InHap*pily Ever After (Incidental Happenstance)

by DeSalvo, Kim

  Tia let out a long slow breath. “I’m on my way right now.”

  “Damn, dude, you still in bed?” Bo plopped himself less than gracefully at the foot of Dylan’s bed and watched him nearly jump out of his skin. “I expected you to be hung over, but I didn’t think you’d still be asleep at ten o’clock.”

  Dylan shook his head and glanced over at the digital radio on the bedside table. 10:06. He looked back and forth between Bo and the clock a couple times and ran his fingers through his tangled hair, stopping with his palm on his forehead and wrinkling his face in confusion. “I’m not hanging at all,” he answered. “Should I be? I don’t remember drinking that much.”

  “What do you remember?” Bo asked cautiously. His friend had been really out of it—if Dyl didn’t remember the incident with the ho-bags then he sure as hell wasn’t going to point it out. Bo had destroyed the evidence, and hoped to hell that if there were other pictures, the bitches only took them for themselves. He had a really bad feeling about the whole thing, but time would tell, and Bo wouldn’t.

  “Shit,” Dylan said, his eyes gazing upward as he tried to recall the previous night. “Not much, really. I remember talking to Dozer…he told me he’s going to be a dad. You and Angelo took off and then I never saw either one of you again the rest of the night.”

  Bo sat patiently as he watched Dylan try to put the pieces together. He was glad at least that he had no recollection, at least not yet, of the little tryst in the back room. As his best friend, he would have stood behind Dylan no matter what, but he would have definitely lost a lot of respect for him if he’d knowingly played Tia that way. It left a bad taste in Bo’s mouth that he’d done it at all, but he’d seen how out of it the man was and knew that the porn stars were taking advantage of it.

  “I walked you home, brother,” Bo replied. “It was no easy task, either—I practically had to carry your sorry drunk ass.”

  Dylan laughed. “Damn, I knew they were mixing them strong, but I had no idea I had that much. Thanks for looking out for me, mate.” Dylan hit the button to power up his phone, and Bo held his breath. “Oh, we’ve got that bloody photo shoot today, don’t we?” Bo nodded. “Let me just shoot Tia a quick good morning—it’s past noon by her. I can be ready to go in fifteen minutes.” He was already multi-tasking, setting up the espresso machine with one hand and texting with the other.

  Bo exhaled when he heard the swoosh of the outgoing message. “I’ll just hang out here, then, and we can ride over together.”

  “You suck for doing that to her.” Dylan did a double-take at the girl who was trying to tape a light box to the floor of the ferry.

  It was not shaping up to be a good day. He’d started it running from behind and it had just gotten worse as the day went on. A storm blew in (Really? Who knew that it might rain in Seattle? he thought) and they’d had to spend more time on the boat than they’d originally planned. The water was rough and they’d already soaked through two changes of clothes from either the rain or the spray, and they still had two more locations to visit before they called it a day. He was getting concerned that Tia hadn’t returned any of his texts—he’d sent at least a dozen since this morning and tried calling twice, and now he had to deal with one of the minions from ‘Penelope’s Posse’ hassling him at a photo shoot. “Whatever. She deserves that and more.”

  “I can’t believe you would even say that!” she yelled, throwing down the roll of duct tape in disgust and marching off. A minute later, a guy came out to finish the job and they completed the shots on the ferry before heading toward the dry land of Bainbridge Island. Dylan was grateful for the clouds when the photographer decided they should match their expressions to the weather. He didn’t feel much like smiling.

  Tia was pretty sure the taxi driver didn’t recognize her, but she wasn’t taking any chances. She had him drop her at Hilton, and promptly jumped into another cab just in case. The day was dismal; cold, windy, and with clouds that looked positively pregnant with snow. The forecast was calling for six to eight inches starting around noon and although Tia often remarked about how being a weather person was the best job in the world because you could be wrong ninety percent of the time and still get paid, she could almost taste the storm brewing in the air. Or maybe it was the vile taste left in her mouth after seeing the horrendous pictures. Either way, a storm was going to dump over her head. Why not two?

