“Don’t even think about it. I’ll throw you overboard,” he says with a wink.
“Wait, how do you know me?” When my vagina stops screaming, my brain finally starts working.
“Well, that is a story in itself, that I would love to share with you, but I don’t think we have the time. So I’ll give you the lowdown. Last time I was in Atlanta recording with Brian Reid, this little spitfire, and unbeknownst to her my future wife, stormed into our session pitching a fit and cussing Brian like nothing I had ever seen. What can I say? It was love at first sight. I made it my mission to make her mine, including finding out who she hangs out with the most. I’ve contacted her several times, but the only problem is that she says she doesn’t date boy band rejects or, and I quote, ‘love sick fucking crooners with bad hair’ which I guess is what I am,” he finishes, lightly shrugging his shoulders.
I stand there with my mouth agape before I realize who he just vividly described. Giggling uncontrollably, I blurt out, “You’re in love with Madison? My Mads?”
For a minute, he loses his suave facade, “Yes. And I’m hoping I can enlist your help.” I notice him glance longingly over at Madison as she laughs at something Lil Rip is saying.
“You are so screwed. Sorry, that’s not nice, but you are not Mads’s type. At. All. I’m sorry. If I thought, even for a second, that you had a chance, I would help play cupid, but no. Not going to happen.”
Turning back to me, he pleads with his eyes. “All I’m asking is for you to help me get close enough to make her realize that I am her type, the last type she’ll ever want to know.”
“Nick, unless you can change the pigment of your skin, start spitting out rhymes instead of singing them, and learn all the pimp and ho terminology, there is not much I can do for you. Honestly. I’m not trying to make a joke of it, but I’ve known Madison for years. Your music is going to remind her too much of her Dad’s which, by the way, she hates with an overwhelming passion. Oh, and you’re seemingly smart. You really don’t have anything going for you.”
“Look, I know. I’ve tried to talk to her several times over the last year. The last time I flew into Atlanta, I tried to contact her, and she said she was thinking about a restraining order. Not sure if she was serious about that or not?” He looks to me for confirmation.
“Oh yes. If she said it, she meant it.” I nod, confirming as my mind reels from this information. Mads has said nothing about Nick Andrews. Nothing.
NOT.
ONE.
WORD.
Mmmm, it makes me curious. Very curious.
“If you can maybe talk to her and then set up some time for us to spend alone together. I would really owe you.”
Did Nick Andrews just say he would owe me? Ten million thoughts go through my mind at once. Concert tickets. Front-row. Backstage passes. Signed shirts. Forget all that. PRIVATE PARTY for my closest friends and family. Ooh, maybe I can have them all. “I tell you what. Give me some time to figure out some way to handle this, and I’ll get back to you. Do you have a card or something?” I ask him.
Handing me his phone, he says, “Program your number.”
In my hand is Nick Andrews’s cellphone, which probably has every single phone number of his old group listed somewhere on it. For one second, I think about taking a quick peek. God, what is wrong with me? I’m a grown adult. Returning to the task at hand, I punch in my number. My hand shakes a bit when I think about what I’m doing. This day keeps getting stranger by the minute. Finishing, I hand it back to him.
“Now I’m texting you so you have my number. Contact me when you come up with something. Hopefully, that will be soon.” A look of hope shines from his eyes.
“Well, in my opinion, you’ve got one thing going for you.”
“What’s that?”
“She tells me everything, and she has said nothing about you.”
Frowning at me, he sputters, “How in the hell is that good?”
“I don’t know, but something tells me it is.”
“Damn, I hope so. Nice to finally meet you, Kylie Lord. Hopefully, this will be the start to a beautiful friendship,” he says, smiling as he turns to walk away.
Shaking my head as I pivot around, I’m really in total amazement at what just happened. Crazy doesn’t begin to cover it. My star crush is in love with my best friend. I LOVE IT! There are two reasons why she wouldn’t have told me: One being that she knows he’s my star crush or two, he is getting to her and making her rethink her choice in men. That’s the option I’m hoping for.
This time, I make a beeline for Mads who is in the same position as before. Approaching her, I notice the questioning look she is giving me and then shakes her head with a firm “no”. I guess she saw who I was talking to. Greeting everyone, I sit down beside Lil Rip as Madison introduces us.
“Hey,” I say.
“S’up?” he replies, nodding his head.
“I’ve heard a lot about you from Mads.”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah, she really likes your music.”
“Yeah,” he stoically answers.
Well, this conversation is going great. I mentally calculate the days until Madison drops this one.
Looking at Mads, I widen my eyes and ask, “Having fun?”
“Yes, but it’s been hotter than two foxes fuckin’ in a forest fire. What about you? Are you okay now?”
“Definitely. Thanks for coming to check on me.”
“Uh, I didn’t, Kylie. Dray said you were fine and just needed some rest. The dickhead pretty much kept everyone away.”
