Chapter 32
It was supposed to be a happy
moment in his life. A proud, exciting
moment. But he found himself nervous,
anxious, and immensely lonely, even though his hotel room was occupied at the
moment by five other people. He glanced
down at his watch. There was an hour to
go and he didn’t even know why
He just wanted to sleep. But he
knew if he got up and walked into his room and undressed and laid down, sleep
wouldn’t come. He’d just lay there,
trying to close his eyes, trying not to stare at the ceiling, trying to think
of anything, everything imaginable, anything that would put him to sleep.
Then he’d start thinking about
her.
And everything would crash down
around him, piling on top of him until he couldn’t breathe, until he’d have to
leave and get out of there, but he wouldn’t know where to go, and the one place
he would want to go, he wouldn’t be allowed.
He had been tempted, very, very
tempted to go and sit at her doorstep and whine and cry and beg for her to come
back to him, but he had lost the strength and lost the energy. He couldn’t do it anymore. He gave up on her the moment she gave up on
him. He thought it would be easy, just
to move on and say fuck it and be bitter and angry.
And he was bitter and he was
furious.
But he missed her, too. And even though he hated himself for it, he
still loved her.
He had come to grips shortly after
the break-up with what was really going on.
He reevaluated her eyes and her voice and everything that had happened
and he knew she was right. It didn’t
have a damn thing to do with him. She
was scared and, and that hurt him. He
never meant to scare her and he never realized how fragile she was until
then. He always assumed she was the
strong woman and he was the man who was so dependant on her that he was
obsessed, even before he met her. He
thought because he had dreamed of her that he had, had to be with her or he’d perish.
Well, he was still alive now and
he had no clue where she was.
But he knew wherever she was, she was
broken. Something had happened, whether
it was his fault or not, that had made her give up, made her terrified and made
her run away. And now that he had the
benefit of reflective perspective he knew it had always been there. From the moment he met her, from the way she
would cling to him, from the way that she wanted him, wanted him so bad but
kept that part of their relationship at bay for a while, from the way that she
got uncomfortable whenever he tried to tell her how deep his feelings really
were.
And now that he looked back on it,
he knew that night at her parents, at the party, in the rain, when she told him
that she loved him, she was fighting herself and she was struggling. She was terrified.
He had always thought that parts
of love could be scary, but when it was right, when it was really, truly right,
it wasn’t scary but instead it was easy and comfortable. It was how he felt when he was with her.
Even when he first met her and the
jitters of not knowing what to do or what to say or what having an actual, real
life Darcy meant, even when he was terrified then, it wasn’t a fear of her, or
a fear of falling in love with her, it was the fear of his mind and the fear of
his dreams, of not understanding what was happening.
But he was never scared of loving
her or of having a relationship with her.
And it was that thought that made
the anger and the bitterness fade away into disappointment and sadness. It made him realize that she was scared of
him and she was scared of loving him and of having a relationship that wasn’t
perfect, that had its demons, and that had to be fought for. It made him realize that to her, the love she
had for him wasn’t right and it wasn’t true.
It was just a fantasy.
He shook his head and mumbled, “no
its not”. Trace looked up at him and
said, “huh?” He just shook his head
again and stood up from the chair he was in and walked over to the window that
looked out over
He knew in his heart she really
loved him. And he knew that, that somehow
they fit and they could be right and their relationship could be real. It wasn’t a fantasy to him and, and he had to
believe that to her it wasn’t either. He
just didn’t understand why she hadn’t tried and why, why after that night she
didn’t even attempt to call him or anything, not even just to say hello or ask
how he was doing.
It was like she gave up and
stopped caring.
At first he wanted to call
her. He almost did several times and
then he would think, ‘no I’ll wait for her to call’ and a week would pass and
it would get harder and harder to call.
And now several weeks had passed and he felt like he was living his
life, living his dreams, putting out a solo record, having a hit on the radio,
doing fairly well for himself independent from anyone else. But he felt dead in a certain way. He was living, of course, but he didn’t feel
alive. He felt like a puppet, being told
where to go, what to do, how to smile, what to say, when to laugh, when to be
serious. He felt fake and it made him
miserable.
Everyone was laughing and even
though he knew they weren’t laughing at him, he knew they weren’t even paying
attention to him, he felt like the laughter was directed towards him and not
the movie they were all watching. He
felt outcasted. He wanted to be
included, he wanted to be happy and part of the group.
And yet whenever they would ask
him to do anything, he’d decline, he’d get angry, assuming they should know
that he was depressed and that he wasn’t in the mood to fake himself into a
good attitude.
