The Girlfriend Stage

by Janci Patterson

I’m just scared, I tell myself, trying Josh’s labeling thing. It’s okay to be scared. I’ve gone through a lot this week, and the whole world has seen me naked and thinks I have a sex addiction and also that I cheated on Shane and damn, why did that song he wrote have to actually be good? But more importantly, I’m Josh’s girlfriend, and I love him.

  I love him, and he loves me, and it’s going to be okay.

  It’s going to be okay.

  By the time the coffee is brewing, I’m feeling more in control again. Calmer. I slowly breathe in the aroma, pretend I’m back at Josh’s place. Pretend, maybe, that it’s our place, and I’m about to crawl back into bed with him and—

  “No! I don’t want to go!” Ginnie shrieks from upstairs, sobbing, and I nearly spill the coffee I’m pouring as I jump. Her feet pound down the stairs.

  “We are going now, whether you like it or—dammit!” This sounds like Tanya, and it sounds like she’s in tears. I set down the coffee pot, just as Ginnie dashes by the kitchen and out the front door.

  “Tanya,” I hear my dad say, though it’s far softer than the rest. “Don’t go, just listen to—”

  “No,” she says, and I can hear the fury in that one syllable. “I don’t want your excuses, Bill. Save them for her. We’re going.”

  I grip the edge of the counter, because I feel like I’ve been punched in the stomach. I’m dizzy from the déjà vu of hearing variations on this over the years.

  Shit. Shit, Dad, why?

  My dad doesn’t beg or argue—I’ve never actually heard him do so when his wives or girlfriends leave him for his cheating. And so the only sound for a few moments is the thump of the suitcase Tanya is pulling down the stairs. She turns back only to say “Byron, get Ginnie’s suitcase too, please.”

  “Mom, why can’t we just—” Byron starts, his voice filtering down from the hallway upstairs, but Tanya cuts him off.

  “We are leaving now, and we will talk about it on the road.”

  I can’t see her face as she passes by the kitchen, her bobbed hair hanging over it, and she’s rolling her suitcase, which isn’t completely zipped up and has clothing sticking out from the sides where it was hastily crammed.

  She yanks the suitcase hard when it catches on the weather­stripping at the front door, and a simple blue cotton bra and long feather earring that is hooked to it fall to the ground. She either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care, and the suitcase thumps down the wooden porch steps.

  Numbly, I walk to the stairs and pick up the bra and the earring. I can barely bring myself to look upstairs, but when I do, my dad isn’t even there anymore. He’s gone back into his bedroom, and closed the door on this relationship like so many others. All I see is Byron bent over an open little-girl’s suitcase decorated in bright butterflies, stuffing in clothes and sparkly shoes, looking like he wants to punch something.

  I don’t blame him.

  From the door down to the basement, Cherstie is peering out, as is Aunt Patrice behind her, both woken up from the commotion. They meet eyes with me, clearly questioning, but it’s like I can barely see them, let alone answer them.

  I swallow, my throat so tight it feels all but closed up. My eyes are stinging, my fingers gripping the bra until my knuckles are white. I walk out onto the porch. Tanya has thrown her suitcase in the bed of one of the pickup trucks—I didn’t realize one of those was hers, though it makes sense—and has wrangled Ginnie into the car, though my heart still cracks open from the girl’s sobbing. Tanya slams the car door, and I flinch.

  How many times have I heard car doors slam like that, cutting off the sound of crying or shouted expletives?

  Tanya leans against the truck door, her head down and her eyes closed, arms folded across her chest, and it looks like the truck is the only thing keeping her from collapsing. I make my way down the steps toward her and she looks up at hearing the crunch of my sandals on the gravel.

  Her face is blotchy, shiny from streaks of tears, her eyes puffy and red. She looks younger than ever. She swipes at the tears angrily as I approach.

  “I—I . . .” I have no idea what to say, and I can’t even form words. All I can do is hold out the bra and the earring, which she takes from me, her lips pressed tightly together.

