by Claire Adams
I wanted to feel it all again, damn it. I wanted to feel her. But it was purely a physical attraction. Any sane man would be crazy not to be attracted to her.
I got dressed while waiting for my erection to go down. I’d have to take care of it later, most likely.
After a moment, I walked downstairs to find Maddie sleeping on the couch. I remembered not letting her up the stairs, and instead forced her to sleep on one of the smallest couches in the house. She agreed, and I was slightly surprised that she hadn’t snuck toward one of the bedrooms upstairs.
I realized the binder full of my stories had been left on the floor near the entrance. I picked it up and flipped through the first few pages. The first two were stories that I had written when I was 10, about a boy trying to find his lost dog. The next one was a 50-page story about a man who had gotten lost in a mall, and the several few following it were all about lost people. I hadn’t realized that I only wrote about losing things.
I found the story Maddie had mentioned at our first dinner together, about the child lost in the hospital. It was my first attempt at horror, and I remembered giving it to Ron to critique. He avoided reading it and asked to take it home over a spring break to look at it. I realized that must have been when he showed it to Maddie. As I thought back to it, Ron hadn’t ever spoken about it again. Mom had been given the story shortly afterward, and I had forgotten all about it.
Something convinced me to take that story out, fold it, and slip it into Maddie’s purse. She may have been a gold-digging whore, but at least she appreciated my writing when no one else bothered to read it. She mentioned that I was her biggest supporter; I would never have thought she had been one of mine.
I shoved the binder into my closet. I hadn’t had the passion to write for a long while, especially after my father passed. Mom begged me to write her a book every now and then, and I realized I always told her that I would write it one day. I never thought that one day would have actually arrived.
I stood over Maddie’s sleeping form. Her hair was tangled and a mess around her face, and the blanket barely covered her naked body. Makeup was smeared across her face, but it was somehow attractive. God, she was beautiful. Better looking than the models I’ve seen in magazines or the internet, and somehow, she was smart and passionate about her dreams at the same time. Maybe a little too passionate. I shook my head. Why was I praising the woman who used my dying mother to her advantage?
“Hey,” I said loudly. “Get up.”
She barely stirred. Instead, she nestled further into the couch on her side. The blanket was cramped toward her front, leaving me with a view of her slender back and the top of her ass. It had a bright red mark on it that would surely turn into a bruise.
“Damn it, woman, get the hell up,” I said again and shook her shoulder. Her eyes peeked open and closed when she noticed me.
“What time is it?” she asked with a sore voice. Her hips wiggled as she woke up, and I wondered if she was doing it on purpose.
“Doesn’t matter. Get out of my house,” I said.
She sighed and leaned on her elbow. The blanket fell toward her lower back, giving me a new view of her breasts.
I turned away and crossed my arms.
“I’ll call you when I need you to come back,” I said. “Probably next week for dinner.”
“I’m just supposed to wait around for your call?” she asked and stood. My eyes gravitated toward her body.
“Get dressed,” I said. She found her dress on the floor near the door of the bathroom and slipped it on. I noticed she didn’t bother looking for her panties or bra. It wasn’t until then that I realized the bar must have been a disaster. “And yes, that’s how this agreement works.”
“Fine,” she said and readied her stuff. She pulled out her phone and snapped a quick picture of me.
“What the hell was that?” I asked and tried reaching for the phone.
“We didn’t get any pictures last night,” she explained. “This one is so your mom knows you’re getting laid.”
“That’s gross,” I said.
“I’m just going what you said. This is going on my profile with a short description of how lovely last night was,” she said and put her shoes on. I raised my eyebrows. “The dinner, you asshole. How lovely the dinner was.”
“Whatever, just make sure to post it before tonight. It’ll make her happy,” I said. Maddie said goodbye as she walked out the door, and I shut it behind her without a word. I walked behind the bar to find three bottles smashed and a pair of panties and a bra soaked in alcohol.
The woman was going to drive me crazy.
Mom was standing over the sink when I arrived at her house. She wiped her mouth, and I knew instantly that she hadn’t been able to keep her breakfast down.
“Do you want a new protein shake?” I asked as I finished the last of my shake. “The banana cream isn’t so bad.”
“I don’t mind the strawberry one,” she said. “I think I have enough for a few more meals.”
“I’ll restock you,” I said and helped her to the couch. “How are you feeling?”
“Tired,” she said and leaned against the back. “Karen let me sleep in too long, and you know how I’m always more tired with the more sleep I get.”
“I’ll talk to Karen about that,” I said. I wasn’t actually going to yell at Karen for letting mom sleep in, but it seemed as if Karen was just an easy target for mom’s frustration. “Do you have any plans today?”
“Really?” Mom looked at me with a raised eyebrow. “Other than just sitting here and watching the rest of that comic book show, I think I’m free.”
“How about a trip to a museum then? That aviation one that you used to take me all the time?” I offered. Dad used to take the both of us to museums once a week growing up until he grew too busy with work. Mom took it up afterward.
