Chapter 3. GRAHAM

Chapter 3

GRAHAM

She’s quiet on the return trip. We both are. For all of our earlier give-and-take, there’s only one issue on my mind now: the 2500 miles between us for the next four months. I have three more weeks of class before graduation. The premiere of School Pride is in LA the following week, with the associated whirlwind of red carpets and cast parties and Hollywood in its usual circus atmosphere. Mid-summer, I’ll begin filming my next movie here in New York. It’s a low-budget indie, which means fast and cheap and long hours with no time to fly to LA for a weekend.

Cassie loaned us hoodies, so we don’t have to huddle together for warmth, but I hold Emma’s hand, fingers laced, and she presses her thigh against mine and leans her head against my shoulder. Sighing, she stares out at the Manhattan Bridge view that keeps me from ever wanting to live anywhere but New York. The high-rise windows are thousands of tiny mirrors from this distance, the skyline lit in waves like a sun-drenched waterfall as rays strike each building. I wish I could hit replay on this five-minute span of time; it might be enough to tide me over for a while. But we reach the other side of the river and plunge underground, the fluorescent lighting casting everything with a sickly green tint.

Between the later hour and the hoodies, we won’t freeze now, walking around. There’s plenty to see in SoHo, even this early in the morning. Peering into wide-windowed galleries and tiny shops, we maneuver our way around street vendors setting up for the day—crowding onto the edges of sidewalks that will be jammed with people in an hour or two. Emma and I hunch together as though we live here and we’re just out getting breakfast, and I realize that this is what scares the hell out of me—I already want that with her. I want to be with her, absorb her into my life and have her absorb me into hers.

A conversation I had with Cassie years ago, soon after Zoe and I broke up, pushes into my consciousness. “I don’t understand what girls want, ” I told her. From what I could tell, girls acted like they wanted declarations of undying love, but once they got them, those confessions were taken for granted. That, or you were rejected for being too clingy, dependent, or insecure—all words Zoe tossed out during the week leading up to the breakup.

“Girls expect you to love them forever, and they say they feel the same, but they really mean until I get bored with you. ” I was well on my way to becoming a very bitter sixteen-year-old boy.

Cassie was twenty-two, and had been through her share of relationships by that point. She’d not yet met Doug, and wouldn’t for another three years and one more failed relationship. Sitting at her kitchen table in the tiny walkup she shared with two other girls, we faced a window overlooking a courtyard of dead grass and gravel. The remainder of the view consisted of an adjacent, equally dilapidated building and no sky at all.

“Graham, not all girls will be like that. ”

Torn between despair and hope, I said, “Hmph, ” and gulped from the soda can she handed me when I sat down. She grabbed my hand, wanting to fix everything for me, I know, but she was as powerless to remedy what had happened as I was. The combination of her commiseration and another wave of Zoe thoughts made my throat ache. Yanking my hand from beneath hers, I stared out the viewless window. I didn’t want to cry over Zoe anymore. I wanted to be angry. Anger was so much easier to work with.

Cassie sighed. “Someday, you’ll find a girl who can handle the intense way you love. Who isn’t intimidated by it—because that’s what this is. Zoe can’t feel this profoundly about anything or anyone. She’s shallow and self-centered. And she’s blown the chance at a wonderful guy. ”

I hadn’t believed her, of course—that I’d find a girl like that, someone other than Zoe.

I still didn’t quite believe it last night, when Emma kissed me, and everything I’d dreamed of with her flashed before my eyes.

Now, I’m visualizing us walking these streets together, alone or with Cara between us. I picture her sleeping in my bed. I imagine her accompanying me on location during breaks from school. Then everything speeds up and I watch her walk across a stage to accept her diploma. I see myself sliding a ring on her finger and promising her eternity and lifting a veil and kissing her.

If she hadn’t sent that text at 2 a. m. last night, I might have let her go. I might have never confessed how I felt about her. I was so afraid of wanting too much that I couldn’t trust her handing me a shot at getting it. I don’t want to be that senselessly fearful ever again.

Our outer hands shoved into our respective hoodie pockets, I hold Emma’s left hand in my right, deep inside my pocket. We end up on a bench in front of her hotel, the minutes ticking away, nothing to be done but let them fall until she’s gone.

“What happens now? ” she says, just as I was going to ask if taking her to meet Cassie was too uncomfortable for her. Too much, too soon.

I swallow my question and answer hers. “Now, we run up the minutes on our cell phones and we text, and Skype, and in less than five weeks, I’ll be in LA and so will you. ” Then I realize that I’m not sure if she means now, this second, or now, this point in our newly established relationship. She chews her lip, and I say, “If all you meant was what are we doing for the next half hour, please don’t tell me, because I’ll feel like an idiot. ”

She laughs. “No, I’m good with the five week plan. ”

What about a five year plan? I think. But instead of voicing that, I take her face in my hands and kiss her.

*** *** ***

Emma

       Dad sleeps during the flight. I try to read but can’t concentrate, so I end up reading and rereading the same passages until it’s just ridiculous and I give up and stare out at the blue sky. The cottony clouds below us come in transient batches, alternatively showing and obscuring the miles and miles of nothing, towns and cities popping up occasionally and disappearing before I can begin to guess where we are.

       Every mile takes me farther from Graham.

       And every mile makes me less sure that what happened between us actually happened. It’s like a dream. All of it. I tried to explain to Dad what had taken place—the share-with-your-parent version, of course. I didn’t tell him Graham came to the hotel last night. Or that I texted him at 2 a. m. But he knows something’s up—more than just meeting a friend for breakfast. He’s given me a couple of sidelong glances I’m probably not supposed to have noticed. He knows that Graham has all of a sudden become significant. I don’t know how to explain myself. I know what I feel; I’m just not sure how to make it sound as sensible as it seems to me.

