Five Years Ago: Part 2

It seems like hours have gone by and still she waits for the whistle. Never for a second does she doubt it will come. That would mean doubting him.

Earlier tonight her mother was waiting for her when she ran, breathless and disheveled, through the front door. Lita was perched on the edge of an enormous chair backed with ghoulish ivory tusks, a relic from the days of Rex Savage, when people didn’t know any better about much of anything. It certainly never occurred to them that massacring a majestic animal for a few trophies was wrong. Ren has always hated that chair.

Lita was tapping her thin fingers on the ivory arm. Dark and gray roots showed through her blonde hair. She made no secret of despising her husband for moving the family out here, for despising her children for failing to lift her out of these circumstances. She observed Ren with a silent sort of disgust before lighting a cigarette. When she decided to speak her words were like bullets. “You better goddamn well watch yourself, girl.”

“Of course, Lita. It would never have occurred to me to watch my step if you didn’t order it,” Ren answered with eye-rolling sarcasm.

She knew how it irked Lita Savage to hear her children call her by her first name. Of course all five of them did it.

After Ren and her mother exchanged a tense look, one of ten thousand such moments of tension over the past seventeen years, Ren hurried out of the room. The air was poisonous wherever Lita was and Ren didn’t want her mood spoiled. She was still on a high from being with Oscar.

Now, lying in the dark and waiting to hear something from him, it seems impossible that he’s been in her life for less than a month. She can’t remember what it was like to spend a day without him in her world. Ren doesn’t think of herself as romantic. She’s not all silly and swoony like her sisters. Boys say nice things to get what they want and every now and then she lets one of them kiss her. Oscar, on the other hand, still hasn’t tried a damn thing. She doesn’t know how to ask him to.

There it is. The sound begins low and ends on a high note. Ren smiles and goes to the window.

“Where the hell are you going?” Brigitte hisses from her bed.

Since August still hasn’t gotten around to cleaning out his parents’ ancient crap from the extra rooms, Ren gets to be stuck in the smallest bedroom with her two sisters. The three beds take up so much room it’s tough to walk across the floor without bumping into a freaking mattress. As Bree complains at least once a day, “This sure as shit ain’t the lifestyles of the rich and famous.”

“Can’t sleep,” Ren hisses back. “I’m just gonna go up to the brothel and see what Monty’s up to.”

“Bullshit,” Brigitte answers, a little too loudly. Ava stirs in her sleep and lets out a catlike whine. Bree lowers her voice. Slightly. “Monty’s either out getting busy with some local airhead or else he’s drunk on that beer he stole from the Consequences Convenience Store yesterday.”

Right outside the window, Oz lets out another whistle.

Brigitte hears. She vaults out of bed and pads over barefoot, pressing her face to the window. But Bree always takes her contact lenses out before bed and Ren knows she can’t see anything out there.

“Who’s that?” Bree frowns into the darkness.

“An owl.”

“Like hell.”

Ava suddenly sits up in bed. She must have been just pretending to sleep. She sighs and uses a rare serious tone. “Careful, Ren. I mean it. Lita’s hair is already standing on end. I heard her this afternoon, whining to Dad about Oscar.”

Ren feels uneasy. “What was she saying?”

“That Aunt Mina better haul her saggy ass back here and retrieve her hellraising little thug.”

Ren exhales, relaxing. “Oscar hasn’t exactly raised hell. She must be confusing him with Monty.”

Bree grunts and crosses her arms. She starts chewing on a fingernail. “She’s afraid. Lita, I mean. I’m not sure why. Maybe she thinks you’ll wind up bearing Oscar Savage’s love child and tarnishing the family name.”

“More than it’s already tarnished,” Ava agrees.

Ren isn’t especially moved by her mother’s distress. “She’s just making noise because she’s got nothing better to complain about at the moment. Lita still thinks one or more of us will be her meal ticket back to Hollywood. To her, any exposure is good exposure.”

Brigitte sighs as if she’s being forced to explain physics to a five-year-old. “Unless it involves the sexcapades of two kids, both with the last name of Savage. Get a clue, Loren. The wrong people get wind of this and we’ll look even shittier than we already do. I can see the headlines: Deranged Famous Family Now Inbreeding.”

“That’s messed up, Bree. We’re not even really related for crying out loud.”

“You think that will matter in the realm of the tabloids?”

Ren turns away, troubled. Brigitte may seem like a spoiled brat most of the time but every once in a while she manages to hit the nail on the head. Ren doesn’t have an answer for her. She’s had enough of her sisters for now. Oscar is out there waiting in the darkness, waiting.

“We’re just friends,” she says, flinging open the window.

“Just friends,” repeats Brigitte in a mocking singsong before hopping back to her own bed.

“Just friends,” parrots Ava with a yawn and then rolls back under the covers.

Ren is still wearing the same cutoff shorts she’s worn all day. But she exchanged her loose button down shirt for a form-fitting tee. The night air smells of rain. Miles to the east the mountains are masked by darkness, an absolute kind of darkness with no moon, no stars. A flash of lighting parries with a groan of thunder as a summer storm approaches.

Oscar is closer than she thought. He catches her as she stumbles on her way out the window. His strong hands linger on her waist longer than they need to and his breath is close to her ear.

“Thought you’d probably be asleep by now.”

“No you didn’t or you would have come.”

“I’d have come anyway, Ren.”

They are inches apart and she can’t breathe. Is this how it happens for every girl? There’s an ache that’s nearly painful, something she can’t solve by herself and doesn’t even know how to talk about. Oscar pushes a few strands of hair from her forehead. They’d spent the day together, as they’d been spending every day together, but it isn’t enough. They are like opposing magnetic ends, always finding their way to the same space in the dreary landscape of Atlantis.

