Remember Me This Way Page 16

  He doesn't bother to find out my answer, as he’s out the door, slamming it behind him. I can hear him screaming at all the leftover party guests that they need to get the fuck out.

  I dig for more pills, and I lay down on my bed that stinks of alcohol and the heavy perfume of that chick.

  It’s for the best, I tell myself as I fade into a nightmare filled sleep.

  It’s for the best.

  22

  Then

  Ariana

  Tanner is in a mood. He’d been quiet all night. I knew that his dad had been in town this week for a business deal, and that was most likely to blame, but I hated when he got like this.

  Even at the show they played earlier, he had been subdued, his energy on stage lacking that passion that he usually possessed in spades. Jesse and Jensen were looking at each other furtively as we sit at the after-party. For once, it’s at someone’s house beside’s Tanner’s. Jesse catches my attention and lifts his chin at me before nodding his head towards Tanner. I get the message.

  My relationship with Tanner… is different than with the others. Once I broke through Jensen’s wall, and especially after the death of his mom, he doesn’t hide who he is anymore. And Jesse has always been open with me, pursuing me with abandon, there hasn’t been a moment where he made me doubt what he wanted. Jesse was real.

  Tanner is a whole other story, though. It’s always two steps forward, one step back with him. Sometimes I get glimpses of the real Tanner, but as soon as he sees that I’m looking and that I’m actually seeing him, he shuts down. So I'm not sure exactly how to approach this.

  "We should go get snow cones," I say suddenly, knowing that Tanner loves the stuff. Jesse and Jensen roll their eyes at me with matching smirks. Tanner’s so lost in his thoughts though, he totally misses what I'm trying to do.

  He stares at me for a moment as if he's coming out of a daze. "I could go for some," he finally says, and I give myself an inner high-five.

  We get up to go, but Jesse and Jensen stay seated. Tanner throws them an inquiring look.

  "You guys go, I have a game of beer pong calling my name,” Jensen stands up and stretches, showcasing a couple of inches of golden skin as his shirt moves up with the movement. Just that peek has my mouth watering.

  "I think I'm going to join him," Jesse says. "You guys go ahead. We’ll meet up with you later.”

  Tanner looks nonplussed about the fact that it will just be me and him, but I'm nervous as hell. We begin to walk through the ever-growing crowd, but Tanner surprises me by reaching out and grabbing my hand. I look up at him quickly, but he isn't looking at me, he's trying to avoid all the people that are trying to get his attention. We make it outside, and the humidity feels even worse than usual. There’s supposed to be a storm soon, and the air feels so thick it almost feels like I'm wading through it to get to Tanner's car.

  While Jesse and Jensen's cars are both very expensive, Tanner's car puts them to shame. I've heard guys at school practically gushing about how there's only a couple of these cars made in the world. Slipping into the smooth leather interior and staring at the dashboard that resembles a computer, I'm more aware than ever of the differences between the guys and myself.

  We start driving, not exchanging any words. Finally, I open my mouth to try and pierce the sudden tension that I'm feeling.

  "Where’s your favorite snow cone place?" I ask, only knowing about a few that are nowhere near where we are right now.

  “It’s just a mile from here,” he says, not offering anything else. We don’t speak until we get there. And then it’s just for him to ask me what we want as we pull through the drive through.

  We eat our snow cones in silence as he drives, and I realize that we’re going to the beach house. He parks, and we sit there for a second before he gets out and starts walking out to the beach without a word.

  I get out of the car and follow at a distance.

  He doesn’t stop walking until the waves are licking at his feet. You can’t see the stars or the moon because of the storm, and the beach is only faintly lit from a few lights on the property next to us.

  He’s standing there, facing the ocean, his shoulders hunched over, his posture broken looking.

  I watch him for a moment before I decide to check on him. People say that they want to be alone, but no one ever really wants that when they’re hurting. And it’s obvious that Tanner is hurting badly.

  "Tanner," I whisper, and he stiffens like he'd forgotten that I was with him.

  "Do you ever just wish you could disappear?" he asks.

  I don't answer, knowing somehow that I just need to listen.

  "Sometimes I think about what it would be like just to get swept out to sea. I once got caught in a wave when I was a little boy, and I remember floating in the water, not sure whether someone was going to save me. All I could see was the sky, and it got smaller and smaller as I began to sink. And I just remember having a peaceful feeling, like no matter what, it was going to be okay."

  He sighs and I continue to be silent even though I'm itching to wrap him in my arms.

  "I think that eventually, it will all be too much. And I just think sometimes that I would do anything to feel that moment of peace, just one more time."

  I feel like I'm a coward right now, because here he is showing me his truth, and I'm not showing him any of my scars. I can't even speak.

  He laughs just then, a hollow sound. "You feel that way, don't you, Princess?" he says, looking down at me with those uncanny silver eyes.

  I look at him in surprise.

  "You and me, we're the same. I just don't wear my scars on the outside," I admit to him in a murmur that can barely be heard over the waves crashing against our feet.

  "You can definitely see my scars," he answers, looking back at the water. And I hold my breath, because I just know that he's about to tell me something important.

