“For a while, we were fine. Sarah even managed to get work as an extra from time to time. Then she started getting plays in small theatre productions. Nothing that paid, but good experience. We would eat pizza and go bowling with her theatre friends. That’s when I learned about camming. I was too young, but nobody knew that. Her friend, Lola, told me all about the money she made and how even guys, especially gay guys, could make good money, too. Sarah said it was illegal. That we could get in trouble for child porn, so I just let it go. But then Sarah got sick. Really sick. It happened so fast. We thought it was just the flu. Maybe bronchitis. But we didn’t have insurance. Sarah was a runaway and I was underage. She was afraid if she went to the hospital, she’d get sent home and I’d go into foster care. She was always looking out for me.
“One day, after a visit with Carl, I came back to the apartment to find Sarah struggling to breathe. She was so pale and her lips were blue and she wasn’t responding to me. I was so scared I called 911. But there was nothing they could do for her. She had a horrible infection throughout her whole body. A fungus had destroyed her new lungs because her anti-rejection meds had left her too immuno-compromised to fight it. She was only in LA for five months and she’d managed to live more than I had in the two years I’d been there…and it killed her. I killed her. She’d come out there to be with me because she knew I was miserable and lonely. That’s what her mother told me at her funeral. Right before she told me she was sorry I’d ever met Sarah and that she regretted ever letting me into their home and that I was no better than my good for nothing trailer trash family. And she was right.”
Jackson shifted until Day was on his back. “She was not. She was angry and hurting because she lost her child, but she wasn’t right. No matter the reason your friend came to LA, she chose to stay. Even if it was a bad decision, she chose it. Not you. You were doing everything you could to survive while adults were taking advantage of you at every turn. Sarah wasn’t your fault. Carl wasn’t your fault. The fact that you managed to find a way to crawl out of that life is amazing, no matter how you had to do it. Do you know how many people never manage to do what you did?”
“It was the room,” Day said, his cheeks flushed, his eyes dull and bloodshot. “The room was full of mold called aspergillus. It was growing on our carpet. It’s why the room was empty. Carl wasn’t allowed to rent it out because it could potentially cause people to get sick. It’s why he let me stay there. There wasn’t any payment exchanging hands, so he figured he wasn’t doing anything wrong.”
“It’s a miracle you didn’t get sick.”
“I wish I had. By the time the health inspector made it out to figure out how a sixteen-year-old girl had gotten so sick, I’d managed to buy a fake ID. I went to Sarah’s theatre friend and asked her to help me get set up. It took a long time to figure out what worked, but it kept food on the table and a roof over my head. Carl moved me to a room, once I could afford to pay, but he still expected to be serviced whenever he asked. Luckily, once I could get online and Carl helped me find a way around not being able to read, I realized that I could order my birth certificate online. When I turned eighteen and was legal, I found better sites and other ways to hustle guys out of their money. I’ve been doing it ever since. And that’s it. That’s my whole life story.”
Day was staring at Jackson’s chest, so he just kissed his temple. “It didn’t work.”
Day flicked his gaze to Jackson’s, his confusion obvious. “What?”
“You didn’t chase me off. I’m still here. If anything, I am honestly just upset that not a single person tried to help you without wanting something to gain for themselves. And that Carl guy is a pedophile and ought to be put in jail for his crimes.”
Day shrugged. “Without him, I’d have been doing things a lot worse than blow jobs.”
Jackson shook his head. “That doesn’t make him a hero, Day. He took advantage of you. He hurt you. He put you in a dangerous situation, and it cost your friend her life. It could have cost you yours.”
Day looked up at him. “You really don’t care, do you?”
This time, it was Jackson who was confused. “What?”
“You really don’t care about my past.”
“We all have a past. You’re not the only person with regrets and things they feel the need to atone for,” Jackson said with a sigh before he reached up and switched off the lamp.
Once they were blanketed by the darkness, Day pressed kisses into Jackson’s chest, his throat, and finally, his lips. It wasn’t a kiss that was meant to go anywhere.
“Jackson?” Day whispered in the darkness.
“Yeah, baby?”
“If you break my heart, I don’t think I’ll survive it.”
Jackson’s chest tightened at the raw desperation in Day’s words. “Your heart is safe with me, Day. I promise.”
“So, Wyatt overheard Jackson telling Linc that you have some creepy stalker who is, like, killing people to prove he loves you. Is that true?”
Day looked up at Charlie from his spot in her lap. “You just totally say whatever pops into your head, huh?”
“So do you. Jackson told Linc that too,” Wyatt said. “He said you’d fight the wind if it whistled by you the wrong way.”
Day couldn’t even argue the point. Jackson wasn’t wrong. It was just easier to swing first and ask questions later, even if his jabs were of the verbal kind. “I guess so. Yeah.”
Wyatt sat on the floor, painting Day’s toenails a coral color. He hadn’t asked him to. They had just shown up out of the blue with face masks and nail polish and told him they were there for a self-care night. Day suspected Jackson had called them, but Day couldn’t even be mad about it. Even though a few days had passed since he’d opened up to Jackson, the truth was, he felt like somebody had skinned him alive, like he was one big open wound.
“So, do you? Have a stalker, I mean?” Charlie asked just before she plucked another hair from between Day’s brows.
“Ouch. Yes. I mean, I think so anyway.”
“That’s so cool,” Charlie said before attacking his brows with far more force than Day deemed necessary.
“Charlie,” Wyatt admonished.
“What? You know what I mean. I’m not saying I’d want somebody dead, but having a stalker is, like, A-list celebrity type status. I want to get to a level of fame where some crazy loser, who sits in his mother’s basement, jerks off to my movies and imagines us in a fictitious relationship until it drives him mad. But, you know, without being murdered and becoming another Hollywood cautionary tale.”
