by Alexa Land
“I can’t imagine what that must be like.”
“In a way, I guess I’m used to it. I’ve been living with it since my late teens, which is when I had my first episode, though I wasn’t diagnosed until my mid-twenties. Really, I think the worst part is what it does to the people around me. I can just ride it out. No matter how bad it gets, I’ve always been able to hold on to the knowledge that it doesn’t stay that way forever.” Zan sighed and turned his head away from me.
“What’s wrong?”
“I just...I hate talking about this with you and admitting the full extent of my issues.”
“Why?”
He shrugged and said, “There’s so much stigma associated with mental illness, and I feel like nobody really understands, not unless they’ve lived it. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve tried to explain my disorder to a friend or loved one, only to have them look at me differently from that point, or write me off as crazy. It really hurts to be betrayed like that by someone you trust.”
He still wasn’t looking at me, so I climbed onto his lap impulsively, straddling his thighs as I threw my arms around his shoulders. “You can tell me anything, Alexzander. I want you to know that. I love you and nothing would ever change that.”
Zan looked at me, staring deep into my eyes. “Even now that you’re starting to see the whole picture, now that you’re realizing how deep my issues run, you still want this? Are you sure?”
“Of course.”
He put his arms around me and buried his face in my shoulder as he whispered, “Thank you.”
*****
Zan was napping in the master bedroom when Chance arrived late that afternoon. “Hey,” I said, greeting him with a hug and a pat on the back. “Thank you for helping us out.”
“Not a problem. I’d been glued to the news watching what was happening with you and your boyfriend, and I kept wishing there was some way I could help when I saw how you were being completely hounded by the paparazzi. Now I can.”
“Come on in,” I said, leading the way into the cabin. “Are you hungry? I can make you some dinner.”
“Thanks, but I grabbed some fast food on the way up here.”
“Where’s your stuff?”
“In the SUV. Your brother booked me a room at that big hotel down by the lake,” he told me.
“Why? There’s plenty of room here.”
Chance grinned at me. “Dante said you and Zan need your privacy, and he’s right. Oh, and speaking of your brother.” He pulled a thick envelope out of the inside pocket of his black pea coat and handed it to me as he said, “He gave me this and called it spending money. There’s ten thousand dollars in that envelope. I’m not going to ask why anyone has that kind of cash lying around, but I am going to ask, is he crazy? He doesn’t know me at all, and he hands me ten large! I almost said something to him, like, dude, you just gave a fucking fortune to a rent boy. Who’s to say I wouldn’t take the money and run off to Vegas or some shit? He’s far too trusting.”
“He’s really not, but I let him know you’re completely trustworthy.” I opened the envelope, counted out a stack of hundred dollar bills and handed them to him. “Here’s your first week’s salary in advance.” I handed the envelope back to him with the rest of the cash inside it. “This is for groceries and so on.”
“What the fuck are you planning on eating that’s going to cost thousands of dollars?”
I grinned at that and said, “Well, Zan does have a penchant for six dollar cans of tuna, and I occasionally try to force exotic fruits on him. It could add up. Except for that, though, I’m guessing the money’s going to last a while.”
Chance took a few bills out of the envelope, sticking them in his pocket before putting the remainder on an end table. “That kind of money is way too big a responsibility. I’ll just leave it here and take some as needed. You really don’t have to pay me so much, either. It’s not like you’re asking me to do a hell of a lot.”
“I asked you to drop everything and hang out in Tahoe. That deserves compensation.”
He smiled and said, “What a hardship, having to go someplace that looks like a Christmas card. How will I survive?”
“It’s hazard pay,” I told him. “You could freeze your nuts off, then where would you be?”
“In need of another line of work. Who’s gonna want a rent boy with no nuts?” I’d always liked the fact that he was so candid about what he did for a living. We settled onto a couple chairs near the blazing fireplace and he said, “I’m glad you didn’t move to New York. I was really going to miss you.”
“I would have missed you, too. Also, going would have been a mistake of epic proportions. I don’t know what I was thinking with Jason Jax. You should have heard the things he said when he saw the footage of Zan and me at the airport.”
“Not surprising, given what we now know,” he said.
“What do you mean?”
“Didn’t you see the news this morning? I mean, you basically are the news right now, but didn’t you hear what else has been going on?”
“No. What happened?”
“Jax was arrested. One of his lovers, this nineteen-year-old guy from New Jersey, came forward and said Jax had been sleeping with him since he was sixteen, then filed assault charges because Jax smacked him around. Apparently the guy accumulated a ton of incriminating photos, texts and emails, which he gave to the cops.”
“Oh my God,” I muttered.
“You really dodged a bullet.”
“Sounds like it. Is the nineteen-year-old okay?”
“Yeah. He’s pissed off more than anything. He said he was tired of being Jax’s dirty little secret, and tired of being his punching bag. I was proud of him for coming forward.”
“Me too, and I’m glad he wasn’t seriously injured,” I said.
“Yeah, that guy will be alright. Jax, not so much. His career is toast, and he’ll probably serve time in jail unless his lawyers work a miracle.”
