Page 20 of Heartstruck at Dawn
He nodded once and said, “Guille,” with that deep voice of his.
Just before William walked out the door, he stopped for a second, as if he’d forgotten something, but he crossed the threshold and left. Two black cars waited for them outside. William followed Tobias toward the first car and out of my range of vision. Joel waited for Lily by the second car parked right beside the apartment building’s green sunshade.
“You look beautiful, Lily. That dress is gorgeous,” I told her as I looked at her up and down with awe.
“Thank you, Billie. I missed you!” She hugged me again. “I just arrived a couple of days ago, but I wasexhausted. Let’s hang out soon, okay?”
“Sure thing. Um, so—where are you guys going?”
“Movie premiere. One of Billy’s.” She smiled a tight smile.
“Sötnos!” Joel shouted. “We have to go!”
Lily apologized for having to leave so abruptly and told me she would be in New York for the rest of the month. “I’ll text you!” she promised, walking away.
“You okay?” Nolan asked, brushing his dark waves off his face.
I had previously opened up to him about the Thomas-William situation that went down on the day of the fire. He knew my interactions with William were almost null.
So to answer Nolan’s question: I was okay. But having him lookthatgood was a slap in the face—unfair.
“Oh, psh, of course. You’re running late.” I herded him to the exit. I didn’t want to analyze my feelings right now. And he was going to be late. “Tell me all about Emily tomorrow, okay? See you at school.”
He left, and I rushed to my apartment to get changed for my training with Grant.
Grant’s class was grueling. I couldn’t even lift my arms to wash my hair while I showered. I was exhausted but I needed to get dressed to meet CJ and Nina for dinner. Once ready, I realized I still had ten minutes left before having to go, and curiosity got the best of me. I’d abstained from googling William, even though he suggested I did, until now. But I’d learned plenty about myself in the past months, like the fact that I was undoubtedly masochistic.
Ineededto know everything about the event he was attending. I wasn’t sure about how premieres worked, but surely there’d be many photographers there. There had to be at least a few pictures online for me to look at by now.
All I wanted was to see him wearing that perfectly tailored suit without having to pretend to look the other way.
I’m only human. And he looked anything but.
William Sjöberg premiere October 20,2009.
Search.
Okay.
I took a deep breath and pushed my hair over my shoulder. A bunch of pictures of him came up from the red carpet. I kept scrolling until I clicked on one, which took me to a website with a heavily stocked photo gallery from the premiere.
I’m officially a stalker.
There were plenty of shots of William posing on the red carpet, some with the three brothers together, others with just Lily and Joel, and more of Lily alone. It was so surreal to see them in that kind of scene. I still couldn’t grasp it.
I skipped through the photographs of other celebrities and guests I didn’t care to see and browsed for more until I saw her.
ErinfuckingPowell. She looked beautiful.
Click. Erin and William smiling at the camera.
Click. Erin and William staring at each other, smiling.
Click. Erin staring at William while he smiled for the camera.
Click. William grabbing Erin by the waist, whispering to her ear while she laughed.
Click. Click. Click. Click—more of the same.