Today August had decided he needed some tools and the town of Consequences was the nearest place to shop. Lately the Savage patriarch had become something of a hermit, adopting a scraggly beard and spending most of his time either up in the stifling attic or out in the old barn with Spencer. The barn was built as a set prop; it was never meant to be a true barn and it was in desperate need of a makeover if it was going to start housing more animals like August wanted. He’d hatched some kind of half-baked scheme for boarding horses. Ren didn’t pay much attention to the details. Of course Lita had nothing but horror for the whole endeavor.

Spencer tagged along with them this afternoon. Ren didn’t mind because Spencer wasn’t in the habit of taking an interest in other people. Her younger brother lounged in the bed of the pickup the entire time and stared up at the sky thinking inscrutable Spencer-type things that probably involved being twenty miles away from the nearest human being. She’d let Oscar drive. Within two days after his arrival, Ren had taught Oscar to drive a stick shift and he was actually more comfortable behind the wheel of the old clunker than Ren was. Several times his smooth fingertips grazed the skin of her thigh as he reached for the stick. Too often to be wholly accidental. She didn’t flinch. She didn’t encourage him either.

Once they were in town, Spencer disappeared into the hardware store. There was a vending machine by the gas station on Central Street where they grabbed some cold sodas and chips. Ren and Oscar wandered around, licking their cheese-covered fingers and laughing together with sticky mouths, not aware that anyone else even existed. For all they knew the entire populace of Consequences had been reduced to ash by some cosmic apocalypse. They sat on the pickup tailgate, side by side with their hips touching while Oscar talked in an excited voice about caves.

Hanging out in the back of a pickup truck in some small town that didn’t even warrant a map dot, beside the boy she was falling in love with, Ren felt as far away from Hollywood as she could get. It was a good feeling.

Then a woman resembling a muskrat, tiny and matted, stopped right in front of them. She smelled like she’d perfumed herself with nicotine.

“You’re one of those Savage girls,” she said in a monotone that hinted at nothing.

“I am,” Ren answered warily. Long accustomed to being known for what she was - or rather what her family was - than who she was, she was prepared to be annoyed. Ever since they’d moved out here to Atlantis they’d been treated with polite suspicion by most of the locals. Most had no memory of Rex Savage or of the golden era of cinema that briefly made the area a place of interest. They only knew a bedraggled family with a famous name had moved into their midst.

The woman shifted her gaze to Oscar. “But you’re not one of them boys, are you?”

“He’s not my brother,” Ren blurted and blushed, irritated with herself for explaining anything to this prying stranger.

“I’m not her brother,” Oscar confirmed in an amused voice and he slung a casual arm around Ren’s shoulders. “I’m her cousin.”

The woman had no more questions after that. She pursed her bloodless lips together and ducked into a paint store.

“Think we scandalized her without even trying,” Oscar laughed.

Ren had wished he would keep his arm around her. But he removed it as soon as the woman was gone.

Now though, in the darkness with nothing but the yips of coyotes in their midst, there’s something about the thickness of his breathing and the way his hand squeezes her shoulder. Like he wants more and he’s considering taking it.

“Come with me,” he whispers, grabbing her hand.

Their steps are soundless as the thunder drowns out everything but its own complaints. When there’s a lull in the rumbling Ren hears music; crashing, angry music from another era.

“Monty.” Oscar nods in the direction of the brothel.

Out of the night comes the brief, piercing howl of female laughter.

“Sounds like he has company.”

Oscar snorts. “That he does. And he’s sure as hell not shy about keeping it in the bedroom. Or in his pants for that matter.”

Ren feels her face getting hot. “A little TMI, dude.”

“Believe me, not as much TMI as I’ve suffered tonight.”

“Gross. Just do me one favor, Oscar, and keep it to yourself.”

He laughs, nudges her shoulder. He’s teasing now, flirting. “I’ve been keeping everything to myself, Loren.”

“What does that mean?” She knows what it means.

He raises his strong arms toward the sky and stretches. “It means this whole goddamn desert stay has been one long drought.”

This is what he does, this flirty banter that never ends with anything more than handholding. Sometimes Ren thinks he’s testing her. Other times she thinks he’s holding himself back for another reason, a vague sense of honor or a funny feeling that there’s a line that shouldn’t be crossed.

Or maybe he just thinks she’s ugly.

Ren withdraws her hand, tosses her hair. The storm has receded, passing them by after all. They are beyond Atlantis now. It’s a bad idea. You never know what lurks in the desert brush and none of it will announce itself in the darkness. It’s the one thing August always warns them about.

“A drought, huh?”

“Yeah. At least I’ve got my blue balls to keep me company.”

Ren sniffs, deciding she’s a little insulted. “All those fancy schools and they skimp on etiquette lessons. Mina might be upset when she realizes she didn’t get her money’s worth.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Means you talk like a man whore sometimes.”

Oscar stops walking. He allows a long minute to pass before speaking. “Thought you figured a few things out about me already. Being a gentleman doesn’t come naturally to me, Ren.”

“Then don’t be one.”

She tosses the words off frivolously. When he grabs her wrist it’s a shock.

“Stop,” he warns. His tone says he’s not kidding anymore.

She’s defiant. “Why?”

He’s closer now. There’s a sweet smell on his breath and she recognizes it. Beer. He must have snagged a can or two from Monty. He’s got her other wrist and if he moves an inch closer their bodies will press together. He’s so much bigger than her, so much stronger. Her head begins to swim.

“Because,” he snarls, “if I kiss you, Loren, there’s no fucking way I’m going to stop.”

He says it like he can’t imagine anything worse.

She shakes her hand loose from his grip and reaches for him, touches his face. He turns his head away and spits a curse, something in another language that she doesn’t recognize. The humiliation stings.

