Fade into Always (6 page)

I texted:
We’ll talk about it, but yes I’ll meet her.

Max:
Let me work on dinner and I’ll get back to you.

Me:
OK. Thank you. That’s so nice.

Max got us a reservation at Spago in Beverly Hills, a restaurant owned by the famed chef Wolfgang Puck.

Carrying out Max’s offer to treat us to dinner was like something out of an espionage movie.

We texted back and forth about how to handle the bill. If the waiter said everything was taken care of, that would raise a major investigation by my parents. So Max had arranged for the manager to inform the waiter to take my card as if I were paying, but they would just put it on Max’s running tab.

“We still haven’t seen your apartment,” Mom said at one point.

I had a mouthful of our appetizer and stopped chewing, but quickly brought my napkin up to my mouth and held up one finger. I knew they’d want to see it—why wouldn’t they—but somehow had fooled myself into thinking they wouldn’t remember. Right. Like parents wouldn’t want to see where you’re living. Especially mine. As I finished swallowing, I actually found myself surprised that it had taken them this long to begin with.

“Maybe when we leave here,” I said. “I need to get home anyway. I don’t have another day’s worth of clothes and I might as well just stay there tonight.”

I looked at Grace, who had an expression on her face like she knew something. Maybe she suspected I had a date with Max or something. If so, she was wrong.

“The prices here are outrageous,” Dad said, a little too loud.

“Dad, don’t worry about it. I told you, I’ve got this.”

He shook his head, and looked down at the menu again. Thank God he didn’t restart the debate we’d had in the car earlier. My parents insisted that they pay for dinner, and I said it was my treat, and it was on from there. I finally got the upper hand by explaining to them that I was on my own now, with my own money, and I was an adult who could afford to treat her family to dinner.

Okay, so the truth was that I was on my own now, and I was an adult with a hot, rich boyfriend who offered to let her look like she was doing well enough to treat her family to a nice dinner at a Beverly Hills hot-spot.

That’s exactly what Max had done, and why he’d done it.

My dad didn’t look happy for the entire meal. In fact, he didn’t say much at all.

Mom, though, seemed to have developed a knack for surreptitiously glancing around the room looking for famous people. I’d heard that Spago was a good place for celebrity spotting, but it looked like we picked the wrong night.

That is, until a large entourage entered the place and people starting looking to see who it was. Turns out it was Linda Evans, an actress who starred on one of my mom’s favorite prime-time soaps,
Dynasty
. I’d never seen it. It was before my time. But mom was happy to tell us all about it, and we let her go on and on because she looked so star-struck and elated. Dad told us it had ruined many a baseball game for him—my mom would insist that they switch the channel for that hour, and they only had the one TV.

“Do you think we’ll see Krystal?” Grace asked.

“Doubt it. But let me see.”

I got my phone out and texted her to warn her that we’d be stopping by the apartment. She texted back and said she was going to the movies with a friend. I briefly worried about whether that was true—she’d been doing well all week, getting ready for the big change—but I had my own things to handle at the moment.

“Krystal’s at work again. She works so much,” I said, taking a big bite of my entrée.

I couldn’t wait to get home and go to sleep. All the deceit was wearing me out.

ELEVEN

I was nervous leading the way up to my apartment. The way things were with Krystal, there was no telling what we might walk in to. She could be sitting there perfectly normal, having found a bit of courage to see Grace and my parents. Or she could be on the den floor, having a threesome or a full-fledged orgy for that matter.

But it appeared she wasn’t there. The apartment was dark, except for the lights over the island in the kitchen, shedding enough illumination for me as I turned on the lamps in the den.

“Well, this is it.” I shrugged. “Not very big, I know, but by LA standards this is huge.”

My dad frowned. Mom immediately asked why we didn’t have curtains on the windows and I pictured a day when I’d get a UPS package with some of her homemade curtains that were suitable only for people over sixty. Grace said she liked the place.

