Chapter 3
3
The next morning was a sodden gray with the previous night’s chill, but Tom could practically hear the major-key orchestral theme following him down the street to Juilliard for a photo call at Ximena’s alma mater. Before falling asleep, he’d worried that maybe he shouldn’t have promised that he was going to be really helpful with the inn repairs. But this morning? It felt like the first day of an endless summer vacation. Everything was going to work out.
The big lobby was noisy and crowded with photographers and their equipment, and there was a happy background din made by Boyd’s fans outside, who pressed their faces and handwritten signs to the glass windows. Tom was normally skittish near the people who followed Boyd around to take pictures of him, but today they merely seemed like the joyful chorus to his mood. Hello, weirdos! Yes, everything is beautiful today.
Tom checked in with the photographer and Ximena’s publicist, kissed Ximena herself on the cheek, and stepped onto the set. He hoped the shoot didn’t take too long—he wanted to stop by a hardware store afterward and osmotically absorb some construction knowledge before he talked to Rosie again.
Boyd rose from the makeup station when he spotted Tom, an out-of-character expression of uncertainty creasing his famous, Byronic features.
“You shaved!” he said. “Wait, are we not doing the mustache thing in the new script? Are we going back to the dick thing? I thought you said the dick thing was gross?”
Boyd looked vaguely like Tom if their height difference was ignored: dark hair and eyes, strong features, muscular build. Their play, All’s Well That Bends Well , was an adaptation of Shakespeare’s least famous comedy, and its central conceit was that Boyd, the real love interest, might be mistaken for Tom, the decoy boyfriend, in dim lighting. In the first version of the script, Ximena’s character figured out the switch when she stuck her hand down Boyd’s pants. She and Tom had both objected: the original play was vaguely rape-y upon any amount of scrutiny, and swapping the genders of the main characters didn’t help. Also, shaming people with tiny dicks, even if Tom was very much not one of them, wasn’t a great look. Tom had been told to grow a thick, seventies-style porn mustache as a compromise to preserve the plot beat.
“The dick thing was gross,” Tom confirmed, taking a step back. “I’ll grow the ’stache back before rehearsals start. It was just getting itchy.”
If Rosie didn’t like it, off it went. God willing, everything else she wanted was that easily handled.
“Oh, yeah, okay,” Boyd said with a great deal of doubt, looking Tom up and down. “It was just, you know, a big part of your character. Did you get the fish I sent? Have you been sticking to the diet?”
Tom tried not to squirm under Boyd’s scrutiny. “I got the fish. I’ve been eating the fish.”
He’d eaten some of the fish.
Boyd’s gaze was assessing. In the lead-up to their Off Broadway run, Tom had been obliged to spend several hours a day lifting weights on the ancient 1990s infomercial torture devices of a local gym in order to force his body into a facsimile of his Hollywood action movie colead’s.
He wondered if Rosie had been at all impressed, what with most of him on display when he’d opened his door. Hopefully a little impressed? He needed all the advantages he could get.
“You could come to my training sessions now that I’m back in town,” Boyd said, face brightening. “I started seeing a new trainer. He’s not just about fitness. He’s also a healer.”
“Like, he’s a doctor and a fitness trainer?” Tom said, trying to sidestep over to the makeup table.
“Not a doctor, no, he’s not captive to western pharmaceutical interests,” Boyd said earnestly. “He teaches your body to protect itself from toxins using natural feedback. Like, if you’re dehydrated and bloating, you use frog venom to restore the balance.” Boyd lifted his loose T-shirt up to display a trio of round, angry-looking welts like cigarette burns along his collarbone. “You do get frog face for like twenty-four hours after he applies the venom, but after that, all the water weight is—boom—gone.”
“Uhhh,” said Tom, looking around for someone to handle this imminent risk to the production’s headliner. Boyd was a nice man, really, but so naive and credulous that it was a wonder no celebrity cult had scooped him up yet, and Tom was in no position to provide a good example before he got his own life sorted out. “Ximena, Boyd’s burning himself with frog juice. Should he be doing that?”
