The Duet

by R.S. Grey

  Jason and I exchanged a glance, but he shrugged. Whatever was going on with her, she clearly didn’t want to discuss it right then, and I’d let her get away with it. It was her day.

  Over plates brimming with delicious food, I recounted stories of baby Cammie and teenage Cammie — oddly, many of the story lines were similar. She was a willful person, no matter the age.

  When it was time for dessert, a waitress came around and cleared our plates away. I took the opportunity to turn to Cammie while everyone was preoccupied.

  “So when do you think your interview will be?” I asked quietly, ensuring our conversation was private.

  She shrugged, playing with her fork. “He said he’d be out of town on a project for two weeks, but that his assistant would give me a call.”

  “Will you end up going through with it?” I asked.

  She dropped her fork and the metal clanked softly onto the ceramic plate. “Of course. I’d be stupid to turn down an interview with his firm.”

  Her dark eyes slid to me and I saw so much emotion buried beneath her gaze.

  “Well, I’m sure you’ll do great,” I assured her, squeezing her hand.

  …

  The days after Cammie’s graduation were packed with meetings, dress fittings, rehearsals, and appointments. My trainer had me working out twice a day (which I tried to argue was a form of capital punishment, but he wouldn’t hear of it). As soon as I’d finish one thing on the agenda, Summer would be waiting by the door, ready to whisk me away to my next task. Grammys week never got any easier, and being one of the performers only made matters worse. When I woke up two days before the award show with a giant pimple on my face, you would have thought World War III had just been declared.

  “Dear GOD, someone just kill me now — I can’t walk the red carpet like this.”

  Looking back, the pimple was probably the least of my worries, but it was physical, tangible, and so I focused on that and not that the fact that my life was crumbling around me. (<- See how dramatic I can be when my trainer forces me to work out twice a day and my nutritionist cuts my carbs in half?)

  “You need to calm down, Brooklyn. You can’t even see it and it’ll go down by Sunday,” Summer said, ushering me through the door of the Roberto Cavalli show room where I was having my final dress fitting. And when I say “dress” I really mean “dresses”. I had three wardrobe changes in all: The red carpet look which was a white poufy thing; the performance look which was a tight red dress that dipped far too low and showed off lots of leg; and then the after-party look which was a just as tight as the red dress, but made out of a black, silky fabric that would be easier to dance in.

  “Whatever you say. You’ll be the one talking me off the ledge Sunday morning when the make-up artist is having to fill in my pores with cement to get a clean work surface.”

  “You’re not even making sense anymore,” she said, shaking her head and pushing me toward the raised platform in the center of the show room. Mirrors surrounded the platform on three sides so I’d be able to see my gowns from every angle.

  “Oh, before we get started, the label has asked me how you and Jason will arrive at the venue on Sunday,” Summer said.

  “Separately,” I answered. “I’m not taking a date, unless Cammie counts.”

  “She does, but she won’t fill out a tux nearly as well,” she said with a smirk.

  “Perfect — it’s settled. Next item on the list.”

  “Are you two dating?” she asked as if she were scrolling through items on a check list.

  “Summer,” I warned, meeting her eyes in one of the mirrors before me.

  She shrugged. “Thought I’d try and see if you would answer truthfully.”

  “He and I are friends. I think, we’re friends at least.”

  “Right, and I’m secretly in the FBI,” she said with an eye roll.

  “I’m serious. Yesterday at rehearsals, we joked around and talked. It was normal and just what friends would do.”

  “Have you or have you not had sex with him?” she asked.

  I propped my hands on my hips. “I can’t recall.”

  “And what about his marriage?”

  I rolled my eyes. “He’s signed the divorce papers and she’s engaged to another guy for God’s sake. He was trying to get some kind of custody of Lacy, but it’s looking like that’s not possible.”

  “Oh no, really?”

  I nodded, sad at how complicated the situation was for him. Just then, one of the design assistants stepped into the show room in tight leather pants and an off the shoulder black sweater. Her spiked heels clapped against the stained concrete floors as she stepped closer.

