Chapter 19 Megan
MEGAN
Amber is still asleep when we head back inside.
The loaded pizza dough is ready to go into the oven, but my appetite vanished somewhere during the confrontation outside the cabin.
Was Nikki aware of what she was doing when she called mystery-guy, or is she so loved up that she isn’t thinking straight?
She put our lives in danger though, the rational voice in my head is shrieking at me. She put Amber’s life in danger.
Nikki stands by the living room window peering out at the mountains. She’s still clawing at her hand with her natural acrylics, scraping bloody skin without even realizing what she’s doing.
This isn’t the Nikki I know and love.
This isn’t the girl who stood by me when things were tough at home with my stepdad.
She flew out to LA only a few weeks before me and Amber.
How has this guy gotten under her skin so badly that she compromised our location for a telephone conversation with him because she couldn’t bear not hearing his voice?
Nikki has always been the first to call out a toxic relationship, so I can’t believe that she has fallen into the same trap as other women we know, especially with a guy who wants to keep their relationship a secret.
It’s a gigantic red flag bopping her on the head, and she has simply brushed it aside and accepted his excuses.
“Why did you call him, Nik?”
The TV is still playing in the living room, the sound turned down low while Amber is dozing, and my voice sounds too loud.
Nikki drags her gaze away from the window.
The expression on her face when she looks at me, the narrowed eyes, and the downturned lips, makes me shiver.
We shared a bed last night. We had a sleepover just like we used to when we were at high school, chatting through the night, giggling, sharing our dreams for the future, but I barely recognize this woman.
“You wouldn’t understand.” Her voice fires back like a bullet.
“Try me.”
“Why? Are you a relationship expert now that you’ve met Gio?”
That stings. “That’s not what I mean. I’m just trying to work out what’s going on with you.”
“Ugh!” Nikki clenches her fists and her jaw. “Listen to yourself. I made a phone call. So fucking what?”
I’m holding a wooden-handled knife in my hand, and without thinking, I slam it down onto the chopping board where it slices into the wooden surface with a dull thwack.
“So. Fucking. What?” I repeat. “This is my sister’s life we’re talking about here. If he finds her…”
“Oh, so you’re blaming me now for him following you here. Don’t you think he’d have found you anyway? Who did Amber wave to on the fucking cable cars?”
I can’t believe I’m hearing this. My blood is rushing through my veins and trying to drown out her caustic voice, but without success.
“You told the jerk you’re screwing around with that you were coming here. You gave him our location.”
“Him?” Her voice cranks up a notch. “You think I’ve been cozying up to Amber’s father all these years? Are you out of your fucking mind?”
I shake my head. Stare at the balls of mozzarella dotted around the pizza.
Am I out of my mind? I must’ve been when I thought that I could bring Amber to America. What was wrong with a cheap vacation to Bournemouth or Brighton or Bognor Regis, someplace with sandy beaches and stripy windshields and people eating fish and chips out of thick white paper?
How can I blame Nikki when I should never have brought Amber here in the first place.
“You’re bleeding onto the carpet.” I stare at the tiny red dots scattered around her feet.
She peers down at the floor and then at her hand. She hangs her head and slumps her shoulders. Her gaze slides to the makeshift den with Amber inside, and then across to me standing behind the kitchen counter, and it’s like a switch has been flicked.
It’s almost as if I’m watching the real Nikki reinhabiting her body.
Her eyes register the blood and the knife sticking out of the chopping board and the darkness outside the windows. “I’m so sorry, Meg,” she whispers.
Something inside me cracks wide open. I open the cabinet above the sink, find the medical kit, and beckon for her to join me.
She pulls out a seat and sits heavily at the table, her bloody hand resting, palm-down, in front of her. I sit next to her and open a packet of antiseptic wipes to clean the deep gouges in the back of her hand.
In all the years we’ve known each other, we’ve rarely argued, and whenever we have, we simply move on from it.
We share a quiet moment over something that brings us together, like a glass of Pinot, a book we both love, or our favorite scene from Schitt’s Creek where David serenades the love of his life Patrick by lip-synching to ‘Simply the Best’.
Now, we come together over Nikki’s bloody hand.
She winces as I clean it gently with the antiseptic wipes. “Tommy isn’t like anyone else I’ve ever met, Meg.”
I focus on her hand. I don’t acknowledge that she just told me his name is Tommy.
