The room was pretty sparse with a vanity mirror, a chair on one side, couch on the opposite corner with a pile of clothes draped across it, and a small wardrobe. There was also another door to the right, probably leading to another dimension, knowing my luck.
Tristan cleared his throat as he slid one of his slender hands up to his hair only to yank at the short strands. He pulled his hand away from his head, staring down at his palm. He frowned, before flipping it over to show me the black smudges trailing across it. "I hate this crap."
"It's washable?" I asked him, referring to the black color in his hair. I felt so nervous for some reason. It was like my senior class salutatorian speech all over again, with sweaty palms and pits.
"Yeah, it gets out after one or two rinses," he answered, looking down at his palm again. "Do you mind helping me wash it out in the sink?"
I should have wanted to tell him no when I realized why he invited me here. Hopefully he wasn't stupid enough to think that we were going toget to know each otherbetter. I knew deep within me that he wasn't like that. At least with me, he wasn't. He'd been nothing but kind and silly. Once again, another reason to deny that he wanted anything besides friendship with me. If he really wanted to, he'd have me pushed up against the wall, but he hadn't. Instead, I just nodded as I followed him through the door I'd seen earlier to find that it was a small restroom with a sink and a toilet. There was barely enough room for both of us to be in there together, so I had to squeeze into the area between the sink and the toilet. I saw him turn on the left knob for the hot water and spotted two white towels hanging on his right side.
He was staring at me through his black-framed glasses when I looked back at him. "Is there something on my face?" I asked.
He smiled and shook his head. "No." Tristan looked at me for another heartbeat or two before taking off his glasses and placing them in the front pocket of his jeans.
"Are those prescription glasses?" I blurted out another awkward question.
He nodded slowly. "I'm farsighted." Tristan ran a hand through his jet-black hair again, grimacing when he was halfway done with the action, probably remembering that it stained his skin. "Kat, I—," he sighed. "The water should be ready now."
Tristan dipped his head closer to the sink and he was so tall that he had to bend over at the waist to get parallel with it. I had to scoop my hand under the tap to get a steady stream of water over his scalp. A faint swirl of charcoal tainted the vivid white color of the sink as the hair color washed off easily with the help of his fingers pulling at the strands. Within a couple of minutes, the auburn color started peeking out from under the black. It took about ten minutes of running water, using one hand to scoop water onto his hair while using the other to help him rub and scratch at the temporary hair dye to get about ninety-five percent of the color off.
"Thank you," he said softly, once we were done. I put a towel over the back of his head for him to dry off. "Did you get your autograph?"
"I did," I replied. "His voice was a little squeakier in person."
He chuckled, still facing down while he ran the towel through his damp hair. It was still a bit darker than it had been earlier when he'd taken his cap off, but nowhere near the shade it was at when he was in Lingus mode. "Most of us are a lot different in person," he said simply, but I felt like he was trying to convey more into his words. It didn't escape me that he saidus, like he acknowledged the fact that he really was a porn star despite the fact that he didn't tell me about it earlier. It suddenly hit me why Nikki thought he looked familiar when I first saw him at Calum's booth. She'd seen his work before. My stomach clenched at the mental picture of the poster he had by his booth with the big-busted bitch.
"I see," I mumbled out. "I won't tell anyone your real name, if that's what you're worried about."
Tristan's bright green eyes looked right at me like he was trying to look through me. "I'm not, I know you wouldn't tell anyone."
It was so awkward in the tiny restroom; the tension felt suffocating. I didn't like this weirdness, whether it was with him or with someone else, I'd hate it. Tristan dropped the towel, which was then more black than white, on the floor and waved for me to follow him out of the bathroom almost as if he read my mind.Don't check him out. Don'tcheck him out. Don't check him out, I repeated to myself to no avail.
I didn't want to look at him but really, who wouldn't eye-molest the shit out of him? I bet if my grandma were still alive she'd probably fondle his perfectly round ass. It looked like he'd cut a soccer ball in half and then stuffed the two ends under his tight ass jeans.
Ugh.Why? Why?
Why couldn't he have a flat ass? A butt chin? At least a really crappy personality? I could live with that. I could use that as a reason to leave, but I know he didn't. Even if he was a porn star, I knew he wasn’t a bad person. My bullshit-meter had become finely tuned after a year of teaching pathologically lying fourth graders. I'd be able to tell if he was full of shit but he wasn't.
"This is really making you feel weird, isn't it?" he asked me all of a sudden, stopping in front of the couch to pick up the black hoodie he had on earlier.
I wanted to tell him no, but I couldn't. "Yeah, a little. I just... I don't know. I just thought you were some bored guy that's really friendly and now... you have fans that probably think... I don't know. I don't know what I'm saying." It was a struggle to express what I was feeling because I really didn't know what I thought or felt exactly.
"I am some bored guy that was friendly to you." He gazed up at me through those long, dark eyelashes without saying anything. He shrugged more to himself than to me, I thought. "Can I tell you something, and you won't laugh?" he asked, but I was nodding before he even finished the question. He shook his head in amusement just a little. "It's hard—"
My phone started ringing obnoxiously loud right then. "Hold on," I told him, digging through my purse for my phone. Yanking it out, I saw the picture I had for Nicole, which was actually of her ass crack, displayed across the screen, so I knew I needed to answer the call. "Yes, Madame?"
"Let's go, Slut McGee. If I hear Zoey cry one more time about how hungry she is, I'm going to kill someone. Meet me in the parking lot, or do you want us to wait inside for you so you don't get lost?"
"I'll meet you by your car, Nikki." We each said a quick bye before I hung up the call and tossed my phone back into my purse.
"You need to go?" Tristan asked, zipping up his hoodie.
I nodded at him. "My friend, Nicole, is ready to leave." I told him, starting to make my way over to the door. "Umm, I think she invited Calum to our friend's birthday party next week so you're welcome to come too, if you want." I blabbered like a moron.
"Okay," he said, standing there, hands shoved into the pockets of his hoodie.
"Well, I guess hopefully I'll see you... there." My hand was on the knob, and I felt bad for just storming out of there. "Bye Magellan," I added not bothering to make any eye contact before throwing the door open and hustling down the hallway to leave.
I was about halfway to the door when I realized he never got the chance to tell me what was on his mind.
