Hidden Gem Short Story Collection (9781301405985) (25 page)

“I don’t need you to tell me that,” Damian
laughed, a bit bitterly. “And I definitely didn’t need to know how
transparent I apparently am.”

“Nah, man. You’re not transparent. But you
can’t think staying quiet will keep the people who love you from
knowing what’s up.”

“And you’re so sure you know what’s up,”
Damian smirked.

“I do, man.”

Damian thought about it. If the people who
loved him knew how he felt this whole time, what were they doing
then? Aubrey had introduced him to Azura. Josh was undoubtedly at
least half behind Vlad’s female flash mob. Did that mean they
thought there really was no chance with Gemma?
Does Gemma know
how I feel about her? Or does she not love me the way that Josh and
Aubrey claim to love me?

“You’re such a sage when you’re drunk,”
Damian said, laughing at Josh with a shake of his head.

“So I’m right?” Josh’s face lit up. “Well,
then I’m a fucking
medium.
”

“I didn’t say you were right. Just that you
try to get all deep after you drink,” Damian stepped out of the
car, closing the door before Josh could get out behind him. He
leaned into the open passenger window, smiling at the driver. He
pulled a few bills out of his pocket and gave it to him. “Take the
man back to the club for me, please? He’s not done with his
night.”

“I said I’d come back with you, we can keep
talking!” Josh said, sticking his head out of his window like a
puppy. Damian smiled at the sight, waving a goodbye to him as the
car pulled away.

~

Damian threw himself into his bed, burying
his face in the crisp white pillows. In the freshly laundered
sheets, he was suddenly aware of all the things he smelled like,
none of which was particularly pleasant. Stale booze, smoke, and
sweat clung to his jacket. He rolled over, pulling his blazer off
and throwing it to the ground. A faint waft of the lavender and
vanilla hung in the air for a moment, before disappearing again
into the less pleasant scents. He kicked off his shoes, pulling his
legs up onto the bed as he sat there, alone and enjoying the
quiet.

They knew. They knew before he did. Or maybe
he just hadn’t acknowledged it. Maybe he wasn’t ready to. Was he so
obvious about his feelings that everyone around him
just
knew
what this was all about? God, that meant his mother
probably also knew. She hadn’t tried the game with him this time,
hadn’t asked him what city he wanted to play for. He knew his
mother would want him home, close to her again after being gone for
so long, but she didn’t say a thing. Which was unlike her. Because
she knew what was keeping him. She was there when it all started.
She remembered him in high school, when Damian would come home
after practice. She said he always knew if he had seen Gemma that
day because he “would just have this glow.”

He fell back onto the bed, covering his face
with the pillow and muffling a frustrated scream.
This
is
why he didn’t want to start think about it.
This
is why he
didn’t want to deal with this big decision. There was much more to
it than what team he was going to play for. This was about the zip
code that would be on his new address and how close it would be to
hers. This was about living out his lifelong dream of playing for
the Knicks but having it forever marred by the fact that Gemma
didn’t want him.

A rapt knock came from the door. He sat up,
his shoulders heaving with the heavy breaths he needed to keep
himself together. He opened the door, not bothering with the
peephole, only to find Azura standing there.

“No,” he said, simply, closing the door
again.

“Hold up,” she said, pushing back against
the door. “You’re not just gonna leave a lady out here when she
just walked
through a mob
of some crazy-ass people just to
get a word with you, are ya?” Azura stood there, waiting for him to
invite her in. “You can’t just throw me back out there. You know
the insanity that’s waiting for me in the lobby right now?” She
didn’t wait for an invitation, pushing past him and sitting herself
on the edge of his bed. She dangled her black leather wrapped legs
in front of her, leaning back on her elbows. Her cropped, strapless
bustier looked slightly overstuffed but highlighted her impossibly
small waist. Her rhinestone chandelier earrings sparkled as she
turned her head towards him, twisting her shiny lips into a come
hither pout.

“You look like the beginning of a bad music
video,” Damian said, shutting the door behind him.

“Well, excuse you,” she replied, flicking
her hair over her shoulder.

