Sometimes I hatedLeo so much that it made me hate myself a little too. Because what kind of a shitty person hated someone for dying? It wasn’t like he did it on purpose. I knew Leo. I knew he’d have tried his best to hang on. But sometimes I hated him anyway… and right now was one of those sometimes. When all the things I felt were churned up inside me like a tornado had been unleashed in my brain and swirled all my thoughts around until they were crashing into each other, making a mess. Making me a mess.
Usually, when I got like this, I went and hung around Lukas. At first, I’d make all kinds of excuses about why I had to be at his house. Eventually, I stopped making excuses and just showed up whenever I wanted, and Lukas had let me. Then I kissed him and he’d been so fucking nice about it.
Humiliation still burned at the back of my throat when I thought about it. About how I’d thrown myself at him, and how it hadn’t even been worth it. The kiss had been wrong and weirdand not at all like I’d imagined it. And since then things had been off between us.
I’d been out of sorts since the scene I filmed with Jax and Blue, but I didn’t want to talk to them about it, and I couldn’t talk to Lukas about it because things were weird and wrong. I’d stepped out for some air and had been wandering around for a while. I realized with a sickening twist in my gut that I missed Leo so much. He was the one person I could have gone to with anything. With everything. Leo always knew what to say to make it better, and I’d never have that again.
Lurching to a stop, I tried to get my breath, but it felt like my lungs had been tied in knots and someone was sitting on my chest. Then I saw him. Sawyer. He jaunted across the street and ducked into a café, and I told myself not to go near him. My brain screamed that it was a bad idea… and I almost listened.
I started walking in the other direction, but my feet had other ideas, or maybe it was my anger. I wasn’t in control of my body anymore, and I found myself staring down at Sawyer. My pulse hammered in my ears, and I wanted to tug at the collar of my t-shirt to create some air movement. I was choking on my anger. Everything had been fine until Sawyer showed up.
I dropped into the seat across from him. Hatred crawled out of me like smoke curling out of my ears. Some small part of me in the back of my mind knew that I should walk away, but my anger had been chomping at me all morning, biting at my heels, nipping at me. Egging me on.
Before I knew what was happening, I was laying into Sawyer, unleashing my fury on him. And hating him more every time he responded like nothing I said affected him.
“You’re not special, you know. Lukas deserves someone who knows him. Someone who understands the industry.” My words shot out of me like arrows, and I watched them hit the bullseye when Sawyer closed his laptop. It felt like retreat, and that feltlike a win to me. Logically I knew that him leaving his table didn’t mean he was leaving Lukas’s life, and that pissed me off.
“He’s going to get sick of being behind the camera, you know. Performing is in his blood.” Urged on by the stricken look on his face, I leaned forward and dropped my voice. “He’s going to start filming again. And then what will you do when Lukas is fucking all kinds of men who aren’t you?”
My tornado became Sawyer’s tornado, and now it was in his mind chucking things around. Satisfaction made me cocky. I could taste victory.
“You don’t know him like I know him.”
Instead of looking threatened, Sawyer tilted his head and looked almost sorry for me. Yeah, he was pissed as hell, I could tell from the way he was shoving his laptop in his bag and the stiff way he held his shoulders. Then he stood and slung his bag over his shoulder and stared down at me like I was dirt. Or something lower than dirt. Something not worth anything.
“What’s his real name?” Sawyer asked.
Kicking me in the balls with soccer cleats would have been kinder. My lungs, which had previously puffed up with bravado, deflated again. Two sad, wheezy balloons tried to give my brain enough oxygen to process what Sawyer said to me next with his stupid expression that made him look like he was still feeling sorry for me.
His words didn’t really register as he said them to me. All I could see was his pity. His sadness. Everything sounded far away except for the rapid hammering of my heart. Sawyer turned and left and that’s when his words caught up to me, slamming into my head like a wrecking ball.
Lukas was going to hate me for this. That’s not what he said, but it was what he meant. I chased Sawyer down, the words he unleashed on me biting at me, making me terrified of what I’d done. Of what I’d said.
“Look, Asher, you’re important to Lukas and I’d never try to come between the two of you and your friendship. But that’s all it is for him, and that’s all it will ever be. So you might want to ask yourself what kind of friend sees someone who is important to someone they care about and decides to treat them the way you just treated me. And then you might want to think about what kind of people Lukas keeps close to him. Don’t fuck up your friendship with him, Asher. Because you’re not even mad at me. And I doubt you’re mad at Lukas, either.”
Sawyer’s words made me feel small and dumb, but I deserved them. I was thankful that Sawyer was easily caught, and without thinking I grabbed his arm. He turned, whipping his head around, ready to really lay into me judging from the look of rage on his face.
“You’re not going to tell Lukas what I said, are you?” I started to babble, frantic for Sawyer to throw me a lifeline that I wasn’t worthy of. Lukas was all I had. Working for him was all I had. There wasn’t anything else for me. “Look, I just saw you and… and it was dumb, and nothing I said was even true. I’m just… please don’t tell him.” Desperation clawed at me, it demanded that I grab Sawyer and shake him until he listened, but Sawyer shook my touch off his arm.
“If you haven’t told Lukas by tonight, I’m going to tell him.”
The ground fell out from under me, and I used every scrap of energy I had to stay on my feet, when all I really wanted to do was curl up into a ball and cry. Nothing had been right since I lost Leo. It felt like I was dropped into someone else’s life.
“He’s going to be so pissed at me.” My words wobbled out of me, terrified of the consequences of my actions.
Sawyer shrugged, indifferent. Not that I could blame him. I’d lost my fucking mind at him. Of course he wasn’t about to care what happened to me or my relationship with Lukas.
“Maybe. Maybe not. But if he hears it from you, you might be able to salvage your friendship.”
For a second, I almost thought Sawyer cared, but then he turned and walked away and left me standing there, trembling and unsure. Part of me wanted to throw up right there, and another part of me wanted to get on a bus and just vanish. But neither of those things would fix what I broke.
I was probably going to lose Lukas. And if Sawyer decided that Lukas was too much drama because of me, Lukas would lose Sawyer and that hadn’t been my intention. Had it? I honestly didn’t know the answer to that question. But if there was a shot at me fixing shit between Lukas and me, I had to take it.
I wasn’t even sure how I got to Lukas’s house, but I let myself in like I always did. Silently wondering if it was the last time I’d be welcome to do so. I knew he wouldn’t be in the basement, but I checked anyway, giving myself another minute to gather myself.
He was in his office, working at the computer. Probably editing footage. Lara gave my presence away with a gentle woof, having spotted me peeking in the room. I knocked to announce myself and waited until Lukas told me to come in before entering.
“Hey, I wasn’t expecting you. Did you want to see the rough cut of the footage? River did an incredible job so far.”