It was then that I noticed a flower arrangement on the coffee table. I picked it up, looked at the card, and saw that it just had a hand-drawn heart on it. Maybe someone had given them to Krystal. Or maybe it was from Max and Krystal had put them there so I wouldn’t miss them. I couldn’t tell, either way, without there being any handwriting.

We weren’t there even five minutes before there was a knock at the door. It was two people, a guy and a girl, who said they were Krystal’s friends—I’d never met them before—and they said she didn’t show up for dinner and the movie was starting soon, and did I know where she was?

“No. She told me she was going out. Did you call or text her?”

The guy nodded.

The girl said, “She’s not answering.”

They had a look of concern on their faces that I knew was probably matched by mine.

“Everything okay?” Mom called out from the den.

“Yeah, just a sec.”

I stepped outside and closed the door behind me.

“You guys know she’s in kind of a bad place, right?”

“Yeah. She told us everything,” the girl said. “We’re not part of that same crowd.”

“Okay, good. But I bet that’s who she’s with.”

“We’ll go looking around at the usual spots,” the guy said.

The girl told me her name was Molly; the guy was Kevin. I hated even hearing that name now.

I said, “I’d go with you but my family is here visiting. If you find her, let me know.”

We exchanged numbers, and they went on their way.

My parents and Grace stayed about an hour or so. Most of the time was spent focused on the baby, which was great in so many ways, not the least of which was that it closed off a lot of opportunities for my parents to resume their campaign to bring me home with them.

Although, Mom tried in her own not-so-subtle way. She brought up things that she thought would make me homesick. Each time, Dad would say something like, “But you’d know that if were you were still home.”

I was getting frustrated with this. So much so that I couldn’t keep it inside anymore.

“This
is
my home. You’re looking at it.”

They looked surprised.

“Olivia…” Grace said in a pleading tone, her voice trailing off.

“What, Grace?” I snapped, then looked back at my parents. “I’m living here now. I’ve started my life. I’m happy, okay? Really happy. And you should be happy for me.”

“You’re right,” my mom said with a look on her face that told me she was simply trying to put an end to this little spat.

Dad, for once, didn’t say anything.

The baby started to cry. Grace gathered her up and checked her diaper.

Mom said, “Does she need to be changed?”

“No,” Grace said. “I think she needs a nap. Can we get going?”

The tension was heavy. I hated it. Hated every second of it. What had started out as a relatively nice weekend was turning out exactly as I had feared. The bickering, passive-aggressiveness, control—all of it, everything I had left behind in Ohio—was now in my den in my new home.

I just wanted them to leave.

And as they did, we made half-hearted plans to have breakfast before they hit the road the next morning.

I tried calling Krystal when they were gone. No answer. I left a voicemail, then texted her. I was becoming increasingly convinced that she was off with the “friends” who had the cocaine.

I called Max.

“Hello, dream girl,” he answered.

“Can you come over?”

“What’s wrong? Where’s the family?”

I felt the sting in back of my throat that I get just before I cry. But I fought it back. “My family’s gone back to their hotel, and
they’re
what’s wrong.”

“Oh no. I’m sorry.”

“Can you just please come over here? I need you.”

“Give me thirty minutes.”

My phone served as a good time-killer while I waited for Max. I checked Twitter to see what was up with the people I was following, and the trending topics. Nothing much interested me. So I opened the browser and went to People magazine, where they had photos from the red carpet at the Emmys.

I thought about that night Max took me to the movie premier in New York City. My first red carpet event. Maybe my last, too. But I didn’t care. Seeing how extraordinarily glamorous the women looked made me feel like a poser by comparison. I had no business even thinking I could pull that off.

I snapped out of my downward spiral thinking when I heard a key in the door. It was either Krystal, or it could be Max, who had a key, but it was a little too early for that. He’d said to give him thirty minutes.

I stayed on the couch but looked at the door as the knob turned slowly. Krystal sneaking in, I thought.

Then I froze. My mouth went dry. My eyes widened and stayed there.

