by Lily Zante
She shakes her head without turning around, and then she disappears out of my sight.
Chapter Thirty-Three
NINA
* * *
I awaken with a start. I dreamt I was back at Grampton House. Every time I am reminded of that place I feel as dirty as when I lived there.
Some stains never fade.
It’s cold, and it’s takes me a few moments to fumble around and switch on my lamp. I sit up and shiver, and rub my arms. The shift at work was so hectic and I couldn’t wait to get home and when I did I promised myself that I would lie on the couch for a few moments. But I fell asleep. Now it’s nine in the evening and I’m still in my waitress’s outfit. And I’m hungry and cold.
I get up and put on a thick cardigan, then put on the central heating. And still I shiver.
I wash my hands then open the cabinet. I open the cupboard door and stare at it. My fingers tremble with anticipation. I could slice into my skin with this and I would feel so much better.The razor blade lies on a small shelf, teasing me. It’s been my go-to after bad days at work, on nights I couldn’t sleep, after run-ins with Rhys.
I’ve often wondered if it’s written on my face, that I am weak. If there’s a note on my forehead that says I can be used.
Just as I go to pick it up, my phone rings, and I pull it out of my back pocket. An involuntary smile flickers across my lips when I see who’s calling.
“Did you pick something for me?”
I roll my lips together in an attempt to stop myself from smiling. I had a feeling he might call. I’ve been thinking about our little conversation, and him wanting me to suggest a disguise for him. I was hoping he would forget and things would slowly peter away.
Surely his filming days are almost at an end? I don’t answer, but I hold the phone to my ear, somehow reassured by the sound of his voice.
The silence rolls on.
“Nina?”
“Yeah?”
“The disguise … you were going to call me.”
I hadn’t given it any more thought. I mean. I had. I had wondered what to suggest for him. A long-haired blonde wig, hippie style, but since he sometimes doesn’t bother shaving, and has a dusting of dark hairs across his jaw, the blonde hair would look odd. But who am I kidding? Where is this going to lead? What is the point? It was easier before, when he was using me to find a route to Elias. This is … this is something I can’t deal with.
“You weren’t going to call me, were you?” he asks, guessing correctly.
I wasn’t. I talked myself out of it each time I started to. But I should have known Callum better than that. He’s a persistent guy.
I stare at the blade. My past drags me to it, and now I have Callum at the end of a phone, offering me a different future, a way out.
I could cut myself and feel better. Or I could give into Callum and lie some more, fake my way through this friendship, then push him away when he wants to get too close.
“I’ve been busy,” I say finally.
“You don’t have to go out and buy me anything. I’ve got an entire costume department at hand. Just tell me what you’d like to see me in.”
Now he’s put me on the spot and I can’t think straight. “Uh…” I haven’t given it any thought, and that’s why I’m struggling.
“You were never going to call me back, were you?” He sounds more serious than I’ve ever heard him.
I let out a sigh. He meant this to be some sweet and sappy thing, but it’s had the opposite effect on me. He is the one guy I haven’t been able to push away. He will never understand why none of this is easy for me. I’m not like other women who would fall at his feet, swoon at his interest, go dizzy with his delight at the attention he’s giving.
Me? I can’t let him get close to me, and yet, my heart seems to disagree with my brain.
“I tell you what. I’m going to surprise you. I’m going to walk into the diner and I bet you won’t recognize me straight away.”
“You’re going to surprise me?”This sounds like a challenge, and one which I’m strangely up for.
“Seeing that you haven’t picked anything out for me. You had three days, Nina.”
“I was busy.”
“Is that your excuse?” Maybe he knows me better than I think he does. “Do we have a deal?”
I can say ‘No’, but I’m curious, and because he’s made me smile. “We have a deal.”
“Good. I’ll come by soon and surprise you.”
I laugh.
“Did you just laugh?” He picks up on it lightning fast.
“It was a cough.”
“Funny. It sounded like a laugh to me.”
“I’m curious to see what you might transform into.”
“You’ll find out soon enough.”
“Where are you coming? To the diner, or my place?”
“I’m going to surprise you.”
“When?”
“Again, I’m going to surprise you.”
My smile widens. Callum is like a tiny light, and I’m the moth drawn to it amid all the blackness.
“‘Bye.” He hangs up.
All these things he’s been doing—the autograph, the ploy to get me to deliver food to his set, him turning up on my doorstep to see how I was—that kind of commitment deserves something more than a trip to my night school and back.
Elias said talking to Harper helped him. I can see why. Having someone who cares is like having a security blanket, someone to cushion the heavy blows that life can throw sometimes.
Callum isn’t my security blanket, but he’s the nicest thing I’ve had around lately. I begrudgingly accept that my daily trips to deliver his lunch were something I had started to enjoy. Enjoy is probably too strong a word for it. ‘Look forward to’ is more like it.
I close the cabinet door and turn my back to the blade. I don’t want to be a slave to it. I don’t want to wake up sweating, with my heart thumping like it’s going to explode just because the janitor sneaked into my dreams and turned them into nightmares.
