Ian let out a loud catlike yowl of pain and Autumn rolled her eyes. He was always such a baby when it came to pain. The doctor was lapping it up though, swabbing him so gently she might have been dressing a baby. “Is that better?”
Ian gave another hero’s grimace. “Yeah, it’s fine. Just stings a little, is all.”
Autumn resisted the urge to say she’d mopped up braver corgis. She figured it wouldn’t be constructive. The doctor continued dabbing at Ian’s face. “Say, are you an actor?”
“At times,” Ian said, dropping the walking wounded act in a heartbeat. “I do improv at a local theatre.”
The doctor beamed. “I knew it. You just have that kind of face. I’ve been trying to guess who you look like the entire time we’ve been in here.”
Ian laughed. “What have you come up with?”
“Oh, a young Paul Newman, James Dean, Chris Pine…”
“I love Chris Pine.”
The doctor blushed. “I love him, too. Where are you from? I’m so terrible with accents.”
Her ex-boyfriend grinned like he’d just been named Miss Universe. “Melbourne.”
“Is that in New Zealand?”
Ian cast Autie a wicked smirk she refused to return.
“No,” Ian said. “It’s the second biggest city in Australia. Chris Hemsworth, Hugh Jackman, Thunder from Down Under. That kind of thing.”
The doctor laughed and Autumn gave a small cough that she hoped would let Ian know she thought he was a knob-skin. The only way he could be laying the accent on any thicker was if he smeared Vegimite all over his mouth. Her ex had no qualms about using their nationality to charm ‘the ladies.’ He had once bemoaned that the Australian lexicon didn’t have a charming appellation with which to refer to women. American southerners could melt hearts with ‘ma’am,’ the Scots had ‘lass,’ the French purred ‘mademoiselle,’ but all they had was ‘mate’ or something dumb and bogan like ‘sheila.’ Not that it affected his pull rate, the doctor looked like she was a touch on the arm away from orgasm. She seemed to realize this herself, clearing her throat and turning to address Autie. “Are you Australian, too?”
“Yeah.”
“And is this your boyfriend?”
“Yep,” Ian said, before she could respond. “Autie’s my soulmate.”
The doctor’s eyes became cartoon hearts. “Oh how lovely. And her name is Ortie? Is that German?”
Ian laughed like a merry psychopath. “No, it’s short for Autumn. You know, like fall?”
“Oh Aaaaautie,” the doctor said, clapping her hands. “That’s so adorable. You’re both adorable.”
Autumn gave her a big, orange-juice commercial grin. “Thanks, doc. Hey, if you get a moment, have Captain Edge over there tell you how many times he cheated on me before I dumped him. Warning; it’s somewhere between thirty and a hundred times.”
The doctor looked like someone had just clubbed a baby seal. “I…um…”
Ian immediately donned his victim cloak.
“Doc,” he said, his tone dripping with salty male misery. “I made a mistake, but I promise I’m making up for it. I’m not going to give up until Autie sees I’m truly sorr—”
“Yeah, cool story, bro,” Autumn interrupted. “Here’s the thing, it’s not even the cheating that makes you the shittest person on earth. There are worse things you can do to someone you love than rub your genitals on a teenager and lie about it.”
Both Ian and the doc looked genuinely surprised.
“Like what?” he asked.
Autie tapped her chin in mock thoughtfulness. “Um, try ignoring me, never encouraging me to pursue my dreams, dragging me to New York and leaving me at home every night unless I wanted to come to a club and watch you do dumb shit for no money—”
“Autie’s obsessed with money,” Ian said in a loud, conspiratorial whisper.
Autumn stood up, pushing back the arm chair. “Fuck off! I’m not obsessed with money, I just know that it matters, unlike some entitled assholes who’ve never worked more than a five-hour bar shift in their lives.”
“I’ve worked longer hours than that!”
“In plays. About pubescent choirboys cutting their own dicks off.”
“You never understood that was a metaphor!”
“I understood that it was fucking weird!”
