“What?” I said, “You told him to leave?”
“Yeah, I did,” Eric said, his eyes looking up at the top of my building again. “Because we’re going up there.” He pointed to the roof.
“Um… pretty sure that’s not allowed,” I said.
“Ask me if I care,” he responded with a smile.
“Oh God, you can’t be serious,” I said, but I couldn’t help a smile from appearing on my face as Eric rounded the building looking for somewhere that he could climb.
“I’m totally, one hundred percent serious. And I’m not that drunk anymore, so don’t worry. Here! There’s a ladder on the back side of the building, Dash.”
I knew it was a bad idea. Terrible, even, maybe. But for the first time in… maybe years, I felt alive, that night. I’d felt it while we were filming, and I felt it now, with Eric. I watched as he stepped up onto an unused brick planter on the side of the building, and reached up to the ladder. He started to climb, and after a few seconds I realized that there wasn’t much danger in what he was doing. He was sure-footed, and in less than 30 seconds, he’d climbed up to the top of the roof.
“Come on up,” he said, his voice low. “You’ve gotta see this.”
“No,” I called up, shaking my head at him above me. “No fuckin’ way.”
“Yes,” he said, “Come up. This is a totally flat roof. There’s no danger of slipping off. If I can do it, you can.”
I groaned, but followed to where he’d climbed up. I got onto the planter, then hoisted myself onto the ladder, using my strength to get my feet onto the bottom rung. And once I was on, it was no problem—I ascended the ladder easily, and then I was climbing onto the roof, and walking toward Eric.
“Looks like people already come up here, anyway,” he said, pointing to a couple lawn chairs people had stored at the other side of it, and an ashtray with used cigarette butts. “But come here,” he said.
He led me over to the furthest point of the roof, on the western side.
And the view was absolutely incredible.
The moon hung in the air, above the sea, and from the roof, you could completely see the ocean. It was framed with palm trees, all shades of gray in the moonlight, broken only by the occasional taillights of a car that drove past down below.
“Told you your place is cool,” Eric said, stepping to my side and looking out at the view. “Guess we both have ocean views.”
“You win,” I said, my voice low.
“Hey Dash,” Eric said, keeping quiet.
“…Yeah?”
“What do vegan zombies eat?”
I looked at him, confused, then smiled as I realized what he was doing. “What, Eric. What do they eat?”
“Graaaains.” His lips pressed together, holding back a smile, and I couldn’t help but laugh. It was so stupid, and adorable, and a reminder of how far we’d come since the first day we’d met. When he’d tried to make me comfortable by telling lame food jokes.
“Corny as ever, Eric.” I turned to look at him, and almost felt vertigo from how beautiful he looked in the cool light, standing and looking out at the ocean, the breeze just gently blowing through his hair. He was so close to me, and it would have been so easy to lean in, to kiss him, to sink into his arms.
But there was nobody else around. No pretense, no one to pretend for, no one to be fake for.
I thought of how he’d called me beautiful, just over a week ago, moments before I’d come with him inside me. What was more real: what we’d had then, or what we had now?
He turned away from the ocean, and looked to me, pausing for a moment. I swallowed hard. Was he going to kiss me? Could we really have that, here with no one watching?
He took a step closer to me, and put his hand on my arm, squeezing me lightly.
“Dash,” he said, his voice a whisper. “Do you want…”
Suddenly he was cut off by an incessant jingle. A ringtone. It took me a second to register that his phone was going off in his pocket, and he dropped his hand from my arm to reach for it. After looking at the caller ID, he looked back up at me.
“Fuck. I’m sorry,” he said, looking at me helplessly, “I have to.”
I nodded, taking a deep breath and realizing that I’d been shaking slightly. I was sure that he was going to pull me into a kiss.
I watched the ocean as he took the phone call.
“Adam,” he said, answering the phone. And a few second later: “Right now? Are you kidding?” He let out a big sigh. “No, no, it’s fine—just… you could have called sooner. No, I understand. I’ll be there.”
