“A bloody tour guide?” Jay roared slamming his hands against the counter. “You need a therapist! Not a tour guide!”
“Go to hell!” I roared. “What are you, my dad?”
“No.” He swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. “I’m not your dad, but if I was, I’d tell you to get your head out of your ass and get some help. I know you know it’s getting worse, you need to talk to someone, someone who knows how to help.”
I shrugged. “Maybe.”
“Are you taking your meds?”
I flipped him off and shoved past him.
“Zane.”
“Yes.” I grit my teeth. “But clearly, they aren’t helping if I can’t go for a run on the beach by myself.”
“This girl…” Jay sighed. “Are you going to tell her?”
“What’s there to tell?” I challenged, crossing my arms. “I told her I can’t do it alone, and she offered to help. I get Cinderella to the ball, and she makes it so I can finish my album on time. Everyone wins.”
“Does she, though?” Jay just had to ask. “Some local girl with stars in her eyes?”
“Trust me,” I grumbled. “There’s zero interest on both ends. She’s cute, but not my type, and I get the distinct impression that if it was between a science nerd and me, she’d do him in a heartbeat all the while wondering if I even know how to spell.”
“You have a master’s degree in—”
I burst out laughing. “What? Should I flash my degrees?”
“You worked hard for them.” Jay shrugged. “Not everyone can do school full time and tour.”
“Yeah well, I’m also a marshmallow-addicted hermit.”
“There is that,” Jay agreed with a flick of his hand.
“Gee, thanks.”
“Hey, you said it, not me. I was just thinking it, only in more crass terms, lots more swearing.”
“You done?”
“Ten minutes a day.” Jay pointed his finger at me. “Even dogs get walks.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Did you just compare me to a bitch?”
He grinned. “Don’t forget…you’re welcome on set anytime.”
When hell freezes over. “I know.”
Jay started to talk away and then paused before grabbing his keys and turning back around. “This girl, she isn’t like…” He did a weird thing with his hands in the air and then coughed. “The one?”
“Whoa!” I matched his awkward hand motions. “There will be none of that.”
“Because you’re afraid of girls?”
“I threw many a rocks in my day.”
“Hah.” Jay nodded. “Fine, fine, just, remember, she’s a mere mortal, you can’t run around naked pelting her with marshmallows and writing her love notes with a circle yes or no life decision, alright?”
“Like I would ever confess my love in a note. I’m more of a sing-my-feelings sort of guy.”
“I know this. So does the rest of America. Just tread carefully…sometimes the ones we think are the strongest are the most frail.” He eyed me up and down. “Case in point.”
“Message received.”
“Good talk.”
“Yup.”
“Don’t give away your V card to a girl who won’t appreciate it, man.”
“Dude.” I shook my head. “Too far. Go to work already so you can come home and make sweet love to Mom.”
“Gross.”
“Hey, you’re the one treating me like I’m your child.”
“Bastard.” He chuckled as the door slammed behind him.
I snatched my coffee off the bar and made my way back into the bedroom, my eyes locking in on my guitar and the stupid clothes I knew would have to accompany it if I didn’t want to get arrested while hanging out with Fallon.
With resignation, I marched over to the clothes and pulled them on. It felt like my life, the way I put on clothes.
I wanted to be secure.
Naked.
Myself.
I put on clothes because my true self wasn’t accepted…not really. Because even though people screamed “Saint”—what they really wanted was a sinner.
Sometimes I hated my life.
Chapter Ten
Fallon
YOU KNOW HOW DOCTORS always say never to do an internet search of your symptoms? I believed them. I refused to Google anything.
I’d always been cautious to a fault.
Half nerd, half goody two-shoes.
More focused on my grades than my hair or the fact that girls around me were wearing heels while I was still sporting chucks and vintage band T-shirts.
So, the morning after seeing Zane, after agreeing to his asinine plan and walking home in a complete daze.
I did the unthinkable.
I typed in his name.
Zane Andrews.
My first mistake was assuming that it would be all about his music and his time in Seaside.
Instead, there were so many pictures of the guy shirtless that I almost dropped my phone in my bowl of oatmeal, and about died on the spot when my dad snatched my phone instead of his off the table.
And being an idiot, mine wasn’t password protected.
So he got a huge eyeful of chest.
And nearly collided with a wall in an attempt to get away from the kitchen and his daughter’s dirty pictures.
“What’s the plan for today?” Mom plopped down next to me and poured herself a cup of coffee. “Work and then home?”
I squirmed in my seat.
“Stop that,” she said without looking up from her own phone. “You always fidget when you’re nervous. Now, no lying.”
Groaning, I pushed around a few raisins in my bowl. “I’m working the morning shift and then…hanging out with Zane.”
My mom didn’t say anything. I chanced a look at her out of the corner of my eye.
Her smile was frozen on her face. “Honey…” She set down her phone and touched my hand. “Do you think that’s a good idea?”
I pushed my black glasses, the ones that had been fixed the day before, up my nose and sighed. “Mom, it’s not like that.”
