Impossible Things (Star Shadow #2)

by Bolden, Beth

  Benji knew that he was gaping at his friend and his lover. “You don’t know how to do that anymore?”

  There had always been a sense of the inevitable surrounding him and Diego, a feeling of permanence, rooted in their friendship and in Star Shadow, even when Star Shadow had ceased to exist. But now, he felt like Diego was slipping away.

  That isn’t even right, Benji thought, I’m driving him away.

  “I want Ana and my life and you, of course I want you,” Diego said, but Benji could hear the but coming before he even said it, “but this circus, everything going sideways, it’s too much. It was fine being on the periphery, but now we’re in the eye and it sucks. I have to drive by a whole group of paparazzi every single day to get out of my development. And you know the shit they say? I couldn’t hear it before, but now they scream it at me, and it’s vile.”

  Diego turned away, and Benji wanted to go after him, to pull him back, to save them both the pain of him leaving, but that was ultimately selfish. It had been selfish of him to involve Diego in the first place, to anticipate that while Diego might not want the same things as him out of life, he would be willing to share the burden. And maybe while Diego undoubtedly loved him, he didn’t love him that much.

  “I don’t know what to do,” Benji said desperately. He knew Diego couldn’t go back, not to the casually anonymous existence he’d enjoyed before, but he also didn’t want to push forward, either.

  Diego waved his arms. “Fix this,” he said in a hard, uncompromising voice. “Make it all go away.”

  “I can’t do that. It’s impossible to get rid of something once it’s started, you know that.”

  “I’m not even sure you want it to go away,” Diego sneered. “This is your big break. Me and a supermodel, fighting over you, with the tabloids there to tackle every possible angle.”

  Benji didn’t think he’d ever heard Diego talk like that before, not in the ten years he’d known him. And of course it had been stupid to ever think he could hide the ambitious parts of himself from this man. Nobody else on the planet knew him as well as Diego did. He knew how Benji ticked, and what he wanted, and worse of all, the lengths he might go to get it.

  “This isn’t like that, I’m not like that,” Benji argued, because when it came down to it, that wasn’t what he wanted. He wanted to be known for his music, for his producing, maybe even his body, but for the very first time, he realized that this—his heart—was more off-limits than he’d ever imagined.

  He’d had an uneasy feeling from the first moment Jay had brought up fake dating Rochelle Andrews. That feeling had only grown and grown, even more exponentially after Jay had given him the two choices: Rochelle or Diego. He’d thought at the time that he hadn’t wanted to expose or explain his sexuality, but he realized now that wasn’t it at all. He wasn’t ashamed that he was in love with Diego. He’d just wanted one thing that wasn’t for the world to consume. This new relationship with Diego felt precious and sacred, something he’d won because he was Benji the man, not because he was Benji of Star Shadow.

  “I’ll call Jay right now, I’ll call the whole thing off, I’ll fix it,” Benji continued in a horrified rush. “We can still fix this, I promise.”

  “Don’t make promises you can’t keep,” Diego said, and started to walk away, to leave.

  Benji watched him go and desperately wanted to fix this, even temporarily, but he didn’t know what to say to stop him. And that was the most wretched cherry on top of this whole fucking mess. He needed Diego’s cooperation to help fix this clusterfuck, his valuable opinion so it wouldn’t get even worse, but instead, he was walking away.

  Anger bled through the hurt, and Benji got pissed off.

  “So, that’s it?” Benji called out. “You’re just going to walk away? Turn out and leave when things get tough? Run back to your house and hide out? You gonna do that for the next five years?”

  That, Benji would realize later, was why they always said love and hate were two halves of the same coin. Because you knew better than anyone else how to hurt someone you loved. How to precisely aim the arrow that weaseled past their armor and dug right into their most sensitive spot.

  And Diego must have agreed with him, because he kept walking and the door slamming shut was the final, ugly punctuation on an even uglier fight.

  Benji fell back onto the couch and wondered what the fuck he was going to do now.

