This was all one big mess and I didn’t know how to clean it up. Christian and Chris were both physically inside of my room now with the door tipped shut and I was sure that everyone on the entire floor could hear the soap opera that was my life, unfolding. They’d both said things I didn’t understand and each time they did, they’d stop, look at me, look at each other and try to cover it as soon as possible. This got me to thinking. Turned out that thinking got me nowhere and I’d decided to act as the peacemaker and disengage this whole thing. Whether or not I’d be successful was up to them.
“Please guys, stop. Stop fighting. This is silly. You’re both acting like children.”
I put a hand on each of their shoulders but Christian stiffened at my touch and shrugged my hand off. “Don’t touch me.”
“Christian, I don’t want you two fighting over this.”
“Over ‘this’? What’s ‘this’? Is ‘this’ you? Is that what you think we’re doing? Fighting over you?”
“That’s what I’m doing.” Chris said hastily.
“Oh yeah? Why don’t you tell her the truth then Christopher?”
Oh no. I’d heard those words before and they never led to something good. Joey appeared at the door just then and pushed it open a bit. He wandered in like a child does his parent room early in the morning. His cheeks were slightly flushed and his hair was flat and unkempt. He wore red boxers, a black tee-shirt with the sleeves cut off and a plain, flat gold chain. He finished rubbing his eyes and squinted at us through a sleepy haze. “What is going on?” he asked raspy voiced. “You guys are waking everyone up.”
“Sorry Joe, just go back to bed,” Chris said apologetically.
Joey tuned to head back out the door. “That was my original plan,” he mumbled on his way out.
“Original plan you say?” Christian asked, stopping Joey in his tracks.
He raised his voice, “You hear that Chris? Joey wants you to tell Abby your original plan.”
“Don’t do this Christian, I’m begging you..”
Joey turned around and shook himself awake as JC walked through the door. “Sleep…” JC whispered.
Joey grabbed JC’s bicept and shook him further awake. “Ow, what?” JC asked and looked at Joey as if he were mad.
Joey glanced at me quickly and then whispered something into JC’s ear which caused his eyes to shoot open. Christian in chuckled “See, JC knows the plan.”
I closed my eyes and fought back tears. “Chris, tell me there was no plan.”
“Tell the truth Chris,” Christian egged.
I wiped away a fallen tear. “What is it this time guys?”
They each looked away but Chris spoke. “This plan was not a prank,” he began. “Please don’t cry.” He reached for my cheek but I withdrew before he could reach me. I could see the beginning of tears forming in his eyes. “When you left for London I was devastated. So that night I called Christian and I asked him to keep an eye on you and treat you nicely. We got to talking and I convinced him to…” Christian folded his arms and waited with a smug grimace. Chris took a deep breath and twiddled his fingers but went on. “I convinced him to date you so that I’d knew you were in good hands.”
He looked up at me to see how I was taking it. “Don’t stop, that’s not it.” Christian urged.
“Yes it is.”
“If you don’t tell her then I will.”
“Chris just tell me the truth, the whole truth,” I pleaded.
He took another deep breath. His eyes were red now from trying to hard to keep the tears from falling. “Then when you guys got here I told him to break up with you so you’d, well, so I could date you but he said he’d fallen in love with you and he couldn’t do that.”
“So he got mad and took you out, wined you and dined you and then kissed you and had it published in a magazine!” Christian accused.
“That is not true!” he turned to me, “That’s not true Abby. That night at Disney World was genuine. I didn’t tell anyone to take those pictures I swear to God, I swear to you Abby that was all an accident.”
“That was not an accident,” Christian interjected. “He’s nothing but a selfish bastard. He knew, I told him I was in love with you and he still planned to break us up. Maybe he thought it would work better than trying to win you on his own. Just, maybe, maybe it MIGHT work.”
I removed my head from the small of my hand where it now laid and sniffed once. “….but it just might work,” I remembered having heard someone say oh so long ago.
“But it just might work,” I said aloud.
“What just might work?”
I looked to Joey, JC and Chris. “I heard one of you say that outside of my hotel room when we first got here. What was that about?”
They looked at each other for a good five seconds and then shrugged. “We, we don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Joey. I don’t expect Joey to know because he wasn’t there but you, and you,” I said and pointed to Chris and JC respectively. “You two know what I’m talking about.” JC took a deep breath. “Tell me Josh, what was that about?”
Josh. Hmm. I’d never really called him that before but this was a desperate time and desperate times called for desperate measures and I figured the use of his given name would be as effective a measure as any.
“That was…that wasn’t anything,” he said softly.
“Tell me what you said.”
“It wasn’t..”
“Dammit JC, just TELL me!”
He rubbed his face hard and began. “Well, Chris told us that Christian wasn’t willing to break up with you so we decided we were going to try to get you to break up with him instead. It’s kind of ironic actually, how it happened in reverse.”
“What were you going to do?”
“We were going to take him to a club, give him some drinks and….”
“Introduce him to some girls,” Chris finished. “I have a friend who works in tech who was willing to..”
“To sleep with me?” Christian said, disgusted.
“What happened?” I asked. “ Why didn’t you go through with it?”
“When we asked him to go out for a few drinks he said no.”
“And do you remember WHY I said no?” Christian asked harshly.
“He said no because he wanted to spend the night with you.”
“You’re damn right. I can’t believe you guys would do that to me. Or Abby. You call yourselves friends but that couldn’t be farther from the truth.”
“I know it was low of us but , Abby, I just love you so much. I couldn’t see you come back and leave again like before. I couldn’t loose you twice. I would have died.”
I put my hands on Chris’s cheeks and looked into his eyes. No sign of betrayal there, just utter sorrow and regret but I knew how well these men were at hiding their true emotions. They did it damn near every day. Every time they had a bad day and a concert, they’d go out there and smile, laugh, act like they’re having a good time. Acting. That’s all it was. I tilted my head to the side, not knowing who to trust.
Christian ran to me and grabbed both of my wrists and faced me toward him. “You’re going to believe that? You’re going to take this liars word over mine?”
“Liar?!” Chris exclaimed. He took one of my wrists from Christian and pulled me back toward him a bit. “So what, you wanna listen to him? To the guy who, when things got a little rough decides to call your father and have you removed, FIRED from your job?!”
“That wasn’t my fault!”
“Just like the kiss wasn’t mine!”
That’s it. I’d had enough. “STOP!” I shouted and wrenched my wrists away from the both of them. “I can’t take this anymore. Everyone, just get out! I need time to think about this.”
“What’s there to think about?”
“Christian, please.” I said forcefully, “just give me 30 minutes.”
I watched each one of them leave and shut the door and locked it after they were all out. I keeled over onto my knees, spent from the events that had just occurred. I walked into the bathroom and turned on the shower. Letting the steam from the water fill the air around me, I began to think about what I was going to do. I looked down at the counter through my tears and saw one of the rings that Chris usually wears. The whole bathroom spelled sweet of his aftershave and I couldn’t help basking in it. I’d have to forget how good it felt to be wrapped in his arms for the next twenty minutes at least, or until I could figure this whole thing out. I slowly stepped into the course rays of steaming water and wet my hair, letting the spray reach all the way down to my scalp. I exhaled heavily and took an equally heavy breath in. The next half hour was going to be the longest one of my life. I was so confused that even I wondered what I my verdict would be. I hope I made the right one.
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