by Lacey Dailey
My callused fingertips trace the dimples in her back as she sleeps. My lips whisper over her temple with the understanding that when she finally opens her eyes, the world will be nothing like it was yesterday.
I have surrendered to love, and I’m incapable of pretending otherwise. Gia is not just my best friend—she fills in my blanks. Her touch feels like an extension to mine. Her heart knows what I’m feeling before I do. Her mind is synced with mine, and she recognizes the words I can’t say through sharp gestures and frustrated huffs. Lying here with her, her limbs tangled with mine, feels suspiciously a lot like harmony.
I am painfully in love with her. She stirs as my fingers trail each divot of her spine, and I find myself wishing she’d sleep for several moments more. I’m not so sure I’m ready for her to awaken to a world that makes Aiden and I feel like we have to stay in hiding forever. It’s not fair that I have to conceal half of myself from her or yield to rejection from the only woman I’ve ever loved.
“Max.”
She says my name though a yawn, stretching her arms across my chest. A sleepy sound leaves her lips, and her eyes appear leisurely beneath heavy eyelids. The tip of her nose is warm when it meets mine. Her sleepy smile fillets me. Its vibrancy is equivalent to the moment every star in the sky agrees to light up at the exact same time.
“I love you.” I tell her, my hand braced against the nape of her neck. “I’m fucking drowning in you, Gia Maria. I slipped right into your pretty blue eyes, kidding myself when I said I was going for a swim. I’m drowning, and I don’t care to come back up for air.”
She sits up, the white sheet pillowing around her waist. She keeps her hands planted firmly on my chest as she takes deep, savoring breaths. Her long, golden hair frames her flushed face as she regards me as though I am a work of art. A living, breathing sheet of music, speaking to her in a melody.
“Max, I lov—“
I throw my hand over her mouth. “Not yet.”
Her eyes cloud with a pained expression. I drop my hand.
“You can’t love me yet, Gia.”
“Maxwell.” She seizes my wrist, pressing my hand against her chest as if to say ‘this belongs to you.’ “I cannot and will not turn off the way I feel for you. You understand that hearts don’t work like that, yes? I love you. Whether I say it out loud, whether we’re together or not, I love you. Deal with it.”
Deal with it.
As if her loving me is some sort of hardship.
“I have been agonizing over my feelings for you for weeks, wishing what I felt was reciprocated.” Her eyes glisten. “Please don’t ask me to pretend last night didn’t happen because you’re afraid of us.”
“I’m not afraid of us, baby.” I cup her cheek, swiping my thumb through the wetness at the corner of her eye. “Loving you doesn’t scare me anymore.”
“Then what scares you, Max?” Her hand falls over mine, holding it prisoner against her skin. “Why are you shaking?”
“For the first time in my life, I have something to lose.”
“Me?”
“You.” I sit up, pressing my forehead to hers. “I just barely have you and already I’m terrified to lose you to secrets and experiences that belong in the past. I’m afraid to let you fall because you’ll never understand what you’ve fallen into.”
“Is this about Aiden?”
His name on her lips incinerates me. My body temperate sky rockets as the blood just below my skin starts to bubble. I feel him stir in the back of my mind, pushing at me to allow him access to this moment. I’m aware of his presence immediately. Gia’s left in the dark. She has no idea she’s talking to two people right now.
“I think you’re being unfair to me, Max. You haven’t given me the opportunity to listen. I understand how difficult this is for you.”
“I don’t think you do, Gia. You have to understand, only three people in the world know of Aiden’s existence. When I told you his name, it was like tearing the skin off my body. I’m not sure you grasp how difficult it will be for me to share something with you I’ve worked my entire life to keep hidden.” I push my nose into her neck, curling my fingers around hers. “I don’t want to disappoint you. I don’t want to be the cause of your tears, Gia, but I’m not sure I’m strong enough to expose myself like that.”
