by J. Daniels
I saved my energy for the conversation I was about to have.
When we stepped outside, I tossed Tori my keys and slid into the passenger seat. My phone started ringing from my pocket as we pulled away from the house.
I ignored it.
Only one person was most likely calling me right now. I’d been gone awhile and Brian would want to know why.
He could wait to find out. I didn’t owe him a damn thing.
Images of the man I thought I knew filled my head as we drove, ones of him touching and kissing and fucking girls who weren’t me. I put words into his mouth and heard him calling them Wild and Babe and moaning Baby Baby Baby when he was coming. It was torture.
I cried with my head against the window and Tori’s hand in mine.
“Wait here,” I told her after she pulled into the driveway and shifted into Park.
She unbuckled her seat belt, regarding me sadly and uncertainly.
“You sure?”
I nodded, gave her hand one last squeeze, and exited the car.
I’m not sure why I did the next thing I did. Maybe it was because I didn’t feel as if I belonged here anymore. Maybe it was because it was all a dream and I was finally awake. I never really lived here.
I climbed the porch and knocked instead of entering.
Sir barked a few times, then Brian opened the door and flinched at the sight of me.
“Babe, what are you doing?” He reached for me.
I took a step back.
“Can I please come inside?” I asked, wiping a tear away.
He stared at me, taking in my sadness and behavior.
“Wild, what the fuck?”
He made a move to step outside and I halted him with my hand raised.
“Brian,” I began in a warning tone, freezing him in the doorway. “I am asking you if I can come inside. I don’t want to do this out here.”
Something flashed in his eyes then, recollection of what he did or realization of what I knew, I wasn’t sure which, but he suddenly looked as empty as I felt and it took everything in me not to reach out and hold him.
Love is stupid like that.
He silently stepped aside and held the door open for me to enter.
I closed the door, ignoring Sir, who was jumping up at my feet for attention. He gave up after he wasn’t getting it and moved on, leaving me to watch Brian as he padded across the room, rubbing harshly at his face with both hands. He stopped behind the couch and gripped the back of it, keeping his head down and his eyes fixated on the cushions.
“You need to know why I did it,” he said quietly.
“I do, but it won’t change anything.”
His head snapped up at my words.
“Wild,” he whispered.
“Don’t call me that,” I said, fresh tears brimming my eyes as I took a step forward. “You don’t get to call me that. My boy calls me that and you are not him.”
His spine straightened.
“The fuck I’m not,” he growled.
I ignored his defiance and probed for the answers I needed.
“Why, Brian? Why were you doing that and why didn’t you tell me? How could you keep that from me?”
“I was trying to protect you,” he countered, his tone gentler now as he tried to explain. “I didn’t want you ever seeing that. I didn’t want you knowing about it. I knew it would hurt you.” He looked back to the cushions and murmured, “I didn’t think you would ever see it.”
“Well, I did,” I spat, gaining his attention again. “I did see it. I watched you with them. I watched the man I care about more than anything making love to those women.”
“That is not what I was doing.”
“Fine. Fucking,” I hissed. “I watched you fuck those fake, nasty porn stars. I watched it! Do you have any idea what that was like for me? Having my best friend show me something like that? Sitting there not knowing anything about the man I love because he was doing this behind my back for months! I saw you get off on them! I saw enough to make me sick!”
“You think I wasn’t sick going through with it?” he shouted, turning to face me now. “You think that’s the kind of man I am? Fucking for money because I wanted it?” He jammed a finger at his chest. “You think that’s me?”
“I know what I saw,” I replied curtly. “Your dick was hard, so explain to me how you didn’t want it.”
“I had to take a fuckin’ pill to go through with it, Syd,” he spat. “None of that was real. None of what you saw meant anything. I fuckin’ hated it. All of it. I was just doin’ what I had to do.”
“Why?” I asked. “Why were you doing it? I don’t understand…why would you need to do something like that?”
