I’d spent the rest of the day in my room, not able to make heads or tails of how we were gonna handle this situation and what my part in it would be. For someone whose life was about making plans, I didn’t have a clue. All I knew was that Hacksmore, Elliott, Carter, and I had a meeting at noon the following day and I needed a gameplan.
Despite my discussions with Elliott and Carter after my identity was exposed, I hit a wall, couldn’t think straight. So I messaged my personal Batman, asking him to meet me at the hotel because I needed to talk to someone, and as I’d learned that day, he was a goodlistener.
A knock at the door caught my attention, and I headed inside to answer it. Jace stood in the hallway, dressed in a form-fitting polo that stressed the details of the physique I knew was underit.
“Rough day?” heasked.
“I’ve had worse. Come onin.”
I escorted him inside and led him to the minibar. “What can I get you? The company’s paying for it, so just say theword.”
“Jack and Pepsi works forme.”
“You gotit.”
I fixed him a drink and passed it along to him. “I was enjoying the view of your little town before you got here, if you’d care to joinme.”
“It would be mypleasure.”
Jace’s relaxed attitude, that cool demeanor he exuded, helped soothe my nerves, which had been on edge allday.
He didn’t rush me…or reach for answers the way Elliott and Carterhad.
He was justpresent.
We headed onto the balcony, where I could collect my thoughts a little bit. “Did you talk to your family about the pictures?” I didn’t want to pry, but I was genuinelycurious.
“I did. Nance and Keegan were really cool aboutit.”
“Figured as much, but you never know with stuff like that. You’d be surprised by some of the people who can have a gay hairdresser, backup dancer, boss, or father, but God forbid it be their own kid. My mom, for instance, had plenty of gay friends, but she didn’t want it to ruin my career. That’s what she was most worriedabout.”
“World’s a crazy place sometimes,” Jace said before taking a sip of hisdrink.
“Tell me about it.” I glanced over the ledge at my view of the city, taking it all in. “One minute you feel like the world’s your oyster and the next like you’re trapped in your hotel room because you don’t want to hear anyone shouting at you to say a catchphrase or signsomething.”
“You’ve been in here all day?” Jaceasked.
“Yeah. I have this idea in my head that I’m going to walk out there and have to hear someone call me by that name again. I’ve spent a lot of years cherishing my anonymity. Where others wanted fame, I just dreamed of being able to walk into crowded rooms and disappear, blend rightin.”
“I doubt you blend in anywhere,Dax.”
The way he said it, scanning me over, brought back that feral desire he stirred almost effortlessly with as little as a simpleglance.
“It’s different, though. It’s nice when you’re out and someone you don’t know treats you like a stranger, rather than acting like they know you…reallyknowyou, when you’ve never talked to them in yourlife.”
“I kind of get that,” Jacesaid.
“Oh, you’ll definitely have more than your share when this all keepson.”
“What was that like? You told me a lot about your mom and what happened with her, but what did it do toyou?”
It was effortless for my mind to go there, since that’s where it’d been all day. “It was a lot of pressure on a kid. Every agent, every casting director, every producer, every reporter, every fan…they all had an image in their head of exactly who I was, and I didn’t think it was very fair when I wasn’t so sure. I went to a casting session for a film when I was fourteen. It was supposed to be the next break for me. A TV movie. I was coming into my own, maturing, and I don’t know what I did in the audition, but the casting director said, ‘You came across a little gay that time. Can we do it again?’ I didn’t even know that part of me yet. I was a fucking kid who didn’t know shit about who I was, but I remember thinking,This isn’t about me. This is about this thing they think I am…Lil’ Donnie Gibson. And I didn’t want to be something for them. I just wanted to be me, whoever thatwas.”
Jace looked off the balcony, staring into the distance, as though thinking very seriously about what Ishared.
“I get that,” he said. “My father, Crawford, arrived on a scene, and this guy told him his wife was stuck inside, first floor in a back room. Of course, Crawford didn’t flinch any more than I would have. He and his crew rushed inside, and like the heroes they fucking were, found her. She’d lost consciousness, so they carried her out, Crawford at the back, where the fire was creeping up on them. The floor gave, and Crawford pushed them forward so it wouldn’t take the rest of them with it. But he got trapped in the basement. He didn’t makeit.”
“Oh my God,Jace.”
