Boomerang (30 page)

After that, I couldn’t get away fast enough. I hate that I didn’t say goodbye to the kids or to Rhett, but I just didn’t have it in me. I couldn’t have those images looping through my mind, couldn’t stay there, so close to him. But not
with
him.

Skyler fires up her drum sampler and launches into a powerhouse version of “Purple Haze,” her blond hair swinging forward and a look of pure joy lighting her face.

Not what we want to be doing.

Ethan’s words ping-pong around in my brain. It’s true. What I
want
to be doing starts with a replay of that snippet of memory and ends with him naked in my bed. What
I
will be doing is forcing it into my own thick head that I can’t have that. Even though he slipped tonight, he’s made his feelings clear.

And he’s got Alison now, thanks to me. Which is okay because I have Boomerang and the Vegas trip in just a few weeks. I have my film and my friends and family. That’s plenty, I tell myself.

Really.

Skyler launches into a bossa nova “Bitter Sweet Symphony,” her bow flying over the cello, hands slapping at the fingerboard to create this beautiful chop that’s her signature sound. She’s on fire, and her passion incites me.

I’ve seen so many friends graduate with no idea who they are, really, or what they want. Nothing drives them. So they drift, shifting their discontent from low-wage job to low-wage job.

I’m lucky enough to know—to have always known—where I’m meant to be. I have to stop taking that for granted. I have to attack it the way Skyler attacks that cello. I have to find out who I am and dive deep.

And I will.

For the next hour, I watch my best friends: one of them onstage, transported, in love with what she’s able to do; the other here with me, wearing an avid expression that tells me she’s dreaming of her own turn in the spotlight. I want to thank them both for the awesome gift they give me every day. The gift of being kickass beautiful girls.

Skyler starts in on “Seven Nation Army,” my favorite, and the music lifts me. I want to thank her for giving me that, for dragging me out of my self-pity into a place of inspiration and gratitude.

A mental light bulb pops to life. At the break, I dig in my purse for my cell phone and find the phone number for Brian, my Boomerang date from the other night.

Mia:
Hey, want to meet an amazing girl?

Brian:
Another one, you mean?

Mia:
☺ Maybe
THE
one.

Brian:
You bet.

Mia:
Maxi’s Cafe. Half hour?

Brian:
See you there.

“What’s got you all smiley all of a sudden?” Beth asks.

I drop my phone back in my purse and give her a smile. “You’ll see,” I promise. And for the first time in a few weeks, I feel certain I’m right.

Chapter 38

Ethan

Q: Are you good at facing the music, or do you dance away?

W
hat are you saying?” Rhett jerks the steering wheel, almost hitting the car to our right as he pulls into a parking spot in the underground garage. He cuts the engine and the blasting A/C shuts off, leaving a coating of frost on my dress shirt and tie. “I know I didn’t hear you right.”

Ten minutes ago, we were laughing about how close we came to disaster last night when Milo picked up Raylene’s Jack and Coke instead of his drink. Now we’re on Alison somehow. I don’t know how Rhett got me onto this, but I’m learning that he can do sleight of hand with words.

“You heard right,” I say, forcing myself to sound casual. “I’m going to Colorado with her this weekend.”

Rhett’s features go even sharper with a scowl. “Your
ex-girlfriend
?”

“Yes, Rhett. My ex. We went for sushi after we left and—”

“Damn . . . Bowling to sashimi.” He shakes his head. “That offends me for some reason.”

“Yeah, the whole night had more twists than a bag of pretzels. Speaking of which”—I push his shoulder—“What’s with you and Raylene?”

“Nothing.” Rhett’s eyebrows snap together, and he’s suddenly serious. “She’s a nice lady, that’s all.”

I grin. “Definitely not all, Rhett.”

“It’s not what you think.” He makes a dismissive motion with his hand. “We talked divorce lawyers. Alimony. Stuff like that. Trust me, youngster. Things get complicated when you’re an old dog in your early thirties.”

“Dang. And here I was enjoying the simplicity of my social life now.”

“My point exactly, Vance. Going away for the weekend with your ex-girlfriend is a
very
bad call. Sorry, man. I try not to meddle. I haven’t said anything about the stunt you’re trying to pull with Cookie—”

“You know about that?”