  She shakes her head. “You were right. God, I should have—I should have done lots of things. I should have not been an idiot who thought this would be different, and—” Her voice breaks, and she looks up at the sky, tears leaking from the corners of her eyes.

  It’s like I can still hear the echo of her voice from the other day: He’s a good man, and I love him. And I think that’s worth the risk, don’t you?

  “I’m sorry,” I manage. “I’m so sorry.” My voice sounds like a little girl’s, just this squeak, and I feel my face burning from shame, though I’m not even sure why.

  Because it was my dad that broke her heart?

  Because I didn’t somehow stop it?

  Because I get to stay my dad’s “favorite girl,” even as he goes through woman after woman and leaves them all devastated in his wake?

  The crunch of gravel sounds behind me, and it’s Byron hoisting a faded backpack and Ginnie’s suitcase. He glares at the ground, and climbs into the truck without saying anything or even looking at me. The door slams shut again.

  Tanya’s face crumples, as if she was only barely holding total grief at bay until both her kids were safely in the car. She takes a long shuddering breath, and I want to put my arms around her. But my arms feel like they’re weighted with lead, and if I move they might shatter both of us.

  “Me too,” she says, with a nod. “I’m sorry, too. Take care, Anna-Marie. I wish . . .”

  But she doesn’t finish that, and she doesn’t need to.

  It doesn’t matter what she wished, or what I wished, or what her kids wished. Because my dad did what he always does, and now she is joining the long list of women betrayed and gone.

  Then she turns and walks to the driver side of the car, her spine unnaturally straight, her hands clenched into fists. She climbs up into the truck and it rumbles to life, and then they are gone, my almost stepmother and stepsiblings, and I hate myself that I didn’t really say goodbye to any of them.

  “Anna-Marie?” a worried voice calls, and it takes me a numb second to realize it’s Josh.

  I turn to see him standing on the driveway; he must have heard Ginnie’s crying and the slammed doors and come around the side of the house. He walks toward me, his gaze never leaving my face. “Did Tanya leave?”

  He must have seen Tanya leave, so it’s clear what he’s really asking.

  “My dad cheated on her.” I find myself hugging my arms to my chest, in the same position Tanya was, only without a massive truck to lean on. “She took the kids and left. He didn’t even—he didn’t even try. It’s like he never cares.” My own voice sounds distant, removed from me.

  Josh’s brows draw together. “God, Anna-Marie, I’m so sorry. I’m so—come here.” He reaches for me, ready to bring me into his arms. Ready to hold me and comfort me and tell me he loves me.

  But I take a step back.

  Because my ears are still ringing from the slam of Tanya’s truck doors as she left. I feel the pain on my scalp from when my mom would brush my hair as a child, after one of her fights with my dad, brushing too fast and too hard, tugging through the snarls like maybe this was one battle she could win. My eyes sting from the tears of every time I’d find Shane with whatever girl he broke up with me for, tears I’d never in a million years let him see. My face burns with the shame of opening Reid’s wallet to slip a sexy note inside and seeing the picture of a pretty blond woman I would soon discover was his wife.

  “I can’t do this,” I say, and the tears spill over onto my cheeks.

  Josh freezes, his arm still reaching for me. “What?”

  “This. Us. I can’t�
�I can’t do this.” My voice is cold, a perfect match for the ice flooding my veins, pooling in my stomach.

  And it’s Josh there in front of me, Josh who swore he’d never cheat on me, that he’d never hurt me. Josh who I fell in love with, who I pictured a future with. He looks like he’s going to be sick, and he’s shaking his head and saying, “No, Anna-Marie, let’s talk about this, okay? Let’s—is this about last night? Because I know that wasn’t real, okay? We never have to talk about it again.”

  But it doesn’t matter if we don’t talk about it, because now all I can see of that future is me yelling and crying and gathering up our dark-haired children into the car and trying with everything in me not to completely break apart where they can see.

  “We knew perfectly well it would have consequences.” I squeeze my eyes shut, to try to stop the tears and to keep from seeing his pain, because I can’t handle that and protect myself the way I need to, the way I should have all along.

