Real Ugly(67)
After all, Turner Campbell always gets what he wants.
By the time we're finished with our set, I'm ready to go on a rampage, storming off into the night with a cigarette between my lips and Milo shouting at my back. He's saying something a record exec and a deal, and I just don't fucking care right now. If he wants me, he'll wait. I'm not begging anything from anyone anymore. I figure, if they really want to sign us, they'll stick around. At the moment, I'm nursing the world's worst hard-on, rubbed raw against my jeans and aching like a fucking bitch. I just want to go back to the bus, snort a few lines and take a fucking shower. I don't even want to touch myself.
All I can think about is Naomi, like an all consuming fire, she's taken hold of me and turned everything else to ash. Jesus Christ. I run trembling fingers through my hair. If I'm this bad now, what happens next week? Or next month? Am I going to get progressively worse? I don't know shit about how this works, and there's nobody that I'm willing to ask about it. Anyway, the only person I can even think of who's been in love is Ronnie, and he's the last one I'd ever talk to. Whenever Asuka's name comes up in conversation, he just loses it.
So I pace outside for awhile, just to burn some energy, when I notice this girl staring at me from the edge of the fence. It's kind of obvious that she's just jumped it, making me pretty damn sure that when I actually find my fucking bodyguard, that I'm going to fire him.
She's looking at me with big, blue eyes, haunted eyes, eyes that tell a story I don't want to hear. Her blonde hair is buzzed short, military style, so close to her skull that she almost looks bald at first. She's got on a white dress that's stained with dirt and in her hands is a purse, clutched so tight it looks like her fingers are going to snap off. Something about her catches my attention and not in a good way. When this girl walks, angels cry. That's how sad she is. Something bad happened to her, and it's written all over her face. As she starts to walk towards me, I change my mind. Not something. A whole lot of fucking somethings. Jesus, Mary, and fuck.
“Am I too late?” she asks me, biting her lip and glancing around surreptitiously, like she expects something horrible to crawl out of the darkness at the edge of the lot and consume her, flesh, blood, and bones. “Is she still here?”
I take my cigarette out of my mouth and toss it to the ground at my feet.
“She?” I ask as the girl moves tentatively towards me. She's kind of freaking me out, to be honest. I glance over my shoulder and see Treyjan storming across the lot. He wants to rip me a new one for what happened backstage, but fuck him. This is nobody's business but mine anyway. If I want to fall in love, that's my problem, not his. I really don't want to deal with his shit tonight, but at least if this girl turns out to be a crazed fan, I'll have someone at my back. Can't ask for anyone better in a fight.
“Naomi,” she whispers, and then it just clicks. The foster sister. Fuck. I take a step backward, but the girl is already shaking her head. “I don't know what he told you, but whatever it is, it's a lie.” She pauses and bites at her lip, like a rat trying to chew its way through the bars of a cage. It's disturbing as shit. “This is big, much bigger than I first thought.” She stares at me, and I find myself unable to look away. I let my hands roam down to my pockets for another cigarette. “Much bigger than you and me.”
“Who the fuck are you?” I ask her as she continues forward, brow scrunching up so tight that her forehead looks like it has ripples.
“Where's Naomi?” The girl pauses and squeezes her eyes shut tight. “Please tell me she's still here, that I'm not too late. Please. Please. Please.”
“What the fuck are you even talking about?” I ask, contemplating what the fuck it is that I should do. Do I call the cops? Do I get Naomi? Is it safe to show this chick where she is? “Naomi's back at her bus, I guess.”
“When's the last you saw her?” the girl asks, leaning forward and staring unblinking up at me. I think that's about the moment when I first hear the sirens. Both the girl and I turn to look. “Oh no,” she whispers, and then she starts running. Not away like I think at first, but towards the sounds, towards the red and blue lights that are swinging in off the highway.
The cigarette falls from my fingers. My heart stops beating. I don't know when it hits me, but when it does, I start running, too.
“Fuck.”
Naomi.
That's where the sirens are headed. And it's not just police. Just police I can handle. But there's an ambulance. No, no, no … two ambulances. I run faster and manage to outpace the blonde girl who's running with tears streaming down her face. It's only then that I realize she's barefoot.