What I Did for Love (36 page)

“You followed me!” she heard him exclaim. “You don’t even like to drive to the grocery, and you followed me all the way to Malibu?”

“Let me in.”

“No way,” he said. “Go home.”

“I’m not going anywhere till I talk to her.”

“You’ll have to get past me first.”

“Oh, puh-leeze, like you can stop me.” Chaz stormed past him and soon found the spare bedroom where Georgie had set up her equipment. She was dressed in avenger black right down to her flip-flops. “You know what your problem is?” she declared, advancing on Georgie without preamble. “You don’t care about people.”

Georgie had barely slept, and she was too drained to deal with this.

“Bram hasn’t come home from the studio for the past two nights.” Chaz continued her attack. “He’s miserable, and it’s all because of you. I wouldn’t be surprised if he started doing drugs again.” When Georgie didn’t respond, some of Chaz’s fire gave way to uncertainty. “I know you’re in love with him. Isn’t she, Aaron? Why don’t you just go back to him? Then everything will be fine.”

“Chaz, stop badgering her,” Aaron said quietly as he came up behind her.

Georgie had never imagined Aaron would turn into such a determined watchdog. His weight loss seemed to have given him a new confidence. One Tuesday, when Mel Duffy’s story about Georgie’s phone call had surfaced, Aaron had gone on the attack and issued a vigorous public denial without even consulting her. She’d told him that Mel’s account was true and she didn’t care anymore, but he refused to listen.

It was easier to attack Chaz’s weaknesses than think about her own. “Here’s the thing about people who are always sticking their noses into other people’s lives. It’s generally because they don’t want to deal with their own screwups.”

Chaz immediately went on the defensive. “Everything’s just fine in my life!”

“Then why aren’t you in culinary school right now? As far as I know, you haven’t even glanced at those GED workbooks.”

“Chaz is too busy to study,” Aaron said. “Just ask her.”

“I think you’re afraid if you step outside the security of what you have now, you’ll somehow end up back on the streets.” The words were no sooner out of Georgie’s mouth than she realized she’d betrayed Chaz’s confidence. She felt sick. “I’m sorry, I—”

Chaz scowled. “Oh, stop looking like that. Aaron knows.”

He did? Georgie hadn’t expected that.

“If Chaz doesn’t study,” Aaron said, “she won’t have to worry about flunking. She’s afraid.”

“That’s bull.”

Georgie gave up. “I’m too tired to deal with this now. Go away.”

Naturally, Chaz didn’t move. Instead, she regarded Georgie with displeasure. “You look like you’re losing weight again.”

“Nothing tastes good right now.”

“We’ll see about that.” Chaz stormed into the kitchen where she
stomped around for a while, banging cupboard doors, opening and closing the refrigerator. Before long, she’d produced a crisp salad and a bowl of gooey mac and cheese. It was comfort food, but not as comforting as having Chaz fuss over her.

Georgie made this
big fricking deal out of Chaz borrowing one of her swimsuits and going down to the beach. “Unless you’re afraid of the water.” Georgie had said it with a kind of sneer, like she was daring Chaz to put on a suit. She knew Chaz hated showing off her body, and she must have decided this was some kind of therapy. But since she’d basically dared her, Chaz had put on the suit, then rummaged around in Georgie’s crap until she found a terry cloth cover-up to wear over it.

Aaron lay on a beach towel, reading some kind of lame video game magazine. When she’d first known him, he wouldn’t get anywhere near the water. Now he wore new white swim trunks with navy trim. He still needed to lose a few more pounds, so he shouldn’t have looked so semihot, but he’d started working out with weights, and it showed. He was also spending money for decent haircuts, plus his contact lenses.

She sat on the end of the towel, her back to him. The cover-up didn’t even reach the middle of her thighs, and she kind of tucked her legs under her.

He put his magazine aside. “It’s hot. Let’s go for a swim.”

“I don’t feel like it.”

“Why not? You told me you used to swim all the time.”

“I just don’t want to right now, that’s all.”

He sat up next to her. “I’m not going to jump you just because you’re wearing a bathing suit.”

“I know that.”

“Chaz, you’ve got to get over what happened.”

She poked at the sand with a stick. “Maybe I don’t want to get over it. Maybe I need to make sure I never forget so I don’t get caught up in anything like that again.”