“I think I’d like that,” she said. “Let me just get dressed and then we can leave.”
I waited in the living room for the better part of an hour until she was ready. I wasn’t upset; it was just a reminder of how much energy she had left in her body.
“No more than three hours,” Karen said before we left. “She needs to take her medicine and rest in three hours.”
“I think my son can take care of us,” she said.
“Thanks, Karen. I’ll have her back in time,” I said as mom followed me to my car. She walked with a slight limp and hump in her back, and it was a struggle getting her in the car without her falling over.
“I don’t remember it being this hard,” she said.
“What being hard?” I asked.
“Everything,” she said. “Just, everything.”
I frowned and started the ignition. “Just tell me if it’s too much, okay?” I asked.
“I will. I’m just so happy to be out in the cold air.” She rolled her window down and put her elbow out. It was barely 50 degrees outside, and I made sure she was wearing three coats and a thick pair of pants before leaving the house. I had a sweater beneath my faux leather coat with jeans.
“Maddie is such a darling,” she said. My fists clenched on the steering wheel. I was surprised that we had gotten this far before she mentioned her, but there was still hope in me that this outing could have remained Maddie-free.
“Yeah,” I said and turned onto the highway. The aviation museum wasn’t far, maybe a 20-minute drive, and I hoped she wouldn’t talk about Maddie the entire drive.
“She knows how to put you in your place.” Mom laughed. “That’s the type of woman you’d need. Your dad would have loved her. I think he did, actually. I remember she baked him a birthday cake one year, a little ugly yellow cake with weird blue frosting. She must have been only six or seven, but Charles loved it.”
“I remember that,” I said with a faint smile. “It was supposed to be lemon flavored, but it ended up tasting like sour heads. I didn’t even know that was a possible flavor for cakes.”
“We all had
a good laugh,” mom said. “But I knew she was special. Granted, I thought she was going to end up with a good-looking senator. She sure has the look of a senator's wife.”
An image of her bent over my bar popped up, and I forced it away.
“She does,” I agreed. “I’m glad you like her.”
I parked the car toward the front of the aviation museum.
“Like? Gavin, I love her. She has the perfect sense of humor, she’s beautiful, your children would be beautiful, and do you see the way she looks at you?” mom asked.
“The way she looks at me?” I frowned. “What do you mean?”
Mom shrugged. “She just looks at you with such devotion. Like she can’t even believe she’s with you. Poor girl has no idea you’re the lucky one.”
I tried recalling a look from Maddie, but I realized that I barely even paid any attention to her face the entire night. I only bothered with her words and her body.
“You sound like you’re the one who wants to marry her,” I said with a chuckle and helped her out of the car. She leaned against me as we entered the museum.
“I just really think she might be the one,” mom said. “The woman for you.”
She was smiling so much that it pained me to keep the truth from her. I wanted nothing more than to tell her that I wasn’t in love and that Maddie wasn’t the one. But I wanted to keep her happy.
“She really might be, mom,” I said.
“Oh, that’s wonderful,” she said. I purchased our entrance tickets at a booth in the middle of the giant museum. “Have you talked about children? Does she want any? Or maybe she wants one of each?”
I pocketed the tickets and helped her up an escalator. Posters of exhibits surrounded us as we went up a floor, and she picked a few that she wanted to look at. I knew it was impossible to see them all within three hours, so I had her pick a few particular ones.
“We haven’t even talked about marriage yet,” I answered her question from earlier when she reminded me of it. I realized my mistake and corrected it. “I mean, we’ve talked about it in the sense that we know we both want to get married. And soon. But I think the kid talk might come a little later.” I would never tell her I wasn’t interested in children at all, it would have crushed her.
“Well I can just imagine how beautiful my grandchildren would be,” she said. “Hopefully they’d take after her.”
I tuned out the rest of the conversation while still giving her the answers that she wanted. She truly believed Maddie was the one for me. I supposed she was an incredible actress after all.
Chapter Sixteen
Maddie
I couldn’t believe how quickly he had kicked me out of his house. He had the right, I supposed, to be so angry. But a part of me hoped our night together might have softened him up. The irony wasn’t entirely lost on me.
I stopped by a fast food restaurant on the way home and ate a quick, greasy breakfast. I hadn’t gone grocery shopping in almost a week, and with Nancie’s absence, it was hard to cook for myself. We had a good routine set up; she shopped for groceries, and I cooked the food. Now, without her, I had no idea what I was doing.
Gavin’s money had arrived in my account at the perfect time, at least. I had asked Ron to move into his house in case Nancie ended up moving; there was no way I would have been able to afford the rent on my own. But now I wouldn’t have to worry about a thing.
I still messaged Martin every now and then asking if he had any more photoshoots. The last one had been a quick shoot, with barely 50 pictures taken. The money wasn’t bad for the length and work involved, and I wouldn’t have minded more like that. I was even given 100 umbrellas afterward, and they all sat in my closet waiting to be gifted to friends and family for Christmas.