Ren tears away from him and begins stalking back to the house. All their teasing during the long, hot days of the last month and they’ve never fought. They’ve also never kissed. What kind of an idiot is she anyway? They’re not falling in love. They are just two bored kids who can’t find anyone else around worth talking to. Even if they were to mess around it wouldn’t mean shit. Oscar has told her a few things about himself already, about all the girls. To him, she would just be another one. Forgettable.

Oscar doesn’t let her get far. He catches her from behind and his arms wind around her body, holding her tight against his hard chest.

“Let me go.” She kicks at him.

“Why the hell are you acting like this?”

“Look, I feel like enough of a jackass already. Just leave me alone and maybe Monty can find you a friend to help end your fucking drought.”

He spins her around. Roughly. His hands are on her face and then his fingers are all wound up in her long dark hair. He’s forcing her to look at him even though there’s no light in the sky and she can hardly see his face.

“Damn you, Ren! I can’t just treat you like any girl. You know how many there’ve been? You don’t know because I don’t even know. Not one of them has meant a thing to me except a good time. I’ve been bouncing around from place to fucking place since I can remember. I don’t even have real friends and the only family I have is a woman who forgets who I am most of the time.”

He coughs at the end but relaxes his hold on her. Ren reaches up, finds his lips with her fingers, tracing them.

“I’m your friend,” she whispers. “I’m your family.”

A small groan rips out of his throat. He kisses her. He’s not soft or hesitant like the few other boys she’s kissed. All she can think is my god, my god, my god. She would sink right into the desert floor if he wasn’t holding her up. This, she knows, is how a kiss should be. This is the one she’ll compare all others to for the rest of her life.

A sonic boom of thunder cuts loose overhead and the sky opens up. The storm that had seemed to roll back into the Harquehalas has returned with a vengeance. They are soaked to the skin within seconds but their mouths stay glued together. It seems nothing can conquer the power of that kiss. It is cosmic, it is limitless.

Then a streak of lightning lights up a mesquite tree only a few yards away. The feathery branches are briefly lit by a burst of fire and then just as suddenly the flame is drowned by the rain.

The kiss is over. Oscar grabs her hand and they run all the way back to the house. There’s a narrow patio overhang along the south side of the building and they huddle beneath it but everything is all right because she’s in his arms.

“You should go in,” he sighs, running his lips along her neck.

“I will.” It’s a weak promise. She has no desire to go anywhere.

“Loren.” God, her name never sounded as good as it does coming from his mouth. He gently kisses her forehead, her eyelids. “This changes everything you know.”

“I know.”

“There’s no going back. No matter what.”

“I don’t want to go back, Oscar,” she promises, hugging him stubbornly. She doesn’t even know what it means. She doesn’t know what she’s saying. She only knows that she needs him. She feels lightheaded and needs to breathe deeply before she can speak. The words aren’t as hard to say as she thought they’d be.

“I lied from the beginning,” she whispers. “I don’t want to be just friends. I never did.”

He strokes her hair. She hears the smile in his voice. “Good.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

OZ

Loren Savage was never as tough as she pretended to be. I’d figured that out less than five minutes after meeting her. Beneath that know-it-all shell was a vulnerable girl just aching to be loved.

Which I did. Goddammit, I did. Not that it mattered when the world caught fire and a choice was laid at her feet. I don’t know what she really believed or didn’t believe. But she turned her back and cowered behind her train wreck of a family.

And now…

I don’t know who the hell she is. I just know that the second she sees me she looks like all the blood in her body went somewhere else and she might tip over.

Maybe if she does fall over I will catch her.

Maybe I won’t.

Some perverse part of me is glad to see the alarm in her eyes. She probably thinks I’m just here to fuck things up with her stupid show. Ren glances sideways at a creeping cameraman and then looks back at me with what seems like silent pleading.

Yeah, I know they’re there, sweetheart. If you think I give a damn you’ve got another thing coming.

I’m pretty good at playing it cool when it suits me and right now it suits me to act like I’m just here for shits and giggles.

“Are you staying?” she asks.

The tremor in her voice does something to me and it crosses my mind that I ought to cut the crap and just go to her. If I could touch her, just once, I’d know right away whether or not I’m wasting my time. Problem is, I’m not ready to face it if that’s the case. I’ve upended my simple, solitary life to come out here and expose myself to the world.

For her.

I’m just not ready to let her know that.

“I am,” I answer and she tiredly nods like she was expecting that answer but hoping for another one.

There’s no time to say anything else because the most irritating feline shriek in the world crushes all the conversation.

“Oh. My. GOD!” it says as its owner flies out of the house in a cloud of red hair and skin. “Oscar Savage! We thought you were dead!”

It’s Brigitte, the youngest and most obnoxious of the Savage siblings. I didn’t like her five years ago and I don’t like her now, especially not when she wraps her ropy arms around my neck and makes me choke on her perfume. She detaches herself after a quarter of a second and starts howling about how she absolutely can’t believe it and oh my god she’s so glad I’m not dead and oh my god she can’t believe that the earth is really round and that I’m still walking around on it.

Ren remains silent, rooted to the front porch, although I notice she has shifted her attention from me. She’s now glaring at her sister with angry suspicion. She should. After all, someone told that Vogel character more than he ever had a right to know and by the look on her face, that someone sure as hell wasn’t Ren.

“Hey there, Oscar,” says a more timid voice. It belongs to a stacked blonde holding a little kid.

I don’t know her. I wave half-heartedly. Never mind, I do know her. It’s Ren’s other sister, the one who was always walking around with her teenage tits hanging out and waiting for someone to notice them.

“Hey, Ava.” I greet her with a smile because I don’t remember her being awful. Kind of lonely and needy but generally a good kid. The only ones in this ridiculous family I could stand to be in the same room with for five minutes were Ava and her twin brother, Spencer. And Ren of course. The rest of them were generally pains in the asses. Brigitte with her scheming seemed destined to be a carbon copy of her witchy mother. August kind of lost himself in his own hazy fantasies and generally couldn’t hold a conversation. And Montgomery, Ren’s older brother, always skulked around spoiling for a fight just for the sake of fighting, not because he gave a shit whether he won or not.

