Addicted for Now (42 page)

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LILY CALLOWAY

Garth must have been ex-CIA or a stunt driver on
some Hollywood lot before becoming a personal bodyguard. He lost the paparazzi
tailing us within two minutes. It usually takes me a solid hour driving in
aimless circles, and I get so bored that I make stops at The Donut Man for
jelly-filled pastries. Now that I think about it, maybe the donuts are the
reason it takes me so long.

Lo has tried to conceal the location of his office from the
press. For now, it’s the one place void of cameras peeping through windows or
gates. Being here makes me feel normal again.

I kick my feet on his desk and lean back in the nice leather
chair. Garth is broad-shouldered, his peppery hair receding and his forehead
oily. He sits on the couch, currently transfixed by his mini-tablet. We don’t
talk much other than to discuss where I want to go, which is fine with me.
Talking can be overrated.

Lo’s office has more personality than our bedroom. Posters
of his favorite science fiction and superhero movies line the walls:
Battlestar Gallactica
,
Star Wars
,
X-Men
(of course),
Spider-Man
(the Andrew Garfield version), and
Kick-Ass
.

We ate up a whole day just stocking the bookshelves with all
his comics, organizing them by issue. When he told his father he wanted to
start a comics publishing company, he probably expected Jonathan to laugh in
his face, tell him to grow up, and find a serious job. But no, his dad signed a
check and wanted a formal business plan the next day.

 
I thumb through one
of the manuscripts out of the large pile. Lo has to read original comics (not
all good) and choose which ones he wants to publish for Halway Comics. He lets
me read them if he’s on the fence, but when I graduate from Princeton, I won’t
be helping him with this side of the business.

I focus on the comic in hand. The art is surrealistic with a
satirical edge. Some of the people even have dog heads. And some of the humans
are drawn with animal feet. Lo can find the meaning behind most comics, but my
brain just sees a dog-man with a big butt.

The comics I gravitated towards are more realistic and
classical, like ones where the superheroes can spring from the page and fit in
our world. Lo will try anything and everything, even panels that contain black
dots and no words. I do love sexy superheroes, but those are hard to find in
indie comics publishing. The most I’ve seen are sexy-clad characters that look
like they’ll murder me in my dreams.

I sift through his pile and find a more realistic comic. Not
superheroes, but it’s a noir strip with a detective as the lead. I flip through
the pages to look at the pretty art.

Ahhh! I throw the manuscript on the floor and cover my eyes
with my hands.

There is nudity in that comic book! And I’ve sworn off porn.

“Everything okay, Lily?” Garth asks.

“Yeah,” I croak. “I’m just gonna…go downstairs.” I bypass
the dirty comic book on the ground and slip out of the room. I take the winding
staircase down to the main level.

The first floor.

My dream.

I enter the store from the back (Employees Only) entrance
and into the dimly lit space. Red linoleum booths hug the walls and windows,
plastic wrap covering their cushions. The appliances and furniture are all
hidden behind smocks, and I can still smell the fresh coat of warm gray paint
on the walls. Red and gray and a bit of blue. I picked the color scheme, even
after Lo warned me that the palette fit Captain America. We’ve been anti-Cap
since he threw Wolverine out of an airborne plane.

I still love it.

Rows of low shelves create aisles and resemble a video
store, but they’re going to be filled with comic books when the shipments
arrive. The front area is sectioned with a small kitchenette for pastries and
coffee. Not everything is here in the store yet. And it’ll be months before the
place is ready to be opened for the public.

Lo pitched Superheroes & Scones to his father as a
marketing strategy for Halway Comics. But I know the idea has nothing to do
with his company. What he did was buy me something of my own, something I could
look forward to after college. He found me happiness, and I think it’s worth
more than any silly engagement ring.

A store that sells coffee, scones, and comic books.

It’s perfect.

And for once, we’re doing something good with our
inheritance rather than wasting it away. For two people unwilling to let anyone
in, sharing this intimate part of our lives—the nostalgic happiness of
comics—has to mean something.

While we’re under construction, I can hide out in one of the
plastic-wrapped booths with a comic, like my own secret getaway.