“Oh, baby, no,” Ximena said, catching on to Tom’s imploring look and sweeping over to put her arm around Boyd’s massive shoulders. Ximena was tall, Tom’s height, with her black hair freshly styled into a spiky pixie cut and delicate gold hoops crowding her earlobes. “No frog venom. Have you tried drinking actual water? I’ll get you some.”
She pushed Boyd back toward the makeup artist, who sat him down to work on his foundation. Boyd’s skin wasn’t great—theater pancake would do that, but so would anabolic steroids, which he’d offered Tom before. If he wanted health advice, Tom’s position was that no role was worth shrinking his balls or puffing into “frog face.”
Ximena frowned and looked at her watch as they waited for Boyd to be made pretty.
“I was hoping to get out of here by eleven,” she complained. “Lú wanted to tour another school during her lunch hour.” Ximena’s wife Luísa was a partner at a fancy white-shoe law firm and the child of Broadway producers; the dirty secret of this industry was that people mostly managed to stay in it via someone else’s money.
“Preschool? Already?” Tom asked. Ximena wasn’t even due till May.
“Preschool. This town is insane,” Ximena said, pressing a hand to her forehead. “Lú was applying to day cares while my feet were still in stirrups at the fertility clinic.”
They both fidgeted impatiently through makeup, but at last the photographer came over to tell them where to stand for light check.
“Why am I in Boyd’s lap again?” Tom complained when he got his own assignment. It didn’t make thematic sense in the context of the already incoherent play, but this was the third photo call since the hurricane to explore the visual concept of “Tom and Boyd love to cuddle.” Vanity Fair Mexico had draped Tom across Boyd’s naked, greased-up chest with instructions to simper when it had been Tom who’d hauled Boyd’s lunatic ass out of a drainage ditch!
It was a bait and switch. Tom didn’t even appear until the second act, his onstage romance with Boyd was nothing but misdirection, and their offstage relationship was nothing like the fangirls imagined.
“Because our friends outside love the idea that you call him ‘Daddy,’?” Ximena answered, nodding her chin at the crowd on the other side of the windows, although the question had been hypothetical at best.
“It’s part of our brand now,” Boyd agreed.
Tom was a little queasy at the idea that he was a part of Boyd’s brand, much less a part that masses of strangers found sexually titillating.
“We should switch things up,” Tom said. “Ximena’s the oldest. Get in her lap and I’ll stand behind you both.”
Ximena shot Tom a dirty look, but hey, their characters got married in the last scene, this was her cross to bear.
Boyd shook his head. “ Daddy isn’t about age,” he rumbled in his bass voice.
“ Daddy is a vibe,” Ximena agreed, crossing her legs and inspecting her manicure. “Get in his lap, baby bear.”
“I can do the daddy vibe,” Tom muttered darkly. If Rosie had arrived at his door looking for a guy who could swing a hammer, that was the vibe he needed to project. But nonetheless he took his assigned perch between Boyd’s spread knees, wrapping the other man’s arm around his waist and tilting his head to find his light. The girls outside went berserk, cheering and banging on the windows so hard Tom was afraid they’d break the glass. Boyd shot them a tolerant smile and patted Tom’s stomach consolingly.
“Hey, do you have some time to look at the script revisions? It looks like they want to take my character in a different direction, but I want to make sure I understand the deeper implications,” Boyd said as the photographer’s assistant took some test shots.
“Ooh, I’d love to,” Tom lied. He was sure there was nothing deep to be found. The story was bananapants fluff tied together with a few clever anachronisms. “But I’m actually heading out of town, and I probably won’t be back till rehearsals start.”
“Are you pursuing other artistic endeavors?” Boyd asked in his recitative way.
“No, my, ah, Rosie asked me to go spend some time with her out on Martha’s Vineyard. We’re going to replace the roof on her aunt’s B and B.” The idea of it was so new and precious that it felt like jinxing it to speak it out loud. But he couldn’t stop an uncertain, giddy smile from spreading across his face, much to the photographer’s dismay.
