When It’s Real by Erin Watt

12

HIM

BeeBee_OF@OakleyFord_stanNo1 Please take screenshot of her account. It’s private.

OakleyFord_stanNo1@BeeBee_OF Here u go.

BeeBee_OF@OakleyFord_stanNo1 She’s not even that cute.

OakleyFord_stanNo1@BeeBee_OF I kno but we gotta respect Oakley’s choices. At least it’s not April Umbrella

BeeBee_OF@OakleyFord_stanNo1 true, but I hate her. Why can’t it be me?

BeeBee_OF@OakleyFord Pls follow me bae!

Vaughn shows up at my beachfront home around seven. She’s wearing jeans with a hole in the knee, a striped tank top and a big scowl.

“I cannot believe you sent a car for me!” she fumes as she enters the huge foyer.

“Hello to you, too,” I crack.

“It took us two hours to get here! I could’ve just taken the bus. It would’ve been way faster, and then your poor driver wouldn’t have had to sit in LA traffic there and back.”

She’s worried about the driver? That’s a first. The last time I sent a Towncar to pick up a date, the chick complained that it wasn’t a limo.

“It’s Marco’s job,” I tell Vaughn. “Trust me, he gets paid a fortune to sit in traffic.”

She doesn’t look appeased, and she barely even glances at her surroundings. Most people oooh and ahhh over the white marble floor, the high ceiling and the sparkling crystal chandelier, but Vaughn couldn’t care less.

Tyrese closes the front doors behind her and shoots me a wry grin over her head. Good luck with this one, he seems to be saying.

Awesome. We’re already off to a great start. “C’mon, let’s go to the living room,” I say with a sigh.

Vaughn follows me down the wide marble hallway, clutching her oversize canvas purse at her side like she’s afraid I’ll try to snatch it from her. I lead her into the enormous media room and gesture to the sectional.

“Sit down. You want something to drink?” I drift over to the bar area and open the stainless-steel fridge. “I’ve got beer, Coke, OJ, water—”

“Water, please.”

I grab a bottle of water and a beer for me then join her on the couch.

“You hungry?”

“I ate before I came.” She’s huddled over her phone, engrossed by whatever’s on the screen, but when she hears Ty’s footsteps edging toward the door, her head snaps up. “Where are you going?” she asks him, sounding nervous.

“Leaving you two alone.” His lips twitch. “Seeing as how you’re on a date and all.”

“Oh, no, please, stay,” she blurts out. “You can hang with us. Let’s play Monopoly or something. Please.”

My jaw hardens. Seriously? She’s literally begging Ty not to go. And she wants to play a board game? On a frickin’ date?

I’ve never been more insulted in my life.

“Uh…sounds fun, but…nah.” Looking like he’s choking down laughter, Ty ducks out of the room and shuts the door.

I twist off the bottle cap and glare at my date. “Monopoly? Really?”

Her brown eyes flicker with resignation. “It’s fine. We don’t have to play. I brought a book.”

To punctuate that, she sticks her hand in her monster purse and legit pulls out a paperback. I can’t see the title. I don’t care what the title is. Because this is fucking unacceptable.

“You realize there are millions of girls out there who would kill to be sitting beside me right now?” I say tightly.

She flips the book open, not even looking at me. “Yeah? Then why are you paying me to do it?”

I bristle at the reminder, but choose to ignore it. “Put the damn book away,” I order.

“Why? It’s not like this is a real date.”

“You just said so yourself—I’m paying you to be here. And I’m not spending my hard-earned money on sitting here and watching you read.” I scowl at her. “I decide what we’re gonna do.”

Her eyes flash for a moment, but she manages to rein in the comeback she clearly wants to hurl my way. Very methodically, she closes the book and puts it back in her bag. Then she primly clasps her hands in her lap. “Fine. What would you like to do, Oakley?”

“Call me Oak,” I say automatically.

“Pass.” She smirks. “I repeat—what would you like to do?”