Holy fuck. Chris….

TWELVE

I sat in shock on the couch as he crossed the threshold of my apartment.

He held up one hand. “It’s okay,” he said in a calm voice.

I shot up to my feet. “Get the fuck out!”

He closed the door and locked it without turning around. He faced me the whole time. His expression was serious, intense, crazy….

Luckily I had my phone in my hand. I raised it to dial 911.

Chris rushed me. I didn’t have time to evade his quick movement. His arms wrapped around me, bear-hugging me from the side, almost crushing me. With one hand, he tried to pry the phone away from me, but I clutched it like my life depended on it because it probably did.

He was breathing heavily through clenched teeth, and I felt his saliva spraying against my cheek when he exhaled.

“Help! Get the
fuck
away
from me! Help!”

“Give it up.”

“Let me go!
Help me
!”

He squeezed me tighter, almost so I couldn’t breathe, and said, “Did you like my flowers, sweetheart?”

Holy fuck fuck fuck!

He’d been in my house. How? Where did he get a key?

I needed to breathe. My face was getting tingly and I could hear my heart racing in my ears. He was still gripping me from the side, so as best I could I gathered all the strength in my body and forced my leg up and to the side, slamming into him—right into his balls.

He made a sound like “Ooomph” and released me. He staggered back a couple of steps, bent over, his hand between his legs.

I’d never taken a self-defense class before, and I’d never even thought about what I might do in situations like this. So maybe what I did next just came naturally. Or maybe from the movies.

I kicked him in the face. The bottom part of my shoe connected with his forehead and the short but thick heel caught his chin. I heard his jaw snap shut with a sickening and loud sound.

He tried to say something, but couldn’t. Blood rushed from his mouth in a torrent. He opened his mouth as I stood over him, again trying to say something. His gaping maw was a deep, dark red, but I could tell his two front teeth were gone.

Adrenaline was flowing intensely through me. I could have killed him. Easily.

I moved closer to him, and he made one more attempt to fight, grabbing my ankle.

I raised my other leg and brought down my foot. A hard, crushing stomp on his crotch.

Chris turned on his side, curling up in the fetal position. Blood gushed from his mouth and it started forming a pool on the carpet.

I miraculously still had the phone in my hand. I swiped the lock screen, touched the dialer, and then the Emergency icon at the top.

Chris wasn’t going anywhere.

The 911 operator answered and I spluttered out a nearly incomprehensible string of words.

“Ma’am, slow down. Please calm down. Do you need police?”

“Yesyesyesyes….”

The police arrived quickly. It must have only been four or five minutes. I had opened the door in the meantime, and I had also moved one of the chairs closer to Chris, where I stood on it, trapping his legs underneath.

When I saw the first officer come through the door, I jumped off the chair and collapsed on the couch. The adrenaline rush was subsiding and I just felt like I wanted to sleep. Forever.

I called Max. “Where are you?”

“About five minutes away. Why? What’s wrong?”

I was crying again.

“Olivia,” he said, flatly. “What is it?”

“J-j-just get here.”

It didn’t take him five minutes. Probably closer to three. I was sitting in the back of an ambulance when I saw him pull up. They were checking me out because my left side hurt like hell.

They were loading Chris on to another ambulance.

“Max!” I called out, which only made me hurt more.

He turned, saw me, and rushed over through the flashing blue, white and red lights.

“Please stand back, sir,” one of the paramedics said.

“That’s my girlfriend. What happened Olivia?”

The paramedic who was checking me out broke in. “We’re going to take you to the hospital. Your ribs need to be x-rayed.”

“Jesus, Olivia. Will someone tell me what happened?”

Across the parking lot, we heard some shouting and lots of movement followed. I looked and saw that they’d found Chris’s car.

The only words I heard were “keys” and “crowbar.”

Then more commotion.

Max and I watched in horror as the cops popped open the trunk of Chris’s car and pulled Krystal out of it.