“What do you want from me?” Damian asked.
“Why are you following me around?”

“I think that’s obvious,” she smiled.

“Alright,” he said. He leaned back against
the desk across from her, crossing his arms. “Then I should just
say now that I’m not interested.”

“Why?” Azura yelled a little too loudly,
sitting up.

“It’s nothing on you, I’m just not in a good
place right now.”

“Really? ‘cause you looked like you were in
a place to get with that thirsty bitch back at the club.”

“Stop that,” Damian pinched the bridge of
his nose, feeling a slight headache form. “I was drunk.”

“Oh,” Azura said, becoming surprisingly calm
all of a sudden. Damian looked up to see her lean back towards the
phone on the nightstand. “So let’s order ourselves some champagne
and let’s see how interested you are.”

“Stop,” Damian laughed, striding towards the
phone. He put his hand over hers, holding the receiver down. She
looked up at him, laying awkwardly on the bed.

“Why don’t you want me?” Azura asked. Damian
looked at her. So far, she had done nothing to challenge the image
that the media had portrayed. In fact, she had done everything to
match it. But when she asked the question, he saw a glimpse of
something else. He had heard that question many times before from
the various, beautiful women he had encountered who couldn’t wrap
their minds around why he didn’t want to be with them. It was often
a bit manipulative, meant to make Damian feel bad about turning
them down.

But when Azura asked the question, it was
different. She wasn’t one to hide her feelings – that was for sure.
She had given enough train wreck interviews and written enough tell
all songs so that anyone vaguely familiar with celebrity gossip
could write an in-depth biography about her. So it wasn’t exactly
shocking that she would forego any shred of dignity, like all those
nameless girls in the past, to ask something as desperate as, “why
don’t you want me?”

In that moment, however, the question was
not just some plea for continued attention. It wasn’t some
manipulative thing to say to make Damian feel bad. It was, instead,
a reflection of the question he had wanted so much to ask
Gemma.

Don’t think, just answer, why don’t you
want me?
And in the millisecond between the question and the
answer, he would allow all the doubt and the fear that he ever had
about their friendship, their relationship, to well up in his
heart. It wasn’t something he wanted to go through. In fact, he had
always hoped it would fade as the years went by. Instead, those
feelings grew in him, compacted and concentrated in his chest, held
down by the strong will he had to keep it from his mind.

“I don’t know you,” Damian replied. “And you
don’t know me. We just met the other day.”

“I’ve read about you,” Azura said, sitting
up. “And I’m sure you’ve heard about me.”

“You really want me to go by the things I’ve
heard about you?” Damian smirked, lowering himself to sit on the
floor before her. Azura pursed her lips, actually thinking.

“I don’t really read anything about myself.
But I like reading about everyone else,” she shrugged. “I sometimes
read the things people tweet at me. There are some angry people out
there.”

“I’m sure,” Damian laughed.

“And
I’m
sure you know what I mean.
Now that you’re thinking of leaving the Warriors.”

“I never said I was leaving.”

“Everyone knows you’re going to New
York.”

“I never said that.”

“Yeah, but people just know.”

“They can’t
just know,
” Damian said.
“Because I don’t even know.” Azura shrugged, inspecting her nails.
She was beginning to look bored. He was glad she didn’t want to
keep talking about where he’d be playing.

“I’ll make you a deal, ‘kay?” she said.
“I’ll leave you alone if you just tell me why you don’t want
me.”

“I was being honest before, I’m just not in
a good place right now and I wasn’t thinking before with
Lacey.”

“You were ‘bout to get with a girl named
Lacey
?” Azura sneered.

“Any man in his right mind would ‘want’ you.
You don’t need to be following around one of the more boring guys
in the NBA.”

“I don’t think you’re boring,” Azura said,
batting her lashes. “But I don’t like your answer. You’re tryin’ to
get around the question. You’re not givin’ it to me straight.”
Damian sighed. Azura didn’t look like she was planning on going
anywhere anytime soon and he really needed a moment to himself.