I smirk back. “Make out.”

Vaughn squeaks in horror. “Ew. No.”

Ew?

I grit my teeth. “Don’t act like you don’t think I’m hot. I see the way you check me out.”

A blush blooms on her cheeks. “I have never checked you out.”

“Yeah, right. Yesterday at the fondue place, you couldn’t quit staring at my arms.” A cocky grin stretches my lips as I lift one arm and flex for her. “You like the gun show, huh?”

Her face turns even redder. “Stop being a jerk.”

“Stop pretending I’m not hot.”

Vaughn stares at me for a minute, her expression going from embarrassed to outraged to disbelieving. “You’re the most conceited person I’ve ever met.”

I shrug.

“And PS? Even if I did think you were hot, I still wouldn’t make out with you. I have a boyfriend, remember?”

“Right. Z.”

“W,” she growls.

I knew that, but I kinda like making her eyes blaze with anger like that. If she’s angry at me, then that means she’s not ignoring me. I don’t like being ignored.

“You’re gonna have to make out with me eventually. It’s part of the deal,” I remind her.

“I have to kiss you. Not make out with you. There’s a difference.”

I laugh. Is that what she tells herself? “Really? Because our lips will be pressed together. My hands will be somewhere on your body. Maybe your ass. In your hair. My tongue’s gonna be in your mouth.”

Her eyes flash again and this time the heat in them isn’t entirely because she’s pissed off. Then again, I could be imagining things.

“I’m good with my tongue, Vaughn.” I smile at her. “You’re gonna find that out soon enough.”

“There will be no tongue,” she sputters. “No one said there would be tongue!”

I can’t help myself. “You never swap spit with ol’ Xylophone? You sure this kid isn’t using you as a beard?”

“Oh, my God. It’s W, which you know, and what I do with W is none of your damned business.” She folds her arms across her chest and stares straight at the blank television screen.

My retort stalls in my throat because her action pushes her tits together in a pretty fantastic way. I wonder if I should tell her that I can now see the white lace of her bra cups peeking over the top of her tank. Nah, what she doesn’t know can’t hurt her.

Besides, if she’s going to be a complete asshole, I should get the pleasure of looking at her rack. I leisurely inspect her as I tip the bottle back. Vaughn is about as far from my type as possible. I like them leggy, with big boobs and a lot of hair. She’s got the hair, but she’s kind of on the short side—I’d peg her around five and a half feet—and she doesn’t have a ton going on upstairs, but what she does have is nice to look at.

“What do you want to watch?” she asks.

I almost say you but catch myself in time. She looks like a girl who slaps. Hard. “Movie?”

“Sure.”

I pick up the remote and turn the TV on. A few more flicks and I’m at the movie listings. “Pick one.”

She picks the first one on the list, which tells me she doesn’t care what we’re watching. Unfortunately, she’s chosen my dad’s latest Oscar bait flick, but I don’t mention that. It’s a World War II epic with long battle scenes. Dad is particularly proud that he survived a Navy SEAL’s two-week-long training period to prep for this movie, and he’ll tell anyone who’ll listen about how he coulda been a SEAL if it wasn’t for his whole passion for acting.

The man can’t drink tap water, for Christ’s sake.

I don’t think what movie she picked registers with Vaughn. She doesn’t watch the opening credits, but instead spends the entire time with her nose pressed to her phone.

“What’re you doing?” I’m annoyed that she’s not watching the movie even though I can’t stand my dad.

“Checking my boyfriend’s Instagram,” she says wistfully.

Jesus. Again with the guy. I narrow my eyes. “You’re not supposed to have contact with him.” I sound jealous, but I’m really not. I just don’t want to break in another chick for this pretend gig. It’s hard enough with Vaughn. Who knows what kind of female I’d get next? With my luck, it’d be a stage-five clinger who thinks we’re going to get married. AKA April Showers but on emotional steroids.