If Mads wasn’t there? NO! WAY! “You never were even there?”
Shaking her head, she answers, “No. I told him I would castrate him if I found out he took his penis and touched you anywhere with it.” Looking at my face, she abruptly stands, saying, “That boy better have kept his one inch detestable dick to himself. Did he?”
“Yes,” I answer. “No dicking here,” I hope. I wouldn’t put it past the bastard.
Sitting back down, she leans forward, whispering in my ear, “We need to talk about Nick later. Okay?”
So she did see me talking with Nick. This is getting more interesting by the minute. Nodding, I look over her head at Lil Rip staring back.
“Are my girls ready to drink it out?” Tamara sits down with a large tray filled with premium bottles of alcohol and shot glasses.
Everyone reaches in to pour, except Madison and myself. I’m not a big drinker and Mads is the designated-driver tonight by choice.
“I’m the double D tonight, so pour a couple shots of Patron up for Kylie. She needs to get a little lit,” she says, smiling at me.
“No thanks.” Everyone around me groans at my answer.
Leaning over to whisper in my ear, Mads says, “If you want to know about Nick Andrews, then drink up.”
I don’t get drunk often, and especially not in public. The local media loves to print gossip, and for some reason, they refer to me as a Southern Socialite. I don’t understand it. It amazes me that my love life, or lack thereof, is an interest to anyone. Secondly, I represent my business at all times, and I care about my reputation. It’s a conundrum, because I really want the low down on the whole Nick situation.
“One shot,” I say, reaching for the glass. Grabbing a shot, I shoot it back, feeling the burn all down my throat. Staying still for a moment, I will my stomach not to rebel.
“Two,” Madison dares.
“Don’t push it,” I warn.
We sit around talking about music as several people weave in and out of the conversation. I have to admit that the shot relaxed me enough to enjoy the evening. At some point, Lil Rip had to depart with some emergency, so Mads walks him out, and I go to say my goodbyes.
I make my way through the house, when suddenly, I’m face to face with Dray.
“Aren’t you going to say goodbye to me?” he says.
“I can now that I’m seeing you. Did you molest my hair?” I waste no
time asking.
“Well, I guess you could say I fingered it.”
“Did you finger anything else?”
“No, I’m afraid of frost bite, but now that you are asking…, I might be persuaded to take the chance.” Leaning in, he speaks softly, “You know, if you want to stay, I’m sure we can find something to do. I would love to kiss those beautiful, plump lips. And then, I’ll move up to kiss the ones on your face.”
It takes a minute before I realize what he is implying, and I really want to smack the grin off his face. Shoving his shoulder to move him out of the way, I storm past muttering, “You butt-fucker.”
“Is that an invitation?” he calls after me.
Finding Mads waiting in the car, I sit down and slam the door.
“Must have run into Dray,” she says laughing.
Grunting my response, I buckle my seatbelt and close my heavy eyes. One day, I’m going to lose it and slap him silly in front of everyone. I hear women constantly say how he’s such a smooth sweet-talker. Bah, why does he act like a frat boy every chance he gets around me with his blatant innuendos? One day soon, instead of getting upset or completely ignoring him, I’m just going to agree to whatever he says and freak him out. I like that idea. Actually, I really like that idea.
“Why are you quieter than a graveyard over there?”
“Plotting payback,” I retort.
Madison’s high shrill echoes through her small car as we drive the rest of the way in silence.
The next several weeks pass unnaturally fast between running my business and visiting my Aunt Leigh. She has good and bad days, so I try to be available to plan things on the better days. I love showing her the items I procure, and together, we decide which ones will be keepers for our personal collection versus store inventory.
Today is a good day as we sit on her screened-in porch having sweet iced tea. The fans overhead help to deal with the stifling humidity. I worry about my aunt, but it doesn’t seem to be affecting her. Looking at her frail frame, I tell her about the past several weeks, including everything that happened with Jason and how I have been dodging his phone calls. Glancing into her smiling eyes, I sadly smile back.
“Have you heard from Trent?” she asks.
Rolling my eyes because I knew we would eventually get to the conversation, I answer, “As a matter of fact, he called me from South Africa several days ago when he went in for supplies. Seems the waterway is coming along fine, and when I mentioned how much money I was able to help raise this summer for the Clean Water Project, he was astounded. You know Trent. He’s already trying to figure out who to help next. He’s extended himself for another eight months, so I have to handle some personal things for him here at home.”
“Personal things?” she asks.
I knew I couldn’t keep this from her forever, but for some reason, at the time, I didn’t want to share it with anyone. As always, I nursed my broken heart in private. Looking out over the lake, I reply, “He called me about six months ago saying he had met some nurse at one of the medical camps and they were getting married when he returned home. He wanted to know if I could plan everything for them, nothing fancy, because they wouldn’t have much time at home before they had to return. He said he knew he could count on me,” I finish, looking back at her.