“Because I needed the money.”
“For what?” I yelled, moving even closer as I cried openly for him to see. “Why would you need money?”
“BECAUSE OF THAT FUCKING KID!” he bellowed, his face as red as the center of a flame.
I jerked back. My hand covered my mouth.
Oh, God.
Oh, my God.
No…
“Brian,” I whispered.
He lowered his head. Fists clenched at his sides, he heaved deep breaths in and out of his nose. He looked as sick as I’d felt watching those videos.
I stood there, crying silently, and waited. I needed to hear it.
He lifted his head.
“There were bills, all right? Thousands of dollars’ worth of hospital bills and that shit was gonna keep piling up for them and I couldn’t just let that happen! I couldn’t do nothing!” he roared. His voice was thunderous. “Not after what I did. I fucked up their lives. I put them there. Me! No one else. Fucking me, Syd! And I was gonna do anything I could to ease some of that burden. Anything. I WOULD’VE DONE ANYTHING!”
I was sobbing, hand to my mouth, while Brian’s entire body shook with the bad he was finally letting go of.
The cords in his neck were bulging. His chest was heaving. Knuckles white.
He closed his eyes, made a choking sound in the back of his throat, then slowed his breath enough to continue on.
“And I did,” he said, jaw tight but appearing slightly calmer. “I did anything. Found an ad in the paper when I was doing a crossword. Gig was paying eight hundred a scene. I saw the opportunity and to me it was the only option. You gotta know…Syd, I wasn’t in a good place. In my head, all that fucking guilt, I wasn’t thinking about how fucked up this was. I wouldn’t let anyone help me. Jamie and Cole offered to give me cash but it wasn’t their fuckup. I couldn’t take it. I couldn’t drag people into this shit with me. I couldn’t fuckin’ do that! This was mine! I had to fix this, but I swear to you…I swear to fuckin’ God I hated it. Zoned out, got paid, then delivered the money. I didn’t keep a fuckin’ dime. I wouldn’t do that.”
“I believe you,” I told him, because I did. I believed every word.
He made a move to come toward me, but I kept him back with a shake of my head.
“They knew you were giving them money?” I asked.
That didn’t make sense to me. I still remembered the look on the father’s face that night at Friendly’s when he recognized Brian. That wasn’t how you looked at someone you were seeing frequently because they were handing over cash.
Brian shook his head.
“No. I either stuck it in their mailbox or I gave it to this woman who runs a horse-riding place where the kid is doing therapy. It was supposed to help him so I was making sure he was getting to do that, too. I didn’t want them knowing it was coming from me. I didn’t want to risk them not taking it.”
“So you kept this from everyone except Jamie and Cole,” I offered, feeling my lip start quivering again. “Nice of them not to share it with me.”
“They knew I didn’t want anyone knowing,” he murmured.
I looked away.
That hurt. They were my friends. Friends look out for each other. They should’ve told me.
Brian shoul
d’ve told me.
I felt my shoulders drop. Air rushed out of my lungs.
“Oh, my God,” I whispered as more tears fell, looking back to Brian. “This was why, wasn’t it? This was why you didn’t want to know me. You were afraid I’d recognize you from that site.” My eyes widened. “You asked me. You asked me if I recognized you the night of the party. This was what you meant.”
“Knew you’d end it if you knew who I was,” he admitted. “I couldn’t lose you. I couldn’t risk you finding out. Figured if I gave you my last name or any other shit, you’d search for me and something might come up.”
“You were selfish,” I put out.
He nodded. He wasn’t disagreeing.
“You lied to me,” I added a beat later.
His eyes got hard.
“I never lied to you,” he returned quickly and with a rough voice. “Not once. I would never fuckin’ lie to you.”
“You didn’t tell me the truth. That’s the same thing as lying,” I shot back, watching his mouth open to speak and cutting him off before that happened. “How long? The whole time? Were you doing this behind my back the whole time you were talking to me? In the beginning when we were just friends and then when we became more, were you with those girls? Did you ever stop? Oh, my God.” I held my face with my hands and cried out, “Are you still doing it?”