I want to get over him.
I want to get over my past.
I want to get better, so that I can move on.
This unlikely suitor might just be the perfect distraction for now.
Chapter Thirty-Four
NINA
* * *
I regret taking Joni up on her offer. I want to go home. It’s been another long day at the diner, but at least there’s no night school tonight. I have another assignment I need to make a start on when I get back. Only problem is that Joni wants to go out for dinner. I have a feeling that she wants to talk. With things being a little cool between us, I agreed, even though I’m not in the mood.
“Table five.” Joni rolls her eyes as she walks past me.
“I’ve almost finished my shift,” I moan. “Can’t you get one of the others to do it?”
“They’re all busy and he was getting snappy.” I glance over my shoulder and see why she’s happy to let me have him. The guy is old, and bald, and so not her type. Nor mine. “Hurry up. I’ll wait for you outside.”
I go over and take the order, and I’m not surprised when he orders everything fried and doubled in portion. Surprisingly, he doesn’t make any conversation. I usually get asked about Elias, but this guy seems preoccupied with his cell phone.
I hand his order to one of the cooks, and beg them to make his food first. This isn’t allowed, skipping the line, but it’s early evening, and I really want to finish my shift. I want to eat somewhere fast with Joni and go home. I’m also annoyed at myself for agreeing to go out with her. It’s not like I owe her anything.
Checking the messages on my cell phone while I wait, I see that Harper’s called me a few times. She’s probably itching to know about my cab ride home with Callum. I keep hoping she’ll forget, but she, like Callum, is persistent. She and Elias are heading towards the mountains soon so I hope she’ll soon forget to dip her nose into my business and focus on my br
other instead.
I circle back to the kitchen. “The order for Table four, is it ready yet?” I ask one of the chefs.
“Five minutes.”
I hover around. Joni’s already got her coat on and tells me she’s going outside for a cigarette. “You’re making us late.”
I narrow my eyes at her. “I wouldn’t have if you’d passed my last order off to someone else.”
“He asked for you,” she says, sliding past me. “This is what you get for having a famous brother.”
I walk around the diner, refilling water glasses and coffee mugs, in order to avoid having to deal with any more new customers.
“Table four!” The cook passes me the customer’s plate just as I return to the coffee station. This order consists of everything fried. I hate to think what this guy’s arteries must look like.
“Your order, sir.” I put the plate down in front of my customer. He’s still looking at his phone, and grunts in acknowledgement. “Is there anything else I can get for you?”
“Nah,” he says, gruffly. I turn around to walk away when he says, “Well, maybe you can.”
I recognize that voice.
I spin around. My eyes grow wider as I lower my head and peer closer.
Oh.
My.
God.
My mouth falls open.
Callum laughs. “I told you you wouldn’t recognize me.” Even as I stare at him, I can’t see the man I know. “Callum? Is that really you?”
He’s balding badly, with a combover, and wrinkles, and saggy, baggy eyes, and he has the skin of an old man. He has age spots and jowls, and a saggy neck and chin.
“I got you though, didn’t I?” he cries, thumping the table in glee.
I slide into the seat opposite him because even after all this intense staring, I still don’t seeing the Callum I know. I put my hands to my face. This is a work of art. “I didn’t realize you were going to enlist the help of your entire makeup department.”
“Not the entire department. Just two make up artists.”
I shake my head. It’s him, it’s his voice, and those are his eyes, but the rest of him is not him. It’s jarring, hearing his voice, looking at him but seeing someone completely different. An old, and out of shape man wearing ill-fitting clothes. His body is misshapen, and large, and bloaty. I marvel at the transformation. “How long did it take?”
“Long enough.”
“Are you coming?” Joni comes over and taps her watch impatiently. Her questioning eyes bore into me and she’s clearly wondering what the heck I’m doing sitting and talking to this man.
I’m torn. I really don’t want to go out with her tonight. I would much rather prefer sitting here talking to Callum. Even Callum looking like this. I’m touched that he went to these lengths. He picks up a greasy fry and examines it.
“Just give me a few minutes,” I beg Joni, waiting to see if she recognizes Callum.
“Hurry up,” she hisses, then walks away again.
“She didn’t know it was you,” I say, as if this is a surprise.
“You didn’t know it was me.”
I prop my elbows on the table, and take him in. It is so very strange to see him and have him be completely different to what I’m used to.
“I told you I’d surprise you.”
“You did that, alright.” I sink back against the leather backrest and smile. “You really did take that as a challenge.”
He pushes his plate away. “You gave up on me. You didn’t even want to give me a chance.”
He says this like it’s a question, and of course, I will ignore it and not answer. It saves me lying more. “So, tell me about your transformation.”
And he does. He tells me how he asked his make up artists for help. As I sit there and listen, I’m still amazed by the transformation. I’m aware that I’m talking to Callum, yet he is buried beneath this huge, hulking shell of a man I would never look at. He went to all that trouble. Again. For me.