“You won’t.”

“How do you know?”

“Simple logic. Let’s say you broke your arm again, or even your leg. Do you really think Bram would throw you out? Or that Georgie wouldn’t step in, or that I wouldn’t let you stay at my place? You’ve got friends now, although you’d never know it from the way you treat them.”

“I made Georgie eat, didn’t I? And you shouldn’t have said that to her about how I was afraid of flunking.”

“You’re smart, Chaz. Everybody knows it but you.”

She picked up a broken shell and ran the sharp point over her thumb. “I could have been smart, but I missed too much school.”

“So what? That’s what a GED is for. I told you I’d help you study.”

“I don’t need help.” If he helped her, he’d figure out exactly how much she didn’t know, and he’d stop respecting her.

But he seemed to understand what she was thinking. “If you hadn’t helped me, I’d still be fat. People are good at different things. I was always good in school, and it’s my turn to do you a favor. Trust me. I won’t be nearly as mean about it as you were with me.”

She had been mean to him. Georgie, too. She stretched out her legs. Her skin was pale as a vampire’s, and she saw this one little place she’d missed when she’d shaved. “Sorry.”

She must not have sounded like she meant it because he wouldn’t let it go. “You’ve got to stop being so rude to people. You think it makes you look tough, but it only makes you seem sort of pitiful.”

She launched herself off the towel. “Don’t say that!”

He looked up at her. She glared back, her arms rigid at her sides and her hands fisted.

“Stop the bullshit, Chaz.” He sounded tired, as if he’d gotten bored with her. “It’s time for you to grow up and start acting like a
decent human being.” He rose slowly to his feet. “You and I are best friends, but half the time I’m ashamed of you. Like that bullshit with Georgie. Anybody with eyes can see how bad she’s feeling. You didn’t have to make it worse.”

“Bram’s feeling just as bad,” she retorted.

“That doesn’t justify the way you talked to her.”

He looked like he was ready to give up on her. She wanted to cry, but she’d kill herself first, so she tore open the cover-up and threw it down in the sand. She felt naked, but Aaron only looked at her face. When she’d been on the streets, the men had hardly ever looked at her face. “Are you satisfied?” she cried.

“Are you?” he asked.

She wasn’t satisfied with much of anything about herself, and she was sick of being afraid. Leaving the house made her nervous. She was scared to take her GED. Scared of so much. “If I’m nice to people, they’ll start to take advantage of me,” she cried.

“If they start taking advantage of you,” he said quietly, “stop being nice to them.”

Her skin prickled. Did it really have to be all or nothing? She thought of what he’d said earlier, that she had friends who’d watch out for her. She hated depending on other people, but maybe that was because she’d never been able to. Aaron was right. She did have friends now, but she still acted like she was alone in her fight against the world. She didn’t like knowing he thought of her as a mean person. Being mean wouldn’t save her from anything. She studied her feet. “Don’t give up on me, okay?”

“I can’t,” he said. “I’m too curious to see how you’re going to turn out when you grow up.”

She looked back up at him and saw this funny expression on his face. He wasn’t looking at her body or even taking his eyes off her, but she was aware of him in a way that made her feel…itchy or thirsty. Something. “Are you ready to swim yet?” she said. “Or do you want to stand here all day psychoanalyzing me?”

“Swim.”

“That’s what I thought.”

She raced for the water, feeling almost free. Maybe it wouldn’t last, but for now it felt good.

Georgie edited film
during the day and wandered around the more squalid streets of Hollywood and West Hollywood at night, with only her camera and her famous face for protection. Most of the girls she approached recognized her and were more than willing to talk into her camera lens.

She discovered a mobile health clinic that served street kids. Again, her fame paid off, and the health care workers let her ride with them each night as they offered HIV and STD testing, crisis counseling, condoms, and disease prevention education. What she saw and heard during those nights left her heartsick. She kept imagining Chaz among these girls and thinking about where she’d be without Bram’s intervention.

Two weeks slipped by, and he made no attempts to see her. She was exhausted to the point of numbness, but she couldn’t sleep more than a few hours before she jerked awake, her pajamas damp with sweat, the sheets twisted around her. She desperately missed the man she’d believed Bram to be, the man who’d harbored a caring heart beneath his cynical exterior. Only her work and the knowledge that she’d done the right thing by not giving up her soul for the sake of revenge kept her from despair.