He hung up and then was at my side again.
“I’ve gotta go, Dash. I’m gonna run home. Adam is there now, apparently, and I had no idea he was even in town.”
“Seriously? Adam from 5*Star? Wow. That’s… short notice.”
“Yeah... Adam does that sometimes. It would be annoying if it were anyone else, but… it’s him. He’s just always been that way, even since back when we were in 5*Star. He’s an amazing person, though. Anyway—I’m sorry. I’ll see you soon, okay?”
He pulled me into his arms, a quick but tight hug, so good but so much less than I really wanted.
“Bye, Eric. And good luck.”
Eleven
Eric
“Adam,” I said, out of breath. I had run the whole way back to my own house, and it took me 15 or 20 minutes from Dash’s. Adam was leaning against his pickup truck by the curb of my house, dappled in the shadows of moonlight filtered through the trees.
“Eric,” he said, smiling and coming at me with open arms.
“You might not wanna—I’m really sweaty—” but his arms were already around me, gripping tight.
“I’ve missed you, Eric.” His voice had always been very deep, and there was something reassuring and comforting about it.
“I always miss you,” I said, letting go and looking at him again. He looked pretty much like he always looked—tall as hell, with dark hair that was always just a little too long, in a white t-shirt and black jacket like a veritable James Dean. It was just about the only thing about him that hadn’t changed, in all these years.
“Come on inside, and you can tell me why the hell you’re here,” I said with a smile.
I led him into the kitchen, quickly went and changed my clothes, then came back out. He’d gotten us both glasses of water.
“Thanks so much Adam,” I said, taking a seat at one of the breakfast bar stools next to him. “So tell me. What’s up?”
Adam had always shuffled from place to place, ever since 5*Star broke up. None of us knew where he was at any point in time—he’d just show up, like he had today, with tons of stories and new adventures. I grinned at him, waiting for him to speak.
“I was in Arizona,” he said, hunching over his water glass. His body was so large—he was 6’4”—so it almost looked comical, seeing him at my tiny breakfast bar. “In Yuma, Arizona. I took a job at the front desk of a little hotel and, well, after a couple months it didn’t work out.”
“Let me guess,” I said, smiling, “You forgot to show up to work half the time?”
“No,” he said, his mouth ticking into a smile at the corner. “I’m better at that than I used to be. But the main problem at the hotel desk was that they hated that I played guitar behind the desk, and hated when my friends would come talk to me.”
“Wait a minute,” I said, holding back a laugh. “You would bring your guitar behind the desk with you?”
“I worked the night shift,” Adam said, his deep, brown eyes fixated on the water glass in front of him, “And at a tiny hotel in Yuma, do you know how often people would come in at 2 am looking for a room? Not often. So what am I supposed to do for 8 hours on the graveyard shift?”
I shrugged.
“Exactly. So I brought in my guitar and would play it quietly behind the desk.”
“Of course,” I said, as if that was something a normal person would do.
“An
d apparently they got more than one complaint from customers who said I was distracted on the job. But I wasn’t. I was fully attentive. Playing guitar centers me, and it was better than the elevator music they liked to pump into that lobby, anyway.” Adam normally didn’t talk much, but when he told stories, he talked with his hands—gesturing to his heart when he said that playing guitar “centers him,” and waving his hand dismissively when he mentioned the usual lobby music.
“Okay. And your friends would come talk to you? While you were on the job?” He’d always had been the type to collect friends wherever he went—he’d been doing it so long that he now had friends across the globe. He wasn’t a partier, like me. Instead he just was open to talking to anyone. And despite his imposing height and strength, once people talked to him, they tended to like him.
“Yes,” he said, “my friends would come by to say hi. Usually around the beginning of my shift, before they headed home to go to sleep. They’d bring me food sometimes, or bring bongos to play alongside my guitar. The hotel didn’t like it.”
