“She kissed me… but I pushed her off. I think it was just a mistake anyway. Nothing serious. There hasn’t been anything going on with us. I’m with Darcy. The world knows that, don’t they?”
“I’m going to warn you now, Seth, that doesn’t matter. A picture speaks a thousand words and these pictures say everything. No one is going to assume that you are with Darcy anymore. People will either assume that you secretly split up because it wasn’t working and you moved on to Winter, or that you cheated… but I will be honest with you, Darcy isn’t mentioned at all in any of the articles that I have seen. She isn’t famous, so the public doesn’t really have an interest in her. Not like they do Winter. They feel like they know her, which is why they are going to be more invested in you two. Now, if this were going to be a career move…”
“This isn’t a career move,” I snap angrily. “This isn’t supposed to be all over the Internet. It’s just a bunch of misunderstandings. And now it’s going to fuck everything up for me and Darcy for nothing.”
Sierra continues to talk to me, but to be honest I have switched her off. She pissed me off with her bullshit, assuming that I am doing this for attention or something. How could she? I have someone who I want to be with, and it isn’t Winter. I wish that stupid drunken moment didn’t happen at all.
Eventually, I force Sierra off the phone, and I head back into the bedroom. All I want to do is climb back under the sheets and block this out for a little while. I would love to deal with it later… but as I spot Darcy sitting bolt upright with wide shocked eyes as she scrolls through something on her phone, I know that isn’t going to happen.
“Wh… what?” I ask her, wishing that she hadn’t seen what I’m sure she’s seen, before I even had a chance to explain. “What have you seen? Because it isn’t what it looks like. I need to tell you…”
“I thought that you were out with everyone last night,” she whispers with distrust rolling off her tongue. “I thought that it was all of you. You said that it was the director and everyone else too. I don’t understand.”
“I was. At least for the beginning part. I didn’t even realize that everyone else left…” I trail off, realizing just how bad this sounds. It’s like I was so wrapped up in Winter that everyone else melted into the background. It wasn’t like that; I was just drunk and idiotic. “I wanted you to come with us. I didn’t want to be alone…”
“So, it’s my fault?” She tosses her phone on the bed for me to see the photos, and honestly, they look bad. I can see why she is freaking out. Even if I know the truth behind those images, Winter in my work hoodie because she was cold, flirting with me not in character but as herself, a kiss that I wasn’t really a part of… but I don’t think that I can make any sense of that for Darcy’s sake. This would kill me if it was the other way around. “Because I had other stuff going on? I don’t think all of this is from last night anyway.”
“No, but none of it is what it looks like, Darcy. I don’t want to be with Winter, I want to be with you.”
“Do you though?” She shrugs helplessly. “Because I think that you are right. We don’t make each other happy. I can’t help but see what you mean with that statement now. It makes so much sense now…”
I don’t remember saying that, but it doesn’t seem like something that I can argue right now, because there are some serious flames dancing behind Darcy’s eyes. I don’t really see what I can do to calm her down right now, I can’t think of any words to douse the fire, so I say nothing. Maybe we can talk this through once we are in a better place. As hard as it is, I need to leave her to feel how she wants right now.
“I see that this looks bad,” I tell her calmly. “But I can assure you that I did nothing wrong.”
Darcy doesn’t answer me. Instead, she leaps off the bed and pushes passed me, before storming into the bathroom. I want to help her, to demand that she sees what I mean, but I also need to see this story again. For my own sake probably, just so I know exactly what I am up against. Everyone else knows what the world has now been told to think about me, which is generally what they go with, so I have to know as well.
What does Winter think about this? I wonder as I read with disgust. If she meant what she said last night about wanting to be with me, to be honest my mind is pretty hazy, she might actually like this. This might be what she was aiming for all along. I don’t even want to think about the possibility that it was a career move on her behalf, but she could be happy about what she sees. She must know that this is going to cause a wedge between me and Darcy, how can it not? Not that I’m saying she sold the story or anything. Winter has no need to. I guess we just weren’t careful with how we behaved out in public and it has been misconstrued.
