Rick nodded.
“But Ricky, you didn’t do anything. You stopped yourself.” He paused, and then asked, “Do you know how much character that shows? If you didn’t love her, you probably would have slept with her. How could I not respect you for doing the right thing?”
Rick chuckled at that and shook his head. They sat quietly for a bit, and finally Rick asked, “Do you have any cigarettes? I ran out a long time ago.”
Devon pulled a pack from his pocket and handed one to Rick.
“Thanks.”
“No problem.” Devon lit one himself and put the pack on the table in front of them. “So what do you want to do, Ricky?”
Rick shook his head and looked down at his feet. “I don’t know. I don’t know what I
can
do.”
Devon thought for a minute and then said, “Well, I think we need a group meeting. We always do better when we put all our heads together.”
“No, I don’t want them to know about any of this.”
“I think you need to tell them. It explains so much that we’ve all wondered about for a long time. I think it’s only fair to let them know and let us help you figure out where you go from here.”
Rick stared back at him blankly. “There
is
nowhere to go from here.” Devon furrowed his brow and glared at him. “Fine, whatever,” Rick finally said.
“I’ll set something up. We’ll get together later. For now, you need to get some sleep.”
“I’m not sure I could, and there is no way I’m going up there, with her,” Rick pointed up.
“Okay. That’s understandable, I guess. I’ll go get you another room. You stay here, and I’ll take care of it, okay?”
Rick nodded and lit another cigarette.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Rick slept fitfully, and felt like he was floating in some alternate universe, not quite fully aware of, and certainly not comfortable in his own. He awoke continually, and each time was very conscious of the emptiness. Nothing had ever hit him so hard, and only a day ago, he could never have imagined anything worse than his initial heartbreak. When he finally got up, he showered and picked at the food Devon had sent to his room, but it only made him feel sick.
It was nearly eight that evening when the four met in Rick’s room. Devon chose a suite so there would be plenty of room and comfortable seating for the meeting. Privately he told Rick that Sonya had packed up and left earlier in the day, and Rick was relieved. He knew he should have said something to her, but he didn’t have the stomach for it, and didn’t really care. He would deal with her later.
It felt odd, sitting with the other three, with no one else around. It had been a long time since the four of them were alone together. Someone’s wife or girlfriend always served as a buffer. Rick knew that without that buffer, they would have been bickering non-stop, and he hoped they could make it through this without an argument.
Randy was the first to bring up the reason for the meeting, after a period of stiff, idle chitchat.
“So Ricky, what’s going on? Devon filled us in a little bit, but I guess I’m not real clear on what the problem is.”
“The problem is,” Devon said, “we need to find a way to get him through this, or over it.”
“You just have to give these things time. I mean, we’ve all gotten our hearts broken before, right?” Randy looked around for agreement.
“I think seven years qualifies as
giving it time
, Randy. After that long, if you can’t get over something, it’s time to do something about it.” Devon crushed out his cigarette in the ashtray, burning the tip of his finger as he did. He yanked his hand back quickly and fanned it in the air to cool the sting.
“I just don’t understand how it ever even happened in the first place,” Randy said. “I mean, we all liked Shelby, but I thought we all knew to keep our distance.”
“Ha! You were the worst one Randy. You flirted with and hit on that poor girl constantly,” Keith said. “I knew there was something going on with you two, Ricky. I just figured you’d worked it out.”
“What do you mean, you knew?” Randy asked.
“It was kind of obvious.”
“How?”
“Ricky acted different whenever she was around. And I saw the way they looked at each other, only an idiot could have missed it.” Keith directed the comment to Randy, but Randy didn’t notice. Then he turned to Rick, “And besides, you never even looked at any women the whole time we were there, even though the place was crawling with them.”
Rick started to wonder, if it was so obvious, why no one else had noticed. He was perplexed, so he asked, “If you could see it so easily, why didn’t anyone else? Besides Devon of course.”
“Because you had your wing man there drawing any suspicion away from you. Everybody was so worried about Randy doing something to the kid, nobody noticed what you were up to.”
“Yeah, I guess that makes sense,” Rick agreed.