“Oh, Kylie.” Her voice radiates sympathy.
Laughing instead of crying, I continue, “So I did. I arranged everything from the preacher to the cake. It was almost like an out-of-body-experience. And the kicker is, when he called the other day, he said it didn’t work out, and asked if I would mind canceling everything. I mean, I should have known. I’ve told you how bad he is at personal relationships.” Not wanting her to see the hurt emerging on my face, I turn to sit my glass down.
“Look at me, Child.”
I feel her paper-thin skin as her hand reaches to hold on to mine. Glancing up into her knowing eyes, she gently smiles.
“You know that I spent the first thirty years of my life chasing my husband. What you probably do not know, and thank God many gossipmongers never knew, is that he was married.”
I’m shocked because I didn’t know. Never would have even guessed. Not that my aunt is perfect, but chasing a married man doesn’t seem like something she would ever have done or had to do.
“I see the look of shock on your face. It’s not something I’m proud of, but I think you can relate to what I was feeling. It was the beginning of summer, and the first time we met it was as if the world stopped spinning. He walked into the soda shack that fateful day and my heart was never my own. A mutual friend immediately informed me that he was single, but not for long because he was also engaged. Everyone said it was to prosper both families’ business holdings, which was the truth, but he cared about her too. He just wasn’t in love with her. God, I loved that man from the first conversation we had. I was all in, hook, line, and sinker. Being young and naive, I thought I could win him over, and I tried my best the summer before his marriage. We spent every day together, but come three months later, never mind that we were both head over heels in love, he stood at the alter and married her.”
I can’t believe I never heard this tale before. I see the wetness she tries to conceal as she looks away telling her story.
“My father allowed me to travel after my mother told him of my broken heart. So I spent the next three years living in Paris studying fashion. Once my mother became sick, with what I now believe to be breast cancer also, I traveled back home to be with her. One of the reasons I refuse to let you or your mother be with me every second is because I know what it’s like to sit, day after day, watching someone you love whittle away. At the funeral, I glanced up from her eulogy to see my love standing across from me. This time, he pursued me,” she says staring off, caught in a different time. “I was lost and let a married man chase me. I refuse to detail the gory history, but to be honest, we both acted like hedonists when we shouldn’t. Forbidden fruit and all that.”
Smiling, she shrugs at me, and I reach to squeeze her hand.
“One day, I woke up realizing that this was no life. A love that I couldn’t tell anyone about, nor was it going anywhere. So one morning, I packed my bags and without a single goodbye, moved with some friends to New York. My heart ached because I never allowed myself to give any other man a chance, and believe me, there could have been others. Several years later, I opened my door to once again see my lover standing on my doorstep. He was devastated after his wife had died in a car accident along with his infant daughter, and ironically, with her own lover as she was evidently leaving him. Within a year, we were married, and I loved him more than life itself. I never knew if his death was my punishment because I loved him more than God almighty, but a year to the date that we said our vows, he died of a heart attack. The greatest tragedy for me is that I allowed my heart to die with him that day, never realizing that life is too short and, at the same time, so long, to think your love is limited.”
Tears gather in the corners of my own eyes as I listen to her story. I never knew.
Gripping my hand tighter, she pulls me closer to her, saying, “The biggest tragedy would be never knowing for sure how Trent feels or denying someone else of having their own happily ever after because their soul-mate is hung up on the wrong one.”
“What if I can’t stop loving him, and he doesn’t feel the same way about me?”
“What if he does, Kylie? You will never know until you lay it on the table. While you wait, you are just spending your time, precious minutes that you will never get back.” Groaning, she pulls back her hand and reaches for her back. “Enough gabbing with an old lady for today. Go live your life. Live it until Trent comes home, and then, you can decide what you need to do. Don’t waste a second.”
I help her as she struggles to stand, hugging her closely until she finally does. “I love you so much, Aunt Leigh.” She has lost so much weight that I take extra care not to squeeze too tight. My soul hurts with the knowledge t
hat her time on this earth is limited.
“I know you do, dear. Just remember that the heart is capable of many loves. It took me way too long to figure that out. By then, it was too late.”
Kissing my cheek, she calls out for her nurse to help her back inside. Turning to look back over the lake, I release the tears I’ve been holding back and digest all that I’ve learned today. Can I begin to give other men a chance when I know that my heart is elsewhere? To me that is just cruel. But what if Trent isn’t the one?
Later on that day, sitting at my desk while working at Decadent Darling, I look up as Madison breezes in on a cloud of her signature True Religion perfume.
“Who loves ya, Babe?” she says, holding two tickets in her hand. Plopping down in the chair across from me, she waves them saying, “Two fifty yard line tickets to the opening preseason football game. Who is with me?”