Someone knocks on the door, and I jump out of my skin. I
can’t see the figure since the glass is shrouded in COMING SOON posters. It
doesn’t even say what’s coming, and the building looks equally as closed and
deserted with more ads all over the brick. For all anyone knows, this could be
a future porn shop. Oh jeez. Now I can’t stop thinking about
porn
.

The rapping on the glass continues, and I take a tentative
step towards the noise. The figure is shadowy and indistinguishable. But the
shape looks tall enough to be a guy.

What if it’s the press? Or worse.

A stalker who stalked me here.

The knocking is louder and more persistent. I end up
scurrying underneath the nearest booth before my heart abandons my chest. Maybe
he didn’t see me. Maybe he’ll just go away.

If it’s someone I know, they’d call me, right? I pat my
pockets for my phone. Oh no. I left my cell on Lo’s desk, along with Garth.
Well Garth is not
on
Lo’s desk (at
least I hope not), but he’s definitely upstairs, consumed with his mini-tablet.

Bang. Bang. Bang.
Those
knocks sound mean.

I scuttle further underneath the table, curling my knees to
my chest. I imagine the glass shattering, the man barging his way through.
Should I scream for Garth or just pretend not to be here?

Garth makes the decision for me. His hefty boots pound their
way across the store, and the lock clicks, the door jangles, and the stalker is
met with my intimidating bodyguard. That should deter him.

“Where’s Lily? I’ve been trying to call her.” The voice is
calm, smooth, familiar and so very
very
unthreatening.

“I’m right here!” I crawl out from under the booth and dust the
cobwebs off my kneecaps. Connor raises his eyebrows, as if he knows exactly
what I was doing under there.

Garth must be confused because he (truly) says, “What were
you doing under there?”

“I thought I saw a…rat,” I say quickly, “so I was inspecting
the area to lay some traps later.” Before they can foil my lie, I turn to
Connor. “What brings you to S&S?” I really should not try to shorten the
name because every time I say it, I immediately think of S&M. My mind has
dangerous side roads.

“Lo wants me to look over a contract. He said he left it in
his office.” He gazes at me with a little more concern than I appreciate from
Connor Cobalt. I like his self-satisfaction much better.

“Okay, I’ll bring you back there.” I add to Garth, “Can you
stay here? Watch the door?” I try to smother the worry in my voice, but I fear
I’m not doing a good job.

“Of course.”

In Lo’s office, I flick on the lights, and Connor targets
the file folder on the desk. I find my dinky flip phone and scroll through all
the missed calls from Connor.

“So who did you think I was?” Connor asks as he opens the
file and sinks into the leather chair.

“What?”

“This is a new building. I don’t think rats have moved in
yet. So obviously you were hiding from whoever you thought was at the door.”
He’s too astute for his own good, and I’m sure he already knows the answer to
his own question.

I pick up a Black Widow action figure on Lo’s bookshelf. “I
wish I was Rose,” I say softly.

“Why is that?”
She
wouldn’t be so scared.

“She’d handle this better than me. She doesn’t even have a
bodyguard.” I want that kind of confidence, but I just don’t think it’s
something a twenty-year-old can learn. I’m too late.

“There’s a difference between courage and pride. Believe me,
I’d sleep better at night knowing she had a bodyguard.”

“She is alone a lot,” I say. How can she not be brave? She’s
willing to face the swarming paparazzi and media-hungry press by herself every
day.

“Yes, but that girl would rather carry her own Taser than
let someone else defend her, all to prove a point. So when she meets an
adversary twice her size and in a much larger quantity, she’s going to realize
that some battles are best fought with a sidekick.”

“Oh,” I say, finally understanding, thanks to his superhero
analogy. My sister is not a team player. She’d rather do things on her own.

“While my talents are immeasurable, I don’t have the power
to save her from halfway across the city,” Connor says. “And our relationship
is a bit different from yours.”

“That’s an understatement, I think.”