  "My dad was so fucking proud when he found out that he was having a son. He didn't even care when I came out with eyes that were nothing like his or my mother's. I was everything to him. The next heir of the Crosby fortune. But he went in for some testing when I was five. And he found out that he was shooting blanks. He confronted my mother, and she tried to deny it at first. And I wondered why my mother and I were both thrown out into the front yard in the middle of the night."

  A large wave crashes against the shore, spraying us with water, but he doesn't even seem to notice.

  "She banged on that door for hours, begging to be let back in. She feared being poor more than she feared being miserable. He finally let us back in, but my life changed that night." He pointed to a cross tattoo on his arm that said: "Only God can judge me."

  "This hides the three-inch scar I got that next day, when he threw me down the stairs. And this hides the scar where he sliced me with a hunting knife," he explains, pointing to a rose that looks like it’s dripping blood.

  I shiver, feeling sick as he talks.

  "Almost every time he comes home, he carves out a piece of me. And I can't do fucking anything, because he'll kill my mother if I do. I've given up eighteen fucking years for her, and she could care less. So when I walk away, that will be it. She'll be on her own, just like I've been all these years."

  I don't say anything, I just wrap my arms around him and try to give him my love. And I can't help but think of what a pair we are. Both fighting our own demons. And I wonder if it’s only a matter of time until we both crash and burn.

  Because I don't think I can save him when I can't even save myself.

  23

  Now

  Ariana

  "How are you doing?" Clark asks when he sees me at my next show. He doesn’t know about what happened, and I’ve tried to keep it that way since he represents both of us.

  "I'm fine," I lie. It’s all I can say, because the real answer is that I’ve been destroyed and I don’t know how to fix myself.

  That seems to be a good enough response for him, because
he pulls a large packing envelope out of the briefcase he has with him.

  "What's going on?" I ask. Clark just smiles and hands me the envelope. I open it, and my hands start shaking. It’s my album cover. I took the shots a few weeks ago and picked the cover myself, but seeing it on an actual album was unreal. In the shot, I’m lying on a grassy field, the stars stretched out before me with the album name written in the stars. You could see that I was holding someone’s hand in the shot, but you couldn’t see who the hand belonged to. I smiled because it was Jesse’s hand in the shot of course, because I couldn’t stargaze without him.

  Just as I smile, my heart clenches at the fact that I haven’t really talked to Jesse or Jensen since I left the hotel. We’ve exchanged texts, but I’ve been too raw to talk to them on the phone. I know they will want to talk about what happened, and I just can’t do that right now.

  The next couple of weeks, I go through the motions. But I’m just empty inside. I'm once again letting a man mess with my hopes and dreams, but I can't help it.

  It’s Tanner.

  I ache inside and although time is passing, I’m not healing at all. If anything, the hole inside of me is growing even wider. And I wonder if anything I’m doing is even worth it, if I’m doing it all alone.

  I can’t seem to fix what’s broken between Jesse and Jensen either, because I can't help but think, what if they’re next? What if I'm just not enough? Or the pressures of family, Tanner, me being away… It just all becomes too much?

  If you asked me two weeks ago if I thought it was possible for any of them to ever cheat on me, I would've said no. Yet here we are. Maybe it was unrealistic for me to think that we could last in the first place.

  Not that I would ever give someone an excuse to cheat, but maybe the whole reality of this relationship working was idealistic. I mean, I was dating three men and expecting them not to date anyone else.

  Either way, everything sucks.

  Clark confronts me after the show tonight. "What the hell, Ari?" he snaps at me. "I give you this opportunity, and that's the best you have to offer?"he says angrily. And I don’t blame him. I sucked tonight. I even started crying while I was singing Tanner’s and my single.

  "I'm going through some personal things at the moment" I tell him not looking him in the eye.

  "Let me guess, you’re having trouble with my other clients," he says dryly.

  I shrug my shoulders, even though I really just want to talk to someone about how my life has fallen apart.

  Clark comes and sits down next to me with a sigh. "Let me give you a piece of advice, Ariana," he begins. "This is your chance. Chances like this are once-in-a-lifetime, and Jesse, Jensen, and Tanner...they already got their chance. And they took it. And they succeeded. And they have their careers. And as much as they love you and want what I assume is what's best for you, they’re never going to care about your dream as much as you care about it. I don't know all the history with your ex, but it sounds like you spent a large portion of your life living for other people. This is your chance to live for you, and who knows, maybe the life that you build doing this for yourself makes everything with them even better."

  He takes a deep breath and then stands up. “Take a few days off and come back with your head on straight.” And I can hear the implication in his voice. Don't bother coming back if you can’t fix yourself is what he really means.

  Sitting there, I know he's right. I may be heartbroken. But giving up on myself and my dreams will only make everything worse.

  I can’t go on like this.

  Not giving myself time to think, I pick up my phone and called Amberlie.

  "Ari?" she says sleepily when she picks up, and I wince, knowing that she probably had gone to bed since she usually has to be up super early to teach her class.

  "It's me," I tell her, and my voice is already breaking despite the little pep talk I had just given myself.