  “So sorry to keep you waiting. Let’s get started,” she said, eyeing me up and down. She glared a beat too long on the pimple. Motherfucker, it was huge. I knew it.

  “Your final rehearsal is tomorrow?” the assistant asked with a constipated smile.

  “Yes,” I answered, trying to ignore the clenching of my stomach. With everything going on, my nerves had been pushed to the back burner, but every time someone brought up the impending award show, the feelings came rushing back in.

  “Well, let’s hope you can pull it off,” the woman said, clapping her hands twice to beckon a second assistant who rolled out a garment rack from the back room. My three dresses hung from the metal bar, each more beautiful than the last.

  I stared at myself in the mirror, trying to see the confident woman that I knew was there somewhere. The truth was, it wasn’t the Grammy performance that I was nervous about— it was what happened after, when Jason and I no longer had a reason to hang out together at rehearsals. I knew I’d either have to come clean and tell him the truth: Surprise, I don’t want to be your friend, you ridiculously sexy man. I want to date you and have your babies. Or I’d have to just play dumb and continue to live a lie. I’d have to watch him go back to Montana or wherever else he was heading once the Grammys were over, and I’d have to live with the fact that I never told him the truth about my feelings for him.

  Oh yeah, and I had this little performance in front of a million people to do in two days. No biggie, right?

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Things to know concerning Grammy prep:

  1. You don’t eat for like 24 hours beforehand. I’m serious. People who tell you that they actually eat before stepping onto the red carpet in a couture gown are a bunch of freaking liars.

  2. Getting ready for the big day is a marathon, not a sprint. Except if you’re me, and then your trainer does in fact make you sprint everyday leading up to the actual event.

  3. My body had been massaged, plucked, prodded, and facial-ed.

  4. I hadn’t had a decent night’s sleep in over a week

  The night before the Grammys, I was tossing and turning as my mind worked over every single scenario that could possibly play out during the show the next day. What if the lights cut out? What if my microphone breaks? What if I forget my lyrics during the song? What if a bear gets set loose inside the Staples Center?

  As you can see, I was starting to plan for all plausible outcomes.

  Which is why I didn’t hesitate to roll over and check my phone when I heard it vibrating on top of my nightstand. I hadn’t been asleep anyway.

  Jason’s name flashed across the screen, but I couldn’t fathom why he’d be calling me at midnight.

  “Hello?” I asked, holding the phone up to my ear.

  “Did I wake you?” he asked.

  “Nope. I was just thinking about the best way to defend myself with a mic stand if a bear was on stage with us tomorrow night.”

  He chuckled. “Huh, I hadn’t thought about that,” he admitted. “Come let me in.”

  I sat up and glanced around my room, trying to comprehend what he meant.

  “Let you in… my condo?” I finished, utterly confused.

  “Yes, and hurry, the pizza box is burning my hand,” he said, as if his request was perfectly normal.
<
br />   I shoved my blankets off my bed and continued to hold the phone up to my ear as I walked through my silent condo. All the lights were off since I should have been asleep three hours before. I flipped the light on in my kitchen and went to the front door.

  When I swung it open, Jason was standing there with a boyish smile and the most delicious pizza I’d ever had the pleasure of smelling.

  “Well, hello there,” I smiled, pushing the door open wide enough for him to step inside. Then, I promptly stole the box of pizza out of his hands. When I pried it open, my eyes feasted upon cheesy, pepperoni goodness. “Oh sweet, baby Jesus. This smells like crack.”

  Jason rolled his eyes and stepped into the kitchen to retrieve two plates as if he joined me for a midnight snack in my condo all the time.

  “This is technically off limits,” I said, eyeing the pizza like it had the ability to kill me. Which is theory, it did. But let me tell you, as Jason pulled out that piece of pizza and held it up for me to take my first bite, it tasted pretty damn good. I ate two slices and enjoyed every moment of it. If I had a little flab on my stomach on the red carpet the next day, I’d just let the paparazzi spin it into a baby speculation story— that’d keep them occupied for a while.