“He’s a guy, a famous guy, and you’re just…” She tilted her head as if she couldn’t come up with one single word in the English vocabulary that would describe the enigma that was her daughter. “You.”
“Is this where you actually do the opposite of parents worldwide and tell me not to act like myself?”
“You don’t stutter around him.”
“I don’t stutter around you guys either.”
“All those years of speech therapy.” She sighed. “And look, it only happens when you get frustrated or nervous…but…” Then she frowned. “He doesn’t make you nervous, does he?”
“Look.” I stood to put some space between us and the uncomfortable conversation. “I’m going to be late for work, I swear it’ll be fine. We’re friends. He’s not into me in that way, and I’m sure not into him in that way either. We’re from completely different planets.” Besides, guys like him, they just couldn’t help themselves. All females—males too—stared. It worked for him, but I wasn’t sure I would ever be comfortable with that type of attention.
“Okay.” Mom nodded sagely and held out my phone.
I tried grabbing it, but she didn’t let go. “Mom.”
“He doesn’t do drugs does he?”
“Mom.” I snapped grabbing my phone. “No, of course not!”
“Has he touched you?”
“I want to die right now. Why don’t you just run me over with the minivan?”
“It’s in the shop.” She grinned then finally released my phone. “Just be careful with him. He has seductive eyes.”
“Mom, eyes are eyes. His eyes are…normal I don’t even know what color they are.” I was lying. Everyone knew his eyes were blue, an icy blue that, according to one blog, felt like you were getting stripped naked and worshipped all at once. I shivered.
“Uh huh.” Mom sipped her coffee
and gave me a total look of disbelief. “Your dad knows the color of Zane’s eyes, and he’s partially blind like my offspring.”
“Okay, first of all, that’s creepy. Second, I’m your daughter. Offspring sounds too medical.”
“Honey,”
“What.” I huffed, stuffing my beanie over my head and crossing my arms. “What is it?”
“Sometimes…it’s okay to be reckless.”
I hesitated, not sure how to respond because, it sounded like my mom just gave me the talk then ended it by handing me a beer and a condom. What had just happened?
“I’m the opposite of reckless.”
“Something tells me, he likes that.”
“Bye, mom.”
I hopped on my bike and shoved my earbuds in as I made the two-mile trek over to the resort.
So what if I was listening to his music?
And had just recently purchased his last album on iTunes?
And was obsessed with the duet he’d done with Gabe Hyde?
The guy could sing.
His last album sounded completely different from what he was writing or working on the day previous.
And even though I tried, the images of his shirtless body invaded every stream of consciousness I had as I pumped my legs faster and faster.
Paired with the taste of his lips on mine.
And his fake orgasm the night before.
Don’t even get me started on the fact that the song I was listening to was called Skin.
By the time I made it to the hotel, I was sweating profusely, pieces of my hair stuck to my neck. I tugged off my beanie and pushed my glasses back up while I locked my bike and quickly ran into the office to clock in.
“Fallon.” Jared was my manager, and he was creepy. As in, he seemed like the type of guy that used way too much hair gel and wasn’t aware that if you smiled too big all the time it wasn’t sexy, just disturbing, and alarming on so many levels. “Rough morning?”
I grunted.
It was my typical Jared response.
And I wasn’t in the mood to make small talk, not with images of Zane still burned in my head.
There had literally been nothing in any of the articles about his new album, just that he was working hard at it after a freak accident on stage last year.
The YouTube video didn’t show much, there was lots of screaming, then the stage had collapsed, and he’d gone into the crowd face first.
A crowd of over eighty thousand people.
The caption read. “Pop star has nervous breakdown.”
He was rocking back and forth, people tried to touch him, he screamed, I’d never seen anyone look so crazed in my entire life.
The worst part was his voice.
It wasn’t confident, smooth, controlled.
It had been terrified, as if someone was trying to hurt him.
I refused to watch the rest of the video. Because really, it wasn’t fair that all of his embarrassing and horrible moments were live for the world to see. If I wanted information I just typed in his name, if he wanted information on me, he had to ask. It seemed hardly fair.
“So?” Mags grabbed my shoulder with her hand. “Spill!”
I glared. “You pushed me off a ledge!”
She rolled her eyes. “Fallon, I say this because I love you, but if I had to push you in front of oncoming traffic, just to get Zane Andrews to notice you, I’d do it in a heartbeat.”
“You’d kill me?”
“A slow moving vehicle, you’d break a leg, hardly something to cry about.”
“Are you hearing yourself?”
She rubbed her hands together. “Tell me every single thing. Don’t leave out any details. Has he kissed you? Are his hands soft? Does he have a big—“
“—Dick?” A familiar male voice said from behind me.
Mags’ eyes widened in horror.
I hung my head. “He’s behind me isn’t he?”
She nodded, gaping like a fish.
Slowly, I turned. “Oh, hey.”
“Casual.” He nodded. “I was curious if you were going to go for the whole casual approach or just turn red, and—oh wait, you’re doing that too.”
He pointed while I let out a shaky breath. “Please don’t hold my friend’s sins against me. She’s medicated.”