  “Anna-Marie,” he says again, and his fingers touch my elbow, just barely. “Please, let’s just talk, let’s just—”

  “No!” I yell, jerking away from his touch. From him. Because I know what will happen if we talk. He’ll make me believe again in things I never should have believed in the first place.

  When I open my eyes, I see that his are red-rimmed, and my heart cracks.

  “Why are you doing this?” he asks, his voice strained.

  “Because I have to!” The words burst out of me, a tidal wave that won’t stop until it’s swept both of us under. “Because you’re just like all the others! Because I’ll trust you and love you and give you everything, and one day you’ll find someone younger and prettier and you’ll just toss me aside like I’m nothing. And I won’t let that happen to me. I won’t.”

  Josh’s face pales, and then flushes. “How can you say that? After everything we’ve—how can you—?”

  He stares at me, like he’s waiting for me to tell him I don’t mean it. But I don’t—I can’t.

  His voice goes flat. “You really think that of me.” When I don’t deny it, he shakes his head and a dark look crosses his face. “Fine. Fine. If that’s what you really think I am, then maybe you’re right. Maybe you’re just like all the others. Maybe you are replaceable.”

  Everything goes still. Even my heart, like the pain is so great it can’t beat past it. “Leave. Now,” I growl.

  There’s a beat where I think maybe he won’t. Where I think maybe I’ll beg him not to.

  But I stay rooted where I am, silent, and he stalks off to his Porsche. Before I know it, he’s gone too, his car disappearing down the street.

  And I’m left standing alone in the yard, filled to bursting with so much pain and anger and regret, and yet somehow emptier than ever before.

  Twenty-four

  Josh

  As I drive away from Anna-Marie’s house, I know I should pull over and call Ben. I should do it now, and not drive first, because I’m not sure I can actually see straight, and I’ll probably hit one of those damn antelope and end up marooned at Bleeker’s Auto Shop while they order in parts for my Porsche.

  I should not drive a couple blocks over and park in front of Shane’s house. I should not slam the door of my Porsche and stalk down Shane’s stairs, past the foliage that won’t have my children named after it. I should not beat his damn balls against his door and wait, breathing heavy, fists clenched, for him to open the door.

  But that is exactly what I do.

  Shane opens the door and gives me one of his affable smiles. “Hey, man,” he says. “Look—” But I don’t give him another second to give me whatever excuse he’s concocted for why he had to call TMZ and then had to write the damn song and put it up on YouTube. I shove him hard by the shoulders, and he goes flying back into his apartment, tripping over an amp and landing on his ass. He stares up at me wide-eyed as I plant a foot on his chest.

  “You,” I say, “are an asshole.”

  Shane holds up his hands. “Hey, man, I don’t know what you’ve heard, but—”

  “It’s not about what I’ve heard. It’s about what I saw you do to my girlfriend.” Ex-girlfriend, technically, but I don’t think that will have quite the same effect. “She trusted you and you hurt her. And for what? Just to get your stupid music a little boost. God, you’ve known her forever and you just threw her under the bus like she was nothing. She used to be in love with you, you know?”

  Shane blinks at me. “Yeah, like five years ago.”

  I step harder on his chest, and he winces, but he’s wisely not trying to get up. “Here’s what’s going to happen,” I say. “I’m going back to LA, and I’m going to tell everyone I know what a worthless piece of shit you are. Forget about moving to LA. No one is going to let you play. I can’t stop you from profiting for being a total asshole to a girl who did quite literally nothing to you, but not in my town. Not ever.”

  I shove him again with my foot, and then spin around and stalk out the door, slamming it behind me. I have no power to do anything I just said, and even though I’ve lived there my entire life, I have never before referred to LA as “my town.”

  Still, that felt good. So good that I get all the way down the block before the weight crushes down on me again.

  You are replaceable. I would do anything to take those words back. To have the slightest hope that when we’re both back in LA I might be able to call her, and we could figure this out. But no, for one horrible second I wanted to hurt her the way she hurt me, and I can’t take it back.

