Char (12 page)

“Is it really that easy for you to get a girl?” I ask Tristan.

“Yes,” he answers. “But I don’t want just any girl. Not anymore.”

“Oh, so you were like Christian in high school?”

“Worse. But I’ve recently decided that one night stands bore me, and I want something more serious.”

“Oh really. And when did this life altering decision come about?” I ask.

“The night we met,” he says. “I wanted you. You wanted me. But I could tell you weren’t a one night stand kind of girl. After talking to you, I quickly decided I didn’t just want one night with you. I want
many
nights with you… and days.”

“You’re right. I’m not a one night stand kind of girl. I’ve never had one before.”

“They’re not all their cracked up to be. It might feel good, but then the next morning I would always wake up feeling like crap.”

“So just
how many
one night stands have you had?”

He doesn’t look at me as he answers. “I don’t know. A lot.”

His answer scares me. “I haven’t been with a lot of guys.”

“How many?”

I clear my throat, sort of afraid to answer. “Two.”

I’ve never been self-conscience before. Especially when it comes to sex. Probably because both of the guys I’ve been with before were virgins. But now I am in a whole new playing field, and I am nowhere near Tristan Becker. He’s like a sex god or something. What if he thinks I suck? What if I
do
suck?

“You’re blushing,” he says.

“Well, I’m a little scared,” I admit. “What if I’m not… as good as you expect?”

“Isn’t it the guy who should worry about being
good
? I mean guys always get off. But not girls.”

I’m pretty sure that my blush just intensified. “I’ve never actually got off during sex… only when I play with myself.” Yeah. Why the hell did I just say that out loud? And to Tristan of all people.

“You play with yourself?”

“Well, yeah. Doesn’t everybody?”

Tristan grins. It’s his sexy grin. The kind that makes girls all over the world want to fall into bed with him. Me included. “I want nothing more than to throw you over
 
my shoulder, walk out of here, and then have my way with you over and over again.”

Hmm yeah, I think I would like that too.

“You should stop looking at me like that.”

“Like what?” I sound breathless.

“Like you want
me to have my way with you.”

I bite my lip. If I talk, I’m pretty sure that I will tell him to do exactly that.

“I don’t think you realize the power you have over me,” he says.

“When are you going to kiss me?” I ask. I’m hoping that he will kiss me now, because I am tired of waiting.
 

“I am not going to kiss you at my little brother’s party, surrounded by hundreds of people. When I kiss you, it will be just the two of us. And it will be special. I want our first kiss to make you never want to kiss another guy ever again.”

I’m pretty sure the temperature just rose. Part of me wants to drag Tristan out of here and do just that. But the other part of me is reminding me that I came here with Layla, and she just left with Christian. So I should probably find her before he steals her virtue.

“We should probably find Layla before my brother smooth talks her into his bed,” Tristan says.

“Yes. We should.”

Tristan and I look around for a while. We finally find Christian and Layla at the bar. She has a drink in hand, and she’s laughing hard at something that Christian is saying.

“Oh my God. He got her drunk.” I am a little furious.

“Wow. He seriously needs to work on his technique. Drunk girls are sloppy in bed.” Tristan shakes his head at his brother.

Layla sees us and stumbles off the bar stool. “Charlotte, did you know that Christian is funny? He is
sooo
funny.” Her voice is slurred.

“What are you doing with my friend?” I ask Christian, ignoring Layla.

“I’m just having fun.” His voice is very nonchalant.

“Well have fun with some other girl.” I put my arm around Layla. “It’s time to go home.”

“Home?” She pouts. “I don’t wanna go home.”

Tristan, Layla, and I all walk towards the front to leave.

“The party was lame anyway,” Tristan says. “It was just an excuse to hang out with you.”

I laugh. “Well let’s take Layla home, and then we’ll figure out something else to do.”

“Sounds good.”

I’m kind of excited that we get to leave early. Parties have never really been my thing. I only went in California because Landon liked to go. It kind of feels good to actually be myself. I hadn’t realized just how much I was pretending with Landon until I wasn’t with him anymore. I have to admit — I kind of like the real me.

11pm

What is normal?