Once we’ve said our awkward hellos, things kind of come to a standstill. Ren disappears into the house without another word, Ava on her heels. Brigitte sighs and wanders purposefully toward the scenic backdrop for some meaningful modeling.

I would grab my bags out of the truck but no one ever gave me any hints about where I’ll be staying. Atlantis looks pretty much the same as is ever did, a fake town that some rich guy bought as a souvenir. A sturdy-looking barn has replaced the dilapidated building that I remember. The brothel has crumbled a little more, the phony jail is more rusted, the church seems like it’s one sigh away from pitching over into the dirt.

The only really nice building is the main house and it looks like someone has been keeping it up okay. But overall, Atlantis Star doesn’t look like the kind of place anyone would brag about so once again I wonder about what kind of ideas that Vogel character has.

I still don’t know what the hell the point of this show is. Was the whole pack of Savages lured out to this bad memory just to be made fun of? Gloated over? And are they all so goddamn desperate not to have to earn an honest living that they fell for it?

“Oz!” hails a voice and suddenly there’s some middle aged woman with bouncy implants heads my way. She’s not familiar so either she’s part of the crew or some other long lost Savage.

I was right on the first count. Her name is Cate Camp and she’s part of Team Gary. She fluffs her brassy blonde hair, describes her role here as something more than a director but less than a therapist, Ha ha.

She actually laughs just like that; HAHA, two staccato bursts of artificial personality. She’s trying to get me to like her because someone in Reality Television School probably told her if she wins over the cast they’ll be more likely to spill a thousand and one of their darkest secrets. Nothing about her interests me but I’m trying for minimal civility until I can figure a few things out.

So instead of silence or profanity I give her a series of one-word answers.

Cate Camp says, “You’ve traveled a long way.”

I say, “Yes.”

Cate Camp says, “And you haven’t had any contact with the family at all these past five years.”

“Yes.”

“You spent a summer here and left shortly after the death of your adopted mother.”

“Yes.”

Cate Camp shows me her un-Botoxed frown lines. She’s displeased with me. “From what I hear you left under bad circumstances.”

“Yes.”

Cate Camp goes for the throat. “And all the trouble was due to an inappropriate relationship with one or more members of the family.”

Now I’m done answering her questions.

Cate Camp gets suddenly maternal, patting my arm lightly and lowering her voice even as she silently signals the nearest Camera Creep to get ready. “It has something to do with Loren, is that right? The tension was obvious between you two. She wasn’t exactly dancing for joy when she saw you, now was she? No, she looked at you like you were the last man on earth she wanted to see. Oh Oz, nobody could blame you for whatever happened. You were just a kid. And they threw you out into the world like you were nothing, didn’t they? After all, you’re not really one of them. You’re not; you know that. So tell us. Tell us how that makes you feel.”

What a fucking joke. She’s going to have to be a lot more cunning than that to get a rise out of me. I act like she didn’t say anything. I grab my duffel bag out of the truck and look around.

“So what are the sleeping arrangements here, boss?”

Frown lines etch themselves deeper into other frown lines. Cate Camp isn’t good at her job. She has no patience for anyone who doesn’t immediately cooperate with her. The frown lines would dissolve if I would punch a fist into my palm and spill my guts about everything that happened but I’m about as likely to do that as I am to start square dancing.

She points to a run down trailer-like structure. “Your remember your old quarters?”

“Yeah.” I give no hint that I’m surprised. Of course they already know the details of that summer, all the details.

Cate Camp snaps her fingers at the Camera Creep so he’ll follow me as I trudge off in the direction of the brothel, toward the little house that still sits behind it.

Gary Vogel has a hell of a lot of money backing him up. He could have set the show in posh California quarters. Or at the very least he could have sprinkled some of those resources over Atlantis Star to make the place slightly less dilapidated. But what the hell would be the fun in that? I have a bad feeling it’s all intentional. Of course it is. There’s nothing more American than a sordid tale of celebrity ruin.

The structure that squats behind the brothel is the old caretaker’s house. It was all right when I stayed here. The air conditioner wasn’t really enough to deal with the thin walls and living with Monty was like rooming with a wolverine. But other than that, it was fine. It actually doesn’t look much different and a wave of nostalgia sweeps over me. I’ve passed through dozens of places in my life and rarely thought of any of them as home. Something about being back here leaves me feeling a little out of sorts though. I suppose I knew that would happen all along. If this place didn’t mean a thing to me I wouldn’t have come.

No one answers my polite knocks. There’s a camera trained on me, of course, but I’ve already decided not to even think about that. After all, I have no intention of watching whatever kind of strange brew they turn into a so-called show.

The doorknob turns in my hand and since I don’t feel like standing out here in the heat all day I have no qualms about going inside.

“Hello?” I call.

Someone spiffed up the inside of the place. I know Spencer lives at Atlantis full time but the leather couch, hipster wall prints and turquoise accents don’t seem like things he would choose.

No one answers me but in a few seconds I can see I’m not alone. Well, I’m never alone now. The Camera Creep comes slithering through the doorway after me and I know there are fixed cameras installed all over the place. I was told that the crew tails us in shifts for about twelve hours a day and the fixed cameras pick up anything else that might be exciting. Maybe I should have asked Cate Camp if they’re everywhere, even in the bathrooms, but then again maybe I’d rather not know. If someone really finds it interesting to watch me brushing my teeth and taking a shit, then we as a people have probably fallen off the evolutionary abyss.

