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“It’s fine, dear,” Mom had said. “Don’t you worry about us. We know who you are, and we love you. You just take care of that omega of yours.” It was like a punch in the gut. I hadn’t even told them about Arlo, and yet they called him mine. How was I supposed to admit I’d lost him—even worse, that he’d never been mine in the first place.
Gods, I hoped the media wasn’t harassing him. I’d been trying to keep my distance for both our sakes, but I thought about him pretty much every waking moment. He’d sent me one text right after the article went live. It said simply: You’ve got this.
I hoped he was right, because right now, I felt like everything was slipping through my fingers.
It was with Arlo’s words of encouragement that I found myself heading for dinner with my agent. Dane had insisted I leave my hotel room, but I wasn’t in the mood for a public show with people gawking, so I picked a tiny hole-in-the-wall restaurant, Tony’s Pizza.
The place was kitschy, but I loved it immediately, with its red-and-white checkered tablecloths, paper menus, and greasy, cheesy pizzas that seemed to mock my old diet. Maybe if I still had a career, I would care about what I put in my body, but right now, all I wanted was to eat until I filled the hole inside me.
Dane sat across from me, his ginger hair somehow even redder in the fake, flickering candlelight. He looked grim. “Okay, so I’ll give you the bad news first. Production of Summer of Love has been put on hold… indefinitely. They want to see if public opinion will shift one way or the other before they waste money on marketing something that might not sell.”
I scoffed, shoving pizza into my mouth. “They wanna see if I can come back from this,” I mumbled around the mouthful. My back had bowed, and my head was nearly hanging over my plate. “Never gonna happen.”
My agent took a sip of his wine, not speaking for a long minute while I moped. “Now, do you want the good news?” he asked.
I glanced up at him warily. “There’s good news in all this?”
“There is.” He pushed his plate aside and folded his arms on the table in front of him, leaning in to look me in the eye. “I’ve had some offers for roles. It seems a lot of people want to jump on this publicity, regardless of whether it’s good or bad. You’re still a name, after all.”
“Roles?” I asked suspiciously. “What kinds of roles?” I imagined people might think I was desperate for work, inviting lowball offers. Great, I was a budget actor now.
“The roles are… different,” he admitted before holding a hand up, forestalling any argument. “Hear me out before you say no. There are a couple small stage productions, including to play Hamlet.” I opened my mouth to argue, but he shot me a look that said to shut it. “And there’s one fairly gritty film, about a cage fighter with a drug addiction. Now, I know it’s not your usual light, fluffy rom-com niche, but I think that could be a good thing. Your image is changing, and now is the perfect chance to redefine who you are and what you can do.” Dane seemed to hold his breath, waiting to see what I would say.
I set my pizza down and took a long slow breath. Arlo’s words came back to me, an echo of what Dane was saying. “This might be your chance to show the world what you can really do.” Arlo had faith in me, that I was more than what came across on the screen. Dane, apparently, also believed in me.
“Maybe,” I said at last.
“Maybe?” my agent echoed, surprised and thoroughly too pleased.
“Yeah. Maybe.” I wasn’t outright agreeing to anything yet, but it wouldn’t hurt to look over a script. Right?
The film company was small, up-and-coming, looking to make it big by throwing my name into the mix. It wasn’t my usual paycheck, but it was work. They were based out of LA, and they wanted me to come in for a table read, which meant… it was time to go home.
I’d known for a while that I didn’t have a reason to stay in the hotel—or town at all, for that matter—but Arlo was here, and though we weren’t together, knowing he was close by had been a comfort. Now, the thought of flying across the country and leaving him behind nearly broke me.
With fumbling fingers, I shoved my clothes into my suitcases. I paused when I came to the tie we’d used to bind Arlo’s wrists. I was suddenly struck with an image of him submitting to me, his moans in time with the smacks of my palm across his ass. Sighing, I balled the tie up and shoved it into my pocket.
With my bags packed, I called a porter to bring them downstairs, then headed down to check out. The sun was just beginning to set. My flight would leave for LA in three hours, and I would say goodbye to the city, the hotel… and Arlo.
Gerald saw me crossing the lobby and opened the door for me. “I haven’t seen you all week. I hope you’ve been well.”
“Fine,” I said, though I suspected it would be a long time before I was fine again.
Gerry glanced at my bags being wheeled out on a cart. “It looks like your stay is over.”
“It is,” I said gravely. “Filming is done, so there’s nothing keeping me here now. I’m headed home to LA.”
He nodded, his smile slipping. “I’m sorry to see you go. I thought maybe… well, I hope you’ll excuse my saying, but after your fiancé left here brokenhearted, I thought you might decide to stay. You two seemed perfect together.”
“We were…” I whispered, tears prickling behind my eyes.
Gerry seemed to understand I didn’t want to talk about it, so he waved down a cab for me and saw to my luggage being put in the trunk.
I was only vaguely aware of the cab ride to the airport, to the plane ride home. The whole time, I ran the silk tie through my fingers, the creases left from the knot I’d tied around Arlo’s wrists. He should’ve been here with me, but it had only ever been a job for him, and now the job was over.
And I was alone.
When I got back to my condo, I paused in the entryway, dropping my bags to the floor. It had that smell of absence and neglect, stale and unlived in. Or maybe it had always smelled like this, and it was only Arlo’s remembered scent I missed.
