I sighed. "Silas has a theory that something's going on here, that the asshole was murdered or some shit," I said. "He'll tell you all the fuck about it if you listen."
Killian turned toward Silas, and Silas put his hands up. "I'm not crazy," he said. "Something's going on, and now this- it doesn't make any sense she'd kill herself, not with the asshole gone now. He was her whole problem for years. She'd be happy he's gone."
"Or..." I said. "Could be like prisoners, you know?"
"What the hell are you talking about, prisoners?" Luke asked.
"You know, like when prisoners are released after years in prison," I said. "Kill themselves when they finally get out. Can't deal with it."
"Where the hell did you hear about that?" Luke asked.
"It was in that movie, the prison one -"
"Shawshank," Killian said.
"Exactly."
Silas rolled his eyes. "He's going to say my theories are bullshit and crazy, but he's giving you theories that come out of the movies." He paused, his gaze on the television on the other side of the room. "Isn't that - the screen says River Andrews. Is that your girl?"
I looked up at the TV, to see her face. River Andrews, sitting across from one of those talk show hosts whose name I couldn't remember, one of those women famous for making celebrities cry, doing real heart-to-heart crap.
"Hey," Silas walked over to one of the nurses in the reception area. "You got a remote for the TV? Turn it up right quick, will you?"
She looked at him, then at the television, and raised her eyebrows. "Oh yeah," she said, clicking with the remote. "That's that chick that was here in West Bend, isn't it?"
I heard the interview amplified, River's voice louder in the room, and despite everything in me telling me to turn away, to not pay attention to what was on the screen, that I didn't want to hear what was coming out of her mouth, I walked over to the television and listened.
Everything else, the hospital noise, my brothers talking, giving each other shit, faded into the background.
"River Andrews," the host smiled, her expression welcoming, disarming. Like someone's grandmother. She leaned forward. "You must have been through a rollercoaster of emotions over the past month, betrayed by your fiancé, running to Colorado..." Her voice trailed off.
River nodded. "Well, Deborah," she said. "It was a life-altering moment, walking in on Viper and my sister."
I felt sick. I wanted to turn away, hearing her talk about how she was torn up by her fiancé's cheating. I didn't need to hear about that shit.
Why torture myself?
I heard River speak again, a response to a question I'd missed. Then the interviewer.
"It had to be crushing," Deborah said. "Walking in on the two of them, together, and then learning about their engagement. Discovering that Viper had been unfaithful for quite some time."
River shook her head. "I wish them all the best in the world," she said. "I truly hope they find happiness together."
The host shook her head, and made a face. "You sound too calm right now, River," she said, baiting her. "Your mother has plans to release her account of your childhood, your life."
River exhaled, and now I saw the pain in her eyes. "And it will be my mother's account, not mine," she said. "None of it is mine."
I felt a pang of empathy for her, knowing her relationship with her mother. I knew that learning her mother was writing a book about her would hurt her.
"But surely you must have some feelings about all of this, River," she said. "No one is this calm about all of this."
"Shit," Silas said. "She was at the bar that day."
"What are you talking about?" I asked. "Shut up. I'm trying to hear this."
River smiled. "A good friend once told me that none of these things are the ones that are important in life. They're minor."
She was talking about me. I was the friend.
I wasn't sure if I was pleased that what I'd said mattered, or disappointed that she called me a friend.
"Like what?" Deborah asked.
"Lots of things," River said. "Family. Friendship. Love."
Deborah was more shrewd than she appeared. Her eyes lit up and she leaned in closer. For the kill, I thought. "You were linked to someone when you were in Colorado," she said.
River pursed her lips. I didn't know what the hell she was thinking, but I felt myself hanging on what she was about to say.
"I was," she said.
"A military veteran," Deborah said, looking down at a notecard. "Bomb disposal. Injured in Iraq."
"Afghanistan," River corrected. "Injured in Afghanistan."