It’s not just the Camera Creep keeping me company. Not six feet in front of me is Montgomery Savage. He’s sprawled in a chair. He’s got no shirt on, a web of dark ink on his body and his pants are open. His bleary eyes try to shift into focus. Then they widen. “The fuck are you doin’ here?”

“I’m not here,” I say, dropping my bag. “You’re dreaming.”

Monty utters a grumpy string of curses and rolls out of the chair, finally straightening up and glaring at me like he’s an angry bull and I’m standing here with a red blanket screaming ‘Toro!’ He’s pretty ripped, more than he used to be, and it’s obvious he’s been roughed up by life. But I would bet that I could take him down if I needed to. I’d rather not though. We’re not fucking teenagers anymore.

Luckily, Monty seems to settle down after a few seconds. He pats his pockets and finds a pack of cigarettes there, lighting up and looking me over coolly.

“Jesus,” he says with a short, humorless laugh, “I wonder who else will come crawling out of the fucking woodwork.”

“Yeah, I’m glad to see you too, Monty.”

He puffs on his cigarette while I look around. Monty probably isn’t going to make things any easier, or more pleasant. I’d rather just stay out of his way.

“So is there anyone else home?”

Monty shrugs. “Spence is jerking off in the creosote somewhere. The girls are probably in the big house.”

“I saw them already.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Is that so?”

I look him in the eye. “It is.”

The last time I spoke to Monty Savage we had a difference of opinion. I thought he ought to mind his own goddamn business and he thought I needed to get acquainted with his fists. I wasn’t about to be taken down by some Hollywood pretty boy no matter whose brother he was so I gave it right back to him, like I usually did. We both came out of the scuffle rather worse for the wear with no clear winner. He’d gotten in the last parting shot though.

“You go near my sister again and I’ll fucking kill you.”

A few hours after that all hell broke loose and whatever I’d thought I was to these people didn’t matter. They were more than ready to toss me in the dumpster. Even Ren. Maybe she had her reasons but I’ve never understood how they could have led her to do what she did. People didn’t connect the way we’d connected and then lose it all just like that.

Anyway, whatever else I have to say about Monty, he cares about his family in his own way. That’s why I decide to hold my tongue and not fire back some snappy retort that would piss him off. If I’d ever had a sister I probably wouldn’t like any guy who messed around with her either.

“I guess you can take the back room,” Monty says, turning his back to me as he runs a hand through his black hair. “I wondered why someone got it all cleaned up. I guess I should have known.”

“Thanks,” I mutter and start to head down the narrow hallway.

“Hey, Oscar.”

I turn around.

Monty Savage is giving me his best and most dangerous scowl. I have to admit it is effective. “If you’re here to cause any trouble for her, you and me are gonna throw down.”

I’m not in the mood to cave to him. Or to give any assurances. Let him stew for a while and wonder what I’m up to. So all I say is, “I expect we will.”

It’s the same room I stayed in five years ago. It’s small and square and someone decorated it in retro southwestern style. I close the door in the face of the Camera Creep but I’m sure they have other ways to watch me.

Even though it’s hotter outside than it is inside I crack open a window. There is all kinds of nervous energy running through me even though I get nervous about as often as I turn my head and cough.

Ren was obviously shaken by the sight of me. Part of me wants to go barreling into the big house right this minute and make her even more uncomfortable. Another part of me feels kind of sorry for the way her face paled and her hands trembled. I’ll give her a little space, for now. But only for a little while.

Because I’m here. And she’s going to have to deal with me whether she likes it or not.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

REN

Ava chatters away about the gourmet spaghetti she’s going to make for dinner even though dinner is hours away. She grabs mismatched pots out of the kitchen cabinets and let Alden smack them against the terra cotta tiles.

There is no mention of the fact that Oscar Savage has materialized. It should be a subject worth discussing even if she knows nothing about what happened between me and Oscar five years ago. And I’m sure she knows something. She’s trying to distract me from the full tilt freak out that threatens to erupt.

“That sounds good,” I tell my sister when she mentions driving into town for a bottle of wine. When I look up, Ava catches my eye and gives me a tiny smile of sympathy. She opens her mouth to say something but then glances at the nearby camera and shuts it.

I rub my eyes and see a medley of rainbow color. When I stop rubbing, I see his face. He’s no longer just a painful memory spasm.

He’s here.

He’s right out in the yard talking to Cate fucking Camp, likely plotting the next shocking plot twist. At least it doesn’t look like he’s going to follow me into the house. For the time being anyway.

If Oscar had wanted to find me he could have found me long ago. I was never hiding.

Why now?

Of course I already know the answer. Oscar is here for the show. He’s here because someone thought this would be a nice unseemly addition to the story. I’m sure he’s being paid handsomely for showing up. With some bitterness, I think about how his arrival could not have been scripted better.

“Shit,” I whisper, so softly it could be mistaken for a sigh.

Alden scurries over and drops a stainless steel pot in my lap. He offers me a delightfully impish toddler grin and announces, rather oddly, “Imma bat!”

Ava’s still gathering kitchen implements and trying to hide the fact that she’s furtively looking over my shoulder to see what’s going on outside. Meanwhile, I’m at war with myself.

On one hand I want nothing so desperately as for Oscar Savage, Oz, or whatever he’s decided to call himself now, to climb right back in his pickup truck and return to whatever pocket of the world burped him out. But then the other hand holds out a big stop sign. Because the second I saw him, some shriveled, long dormant piece of my heart swelled.

This is something I can’t help. This is something that happens despite the fact that I know very well he’s been paid off.

Ava’s watching me worriedly and trying to corral her son as he starts galloping around the kitchen island carrying a wooden spoon. She looks like she’s scouring her mind for something to say to me and I wish I could let her off the hook. Really though, we’re not the sort of sisters who pour our hearts out to one another. And even if we were, I simply have nothing to say at the moment.