  ———

  Benji knew who it was banging on his front door, and he had absolutely zero intention of opening it because there was zero chance it was the person he wanted it to be.

  No, he’d made damn well sure of that with his final shitty statement to Diego. If Diego ever wanted to talk to him again, Benji would be shocked.

  “Benji!” the voice yelled through the heavy wood door. “You’d better fucking open this door right now.”

  The person on the other side had been alternating between threats and heavy pounding for the last ten minutes and preceding that had called and left about twenty voicemails, and a whole variety of texts, ranging between sympathetic and angry.

  But Benji didn’t want to talk to anyone. After Diego’s departure, he’d dealt with the immediate problem by calling Jay and telling him to figure out the shit spreading across the media and cut it off at its knees. About an hour later, Benji had seen a statement put out in his name that claimed he’d only met Rochelle Andrews once, and he had no other comment on his personal life. Jay had tried to ask during their phone call what he should do about all the Diego speculation, but Benji had hung up before answering.

  Essentially, Benji wanted him to do nothing.

  A key turned in the lock. Benji raised his head briefly. It had taken Leo longer than he’d ever anticipated to remember the spare key he’d given him about seven years ago, track it down, and then use it.

  “What the fuck,” Leo spit out, as he walked into Benji’s living room.

  He’d left the couch briefly once or twice—to pee, to find a few beers, to stare helplessly and pointlessly outside—but other than that he’d been glued to it for nearly twenty-four hours.

  The time everyone was supposed to meet up for a recording session had come and gone, and for the first time in his life, he hadn’t wanted to fulfill his obligations to his friends and bandmates. And not just because he knew Diego wouldn’t miss it, no matter how ugly their fight had gotten. He just . . . hadn’t wanted to move. He felt like he’d spent the last ten years in a constant state of movement, and he hadn’t realized just how goddamn tired he’d gotten.

  “You didn’t show,” Leo said, coming to a stop right next to the couch. He was still wearing a pair of silver aviator sunglasses, the shine glinting even in the dim light of the living room. Benji had dropped the shades after realizing that staring out into the view only reminded him of Diego’s house and inevitably of Diego himself.

  Leo shoved the sunglasses up onto his head and glared. “Are you going to talk to me?”

  Benji shrugged. “I don’t have much to say,” he said.

  “You, of all people in the fucking universe, are not the kind of person I’d expect to let us down, even if you and Diego fought. Especially if you and Diego fought.”

  “Well, maybe you don’t know me very well at all,” Benji said evenly. So Leo knew about the fight, which meant that Diego must have told him. Had Diego sent him over here? No, he wouldn’t have, not after Benji’s particularly virulent parting shot. Besides, Leo was the type to send himself. He likely would have volunteered when Benji didn’t show up for the recording session.

  “Are you fucking crazy?” Leo asked, sitting gingerly on the edge of the sofa, eyeing the empty beer bottles and used tissues with a disdainful glare that was not very fair, considering how many messes of his own that Benji had cleaned up over the years. “I know you better than anyone.”

  “I’m just . . . I’m really tired. Exhausted, really.” Benji tried to make his face move into a wry smile, but it must have been a godd
amn terrible attempt because Leo grimaced.

  “Does this have anything to do with that crazy TMZ article about you apparently juggling Rochelle Andrews and Diego? Because we all knew that was absolute crap. You’d never date that stuck-up bitch.”

  “Are we talking about Rochelle or Diego?” Benji asked tiredly.

  Leo glared. “You know I’m talking about Rochelle, and I also know you didn’t even mean that, because you’ve always believed sunshine and rainbows shot out of Diego’s ass. So what, you guys said some stuff to each other? Caleb and I have been doing that forever, and we’re still together, still going strong.”

  “Yeah, I’m aware of that. I think the whole world is aware of that,” Benji said with an eyeroll.

  “Then, get off your ass, come down to the studio and fix it,” Leo ordered, but Benji didn’t move. It was going to take a lot more than Leo deciding to interfere to fix anything.