“Public contact.” She juts her chin toward me defiantly. “No one said I’m not allowed to look at his Instagram. I do everything else Claudia demands, including quitting my job.”

“You have a job?” I’m paying the girl a fortune and she has another job?

“I did. I was a waitress at Sharkey’s.” She crosses her arms again.

Forcibly, I move my eyes to the coffee table. “Never heard of it.”

“It’s a chain. They serve steak.”

I roll my eyes. “Sounds like you loved it.”

“I made good money there.”

“Did Alphabet love it?”

She scowls. “No, why?”

I pluck her phone from her hand and scan the feed. W is attending college and his feed consists of his “crew,” a bunch of backward-hat-wearing bro dudes who are surgically attached to red Solo cups and too much plaid. “He looks like a douche.”

She grabs the phone back. “He’s not a douche. He’s great.”

“Okay, tell me what’s so great about him,” I challenge.

“He’s kind…he’s funny…” She trails off. “He’s kind.”

Kind?Man, if any girl ever describes me as kind in the same lukewarm tone, I hope someone takes me out back and shoots me. “You said that already.”

Her jaw snaps shut and she stares at the television.

That’s no fun. “Besides the fact that he’s kind,” I say sarcastically, “why him out of all the guys you could have?”

She casts me a dirty glance. “You make it sound like there’s a buffet of guys and I can just pick out anyone I want. It doesn’t work that way in the real world. The person you like has to like you back.”

“Are you saying you like W because he was your only choice?” I ask incredulously. I can’t believe that. This girl? She’s got to have a few of the high school guys after her. I never went to an actual high school, but Vaughn’s a babe in her own way. I’d totally want to tap that ass between classes.

“He wasn’t my only choice. I like him. I don’t have to justify my feelings to you.”

“How’d you meet?”

“Why do you want to know?”

Because I’d rather shave my legs than watch my dad act. “I figure the two of us should get to know each other, seeing as we have to spend an entire year together. Sitting in complete silence during all our dates doesn’t sound like a boatload of fun. Not to mention you may want to consider being a little nicer, considering that I’m paying you a fucking fortune for this gig.”

Her brown eyes widen and her plump lips fall open, forming a little circle—one that has me conjuring up some dirty ideas.

Then she scoffs. “Oh, come on, like you’re actually the one paying.”

“Who the hell else would it be? The tooth fairy?”

“I thought it was Jim.”

“Who do you think writes checks to Jim?” I scrunch my eyebrows. Is she that clueless?

“Oh.”

I guess so. “Yeah, oh.”

“What is it that you want to know?”

The question comes out as a sigh, as if it’s such a burden to talk to me, and suddenly I’m done. There are worse things than watching a film starring my dad, and one of them is trying to drag out boring details from an ordinary girl who has to be paid to sit and watch a movie with me.

“Whatever. Let’s just watch the movie,” I mutter irritably.

We both stare at the screen again, but I don’t think we’re watching the same film. Instead of seeing Dad point a gun at a Nazi deserter, my eyes conjure up the sight of him spotting my Double Platinum record on the mantel next to his Oscar. What the hell is this trash doing here? Mom titters. Honey, Oak’s second album sold another million copies. Dad sneers. He sings songs that preteens buy for ninety-nine cents. He pulls it off the mantel and shoves it at Mom. Find somewhere else for that shit. The scene flips from the living room to the deck, where I come home early from the studio to find him screwing his latest assistant over the edge of Mom’s balcony. No wonder she gets the place redecorated all the time. There’s a fade cut and a new action shot of Dad standing at the end of Jim’s conference table, telling me that I’m a dumbass if I sign the contract for three more records.

And I’d have killed myself if I stayed in that house one more minute with him, so I signed the contract. It takes money to fund a legal emancipation, after all.

“This movie’s kinda boring,” Vaughn remarks, breaking into the lame drama that’s replaying itself in my head. She tugs on her messy ponytail.