Autumn could see the doctor’s eyes going from her to Ian as though watching a ping-pong match. She knew she was embarrassing herself, but she was too angry to care. Blake was gone, her whole life was a smoldering garbage fire and it was all Ian’s fault. He’d brought her to New York, the land of anti-dreams. If she’d just stayed at home and been exactly who everyone wanted her to be, this never would have happened. “You know what, Ian? You’re a trashbag.”
“Very mature.” Ian turned to the doctor. “She’s fucking our landlord. He’s the one who decked me in the face.”
The doctor gasped.
“You-you f-fucking asked for it,” Autumn said, literally spluttering with rage. “And he’s not your landlord, anymore, because you don’t live with me.”
“You’re right, I live in an artist’s residence where I belong.”
“Yeah, you definitely belong in someone’s asbestos lined basement.”
“Okay, that’s enough, you two!”
Both she and Ian fell silent. The doctor put aside her bloodied swabs. “Ian, we’re going to need to do a CAT scan of your face to make sure there’s no loose bone fragments. There shouldn’t be any problems, though, it was only a minor fracture.”
“Cool,” Ian said.
“So I can go?” Autie asked.
The doctor walked over to the small sink and pumped hand sanitizer into her palm. “You can, but first I’m going to give you guys a moment to talk. You seem like you need it.”
“We don’t,” she and Ian said at once.
The doctor smiled. “Whatever happened between you two, it’s clear you guys have a lot of history and as my mom used to say, ‘never leave angry.’ I’ll just be five minutes and then you can go, Autie.”
She swept out of the room, smiling to herself. It was pretty awkward without her there. Ian wouldn’t look at her and she had no idea what to say. He felt like a stranger to her, like they hadn’t spent years living in each other’s pockets. So strange how life could flow that way, turn someone you once loved into your nemesis. Autumn could only remember affectionate facts about him, not feelings. She couldn’t recall what it was like to look at this man with his handsome face and his evil smile and not want to leave the room. Especially not now that she’d met Blake and learned what it was to be cherished. Ian had never cherished her, but maybe that wasn’t his fault. He wasn’t the kind of guy who knew how to cherish, just like he’d probably never be able to make a monogamous commitment. Things had ended badly, but maybe she should be glad. At least it had happened before they had kids, or did something equally impossible to take back.
“So…” she said. “Good thing your face isn’t all messed up? Acting-wise.”
“Yeah.”
There was a short pause.
“We’re never getting back together, are we?” Ian said.
Autumn dropped her ass back into the guest chair. “No, Taylor Swift, we’re not, and if you’d paid any attention to me when I was turfing your ass out, you’d know that. But you chose to not take me seriously and think you could come running back whenever you wanted.”
Ian ran a hand through his carefully cropped hair. “That’s fair, I guess. I just…I miss you.”
Autumn was very proud of herself for not saying ‘tough titties.’ “You don’t get to miss me after what you did. Or I guess you do, but I am under no obligation to give a shit.”
Ian rolled his eyes. “I know.”
“Do you? Because you shouldn’t have sent me that dick pic and you definitely shouldn’t have showed up at Essence. How did you even know I was there?”
“That gay dude tagged you in the photo. When I saw you
were with your landlord I just kind of…lost it.” He looked up at her, his blue eyes made even bluer by the redness of his nose. “So many people texted me after that stupid picture of you two hugging made the rounds. Everyone thought you were cheating on me. Do you know how humiliating that was?”
Autumn took a deep breath, willing her good temper to hold. “I don’t want to lose my shit at you again, but seriously, use your head. How do you think I felt when I found out you were actually cheating on me while we were still fucking living together?”
“That was different!” Ian said, with predictable hypocrisy. “None of those girls meant anything. This, you and our fuckin’ landlord, it means something, I can tell.”
His words thumped down on a space inside her that was already aching.
“It’s complicated,” she said, because that was what she’d been saying from the start. “You wouldn’t understand.”
Ian snorted. “Yeah okay, only I’ve never seen you look at anyone the way you looked at him, but sure.”