  The one conclusion that Benji had come to over the last twenty-four-ish hours was that their situation wasn’t exactly fixable. He wanted to live a more public life, and Diego wanted a more private one. Maybe that ultimately was why they’d never done anything about their feelings. Maybe they’d known, deep down, that they weren’t really compatible. Lust and even love couldn’t change the fundamentals of who a person was, and the essentials they wanted out of their life.

  Benji’s ambition was never going to completely die, and Diego was never going to stop wanting to settle for what he already had.

  “It’s not going to work, so feel free to stop trying to fix everything,” Benji said. He wanted nothing more than to just close his eyes and close out the world. Nothing hurt, he just felt numb, and he wanted to bask in his blessed numbness. Leo brought too much bright, too much life, too much potential for pain.

  “Giving up awfully easy, considering how long you’ve wanted this,” Leo said. “How long you’ve wanted him.”

  Benji wanted to wipe that prissy tone out of Leo’s mouth, but that would require energy and also moving. The first had vanished, and the second felt impossible without that vital piece.

  “It turns out some things aren’t worth it, after all,” Benji mumbled into the couch cushion. He wasn’t really talking about Diego—because even now, Diego would be worth anything, but there wasn’t anything left that he could give that Diego would ever want. That was the problem. Everything he’d ever valued was not only useless, it was everything Diego loathed.

  Leo didn’t say anything for a long moment, then finally murmured, “If you’re really tired, you should sleep, Benny.”

  Benji barely even heard him because he was already falling asleep.

  ———

  He woke up to some frantic murmuring an unknown amount of time later. The room was still dark-ish, but he’d pulled the blinds the day before, and Leo had clearly not opened them.

  Coming to slowly, he realized that one of the voices belonged to Leo. His tone was undeniably distinctive. And as he woke up a little more, he realized the other belonged to someone who sounded very similar.

  Felix.

  “We should tell him,” Felix muttered. “He deserves to know.”

  “And you’re willing to take responsibility for what he does when he finds out? How are you going to stop him from going postal?”

  “Who’s going postal?” Benji asked, struggling to rise from the couch.

  Leo was in a different t-shirt, which meant that he’d probably gone home and come back. And now that he thought about it, Benji realized his eyes felt coated in sticky grit, like he’d been sleeping for hours and hours and hours.

  “How long was I out?” Benji asked, as both brothers gaped at him.

  “Almost a whole day. Twelve hours,” Leo said, coming over to regain his perch on the side of the couch. “You should take a shower. You’d feel better.”

  “And Leo would feel better about getting close to you,” Felix piped up, as Benji felt around for his phone and realized that the spot he was sure he’d left it—on the floor, next to the couch—was empty.

  “If I take a shower,” Benji ground out, “will you tell me what’s going on? And give me my phone back?”

  “How about we settle for telling you what’s going on?” Leo offered, giving Benji one of his most charming smiles. The one he pulled out when he wanted to manipulate you into doing something but didn’t want you to know that it hadn’t been your idea all along.

  Benji was uncomfortably familiar with that smile, and it usually didn’t bode well for anyone who fought it, so he struggled to his feet, finally regaining his balance.

  “Why can’t I have my phone?” Benji asked plaintively as the three of them walked toward the master bathroom.

  “You shouldn’t use it yet,” Leo said.

  “I wasn’t going to call Diego,” Benji muttered.

  “Yeah, that wasn’t what I was talking about,” Leo pointed out as he flipped on the bathroom light.

  Benji had been naked in front of his best friend more times than he could count, but he’d forgotten that Felix was standing there too. But he barely registered Felix’s squeak as he stripped off his t-shirt and shorts.

  “Yes, we know, he’s hot,” Leo admonished his little brother. “Keep your tongue in your mouth. None of that’s yours.”

  Benji could almost muster up a smile as he flipped on the shower. “Sorry,” he said apologetically. “I forgot you were here, too, Felix.”

  “Don’t be, I’m not sorry at all,” Felix said.

  Leo laughed. “No, he really isn’t.”

