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With everything we both had going on, the telephone calls eventually became less frequent. Then the letters died off all together. And at some point, one of us suggested that we call things off, at least until he moved back to town. But he loved being a big part of his sister’s life, loved the slower pace out West, loved the warm weather, so I think we both knew by then that he wasn’t ever coming back.
In retrospect, I realize that at twenty and twenty-one, it would have been damn hard to maintain a relationship even if we’d lived in the same city. Doing it long-distance was more than we could handle. But at the time, all I could do was ache bone deep and wonder what I’d done wrong, why I’d driven Scott away.
For another year or two, we called each other on birthdays, and I still spent a good bit of time with his mom and stepdad. But then I started feeling like just when I was getting a little better, something would remind me of Scott and I’d regress all over again. So I asked him to stop calling and I did the same.
I danced every minute I wasn’t working and landed enough roles to be able to move out of my mom’s place and into a dump in Queens. I cut my hair. I started going by Chase Rhodes, my childhood nickname, because my agent said it made me sound like a star. I even tried listening to country music. Basically, I did everything humanly possible to put Scott Boone in my rearview mirror and, eventually, I succeeded. Mostly.
Chapter 8
INTRODUCTION
Charlie (“Chase”) Rhodes
I KNOW I should have warned you that breakup was coming, but, honestly, it hurts like a motherfucker either way and I didn’t want to bring you down, so I figured tearing the Band-Aid off would be the least painful approach. As for me, well, about the only good thing I can say about the next few years in my life is that struggle and pain breed good art. So my heart was broken, my soul fractured, but I danced well. Totally worth it, right? Yeah, I never thought so either. Fucking sucked, but I survived. Bear with me here, and I’ll tell you how.
I’m going to skip the gory, miserable shit because you don’t want to know about how many nights I cried and how many assholes I dated. You don’t want to hear about the times I walked along the street in the middle of the night and fucking screamed, or about how more than once, I fell to my knees and wondered if I was actually bleeding inside because it hurt so bad. And even if you do want to know about that time in my life, I honestly don’t think I can dredge it up without getting depressed all over again, which is not something I’m willing to endure. So trust me when I tell you that my emotional state and my personal life were dreary and shitty and fucking pathetic for a long time.
But then one night, out of nowhere, a beam of light came in. Well, maybe that’s not the best description because it makes him sound angelic, which is a piss-poor analogy for a man who rarely smiled, thought everyone on earth was annoying, and carried so much anger and pain inside him that he made my depressed soul seem joy-filled. But despite all that, there was something about him that drew me, something that made me feel an emotion other than misery and pain, something that gave me a glimmer of hope that maybe, just maybe my heart wasn’t completely dead. His name was Adan Navarro, and the next picture in the album is one I took the night I met him.
My friend Selina and I walked into a bar—yes, I realize this sounds like the beginning of a bad joke, and there were times it felt that way. Anyway, we walked into the bar, and some girl neither of us had ever met came running over, waving one of those disposable cameras.
“You guys! You guys! Can you take our picture? Pleaaaase?”
Sister was drunk as a motherfuckin’ skunk. Her shirt was stained with unidentifiable substances, and her skirt was twisted around and rucked up dangerously high. I mean, if she had sat on a barstool at that point, she’d have had to make sure her underwear was providing good coverage or else she’d have gotten intimately familiar with whatever shit was on there.
“Sure,” Selina said. “No problem.” Then she looked at me expectantly.
I chuckled and said, “Sure. Give me the camera.”
“Thank you!” she squealed as she threw her arms around me and gave me a hug. “I totally owe you!” I had no idea what she owed or how I could collect, but I figured it didn’t matter because by morning she’d forget all about me and be praying to the porcelain god. “Here.” She handed me the camera and then hustled back to her friends.