He smiles. “Yes, it is.” He closes the folder. “What I mean
to say is that I’m trying not to be afraid for her. Since we were teenagers,
she has always looked to me for reassurance, even if she won’t admit it. I’m
her…rock.” He stares off as he finds the right words. “The…unwavering thing.
Confident, poised, unrelenting and annoyingly persuasive. If she sees that I’m
frightened, she’ll gloat on the outside, as though I lost a round of chess, but
internally she’ll begin to question herself. And I don’t particularly like when
Rose loses her confidence and becomes less self-assured. She’s more vulnerable,
and it breaks my heart.”

This is brand new honesty for Connor Cobalt, no insults
hidden beneath the words. It’s just…the truth, from the soul. I kind of like
it.

“Do you love her?” I ask, returning the action figure and
taking a seat on the couch.

He flips the folder back open and reads the contract in his
brisk, super-human manner, turning the page faster than I can read a magazine
on a toilet. “Love is irrelative to some.” He dodges my question with a strange
answer. As he concentrates on the contract, he begins closing the door on his
brief openness.

I squint at him as I realize something else. “How come you
don’t say
wicked
anymore?”

He briefly tears his eyes from the papers. “What are you
talking about?”

“You used to say ‘wicked smart’ and ‘wicked cool.’ It was my
favorite thing about you.” His lingo has changed since I first met him. Not
completely though. I mean, when we run into someone he knows, he’ll sometimes
throw out a ‘hey, bro.’

His lips rise. “I usually dumb down around the
intellectually deficient so I don’t come off like a complete prick.” I think he
just called me stupid. “But I see you as a true friend, so I’ve backed off some
of the pretenses. Most people wouldn’t be able to stand all of me.”

“Can Rose?” I ask, still trying to process everything he’s
saying.

His lips just lift higher. I suddenly come to the conclusion
that I won’t ever know what Connor Cobalt really sounds like in his head—what
words he finds abhorrent, what he thinks of certain situations, his
real
honest reactions that aren’t
half-insults and half-something a little nicer. Maybe Rose already knows him.
Or maybe she’s just as clueless as the rest of us.
 

I stick to a safe subject. “So next semester, you’ll be at
Wharton and Rose will be in New York.” They both graduated from college in May
(along with Ryke), and we threw a small celebration for all of them a couple
weeks ago.

Connor’s dream came true—an acceptance to Penn’s prestigious
Wharton School of Business for his MBA. Rose always scoffed at grad school. She
thinks it’s just a piece of paper to brag over, at least for someone who’s an
heir to a fortune. So she’ll spend her time at the Calloway Couture office in
New York City, commuting from Princeton, New Jersey.

“That’s the plan,” Connor says.

I’m worried for them, and I know neither Rose nor Connor
would appreciate my concern. But long distance relationships are difficult, and
I can see all the drives back and forth not being worth the trouble—especially
if Rose continues to struggle with her intimacy issues. She conquered sleeping
in the same bed as Connor during Cancun, but she has yet to make the leap to
sex.

I want her to find love and the fireworks, but nothing I do
or say will change her problems. I’m just her little sister, and a broken one
in her eyes.

Connor’s gaze falls to the floor where a comic book is
splayed—the page opened to a pair of giant naked boobs and an erect penis.
“Lily.”

“I wasn’t looking at it!” I defend. “I mean, I was, but then
I wasn’t.” I grimace. How can speaking be this hard? I take a deep breath and
realign my thoughts. “I was flipping through it and then when I came upon the…”
I frown. “…genitals. It burned my eyes and magically flung from my hands.”

“I’ll forgive you for the hyperboles if you’re telling the
truth.”

“I am! Cross my heart.” I start drawing crosses over my
heart with my finger, but then I get confused. “Am I supposed to draw Jesus
crosses or X’s?”

“Sometimes I wonder if we speak the same language.”

“X’s,” I say with a nod, ignoring his slight. “Definitely
X’s.”

He returns to the contract, and I sidle to the window,
peeking through the blinds to check for paparazzi or sketchy men lurking on the
side street.

I don’t know how to vanquish this fear. I have an
overwhelming desire to hide in the bathroom and masturbate my anxiety away. But
I want to feel like I did in Cancun. Safe and not so crazy compulsive. I yearn
for that stasis again.