Maritza slides down, but she doesn’t let me go and she won’t stop looking at me. It’s been six months since I’ve seen her last, but this is my fourth deployment since she’s met me. It never gets any easier and there’s always that unspoken chance that I might not make it home this time.
But I made it home in one piece.
The last few tours were some of the hardest of my life. Turns out things are different when you’ve got someone waiting for you back home, but my stint in the Army is officially over and I’m never going back.
Maritza is my home now. She’s the place I run to when life gets hard. She’s my refuge and my solace from the storm. When I’m with her, all my worries and cares and demons tend to fade into the background, sometimes melting away entirely.
“Ian’s probation got denied,” she tells me, biting a smirk.
“Good.” The bastard got caught last year embezzling money from the brokerage firm he was working for in Brentwood. Wouldn’t surprise me if he was another Bernie Madoff in the making, but now we’ll never know because he’s serving time at some white-collar facility on the east coast and once he’s out, he’ll never be allowed to work in finance again.
“Your sister called and told me this morning. Wanted to personally deliver the news. Kind of sad though. Almost feel bad for him.”
“I don’t,” I chuff. “I feel bad for all the people who trusted him with their money.”
“True … anyway, let’s focus on the important stuff. Like the fact that you’re home for good and the fact that I cannot wait to show you my new office space in Riverside and introduce you to my newly hired assistant.” She does a little jump. “It’s so weird being someone’s boss but I kind of love it.”
I kiss her forehead. During my latest deployment, she opened a small PR and web development firm out of some cheap office space in Riverside. From what she’s told me, everything’s going well, but I’ve yet to see it in person. “I knew you’d find your element. Never doubted you for a sec.”
I make my rounds, saying goodbye to all the familiar faces, and then we head out to the parking lot where Maritza parked my vintage Porsche.
“I knew you’d want to drive her first thing when you got back,” she says, handing me the keys, which I gladly accept before stealing a kiss from that sweet mouth of hers. As soon as we get to the car, Maritza flings her arms around me once more. She does this whenever I get back, hugs me and kisses me and touches me a hundred thousand times, like she has to make sure I’m real, that I’m here to stay. “So what next? What do you want to do now?”
Resting my hand beneath her chin, I peer into her gorgeous dark eyes and smile. “First I’m going to marry you. Finally. And then I’m going to buy you a house. And we’re going to fill it with lots of babies. After that, I think I’m going to spend the rest of my life growing old with you. A lifetime of Saturdays. How’s that sound?”
Maritza chuckles. “I meant, like … are you hungry? Do you want to grab dinner? Do you want to stop at your mom’s? But I like your answer. It sounds pretty perfect to me.”
I kiss her, threading my hand through hers and pinning her back against my car.
Our future starts right here, right now, in this high school parking lot, just a former waitress, a former Army corporal, and a lifetime of memories ahead of them.
DREAM CAST
Isaiah – Milo Ventimiglia
Maritza – Olivia Culpo
Melrose – Jennifer Lawrence
Rachael – Rachel McAdams
Gram – Susan Sarandon
Murphy – Murphy Renshaw
Myles – Matthew Gray Gubler
Coming Soon
I’VE BEEN A DOG-WALKER on an episode of Will & Grace.
A bakery shop owner in a Lifetime movie.
Ryan Gosling’s kid sister in an indie flick that never saw the light of day.
Victim #2 in an episode of Law & Order: SVU.
But today I’m faced with my most challenging role yet; a camera-less reality show called Girl with Lifelong Crush on Best Guy Friend starring Melrose Claiborne as … Melrose Claiborne.
Standing outside Nick Camden’s Studio City bungalow, I straighten my shoulders, smooth my blonde waves into place, and reach for the doorbell. The heavy thump of my heart suggests it’s going to fall to the floor the second he opens the door—but I’m hopeful the butterflies in my stomach will catch it first.
He has this effect on me. Every. Single. Time. And that’s saying something because it takes a lot to make me nervous, to throw me off my game. But my crush on him has only intensified over the years, growing stronger with each unrequited year that passes.
Last night, out of nowhere, Nick called me—which was strange because Nick never calls. He only ever texts. He’s so against calling, in fact, that he has his ringer permanently set to “off’ and his voicemail box has been full for the last six years.
“Mel, I need to talk to you tomorrow,” he’d said, breathless almost. There was a hint of a smile in his tone, giddiness. “It’s really important.”
“Nick, you’re scaring me,” I told him, half wondering if someone slipped something into his drink and he was high on something. “What’s this about?”
“I have to tell you in person. And I have something to ask you, something crazy important,” he said. “Oh, my god. This is insane. I’m so fucking nervous, Mel. But as soon as you get here tomorrow, I’ll tell you. I’ve been wanting to tell you about this for a long time, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t until now. But now I can. And I can’t fucking wait. This is huge, Mel. This is … oh, God.”
“Nick …” I paced my bedroom floor, my left palm clasped across my forehead. In nearly two decades of friendship, I’d never heard Nick so worked up before. “Why can’t you just tell me now?”
“Come over tomorrow. Around three,” he’d said. “This is something that has to be done in person.”