Then the heavy wooden front door swings open and a second later Brigitte comes flouncing in, all apple-cheeked and bright-eyed. Even though I know I shouldn’t, even though I can see myself in my mind’s eye already in a television promo clip grabbing my sister’s arm in a vice-like grip and hissing in her face, I do it anyway. It’s all I can do not to slap her when I demand, “What the hell have you done?”

She’s startled, her face frozen in angelic innocence. If a cartoon balloon materialized above her head it would read “Who, me??”

“I haven’t done anything, Ren,” she pouts and lets her soft blue eyes fill with tears. She looks down at my fingers clamped on her arm, likely wondering what kind of mark will emerge on her delicate skin and how she can capitalize on it.

I let her go.

“Damn you,” I choke out.

“Ren,” whispers Ava with hurt bewilderment. She always has and always will defend Brigitte. Ava is not a good judge of character. Beyond her reputation as a hardcore party girl, she’s really flighty and naive. But she doesn’t have the kind of self-serving nature that our little sister does. She wouldn’t have sold me out in exchange for a few close ups. And the boys wouldn’t have blabbed about me and Oscar, not for any amount of money.

But all bets were off when it came to Bree. She might have inherited a little too much of Lita.

I stalk back to my bedroom, ducking in there only long enough to grab my keys and purse. My sisters are exactly where I left them in the kitchen. Bree is traumatized by the way I manhandled her and Ava is patting her injured arm with maternal comfort. It makes me want to scream.

“Imma bat!” Alden announces winningly when he sees me.

Even though I’m not feeling especially cheerful I’d have to be heartless not to smile at him. None of this is his fault. He was just born in the middle of it. I smile at the little boy. “You sure are, buddy.”

“Where are you going?” Ava calls as I head toward the door.

“Town.”

Bree practically knocks the kid over as she lunges in my direction. “Wait, Loren,” she calls a little too loudly. “We need to talk. I’ll come with you.”

“No, you won’t, Brijeeet.” I slam the door without looking to see if she’s got her fingers on the doorjamb. I need some time with no sisters and no brothers and no wronged, angry ex-lovers.

However, apparently I can’t have some time without cameras. At least it’s just Rash who trails after me. If Cate Camp shows her face right now I just might gouge her artificially inflated boobs with my ignition key.

I get behind the wheel and wait for Rash to follow me in there. He has stopped though. He’s standing about ten feet away from the car and he’s got his camera off his shoulder and stares down at it with a frown. He looks up and winks, then jerks his head briefly in what seems to be a ‘Get out of here,’ gesture.

I get it now. He’s actually being decent, pretending to have technical difficulties. He’s trying to do me a favor. Rash does point to the dashboard though and I notice the tiny camera now mounted to it. I give him a thumbs up and get the car pointed toward Consequences. I think about tearing the camera off the dashboard and chucking it to the side of the road but I don’t. In the end I just crank up Katy Perry tunes and sing in a very loud off key voice, feeling perversely gleeful that someone is going to be forced to sit through the footage of my rotten performance.

It’s good to be out alone. The ever-present feeling of slow suffocation relaxes a little. Mercifully, Oscar was nowhere in sight when I pulled away from Atlantis. His truck, however, was just where he’d left it in the large clearing between the house and the brothel. So he isn’t gone, just hidden.

The Consequences Convenience Store is just as I remember it. Beside the door they have the same air freshener carousel with probably the exact same merchandise that was hanging there five years ago. An older man wearing a red smock and a tag that says ‘Kenny’ is dusting off a shelf of fishing gear, which doesn’t make any sense because there’s no fishable water within a hundred miles. He doesn’t look up when I enter.

The booze is still in the back, exactly where it’s always been. Monty used to make raiding the CCS, as we called the store, something of a hobby. He was always brazen and foolish about it so I don’t know how he managed to never get caught.

The pickings are rather slim here. I’d meant to bring back some wine but even I know a seven-dollar bottle probably isn’t go win over anyone. I grab a bottle of red anyway and snagged a six-pack of beer on my way to the cashier.

Once I’m done at the CCS, I drop the bags off in the car and take my time, dawdling around Consequences even though there’s little to see. It’s not that it’s the crappiest place on earth. It’s just kind of a dull void. One that’s been loosely sprinkled with people who seem half asleep.

There’s too many memories here though. That’s the whole damn problem with this godforsaken wrinkle in the state. It was hard enough to keep Oscar at bay and out of my head when he was somewhere unknown. But now he’s lurking back at Atlantis, waiting to assume whatever role in the Savage comedy he plans on playing. If there was ever a good reason for me to ditch this whole project and drive in the opposite direction until I can’t drive anymore, this is it. Gary couldn’t physically force me to return. Whatever kind of power Vogel Productions has, they still might run into some legal trouble if they try to drag me back to Atlantis by my hair.

My fingernails are digging into my palms. No, I won’t do it. I won’t run. There must be some feisty blood left in me somewhere. Maybe I can call on the spirit of Margaret O’Leary to spare some of what made her so hot-tempered and indomitable. If I’m weak enough to be chased away by a ghost of old heartbreak, then I’ll never really make much out of myself. I’ll be another sad drifter, perhaps like Aunt Mina, always confusedly searching and always coming up short.

Let Oscar Savage do his worst. Whatever scripted part he means to play can’t be any more painful than what we’ve already done to each other.

No. Lie. What I did to him.

Oscar walked away from me because I told him to. And as I watched him disappear, a boy alone cast out like garbage, I silently pleaded for the world to be kind to him. I begged him to forgive me, to forgive all of us for being too flawed and cowardly to stand up for anything. My own father had stood by with vague confusion and didn’t say a word because he was too drained to notice anyone else. And then Oscar was gone.