“No,” Brian answered with panic in his eyes, crossing the room to get to me and doing so without me stopping him. He grabbed my wrists and pulled my hands away. “Fuck, no, Jesus, I would never do that to you. Look at me,” he ordered, lifting my quivering chin. “I would never fuckin’ do that to you. I stopped after that night you attacked the car. Switched to solos after that. There was no one else.” He held my face. “Once I had you, there was no one else. I swear on my fuckin’ life, Syd.”
Brian wiped my tears away, then his face tensed again through a breath and he did something that completely shocked me.
He stepped back.
I gaped at him.
“Before I tell you this, know I realize how different things could’ve been if I would’ve thought of this option five months ago,” he said. His voice was shaking.
I braced myself, pressing the pads of my fingers to my mouth.
I could barely breathe.
“After that night of the party when I finally got you, when I finally got my girl, I knew I couldn’t keep going to that warehouse and filming, solos or not. I wanted out. I needed another way. I had you and I wouldn’t jeopardize it, so I convinced Jamie to buy me out of Wax.”
My lips parted.
“What?” I asked, blinking up at him.
Brian nodded as if to confirm I wasn’t hearing things.
“Sold my share and gave all the money to that family, and it was a lot of fuckin’ money, Syd. More than I had given them up to that point. I didn’t even think about it. Months ago, selling out didn’t cross my mind. I was so fucked up over this shit, I wasn’t thinkin’ straight. I wasn’t seeing other outs. If I had, I swear to you that’s what I would’ve done. You gotta believe me.”
“I do. I believe you,” I told him, watching his face soften and then eliminating that soft when I bit out, “What I can’t believe is you letting me think, for months, that you still owned Wax. You kept the truth from me, Brian. Again! I was getting everyone to go to the shop my boy owned because I was proud, and that whole time you let me think something that wasn’t true.”
“What could I have said?” he asked tensely, his voice growing louder. “Tell me. What the fuck could I have said to you? Why would I sell out?”
“You could’ve told me the truth!” I screamed. “But you didn’t! You didn’t tell me anything! You kept everything from me!”
“I was trying to protect you!”
“Well, you didn’t, did you? You didn’t protect me! You hurt me worse than anyone ever has!”
He sucked in a breath, then stepped closer, reaching out.
I stepped back.
“No,” I said, my hand raised between us. “You kept everything from me, Brian. You had plenty of time to tell me the truth but you didn’t.”
“I was planning on telling you. I was just waiting for the right time. I needed you to understand…”
“Stop,” I interrupted. “I don’t wanna hear your excuses. They don’t matter.”
He looked away briefly, then met my eyes again. “I’ll fix it,” he rasped. He sounded desperate. “Let me fix it. You know everything now, Wild. Everything.”
“Don’t call me that,” I whispered through my tears, then somehow with a softer voice added, “You lied to me.”
His chin jerked back, then his jaw got hard.
“Never lied to you,” he repeated gently but with eyes that were burning right through me. “Never touched another girl after you gave me that night on the phone. Kept things from you and did that because I thought that was the right move. Didn’t want you getting hurt and would’ve done anything, know this, Syd, would’ve done fuckin’ anything to keep that from happening. Can’t stand the thought of you hurting. From the beginning, couldn’t stand it. Thought about finding that ex of yours and killing that motherfucker more times than I could count. You did me in that night you called me. Lit my fucking world up. Had shit in my life, nothing but shit, then I got you, and fuck, baby, you gave me so much good.” He smiled a little, then lost it to continue on, “So much good, and I didn’t deserve any of it but you gave it. Got dick back but that didn’t stop you. Gave me that good and I took it. I was selfish, I know I was. I couldn’t risk losing you. And I’d apologize if I was sorry for getting your heart but I can’t be sorry for that.” He shook his head as tears filled his eyes again. “I’m trying. Right now, looking at you, I’m trying, Syd. I can be sorry for a lot of things and I am, I regret a lot of shit, but getting you? Fuck that. I’m not sorry. I’m in love with you. I’ll die being in love with you.”