I stretch my arm across the back of the sofa until the ends of her rich dark brown hair brush the back of my hand. “I’ll make sure to pass that critique along to my dad.”

She pinks up immediately. “Oh. Oh, my God. I forgot Dustin Ford was your dad. Is your dad, I mean. That must be awesome.”

Unbelievable. The first sign of enthusiasm from her and it’s toward my asshole old man? “Yup. The one and only Dustin Ford.” Do I sound bitter? I clamp my mouth shut.

“Oh,” she says for the third time tonight. But her embarrassment lasts only a beat, because she rallies to add, “Well, I’m not going to pretend I like it just because he’s your father.”

I don’t tell her that it’s the one nice thing she’s said to me tonight. Instead, I reach for the remote and turn the movie off.

She picks up her bottle of water and rolls it between her hands. “Should we try the get-to-know-you thing again?”

“Sure.” I flip my hand over and rub a few errant strands of hair between my fingers. Her hair does seem unreal. It’s a deep mahogany and there are a dozen shades of red and brown in it. It’s probably from a bottle. Nothing out here is natural.

“Okay, me first. Why wouldn’t you shake my hand?”

“I’m not a fan of being touched.” Ironic given that I’m surreptitiously fondling her hair. I continue to do it anyway. “I’m constantly being grabbed when I go out, even though I have Big D and Tyrese at my side. When I’m in private, I prefer to be the one to initiate contact. It’s nothing personal. And now it’s my turn. Why are you doing this?”

“Money.” She looks at me under her lashes. “My parents were kinda irresponsible and left us with a lot of debt. Paisley’s held our family together and it’d be incredibly selfish of me to not step up when I had the opportunity.”

I rub my forehead as the implication hits me. I’m being mean to an orphan. A family of orphans. And it doesn’t escape me that we’re both kind of in the same situation—two teenagers without any parents in the picture. My folks aren’t dead, but they might as well be, considering how often I see them.

“My turn again,” she says. She turns toward me, pulling a knee up onto the sofa and tucking her foot under a jean-clad thigh.

“Why are you doing this? Out of all the people in the world, I would think that you’d have the least amount of trouble finding someone to go out with—even a ‘normal’ person.” She air quotes the word normal.

It’s hard to hide that I’m fondling her hair when she’s staring at me, so I pull my arm away on the pretense of reaching for my beer, which tastes like warm piss.

“Everyone in LA says they want someone normal, whatever that is, but in the end they don’t because creative types are made differently, live differently. I’m crazy, and everybody else I run with is slightly crazy. You have to be to want to live in a fishbowl and have no privacy. Where ninety-nine percent of your relationships—whether they’re friendships or fuck buddies—are set up for publicity purposes.”

I throw back the rest of the warm-ass beer before continuing. “That’s a long way of answering your question, but the short answer is no normal girl can handle me.” Vaughn opens her mouth to object, but I barrel on. “I’m not saying it’s because I’m great, even though I am—”

She snickers.

“But it’s because she won’t be patient enough to understand there are times that I get so lost in the music I can’t remember to eat, drink or take a shit. All I want to do is sing and play my guitar until my fingers bleed and my voice is sore.” I can’t count the times that April would pound on my home studio door and whine that she was bored. “No normal girl is gonna be able to handle it when I go on tour and find a naked groupie in my hotel suite who got my room number from the bellhop she blew in the stairwell. No normal girl is gonna be able to stand the long concert tours unless she wants to come with, and I promise you by the third tour stop, she’ll be begging to be left behind because she’s tired of the long hours of doing jack shit followed by listening to the same damn set list followed by an endless amount of glad-handing with the tour promoters followed by another flight, bus ride, radio, print and television interview where the people ask the same damn question a million times. So that’s why you’re here and not someone else.”

She’s silent for a long time, and when she does open her mouth, she says something completely unexpected. “That was actually two long answers. Not a short one and a long one.”

“Does it answer your question?” I mutter.

Vaughn bites her bottom lip. “Yeah. It does.”