Page 15 of Holiday Star
As I work, I shake my head, thinking about all those movies where Caleb played the macho tough guy. The mobster. The cowboy. The superhero. How ironic that one stitch has him fainting.
Just goes to show, you can’t believe everything you see on the screen. The real Caleb is obviously a different person from the roles he plays. It makes me wonder about what the true Caleb is like. The man behind the mask of fame.
Once I’m done closing his wound, I reach around to feel the swelling on the back of his head. There’s a golf-ball–sized lump from where he fell the second time. It’s going to hurt like hell when he wakes up.
I rouse Caleb enough to move him over to the fluffy rug that lies in front of the sofa. He crawls over and flops onto his back, closing his eyes. “So tired,” he mumbles. Before I can get him up on the couch, he’s asleep, sprawled out on the floor, limbs spreading in every direction like a human starfish.
As I stand over him, I worry that he’s tired because of his head injury, but then again, it could be because it’s almost dawn. The light in the room is changing, first to gray and now to a rosy, yellow pink.
What should I do? I’m exhausted. My mother’s bed is calling, but if Caleb has a concussion I should stay and monitor him. Make sure he doesn’t wake up vomiting or slip into too deep of a sleep.
Resigned, I gather some blankets and pillows. Placing a pillow under Caleb’s head and then one next to him, I lie down. The room has a chill to it, so I pull the blanket up to cover both of us. I roll onto my side, facing away from him, and close my eyes, falling quickly asleep.
It’s a nice, dreamless sleep until it’s interrupted by someone screaming.
7
My eyes fly open to find Jenny standing over us, her hands clamped over her mouth in an effort to contain the loud squeal that just erupted from it.
“Jesus Christ, Jenny!” I clutch the covers to my chest, my heart racing. “You scared the crap out of—”
“OHMYGOD! You’re sleeping with Caleb Lawson.”
“Shhh,” I shush her, getting up from the floor. A quick glance shows Caleb is asleep and, thankfully, still alive.
I grab Jenny by the elbow and lead her away before she wakes him. Quickly, I drag her up the stairs to the master bedroom. “I’m not sleeping with him,” I hiss, maybe a little too vehemently. “I’m sleepingnextto him.”
I’m not in the best mood, having been woken abruptly twice now.
Her eyes are wide. “But what’s he doing here?”
“Not totally sure,” I admit. “He showed up in the middle of the night saying something about hiding. I kind of hit him,” I wince, embarrassed to say it out loud, “with a wrench on the head and knocked him out.”
“What?!” Jenny’s voice rises in a near shriek.
I shush her again. “Yeah. It was a crazy night. Anyway, what are you doing here? How’d you get in?”
“We’re supposed to go to Butt Camp, remember? I knocked and knocked. You didn’t answer, so I used the key under the flowerpot. You know, the emergency one.”
“Oh! With all the excitement, I totally forgot.” Whenever I’m in town, Jenny likes to drag me to every bizarre workout she can find. The one she’s referring to now is a boot camp workout. As a joke, we call it Butt Camp because when we are done our butts always hurt. It’s basically torture with farm equipment. We do a lot of pushing around tractor tires and lifting bales of hay. I hate it, but Jenny adores it, so I go for her sake.
“Sorry. I don’t think I have it in me to work out today. After being up half the night dealing with Caleb, I’m dead on my feet.”
She smirks. “There’s only one excuse I would accept from you to miss Butt Camp, and it’s staying up half the night with Caleb Lawson.” I grimace, which makes her laugh before she adds, “I wish you had knocked him out with your hot body instead of a wrench, though.”
“Yeah, right. Like that would ever happen.” I roll my eyes at her fondly, ignoring the memory of how soft Caleb’s hair felt against my palm.
“A girl can dream,” she counters.
“My only dream right now is to go back to sleep.”
“Okay, I can take a hint. I’ll leave you to it.” Jenny leans forward and wraps me in her signature so-tight-it’s-almost-painful hug. It’s perfect.
“We’re still going to baby goat yoga on Wednesday, right?” she asks.
“That’s a real thing? I thought you were joking when you told me about it on the phone.”
“Of course it’s real. You’ll love it. All these adorable baby goats walking on you while you do yoga. It’s relaxing.” Jenny looks at me, her cheerful expression shifting into one full of concern. “You need that, Gwen. You’re so stressed all the time. So serious. I know it’s a lot, your job in the hospital. I know how hard you worked to get there. How you had to be so responsible, always studying, but those days are over. You made it.”