  “So I’m guessing pizza was a good choice?” he asked with a cocky smile.

  I picked up a stray pepperoni from my plate and popped it into my mouth. “Oh yeah.”

  He nodded before taking the pizza box to my refrigerator. He could hardly fit it inside among all the fruit and vegetables that my nutritionist had loaded me up with earlier in the week. I swear if I die soon, the cause would be death by vegetables.

  “How’d you know I’d be awake?” I asked once he’d shut the refrigerator door and turned back to face me. Now that the pizza wasn’t distracting me, I took in his appearance. He had on a worn black t-shirt and jeans. His arms were sculpted, but not obscenely so. Even still, I had a hard time focusing my attention anywhere else.

  “It was a wild guess,” he said simply, meeting my eyes with a grin of his own.

  “I technically have to be up in a few hours to start getting ready for the press and everything. Tomorrow is going to be a long day.”

  He leaned forward and propped his hands up on the kitchen counter so that he could support his upper body.

  “Well, I guess I should probably go then,” he said, though he didn’t bother actually moving his body.

  “Guess so,” I replied with a slow smile that built upon itself the longer he watched me from across the island.

  “It’s pretty late,” he said, although he wasn’t looking at his watch. His dark eyes were pinned on me.

  I could have told him to leave, but instead I shrugged. “You could stay here if you want, you know, just to make it easier for you.”

  He glanced around my kitchen as if I had asked him to literally sleep on the counter.

  “I mean, I have a comfortable couch,” I said, pointing to my living room.

  His eyebrow arched and he finally pushed himself off of the kitchen island. “I’m not sleeping on the couch.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Oh please, get over yourself. You’re not too good for the couch just because you’re a fancy pants singer.”

  I’m sure I would have kept on rambling had he not stalked around the island and forced my silence with his lips. Oh, ohhhh. He wasn’t going to be sleeping on the couch because he wanted to sleep in my bed.

  It’d been over a week since I’d felt his lips on mine, but my body hadn’t forgotten what heaven felt like. His lips were just as tender and firm as I remembered, and the way he caged me against the island turned any protests into soft, encouraging moans. My hands glided up over his t-shirt, over every dip and curve of his hard chest. If he didn’t do something fast, I’d be having quite a blissful moment on the stool in the kitchen.

  “Couch or bed?” I asked, trying to shove myself off the barstool. He didn’t answer, and he didn’t let me up. His arms bent and his head dipped down to steal another kiss. The stool wobbled beneath my shifting weight, but I clenched onto his arms and he held me up. One of his hands worked at my shirt and a chill ran down my spine. Holy, we were going to do it right here, on this stool like a bunch of heathens. Bring it on.

  I fumbled with his belt buckle and then tugged his pants down just far enough to get to his boxers.

  “Stand up,” he instructed, gripping my biceps to lift me off of the stool. I’d barely found my footing when he tugged my pajama shorts and panties off. The draft from the air conditioner hit the crest of my thighs and goose bumps pricked the back of my neck. I stepped out of my clothing as he tore off my tank top, and suddenly, I was naked. Naked, with my dishes in the sink and my stray cutting board silently judging me from afar.

  “Tell me if it’s uncomfortable,” he said, guiding me back to the stool.

  I’d have to be sitting on a bed of hot coals to tell him to stop. And even then, I’d probably just go for the ass burn. My head fell back and my eyes fluttered closed as Jason’s fingers skirted along my skin. He was igniting my blood, trying to coax out our passion, but I’d been ready for that moment since I’d found him on the other side of my door.

  “Did you hear me?” he asked, nuzzling the skin beneath my ear and then gently biting down on my earlobe.

  Holy mother of—

  “Yesssss,” I dragged, answering him as best as I could just as his fingers skimmed to the center of my thighs.