He found himself laughing. Thinking about how stupid he had been the day
before calling Britney up. He didn’t
know what he had expected. He just
needed some female attention other than his mother who had been fussing over
him annoyingly since the break-up had happened.
She would waver back and forth between happiness that he was getting over
this fantasy relationship and true sympathy that he had lost someone he
loved. He hated that. His mother was supposed to have the
answers. She was supposed to make him
happy and make him feel better and tell him what he should do.
But she didn’t even know.
And Britney, well that had been a
mistake, a low point. She wasn’t mean or
uncaring on the phone. In fact, she
seemed interested and happy that he had called.
But it was damn, damn clear that
she had moved on and that she was really confused and unsure about what his
phone call was supposed to accomplish.
He shivered and crossed his arms
over his chest, still looking out over the city. He closed his eyes and bowed his head
slightly. He felt small and unimportant
and even though this moment was supposed to be proud and exciting for him, he
felt true juxtaposition of that. He
really did feel like a failure.
“Hey…”
He slowly lifted his head and glanced
at his friend who was standing near him, looking at him. “Oh…what’s up?”
“You alright?” Trace asked.
He didn’t smile and he didn’t
frown. He just looked out of the window
again, suddenly feeling very, very tired.
“Not really.”
“Nerves?”
“I guess.” He shrugged and looked
down at the floor. He was starting to
feel cramped in this room. Even though
it was one of the biggest rooms at the Ritz, and even though Trace was several
feet away, he felt cold and enclosed.
“Don’t worry…” He felt Trace’s hand
on his shoulder and it made him feel like he was choking and that someone was
pinning him down. It was bad, real bad
when comfort from your best friend had turned into something negative. “Everything’s going to work out. I promise ya.
Why don’t you come over here and watch the movie and have a beer with
everyone else?”
And he couldn’t stand the chipper
son-of-a-bitch attitude Trace had had since they had been in
“You need something to take this
edge off. You’re freaking everyone out.”
He turned and stepped closer to
his best friend, looking down at him.
This was the last straw. He let
his voice strengthen in volume and was ready to really physically let out his
frustration on anyone, even Trace. “Oh
am I, Trace? Just fucking great, why
don’t-”
He was silenced and he felt
immediately like a child and knew he had no energy to even try to fight with
anyone. “Shh…calm down. I just, this is a big night for you. You should be happy and do whatever you
want.”
He let his hands drop to his
sides, shaking them and then rolling his shoulders, looking over at all the
people that were watching the movie. But
he knew even though they weren’t looking at him, they were trying to hear every
word he said. He felt like he was in a
room full of spies. “I want to get out
of this hotel room.”
“It’s kind of late.”
He stared at Trace who immediately
had a nervous look on his face. He
didn’t know what had just scared Trace but something had and it was ridiculous
and pissed him off. He smiled at his best friend. “Ya know what….I think you’re right.”
“What?”
Justin walked around the table
there near the window and towards the den area, scratching his head. “What do you guys say about going out for a
drink?”
Everyone glanced up at him and
then back at the movie. Johnny kept his
eyes on him and asked, “What?”
“I don’t know. I figured we could go to a club for a few
hours or something, instead of sitting here like hermits watching movies.”
“You have to be up super early
tomorrow,” Johnny replied.
“You really think I’m going to get
any sleep tonight anyway, Johnny?”
The older man sighed and pushed
himself off of the couch. “Well, you guys decide what to do. Just no early
hours of the morning. You need to be
back here no later than two and try to get some sort of rest. I gotta get home anyway.” He walked over
towards Justin and narrowed his eyes. “You
alright?”
“Yes, I’m fine.”
“I’m proud of you, Justin. You’ve done really solid work this year. You should be happy about that. I have a feeling this is going to go crazy. ”
He rolled his eyes. He wanted to go home. He wanted to relax. He didn’t want anymore uncertainty and
insanity in his life. “Great….”
“Hey, that’s a good thing. You guys be safe. Have a good night.” He followed his manager as he walked over
into the entrance area of the room and grabbed his coat. He put it on and pointed at Justin. “I’ll see you in the morning, alright?”
“Yeah.” The door shut and Justin
stared at it for a moment. He wanted to
leave, too. He needed to get out of
there. Swiftly, he pivoted around and
waved at everyone in the room, walking straight to the TV and turning it
off. “Come on, we’re going out. We’ll meet back in here like 15 and figure it
out, ok?”
There were a few groans and Eric
leaned forward and said, “Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I don’t know if I really
wanna go out,” Trace replied.
Justin threw up his hands. “Well then fucking stay here! I’ll go by myself.”