Autie didn’t reply, couldn’t reply. It was too big, too much to process on a night when so many things had happened. All she’d wanted to do was be with Blake in his bed again, delay the reality of her future for at least a few more hours. How had she wound up here, rehashing her life with her ex?
Ian drummed his fingers on his thigh. “Since we’ve got at least four more minutes and I’m bored, I’m gonna ask—what’s the deal with you and The Landlord? You guys a couple now?”
She looked up at him. “Are you for real?”
He gave her the cocky shrug that once set her heart a-flutter. “Why not? There’s nothing else to talk about.”
Autumn shook her head. “You’re a knob, but we’re not a couple, we’ve just been dating.”
“Seriously dating?”
Autumn thought back to all she and Blake had done together, the experiences they’d shared, how she’d peeled back his layers, found he was so different from anyone she’d ever known before. It was all so, so complicated. “I don’t know. It’s been weird. Good and new and scary and…weird.”
“Jesus, you like him. You really fucking like him.” He grinned at her. “Shame he signed you up for that show. That was dumb.”
Autumn rubbed a hand over her forehead. “Yeah, it was.”
“Not very tactful. Disrespectful to your feelings, even.”
“Yeah, you can shut up now.”
Ian did so, though he started whistling ‘Everybody Hurts’ by REM. Autumn ignored him. The doc would be back soon and then she could leave, head back to her stupid apartment and take a shower. Maybe there was an injured pigeon she could pick up on the way home. Take care of it and make herself at least the smallest bit useful again. Or would Blake chuck her out for doing that, now they were through? Seemed likely. He would revert back to his old self, maybe become even grumpier. That was it, she would have to put in her notice at Happy Paws and go back to Melbourne with her tail between her legs. A perfectly tragic fairytale. Like if Belle stayed in her hometown and read the same nine books and took care of her nutbag dad forever.
“I knew you wanted to do comedy.”
Ian’s voice came in loud and clear, but Autumn still couldn’t believe she’d heard him right. “Huh?”
He scratched the side of his neck. “I, uh, knew you wanted to be a comedian.”
“No you didn’t.”
“I did. I read your notebook, you know, the one with the stars on the cover.”
Autumn’s belly clenched. God, just when you thought you had truly suffered enough, life hit you in the head again. “You fucking suck, Ian!”
He shrugged. “Sorry. I just wanted to know what you were always working on. I knew it wasn’t a beat poem.”
Autumn shook her head. “Fucking unbelievable. Why didn’t you say anything?”
Her ex looked out of the darkened window, still scratching his neck. “I don’t know.”
“Oh, sick. Wonderful. Glad you brought it up then.”
“I was jealous or something,” he burst out. “It was good, what you’d done. Not great, but good.”
Her mouth fell open. “You’re serious?”
Ian looked more uncomfortable than she’d ever seen him, his shoulders hunched and his mouth turned down. “Kind of. You know I find it hard to write my own stuff. I take workshops, I spend hours going over the same jokes and then I open up my girlfriend’s notebook and she’s better at it than I am.”
Autumn could barely process what she was hearing. It had been insult enough that another guy she’d fucked had taken liberties with her private comedy work, let alone that both of them thought it was good. She’d appreciated Blake’s enthusiasm and believed him when he said it. Ian, her ex-boyfriend that she’d just permanently rejected, was under no obligations to tell her that her jokes were good. In fact, he looked bitter as lemons about it. “Are you taking the piss?”
Ian screwed up his eyebrows, turning his lips down at the corners. He was good at that. He could tell entire sonnets with his rubbery face. The crux of this one was ‘fuck you, yes I mean it. You’re funny.’
“Okay, so, you think I’m good.” Autumn grinned. “You think I’m good at comedy.”
“Don’t get smug.”
“Why, because it’ll distract from you?”
He smiled and just like that, they were caught in a very bittersweet moment. In her ex’s smile, Autumn could see both the man she once loved and the man she didn’t know at all, but that didn’t matter. They were all just…Ian. Scheming, clever, handsome asshole Ian. She’d already known they were over, but in that instant, it became canon.
“You don’t have to worry about writing your own stuff,” she said. “You’re an actor, you’ve got great timing. Other people’ll write the lines.”