“You mean the seventeen-thousand-dollar video game you’re developing without her approval? Yeah, I know about that. Guess who’s covering your ass?”

A combination of embarrassment and anger spreads heat through me. I can’t let Rhett take the fall for me. “I didn’t ask you to get involved in my business.”

“Your business is the same as mine, Ethan. And it’s too late, I’m already in, but that’s not what we’re talking about right now. Going to Colorado with your psychotic ex is like launching a grenade into your personal life.”

“Alison’s not psychotic.”

“See? She’s already breaking down your defenses.”

“She is not. We’ve—accepted each other in a new way. We put the past where it belongs.”

Rhett’s scowl deepens. “She has you speaking in
greeting card
, bro. You can’t reduce life to a pithy statement.”

“You sound a lot smarter when you’re pissed.”

“You commit to stupid shit when you go to sushi with your ex.”

“I retract my last statement.”

“Retract your weekend plans too. She’s reeling you back in. Can’t you see that?”

Sitting across the table from Alison last night, she seemed so
different
. So vulnerable and honest. She doesn’t want me back. Not in the way Rhett thinks.

“No,” I say. “She’s letting me catch a ride on her private jet so I can see my parents. Her family owns a ranch an hour away from my house, and my dad’s birthday is this weekend. And my brother, Chris, is coming home from college—” I’m starting to sound like I’m asking for permission so I wrap it up. “It’s a convenience thing, that’s all.”

Rhett stares at me in that human resource-ey way, all perception and insight.

“Definitely not all,” he says finally.

“Whatever.” I grab my messenger bag and jump out of the Mini, shutting the door harder than I need to.

Rhett and I are silent on our way into the offices, but I’m done being judged by him. What does he know, anyway?

I won’t spend the weekend watching Jason and Isis cuddle on the couch while I try not to think about Mia. About how she felt against me. Or remembering the way I hurt her. I need to get out of town or I’m going to lose my fucking mind, and if I want to go home to Colorado, then I’m goddamn doing it.

Rhett’s wrong. Nothing’s going to happen with Alison.

I’m getting a free ride, and that is
definitely
all.

Chapter 39

Mia

Q: Can your friends tell you everything?

T
hrough elaborate machinations involving cupcakes, a promise to film a bridal shower for Paolo’s cousin, and a little bit of extra sweet-talking of anyone I know won’t narc me out to Cookie, I have commandeered the Boomerang production studio so I can shoot Beth for the convention booth. I’ve also commandeered Paolo, who’ll act the part of Beth’s dates. I plan to have them improvise some datelike chitchat, maybe hold hands or make out a little, and then I’ll play around with backgrounds and settings in post. Brian offered to help, and I may take him up on it, since effects are not my thing.

The equipment here is so high-end it makes me salivate. Some of it’s nicer than the stuff we used in film school. Guess that’s yet another benefit of working for a big-time media mogul. I doubt eHarmony has a full-scale editing bay in
their
basement.

Just being around all of this piques my hunger for the job. The money is one thing. But all of this—the resources, the equipment, the creative trust that serves Adam across all of Blackwood Entertainment—makes for a ridiculously rare opportunity. An opportunity I really,
really
want.

“Okay,” Beth says, settling onto a green-painted cube that will become a divan or a high-backed cushioned chair or, who knows, maybe the captain’s seat on a spaceship. “Before your friend comes down, you
have
to talk to me about this Colorado situation. You’re being too calm, girl. It’s freaking me out.”

“It’s fine,” I tell her, though my throat closes around the words, making them sound strained. “It just means I can totally shut the door on all of this nonsense.”

What is there to say? From the minute Paolo stuck a mug of latte in my hands and laid the news on me about Ethan’s big trip, I’ve felt sick and deflated. If I let myself think of them together in that way—the way we were, in my mother’s studio, in the back of the cab, in the cool shadows of his kitchen—I won’t be able to accomplish a thing.

She folds her arms across her chest and raises an eyebrow. “Which nonsense is that? The nonsense where you’re totally into him? Or where he’s totally into you?”

“The nonsense where he clearly still cares about his ex. The nonsense where I have much better things to do with my life than kill my career to go grubbing around after someone who’s not into me. Again.”