How the hell does she know? I thought, deciding she must’ve been in the restaurant eavesdropping while I talked to Ashley.
Snapping my head back, I looked the mouthy bitch up and down. “You even old enough to be talkin’ like that?”
Hands on her hips, she swished her ponytail. “I talk how the fuck I want.”
Expelling a humorless laugh, I went to turn around but stopped when I saw the girl who first approached me looking to the floor, her cheeks burning.
“You still want that photo, Leanne?” I asked, silently praying I’d remembered her name correctly.
“No she fuckin’ doesn’t,” Mouthy Bitch yelled. I felt sorry for the kid, Leanne, for not having the courage to stand up to her stupid ‘friend’.
Ignoring Miss Delightful, I stepped up to Leanne. “Gimme your phone.”
Mouthy Bitch continued to yap in the distance but my ears tuned out of her frequency. With shaking hands, Leanne passed me her cell, never taking her eyes off my face.
Bending to her level, I pressed my cheek against hers while I pulled up the camera. “Say cheeeeese,” I said, holding the phone out in front of us.
“T-thanks,” she stammered, gazing up at me like I really meant something to her. It frustrated me. I’d done nothing to deserve her admiration. She adored me, I saw it in her eyes, and yet once I got in my car I’d probably never think of her again. She should save those emotions for real people. People she knew. People who would feel them back.
“Hope you’re gonna delete that, Leanne.”
I just hoped she knew better people than the one she was currently hanging out with.
“Later,” she whispered, nodding weakly to her bitch friend. It seemed to appease her and she strutted away.
“Hey,” I said, putting my hand on her shoulder. Her anxious gaze flipped between me and her asshole friend. “Don’t ever value anyone more than you value yourself. You matter. Remember that.”
“Leanne!”
“S-sorry. I gotta go.”
Offering a saddened smile, I clapped her shoulder and she scurried away, turning back just briefly to mutter a silent thank you.
Sliding into my car, my head collapsed onto the wheel. I felt like shit. The bubble I’d been cocooned in with Alex had well and truly burst.
It was evening by the time Alex returned from the club. I stopped by after my lunch with Ashley but ended up driving away without getting out.
He found me outside, perched at the pool bar. “What’re you doing?” he asked, surprising me by snaking his arms around my waist.
“I was building a tower,” I grumbled as the ice cubes collapsed in front of me.
“Hey,” he said, his tone concerned as he palmed my cheek and turned my head to face him. “You okay?”
Blowing air through my nose, I frowned. “Sure. Think I just expected too much.”
“Is this about Ashley or today’s paper?”
“What’s the paper got to do with anything?”
“Oh,” he mumbled, sucking his bottom lip between his teeth. “I came straight here, but Sawyer said he was going to call you.”
I pulled my phone from my pocket and noticed four missed calls. “It’s on silent. What’s going on?”
Anxiety danced on Alex’s face, knitting his eyebrows together as he tapped and swiped on his phone. “Please don’t freak out,” he begged, hesitating before handing it to me.
He’d brought up some online celebrity magazine and staring me in the face, under the headline Another Soul of the Knight Comes Out as Gay, was a photo of Alex and me in the ocean. That explains Mouthy Bitch shooting her mouth off earlier, I thought, remembering the girls outside the restaurant. I scrolled down a little and found a whole freakin’ gallery of photos taken last night. Pictures of us kissing, hugging, laughing…
Shrugging, I passed the phone back to Alex.
“You don’t seem as upset as I thought you would,” Alex said, his eyes assessing my reaction.
“That’s ‘cause I’m not.”
“It’s not just that site,” he added, almost as if he was trying to provoke some kind of emotion out of me. “They’re everywhere.”
“I stopped reading those things years ago. They’re always exposing some shit or another about me. Most of it true.” I winked, a weak attempt to lighten the mood.
“So…you don’t care?”
“They’re strangers.” I shrugged. “Why would I give a rat’s ass what they think?”
“Right,” Alex said, followed by a heavy sigh. That’s when I realized what the real issue was. I was used to living in the public eye, existing in a world where people thought buying our music meant they got a free backstage pass to our private lives. But that was my life, not Alex’s.
“I’m sorry,” I said, standing up to his level. “I didn’t think. It’s upset you, hasn’t it?”
“I don’t want it to. I know this is part of your world and I wish I could ignore it. I just…” His voice cracked and he shook his head. “I just hope my parents don’t see it. They won’t take it well.”