       I turn it all over in my head. Neither of us said the words, but they hung over our heads like a shared thought bubble: I love you. I can’t reconcile the fact that the words seem both too soon and past due.

       Emily will help me sort it out. Before I left for New York, she asked me if I was falling for Marcus. We’ve gone out together several times, the four of us. Emily’s boyfriend, Derek, is one of those guys who gets along with anyone; so is Marcus, usually. Which makes it all the more odd that they don’t seem to relate to each other. Emily and I have watched the two of them talk, and we decided they’re like polite coworkers, or neighbors who’ve never seen the inside of each other’s houses, and don’t really need to, thanks.

       We shrugged and said, “Boys, ” though it annoyed us both.

       I text her right before takeoff.



       Me: I have news

       Em: You changed your mind and aren’t going to move THOUSANDS of miles away from me?

       Me: Um. No. That’s still happening. I thought you were okay with it? : (

       Em: Of course I’m not ok with you leaving Cali! I’m going to miss the shit out of you! What is this news of which you speak?

       Me: We ran into Graham

       Em: Get OUT. MILLIONS of people in nyc… and you run into the hunky, mysterious costar with whom you shared a steamy hotel room moment?

       Me: You’re reading those trashy romance novels again, aren’t you

       Em: I dunno what you’re talking about

       Me: ANYWAY. So graham has a daughter.

       Em: WHAT?!?!?!?

       Me: And also, we’re sort of seeing each other now.

       Em: WHAT?!?!?!?

       Me: Gotta go. Getting the evil eye from flight attendant. Meet me at home at like 3.

       Em: I’m just… WHAT?!?!?!?

       ***

       Two minutes after we land and right after I power it up, my cell is ringing. I’m surprised to see Dan’s name in the display, but he did warn me he’d have School Pride promos set up and we’d discuss them when I returned from my “little college tour. ” I didn’t know he meant we’d talk about them the very minute I got back. My energetic agent is probably on high alert, though I suppose he doesn’t really have any other setting.

       “Hi, Dan. ”

       “Emma, glad you’re back. I have a tentative schedule of interviews, appearances, etcetera for you—Ellen, by the way—woot! —we can go over that in a moment, though, because first I really have to ask—are you absolutely certain about this whole college slash career-killing slash no-more-movies decision? Because I’m getting tons of calls about parts you’d be perfect for—”

       “No, Dan. I’m sure. ”

       “Now hear me out just a moment—the call that came in this morning was actually an action flick and you’d need some personal training to get all badass of course, but hey if Linda Hamilton can do it for The Terminator sequel—oh, I guess that’s before your time, though—” he chuckles and I take that opportunity to try to stop him again.

       “Dan, seriously, I’m sure that I’m not interested. But thank you. Really. ”

       He sighs in his long-suffering agent manner. “You’re killing me, Emma. Killing. Me. ”

       This is not an appropriate time to laugh. Not even if I can picture the exact sad-puppy expression on Dan’s face, which is made funnier by the fact that he’s known in industry circles for being more of a piranha and less of a Bassett hound. “I’m sorry, Dan. ”

       Dad, removing our luggage from the overhead bins, smiles and shakes his head. He knows Dan as well as I do.

       “Yadda yadda, ” Dan says, which is Dan-speak for you are saying words I don’t like.

       The first interview is in a couple of days, and Graham was right—it’s just Reid and me. This doesn’t really bother me until Dan says, “You probably know there’s still widespread speculation about the nature of the relationship between you and Reid Alexander—”

       “But we don’t really have any re—”

       “Now, don’t feel as though you have to share anything with me—”

       “Dan. There’s nothing to share. We’re barely speaking. I mean, I don’t even know if we are speaking…”

       Dad mouths What? and I shrug one shoulder and roll my eyes as we stand in the clogged aisle with our carry-on luggage in hand.

       “Let’s just keep that to ourselves, shall we? Here’s the deal. The studio wants you two to make nice. You can tell interviewers that there’s nothing going on between you, or leave it open by saying no comment, but you should look as though something could be going on. It’ll be good publicity for the film release if people already love you as a couple. ”

       My mouth hangs slightly ajar and I snap it closed as Dad gives me an arch look. I’m acutely aware of the people crammed into the aisle in front of and behind me, waiting to deplane, so I keep my voice low. “Are you—are you saying we should pretend to be together? ” I ask, teeth clenched. Oh, hell no. That is not going to work.

       “Of course not! Just don’t pretend not to be together. ”

       “That’s no different from pretending we are. Dan, we aren’t—”

       “What I mean to say is, just don’t make that an obvious thing. ”

       I pinch the bridge of my nose, eyes closed. This is a nightmare. “As in, the studio wants us to pretend we’re together. ”

       “Well, okay, if you need to put it that way. ” At my silence, he adds, “Just give enough of the illusion of the possibility that you could be in love or involved in some delicious little clandestine liaison. ” It’s easy to visualize Dan leaning back in his huge leather chair behind his massive desk (which I’ve always suspected had been carved from illegally-obtained rainforest lumber). Headset in place, his elbows resting on the arms of the chair with fingers steepled, he’s swiveled to face the giant plate-glass window overlooking LA. Too many times, I’ve been on the opposite side of his desk, listening in on these short conversations with other actors. “Oh and BT-dubs, they just let me know that there’s a photo shoot for People in a week and a half. Whole cast. So clear time for that. ”

       My brain skids to a stop. Whole cast. Graham. “Where? ”

       “Here in LA. They’re flying everyone in. ”

       The upcoming sham relationship with Reid forgotten for the moment, I focus on the fact that I’ll see Graham next week. As soon as I hang up with Dan, I’m texting him to see if his agent has already given him the news.