He got up, walking into the bathroom to
splash some water on his face. He made a mental note to make sure
Aubrey refrained from introducing him to any more girls in the
future, especially ones with whatever issues Azura suffered from.
Damian could hardly understand what Aubrey saw in her. It was
difficult for him to believe that the two would be able to stand
each other, let alone hit it off and become friendly enough to hang
out. Damian closed the door behind him, locking it to make sure he
wouldn’t be surprised by Azura bursting through while he changed.
He put on a white t-shirt and a pair of gray gym shorts, tossing
his club clothes in a pile and kicking it aside.

When he walked back out into the bedroom
area, he found Azura laying on her stomach on the bed, holding his
phone. He marched over and took it from her hand, cursing himself
for never getting around to setting up a password.

“You’re not too into boundaries, are you?”
he said, glancing at the screen to see what she had been looking
at. It was his just his home wallpaper of the Warriors logo. He
clicked to see the open apps. His email had been opened.
“Seriously? My email? What were you even looking for?”

“I swear, I thought it was my phone and I
was just gonna send an email to my manager canceling our meeting
tomorrow morning,” she said, jumping to her feet and looking
convincingly apologetic. “Your case looks just like mine. We even
have the same wallpaper.”

“Really,” Damian replied. He held up his
iPhone so the case was facing her. It was made of a rugged black
rubber and meant to look like car tires. “I’m supposed to believe
that the rhinestone-studded, leather-loving, mega-popstar has this
phone case right here?” Azura rushed to her purse, rifling through
it before pulling her phone out. She handed it to him without a
word. Damian took it, smiling as he shook his head. He turned it
over, looking at the rugged black structure and feeling the
familiar rubber in his hands. It was indeed the same case.

“I kept breaking all the other ones,” Azura
explained. “I’d drop them so often that I’d crack straight through
the case and into the phone. And I was tired of replacing them
because I had all these pictures and texts and stuff on it.
Sentimental stuff.”

“And your wallpaper is
also
the
Warriors logo? When
everyone
knows you’re a Lakers fan?” he
asked. She nodded, gesturing for him to look. He unlocked her phone
to find the same wallpaper. “Okay, so you’re a traitor to Los
Angeles.” He laughed.

“I just changed it for the game the other
day,” she said. “I imagined maybe you’d give me shit for being into
you but not your team and then I’d pull this out and show you that
I was all in, you know what I mean? But you didn’t even stick
around to chat.”

“Okay, okay,” Damian said. He sat down on
the bed, allowing himself to sink in. “I’m sorry. For yelling at
you about the phone. And not sticking around to chat.”

“And don’t worry,” Azura said. “I didn’t
really see anything. On your phone.”

“Didn’t
really
see anything?”

“Okay. I saw one thing.”

“I figured that’s what you meant.”

“But I can pretend I didn’t see it and I
won’t tell anyone.”

“Ah, well,” Damian sighed. He had probably
left his draft to Gemma up. “Great.”

“And I’m sorry,” Azura blurted out.

“It’s fine, you didn’t know it was my phone,
somehow we have near identical phones. I understand.”

“No, I mean…” she shrugged, leaving her bare
shoulders up around her face as she bit her lip and looked up at
the ceiling. “I mean, I’m sorry that you’re going through stuff. I
get it. I’ve been there. I didn’t know when you said you were going
through something that you were going through like, girl issues. I
thought you were just cranky about everyone on your back about
where you’d play next year, not that you were hung up over a girl.
That’s
a totally acceptable reason for why you don’t want to
get with me. Even if you
did
go for that
Lacey
chick.”

“I didn’t really want to,” Damian laughed.
“It was a bit of peer pressure. And wanting to feel normal again.
And the fact that she kind of smelled like Gemma. And had her eyes.
And even kind of sounded like her when she wasn’t putting on her
stupid voice.”

“Dang. You ballers. Should’ve known. Always
ending up back with the high school sweetheart,” Azura flashed her
eyebrows, sitting beside Damian. “Well, why didn’t you say so
before? I would’ve taken that answer and let you be.”

“Because I don’t want to talk about this,”
Damian said. “Because it’s kind of sad that I’ve been hung up over
a girl I dated in high school.”