“That’s not the same. I want to be the creative genius. It’s unfair you get to have that, too. You’re already a vet…” Ian made a face. “Anyway, forget all that shit. I just wanted to say The Landlord was definitely a cock to sign you up for a fucking live show, but maybe he was just…you know…maybe he had your best interests…” Ian began to cough violently, blood spraying from his ruptured nose.
“Jesus, is being nice actually killing you?” Autumn got up and filled a paper cup with sink water. “Here.”
Ian accepted the cup, downing the entire thing. “Thanks.”
“No problem,” Autumn said, and meant it.
He thinks I’m good at comedy, too.
The thought was a hot glow in her chest, a glow that faded when she remembered that Blake was gone and her future in America was over. A moment of pleasure to give the stupid darkness more depth.
The doctor came back into the room and beamed at them, clearly happy they were standing so close together. “Worked things out, I see?”
Autumn looked at her ex. “Yeah…I guess.”
“As much as we could,” Ian agreed. “But you’ve gotta go, right, Autie?”
“I do,” she said gratefully. “So, uh, good luck? With your nose? And your life?”
“Thanks.” Ian contorted his rubber face into a hammy glare. “Here’s looking at you, kid.”
Autumn smiled. “I told you, you’d be great at other people’s lines. See you later.”
She walked out of the emergency room feeling far less shitty than when she’d walked in, which was saying something. She paid for Ian’s visit at the front counter. It was only a couple hundred bucks and it felt like a parting gift to the man who used to mean so much to her. Plus, she was still pretty happy Blake had broken his face, which made her feel guilty.
She returned to her building in a daze and walked past Blake’s door. She couldn’t bring herself to knock but she did press and ear to the wood and listen for signs of life. There was nothing, and though she couldn’t prove it, she’d have bet money he wasn’t in. Feeling decidedly empty, she continued to the elevator and went up to her floor.
Her apartment was exactly the way she’d left it, everythi
ng poised in their neat and orderly positions, as though everything was normal. That would have to change. Autumn kicked off her shoes, knowing she should go to bed and knowing it wasn’t going to happen. She cracked open a can of off-brand energy drink and was contemplating what things to toss around the room when there was a knock at her front door. Her heart stopped. Surely it wasn’t…could it be?
She ran a hand through her unwieldly hair and wet her lips before racing to the door and yanking it open to find…various people from her building. “Uh, hey…dudes…?”
“Hey, Autumn,” said Ross, the perpetually stoned guy from downstairs. “What’s going on?”
“Uh, nothing, though that might be because it’s one in the morning.” She took in the rest of the group who were all staring at her in a very horror-movie fashion. “If you guys are forming a committee or something I’d be happy to hear about it, but, like, in the morning or maybe via email?”
“It’s not about our committee, though I will be filling you in on our petition to have Mr. Munroe provide us with a new hot water system,” said a sharp blonde woman Autie thought might have been called Mrs. Fuller. “Right now we’re all here to talk to you about Mr. Munroe, himself.”
There was a general jostling of agreement.
Oh fucking hell. In spite of the fact that she’d just drunk half a can of guarana flavoured crack, Autumn was suddenly so, so tired. They knew about her and Blake and were probably here to complain about their inappropriate building relationship and demand to see the receipts from her rent payments to make sure she wasn’t getting a better deal in exchange for her pussy. “Guys, I really don’t want to talk about—”
“You need to stay with him,” Mrs. Fuller said. “You’re not allowed to break up.”
Vigorous nods from all of the nine or so residents outside her door.
Autumn gripped the sides of her head. “What the fuck is happening? Am I dreaming?”
“No,” said Mrs. Zhu. “You and Blake should be together because—”
“What she’s trying to say,” interrupted Mrs. Fuller. “Is that we’ve noticed ever since you and Blake started…dating, he’s a whole new man. He’s agreeable, he’s friendly, well friendlier. He even smiled at one of my boys. Andrew’s been terrified of him since he was a baby and I can’t tell you how good it’s been for his self-esteem to know—”
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