Everyone was staring at him wide
eyed and he turned and marched straight in his room, wanting to slam the door,
but not, knowing that Trace was probably right on his trail.
Sure enough when he looked over his
shoulder from salvaging through his suitcase, Trace was leaning against the
mahogany dresser. “Why can’t we just
hang out here? You look tired. We can get plastered here.”
“I don’t want to be here anymore!
How hard is that for you to understand?” He said, throwing a shirt onto the bed
and tugging off the t-shirt he was wearing.
“Shit Justin, you’ve got to calm
down.”
He pulled the shirt off and
grabbed the other. He glared at
Trace. “Are you coming or not?”
Trace just stared at him and
finally pounded his fist on the dresser and then turned and yelled, “Fine! Fucking fine!” Then he walked out and slammed the door
behind him.
Justin sat down on the edge of his
bed and stared blankly in front of him, twisting the red shirt in his hand. He almost started laughing. It was just all so pointless. Going out wouldn’t make him feel better. He’d just feel as crowded, as fake, as lonely
as he was now. It would just be a
different scene with more people to witness it.
He was pathetic.
Maybe calling her would be a good
idea. No, no that was a horrible
idea. But maybe, maybe he could have
Trace go see if she was at her place.
And maybe he could convince her to come talk to him.
He didn’t even want to talk to
her. He didn’t want to hear the excuses
and the reasons why she had moved on and why they couldn’t be together. He didn’t want to hear from her that it was
too much, that she couldn’t compete, or whatever the fuck it was she had said
before.
Nothing had changed, nothing.
And he was more miserable now than
when she was infecting his sleep, before he knew her, before all of this had
happened. He almost wanted to go back
then, back there when she couldn’t hurt him that much, not like he was hurt
now.
He blinked, sniffed and ran his
hand over his face. He should just go to
sleep or watch a movie and pretend to concentrate on it, even though his mind
would really be far, far away..
He stood up a little too quickly,
feeling dizzy. He pulled the shirt over
his head and down around his torso, then stumbled to his door and opened
it. Trace was on the couch next to Eric
who had the TV back on, watching some episode of Law and Order on TNT. Everyone else had left and Trace was smiling
and talking into his cell phone.
“Yeah, I don’t know…” He looked up and caught Justin’s stare and
his smile dropped. “Wait, hold on a
second girl….” Justin walked further into the room and sat down on the chair
adjacent to the couch. “What’s up?” Trace asked.
“Who’s that?”
Trace cleared his throat, “Ellen.”
“Oh…well, I’m not feeling too good
so…” He shrugged and moved his gaze to
the TV. “Forget it.”
“You sure?”
He cut his eyes to his best friend
and glared. Why was he asking that if
just a few minutes ago he was pitching a fucking fit? “Yeah…”
Trace pulled the phone back
towards his mouth and said, “Yeah, no. We’re not going out…” Justin watched him laugh and glared at him some
more. “I know, right…yeah, I’ll be
here….see ya.” The phone snapped shut and he looked over at Justin while
putting the device in his pocket. “What
changed your mind?”
“I just…” He shrugged and looked back at the screen as
Ice-T slammed someone into a wall. “I
can’t do this.”
“Why don’t you call her?”
He stared at Trace. He heard Eric sigh and mumble something like,
“I can’t handle this shit,” as he got up and left the den area. Trace met his stare and looked right back at
him, unwavering.
“Don’t give me any bull shit that
this mood is about the album, ‘cause it’s not.”
“What am I supposed to say to
that?”
“I don’t-“
Justin cut him off and leaned
forward, running his hands over his head.
“No really Trace, what the hell am I supposed to do in this situation?”
“Call her.”
He made it sound so simple. Like he could seriously just pick up a phone
and dial. But what if she didn’t answer?
“I can’t.”
And what if she did answer? What then?
“Do you want me to dial and hand
you the phone?”
Trace was mocking him and Justin
leaned back, folded his arms over his chest defensively and muttered, “Fuck
off.”
“All I’m saying is you never
know. She might be in her place right
now, just like you, sitting there depressed, wishing you guys could see each
other again.”
He sighed and lied, “I don’t want
to see her.”
But for some reason he thought
that maybe it wasn’t a lie. Maybe he
really wasn’t ready to be forced to look her in the face and see the
truth. Maybe he’d never be ready. He was starting to annoy himself. He should’ve been over her, long over her,
moved on to some other girl.
But he didn’t want another girl.
“Well then what do you want ME to
do Justin?” Trace said and Justin was semi-surprised at the slightly panicked
tone. “Do you want me to ignore it? ‘Cause
I tried and you got mad at me for not being supportive, but then when I bring
it up you get defensive. So you tell me
what the hell I can do about this situation.”
