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Harder to Breathe
Holy. Shit. TMZ. This couldn’t be happening. When I left with Rich the night before, I left all my things behind. I was so upset from having to dance for Lucas that my only thought was to get the hell out of there. After a few drinks, the thought never crossed mind that anyone would even be wondering where I was. But apparently it wasn’t too long until everyone found out where I was anyways. I completely forgot that Nathan’s tournament was at the Bellagio. And it fucking figured it would be a celebrity tournament with the paparazzi.
Deciding not to look at my phone until I got home, I hit the Bluetooth in my car to call Rose. She had to keep me from seeing the mess I just made for myself.
“Where the fuck have you been?” she screamed before I could even say hello.
“Well, good morning to you to,” I responded.
“Don’t even give me that shit. I see you have your phone back. Where are you?”
“Meet me at my house in twenty,” I told her.
We both pulled up at the same time. I could see the angry look on her face, but also that look of concern only Rose could give me. Before we even made it through the front door, she pulled me into a hug so tight that I almost couldn’t breathe.
“Is it that bad?” I asked.
“You haven’t checked it out yet?”
“No. I just got my phone back. Once Damon told me I was on TMZ, I didn’t want to look at anything until I got home.” I replied.
“C’mon. Let’s go inside.” Shit.
I let Roxy out, cleaned up her mess since she’d been locked for over twelve hours, and let Rose turn on the computer. All I could hope was that my Vaughn get-up disguised me enough that no one could recognize me. My jaw hit the ground when I saw the picture was sprawled all over the internet. Right there in full color were my beautiful butterfly tattoos. My tattoos are something that I'm proud of. I believed that my babies should be remembered and talked about, so I often showed them to people.
I sat there stunned. If things weren’t bad before they were sure going to get bad now. Between Lucas and now the pictures, there was no going back to the Ryann I was before. I felt like someone had punched me in the stomach. The tears started to build in my eyes, my hands started to shake, it became hard to breathe. I could feel the anxiety attack coming on.
“Go lay down. Now!” Rose demanded. “Give me your phone.”
I did my best to calm down and listen to her. A few minutes later she brought me a Xanax and a bottle of water. Again, she knew me all too well.
“Alright, let’s see what we have here,” she said as she started scrolling through my phone. “Missed calls from me, your mom, Lucas, and Nathan, and same for the text messages. I'm just going to delete all this social media crap.”
“Anything that I need to hear? Nothing from Lucas please. I’ll deal with him later. What did Nathan say?”
“He’s seen the news and wants to see you tonight.”
“K,” was all I said.
“Sent,” Rose snickered.
“Wait, what?”
“You said "K," so I assumed you wanted to see Nathan.”
“No, bitch, I was saying "K" to you. I broke it off with him, remember? I really don’t want to deal with all of this right now.”
“Too late. You can thank me later,” she bluntly told me.
I slept for most of the day. When I woke up, Rose was gone and I had no idea when or if Nathan was coming over because I hadn’t heard from him since Rose sent him that text. I knew he was playing in a tournament, but didn’t know what time it was over. I decided now was as good of a time as any to start reading my missed messages.
Text messages were first. My mom, Nathan and Rose were all very concerned about me. But Lucas just straight out got hateful.
Lucas- What the fuck Ryann? Great way to tarnish your name and your reputation. I always knew you were a slut.
You’ve got to be kidding me right? He was the one who left me! He was the one in a strip club already getting married again! What right did he have to call me anything? I couldn’t stop the angry tears from falling. Lucas McKennan would get what’s coming to him.
When I checked my Facebook most of the messages were from friends or coworkers asking if it was me or that some stripper had the same tattoo as me. I’m glad that not everyone recognized me.