“I’m surprised I hadn’t heard about this.”
Chance leaned back, crossing his ankle over his knee, and said, “That dick should be grateful to you and your boyfriend. Since Tillane’s reappearance is such big news, it’s diverting the headlines away from him. Otherwise, all the major news outlets would be airing Jax’s story twenty-four-seven.”
“It’s scary how wrong I was about Jax. I never suspected he was like that.”
“He really had you fooled, huh?”
“Me and everybody else. It’s like Zan said, Jason was a better actor than anyone gave him credit for.”
“Apparently.”
We talked about Jax for a couple more minutes before I said, “So tell me, how’s everything with you? How’d that photography class turn out?”
Chance sighed. “Not great. I ended up with a B, I found out this morning after my last assignment was graded. The teacher had all kinds of criticisms about my technical skills and didn’t feel I progressed enough during the class.”
“I really hope you’re not letting that discourage you.” He shrugged and I said, “Come on, Chance, your work is brilliant!”
“It’s really sweet of you to say that. Christian said the same thing, but I know you guys are just being nice.”
“We’re being honest. You have an incredible eye! I was blown away when I saw the photos you took at Vincent and Trevor’s wedding. Please don’t let some random junior college instructor get to you.”
“Easier said than done.” Chance pushed to his feet and changed the subject. “Alright, give me your shopping list and I’ll go find the grocery store. I’m not sure if it’s open late and I want to get this done today.”
I got up too and handed him the list I’d prepared. “First thing tomorrow there’s a prescription to pick up. The pharmacy’s closed now, but it’ll open at nine. It’s under the name Alex Lane, in case I forget to tell you later.”
“Alex Lane?”
“Zan uses that name when he wants to remain inc
ognito.”
“Got it.”
“Thank you again, Chance. I’m really grateful that you’re helping us out.”
As he put the shopping list in his pocket, he said, “I still can’t believe how your life changed overnight. What’s it like, being the boyfriend of an international pop superstar?”
I said as I walked him to the door, “Well, I’d be lying if I said the whole paparazzi thing and everyone suddenly knowing my name didn’t freak me out a bit. But it’s all worth it, because in return I get to be with Zan.”
“Wow. You’re so totally into this guy.”
“That’s putting it mildly. He’s completely extraordinary. He keeps surprising me, not just with the grand gesture of showing up at the airport, but with little things, like when he tried to bake muffins for me this morning.”
Chance grinned. “Tried to?”
“They were bizarre. I don’t know what exactly he substituted for eggs, but my God no. All that matters though is that he tried. It was so sweet of him.”
After Chance took off, I slipped under the covers with Zan. He rolled over right away and gathered me in his arms. His eyes were closed and I thought he was asleep until he murmured, “Olive oil.”
“What?”
His lips curved into a grin. “That’s what I used in place of eggs in my woeful muffin attempt.”
“They were good.”
“Liar. The word you used was bizarre.” He was still smiling, and raised one lid slightly to peek at me.
“They were both good and bizarre. The olive oil added a certain savoriness that one might not necessarily expect in a blueberry muffin. But that could be the start of a new culinary trend.”
“Because that’s likely.”
“Shame on you for eavesdropping, by the way,” I said before kissing the tip of his nose.
“Couldn’t help it. I was just lying here minding my own business when your lovely voice wafted in to me.”
“You think my voice is lovely?” I asked.
“I think all of you is lovely.”
I grinned at that and said, “I’m sorry I woke you from your nap with my allegedly lovely but apparently far too loud voice.”
“I’m glad you woke me.”
“You are? Why?”
Zan smiled again and rolled on top of me. “Three guesses.”
Chapter Seventeen
“This was a mistake.”
I turned to look at Zan, gripping his hand a little tighter, and said, “We don’t have to stay if you don’t want to.”
We’d returned to his house in Marin, having left Tahoe that morning after five blissful weeks spent getting to know each other. Zan had also been working with a therapist during that time, who drove up twice a week from Sacramento. She was kind and gentle, not really pushing for solutions, but just letting him talk through his fears and concerns about returning to life in the public eye. He thought it was helping, but said he also knew he had a long way to go.
It was my thirtieth birthday, and Nana had a celebration planned that evening at a small hotel in Sausalito. It was good motivation for leaving Tahoe and beginning the next chapter of our lives. We couldn’t keep postponing the inevitable. As much as we’d loved our time at the cabin, it had been high time to relinquish it to its owners and return to reality.
The closer we’d gotten to the house, the quieter Zan had become. Once inside, he just froze up. We’d been rooted outside the door to the den for a solid minute, the epicenter of his world for over a decade. He said softly, “What if I get stuck again? I don’t want to go back to being that person. I can’t do that to you, and I can’t do it to myself, either.”
We’d talked about finding someplace new, but the house was ideal for many reasons, including a degree of privacy that was rare in the Bay Area. We were still at the top of the paparazzi’s most-wanted list, even though the initial fervor had died down. Life felt almost normal again, but we both knew the last few weeks had just been a temporary reprieve. The moment we’d try to do anything in public, it would all start up again.