“Nothing,” he said and slouched
into his seat some more. “You can’t do a
damn thing, and neither can I.”
“Right…” Trace laughed and stood
up. “That’s a great attitude.”
Justin stood up as well and stared
at his best friend in the face. “What
the hell is your problem? Why of all
nights is this the night you’re bringing this shit up?” Trace’s stare broke and
he tried to step around Justin and ignore the question. But Justin could see something in his eyes,
some flicker of mischief, as if something was going to happen and he didn’t
know about it. Justin stepped in his way,
hands fisted by his sides. “What are you up to?”
“Nothing.”
“You’re such a liar.”
Trace stepped around him. “You want something to drink?”
“What’s going on Trace?” His eyes followed him as Trace walked into
the small kitchen area.
“Just relax. Let me get you a beer. Or how about a shot?”
“I don’t want anything.” Justin
glared as Trace pulled a beer out of the small refrigerator. He was about to interrogate him some more
about the small smile he was carrying around and the way he was talking, but
there was a knock at the door. It scared
Justin and immediately he felt like he was going to throw up. “What the fuck is that?”
“Why don’t you go open it and see?” Trace was smiling.
“Hell no, what did you plan?”
Trace took a sip from his beer and laughed.
Justin felt like he could punch something, anything. His best friend was looking like a good
target. His heart was pumping fast. He couldn’t deal with anyone right now, even
if it was only room service. “Fuck Trace,
I don’t want a fucking party!”
“It’s not a party.” Trace rolled his eyes and Justin started to
feel sicker.
“Well, I’m not answering.”
Trace sighed and shook his head,
walking towards the door. “You’re such a
fucking pussy. I’m going to find Marty.”
Trace was soon out of sight and he could hear the door open, but it
didn’t close.
Justin was tired of this and
didn’t want some stranger coming in. “Fuck
Trace, you can’t just….”
But when he turned the corner,
there wasn’t a party and there wasn’t someone with room service. Trace was gone. The door clicked shut, and standing before
him was the one person who he loved and at the same time feared more than
anything.
“Hi.”
She was wearing jeans and a
sweater and a little knit hat. Her
cheeks were red and her hair was wavy.
She looked more beautiful than he remembered. He really felt like he was going to vomit.
He gulped. “H-hello.”
It started to make sense. The reason Trace suddenly started mentioning
her again, how Trace had been happy and trying to get him to cheer up. How much he had tried to convince him to call
her. Apparently Trace had called Darcy
and set this whole thing up.
Shit.
And now she was here out of
pity. She stepped forward, eyes wide. “Are you ok?”
“What are you doing here?” He
said, his voice a hoarse whisper. He
cleared his throat. He was feeling
dizzy. “Did…did he put you up to
this? ‘Cause I swear I didn’t ask him
to. You don’t have to be here.” He rushed to explain. He could see the pity in her eyes, the
nervousness.
She didn’t want to be there.
A small, sad smile came to her
face and she looked down at the floor. “I
want to be here.”
But she couldn’t. They were over. They were done. And he couldn’t be dragged through this
again. He wasn’t strong enough.
“What?”
She stepped forward and she was
close now, only a few feet separating them.
She was wearing that perfume she always wore, that he had told her many
times how much it intoxicated him. And
she was wearing her hair the way he liked it.
She pulled off her knit hat and set it down on the floor, along with her
purse.
She was chewing at her lip and she
ran her hand through her hair, staring directly at him now.
Her brown eyes were haunting and
suddenly he was reminded of the first time he saw them, really, truly saw
them. At that time they had been
surprised, excited, happy.
Now they looked tired and
distant. But they were looking right at
him.
“Can we talk?”
He didn’t know what to say. He didn’t know what was happening. She wanted to be there? She wanted to talk? He didn’t invite her in, but he didn’t have
to. She walked through the room, past
him and sat quietly down on the couch, staring at him, waiting for him to come
over and figure out what was going on.
He was clueless and even though he
was happy to see her, amazed to see her, somewhere in his heart there was dread
and fear and the desire to kick her out, slam the door in her face and cry
himself to sleep.
That seemed much easier than
having to listen to whatever she was about to say to him.
But it was too late.
She was there, and he was walking
towards her and as much as he wanted to tell her to leave, he couldn’t. He sat down near her, staring at his knees,
waiting for her to speak. He realized in
that moment that that’s what he had been doing for the past month, waiting.
He had been waiting for her, just
as he had promised. And now she was here
and he had no idea what that meant.