  She’s instantly alert. "Is everything okay?" she asks me, her voice full of worry.

  I say a silent prayer of thanks that she’s back in my life. She had been an amazing friend in high school, the best you could have hoped for. And the fact that she had no problem picking right back up after I ditched her for so many years...that made her priceless.

  "I'm in San Antonio," I tell her.

  "Do you just finish a show?" she asks, her voice filled with pride at my accomplishments.

  "I did," I say, trying to keep my voice level. "I was wondering if you wanted to go on a girls’ trip with me," I blurt out.

  Now she sounds really awake. "Of course. When?"

  I grimace, wondering how feasible it is to even find a substitute teacher with so little time. "I was wondering if we could go this week," I say softly. “I'll pay for your flight and everything. Do you think there's any way that you can get off?"

  “I can pay for myself, but just tell me where to fly,” she squeals. “The kids have been little monsters this month, and I haven’t taken any time off all year yet. I know that Teddy won’t have a problem watching Cody by himself for a few days. He’s always saying how I deserve to have a break.”

  Not for the first time I think about how happy I am-and a little jealous-about the life my friend has managed to build for herself.

  “I’ll pay for the flight, no arguing,” I tell her. “And I was thinking Scottsdale.”

  She squeals and begins to talk about how she once went to Scottsdale with a rich aunt and all the good shopping there. And it feels strange to listen to her, because how can she be so happy when my life has fallen apart?

  It was weird how the human existence worked like that. We were all connected, and yet so far apart at the same time.

  “I’ll send the flight details if Wednesday works for you,” I finally tell her after she’s finished telling her story.

  We exchange goodbyes, and I get online, buy the tickets, and then send her the information.

  Maybe a few days in the sun can help, I think hopefully.

  But I know that it’s just wishful thinking, because nothing is going to make my stop hurting.

  It’s hot when we land in Scottsdale, and that’s an understatement. The dryness is refreshing though, since the last couple of shows in Texas were so humid that it was almost unbearable.

  Amberlie’s waiting in the baggage claim when I walk out, and she squeals and runs over to give me a huge hug. I have a ballcap pulled down low on my head, just because people are starting to occasionally recognize me and I don’t feel like talking to anyone.

  "Thanks for giving me a much needed break from those hellions," she says as she flips her hair out of her face.

  "Always happy to help," I say as I try to laugh at her exuberance. I fail miserably though, and Amberlie obviously notices it, because she gets a concerned look on her face. My face starts to crumble, and she pulls me in for another hug.

  "Oh, honey," she soothes. "We'll talk all about it, but let's get to our hotel first," she says, eyeing the people around us.

  I straighten up and try to school my face. I wasn't anyone big yet, but there was always the chance that someone had seen the headlines of the shooting and hints about my relationship with the guys. That's all I needed was a picture to go up of me sobbing in the airport.

  I rented a car, not wanting to deal with having to get an Uber everywhere we went, so we pick it up first, talking about everything but the reason why I almost cried in the Phoenix International Airport.

  My phone buzzes a couple of times with either Jesse or Jensen trying to call me, but I ignore it. It’s stupid, and I can’t avoid them forever, but I feel like I just need a couple more days before I talk to them.

  Plus, there’s a part of me that’s still desperate to know what’s going on with Tanner. And I know I won’t be able to prevent myself from asking about him if I talk to them. It would probably push me off the deep end if I found out he was with that girl.

  I had booked a boutique hotel, the Scott Resort, and Amberlie beamed as
we stepped into the lobby that had been remade to be an Instagrammers’ dream.

  "Your two bedroom suite is ready for you. The pools are right through the lobby, and there's a cocktail hour tonight starting at seven, if you ladies are interested,” the girl at the check-in desk says as she hands me a few bottles of water. I thank her before stepping away to walk to our room.

  We get to our bedroom, and it’s just as charming as the lobby. Bright gold details and mod pink decorate the space. There’s a bar cart with ingredients to make specialty cocktails in the room, and the sliding glass doors open up to vibrantly blooming pink flowers. Even though my allergies are already acting up, it’s one of the most charming hotels I’ve ever stayed at.

  "Pool or talk?” Amberlie asks after we finish admiring the room.

  "Let's go to the pool," I say, noting that my spray tan had already begun to fade.

  After getting into our swimsuits, we walk out to one of the larger pools that has a sandy beach section. Everywhere you look, there are spots set up to take pictures.

  The bloggers are out in full force, taking pictures of each other in their swimsuits at each one. One of the girls looks too closely at me, so I pull down my sun hat and turn towards Amberlie who is reading a magazine as she lounges in her chair.

  "Only a few more months of school left," I comment. "What are your plans for the summer?"

  "I think Teddy and I are going to take a long vacation. Maybe rent an Airbnb in California or something like that," she says excitedly. “He tries to save up all of his vacation time for during the summer when I'm off.” I smile, and we begin to discuss some of the places I’ve been in California that she might like.

  I watch as a group of girls set up on loungers across from us at the pool. They’re giggling and laughing, snapping pictures and sipping on frozen cocktails. I wonder what it would be like to have been that carefree at any point in my life.