I ring his doorbell again before checking the time on my phone. Stifling a yawn, I rise on my toes and try to peek inside the glass sidelights of his front door. Knowing Nick, he probably got side-tracked for ran out for burritos and got caught up in conversation with someone he knows.
Then again … he was pretty insistent about talking to me in person at three o’clock about this “major” thing.
All night, I tossed and turned, trying to wrap my head around what this could possibly be, how I could know someone for so long and fail miserably trying to get a read on them.
Growing up Nick lived next door and the two of us were inseparable from the day he first moved into the neighborhood and I found him by the creek trying to catch bullfrogs—which I promptly forced him to set free. By the end of the day, we both realized our bedroom windows aligned perfectly on the second floors of our houses, and by the end of the week, he gave me a walkie-talkie and told me I was his best friend. When we were ten, he gave me a friendship necklace—like the kind girls usually give to other girls. He gave me the half that said “best” and wore the “friend” half but always tucked under his shirt so no one would give him any shit—not that anyone would. Everyone loved Nick.
It wasn’t until the summer after seventh grade that Nick hit a growth spurt and everything changed. His voice got deeper. His legs got longer. Even his features became more chiseled and defined. It was like he aged several years over the course of a couple of months, and I found myself looking at him in ways I never had before. When I closed my eyes at night, I found myself thinking about what it’d be like if he kissed me.
Suddenly I couldn’t look at him without blushing or getting all fidgety, and it was as if it’d happened overnight.
I’d gone from running next door with a messy pony tail to see if he wanted to ride bikes … to slicking on an extra coat of Dr. Pepper Lip Smackers and running a brush through my hair any time I knew I was going to see him.
It was just a little crush …
Unfortunately, I wasn’t the only one who noticed Nick’s head-turning tra
nsformation.
Nick’s door swings open and I don’t have time to realize what’s happening before he sweeps me into his arms and swings me around his front porch.
“Mel!” He buries his face into my shoulder, squeezing me so hard I can’t breathe, nearly suffocating the swarm of butterflies in my middle.
He smells like … Nick. Like stale bar smoke and cheap fabric softener and Irish Spring soap. Growing up in Brentwood, the son of a successful screenwriter and music executive, Nick could’ve had it all—materially and professionally. But all he ever wanted was to be a regular guy who got by on merit and I adored that about him.
“Look at you,” he says when he puts me down. His hands are threaded in mine as his deep blue gaze scan me from head to toe. “I haven’t seen you in months.”
Three months, two weeks, and five days—but who’s counting?
The last time we hung out was on my birthday, and there were so many people at the bar, I barely had a chance to say more than two sentences to him. We’d made plans to get together the following weekend, but his band booked a gig in Vegas and I was leaving to film a Lifetime movie in Vancouver the day before he was coming back.
Life’s been consistent that way, always pulling us in separate directions, but it never fails. We always pick up right where we left off, like no time had passed.
“You find the place all right?” he asks as he leads me inside. The scent of Windex and clean laundry fills my lungs and a folded blanket rests over the back of a leather chair in the living room.
I chuckle at the thought of Nick tidying up before I got here. He was always a slob growing up.
“I did,” I say, glancing around his new digs. Last time I saw him, he was living in some apartment with four roommates in Toluca Lake. The time before that he was shacking up with a fuck buddy, but that was short lived because the girl ultimately wanted exclusivity and that’s something Nick’s never been able to offer anyone—that I know of. “When did you move here?”
“Last month,” he says. “I’m subletting from my drummer’s cousin.”
The sound of pots and pans clinking in the kitchen tells me we’re not alone, but I’m not surprised. Nick has always had roommates. He’s painfully extroverted. Guy can’t stand to be alone for more than five minutes but not in the clingy, obnoxious sort of way. More in the charismatic, life of the party, always down for a good time sort of way.
I follow Nick to the living room and he points to the middle cushion of a cognac leather sofa before slicking his palms together and pacing the small space.
“Nick.” I laugh. “You’re acting like a crazy person right now. You know that, right?”
His ocean gaze lands on mine and he stops pacing for a moment. “I’m just so fucking nervous.”
My heart flutters and some deep-seeded hope makes its way out in the form of a smile on my face, but I bite it away.
I’d never admit this out loud, but last night a very real part of me believed this entire thing centered around Nick wanting to tell me he has feelings for me, that he wants to date me.
I tried to rationalize it, justify it every way I could.
I tried to come up with alternate theories. But none of them made sense because Nick’s never been nervous around me for any reason. Ever. What else could possibly make him nervous around be other than a heartfelt confession?
Waving my hand, I say, “Come on. Spit it out. I don’t have all day.”
He cups his hands over his nose and mouth, releasing a hard breath, and when he lets them fall, I find the dopiest grin on his face.
His eyes water like a teenage girl with a backstage pass to a Harry Styles concert.
He tries to speak but he can’t.
Oh, god.
He’s doing it.
He’s actually telling me he likes me …
“Mel,” he says, pulling in a hard breath before dropping to his knees in front of me. He takes my hands in his and I swear my vision fades out for a second. “You know when we were kids and we used to tell each other everything?”