This time I couldn’t help but laugh.
“Why’s that funny?” he asked, a little smile on his face.
“It’s just… nobody would do that but you, Adam. I appreciate it, but I have to admit, if I was trying to run a hotel and had a ragtag group of bongo-playing people who brought food to the front desk, I might ask you to leave, too. I say that with love.”
He nodded. “It was for the better. I was ready to move on, anyway. The job had run its course. So I packed everything into my truck and headed here.”
“How much is ‘everything?’” I asked.
“Not much. Couple suitcases, and my guitar. Traveling light. And I apologize for showing up so suddenly, Eric—I was going to stay with my friend Maurice, but his wife went into labor, so I figured I was better off leaving them alone for the night.”
I snorted. “Yeah, that’s a good call. And I don’t normally love unannounced visitors, but you are the one exception, Adam. You’re always welcome. Are you here for a few nights?”
He shook his head, meeting my eyes. “Nope. Just tonight. Tomorrow I’m off to San Francisco, then probably further up the coast. We’ll see where it takes me.”
I nodded. I expected that much from Adam.
“I’m glad you’re here. I’ve had kind of a wild… night. Or wild couple months, really.”
“Oh yeah?” he asked, leaning back. “What’s on your mind, Eric? I want to hear about you.”
I thought of the many ways I could approach answering his question. What’s on my mind? Oh, nothing—I just don’t know who I am anymore, because for the first time in my life I want more than just a hookup with someone. And, also, he just offered to be my fake boyfriend—because he thinks that’s all I want—and I said yes.
It was a little much to dump on him all at once. So I went for something more concise.
“Well, I started a new live TV show, and my co-host is… really interesting.”
“Wow,” Adam said, “What are they like?” It was small talk, essentially, but it never felt that way with Adam—his eyes fixed on mine, and it was clear that he really meant the things that he asked and said.
“He’s amazing,” I said, realizing too late that I sounded probably too enthusiastic. “His name is Dash. And at first he seemed… well… kind of a novice, and quiet and shy. But on camera he is dynamite, and… oh God, I can’t believe I’m about to say this, but, we slept together and I kind of have never felt that way in bed before.”
My face blushed hot immediately. I needed more water. I took another sip, the cold soothing as it slipped down my throat.
“You really seem affected by him,” Adam said, his eyes kind, and too knowing.
“Ain’t that the truth,” I replied, with a slight sheepish grin. I traced my finger through the puddle of water the condensation had left on my counter. “And… the strangest thing is that I agreed to be his fake boyfriend so that we can get good publicity for the show.”
“Eric… really?”
“I know,” I said, wincing, “I know. I knew you weren’t gonna like that. It’s stupid of me. And you can’t tell anyone.”
“You know I won’t tell your personal information to anyone. But Eric, I just… there’s no point being anything other than genuine.”
I nodded, still not really meeting his gaze. “I know.”
“So why?” Adam asked, his voice like a warm blanket being thrown over me. “Why do something fake? You’ve told me so little about him, and yet it’s easy to see how much he means to you. So be real.”
I sighed heavily, like a teenager being told something he knows is true by his parents. “It’s easy for you to say, Adam. You’re not… caught up in shit like this, like I am. The media doesn’t hound you anymore. You don’t have my stupid reputation.”
“Yes, but why not try being his real boyfriend, Eric?”
I paused, finally looking at him. “Honestly? Because he’s too good for me. He just got out of a ten-year relationship. The longest one I’ve had was maybe a year, but even that was a joke, really. I don’t know how to… do that. To be a good boyfriend. To make it so people don’t just hate me and see me as a partier, a player, as someone to avoid. Because I probably am someone to avoid.”
“You can live whatever life you want,” Adam said, wise as ever. “It doesn’t matter how other people see you, but it does matter how you see yourself. If you can learn to trust yourself, I think you could be an incredible partner to someone.”
