‘You’re not,’ he said. ‘There’s plenty of bleeding.’
He took another shaky breath. ‘It’s not the blood, though.’
‘You don’t have to talk about this,’ I said. ‘I’m the last person that’s going to sit here and force you to talk about things you don’t want to talk about.’
‘No,’ he said. ‘I’m just trying to think of how to put it.’
He took a couple of deep breaths.
‘Belinda lost a tooth,’ he said at last. ‘For me.’
‘You can’t blame yourself for that,’ I said. ‘Blame whoever got high and watchedAlice in Wonderland.’
‘But Belinda wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for me,’ he said. ‘She wouldn’t stay if it wasn’t for me.’
‘Someone’s a bit vain.’
I’d hoped a joke would help the break the tension, but it didn’t. ‘You heard her,’ he said, that wild look coming back into his eyes. ‘She’s refusing medical attention. For a chance to be with me. But I’m not going to pick her. It was never going to be her.’
‘All right,’ I said. ‘Then you can eliminate her. You could go out there right now and do it. I bet Murray, or Carrie, or whoever would let you. Then they could take her off to a dentist.’
‘I can’t do that!’ he exclaimed. ‘What would that look like? “Nice girl loses tooth – mean man eliminates her immediately!”’
‘If you don’t want to be with her, you don’t want to be with her.’
‘It’s not that simple!’
He ran both his hands through his hair. ‘I didn’t think it would be like this, Cece,’ he said. ‘I didn’t think… I didn’t even anticipate…’
‘What?’ I asked. ‘What didn’t you anticipate?’
‘That it would be this hard.’
He tugged at the ends of his hair. His breath was starting to come very fast again.
‘I thought I knew what I was getting into,’ he said. ‘I thought I knew what I was doing. It seemed so simple on paper. Be Prince Charming. Choose the right princess, tell the right story, send the right messages. I forgot that everyone here would be a real person, with real feelings. That I could really hurt them!’
‘Hey, hey, I need you to look at me again, all right?’ I said. ‘Take a deep breath, Dylan. You’re all right. I’ve got you. Here. Drink.’
I handed him the bottle of water again. He took it, but didn’t open it. Instead, his fingers tightened around it. The plastic crunched.
‘I’m going to tell you something,’ I said. ‘It’s going to sound like an insult, but it’s not.’
The plastic crunched again.
‘You can’t hurt these women as bad as you think.’
‘She lost a tooth, Cece!’ he said. ‘A fucking tooth!’
‘And she’ll get incredible camera time out of it,’ I said. ‘I’m sure she’s not exactly thrilled about the situation right now, but when her big episode rolls around, and all the promos are like “Disaster strikes! What will Belinda do?” she’ll be delighted.’
Another crunch from the water bottle.
‘The chances that Belinda’s here purely to fall in love with you are miniscule,’ I said. ‘I promise you, she’s not staying because she’ll die if she doesn’t become your girlfriend. She’s staying because she wants to be on TV.’
‘That’s what you want too,’ Dylan said. ‘But you’re still a person, Cece. With feelings. And if I hurt you—’
‘Hey, hey, hey, it’s okay,’ I said, as his breath sped up again. ‘I’m here. I’m fine. It’s all fine.’