  I’m never going to forgive myself for this.

  I manage to at least get out of the neighborhood—clutching the steering wheel all the way—before I pull over and call Ben.

  “Hey, man,” he says. “Nothing new, but the hits on the video just keep climbing, and a couple more outlets picked up the TMZ story. How are you guys holding up?”

  “We broke up.”

  Ben is silent for a moment. “You what?”

  “We broke up.” My voice sounds strained, and I know I need to explain, but there’s so much that goes into it I don’t know that I can. “She’s really afraid of commitment, right?”

  “Yeah, Gabby told me the issues run deep. She says she’s never even heard Anna-Marie consider commitment before you.”

  This should make me feel better, but it doesn’t. “What, are you and Gabby like best friends now?”

  “No. But she’s cool. Wyatt and I hung out with her and her boyfriend last night. We talked about you. A lot.”

  I should probably be annoyed about this, but all I can think is how cool it would be to have Ben and Wyatt and Gabby and Will all be friends. It would be like taking two best-friendships and widening them into this whole community of awesome.

  Except the link that would hold it all together is broken now. I’ll be lucky if I can still be Anna-Marie’s agent. There’s no way we’re going to be close. My chest aches and aches.

  “Anna-Marie’s issues,” I say, “are because her dad cheated on all of his wives, and apparently his current girlfriend, who left today with her two kids.”

  “Classy guy.”

  I tighten my fists. Truth is, he was the one I wanted to shove onto his ass and then threaten. “Yeah. Things were going really well, and then Anna-Marie sees Tanya’s leaving and she decides I’m going to do that to her and she kicked me out.”

  “Ouch,” Ben says. “Jeez, are you okay?”

  “No. I am not okay. We talked about what we would name our children last night. We were planning our whole lives. And now it’s over.”

  “Damn,” Ben says. And I know what he’s thinking, so I say it for him.

  “I’m an idiot.”

  “You’re not an idiot. You’re in love.”

  I shake my head. “Then love has made me into an idiot.”

  “Um, yeah. Rem
ember that time I made you have lunch at the pool hall for four months straight so I could not talk to Wyatt? Dude, he thought you were into him, because you kept calling him over and praying I would finally make a move.”

  “Yeah,” I say. “It worked out significantly better for you.”

  Ben pauses, like he’s trying to figure out what to say, and the hard truth is, there’s nothing he can say that will help. “Maybe it’s not over. Maybe she just needs time to think.”

  But I remember—will always remember—the look on her face when she told me to leave. “No,” I say. “I messed up. She was yelling at me, telling me about all the shit I was going to do to her, and it hurt so bad that I yelled back at her.”

  “It’s called a fight. Those happen.”

  I hold my breath. “I told her she was replaceable.” I squeeze my eyes shut. “It’s like—it’s like her biggest fear, right? That I’ll just go find someone else. That in Hollywood all actresses are replaceable, both personally and professionally. It was like the worst thing I possibly could have said.”

  “Why did you?”

  My eyes are burning, and I’m pretty sure I’m going to cry, but I do still have to drive back to LA today. “Because I want it to be true. God, what am I supposed to do now? Go back to dating girls who don’t get me? Keep looking like I’m ever going to find someone like her again?”

  “You’re going to get your ass back here, that’s what you’re going to do,” Ben says. “Need me to meet you halfway?”

  “Yes. And before we go back we’re going to get completely plastered.”

  “You’ll get plastered. And before you do, I’m taking your keys and your phone. No drunk dialing for you.”

  “I couldn’t call Anna-Marie, anyway,” I say. “A moose took her phone.”

  Ben pauses, and I realize I never told him about that. “Clearly you have more stories to tell me,” he says. “I’m going to expect a full report.”

  “Don’t worry. I don’t think I’m going to talk about anything else for months.”

  Ben says he’ll find out what town is halfway and text me a meeting place. With beer. I’m sure I’m going to want something stronger, but beer is a good place to start.