"She remembers a lot about you," Silas said, beside me.
"Shut up." I couldn't take my eyes off the screen.
"And?" Deborah asked. "Are you and - "
"Elias," River said.
"Elias." Deborah said. "Well, let me ask the question every single man in America wants to know. Are you still in touch with Elias? Was this the real deal, or just a rebound?"
River swallowed, looked down at her lap, then back up at Deborah. The camera panned in close, focused on her eyes. She looked directly into the camera.
She was looking directly at me.
I swallowed hard. Everything faded into the background, and I waited for her to answer.
"I thought it was the real deal," she said. "He didn't feel the same way. I was wrong."
Beside me, I heard Silas mutter under his breath. "Shit."
I thought it was the real thing.
I was wrong.
I didn't know what to say.
I didn't know what to think.
"Shit, man," Silas said.
I was still watching River on the television, but I could only see her lips move. "Dude," I said, irritated. "I'm trying to fucking hear this."
"I know," Silas said. "But I think I know why she left."
"What are you talking about?"
"I know her," he said. "I mean, I've seen her before."
"Everyone's seen her before," I said. "She's a goddamned movie star."
"No, I mean, that day you were at the bar, you went in the bathroom and Roger and I were talking. She was standing there for a minute, then left. I didn't know who the hell she was. She didn't look like her pictures- all those pictures in the magazines and stuff. She was blonde. I thought it was a customer."
"So?" I asked, watching River on the screen. "Who cares, man? It's over."
"No," Silas said. "You're not getting what I'm saying."
"No shit, Sherlock."
"Roger and I were outside," he said. "Talking about River."
I slowly turned toward him. "What did you do?"
I listened to his explanation, his theory that River had heard him talking shit about me and had misread the situation.
I sank into the chair.
River's note.
She thought I was the one who considered this a fling.
She'd left because of me. Not because she was dumping me to run back to Hollywood.
Talk about some shitty goddamned timing.
Silas sat down beside me. "Well," he said. "You have to go after her."
"This isn't a goddamned movie, Silas," I said. "Mom's in the fucking ICU. Let it go."
And then one of the doctors walked out of the door, and shook his head.
"I'm afraid I have bad news," he said.
***
RIVER
I folded clothes carefully, putting pieces in my suitcases.
My best friend Abby sat in the armchair in my bedroom, her long legs draped over the side, back leaning up against the other side, sipping a cocktail. "Are you sure you want to do this?"
"I need a change," I said. "I'm done with the movie. I have no obligations here. Why shouldn't I?"
Abby shrugged. "If you say so," she said. "Or you could, I don't know, fly to Colorado instead."
"Look," I said. "I did the interview. I said what I had to say. That's it. It's over. It wasn't even anythin
g to begin with. He thought it was a fling, and that's what it was. Nothing more than that. It was less than two weeks. No one falls in love in two weeks."
"They do in your movies," Abby said.
I sighed. "Everyone thinks real life is like the movies, but it's not. And I was stupid to think otherwise."
Abby huffed. "I still think you're being a dumbass."
"You're just jealous," I said, balling up a shirt and tossing it across the room at her. She shrieked, angling her glass away from direction of the projectile.
"Jealous of what?" she asked. "Your boyfriend? I don't think so. You know I stay as far away from dick as possible."
"Morocco," I said. "You're jealous you're not going. You should come."
"You know I would," she said. "But I've got a show coming up. Besides, I'm not trying to commit career suicide here. I'm going to have my big break. Soon."
"You should," I said. "You're a talented artist."
"Anyway," she said, sipping her drink. "I give it six months before you're right back here, doing another movie. Tops. Not that I'm not happy for you, but, well, what the hell are you going to do without awards shows and...shit...shoes?"
I laughed. "They have shoes in Morocco, you bitch."
"But seriously- " Abby finished her drink, then crossed the room, throwing herself dramatically on my bed. "You and Elias...it was like the movies, right?"
