6
Denise - A Little Friendly Advice
Ryder just basically confessed that he had feelings for me. He had feelings for me way back when we first met, and if I heard correctly, he still has feelings for me now. And I ran away like a scared little kid when he told me. I spent all these years fighting back feelings for him, forcing myself to watch as he became the biggest man slut in the band so the feelings would just leave. And for what? He wasn’t even sleeping around most of that time? And he was doing it to hide his feelings for me? What is even going on right now?
Looking for answers, I call the one woman who knows both me and Ryder, who may be able to help.
I grab my phone and dial Alex’s number, glad that I saved it after she had to quit the chef’s job. I guess it would have been hard to cook with a cast on. Thankfully, she answers after a few rings.
“Hi Denise, what’s up?”
“Hi Alex, do you have a minute? I need some… advice? Or something?”
“I sure do. The guys are in the studio. How are you feeling? Ryder messaged me earlier to say he was hanging out at your place because you were super sick. And, you know, because of Andrew.”
“Oh, yeah, I’m feeling much better, thanks.” At least I won’t need to tell anyone about Andrew; Ryder already took care of it for me. “That’s not really what I want to talk about though.” I give her a brief rundown of my conversation with Ryder, and I don’t think she’s ever sounded happier.
“He finally told you!Yay! It’s about time. I’ve been hinting at it since I met him. Maybe now he can stop drinking so much and acting like such an idiot. What did you say to him?”
“What do you mean, ‘he can stop drinking so much and acting like an idiot’? Ryder’s been drinking so much because of me?” That’s… I don’t know what that is, but it leaves me with a weird feeling in the pit of my stomach.
“Oh you know,”she says, like it’s common knowledge.“He’s been pining after you for so long, and he’s watched you with Andrew all this time. I think he was drowning his sorrows or something. I’m not completely sure on that part, you’d have to ask him for the real answer.”
“I had no idea,” I say. “I thought he was sleeping with all those women this whole time. I never would have thought his behaviour had anything to do with me.”
“Really? You never noticed that every time you said you had a big date or something with Andrew that Ryder would get up to something and you’d be called away?”Well shit. Now that I think about it, yeah, that did seem to happen a lot.
“But why wouldn’t he just say something? Why act like a jerk instead?”
“Well, see, I have this theory. Are you ready for it? Here it is: boys are dumb.”I burst out laughing and she joins in. Once we’ve calmed down a little, she continues.“But seriously, he had feelings for the manager of his band. His very capable and very effective manager who was actually getting results. He didn’t want to risk that by making things awkward with you.”
“Ugh… it would have been easier to just think that boys are dumb. It’s so much more confusing since his reason was a good one.”
“Denise,”Alex sounds serious now.“It really doesn’t matter if he was just dumb or if he had a good reason. What matters is how you feel about him. This is not about what he wants and when he wants it. This is about you and what you want to do with this information.”
“Why are you making so much sense? I thought you were a chef, not a life coach.” I chuckle. “The truth is that I had feelings for him from the first time we met. But I thought he wanted to have a rock star life, which I just found out was really just a distraction technique for him. And watching him with all these women over the years has been rough. I worked really hard to get over the crush I had on him, and get myself to a place where I wanted to try seriously dating. And we all know how that turned out.”
“How did that turn out?”Alex asks.
“That was Andrew. Who has apparently been hoping I would change into a different person the entire time we were together.”
“Wait. You never dated anyone seriously before Andrew?”
“Nope.” I say, popping the ‘P’ a little at the end. “I had some flings and short-term things, but with my job, and travel, and with being around the guys all the time, it was really hard to find someone who was there for the right reasons. I had a few guys who just wanted to use me to get into the industry, some who were Sleeping Dogs fanboys, and some who were just too jealous to deal with me being around the band all the time.”
“Well, that explains why Andrew appealed to you, I suppose. He is nothing like that at all. He’s as far from rock-and-roll as you can get.”
“Yeah, but it turns out even he wasn’t around for the right reasons. My parents promised him I would change. I was just some sort of fixer upper for him. Looking back, my parents probably set us up so that he could fix me up. The Lathans aren’t exactly proud of who their daughter is. They expected more return on their investment in a child I suppose.”
“Sounds to me like you have some thinking to do.”Alex suggests.“And I would recommend never taking your parents’ recommendations for dates ever again. They have terrible taste in men.”
I laugh. They really do have terrible taste in men. “You’re right. Again. I need to think this all through for a bit. Thanks for the talk though, you’ve opened my eyes to a few things I hadn’t thought about.”
“Anytime, just call me. I’ll talk to you soon, OK? Get some more rest.”
“OK, Alex. Bye.”
I hang up my phone and wonder what to do now. I should go back downstairs and talk to Ryder; I sort of left him hanging after bolting when he said he had feelings for me. But I’m not ready to face him yet. I’m too tired to make sense of my own feelings, even though I’ve already had the best nap of my life today.
I pull back my blankets and crawl into my bed. I’ll just have a little nap here and go down and talk to Ryder after. He can watch the movie without interruption and I can get some rest and then we can get into it. Yeah, that’s the best plan.
I turn onto my side and tuck my blanket up under my chin, already drifting off to sleep by the time I’ve made that decision.