I had been expecting him to come yesterday, on a day when I had my night school class, that I was completely blindsided by his appearance today.
“Shooting took forever last night. We had a long, almost twenty hour, day. Otherwise I’d have come here. There’s no way I would have missed going to night school with you looking like this. It would have been the highlight of my day.”
I shake my head, because his sarcasm is so obvious, and because I find that idea funny.
“Since you don’t have a class tonight, how about we … hang out?” he suggests carefully.
“Hang out?” My hopes deflate as fast as they’ve risen. I’m supposed to be out with Joni tonight. She’s not been the best friend to me, but I’m not so callous that I’d ditch her in a heartbeat in order to spend some time with Callum. “I’m sorry but I’ve got plans.”
“Oh.” He looks as disappointed as I feel.
“I would have otherwise.”
“Would you have? Or are you just saying that?”
“I feel bad that you went to all this effort.” I mean it.
“Some other time, then.”
I nod. I hardly ever go out, and trust tonight to be the night Joni asks me to come out with her. Now I find myself wishing that I could have been free to go out with Callum instead—maybe because that option isn’t open to me any longer. I get up slowly. “Some other time. Call me,” I say, surprising myself with that comment.
Chapter Thirty-Five
CALLUM
* * *
Maybe I should have come yesterday, at least I’d have had a chance to escort Nina to night school. I push my plate away, the small victory I felt at tricking her so perfectly disappears. That said, I think she’s warming towards me. Lately, we’ve been getting on much better. I guess I’m disappointed that she has other plans because I was sure we could have spent a nice evening together. Not doing the kind of stuff I’m used to doing with a woman I like, but something simpler, something that Nina would feel comfortable with. She used to always be so defensive, so angry and irritated whenever I was around. I’ll take this new and improved level of our acquaintanceship.
I settle the bill and get up to leave when Frankie comes over. She asks if there was a problem with the food. “Uh, no, not really. I wasn’t hungry.”
She looks at me for a long time, as if she’s trying to figure me out. “Callum?”
I nod my head and grin. “Clever woman.”
She roars with laughter, then peers closer at me. “Unbelievable.”
“I had a bet with Nina.”
“I hope you weren’t trying to impress her.”
“I don’t think she’s easily impressed.”
Frankie makes a disapproving sound. “She’s not easy to work on, but that look is definitely not going to help you to impress her.”
“This isn’t the type of new man I’d aspire to be. I’m surprised you figured out that it was me.”
“Nina doesn’t talk to many customers, much less sit across the table from them. Besides, your eyes gave it away.” She looks me up and down in wonder. “It’s a miracle.”
“It’s a miracle that the make up department is at my disposal.”
She hangs her hands on her hips. “You did this for Nina?”
“I wanted to surprise her.”
“Boy, you are full of surprises.” She looks over my shoulder. “Seems like your trick worked. Good luck.” Before I can work out what she’s talking about, Nina appears in front of me. “Joni canceled on me.”
I silently thank the lord.
“I’ve got no plans, so if you’re still free, we could … hang out?”
“I’ve got no plans.” I’m about to shoot her one of my genuinely heartfelt smiles, but I rein myself back. “We could hang out.”
“Are you going out like that?” she asks, looking me up and down.
It’s going to take me a while to take all of this gloop off my face, and the fat body suit I’m wearing. But equally, if I keep this on,
it’s going to be uncomfortable. Unless we go outside, for a walk. The upside is that nobody will recognize me. “Yes, unless you have a problem being seen with an old guy.”
“I don’t have a problem.”
We walk out, and I don’t even need to look over to see if Frankie’s staring at us. I can feel her stare on my back. She wished me ‘Good Luck’. I shouldn’t find it odd—given what I know of Nina, but it serves as a good reminder.
I don’t suppose she’ll want to go and get something to eat, and I’m not in a position to do that, wearing what I am. I suggest we do the Chicago Riverwalk and she seems fine with that.
This is the kind of walk I could never do but disguised the way I am, no one bats an eyelid. I love being anonymous. Invisible. People who crave fame don’t realize the huge sacrifice it is that giving away your soul entails. In letting your fans think they have access to you whenever they see you, walking outside, eating at a restaurant, trying to sit in peaceful solitude on a park bench.
So this, tonight, is a gift for me, not only because no one recognizes me, but because I’m with Nina. “What happened with your friend? The one you were supposed to go out with?”
“She got tired of waiting.”
“Was it me? Did I mess things up? She sounded irritated when she came over.”
“I wouldn’t worry about it. Joni’s always like that. Her boyfriend called her, so she’s gone running to him.”
“It sounds like you don’t like him.”
“I don’t.”
I wait for her to tell me why, but she doesn’t. Instead she says, “He’s a bully. He doesn’t treat her well.”
“Why’s she with him?”
“You tell me. Anyway, we didn’t come out to talk about my friend.”
“No, we didn’t.”
We walk along and talk about my shooting, and she tells me more about her interior design course. The conversation soon switches to Elias and Harper, and then she’s curious to know how I got the autograph from Leanne.