It’s too late now. I don’t even know who he is anymore. I don’t know what kind of revenge he has in mind. I just know that I’ll be taking at least a few cans of that six-pack to bed tonight. I need the edges to be numbed just a little. Hopefully it will be enough. I need it to be enough so that when I close my eyes I don’t dream of him, that I don’t dream at all.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

OZ

I’ve been here for a week now. A week in this surreal landscape of cameras and crew members and a cast who play-act their daily lives for a fucking paycheck. Ren avoids me and so far I’ve allowed her to. I’ve kind of been skirting around the whole damn lot of them since I arrived, eating alone and refusing to set foot in the big house.

Yesterday I helped Spencer out, fixing some of the sunscreens that had been knocked loose by a dust storm the other night. Spence seems to regard my presence as nothing out of the ordinary. At least he doesn’t walk around with his head up his hostile ass, like Monty does. But Spence hasn’t asked me what I’m doing here and I haven’t volunteered to tell him. I offered him a hand with some work, which he stoically accepted, and that was that.

Gary Vogel himself has yet to put in an appearance, although he’s got that insufferable disciple, Cate Camp, following me around. She lurks around corners and coughs up nervous suggestions about what I should say and what I should do and where I might want to think about saying and doing it. I don’t tell her openly to fuck off. I figure silence is enough.

I watch Ren when she doesn’t realize I’m around. She never really relaxes. She wanders warily around Atlantis looking for something to do and escapes to the nearby town several hours a day to uselessly roam around there.

Something’s been lost to her these last five years. There used to be an innocent kind of confidence in the way she carried herself. The kind that said even in the midst of her crazy family she at least knew exactly who she was. I’m still furious with her. I still want her like hell, maybe now more than ever.

Last night I found myself wondering what she would do if I stood outside her window and whistled, just like I used to.

The temps are still pretty cool early in the morning so I take a hike toward the Harquehala’s to watch the sunrise. One of the bumbling Camera Creeps tries to follow me but I don’t have much trouble leaving him behind. About halfway up a vague trail I search for a flat rock bench that I know is there, close to a cave opening that I also know is there. A few turkey vultures circle overhead for a while and then move on. As the sun climbs to reach its rightful place in the sky I decide I’m done tiptoeing around this Born Savages bullshit.

The heat is starting to turn fierce. I jog down the rugged trail and nearly topple the huffing and puffing Camera Creep, the skinny one who’s smoking behind the brothel every time he gets a break. I smile to myself as he curses and does an about face, trying to keep up with me. Let him try all he wants. I’m not waiting around for an audience.

The front door of the big house is unlocked so I stroll casually inside. That pretentious little snot, Brigitte, is sitting in the front room on an ugly chair adorned with grisly animal tusks. She looks up from her tablet where she’s probably scouring the internet for news of herself.

“Oz!” she exclaims with round-eyed surprise.

“Where’s your sister?” I answer shortly.

She gives me an empty-headed look and points down the hall. “She’s in there.”

I barrel through a swinging set of doors that I vaguely remember lead to the kitchen. Ava is in there, setting a bowl of applesauce on the table in front of her kid. The hand that holds the bowl freezes midair and she stares at me.

“Imma bat!” squeals the kid.

Ava sets the bowl down and rests her hand on the boy’s blonde head. “Yes, honey, I know.”

Brigitte has collided with my back, making an ‘oof’ noise. I swivel around to glare at her.

“I meant your other sister.”

“Oh, you mean Loren?” Brigitte says in a stupidly loud voice like she’s got a bucket full of sisters and is easily confused. The years have not made her any less annoying.

“Ren’s in the barn,” Ava interrupts, watching me curiously as her little boy jumps from one ceramic floor tile to the next. “At least that’s where she said she was going.”

I mutter a terse ‘Thanks” under my breath and head straight through the side door. I hope Ren’s bratty sister doesn’t follow me. I’ll have to forget how to be polite for a few minutes.

Ava’s apparently doing the work for me though. I hear her say, “Don’t,” in a warning voice and as Brigitte starts sputtering I let the door close at my back.

Once I’m outside I nearly collide with Monty. He smells like an ashtray and has his shirt off so all the female world can admire his chest.

“Where’s the fucking fire?” he growls and I brace for trouble. But he just shakes his head and sidesteps me.

Suddenly Cate Camp’s blonde head peeks around the side of the house. She looks from side to side like she’s a secret agent and then her raspy voice hisses some orders into her mouthpiece.

The barn is new and smells of paint. Ren is standing in the middle of it, holding a giant hose. It takes approximately two microseconds for her face to change from surprise to alarm when she sees it’s me. I’m done biding my time with her though.

“I think it’s time we talked,” I say with supreme coolness.

She blinks. She looks at her feet and swallows hard. “Okay. What do you want to talk about?”

You. Me. Heartbreak. Your fucked-up family. This ridiculous show. Five years of silence. Take your pick, sweetheart.

But none of that comes out of my mouth. Instead I laugh at her. “I don’t know Ren, why don’t we talk about major league baseball standings?”

She turns her head the other way, says nothing.

There’s a giant push broom leaning against a nearby wall. I grab it and start carelessly moving it across the floor. I sweep a large circle around her feet. “Or we could talk about gluten free dietary alternatives. That’s absolutely relevant. What the hell do you think I want to talk about?”

She still says nothing so I keep talking.

“I know. We could discuss that old Savage-endorsed adage that tabloid publicity is the best publicity.” I get right next to her and her breathing quickens. I reach out and tug ever so lightly on the sleeve of her shirt. “Of course once upon a time when you had the chance to test that out you crawled back into your den like a gutless rat.”

“I don’t blame you for feeling that way.”

“Good. I do hate to be blamed for things.”

“Oscar…” she says, her voice trailing off, her eyes full of pain.

“I’m not looking for an explanation, Loren. After all this time I don’t really fucking care.”