The fast food breakfast rumbled in my stomach as I arrived home. The apartment was empty now that Nancie was in California. I hadn’t realized just how little I owned.
She left the TV, thankfully, and the couch for me. I didn’t need a dining table, which made the kitchen look just a tiny bit bigger.
I sat on the couch in my empty apartment with a blank screen on the TV and the windows shut. It couldn’t have been past 11 in the morning, and yet my world was dark and sad. Nancie had been my only friend, I realized, and without her, I didn’t have anyone to talk to.
I rummaged through my purse to call Nancie and found a folded-up wad of paper at the bottom. I took it out and pressed it flat against the couch.
Gavin’s name was sprawled on the top with marker, and the rest was the typed-out story that had given me nightmares as a little girl. I smiled; had he left this?
I read a little of it.
It was perfect and sad all at the same time, and I wondered if his father had been sick when he wrote it. A little boy lost in a haunted hospital, looking in every room but finding only nightmares instead of hope. Gavin had always had a way with words, and they flowed easily to create the story in my head. I thought I remembered most of it, but I realized I had forgotten about the owl that tries to help the child but only dies in the end.
So maybe Gavin had also been a troubled teenager.
I read the story twice over before setting it down on the kitchen counter. I sent him a quick message to thank him, and didn’t expect a reply. Instead of waiting on, I dialed Nancie’s number and returned to the couch.
“Please don’t tell me you’re sitting by yourself in an empty apartment,” Nancie said.
I laughed and laid my head into the cushions of the couch.
“I won’t tell you that,” I said. “But then I can’t tell you anything else.”
“Ugh, Maddie, you need to fix yourself and get out there! Live a little, and do some promoting while you’re at it,” she urged.
“How many new followers have you had?” I asked and realized I hadn’t even checked on my accounts. I needed to post that picture.
“Literally 10,000 a day since I’ve arrived here,” she gushed. “It’s amazing, Mad. You need to come here. It’ll change your life, I promise.”
“I know it will,” I said. “It’s that great though?”
“Well, I used to come here all the time when we both were in high school, so it’s not that different for me,” she said. I remembered her stories of spending summers in beach houses, with Jacuzzis full of other hot teenage boys and enough hormones to go around for all. “But it’s always hot. And I mean always hot. You could walk outside at nine in the morning in shorts and a tank top. And the beach is almost never more than 30 minutes away. Well, 45 with traffic. An hour with really bad traffic and the public transportation is pretty bad, to be honest. I’m going to have to buy a car soon. But the food! Maddie, the food is amazing. Everyone here cares about their health, and everything is fresh and delicious. You would love it.”
“I already do love it,” I said. “How’s your apartment?”
“Smaller than ours, if you can believe it,” she said. “And double the rent. Which means when you get out here, we’ll have to split the cost of a studio or a tiny one bedroom. Which I don’t mind; there’s always so much to do that you hardly spend any time inside anyways.”
A chorus of laughter and giggled erupted on the phone, and I realized that I could hear the cries of seagulls and the roar of the ocean in the background.
“You’re at the beach?” I whined. “I would do anything to be at the beach!”
“Then move!” she cried. “Come here. You belong here, I swear it.”
“I know I do,” I said. “It’s just not possible right now. Maybe in a few months, though.”
“A few months?” she asked. “Not a lot changes in a few months.” She had no idea how wrong she was, but I couldn’t tell her that.
“You’re right; I meant a few years. I’m going to start auditioning for more commercials, and I’ll make my way out there soon,” I said.
“Good luck,” she said. Someone called her name from afar. “I have to go, but I’ll call you when I get the chance, okay?
”
“Okay,” I said. We exchanged goodbyes, and I hung up. In six months, I could leave my lonely life here, and start a new one beneath the sunny skies of Hollywood. Until then, I would just have to pretend to love Gavin, fake marry him, and sit on my couch waiting for his phone call.
I knew I couldn’t just spend an entire Sunday sitting on my couch, especially when he wasn’t going to call me, so I texted my mom and asked if they had plans for dinner.
An hour later, I was on my way toward my parent's house.
My dad greeted me first with a giant lopsided grin.
“Someone’s excited,” I said and pulled away from our hug.
“Someone just got a brand spanking new television!” he said and gestured at a giant flat screen TV hooked on their wall. It was a huge improvement over their last TV, and as far as I could tell from the soap opera they had been watching, there weren’t any dead pixels.
“This looks expensive,” I said and greeted my mom. “Can you guys afford it?”
“My new credit card can,” Mom said. I groaned and asked how much credit she was approved for. “What does it matter?”
“Because it’s another credit card that I’ll most likely be paying off for you guys,” I said. Mom shrugged and walked away from me.
“It’s not eating away at our money,” she said. “And it makes your dad happy. When’s the last time you remember us buying anything new for the house?”
I glanced at the house. She had a point, I supposed. They almost always refused to spend more than required on anything, so it was nice to finally see them splurging a little on themselves. Kind of.