  The further she got from the center of the city, the more her heart settled into a normal rhythm. The roads were quiet for a Saturday morning, and they made good enough time that she decided to take a little tour of her old life. She guided the driver past her school and then her old house, in front of which stood a regal snowman with a carrot nose and a hot pink scarf. They drove down Main Street, past her favorite old café and the boutique where she always knew she’d find something that she just had to have. When they got to the park where she used to take her neighbor’s dog, Bonnie, she had the driver pull in. “I haven’t been here in a long time,” she told him, getting out of the car to take a quick walk to the wooden bridge that spanned the creek.

  She stood there and realized that it had been longer than she’d thought since she had been here. It had been in another lifetime. Already these places felt…separate, somehow, and she no longer belonged. This wasn’t her world anymore, and no amount of wishing would make it any other way.

  Tia took a big gulp of the frozen air and exhaled it slowly, watching her breath swirl away on the softer breezes that sifted through the park. For a couple days, at least, she would sink into the mundane normalcy of her old life. She had the driver make one more stop where Tia ducked into a store and bought a pay-as-you-go cell phone so she could let everyone know that she was fine; she was just taking a bit of a sabbatical. Not wanting to see any texts from Dylan, she’d left her phone in the drawer of the nightstand at the apartment.

  “It is so good to see you!” Lilly opened her arms and Tia walked right into them. She’d considered on the way whether or not she’d tell Lilly the real reason for her visit, and decided that she would not. Getting away from it all for a couple days was the ultimate goal, and she knew that Lilly’s company would do just that.

  “You too,” Tia said warmly, wrapping her arms around her friend in a tight embrace.

  Lilly pushed her back and held her at arm’s length with her hands on Tia’s shoulders. “You look the same. At least your head hasn’t gotten any bigger. Yet.”

  Tia couldn’t help but laugh. “That’s a relief. I’ve been worrying about my hat size a lot lately.”

  Lilly smiled and Tia thought, not for the first time, that her facial expressions reminded her of Bo. They had the same cocoa skin, the same expressive eyes, and almost the exact same laugh lines curling alongside lips that were almost always curved in a smile. “Some things never change,” she said, taking Tia’s hand. “Come on, best get to that coffee cake before Marcus finishes it off.”

  “I’m savin’ her a piece, don’t you worry your pretty little head!” Marcus popped out of the kitchen, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “I saved you a big piece,” he smiled at Tia, pulling her in for a hug.

  “How are you, Marcus? You’re looking as handsome as ever, I see.”

  “Retirement agrees with me,” he smiled, patting his stomach. “I live the life of leisure and my woman won’t stop working. I’m a kept man, and I like it.”

  Lilly grabbed a wooden spoon from the breakfast nook between the two rooms and swatted him on the backside. He howled in fake pain and ran back into the kitchen. “You sure you want to get married, Tia? They seem so charming when you first get hitched, and then they turn into something else entirely.”

  “I was a something else entirely when you met me,” Marcus teased. “You were just too charmed by my good looks to notice.”

  Lilly just rolled her eyes. “Men,” she whispered. “Can’t live with ‘em and you can’t live with ‘em.”

  “Don’t you mean, ‘without �
�em?’”

  “I know what I said. Now how about some coffee and warm strudel?”

  “I won’t say no to that.”

  “Then you can tell me all about the world of the rich and famous. I’ve been following you, you know—life is good, huh?”

  “First I want to hear all about how things are going at school. Is Drake staying out of trouble?”

  “Oh, I got stories, honey. You really want to hear them?”

  “I do,” Tia grinned. “I really do.”

  They got so caught up in story telling that it was almost two hours before Tia took a break to make her calls. “I’m fine,” she told her mother. “I’m just taking a little break from it all. Some peace and quiet. I’ll be in touch soon.” To Lexi she added, “Call Jessa for me and relay the message. I left my phone behind, so I’m borrowing one, and it doesn’t have texting. Have her tell Dylan that I’m fine and I’ll be in touch soon. He’s really busy the next few days anyway.”