His encouragement made me uncomfortable. It was another thing to live up to. I knew that if I tried things, for real, with Dash, I would only end up hurting him.
Because it was inevitable. Because it was what I always did.
I took a deep breath, standing up and putting my water glass into the sink. “I can’t believe I’m such a cliché. Commitment-phobic guy in his mid-thirties. I wish I could just… let go.”
“You can, Eric,” Adam said, “You just need to embrace the change.”
Adam’s advice took up space in my brain, and silently nagged at me every day, but it didn’t really work on me. Because I wouldn’t let it.
For the next few weeks, everything went as planned. We filmed more shows, and they went fantastically well. Eric & Dash started to collect some praise and great reviews, and more and more people started to tune in with each show. There were a few slight hiccups along the way—once, I burned a frittata, and another time, we entirely forgot to put tomato sauce on a pizza—but we laughed the mistakes off, and overall, it just made for better TV. People liked to see the flaws, and it made us seem more human.
And Dash and I continued to be fake boyfriends, just as planned.
I took him out to a few fancy restaurants, ones where I knew we’d probably be spotted together, instead of my favorite casual spots like Fries. We had an Eat Network event, some thing where we went to schmooze with brands and other pseudo-celebrities, and we went hand in hand, and took photos together with our arms around each other. Sometimes we would peck on the cheek. Sometimes we’d even kiss on the lips.
At first it had been sexy, but now it was just… routine. Like a job.
And I couldn’t help but want so much more.
I was spending so much time with Dash, but really, each day I felt further and further away from him. It had started to seem like he was just extending his friendly, bubbly TV persona into real life, and anytime we were in front of other people, that’s the version of Dash he would be. Nothing like the vulnerable, snarky person he’d been before the show started.
I almost felt like I missed him, even though he was right there beside me. I missed the other side of him, the real him, the Dash who tackled me to the ground because he couldn’t play video games right.
And as I stood one night, looking at myself in the mirror after getting ready to go to a beach party with Dash, I couldn’t take it anymore.
So I resolved to do better. Tonight, I was going to pul
l him aside, and talk to him. Really talk to him. Not as the characters of Eric & Dash, but as ourselves.
The party was actually just a small one I was throwing myself, an informal gathering down on the beach right below the hill of my street. It was a public area, so anyone could come by, but usually there weren’t too many people there. I’d recruited friends to help me bring down lanterns, big picnic blankets, and tons of food for an evening picnic.
People started arriving when the sun hung low in the sky, casting a glow over the beach. Dash approached from the direction of his house, skin golden in the sunlight, and I caught myself staring. He was so beautiful, and I couldn’t remember if I’d always thought so, or if getting to know him had made him even more irresistible to me. I can’t believe I’m with him, I thought, before my brain caught up and realized that in reality, I wasn’t with him.
But no one knew that but us. So he walked over, wrapped an arm around me and kissed me, the usual quick peck that we’d been using over the past weeks.
“Glad you made it,” I said, and as he backed away I pulled him in close again, keeping my hands at his sides and squeezing him. I dipped to his face again, taking a moment to look at his eyes before pressing a slower kiss to his lips. I was a little surprised that he kissed me back, not hesitating, even wrapping his hands around my neck for a moment.
“I missed you,” I said as I pulled away. No one was in earshot, but I’d genuinely meant it, and I watched as his eyes widened and he smiled a little.
“You don’t have to say that,” he said, dismissing me.
I shrugged, finally taking my hands off him. “I meant it, but okay.”
I didn’t meet his gaze again, instead going over to help some friends unload the food.
An hour later, all of us were gathered on the blankets as the sunset became deep pink. Dash sat next to me, and the rest of our particular blanket was mostly full of the various lovely misfits I’d met when I tried to open my restaurant a couple years back. My friend Cynthia was talking up a storm with Dash.
The Sweetest Star: Under the Stars Book 2 Page 12