“Max.” She strokes my head with her free hand, stopping to dip her finger in the overgrown strands at the base of my neck. “If you think I don’t recognize the anguish on your face, you’re dead wrong. I recognize it and I respect it. I love you. If one day, you decide to spill your beans, I’ll love those too.”
Tell her we want to be with her.
His voice is faint but very assertive.
Her voice mixing with Aiden’s is almost too much for me. “And if I never tell you? Can you live with that? Can you love me despite the unknown?”
“Do you think it’d be hard for me?” She forces my head up, gripping my chin and looking at me with fierce conviction. “To accept your past isn’t your future? To be respectful of your wishes? To stop asking about Aiden and be thankful he appeared when he did?”
“You’ll be mine then? In spite of my secrets?” I lift her into my lap, covering her with my limbs. “Like say I love you and sleep in the same bed naked kind of mine?”
She kisses the underside of my chin. “Would you have taken no for an answer?”
“Probably not.”
She laughs.
“It’s possible I would’ve begged you. I’m certain I would’ve written a song about it. A PowerPoint presentation could’ve been created.”
“A PowerPoint presentation, huh? You’d go that far for me?” She snuggles closer to me, draping her arms around my neck. “Everybody has secrets, Max. I don’t need to know yours to love you. I trust you’ll tell me if it ever comes to it.”
I hope it never comes it.
But I don’t think about that now. In this moment, and thousands more to follow, she’s mine.
All I want to do is love her.
15
Gigi
I have a boyfriend.
He is a cucumber.
Knowing who Max is now, I recognize that part of his cucumber persona was just a facade. The Max I teased and compared to a vegetable was doing it simply in attempt to conceal the unpleasant parts of his life.
I suppose it isn’t fair of me to say that’s the only reason he seemed so naturally laid-back. When it’s just the two of us, and there are no questions that make him uneasy, he doesn’t feign his easygoing approach to life. His natural inclination to act like a kid eighty percent of the time is not fake.
It’s real.
I think maybe that’s why others never seem to notice he’s struggling. I think maybe that’s why I didn’t notice he was struggling.
Struggle or no struggle, secret or no secret, I love him. I suspect I’ve loved him for longer than my heart was willing to admit. Often times the fear of rejection is bigger than the act itself. I presume it was that fear, coupled with the importance of our friendship, that held me back.
It was so much more for him.
The possibility that I would ostracize him for his secrets slowly dismantled him until he was withering in vulnerability with a guitar strapped across his chest. He revealed nothing and everything at the same time. Whatever secret he has, whatever his devil side is, I’ll love him in spite of it.
“Hey, good looking. That seat taken?” I lift my sunglasses, admiring the man blocking my sun.
A book and the sounds of bodies splashing around the resort’s pool have kept me company all morning while Max spends time alone. I can’t say I fully understand why he doesn’t like anyone around him while he’s trying out new material, but I can certainly respect it.
“Actually, it is.” Using my pointer finger, I push my sunglasses so they rest against the bridge of my nose. I wiggle in the chaise lounge I’ve been relaxing in all morning, adjusting my body until I’m comfortable. “I’m saving that seat
for somebody special.”
A wicked grin spreads across his lips. Gripping the towel he has draped around his neck, he makes a big show of arranging it on the chaise next to mine.
Max maneuvers himself onto the padded chaise, bending one leg and propping his head in his hand in a haphazard attempt at being sexy. He shakes his head dramatically, forcing his sunglasses to the tip of his nose. “Maybe you could tell him you’re busy with a real man.”
The wink he flashes me is my undoing. He’s ridiculous. I laugh, retrieving my tube of sunscreen and tossing it at his bare chest. “Put this on so you don’t turn into a lobster.”
“What if I want to look like a lobster?”
“You want to feel like one too?”
“Do I get to chomp things with my super sharp legs?”
“Claws?” I offer, horrified by the gallon of sunscreen he squeezes into his palm. “Max, holy shit. Don’t use the whole bottle.”