“Me?” Randy pointed to himself.
Nobody answered, and Keith just shook his head and laughed.
“Well,” Randy continued, “I think the best thing you can do, Ricky, is to find yourself another woman. Find someone you like, and just throw yourself into that relationship to get your mind off her.”
“I think he’s tried that before and it didn’t seem to help, did it Ricky?” Devon asked.
Rick shook his head.
“Well, no offense man, but I think you have to try for a little longer than just a couple of months,” Randy with authority. “You know, there are so many women out there, tons that would cut off their right arm at a chance to be with you. You could have any one of them. Why do you have to focus on just one that you can’t have?”
“Ha! You should talk, you asshole. If there are so many women out there, Randy, why the fuck are you screwing Sonya? Huh? Answer me that why don’t you.”
Randy turned bright red and sat, looking at Rick, speechless.
“Yeah, that’s what I thought. You don’t have a good answer…fucking dimwit,” Rick said, dismissing him.
“Okay, let’s not start anything here,” Devon said. “Let’s try to stay focused.”
Randy ignored him and turned to Rick, “What the hell do you care anyway? You don’t even love her. You’re in love with Shelby!”
“That’s not the point and you know it,” Rick said, on the verge of yelling. “I would never do anything like that to you.”
Keith sat forward to get between the two. “Wait a minute,” he said, turning to face Randy. “You’re sleeping with Sonya? That’s just bullshit, man. You’re an asshole.”
“Alright, alright. That’s enough. You guys can work that out some other time,” Devon banged his fist on the table to get their attention.
“Have you ever slept with Julia?” Keith asked him, ignoring Devon.
“No. Of course not,” Randy said indignantly.
“What about Amy? Have you ever slept with
my
wife?”
Randy turned red again, even though he shook his head no.
Keith jumped up and lunged for Randy. “That’s it! I’m gonna fucking kill you, you son of a bitch!” He squeezed his hands around Randy’s neck, but Randy raised his knee and caught Keith in the groin, sending him tumbling backwards, over the coffee table and into Devon’s lap. He rolled off, onto the floor.
Randy stood up, rubbing his neck. “It was before you guys were even married, when you first started dating. At the time, you weren’t even sure you were gonna ask her out again.”
Rick started to sputter at the scene before him. He shook his head at them, but couldn’t stop. Soon, he was laughing hysterically, and it was beyond his control. Devon looked at him as though he was crazy, but soon, he was laughing too.
“What the hell is so funny?” Randy demanded.
Keith, still collapsed on the floor holding his crotch, started to chuckle.
“What?” Randy asked again.
Rick was laughing too hard to speak and he fell over on to his side and started pounding the couch with his fist. Keith tried to stand up, but was still in pain. In spite of his agony, laughter soon overtook him as well. Randy offered his hand and pulled him to his feet.
“Oh my God. Would you guys please tell me what the hell is so funny?”
Devon tried to calm himself enough to speak, and after a few deep breathes, he finally said, “Would you look at us? Would you ever have thought we’d end up like this?”
Randy gave up a halfhearted laugh, but couldn’t find the humor overtaking the other three. He sat back down and lit a cigarette. He waited for the others to compose themselves. When they had laughed themselves out, he said, “So what do you want to do Ricky? How do you want to see this end?”
Rick wiped his face dry and lit his own cigarette. He laughed again, but this time there was no amusement in the sound, just the resonance of defeat. “I want to go back to last night and have her tell me she wants to be with me too, but somehow, I just don’t think that is going to happen.”
“No, it’s not likely,” Devon said. “You could try to find her before she leaves town and talk to her again.”
Rick shook his head, “No, she made it pretty clear that she had no interest in pursuing things. I laid myself pretty bare.”
“Yeah, I guess so,” Devon nodded.
They were all quiet for a minute, but then Keith said, “No, I don’t buy it.”
“Buy what?” asked Rick.
“Buy that she’s not interested,” Keith said, taking a seat beside Devon.
“If she was, she would have said so.”
“No. I think she wants you to come after her,” Keith said.
“Why? What makes you think that?”