  “Where are you, T?” Lexi asked. “You know Dyl’s going to freak if he just hears from Jessa that you’re on ‘sabbatical.’ You gotta give me more than that.”

  “Then it wouldn’t be a sabbatical, would it? I’m fine, Lex, and he will be, too.” She wondered about the truth of her last words even as they escaped her lips. “I’ve got to go.” Tia cut the connection over Lexi’s protests and powered down the phone.

  As promised, the storm hit at about 3:00. Thick, heavy snow fell so fast that they actually watched the driveway disappear under a blanket of white, and they couldn’t even see all the way to the street. Tia helped Lilly in the kitchen as she prepared the perfect meal of homemade chicken soup, salad, and freshly-baked bread, while Marcus watched his alma mater sock it to Purdue. Tia was struck by how comfortable they were with each other, and by how much they still loved each other, even after all these years. She’d really believed that she would have that with Dylan, and she pushed back the crushing sadness that she was planning to deal with later. Spending time with Lilly and Marcus made her feel better; lighter; and she just wanted to enjoy the feeling for a while.

  When the power went out around 7:00, Marcus started a roaring fire and Lilly placed candles all over the house. They challenged each other to identify the different scents of the candles in the potpourri of odors and played Monopoly by the fire. Tia was reminded of her childhood and the joys of the simple, normal life that she’d probably never get to have. Those were her last thoughts as she cried herself to sleep later that night.

  “Holy shit, Dylan, I’ve been trying to get hold of you for hours! Were you hiding out on me? We’ve got a disaster to try and avert, and I can’t reach you!”

  “I was at a shoot all day, Jessa, and I didn’t have…what are you talking about? This whole day’s been a disaster. I don’t think I could take another one.” He jammed his thumb and forefinger into his eye sockets to try and push back the headache that was pounding there. He’d sent over thirty texts to Tia with no answer, and had called Lexi to see if she knew why Tia wasn’t answering her phone. “Um, didn’t you talk to Jessa?” she asked. When she explained that Tia was ‘on a break’ and wasn’t taking any calls, he snapped at her.

  “What the hell is going on? What do you mean, ‘she’s taking a break?’ From what?”

  “Don’t shoot the messenger, Miller. She hung up on me before I got any details, and she doesn’t have her phone. I tried calling the number back a little bit ago and just got a message that the voice mailbox hasn’t been set up; so I can’t even leave her a message. I don’t know what else I can tell you.” Shortly after that his phone died, and he didn’t have a charger, so he had to wait until he got back to the hotel to plug it in and retrieve his messages, and there was still no reply from Tia.

  And now there was another disaster to avert?

  “Well, there isn’t going to be much of a choice in this matter. Where the hell were you last night, and what the fuck did you do?”

  Dylan could hear the anger in her voice, and could almost feel her shaking through the connection. “I was at Skip’s party at the studio, and I had a few drinks with some old friends. Apparently, I had a bit too much, because I don’t really remember anything after Dozer left, and that was about midnight, I think. Bo walked me back to the hotel, and we went to the shoot in the morning. What’s up your ass, Jessa? Why do you sound so bloody pissed?”

  “Oh gosh, I don’t know,” Jessa said sarcastically, her voice venomous, “maybe because I love Tia almost as much as I love you and I can’t believe you’d hurt her like that. Did you think the pictures wouldn’t get out, Dyl? Did you really think you could do something like that and blame it on being drunk and get away with it? Holy shit, Dylan, I just don’t even know what to think about you right now.”

  “You’re going to have to back up, Jessa, because I have no bloody idea what you’re talking about. You’re saying I did something last night that might hurt Tia?”

  “I’m sending you a link, Dylan. You need to have a look at it, think about it for a very short time, and call me back so we can figure out if there’s any way to spin it. I don’t think so, but maybe you can come up with something. In the meantime, I’m supposed to tell you that Tia is fine. She’s left her phone at home and gone on a short trip to a place that no one knows about, apparently. That says to me that she’s already seen them and it may be too late.”