Her eyes flash. “Well, good for you. But you seem to be going to a lot of trouble for someone who doesn’t care.”

“And for someone who used to hold all this celebrity crap in contempt, you’re sure going to a lot of trouble to whore yourself out.”

She whirls around, swatting me away, her eyes flashing. “That’s not fair.”

“Nothing’s fair, baby.”

“Fuck you.”

“Yeah you did.”

Ren knocks the broom right out of my hands. It clatters to the floor. “Why the hell are you here, Oscar? Why now?”

I kick the broom away. “That’s a real bullshit question to ask me.”

She scowls, then adopts an ominous tone. “I can try a different one. How much cash did Gary promise you?”

Laughter erupts out of my mouth. I’m mocking her and she knows it. “Honey, just because you’re for sale doesn’t mean the rest of the world is too.”

Her mouth falls open and her face reddens. I’ve hit a nerve. Good. I’d like to get on every single one of her goddamn nerves with a cattle prod and juice some sense into her.

“You have no idea,” she spits caustically and throws the rubber hose clumsily toward my feet like she’s all of a sudden going to be tough. But then she backs away as her eyes skate nervously from side to side like she’s searching for something.

I get it. She’s trying to figure out how she’s being seen right now.

“Holy shit.” If there was something nearby to punch I would punch it. Instead I glare at her. “The cameras. The motherfucking cameras. That’s what you’re looking for. You trying on a pose for the best angle?”

“Shut up.”

“How about you turn to the side? Give ‘em a profile shot. Suck in your stomach and push out those pert little titties. Didn’t Gary give you orders? Sex appeal matters when it comes to ratings. You know, maybe old Gary should have paid for you to have some work done to enhance your assets. Need to grab that male eighteen to thirty five demographic.”

“Goddammit, shut up!”

She’s about to lose it but I don’t feel like shutting up. I take a step in her direction. Her breathing catches and her brown eyes widen.

What the hell does she think I’m going to do? Hit her? I’ve never hit a female in my life.

But she betrays herself when she looks down. She zooms right in on my cock like it’s just shouted her name. No, it’s not fear that made her gasp. It’s something else.

For whatever reason, this girl is deprived as all hell and every inch of her is shrieking for a good, dirty screw. In truth, I’d be game to give it to her, right here and now, but I’m not going to let her off the hook that easy.

“You know,” I whisper into her ear, “America would probably get off on some hot and filthy incest.”

Her face twists and her body tenses. There we go. God, she’s angry. Shit, it’s hot.

“You son of a bitch.”

“Maybe. No one’s ever claimed the job though so as far as I’m concerned I’m Mina Savage’s kid.”

“The hell you are.”

“Eh, a moot point at this juncture. But it’d be good for ratings if we offered the folks at home something to spank their shit around to. In any case, if you’re unwilling, there are other options. Speaking of which, I haven’t seen Lita around yet.”

I’m hitting way below the belt now. The mere mention of Ren’s mother is like a slap across her face. There’s more than one reason for that.

“Don’t you fucking dare,” she whispers.

“If you believed that lying bitch then you think I already did fucking dare so what’s the harm in talking about it after all this time?”

“You bastard, I wouldn’t believe Lita if she told me the desert is dry.”

“The way I remember it, there seems to have been a few questions. Care to ask them now?”

“No!”

“Fine. We don’t need to talk.” I lean in so close I can nearly taste her. “I’d really rather not hear your voice when we’re getting busy anyway.”

She gives me the coldest of glares but she doesn’t fool me a damn bit. If I tear her pants open right now and shove my hand down there I know I’d get nothing but a warm, wet welcome as her pussy clenches my fingers like a vice. But her eyes flash again and she scoffs, keeping up the charade. “So this is who you are now. Nothing but trash?”

“I always was, Loren. Your mother told you so, remember? Gutter trash that can and did fuck anything with a hole. You knew it. Don’t tell me you didn’t get off on that. You loved it.”

The way she’s looking at me, she might start swinging both fists at my head. What the hell is wrong with me that I’m hard as iron right now? I’m not thinking about what we once had. Things have gone downhill fast since I walked into the barn and none of that long dead tenderness has any place here.

I want it rough and dirty. I want to bend her over, spread her wide and conquer the living shit out of her.

And I know she’d let me.

But then just like that all the fight fades from Ren. Her shoulders slump. She looks at the ground and bites her lip.

“Loren.” I reach out to touch her but stop short. It hurts suddenly because I know she’s no fucking actress. She looks miserable because she is miserable.

“No,” she whispers, writhing out of my grasp. “I can’t do this here.”

My hand falls to my side. “Here’s as good as anywhere else.”

She breathes, slowly, in and out. There seems to be a pattern to it, like maybe it’s some new age technique that’s supposed to clear her head. Maybe I was a jackass for barging in here like this, for blindsiding her on this absurd show in the first place. I’m not sure what I’m hoping for out of all this. But I’m not going anywhere until I figure it out.

“It’s not going to be so easy to dismiss me this time.”

She nods tiredly. “I didn’t think it would be.”

She leaves. I let her go. I stand there alone in a dusty barn, knowing I’m being watched and unable to make myself care. I shove my hands in my pockets and my left knuckle is scraped by an object. I withdraw the rock I’d casually picked up on my morning hike. It looks completely ordinary, parts beige and pinkish red. It isn’t valuable. If you tumble it in a rock polisher for a month it will emerge with a brilliant red color. I like it the way it is though. Five years ago I had a rock just like this and then I lost it. At the time I didn’t even know what it was, just a thing that I’d grabbed as a hasty keepsake because I’d just had the best night of my life and wanted to keep the memory close.

As it turned out, forgetting would have been merciful. I couldn’t forget the most important parts. I’ve spent five long years trying.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Date: 2015-12-11; view: 757