Oh, God.
I cried with my hand to my mouth. My body was throbbing and my eyes were burning.
I wanted so badly to hold him. There was something wrong with me.
And Brian wasn’t finished.
“I fucked up,” he whispered, tears falling down his face. “I fucked up by not telling you that first night I had you in my arms. That I am sorry for. Not giving you what you deserved knowing, keeping shit from you, you finding out the way you did, for the rest of my life I’ll feel this. I deserve to feel it.” He wiped at his face. “Just tell me, Syd, tell me I’m gonna feel it with you next to me because I can’t—”
“Brian,” I cut him off, shaking my head.
He was asking something of me I couldn’t guarantee. Even after listening to his explanation and hearing all he’d just said, even with my heart still reaching for him, I couldn’t guarantee something I wasn’t sure of.
Brian closed his eyes, opened them, and then begged, “Please, Wild. Don’t leave me. It’s over. All of that shit is over—”
“It’s not over,” I interrupted him. “It’s not. Those videos are still out there. Anyone can see them. My mom. Your family. Years from now…” I paused through a sob, the reason behind my pain coming to light and Brian getting it.
He knew what I meant. I saw in the way the saddest boy on earth grew sadder, his body going still and pain sinking in his features.
I didn’t have to say it but I did. I needed him to hear this from me.
“Years from now,” I continued, still crying, “kids will search for anything on the Internet. Being curious, they could search for you, and that website will take them right to those videos, and what would you say? What could you say? They’d see their daddy with somebody else. How could you fix that?” He opened his mouth to speak but I kept going. “Or me?” I asked, breaking into tears again. “I watched three of those videos before I got sick. I saw everything you did with those women. How are you gonna fix that?”
“I will,” he promised, stepping closer.
“You can’t,” I
returned, and he froze. “You can’t fix this, Brian.”
“Wild—”
“You remember what you said to me the first time you called? You said if I didn’t want to speak to you anymore, you’d disappear. You’d leave me alone.”
Brian shook his head.
“Don’t,” he urged.
“I’m asking that of you right now,” I told him, trying to sound firm and resolute in my request but finding that to be a difficult task with a voice that wouldn’t stop quaking and a heart that didn’t want me to speak. I powered through the best I could. “I’m packing my stuff and I’m going to Tori’s, and I am asking you to leave me be. Don’t call me. Don’t text me. Don’t follow me. Don’t come there. Leave me alone.”
“I can’t do that.”
“You’ll do it, or you’ll never see me again,” I promised.
Brian flinched.
He killed me. Now I was killing him.
“I need time to think,” I said, sniffing and looking around the room. “I might need a lot of time, and I need to do that without looking at you. If I want to talk to you, I’ll reach out. If I don’t…” My voice trailed off.
Sir entered the room from the kitchen carrying his rope toy in his mouth.
God…I was gonna have to leave him, too.
“I’m gonna fix this,” Brian assured me once more, turning my head. “I will fix this.”
I could’ve said something back. So many words danced on my tongue as I stood there staring at the boy who built my heart up just to break it.
You won’t.
You can’t.
I hope you do.
God, please fix this.
Instead, I left him standing there and went to the bedroom, packed all the things I could fit into one duffle bag, slung it over my shoulder, and walked to the front door.
Sir met me there.
Brian hadn’t moved from his spot.
I bent down and loved on my puppy for a minute, whispering to him and scratching underneath his neck the way he liked.
When I was finished, I turned and looked right into Brian’s eyes. Then I said good-bye.
If it was our last good-bye, I wanted it to be one worth remembering. I wanted to see him.