by Komal Kant
“My world went up in flames, and as I watched my life burn, I thought of all the people in this world who brought down others for their own selfish reasons.” I paused, sucking in a deep breath. I’d built a wall around my feelings for so long that I was afraid what would happen if it was breached. “Penelope’s lies were the fuel, dousing my life with toxic lies. But, Blair, you were the match. You struck that fuel and burned me alive.”
The statue fell from Blair’s hands and hit the ground with a clang. Her face crumpled up and she fell against the doorframe. Whatever strength she’d summoned to face me, broke right then.
“I’m sorry.” Tears of remorse leaked from her eyes. “I’m so sorry. I knew I shouldn’t have gone through with it, but you were such a jerk that night that I didn’t care if the story hurt you.”
Fuck.
That night came flooding back, a distant memory I had almost forgotten.
***
Penelope had disappeared again.
She was doing that a fucking lot lately.
The gin I’d consumed at the pre-party was roaring through my veins, pushing me into a state of angry adrenaline.
I found my way back outside where it was quieter now that the press had left. Penelope was nowhere in sight. She’d been in a bad mood all day. It was becoming too common now. It was like she couldn’t stand to be near me.
Stumbling a few feet towards a wall, I ran straight into something small and distinctly female. Looking down, I found the attractive reporter from earlier staring up at me with wide eyes.
I smirked at her. “Oh, it’s you.” I pulled a cigarette out of my pocket and lit it, trying to take some of the edge off. “Bear Fonzkicker, the stuttering girl.”
She was quiet for a few seconds as she studied me. I could tell she didn’t like me, and I didn’t care. This woman was nothing to me.
I expected her to snap at me. I expected her to suck up to me. I expected her to throw herself on me.
But she didn’t.
Instead of doing all the things I expected, she did the one thing I wasn’t used to from a woman.
She moved past me and walked away, stunning me.
“Hey!” Even though I didn’t know her, having her around was better than my suffocating solitude, where my imagination came up with the darkest scenarios of what Penelope was doing.
And with whom.
But the reporter didn’t stop. She didn’t look back.
Whatever. Fuck it. She was nobody to me.
I’d never see her again, anyway.
***
“You’re right,” I said, realization hitting me as I stepped out onto my front porch. “I was a jerk. I treated you like you were insignificant.” I paused, my eyes unseeing. “Fame is a strange thing. It’s the highest high and the lowest low. One day, you’re irrelevant and the next, you think you’re invincible.”
Blair moved to my side. Tears glowed on her face, but she wasn’t sobbing anymore. “It doesn’t excuse what I did. I ended your marriage, Wade.”
There was more to it than what Blair had done. There always was. Blair wasn’t responsible for the screaming fights across the living room and the cruel words said late at night. She wasn’t responsible for the lying and indifference. Distance and selfishness.
A marriage couldn’t break down overnight. It happened through a sequence of events, over obstacles and hurdles you couldn’t support each other through.
But I was still angry, and I wanted her to know it.
“I’ve hated you for so long, Blair. Hated you for what you did to me.” I knew her heart was shattering at each word. “But, shit Blair, I don’t know if I can stay away from you either.”
Blair pulled away from me and searched my face. “What are you saying?”
I paused, choosing my words carefully. There was no hope for us anyway. What was the point of dragging out something that wouldn’t even work in the end?
“I’m something ruined, too far gone that can’t be fixed. That’s what they kept telling me. Tabloids and TV and people who I thought cared about me. It made me lose a part of myself. It made me lose trust in the world.”
“Are you saying you can’t forgive me?” she asked, her voice breaking again. “Are you saying you don’t trust me?”
I took a deep breath and looked her dead in the eyes. “You and I, Blair, it’s just a dream. It isn’t gonna happen as much as my heart screams at me. As much as my chest squeezes at the thought of you leaving, I don’t know if I can forgive you.”
We didn’t belong in the same world. Blair had betrayed me once for a job she still prized over basic decency. She could betray me again, just like Penelope had.
The tears weren’t on Blair’s face anymore; instead her voice echoed with the same effect.
“Take me home, Wade,” she said in a hollow tone. “So we never have to see each other again.”
Blair’s words killed me, but all I did was nod. There was nothing else to say.
Two broken people could never be together, not once they started breaking each other.
MY BEST FRIEND STARED AT me like I had the devil on my shoulder.
“Is this about Blair?” Harris questioned when he caught sight of me slumped on my couch, a bottle of Jack clutched in my hand like I had zero fucks to give.
Which was a pretty accurate description of my mood right now.
“What makes you think that?” I asked in a nonchalant tone, drinking down the bottle of Jack like it was water.
“You know what.” Harris’ eyes shot to the amber bottle in my hand. “You’re drinking. You shouldn’t be drinking.”
What Harris didn’t know was I’d relapsed days ago, the stringent walls of my sobriety crumbling at the appearance of the woman who’d originally played a hand in my downward spiral.
Now, I was just falling deeper down the dark hole I had plummeted into all those years ago. The Jack was a strong shove into it, like the friend you knew would get you into trouble, but who could also introduce you to a whole world of fun.