“Whoa, whoa,” said Ximena. “Your ex? She finally called you back?”
“Yep,” Tom confirmed, forcing himself to nonchalance and then, at the photographer’s gesture, a wide-eyed pout. No, this was really happening. He could tell the world. “We’re, well, I guess we’re going to see if we can work things out.”
“Wow,” said Ximena. “That’s pretty sudden, isn’t it?”
“Congratulations,” Boyd said, slapping him on the shoulder with his free hand. “That’s fantastic. Happy for you. Love to hear it.”
Ximena’s expression was more skeptical. “I thought you guys hadn’t spoken in years.”
“Not until last night. She just got my message, I guess? And she’s finally open to getting back together.”
“Why now though?” Ximena asked. “Right before your big return to Broadway? I mean, I pity the woman who decides to be your groupie of all people, but you need to be worried about people who just want to get close to Boyd.”
Tom nearly snorted at the idea of Rosie as a groupie. Or of Tom as close to Boyd in anything other than the very short-term sense that yes, he could smell what the other actor had eaten for breakfast. More fish.
“That’s not Rosie at all,” he said. “She’s a normal person with an actual, normal life. And anyway, I’m the one who messed things up. This is only happening because I asked her for a second chance.”
Ximena’s expression softened, though Tom would have liked to see at least a little supportive skepticism of the idea that Tom had been the one who messed up.
The photographer cleared her throat again, and Tom was glad for an end to that line of questioning. For another few minutes, he obediently struck a variety of alluring poses over Boyd’s trunk-like thighs. As soon as he was released, he bounced up onto his toes and shook out his muscles. Boyd sprawled out on his seat, waving at his fans.
Ximena stood up more slowly, rubbing her lower back and making a face like she needed to pee. But instead of taking care of that important function, she turned back to Tom to continue the interrogation.
“So, what did you do to this poor girl, then?”
Tom swallowed, freezing mid-bounce as Boyd tuned in to the question as well. But Tom still didn’t have a ready answer. He’d been blindsided at the time. Rosie hadn’t exactly given him an itemized return receipt, more a shouted list of emotions she was feeling as she tossed his clothes into the hallway.
Other people had confided their own theories:
His best friend had thought Tom was a bad roommate.
You don’t clean anything until I yell at you, the last time you bought groceries you came home with nothing but lychees and cocktail shrimp, and every sock you own is on my living room floor , Adrian had yelled. It’s like living with a raccoon.
Tom’s parents thought he was a financial drain.
You shouldn’t have gotten married until you could support a family , his stolid, responsible father had told him. It shouldn’t have all been up to her.
But Rosie never expected me to make any money , Tom had replied. That’s why she took this dumb finance job in the first place.
How much of the rent can you cover if you get a second job? his thoughtful, patient mother had asked.
I don’t actually know how much our rent is? Tom had admitted, and his parents moaned.
Their mutual acquaintances seemed to think Tom had never deserved Rosie in the first place.
Rose’s such a sweetheart , Conner Lynch had said. Tom had known him in college, and he was the only one of Rosie’s coworkers Tom had known well enough to call and ask whether anything different was going on at her job. Our VP is screaming at us all day long, but you still have her scheduling your callbacks while she’s eating her little homemade lunch? She’s wasted on you.
You sound like you’re just waiting to ask her out , Tom had accused him.
I mean. You’re still technically married, right? Conner said after a hesitation. So, like, not until she’s ready to date again.
Oh my God, fuck you , Tom had said, hanging up the phone.
Tom knew that people with anxiety often worried that everyone secretly hated them. He’d never suffered that intrusive thought himself. He’d felt great about his life at twenty-two. He was married to his soulmate, he had his Equity card in hand, he was living the dream…and then he discovered over the course of one awful week that everyone he loved did, in fact, think he was a bit of a shithead.