Since the paps weren’t prone to lurk in the neighborhoods she visited, no photos of her popped up. Even though she’d ordered Aaron to stop feeding the tabloids his stories of marital bliss, he kept on doing it. She no longer cared. Let Bram deal with it.

On a Friday three weeks after her breakup with Bram, Aaron called and told her to log on to
Variety.
When she did, she saw the announcement:

Georgie gazed at the screen. It was over. Now Bram no longer had a need to convince her of his undying love, which explained why he hadn’t tried to talk to her again. She forced on her sneakers and took a beach walk. Her defenses were down, and she was exhausted, or she wouldn’t have let herself drift into a sitcom world where Bram would show up at her door, throw himself on his knees, and beg for her love and forgiveness.

Disgusted with herself, she headed back to the house.

The next morning
her phone rang while she was at her computer. She dragged herself out of her stupor and squinted at the display on her cell. It was Aaron. He’d flown to Kansas for the weekend to celebrate his father’s sixtieth birthday. She cleared the muzziness from her voice. “How’s the family reunion?”

“Fine, but Chaz is sick. I just got off the phone, and she sounded really bad.”

“What’s wrong with her?”

“She wouldn’t tell me, but she almost sounded like she was crying. I told her to find Bram, but she doesn’t know where he is.”

Not in Malibu, Georgie thought, trying to win me back.

“I’m worried about her,” Aaron went on. “Do you think…”

“I’ll drive over,” she said.

As she pulled out onto the highway, the sitcom began to play again in her head. She saw herself walking into Bram’s house and discovering balloons everywhere. Dozens of them floating at the ceiling with their ribbons drifting in the air. And she saw Bram standing in the middle of them, his expression soft, anxious, tender.

“Surprise!”

She punched the accelerator and pulled herself back to reality.

Not a single
balloon floated in the empty, quiet house, and the man who’d betrayed her was nowhere in sight. With the paparazzi once again staking out the end of the drive, she’d left her car at Rory’s and slipped through the back gate. She set down her purse and called Chaz’s name. There was no response.

She made her way through the empty kitchen into the back hallway and up the stairs to Chaz’s apartment above the garage. She wasn’t surprised to find it simply decorated and scrupulously neat. “Chaz? Are you okay?”

A moan came from what seemed to be the only bedroom. She discovered Chaz lying on top of a crumpled gray quilt, her knees pulled to her chest, her face pale. She groaned as she saw Georgie. “Aaron called you.”

Georgie hurried to the side of the bed. “What’s wrong?”

She clutched her knees tighter. “I can’t believe he called you.”

“He was worried. He said you were sick, and obviously he was right.”

“I have cramps.”

“Cramps?”

“Cramps. That’s all. I sometimes get ’em like this. Now go away.”

“Did you take anything?”

“I ran out.” Her words were nearly a wail. “Leave me alone.” She turned her face into the pillow and said, more softly, “Please.”

Please?
Chaz must really be sick. Georgie fetched some Tylenol from Bram’s kitchen, made a cup of tea, and carried it back to the apartment. On her way to the bedroom, she saw a GED workbook open on the coffee table along with a couple of used yellow pads and pencils. She smiled, her first one of the week.

“I can’t believe Aaron called you,” Chaz said again after she’d
taken the pills. “You drove all the way from Malibu to give me some Tylenol?”

“Aaron was pretty upset.” Georgie set the bottle on the bedside table. “And you’d have done the same for me.”

That drew Chaz out of her misery. “He was upset?”

Georgie nodded and held out the hot, sugared tea. “I’ll leave you alone now.”

Chaz pulled herself up far enough to take the mug. “Thanks,” she muttered. “I mean it.”

“I know,” Georgie said as she left the room.

She picked up a couple of things she’d left behind, being careful not to even glance in the bedroom. As she came back downstairs, a wash of golden afternoon light splashed through the windows. She’d loved this house. Its nooks and spaces. She’d loved the potted lemon trees and Tibetan throws, the Aztec stone fireplace mantel and warm wooden floors. She’d loved the bookshelf-lined dining room and brass wind-bells. How could the man who’d designed such a welcoming home have such an empty, hostile heart?