“I can’t let my face burn, baby. It’s the money maker.” He smothers himself in the thick liquid, flashing me a pout. “Don’t you agree?”
I’m seconds away from leaping onto his chaise and sinking my teeth into that adorable pout when my phone rings. Shoving my hand into the purse I have wedged underneath my chair, I dig for my phone blindly. “Babe, you need to rub that in.”
“I’m working on it, Gia.” He rubs the living shit out of the disaster happening on his face while I swipe my thumb across my phone screen.
“Hello?”
“If you’re doing something important, ditch it. We need to talk.”
“Well, hello to you, Renzo.”
“Renzo!” Max squeals, launching his body onto my chaise. He ignores my grunt, slathering me with sunscreen while he makes himself comfortable on my lap. Wedging his head beneath my chin, he tilts his head so he can hear Renzo’s voice. “Tell him I said hi.”
“Renzo, Max said—”
“Yeah, I heard him. Listen, Gigi,” My brother draws in an edgy breath, followed by a pause that has me reaching for Max’s hand. “I think I fucked up.”
Max’s fingers, though coated in sunscreen, secure our hold. He kisses my knuckles, easing my apprehension. “In what way, Ren?”
“Dad. He’s, uhm. Ah, shit, Gigi. He’s…” He clears his throat, the speaker of my phone crackling with the force of the sound. “He’s on his way to Vegas. I think he got ahold of my flight information somehow. He called and grilled me over the purpose of my visit. I told him it was something for the academy. I thought he believed me, but I was talking to mom this morning and she mentioned dad is on his way to Vegas for some conference thing.”
“Maybe he really is here for a conference?” Even I don’t believe my feeble words. “Maybe it’s a coincidence? You left here almost two weeks ago.”
“I looked it up, Gigi.” Renzo sighs, and I use my free hand to tug Max closer to my body. “I couldn’t find anything about a conference he’d actually be attending. I don’t even think there are conferences for the type of job he has. If there were, would they be held in Vegas? That seems weird.”
“So, is this some sort of warning call? You think I should pack my shit and leave so dad won’t find me?”
The aggressive way Max’s body jerks makes me aware of his disagreement even before he says, “No.”
“I agree with Max,” Renzo says. “Just because our dad is in Vegas doesn’t mean you have to run off.”
“Renzo, the second he sees me, he’s going to drag me back to North Carolina and shove me back into my shitty desk chair inside City Hall.”
“No, he won’t, Gigi. Tell him where to shove it. You have a plan.”
“I have no plan.”
“Yes, you do!” I picture him holding the phone in front of his face and shaking it roughly as if trying to knock some sense into me. “You didn’t talk to Max, did you?”
“We got busy.”
I’ve been rallying all my courage in an attempt to talk to Max about taking on the role of his manager officially. After I escaped the friend-zone, I began to question whether it was a good idea. Do artists let their significant others be their music manager? That idea seems to be wrapped in caution tape.
“Gigi, seriously? I’m your brother. I didn’t need that visual.”
“Ew, Renzo!” He is like the last person I’d ever want to discuss my sex life with. “That isn’t what I meant, and no I haven’t. I didn’t know if recent events changed things.”
“Then ask him, Gigi!” I imagine he’s tugging at the hair around his ears. “Stop being so afraid.”
“I am not afraid!”
“Not about everything. I’ll give you that, but you need to work with me here and admit you’re afraid Max will reject your talent and dad will reject the future you’ve chosen.”
Max’s body goes rigid beneath me. There’s no use in trying to avoid the conversation now that Max will drag the words from me the second I hang up this phone.
When I don’t say anything, Renzo lets out all the air in his lungs. “Listen, mom said he wouldn’t be in Vegas until late evening. You have time to figure out what you’re going to say, or you can lock yourself in your suite until he gives up looking for you. I’m sorry I wasn’t more careful but I think it’s a sign or something.”
“A sign?” My jaw hardens. “Are you shitting me, Renzo? This isn’t a sign, it’s an ambush!”