“I’m fine.” I waved him off with a hand, wondering why he was ruining the good buzz I had going. “Whaddya want?”
Harris shifted in discomfort. “I came to tell you everything looks good on Blair’s car.” He stopped, staring hard at me. “What the hell is going on with her?”
“Not a damn thing.” I took a swig of the bottle at the sound of her name.
Why did it cut so deep?
“Fine.” Harris’ tone was gruff as he turned out of my front door. “But I don’t like this shit, Wade.”
With that, Harris walked out and shut the door behind him, making me sink into the couch in deeper misery.
My best friend didn’t deserve my indifference, but I was so hung up over the shithole that was my life that this was all I could give him right now.
It was all I could give anyone.
With dark thoughts trailing in the recesses of my mind, I drank half the bottle of Jack just to feel alive.
But I was pretty sure…
…the woman who’d played the role of…
…maestro…in…the…
….downfall of my life…had killed me again…
Because…
…the further…
…I sank into the darkness…
…I died again.
***
The sound of Achilles’ booming bark snapped me from my floating thoughts. He had jumped up and was scratching at the door.
What the hell?
There was a faded buzz.
A low hum I couldn’t find.
A rising din.
Flashes so bright, they lit up the darkness beyond my window.
The faintest touch of familiarity tickled my murky brain.
The bottle of Jack clattered to the floor as I clambered out of the couch. My head was a throbbing metronome infused with whiskey, and each step I took to the window seemed like too much work.
Achilles continued to bark and growl, scratchi
ng at the door with heavy paws, like the world was ending outside my tiny cabin.
With shaky fingers, I pulled open the blinds and stared outside in disbelief.
The world was ending outside my tiny cabin.
It wasn’t meteors or aliens or a natural disaster—it was numerous cameras, their flashes blinding me.
The media had found me.
After three years of hiding and leading the whole world to believe I was secluded in my French chateau, they had found me.
HARLEN. HARLEN. HARLEN.
The name was bitter to my ears. A stage name.
Harlen Walker, the A-list celebrity who had gone into hiding in Europe after a brief stint in rehab after finding out about his wife’s affair with a much younger actor.
That was me. And yet, it wasn’t. How did you explain to the world that you weren’t black and white? That you were every shade in between?
“What the fuck?” I fell back with a cry, pulling the blinds down with so much force, I damn near broke them.
On my coffee table my phone buzzed relentlessly.
Staying low to the floor, I inched my way past an empty pizza box and a pair of my boots.
Without looking at who was calling, I hit answer and continued to stare around the room in a panicked daze.
“Wade?” The voice was familiar. “You there?”
It was Cole.
Cole.
Did my own brother hate me that much that he could do something like this? He was jealous about me and Blair, his childhood best friend. He’d been interested in her, but once again, the attention had gone to me.
Cole would never truly let go of his jealousy over my fame and fortune. He could never truly let go of the fact that I had brought our family all the successes we had. That the house he lived in had been paid for by me. That the car he drove had been paid for by me.
I resented him for never reaching his full potential.
He resented me because I had.
“Itt was youuu.” My tone was blurry, each word drunkenly exaggerated. “You told them I was here.”
“Told who?” The confusion in his voice had to be fake.
“The media!” I yelled into the phone. “They’re camped outside my cabin!”
“The media? What are you talking about?” There was a weird tint to Cole’s tone. “I didn’t call any damn media.”
“You’re lying!”
“I’m not.” Cole paused, listening. “Are you drunk?”
“You’d love that, wouldn’t you? For me to be drunk so you can find something else to talk shit on me about?” It didn’t matter right now that I was drunk.
“That’s not what I’m doing. I called because of Blair.”
“This is about Blair, that’s why you did this.”
“No, because Dad told me it was stupid for me to be mad at you because of a woman. That you’ve been through enough without this petty bullshit draggin’ on between us.”
“Huh? Then why are they here? Who called them?” I trailed off, staring at the window as the onslaught of flashes continued.
“Wade, I’m worried about you.” There was genuine concern in his voice, and I couldn’t bear it.
“Don’t be.” As I hung up on him, realization hit me.
There was only one person who’d found out recently about my real identity. I’d hidden away in this town for years and no one had breathed a word about my location.
There was one woman who would do this to me, who had done this to me in the past.
The woman I couldn’t stop thinking about.
Blair Fonseka.
It was funny how pain didn’t always strike you all at once.
Sometimes, it struck you at irregular intervals when you were least prepared to handle it.
Sometimes, it struck you when you were watching a particularly sad movie about a couple that was so in love but couldn’t be together.
Or, sometimes, it struck you as you were throwing out your grandmother’s obscure furniture as the sun set, casting an orange glow across the field that you were too depressed to enjoy.
Like at this very moment, as I dragged a hideous, old chair covered in triangular designs onto the front yard, a swell of pain hit me so hard, I dropped the chair and collapsed into it in defeat.
Actually, let me take back the funny part. There was nothing humorous about pain. It sucked, and nothing could make it go away.