  That was the last moment in which I was capable of human speech. For the next hour, I communicated in a language only shared by whales and other large marine animals. Mostly just really long moans and sharp cries. Classy, I know.

  The edge of the kitchen island pressed into my back, the marble cold and hard, but Jason’s skin was so warm. I clung onto him as he pulled out and sank into me over and over again. There were a few times when the stool threatened to tip over, but Jason kept us upright, shielding my body against the kitchen island with his chest and arms.

  I dug my nails into his back as he gripped the back of my thighs with a sense of entitlement, ownership.

  I wanted to feel that from him.

  And that’s when I realized what I was doing.

  I was getting lost in him again. Completely lost in his eyes, and arms, and confident mouth on my body. I didn’t realize until it was over and I was left coming down from my second mind-blowing orgasm that I’d given him exactly what he wanted. Again.

  Me with no strings attached.

  And even worse, I realized it’d been, dare I say… a booty call.

  Arriving at a late hour without notice - check.

  Having sex - check.

  No expectation of a relationship after - check.

  Crap.

  As a twenty-seven year old woman with a good personality and decent tits (when I wore the right push-up bra), I needed to grow a freaking backbone. Yet, there I was, letting Jason take whatever he wanted without any regard for what I wanted.

  “You look like you’re lost in another world,” Jason noted as he tugged his pants back into place.

  Any excitement that had just been circulating through the kitchen had been stamped out like a light. I couldn’t even look him in the eye as he handed me back my tank top from the floor.

  “I think I am,” I replied when I realized he was still waiting for a response.

  He used his finger to nudge my chin up so that I was forced to stare in his eyes, but it was too hard. I clamped my eyes shut and fumbled for the first excuse I could think of.

  “I think that pizza made me sick,” I complained, pressing my hand to my stomach for emphasis. When I opened my eyes again, he was frowning and his eyes were dark, empathetic.

  “Can I get you something? An antacid? Water?”

  Stop. Stop being so easy to love. You aren’t love. You’re sex and pleasure and all the easy things in life.

  “No,” I shook my head, pulling out of his reach. “I think I should just try to get some sleep
before tomorrow.”

  He pulled his hand through his hair, causing the short strands to stand on end. His brows knitted together and for a second, I thought maybe he didn’t want to leave.

  “Why don’t you go lay down and I’ll let myself out when you’ve gone to sleep?”

  I wanted to shove him out of the front door. I thought we could be friends, but that was me agreeing to whatever he wanted to give me. It was pathetic. I didn’t need table scraps. I needed to break the cycle.

  I nodded in lieu of a verbal reply considering tears were already dangerously close to falling and I would not cry about this situation for one more moment.

  “Brooklyn,” he called as I walked toward my bedroom. I looked over my shoulder to see him encased in the light from the kitchen. He looked down to the floor and then back up to me. “Let me know if you need anything.”

  I nodded and kept walking toward my room, happy to be alone once the door closed behind me.

  I had one last day with him and then I wouldn’t have to pretend anymore. There would be no more wishful thinking, no more late-night sex sessions. I had to quit the habit or I’d never be able to move on.

  So we’d sing our duet and then the day after that, I’d start fresh and start working on my new album.

  Without Jason.

  Chapter Thirty

  It took a lot of caffeine to get me going the next morning. Summer brought me a latte with an extra shot of espresso, but by noon, I was still in danger of crashing. I’d tossed and turned after Jason had left the night before, and when I woke up the next morning there was a note sitting on the kitchen counter that threw my brain for a loop:

  Give me until tomorrow night. - J

  “Fuckkk youuuu,” I said, tearing the note in two. I’d watched enough movies and I’d yelled at the screen enough times to know when the pitiful character is supposed to move on and stop going back time after time. Let me lay out a few examples for you: He’s Just Not That Into You, Jaws, Jurassic Park, Titanic. Okay, so maybe only one of those is actually a good example of what I thought I was living through, but still.