Page 64 of Hearts Adrift
“I can’t believe I didn’t think this would happen.”
“No paradise lasts forever, bub. Up on your feet.”
“I’ve been such a selfish moron. I’ve ruined his life. Is it just what I am? A ruiner? Do I destroy everything I—?”
Anya is in front of me so fast, it’s like she teleported. “You know what I find to be the most annoying trait about you? As an actor, you have the power to inspire worlds into existence. And yet you abandon that power the second you leave the set. Why hasn’t it occurred to you to use that gift in your day-to-day life?”
“Because I’m a fraud,” I mutter, deranged. “I only got myfirst gig because I lied and said I could sing opera in Italian. I faked it. Looked up videos online and sangFigaroin the shower every night, mimicked it all, faked it all.”
She pats me on the cheek firm enough to shut me up, halfway to a slap. “Wanna hear the big midseason twist ofCissy Sees? They lied about their profession to impress the parents of their fiancée, said they were a surgeon, but in fact they’re a struggling painter holed up in an old studio apartment. Fake it ‘til you make it, huh? And boy, if you could see the ‘picture’ they paint by the end of episode 8. The murderer dad doesn’t see it coming. No one does. Like painting with a scalpel and zero fucks. I shall say no more, I’ve spoiled enough. But Riv …” She draws close. “You can still turn this around. For everyone. Just use yourgift.”
My gift.
Inspiring worlds into existence.
Everyone around me always thinks so much higher of me than I do. Ironically, the exact opposite notion is what made me successful: everyone’s constant underestimation of my abilities, writing me off, dismissing my talent.
Maybe this moment is no different.
Finn needs me.
“You’re right,” I finally say, rising off the floor with Anya’s help. I lower my phone. “Absolutely right.”
“So you’ll make some calls?” she asks, lighting up.
“I’m gonna go out there and find Finn.”
Her face drops. “Uh … no. Not the advice I was giving you.”
“I need to find him beforetheydo.” I pocket my phone and head for the back door.
Anya’s on my heels. “Uh, Riv, hold your dick. No, no, no. I didnotmean for you to go out here into that madness in search of your boy t—ofFinn,” she corrects herself. I’m not even mad about it. She can call him whatever she likes. “I was firing you up to makephone calls. To speak to your assholeagent. Not to …fucking kamikaze into a street full of reporters and rabid teenage influencers.”
“You told me to choose between my career or the boy toy,” I remind her, swiping my jacket, hat, and shades off the back of the wobbly chair. “I choose the boy toy.”
Then I’m out the door.
Chapter 18 - Finn
There Theo stands in the flesh.
In El Amado’s storage room, standing next to a stack of boxes full of decorations from last weekend’s Leather Daddy club night, a riding crop poking out of the top.
Theo looks like such a far cry from who he was when we were together. We used to look exactly the same. Like twins, people would tease us, with the two tiny exceptions of his eyebrow and lip rings. But now his whole vibe is like a rebellion against what we once were. Unshaven face and messy hair with a mixture of bleached and hot pink tips. Loose mesh tank top, ripped-up black shorts, and a chain hanging from the pocket.
Maybe I was holding him back when he was with me. This could be the real Theo standing before me, desperate over all these years to be set free.
But he’s proven himself to be such a chameleon, who can say this is even his true self?
I keep my voice low. “What do you want, Theo?”
He leans against the stack of boxes like it’s the only thing holding him up. “I needed to make sure you’re okay.”
“I thought you were gone. Out of town. Couldn’t care less about me.”
He can barely look me in the eye. “I was. But I had to come back because … I hate that this is happening to you.”
“Was it you?” I ask him, cutting right to the chase. “Is my ‘super illicit affair’ all over the internet because of you and yourinability to let the fuck go of me?”