Mags snapped out of her stupor and shoved me aside. “She exaggerates.”
“Hey, you can’t be in here!” Jared stomped toward us. He was so Portland, in his North Face jacket and khakis. “Employees only.”
“She’s here.” Zane moved his finger from pointing at my face to pointing at Mags.
Jared glared. “Sorry Maggie, you can’t be in here either. No exceptions.”
“Don’t you have more gel to buy?” Mags said sweetly.
His jaw clenched while Maggie sauntered toward him and then grabbed him by the elbow and led him away.
“So…” Zane rubbed his hands together. “What first?”
My head swiveled back so fast I’m impressed I didn’t get a kink. “What do you mean ‘what first?’ I have to work.”
“I’m helping.” The grin was back full force, and it was directed at me. The heat of his stare was staggering in the way it made me want to both launch myself into his arms and then run for dear life.
“You do realize I clean people’s hotel rooms?”
He copied my stance. “You do realize I have two working hands?”
“Alright then.” I grabbed the clipboard and slammed it against his chest. “I’ll grab the cart, and we’ll just go at it.”
“Sounds dirty.”
“Trust me.” I sighed. “It will be.” Just not the way he was probably used to.
Chapter Eleven
Zane
THREE HOURS OF FLUSHING toilets, and I was suddenly thankful she only had a five-hour shift this morning. It wasn’t like I’d planned on going to work with her like a total loser. But I’d driven to the set, taken one look at all the extras, consumed at least a half bag of marshmallows, then found myself passing the resort.
After a few questions at the front desk, I was directed to the back office where Fallon would be, and the rest was history.
Well, sort of.
I ‘d just stripped the bed when I heard her scream.
My feet tangled in the sheets nearly sending me against the nightstand before I freed myself and ran into the other room.
“What’s wrong?” Adrenaline spiked through my system as I sized up the situation. Fallon’s eyes were wide and then she did a little dance and washed her hands about five times before shuddering.
I peeked around the corner of the table. Clinging to the wall like a giant deflated slug was a used condom. I smirked. “Tell me you touched it.”
“With my bare hands!” She squealed. “I was picking up the chair, and something was stuck to it and—” She made a gagging noise.
“Is that how it got on the wall?”
“I kind of threw it once I realized what it was.”
We both turned toward the wall where the used condom was currently slipping down to the floor.
“You should probably pick that up.” I mused in a haughty voice. “I mean this is your job.”
“Screw you! I’m not touching it again!” She shook her head. “Do you even realize how many used condoms I’ve been subject to?”
“Hopefully none of them your own.”
Her face flamed red.
“Or no judgment if they were.” I held up my hands.
“Here.” She shoved a roll of paper towels into my hand. “You want to help? Do the dirty work.”
I pulled off about a billion paper towels and knelt. “Please tell me this isn’t another elderly couple.”
“Honeymooners.” She called from somewhere in the large room. “Just toss it in the trash can.”
“No. Really?” I retorted, “And here I was going to keep it as a trophy!”
“Very funny.” Fallon walked back into the room while I tossed the
condom in the trash. Her hair was pulled up into a tight bun on the top of her head, her black glasses, looked way cuter on her than the monstrosity that had been hanging out on her face yesterday.
In fact, if I was into nerds, she’d be a hot one, like the hot librarian all the kids stare at when they think she’s not looking.
“What?” Fallon touched her face. “Is s-something wrong?”
“You stutter when I stare at you.” I stared harder, mainly because I liked to stare at nice things, so what? Her face was interesting, completely free of makeup except for that damn chapstick and a bit of mascara.
Hell, I probably wore more makeup performing than she’d ever worn in her entire life.
“Zane?” Her Counting Crows gray shirt rose over her narrow hips, exposing some flesh. “What’s going on?”
I took a step toward her.
She backed up.
I took another step.
And her back hit the wall.
“I lost my chapstick.”
“Then you should go to the store.” She patted my chest. “Didn’t we just have this conversation a few days ago?”
“You should make me some more.”
“That wasn’t part of our deal.”
“It should be.”
She had nice lips. Fallon sucked at her teeth, biting into her plump bottom lip as it trembled under the pressure. I’d always been a lip guy. Most guys were all about the tits and ass.
Not me.
Lips.
The mouth.
As it formed words, inhaled, exhaled, the little pant girls tended to make when they were nervous, when I was too close, the exact sound she was making while I unabashedly stared her down.
“You can’t just keep changing the terms of our agreement.” She murmured.
“You have a pretty mouth.” I declared taking a step back. Because for a second, I was tempted to kiss her, my new friend, the only friend willing to take me around Seaside so I could actually get my ass back to work. “Sorry, I tend to fixate on objects.”
She pressed a hand to her forehead. “That’s, fine.”
“I may write a song about it.” No chance in hell was I writing a song about her mouth because songs were emotional, a part of myself. Writing about something I wanted while being able to access it, well in my mind it was like a drug addict penning a song about cocaine, not the smartest move. Music has a delicious way of making you want.