“Yeah …”
“There was something I never told you,” he says, eyes locked on mine. “I guess … I guess I was afraid to say it out loud. I was afraid this thing I wanted so bad, this thing I wanted more than anything I’d ever wanted in my life, wasn’t going to come true. And I thought that by admitting it, I was only going to jinx myself. So I kept it to myself, but I can’t anymore. It’s too big. It’s eating away at me and it has been for years. But it’s time. I have to tell you.”
He’s rambling.
Nick never rambles.
He rises, taking the spot on the couch beside me and cupping my face in his hands. “This is insane, Melrose. I can’t believe I’m about to tell you this.”
My mouth parts and I’m milliseconds from blurting out something along the lines of “I’ve liked you since we were kids, too …” but I bite my tongue and let him go first.
“You know how I have my band, right?” he asks, referring to Melrose Nights, the band he founded in high school and named after me.
I nod, heart sinking. No … plummeting.
“What about it?” I ask, blinking away the embarrassed burn in my eyes.
“My dream, Mel, was always to hit it big,” he said. “Like, commercially big.”
My brows lift. This is news to me. He was always about the indie scene, always so against the big music corporations that controlled every song the American people were played on the radio.
“Really?” I tuck my chin against my chest. “Because you always said—”
“I know what I always said,” he cuts me off. “But the more I got to thinking about it, the more I thought … I just want my songs to be in the ears of as many people as possible. And it’s not even about becoming famous or having money, you know I’m not about any of that. I just want people to know my songs. That’s all.”
I swallow the lump in my throat and glance toward a wood burning fireplace in the corner where a crushed, empty can of Old Milwaukee rests on the mantle next to what appears to be a crumpled lace bra.
Guess he forgot a few things when he was straightening up …
“Okay, so what are you trying to tell me?” I ask.
“We got signed …” his mouth pulled so wide, he looks like a bona fide crazy person right now, “… and we’re going on tour with Maroon 5.”
I try not to let my rampant disbelief show on my face, but something tells me I’m failing miserably. He reads my expression, searching my eyes, and his smile fades.
“You hate Maroon 5,” I say.
“I used to hate Maroon 5,” he corrects me. “Anyway, the act they had fell through last minute, so they got us. We leave next week.”
“Next week? For how long?”
“Six months.” His calloused hands smack together. “Six months on the road with one of the biggest music acts in North America.”
“Wow, Nick … that’s … that’s huge. You were right. That’s some big news,” I say. Everything is sinking. My voice. My heart. My hope. “I’m so happy for you.”
I throw my arms around him, and I meant what I said. I’m happy for him. I had no idea this is what he wanted, but now that he’s shared this with me, I thrilled for him. He’s my best friend, my oldest friend, and all I want is for him to be happy.
Plus he deserves this.
He’s insanely talented. Music. Lyrics. Singing. Playing. Producing. Mixing. It all comes natural to him. Keeping it all on some lowdown indie scene for a select few would be doing a disservice to the rest of the world.
“I just don’t understand why you couldn’t tell me this over the phone,” I say. “Why’d you make me drive all the way out here just so you could tell me in person?”
Nick leans back, studying my face as he rakes his palm along his five o’clock shadow. “Because I have a favor to ask you …”
Lifting one brow, I study him right back. He’s never asked me a single favor as long as I’v
e known him (excluding those times he wanted me to talk to girls for him in middle school or steal him an extra lemon slushy at lunch).
“See, I’m taking over this guy’s lease,” he says. “I pay fifteen hundred a month for my half of the rent. You know what a cheap bastard I am, right? I just don’t want to throw that money away over the next several months and I don’t want to stick Sutter with my half of the rent and utilities and everything because that’s just shitty.”
“Sutter?” I ask.
“My roommate,” he says. “Cool guy. Electrician. Owns his own company. Anyway, I know you’re living in your Gram’s guesthouse, but you’re the only person I know who’s not locked under a lease right now, so I thought mayyyyybe you might want to help me out for a few months? As a favor? And in return, I’ll … I don’t know. I’ll do something for you. What do you want? You want a backstage pass to a Maroon 5 concert? You want to meet Adam?”
“You’re already on a first name basis with Adam Levine?” I ask, head cocked.
Nick smirks. “Not yet. But I will be.”
“I don’t know …” I pull in a long, slow breath. “What about Murphy?”
“We’ve got a fenced in yard,” he says, pointing toward the back of the house. “He’ll love it here.”
“What about your roommate? Would he be cool living with a stranger?” I ask.
“Totally.”
“And you’re sure he’s not a serial killer?” I keep my voice low, leaning in.
Nick chokes on his spit. “Uh, yeah, no. He’s not a serial killer.”
My cousin-slash-roommate, Maritza, recently moved out and got a place with her boyfriend, Isaiah, so it’s just Murphy and I in the guesthouse now. It gets quiet sometimes. Lonely too. And Gram’s on this travel-the-world kick lately. One week she’s home, the next week she’s in Bali for twelve days with her best friend, Constance or one of the Kennedys.
[2018] PS I Hate You Page 22