Tristan and I drop Layla off. I help her walk to her room, and she basically passes out the second her head hits the pillow. She will
definitely
be feeling that in the morning. We are on our way back to my house to hang out when I get a phone call from my mom. Which is weird, because my mom never calls me. It’s always me calling her.

“Hey,” I answer, putting it on speaker phone. “What’s up?”

“I was just calling to let you know we have a little situation,” she says.

“Situation?” Oh, God. This can’t be good.

“I just wanted to tell you before it’s in the news tomorrow. A sex tape that Candice made was leaked.”

I quickly turn my phone off speaker, and turn away from Tristan. “How?”

“She didn’t know it was being filmed. But it’s very graphic, and it shows Candice with two guys. We’ve already got our lawyers on it. We’re hoping to rectify the situation fast, but the damage is already done.”

I want to yell at my mom. She’s being so professional about it all. Where is the emotion? “How is Candi?”

“She will be fine,” she answers. “It’s obviously negative, but even negative publicity is still publicity.”

“Mom, can you just stop being
manager
for five minutes and be my mom? Have you even asked Candi how she feels? Or me? I’m in freaking high school. Can you imagine how embarrassing this is to me?”

“Stop being so dramatic.” She snorts. “You will be fine. If anything, you will become more popular with your little friends because of it.”

“How can you be fine? Candice is
your
daughter. How are you okay with this?”

“I never said I was okay with this, Charlotte. I’m just trying to pick up the pieces from the fallout. Excuse me for not crying and freaking out.”

“Whatever, Mom. I’ve got to go.” I hang up the phone, and stare out the window of the limo. I really can’t look at Tristan right now because I’m embarrassed. Why couldn’t I have a normal family? One who actually cares… Instead I got a dysfunctional family. A mom who doesn’t care if a sex tape is released of her daughter. A dad who doesn’t want anything to do with me… except to control me. A slutty sister who will take her clothes off for anybody if the price is right. The only normal family member I have is Chloe, and even she is a famous TV star. And then there is me — the little sister. I am all alone in this, and I have nobody to talk to. Same old shit.

When we pull up to my building, I’m scared to look at Tristan. But I know I have to.

“You know I’m not like my sister, right?” I am looking out the window as I ask the question, because I’m scared to see his reaction. I’m scared he will think I’m like my family and not want anything to do with me. I wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t want anything to do with me.

“Look at me, Char.”

I wipe the tears from under my eyes, and turn towards him. He doesn’t look disgusted. Or mad. He looks… sympathetic. I hate that he has to be sympathetic.

“I don’t care what your family does,” he says. “You’re nothing like your sister. Or your mom and dad. You’re so much better. And I promise I’m not going anywhere. Of course, when you meet my dysfunctional family you may run away.”

This makes me smile. “Your family is dysfunctional too?”

“Isn’t everybody’s?”

“I don’t know. I guess I always pictured a happy family as a mom and dad who love each other, and siblings that fight over silly stuff but always have each others backs. Maybe even crazy holidays that everybody equally looks forward to but dreads. And, of course, forced family nights that you pretend to hate, but secretly enjoy,” I say.

“No family is perfect.”

“Aaron has a pretty awesome family,” I tell Tristan. “I used to spend more nights at his house than my own. I would pretend that Aaron was my brother… His dads are awesome.”

“Dads?” Tristan questions.

“Yeah. He was adopted by a gay couple when he was a baby.”

“See — even he has a not normal family… I mean, really,
what is normal
? All that matters is that you’re happy.”

“Are your parents still married?” I ask him as we get out of the limo and walk inside.

“Legally, yes,” he answers. “But my parents don’t spend a lot of time together. My dad isn’t very… faithful. I think my dad stays married to my mom because he doesn’t want to give her alimony and half his assets. And my mom stays with my dad because of status. She likes the power.”

“That sounds awful.”

“Yep. I definitely don’t want that out of my marriage. I want to be happy. I want a girl that is so deeply in love with me and I with her that we can’t keep our hands off each other. I want my wife to want to go with me on business trips because she can’t bare the thought of being away from me for even a night.”

“Wow.”