“What the fuck?” My eyes suddenly find something that I wasn’t expecting, something that can’t possibly be true. But it has to be a little bit true, doesn’t it? Because there has to be a little bit of truth behind everything printed, legally, doesn’t there? I mean, the pictures aren’t what they seem to be, but they are based in some truth. Me and Winter were together and hanging out and it does look bad, but this… this…?
There is a quote next to the article from my mother. My fucking mother who hasn’t been in my life ever. Who ran away the moment that I was born because I wasn’t enough for her. But now when I am nearly fucking thirty she decides to come back in to my life… but not directly in to my life, to talk to some journalist about me. That is the weirdest thing ever. I mean, who the hell would behave in such a way? That’s crazy…
And she is talking about me being just like my father, attracting all the beautiful women, which she knows isn’t true because he was fully in love with her. He wasn’t a player when he was with her. So, why would she even say this? And how can she say it about me because she doesn’t know me? Even if she has read all about me in the media, she doesn’t know me. She is just like everyone else, only seeing a character of me.
I need to research this further. I can’t just let this go, this is too much, so I scroll to the bottom of the article to find the name of the journalist because I need to find out who has written this. I need to figure out who this person spoke to and work out why they are pretending to be my mother… unless this is my mother. God, the idea of it being my mom after all this time is weird. I have spent so much of my existence with no mother that it’s normal for me. Changing that will be too much. My heart pounds as I even think about it. But I can’t just push this away, can I? I can’t simply pretend that this hasn’t happened. I need to dig more. Pandora’s box has been opened and I need to find out what is inside. Even if it’s killing me.
I don’t know if I want to, I’m not sure that having my mother in my life will magically make everything better. It could even make things a million times worse, but if she is around, I need to find out. I need to figure out what that missing part of me is. I don’t really feel a hole there, but it has to be, doesn’t it? Kids who don’t have both of their parents around always feel a hole. So, I guess I might be able to fill that. If
this really is my mother, I don’t want to get my hopes up after years of disappointment.
“Okay, Jasmine…” I get her name and her contact phone number, and I call her right away. “Let’s figure out what the fuck is going on here. I am not getting off this call until I find out more.”
I get so involved with this part of things that I almost forget about the Winter and Darcy drama. I guess that’s because there isn’t anything that I can do about that right now. This, I can fix. Or try to anyway. I don’t know what I’m going to find at the end of this phone call, but I’m getting there. Any minute now, this Jasmine will pick up the phone and she will give me all that I need to know, because this stranger who has written an incorrect story about me knows my own mother better than I do. That is fucking weird.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Darcy
January 21st
“What was that about?” I have to admit that I’m a bit surprised by Seth’s behavior. Not only does he not seem too bothered about how sad I am since he hasn’t checked in on me at all, he also has spent the last twenty minutes on the phone with someone else. Someone called Jasmine. It isn’t even Sierra which makes it even crazier. I have been forced to come out here to work out why I have been pushed to the back of his mind.
“A journalist.” He looks almost excited, which blows my freaking mind and not in a good way. “She has been speaking to me about my mother. Someone who gave her quotes for the article, and from the sound of it, this isn’t someone lying. This is my actual mother, after all these years. Can you believe it?”
“Er…” Okay, so in a way I do get this. He hasn’t ever had his mother in his life and I’m sure that this must be a massive shock to him, but I don’t see how we have gone all the way from my feelings about him and Winter to this. Right now, I am still trying to wrap my head around the fact that he has been lying to me about spending time with her and there really seems to be something going on between them, which of course crushes me because she is way more perfect for him than I could ever be. She’s stunning, I can’t imagine her ever getting hate online, she would be incredible on his arm, and she loves LA as well. It clearly suits her, it is the life that she wants, that she has chosen… unlike me. I don’t want to be here anymore.
“So, I have to go and meet with this Jasmine, get the full details. Then I am going to see who my mother is. That must be what she wants, don’t you think? She is trying to reconnect with me by letting me make the first move. She is trying to say to me that she wants to know me, but it’s really up to me what I do.”