“We moved here after graduation,” Tom explained to Ximena and Boyd. “And right away, I got cast as a swing in a revival of Jesus Christ Superstar when someone fractured his tibia. And I met a ton of people that way. So things were going great for me, but Rosie—okay, so it took me a long time to realize this. She was having a hard time at her job, and she missed her family and our friends in Boston. She was lonely, and we hadn’t even been married a year, and I—”
“You what?” Boyd asked when Tom simply trailed off.
“I—nothing.” Tom swallowed hard. That was really the extent of it. He’d done nothing about it. “I nothinged.”
Tom hazarded another look at Ximena, who appeared to be waiting for more. But there wasn’t. He hadn’t done any of the specific terrible things that typically wrecked marriages; he just hadn’t acted like much of a husband at all.
“But it’s going to be different this time,” he added. “Look, I know I fucked up. But things are different now. I’m different now.”
Ximena and Boyd shared a pitying glance, one Tom caught as being about him.
“What’s that look about, oh wise married lady?” he asked.
“She’s your age, right? Thirty-four? And she never remarried, no kids?” Ximena asked.
Tom shook his head.
“So, she’s hearing her biological clock tick. She’s seen what the straight men of this city are serving up these days. And she’s wondering if she made a mistake back then, whether she should have settled for you. Whether you might be better than the alternatives.”
“What? No,” Tom instinctively objected.
“There’s nothing wrong with him.” Boyd came to Tom’s defense, an action slightly undercut by Ximena licking her thumb, leaning over, and swiping a smudge of eyeliner he’d missed off his cheekbone.
“I’m not saying you’re defective,” Ximena said to Tom. “But I think you have to be realistic about this. Are you okay being the guy who’s just good enough in a pinch?”
Tom frowned at the other actor. Ximena seemed to think this would be a big hit to his pride. But he’d always thought he was lucky to land Rosie in the first place, a tiny, marvelous creature dedicated to making the world better for the people she loved.
“Yeah,” he said. “Please. Let her settle for me. I’m glad every other option sucked more than I did.”
A flash of surprise crossed Ximena’s face. “Oh. Well.” She shifted her weight, reassessing him. “So you’re going to prove your devotion with home repairs?”
“Yep, that’s the idea,” Tom said, a little pissed at Ximena’s lack of optimism. “I show her I can be a good little husband this time. I’m fully trained. I make breakfast. I run errands.”
“But then maybe you should take her somewhere nice instead?” Boyd asked. “A place with a roof? Do you want to borrow my condo in Malibu? It has a beach view and a hot tub.”
“Right, home repairs are super stressful,” Ximena agreed. “Lú and I nearly strangled each other when we redid our kitchen.”
“Nah, this place on the Vineyard is terrible, but she loves it,” Tom said. “And she asked me to help her get it fixed up. She seemed pretty stressed about it, in fact, which means I get to swoop in to the rescue.” It sounded like a sterling opportunity to demonstrate maturity! Financial stability! Core definition! All the things Rosie had probably wanted in a partner and not gotten the last time around.
Ximena squinted at him. “Maybe you could find a swooping opportunity that plays more to your strengths than managing a construction project.”
Tom was really getting the sense that she thought he’d screw this up. It would have been deflating, except that he knew Rosie perfectly and Ximena didn’t.
“You don’t understand. If there were an Olympic event for executive function, Rosie would be the world champion. She’ll have everything already planned out,” he said. “I’ll just have to do the manual labor part, and then we’ll work on our relationship. This is the perfect opportunity.”
“I’m sure you’re right,” Ximena said, sounding as though she meant the exact opposite.
“When do we get to meet her?” Boyd asked guilelessly.
“Uh,” Tom said. The last two people from his current life he needed to introduce to Rosie were the judgy pregnant lady and the guy trailed by strangers obsessed with his sex life. Tom wasn’t sure how Rosie now imagined happy domesticity, but these two probably weren’t part of it. And he still had to convince her that he was.
“I’ll bring her to the premiere,” he promised.