He smiles. “What about you? Have you thought about what you want?”

“I just want to be happy,” I say. “I want to find a guy that makes me insanely happy. And if we have a problem in our marriage, I want him to fight for me.”

“How many kids do you want?”

“I don’t know,” I answer. “I guess that would be something I would decide with my husband. I definitely want kids though. And more than one. Because I couldn’t imagine growing up without my older sisters. So at least two kids. Or maybe I’ll have one and adopt one. Since my best friend was adopted I kind of feel strongly about giving a home to kids who don’t have one.”

“What if you adopt a kid and don’t love them as much as the kid you had yourself?”

“I can’t answer since I don’t know, but I feel like I will love them equally. They would both be my children. I’ll change both their diapers. I’ll tuck them both in at night. Just because one will biologically be mine and one won’t be doesn’t mean anything,” I answer.

“I think adopting is a very noble thing to do.”

“I’m wondering — how did the conversation go from a sex tape to adoption?”

Tristan smiles. “Well, we’re just imagining what our family is going to be like. And hoping that we won’t be as screwed up as our parents.”

“We definitely won’t turn out like our parents.” My mom is everything I aspire not
to be.

“What do you think our kid will look like?” Tristan asks.

This makes me laugh. “You and I?”

“Yep.”

Once the elevator doors open, we go up the stairs to my room. I think about the answer on the way up, and once we’re inside my room I answer. “Well, assuming we have a kid together…”

“We will,” he says quickly.

“I think she would have your dark blue eyes.”

“She?”

“Yes. It’s definitely going to be a girl,” I say. “And she will have my blonde hair.”

“I like her already.”

“She will be smart. Maybe a surfer, assuming we live somewhere close to the ocean.”

“Anywhere you want to live, we will,” Tristan says.

“Well we have to be married first.”

“After I graduate college.”

“You mean after
I
graduate.”

“No way,” he says. “I don’t want to wait five more years. Once I graduate, I will happily provide for us until you finish school. And then we can have our kid… And
he
will definitely be a boy.”

“Well what if I don’t want to marry you?”

Tristan laughs. “Oh, you will.”

I laugh with him. Neither of us really know for sure what the future holds, but at least he distracted me from thinking about Candice and her stupid sex tape. For a little bit, I almost felt normal. Almost.

SATURDAY, AUGUST 24

10am

You live in a hotel.

Tristan stays the night, but he sleeps down stairs on the couch. He says just because I don’t care what my dad thinks doesn’t mean he doesn’t. Which makes me think maybe Dad had a point… He didn’t like Aaron and me spending the night together, even if we weren’t doing anything besides sleeping. It was definitely a respect thing. Of course, my dad could have been nicer about the whole thing.

That morning when I get up, I make sure I look cute before I go downstairs. Tristan is up and he’s talking to my dad.

“Charlotte,” my dad says. “Just the person I wanted to talk to.”

“If you are going to say anything about Candice or a sex tape, just save it. I don’t care.”

“I just want you to know that if you need to talk to anybody, I’m here for you.”

Wow. Is my dad actually being nice? This never happens. “Um, thanks.”

With that, Dad leaves for work. I look at Tristan.

“That was so weird. Most of the time, he chooses to forget I exist.”

“He loves you. He just doesn’t always know how to show it.”

“Right,” I say. “So do you want to go grab coffee or something?”

“Yeah. After maybe we can go to my house so I can get clothes,” he says, pointing to the clothes he wore yesterday. “I should probably start packing a bag.”

“Definitely.”

“Seriously, I don’t know what it is about you. You can talk me into anything. I think it’s your eyes. Or maybe your lips.”

I laugh. “I’m the baby in the family. I know how to get my way. And with two older sisters, I definitely had to fight for attention.”

We get in the elevator and head down stairs. “In my family, Christian definitely got all the attention until we got older. Now my dad is all about me taking over the business.”

“Do you want to take over the business?”

“I actually want to expand it,” he answers. “The heart of my dad’s business has always been New York City, but I’m not sure I want to stay in this city. I’ve been looking at other cities like Miami, LA, Vegas, and a few others. I really feel like expanding it is the best move.”