  Dylan felt icy fear swirl through his gut just from the tone of her voice. “Seen what?”

  “Sending the link now. You might want to sit down.” Jessa hung up.

  He didn’t take her advice, but within seconds of the words appearing on the screen, he was on the floor, leaning against the wall for support. “Our Menage-a-trois with Dylan Miller,” the title read. The O’s were made with little handcuffs, the I with a dildo, and the S was a whip that had been curled into shape. The words beneath the title were too small to read on his phone, but he could sure as hell see the picture—it was his own face, pressed between two sets of very large, very naked breasts.

  He crawled across the floor to where his laptop sat at the desk in the corner of the room. Unable to trust his legs, he reached up and grabbed the computer and brought it down to his level on the floor. He tapped his fingers nervously as he waited for it to boot up; there were other pictures, but he couldn’t make out any detail on the tiny screen of his phone. There had to be an explanation for this—he had no memory of ever being sandwiched between two pair of fake tits, and he sure as hell didn’t recall being there last night. More doctored photos? And pornographic ones at that? He’d sue their asses off if that were the case…and it had to be.

  He finally got the link open on his laptop and he froze, his hand holding his heart in his chest while it threatened with every beat to bust out through his rib cage. The air was eluding him and he fought for breath. He recognized the women immediately, and also recognized the shirt he’d been wearing and the couch in the little lounge off the kitchen where he’d had lunch at least a dozen times over the past few weeks. It was like watching someone play him in a movie, he thought, looking at picture after picture of him doing things with these women…kissing them both at the same time, their tongues touching each other as they slid over his lips; his hand holding one unnaturally large breast, his telltale tattoo like a bloody name tag; one of the women on top of him, his hand firmly on her ass… His life flashed before his eyes—not his past, but his future—and it was looking mighty fucking grim at the moment.

  She must have seen these. Somehow, Tia must have gotten a glimpse and run for the hills. And who could blame her? She’d already dealt with the fake pictures Penelope had put out there, and those had nearly crushed her. He’d promised her that he’d never put himself in a situation that would hurt her like that again. He’d promised that he’d always have her best interests at heart. And she’d seen these pictures. Dylan felt the explosion coming and he scrambled to his feet, barely making it to the toilet before throwing up violently until only bitter
bile crept up his esophagus. Because at the bottom of it all he had an explanation for Penelope’s pictures—they never happened. For these, though, he had nothing; no way of salvaging the situation. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t remember any of it, and that explanation was going to go over like a fucking bull in a china shop.

  He tore off his clothes and jumped into the shower, turning the water on cold and shocking himself back to full consciousness. Not even bothering to towel off, he pulled on a pair of lounge pants and called Jessa. She picked up the call, but didn’t say a word to greet him.

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know? You don’t know? That’s a great answer, Dylan. I’m sure Tia will be fine with that.”

  “Bloody fucking hell, Jessa, it’s all I’ve got! I don’t remember a single minute of it! Bo said he had to walk me home because I was so drunk—I didn’t remember that either. I know I was with Dozer Cane, and I do remember those women stopping by our table, but I swear to you, I don’t have a single memory that matches any one of those damn pictures! You need to make them take them off their site. Threaten to sue or something.”

  “Already in the works, but they have almost a million followers, Dylan, and if even ten percent of them—five percent even—shared the link, it could be viral within hours. And did you read the comments? Some girl said she was at a photo shoot with you today, and that she told you that you were a shit to do that to Tia and that your response to her was that she deserved that and more.”

  “Bloody fucking hell, I thought she was one of ‘Penelope’s Posse,’ or whatever they call themselves.”

  “How much did you have to drink last night?”

  “I don’t know. Way too bloody much, obviously.” All the strength drained out of him and he fell defeated onto the couch.

  “You know what, Dylan? Good luck with Tia, because I’m already getting sick of this conversation.”