“Because chicks are like that, man. They say they don’t want you, but what they actually want is for you to
prove
that you really want them.”
“That doesn’t make any sense,” Randy said.
“Sure it does. She was putting the information out there for Ricky to digest. She figures if he still really wants her, he’ll come find her.” Keith waited while they all thought about the idea. “Listen,” he continued, “what does that girl say every time she sees us? One of us says, ‘Jeeze Shelby, we never get to see you.’ And what does she always say?”
“I wouldn’t know,” Rick said.
Devon was nodding. “Yeah, you’re right.”
“What?” Rick asked.
“Every time, she has the same answer. And I quote, ‘You know, I live in the same place I did when I first met you guys. If anyone ever really wanted to find me, it wouldn’t be hard.’”
“Yep, every time,” Keith agreed.
“Are you serious? You think that’s all I have to do?”
“Well no, I don’t think she’s just going to roll over if you show up, but it’s what you’re going to have to do before you can do anything else.”
“Okay, so how do I find her? Devon, did she tell you where she was staying?”
Keith shook his head. “No, you can’t just go find her like
that
. You have to wait. You have to go to Greece.”
“He’s right. Showing up at her hotel room, or whatever, wouldn’t be enough.”
“And even if you get there and find out she doesn’t want you, you can at least set up shop and see her once in a while. Hell, I bet she’d even let you hang out with her,” Keith joked.
“Set up shop? You mean live there?” Rick felt somewhat dizzy from the whole idea, the idea that there might be a way he could actually end up with Shelby, and the thought of turning his life upside down in the process.
“Well, yeah. You’d have to,” Keith said. “She’s made it pretty clear she doesn’t want to live in the States and that Paros is her home. I don’t think you’re going to be able to change her mind about that, at least not right away.”
“But if I move there, permanently, what about us? I don’t want to be the one who ruins everything.”
Randy finally spoke – “I think…it’s time for you to do what you really want to do. It’s time to try to make
you
happy, and honestly, I don’t think there can be an
us
anymore. At least, not the way we once were. We all know that.”
They were all quiet. No one wanted to admit he was right. “Maybe in a few years, we can think about it again, but for now, I think we need to call it a day. I can’t imagine not having you guys as my friends. We’ve been like family for so long, and if I lost that,
I
would be heartbroken.” Randy sat back and locked his hands behind his neck. “If we keep on the way we are, it won’t be long and we won’t even be speaking to each other. Shit, we can’t even talk to each other most of the time now without a go-between.”
“I just can’t even imagine not having you guys around, though,” Rick said.
“Which would you rather have, Ricky?” Devon asked. “Us bitching at you all the time, or Shelby, and us come to visit once in a while?”
Rick laughed at that.
“Plus, you’ll get to see Erin a lot more,” Devon finished.
“Yeah, that would be nice.” With that, Rick slapped his hands on his knees. “Oh my God, I think I’m moving to Greece.” He was so excited and couldn’t believe they had actually come up with a plan that might work. The best he’d hoped to come away with was somebody making a run for rope or a gun, and somebody else hitting the streets to find him some Percocet and cocaine.
“God, I can’t believe I’m going to do this,” he said shaking his head. “What will we tell everyone?”
“I’ll call the label in the morning,” Devon said. “And as far as everyone else, let’s just say we are taking an indefinite hiatus. Okay? That way we’re not committing to anything other than a break.” He looked around, and everyone agreed, but they all seemed a little nervous about the whole idea.
“Alright, now that we’ve got that settled what do you say we grab Julia and get something to eat?” Keith said.
“I think that sounds like a great idea, I’m starved,” Rick admitted. His thoughts were racing, but his head felt clearer than it had for some time. The despair was gone.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
It was mid March by the time Rick got everything settled and headed to Paros. He found a family to rent his house with an option to buy after a year if it was agreeable to both parties. He sold most of his things and put the rest in Devon’s attic. They spent the last few months avoiding reporters who wanted to know if the group was disbanding. It didn’t matter how many times they used the word
hiatus
, the media was determined to make it an ugly break-up, and it got to the point where none of them cared anymore, and finally stopped talking about it publicly.