A sinkhole the size of an ocean formed in my chest. I fought back the feelings that surfaced with it; feelings of Wade, or Harlen, or whatever I was supposed to call him now.
Did I feel the same way about Wade as I felt about Harlen?
Was that even possible? They were two completely different men from two completely different worlds. One was a stoic and reserved junk yard owner; the other an arrogant and self-centered movie star.
Okay, maybe they were both a little arrogant and self-centered.
My heart pined for a man who hated me because of a mistake I’d made many years ago. Sure, that mistake had uprooted his entire life, but that had never been my intention.
There was too much bad blood for us to sift through.
“Blair, honey.” Mom’s voice floated down to me from the front porch.
Maybe she’d glanced out of the front window and noticed that I’d been immobile for longer than was normal, which had probably prompted Drew to tell her about Wade and me.
Mom had noticed my mournful demeanor yesterday, as mothers normally did, but she hadn’t commented on it. The talk was coming now, I could feel it.
“Yeah?” I didn’t turn around as her footsteps drew closer.
“Is everything okay?” She crouched down on the ground in front of me when she reached me. Her strawberry blonde hair was done up Princess Leia style and she was wearing a brown poncho with pink cactus flowers on it.
Normally, I would’ve cracked a smile at her attire, but today I could only muster a deflated grimace.
“I’m not sure, Mom.” I shrugged, running a hand through the messy hair I’d failed to brush two days in a row. If the humidity and its natural frizz wasn’t bad enough, pure neglect had made it look like a nest of tangled, black thread.
Mom placed a gentle hand on my knee and leaned forward, understanding swimming in her hazel eyes. “Drew told me what happened with Wade. Or is it Harlen? It all sounds like a big mess, Bee.”
Burying my head in my hands, I asked in a muffled tone, “Did you know about him? Who he was?”
It was Mom’s hesitation that gave away that she’d known more than I had. “I had no idea until I came back before the funeral. I wanted to say something to you, but I knew you wouldn’t be around for long and I didn’t want it weighing on you.”
My head snapped up and I stared hard at her. “You knew this whole time and you didn’t say anything?” Betrayal leaked into my voice.
“It wasn’t my secret to tell, Blair.” Anxiety twisted at her kind face. “I hoped the two of you would reconnect, far away from the pressures of that lifestyle. And guess what? You did.”
“You should’ve told me.” My voice was shaking. I couldn’t believe my own mother had kept something so huge from me.
The betrayal cut me more than I wanted to show.
“It’s very complicated, Blair,” Mom said, her voice soft. She knew I was upset with her. She’d probably prepared herself for this reaction. “I spoke to Michelle about it and she gave me a little bit of background.”
Great. Had everyone been talking about Wade and me behind our backs? Was there anyone in this town who didn’t know the truth? Krystle’s words were coming back to me now.
I really was the last to know.
“Does Michelle know what I did? That I was the one who-” I didn’t need to finish the sentence for my mom to understand.
Wade’s mom was a blunt woman. If she didn’t like me, I would know it. Not that her approval should mean anything. It wasn’t like Wade and I were in a relationship.
Mom
shook her head. “No, Bee, but maybe she should.”
“I’m scared,” I admitted slowly, not even sure why I cared so much when I would be gone within days. “Scared she’ll hate me, scared that everyone will hate me once they know.”
“Give yourself a break, Blair.” The voice startled us. We’d been so absorbed in our conversation that we hadn’t noticed Drew’s arrival.
My shoeless brother threw himself down on the ground beside Mom, his long hair neater than mine for once. “It was a confusing time in your life, but you learned from it, even if it was too little, too late.”
For once, I was so drained that I didn’t care that my little brother was interjecting with his serene one-liners.
“But what I did-”
“Happened three years ago.” Drew cut me off, that tranquil look on his face that normally annoyed me. “You’re a different person now, Bee. You’re allowed to grow and change and make mistakes. We’ve all done it.”
“You’re exactly right, babe.” Mom wrapped an arm around Drew and beamed at him with pride. “We love you for who you are, not who you were.”
Their words sank in. They were right. Everyone made mistakes, but those mistakes didn’t determine who they truly were.
Musing on this, I leaned forward and mussed Drew’s hair. “When did you get so wise?”
He shrugged, shooting me an affectionate smile. “Hey, someone has to balance out your prissy personality.”
Rolling my eyes at him, I let my gaze wander the surrounding fields. Once an eyesore, the peaceful familiarity of Pine Bluffs was calming now, a place where I didn’t have to worry about the crazy whirlwind of shit I would soon return to.
Even though a crazy whirlwind of shit had happened here, too.
Yet, this was where I had found Wade.
A pang shot through me.
There was no denying the space he now occupied in mind, body, and soul.
It was just as this thought speckled in my brain that I noticed a truck tearing up the access road that led to my grandmother’s property, stirring dust in its wake.
My heart rate spiked.
Could it be Wade? That was a stupid thought; the truck wasn’t black like his, but a grimy white.
A second later, I recognized it as Michelle Welsecky’s. My nerves raced through my body.