  “Noted,” Benji said, tipping his head back and letting the hot water wash over him. It felt better than he had any right to feel. The numbness was fading from his brain—and his heart—and everything was starting to hurt.

  Even if they weren’t a good match, how was he going to let Diego go? Could he really work with him again and not beg him to take him back? Could they really only be friends ever again?

  Benji really wasn’t sure, but the alternative felt even worse—long, empty years stretching in front of him with nothing but his work, and no Diego to give any of it meaning.

  “So, Felix had a realization this morning,” Leo said. “I told him that we shouldn’t tell you, but he’s apparently insisting.”

  “Why didn’t you want me to know? Is that the going-postal part?” Benji asked as he scrubbed his short hair. “You know, I’m not the going-postal type.”

  “You are if properly motivated.”

  “Yeah, this is the best motivation,” Felix chimed in. “I was thinking about the interview that Jay offered to me, for the whole band, and something didn’t sit right.”

  “Yeah, any of it,” Leo said darkly.

  “What about it?” Benji demanded. It was hard to forget how the fight with Diego had started—him accusing Benji of arranging this whole scenario to prevent anyone from doing it differently than Jay had wanted.

  At the time that had seemed insane, but Benji knew Jay. And he knew how Jay didn’t like anyone dictating to him, ever.

  “The way the assistant at the radio station spoke . . . it was like they hadn’t offered the spot, it was like it had been offered to them. So this morning I called her again, and she admitted that your agent had called and arranged the whole thing, including sending it to me to take care of, instead of taking care of the details himself.”

  Benji froze under the hot spray. “Jay arranged the interview?”

  “I would also bet that’s how Steve got the pictures too,” Leo added. “You and Diego were set up.”

  “By Jay,” Benji said flatly.

  Jay had also had the photographs of him and Rochelle. There would be nothing stopping him from releasing those, and from giving TMZ a particularly juicy angle to take in their story. All resulting in a PR firestorm that would force Diego to walk back his restrictions and sensationalize the truth.

  “Shit, shit, shit,” Benji muttered. “I’m gonna fucking kill him.”

  “Aaaaaand that is wh
y we were talking about going postal,” Leo said hastily. “Let’s not have any unnecessary homicides we need to clean up. You already have enough on your plate, fixing things with Diego.”

  Benji turned off the shower and took the towel Leo handed him. “How can I possibly fix things with Diego when I’m the one who fucked it all up? He even told me this was what was happening and I didn’t fucking listen, when that’s all I should’ve been doing.”

  “Diego isn’t exactly blameless either, even if he won’t admit it,” Felix pointed out.

  “He’s terrified, but what he doesn’t realize is that some form of this media shitstorm was inevitable,” Leo said. “You guys need to just ride it out. Don’t give it any more fuel, and it’ll die out. At some point, the bloodsuckers will stop following you around, and you can go back to your semi-normal lives. Diego’s thinking back to when we broke up, how quiet things got, and even if you and he never come out, with either your sexuality or your relationship, it was never going to go back to that. Star Shadow is a commodity now.”

  “Yeah, that doesn’t mean he has to like it,” Benji said dryly. “Or that he has to accept it.”

  “It actually does,” Felix said.

  Benji turned to look at him and Felix shrugged. “Diego needs to take control of his own life. Hiding in his house and flipping off the paparazzi behind his tinted car windows is sort of pathetic, don’t you think?”

  “Lots of people like privacy,” Benji nearly growled. If Diego wanted privacy, then there was nothing wrong with that. He should have what he wanted, always.

  “Yeah, they do, but then they aren’t also actively trying to sell singles and albums and tour tickets. He wants it both ways, and he has to realize that situation’s not sustainable. He—and you, I might add—need to figure out a middle ground that you can live with in the long-term.”

  Benji glanced over at Leo. That was exactly what he’d begun to think before everything had gone sideways.

  “What,” Leo said, “I told you he was intelligent. I told you he could probably get a job at the CIA if we didn’t hire him.”