It’s a start.
“I never thought a man like him would ever look at a girl like me.” She inhales deeply.
“I always felt bold in London, you know. Kind of empowered, especially when I was on stage. But in LA, I felt so tiny, so inconsequential when I first arrived. Of course, the accent made me stand out like a sore thumb.”
I nod while I rummage through the medical kit for a Band-aid.
“So, when Tommy actively sought me out, it made me feel special. I saw how the other women followed him with their eyes. The men too.”
She smiles, and I reciprocate with a smile of my own.
“Our first date was very clandestine. He suggested that we wear a disguise, pretend to be someone else; he made it sound fun. And it was.”
I sense a but coming.
“But you’re right, Meg. I shouldn’t be anyone’s secret.
He should want people to know about me.” She sucks in her bottom lip.
“Only he promised to help me get a role in his new movie. So, when I got this audition, I convinced myself that he did that for me. He kept his promise, which meant that he really liked me.”
“But now you’re not so sure?”
She looks me in the eye for the first time since we came back inside. “You don’t know, do you?”
“Know what?”
“Gio got me the audition.”
My chest swells with love, and I feel a flush of heat spreading from my neck and into my face. He might live the kind of life that requires a team of bodyguards to protect him, but he has a kind heart. I think I must’ve recognized it in him the first moment we met.
“He hurts me sometimes, Meg.”
With the Band-aid in place, I cover her hand with mine. “How does he hurt you?”
I’ve never seen Nikki blush before, but now her face grows hot, and she snatches her hand away. “He likes to inflict pain when we…” She pauses. “You know me. ‘Don’t knock it till you try it’ has always been my motto, and at first, it was kind of exciting. Kinky. Weird even, but exciting.”
“Nik, what have you always said to me? You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do?”
I’m thinking about Gio when I say this. I can still hear him on the rooftop of his hotel building. This is your night, Meggie. Your fuck. Only Gio would never hurt me.
“It’s not that simple though, Meg.”
“It is if you want it to be.”
She draws in a shaky breath. “He can end my career just like that.” She snaps her fingers.
Sounds to me like this has become a regular threat, and she’s barely known him for a month. If this is how he behaves at the start of their relationship, what will he threaten her with next?
“That’s why I went along with it.” Tears spill down her cheeks. “I shouldn’t have listened to him, I know I shouldn’t have. But this is my first real break, and it doesn’t get any better than Hollywood.”
“But you just said that Gio got you the audition. You don’t need him, Nik. What he’s doing to you … it’s abuse, and he fucking knows it. He’s wielding Hollywood above your head like a lightsaber, and I think you should call him out on it. There are laws against this kind of thing, you know.”
“It’s too late.” She won’t look at me.
“Why? What’s happened?” I cover my mouth with my hand. “You’re not pregnant, are you?”
Her lips twitch but remain a narrow line. “No, I’m not pregnant.”
“So, what then? What’s so bad that you can’t walk away from him now? He’s not some all-powerful being, Nik. He can’t create or destroy lives, and Gio will look out for you, he’ll see that you’re alright.”
She squeezes her eyes shut. “He won’t, not when he finds out what I did.”
She’s scaring me now. “What did you do?”
“He was threatening me. He would’ve hurt me if I didn’t go along with it.” She swallows slowly before she continues.“I went with Tommy to your motel room. He said he owed someone a favor. He had a key…” Her voice trails off, but I’m still stuck on I went with Tommy to your motel room.
I stand so abruptly, the chair tips over behind me.
I pace the kitchen, the words playing on repeat inside my head. They went to my motel room. Why? What reason could Nikki’s mystery lover possibly have to go to my motel room after I left Los Angeles?
Then it dawns on me. He said he owed someone a favor.
I feel sick. I rush to the faucet and fill a tall glass with cold water, but I’m a couple of mouthfuls in when it threatens to come back up.
I lower my head over the basin and retch, trying desperately not to wake Amber up and not be sick and not turn around and say something that I’ll regret for the rest of my life.
“Meg, I’m so sorry.” Her voice reaches me from somewhere far away, someplace where we were once best friends who didn’t betray each other over a fucking man we only just met.
I grip the side of the basin, my knuckles white. “Don’t you dare say sorry now.” I speak into the void, barely recognizing my own voice. “Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”
“I never thought this would happen. Any of this.”