“Do you want to leave?” I asked him. “We don’t have to do this.”
“I’m being daft,” he said. “I just need to shake it off. This is the perfect place for you and me. What else would we do, check into a hotel and spend every day dodging the paparazzi? Move in with your gran and throw your family’s life into turmoil again? Sure, we could buy another house, but that’d take weeks. What would we to do in the meantime?”
“We could figure something out.”
Zan chewed his lower lip for a few moments, then stepped forward and closed the door to the den. “I just need to get a grip. There’s a lot more to this house besides that one room. Come on, let’s go take a look.”
I’d never been in the spacious master suite. It was sparsely furnished with sturdy wood furniture in the same masculine style as the rest of the house, and the centerpiece was a massive four-poster bed. The room also had high ceilings and a wall of windows with a pair of glass doors in the center, providing a sprawling view of the surrounding hills. “See? This is good,” he said. “We can make this work.”
Zan crossed the room and opened the double doors. Immediately, fresh air filled the stuffy room. I found some crisp, white linens in an armoire and made the bed, then pushed my shoes off, climbed on top of the covers and held my hand out to him. He’d been staring at the view from the large balcony, but came to me as soon as I did that. He sat on the edge of the bed and took off the hiking boots I’d lent him, then climbed up beside me and drew me into a hug.
“Are you sure about this?” I asked. “If not, we can figure out a place to stay while we do some house hunting. If we go a little further north, we’ll probably find places with open space and privacy. It’ll just take some looking.”
“But we already have that, right here. My initial reaction when I saw the house again was panic, but it’s better in here since I never used this bedroom. Let’s make this work.”
“You sure?”
He nodded and kissed my shoulder. “I’m sorry, Gianni. We should have come back here a couple days ago so I’d have time to adjust, not on your birthday. The last thing I wanted was to cast a shadow on your big day.”
“You haven’t,” I said as I leaned back against the pillows and he put his head on my chest.
“I’ve been really worried, not just about returning here but about the event tonight. What if the paparazzi show up and disrupt everything?”
“They won’t. Not only is Nana bringing in security, she rented out the entire hotel. The manager assured her we’ll have plenty of privacy.”
“Hopefully.”
“I kind of wish Nana had just stuck with a small party at home,” I admitted, “but she’s been planning this for months and is so excited. It’ll be fine, though. It sounds like the hotel staff is used to hosting celebrities and will make sure this goes off without a hitch. On top of that, Dante’s security team will be on hand. There’s nothing to worry about.”
“I’m sorry that something as straightforward as a birthday party had to turn into a major covert operation.”
“It’s alright.”
“It isn’t really,” Zan murmured. He was quiet for a while before saying, “Security was always a big concern back when I was performing, but I was surrounded by people at all times, my agent, publicists, bodyguards, assistants, the list goes on. Even though I didn’t like the pressure of having an entourage, it did mean I was pretty well insulated. But now, I feel so vulnerable. I’m not concerned about myself, I’m worried about keeping you safe.”
I knew he wasn’t just talking about the paparazzi. Granted, they could be really aggressive, but there were bigger concerns as well. While we were in Tahoe, he’d opened up to me about the negative side of fame, the overzealous fans, straight-up psychopaths, and even the death threats that he’d had to endure. I knew all of that weighed on him, and that he really did worry about me far more than he worried about himself.
“We don’t have to go tonight, not if you don’t want to,” I told him as I stroked his hair. “I don’t want this to be too much pressure on you.”
“You’re the guest of honor, love. Of course we have to go.” Zan sat up and said, “I need to stop this. It’s your birthday, and I’m dragging you down with my fretting. I really am sorry.”
“There’s no need to apologize. I know you’re feeling a lot of pressure today, both from returning here and because tonight will be the first time you’ve gone out in public since the airport. It’s perfectly understandable.”
“I think I’ll feel better after a hot shower. That long drive from Tahoe didn’t do me any favors.”
“That’s a good idea. Mind if I join you?”
“I’d love that,” he said with a bashful smile.
I went to find the toiletry bag in our luggage, then joined him in the bathroom. It was enormous, as was the tile shower, which included half a dozen shower heads at various heights. We stripped down and got under the warm water, then just held each other for a while. I could feel some of his tension falling away, his body relaxing in my arms. “See?” Zan said. “There’s a lot to recommend staying in this house, including this shower. I’d forgotten how nice it was, though that’s due to the company more than anything.”
I grinned at that and squeezed some shampoo in my hand, then began washing his hair. “I should be doing that for you,” he said. “You’re the birthday boy.”
“So, you can go next. I love doing this for you,” I murmured as I massaged his scalp.
“I’ve been thinking about cutting my hair off,” he said. “Maybe you’d like me better with a more modern look. What do you think?”
“What? You hair is so much a part of you!”
“Yes, but doesn’t it make me look hopelessly outdated? I don’t want to seem even older with that pathetic clinging-to-my-glory-days thing that some men do.”