Page 80 of Fame & Obsession

“All’s fair in love and gossip, baby doll. Cyberspace knows no sheriff.”

I can’t tear my eyes away from the screen. “Think I could deputize you?”

His soft chuckle does nothing to bolster my hope of this blowing over. In fact, a deep sense of foreboding takes root into my gut like a festering ulcer.

“Gage, I think I’m going to be sick.”

“From the picture, the drive of shame, or the article?”

“Let’s just call it a hat trick,” I whisper, holding my stomach.

“What do you know? I didn’t lie to your boss after all,” he says, patting my head.

* * *

I’ve spent the past eight days avoiding Julian.

Not that he’s let that stop him. At last count, he’s left eighteen voice mails on my cell phone, twelve on my work phone, twenty-four text messages, and sent one ballsy email toVinyl.

That last oneI deleted due to a choice four-letter word used in various contextual verb tenses—creative, but inappropriate.

I finally returned his texts three days after the BD exposé, explaining that I couldn’t deal with the unwanted attention his fame brought. It was a chickenshit way to end things, and I admitted as much. I also told him sleeping together was a mistake.

My real name has been the topic of countless entertainment news shows in the past week, thanks to him. It’s only a matter of time before I’ll be forced to pack up my shit and run away again.

In my mind, that alone justifies my actions. No strings means no broken hearts.

In the beginning, it was easy to convince myself Julian was wrong for me. He was pompous and untamed—two qualities I’ve run from my whole life. Ever since, I’ve thrown up every wall known to man, and he’s systematically knocked them all down.

For weeks, I’ve told myself to avoid him and just write the damn autobiography like a professional.

It’s torn me up inside not to answer his calls. I never expected him to be this relentless. I thought after a few days of silence, he’d just move on.

I thought wrong.

Julian Bale isn’t used to being told no, and he sure as hell isn’t used to being ignored. His persistence is wearing me down, and all the cracks in my walls are widening.

Confusion seems to be the only emotion I can latch on to lately.

We’ve evolved into this weird thing I can’t put a label on. Physically, we’re close—we know intimate things about each other. But on a deeper emotional level, there’s nothing there.

So why does it hurt so much not to see him?

I thought I knew the answer. Julian is the first man in years whose touch doesn’t send me running for my anxiety pills. He’d seen my scars and accepted them. He called them beautiful. No one had ever called my scars anything but repulsive.

Julian Bale made me feel human again.

That’s the reason I haven’t picked up the phone. He has the power to ruin me. A bleak realization driven home the moment he had half a dozen buckets of fresh strawberries delivered to theVinyloffices.

He remembered the story I told him about my mom.

I’m weakening daily, and I can’t risk that happening. I’ve worked too hard to fight my way back from the jaws of hell. Letting him in means taking too many risks.

Why the hell can’t he just accept my decision?

Picking up my stapler, I hurl it across my desk, only slightly satisfied when it bounces against the flimsy back wall of the cubicle.

“Friends don’t let friends abuse staplers, Pheebs.”