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I chewed my lower lip for a few moments, and then I picked up my phone and sent a text to my oldest friend, which said: Hey Beck. Do you have time to talk?
He video called me a few seconds later, and when I answered, his smiling face appeared on the screen. His blue eyes sparkled, and his short, light brown hair was disheveled, as if he’d recently rolled out of bed. “Happy New Year,” he said. “I hear we missed one hell of a party last night.”
“Everyone seemed to be having a good time. Are you and your husband still at your apartment?”
“We are, and we had a wonderful celebration for two last night.” He tilted his head and asked, “Where are you right now? That doesn’t look like Seahorse Ranch in the background.”
“I’m at Lorenzo’s former apartment in West Hollywood. His friend is on vacation, and he’s letting us spend the night.”
“I feel like I’m missing some key pieces of this story,” Beck said. “What happened after Leonidas and I left for L.A. yesterday afternoon?”
“So much. Here are the highlights: Lorenzo and I slept together, and tomorrow night I’m leaving for a month, because apparently I just landed the biggest movie role of my career.”
Beck yelled, “Oh my God, Will!”
I told him about the job first, and he literally screamed with excitement. Then I said, “The part about Lorenzo and me is a lot more complicated.”
“Start at the beginning. Not the part where you’ve had a crush on him forever, because I already know that.”
“Well, it began with a New Year’s Eve kiss.”
I told him what had happened over the last several hours, and then he said, “I’m surprised you don’t seem happier, given how long you’ve been pining for Lorenzo. Wasn’t it like you’d hoped it would be?”
“I just didn’t expect the emotional overload that hit me in the middle of it.”
He asked, “Was this the first time you’ve had sex since you quit working as a prostitute? If so, I could see why that might happen.”
“Yes, and it was also the first time I ever had sex with someone I actually care about.”
“Really?”
“You know my story, Beck, so why do you sound surprised? I was a virgin until I moved to California, and then I was all about the random hookups. Once I became a prostitute, I lost any desire to have sex for fun, and I sure as hell didn’t date.”
He looked sympathetic. “No wonder this threw you off.”
“I was totally overwhelmed. I’m not used to that kind of intimacy, and I’m definitely not used to feeling so vulnerable.”
“I hope you’re planning to talk to Lorenzo about this.”
“I will, but not today. That must have been a lot for him too, since I’m the first person he’s slept with since Javier died. I don’t want to make it more complicated for him.”
“I see what you mean.”
I hugged my knees to my chest, and after a moment I admitted, “I’m scared I might be too damaged to ever really let my guard down with Lorenzo.”
“You’re not too damaged, Will. I promise. Just take it slowly, and it’ll all work out.” I really wanted to believe that.
Chapter 5
The next day, at 12:13 p.m., I signed a contract to play the title character in the film adaptation of a bestseller I’d loved since I was a teen. It felt absolutely surreal.
When I met Lorenzo in the studio parking lot afterwards, I had a death grip on a manila envelope containing my copy of the signed contract, the script, and a big, fat check. He asked, “Did everything go okay?” I removed the check from the envelope and held it up so he could read it, and he said, “Wow, I’ve never seen a check for twenty grand before.”
“Me neither.”
“I’m glad Sylvia was able to get you that much money.”
“This is only a third of what she was able to negotiate. The studio wanted to pay me scale, but she played hardball and got them to increase it, because this was all so last-minute.”
“Holy shit!”
I burst out laughing when Lorenzo lifted me off my feet and swung me around. When he put me down again, I asked, “Can we please go to a bank? Like, right now? I’m terrified something’s going to happen to this tiny piece of paper.”
“Definitely.”
As we climbed into the red convertible, I said, “I think I’m in shock. I keep expecting to wake up and find out it was all a dream.”
Lorenzo smiled at me and said, “Well, good news, Sleeping Beauty. This is really happening.”
When we reached the bank, I deposited ten grand in the account I maintained for my parents and put two thousand dollars in my checking account. The rest went into a savings account earmarked for the IRS, because Sylvia had warned me to err on the side of caution when it came to paying my taxes.
