not even a little holiday traffic.” West waves off her worry, adding in one of his infamously naughty winks.
Savannah giggles, blushing with West’s full attention on her. She moves the interview along, landing on a question everyone has heard West answer a hundred times before. “Why comedy? After leaving hockey, what led you here?”
He hesitates and bites his lip, the wheels turning. “I’ve answered this so many times, and I always say it’s because comedy saved me, and while that’s true, what it really was, was missing my little brother’s laugh.”
The room stills, and Kell mutters softly, “Holy shit.”
Melanie sucks in a breath beside me, immediate tears welling in her eyes. Ben wraps his arm around her, and she cuddles into his arms, keeping focused on her son.
I follow her watery gaze to West. “Micah had this crazy laugh.” He chuckles.
“It made everyone else join in no matter what he was laughing about, and when he passed away, I remember thinking how badly I wanted to hear it again. I started hanging out at LOL in London, hoping I’d find what I was looking for.
None of this was what I was looking for at the time, but chasing his laugh brought laughter back into my life when I needed it most.”
I don’t realize I’m crying until I feel a tear slip down my cheek. I wipe it away before it drips to my shirt. Another rolls down the other side, but before I can reach up to stop its track, a hand slides into mine.
Kell squeezes, staring at West with a smile that seems to heal something broken inside him too.
I hold his hand until the very end when Savannah ends with, “this tour was so successful. How did you do it?”
West glances over his shoulder, staring in my direction. I wonder if he can see me through the set lights, or if he just knows I’m standing on the other side. “With the help of my two best friends and a pretty little Hex.”
Before West joins us side stage again, Kell tells me that’s the first time he’s heard West say Micah’s name in over a year.