“Yeah, and it sucks. I’m sorry, but please don’t miss your chance, Gigi.”
Is that what this was? A chance? A chance to tell my father I enjoyed the destruction of the path he created for me and forged my own with the help of my boyfriend and support of my big brother?
It felt more like a trap than an opportunity.
“I love you, sis. Talk to Max. Call me tonight after you decide what to do. Bye, Max.”
“Bye, Renzo.” Max slips from my lap, seating himself on the edge of his chaise. He watches me closely while I hang up the phone and drop it into my bag. “I’m not going to pretend I didn’t hear that conversation, Gia.”
“I wouldn’t expect you to.” I sit up, tucking my feet underneath me. “There’s something Renzo and I talked about while he was here.”
“I got that.” He leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees and planting his feet firmly against the hard ground. “It involves me?”
“Yes.” I have all his attention, and I’m sweating though it has nothing to do with the sun that glows above me.
What if his label has already found him a new manager? One who is better suited to do the job I’ve been teaching myself how to excel at for the duration of this summer.
“When I offered to be your manager, it was just supposed to be a temporary thing. Just something fun to do so we could both get through this summer.” I drop my chin to my chest, picking off my freshly painted nail polish. “I thought it’d be something to keep me busy until I figured out what I actually wanted to do, but that’s the thing, Max. This is what I actually want to do. Renzo and I discussed it when he was here. I promised I’d talk to you about making this manager thing official. I never did because I wasn’t sure if—”
“If I could handle my girlfriend being my manager?” I glance at him through my lashes. He is smiling softly at me, his hair moving across his forehead with a slow shake of his head.
“Well, that and I also thought you might want a real manager now that you have a label.”
“A real manager?” Moving so he’s sitting beside me, he takes my hands in his. “You feel pretty real to me, Gia Maria.”
“Max…”
He smirks at me.
“You’re interested in doing this full time?”
I squeeze his hands. “Very much.”
“And you’d actually start taking a percentage of my earnings like an actual manager is supposed to do?”
“Yes, but like five percent is good.”
“Five percent?” He throws his head back, mouthing words to the sky before fixating back on me. “You’ll get
twenty.”
“Twenty! Max, no, you’re just starting out. Ten.”
“Fifteen. That’s final. I’m not going to argue about this all morning when we have issues to figure out with your big, scary, Italian dad. I’ll have Landon change the contract.”
“Contract?” I sit up straighter. “What contract?”
“I asked Landon to help me write up a manager contract when I got signed. Managers typically do that themselves, citing their own terms and conditions. I knew you’d ask for next to nothing, so I drafted one for you.” He flips his sunglasses, positioning them on the top of his head. “As for you being my girlfriend, I can handle it if you can. Dozens of artists have managers who are family or—”
“Actually know what they’re doing?”
“Woman, if you stop interrupting me I could finish a thought!” He flicks my earlobe. “You know what you’re doing. Besides that, we’re both still learning. Will you please just sign the contract I had to pull teeth to get Landon to help me with?”
I bat his finger away from my earlobe. “If you had a contract drafted up why didn’t you say anything?”
“I wasn’t going to give it to you until my time performing for Landon’s tour was over. You insisted on being my manager pro bono for the summer.” He shrugs. “I didn’t think you’d sign any earlier.”
He’s right. I wouldn’t have.
“I only have three shows left before I part ways with Landon and start rolling with the big dogs. I need you by my side, Gia. You’re a beacon of strength for me. I need you on my team, in those meetings, and in my bed at night. Please, don’t make me do this without you because you’re worried I’m giving you too much. You can’t even begin to understand the capacity of things you’ve given me.”
Need.
He needs me.
“Max, I—”
“Gia, please.” He drops his forehead to mine. “Please, just look it over?”
“Of course, I will.”
He kisses me.
At this rate, I probably won’t read anything and just sign on the dotted line.
16