Zane: First off, I think it’s only fair you tell me what you’re struggling with even though I’m pretty sure I already know.
My hands shook as I took the phone and got ready to chuck it across the room, only to find my entire body shaking right along with my hands.
Me: So. Angry.
It hurt to type. My body convulsed.
Zane: You’re not angry, man. If you were angry, you’d be over it… you… my friend… have a broken heart.
Me: The HELL I do!
Zane: Sure. Okay. But in my experience, which is vast, by the way, when it comes to emotional conditions, as you know — anger is always rooted in sadness — ALWAYS. Find someone who’s angry and I can freaking guarantee you, that deep down, something’s broken. So yeah, you’re angry, but your anger isn’t the sickness — it’s the symptom.
I dropped my phone into my lap like it was on fire.
Was he right? It buzzed again. I was afraid to look.
Zane: And until you deal with the sadness, the anger will always be there, brother.
I don’t know how long I stared at my phone, but I do know that I never texted him back. I knew he wouldn’t mind either. Because with all the hatred I’d had for myself, for Angelica, for the entire situation. I’d never once realized that for years and years, I’d been angry, I’d been relentless, I’d been a workaholic, I’d been hell bent on being something other than the famous Will Sutherland, even going as far as to change the way I dressed, talked, acted.
And for what?
Because every single part of my identity.
Had been fused with hers.
“YOU LOOK LIKE crap,” Ang said handing me a cup of coffee before swiping my keys off the counter. “I can drive.”
“You can drive?”
This was news to me. The girl never drove. Why drive when someone could drive you and you could drink in the back seat of the limo? It was something that had always bothered me about her, the fact that she didn’t really have a license, I mean she could figure it out as good as anyone but she was too lazy to go in and take a damn test.
“Don’t worry, I won’t kill us.” She gave me a sly wink before tucking her hair under another one of her baseball caps and opening the door to the house, locking it behind us.
Who was this person?
She unlocked the Rover and jumped in. The sky was a clear inky black, stars scattered all around. The breeze was frigid. If we had to go in the ocean today I was going to kick Jay’s ass.
Again.
Or at least threaten to.
I quickly turned on the heated seats and watched in shock and a little bit of awe as Ang moved the mirrors and her seat so that she was closer to the pedals and maybe just because God wanted to punish me and make me feel like a judgmental jackass — she pulled out a pair of black-rimmed glasses and gave me a shy look. “I um, have night blindness a bit but these help, I only use them when I drive, I think it’s more of a security thing since my vision is normally perfect.”
My jaw dropped.
I quickly took a sip of coffee and choked out. “Cool”
Yeah, I said cool.
A thirty-year-old said cool.
I ground my teeth and tried to focus on the heat coming through the vents rather than the fact that she looked so damn natural, normal… pretty.
And, shock of the century, she was a good driver.
Didn’t run through any stop signs, and when a little duck tried walking across the road she stopped and waited.
The car ride felt too short.
“Wait.” I put my hand on her arm before she turned off the car and shook my head. “We’re early. Let’s just… wait a few more minutes.”
She nodded and took a sip of her coffee. The Rover was facing the ocean, the set was lit up like a Christmas tree as people stumbled around trying to get things ready for the night party scene.
My focus was on everything going on inside that car.
With her.
The steady inhale and exhale between her lips.
The soft way she sipped her coffee, and waited patiently without filling the empty void of space with her voice.
And suddenly I couldn’t take it anymore, I was sleep deprived, probably delirious and talking out of my ass, but I couldn’t stop the words from tumbling past my lips. “You broke my heart.”
I didn’t give her time to respond.
I just got out of the car and started walking.
And didn’t look back.
Two PAs took one look at my face then gave me a wide berth as I trudged between them in search of the big ol J, and not the one directing, but the one that came out of a bottle. And just maybe, after I finished it, I could bang that bottle across my head, bleed out, and blame my stupidity on a head injury.
Unfortunately, the wrong Jay found me first.