Total pages in book: 111
Estimated words: 109038 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 545(@200wpm)___ 436(@250wpm)___ 363(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 109038 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 545(@200wpm)___ 436(@250wpm)___ 363(@300wpm)
He nods. “Same. I haven’t drank or smoked or done anything since last year. How is LA?”
He says it so casually, like he’s just reporting a change in his wardrobe.
But it hits me like I just missed a step on the stairs.
“You quit drinking?”
He casts his gaze down toward the floor. “It might shock you, Logan, but I really don’t want to fucking die. I was slowly killing myself with that shit. I have too much I want to do.”
“I’m proud of you,” I tell him.
“Save it.”
“No, Chase, I’m really proud of you. That’s amazing to hear.”
He stares at the ground for a while and I feel like I’m two seconds away from pulling him into a hug again.
Before I move, though, he digs into his pocket and pulls out a little piece of paper. It’s square-shaped and looks like it was printed at home, but it’s clearly a business card. The background is printed with neon-colored line art, and at the center, it says his name.
Chase Cameron Fine Arts.
There’s a QR code and a link written below it.
“This is the only thing I’m proud of,” he tells me. “Quitting everything else was the easy part, even though I felt like absolute shit for a while.”
I take out my wallet and slide his card into it. “Thank you.”
“No problem.”
He stands there for a while looking at me like there are a thousand tiny explosions going off beneath his surface.
It feels like I’ve lived three lifetimes in the span of the year that I’ve been away from Chase. When I won a couple of Emmys, the tenor of my fame changed, and the media veered away from calling me a “heartthrob” and started calling me “the most sought-after actor of the new era.”
I started therapy shortly after going back to LA, too, specifically focused on a sort of gentle exposure therapy, where a lovely woman named Leslie helped me grapple with my rapid fame. I learned how to make better small talk. I spoke to other actors, heard their stories, and slowly felt less alone.
My co-star Charlie has become a good friend to me, and the press is less inclined to rumor-monger about us now.
The media has mistakenly been spreading rumors about me dating an actress, lately, but…
All of that floats away when I’m near Chase.
Last year, it felt like I was ignoring the rest of my world when we were together. But right now it just feels like it’s going into soft focus behind him. He’s always commanded my attention. It would be impossible for him not to.
The thing about Chase is that he doesn’t just wear his heart on his sleeve, though.
He wears it all over his whole fucking being.
He’s leaning there against the shelves now, trying to act casual as he grabs a little sugar packet from behind him and taps at it over and over.
He’s probably dying to touch me. I know him well enough to know that.
“You can talk to me,” I offer. “I know you want to say something.”
He shrugs. “I’m good. Just wanted you to have my card.”
“You’re still looking at me like you’re staring off that fucking rooftop, Chase.”
“Nope. I’m fine.”
I look down, trying to bite back a smile. “Right.”
"Look, we both got it out of our systems, okay?” Chase finally blurts out. “I’m not so desperate for cock that I’m going to throw myself at you just because you’re in the penthouse again.”
“But you told me you were considering coming up to my room last night.”
“Because I just wanted to give you my card.”
“I see.”
“You don’t believe me?”
“Not even a little bit.”
He lets out a frustrated groan, pacing down the hall a little and then looping back around toward me. “Yeah, this is going to be easier than I thought. I forgot how irritating you can be.”
“I forgot how fired up you get when I call you on your shit.”
He holds up a middle finger to me, but behind it, I can see him hiding a smile.
“Just tell me you’ll check out my art?”
“Of course I will.”
I glance down the hall and at the very end, I can see a group of people that asked for my autograph earlier waiting near the elevator bay. I stand up a little straighter, remembering the rest of my life all at once.
“Who’s that?” Chase asks.
“Fans.”
They’re waiting for the elevator right now, facing the other direction, but if they turned around, they’d see us.
“I take it you don’t want to see them?”
I frown. “They were already drunk when they talked to me earlier, and I bet it would be worse now. They had me pretend I was tossing a football to them, over and over, while they tried to film a TikTok.”
“Come here,” Chase says, clasping his hand around mine.
He tugs me a little further down the hall and uses his access card to beep into an employees-only door nearby.