"I don't know. It was...passionate. I've never had that kind of sex with anyone before. That kind of lust," I shrugged. "But that's all it was, you know? Lust. If it were anything more..." I left it unspoken.
If it had been anything more, he would have called.
He wouldn't have said what he said.
We would be together right now.
"He probably didn't even watch the interview," she said. "You still have your cell phone, the one you got there, right?"
I glanced toward my bureau drawer, at the place where I'd stashed it and checked it obsessively since I'd returned, fantasizing that Elias would call.
But that was just a fantasy. Nothing more.
He didn't give a shit. And I needed to let go. It wasn't healthy, pining away after someone who didn't even like me.
"You have it, don't you?" she asked. "You kept it. Call him."
"No," I said. "I'm not calling him. If he were interested, he'd call me. I'm not throwing myself at him."
Abby sighed. "What if it was all just some kind of misunderstanding? Would you really be okay with walking away and not knowing?"
I shook my head. "It's not a misunderstanding," I said. "It's crystal clear to me. He thought it would be awesome to screw an actress. And I was stupid and thought it was more. That's it. Besides -"
The doorbell rang, and I looked for my purse. "Pizza guy is here. Perfect timing, because I'm totally over talking about Elias. When I get back, new conversation topic- Morocco."
***
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
ELIAS
"She tried, I guess," Luke said. "I mean, she was just weak. She wasn't like the asshole."
We all nodded, sitting around the table in the house where we grew up. We'd buried her two hours earlier, just the four of us standing around her grave. I'd purchased the plot with my savings, something to make sure she wasn't in a state burial plot, the way the asshole had been buried. I didn't want her buried with him. No matter what kind of inadequate mother she'd been, there was something that didn't sound right about that. At least I could do that much.
Their feelings about her were as mixed as mine, I was sure. What could you really say about a woman who stayed with a man like our father, someone who beat his wife, beat his kids within an inch of their lives? She tried, at least.
But she should have tried harder, Killian said. We were kids, so she should have tried harder.
I guess that was the reality. I wasn't glad she was gone, not like I felt about the asshole - but I wasn't devastated, either.
It was what it was. Just the way life goes.
Killian held up a whiskey glass. "To our mother. May she finally have some peace."
I nodded. "To our mother."
We tossed back the whiskey, otherwise silent. It was a strange thing, all of us together, for the first time in years. It didn't feel right, somehow, the fact that we were all together solely because she'd died.
Brothers should be tighter than that, I thought.
My cell phone buzzed in my pocket, breaking the silence, and I slid it out, looking at the number.
I looked up at Silas.
"What is it?" he asked, his face apprehensive. "What happened now?"
I recognized the number immediately. It was the number I had emblazoned on my brain, the one I kept telling myself I should call.
It just didn't seem right, me being concerned about what happened with some girl, when my mother had just died.
"It's River's number," I said, the cell phone buzzing over and over. "Her throwaway. The one we got her here."
"Well, shit, man," Killian said. "A fucking movie star is calling you. Pick up the goddamn phone."
The buzzing stopped, and I shrugged, putting the phone on the table. "It's nothing," I said, looking around at their faces.
"Are you fucking serious?" Silas said. "She left because she thought you were a douchebag who said shitty things about her. Then she said you were -and I quote- the real deal on fucking TV, and now she's calling you? What the hell is wrong with you? You don't not answer the phone. Now you are being a douchebag."
Killian and Luke stared at me, nodding.
"Douchebag," Luke chimed in.
"You're being a dickwad," Killian said.
The phone buzzed again, and I slid the screen open to read the message.
"It's not from her," I said, reading it, my heart pounding in my chest.
"Who's it from?" Silas asked. "What does it say?"
"Shit," I said, realizing what I had to do. "I have to go to LA. Now. And you fucked this all up, Silas. So you're coming with