He's Come Undone (3 page)

~ Ellie ~

My apartment was in the converted Pillsbury Building at St. Anthony Main located less than two miles from the University of Minnesota and only a bit further from Prospect Park, the neighborhood where Julian lived. Prospect Park was just outside the boundaries of campus, which meant it was within biking distance.

I didn’t get why he didn’t live in the heart of university chaos since he was a freshman. First-year students normally lived on campus—although I’d gotten lucky. I’d been allowed to live off campus because of a waiting list for student housing. Maybe Julian had done the same thing.

I shared the loft with two people, Carmen, a university student, and Devon, a stylist at an organic salon. My room was tiny, hardly more than a large closet, but I could shut the door and lock it, and if I played music I could block out any sounds that might drift from one space to the next.

Since it was an old warehouse, everything was open, as in just walls, no false ceilings. Privacy could be an issue if you were a private person.

The red dress had been a big hit, so it was my choice for the evening of my first attempt at actual contact with the target. I wore my hair loose with my chunky bangs swept to the side. Foundation and eyeliner and mascara, along with red lipstick called Hollywood Dream. It came close to matching my dress.

That was followed by the black heels. I topped everything off with a sparkly necklace that dropped between my breasts, and a light-blue coat with big black buttons and a wide collar. I actually liked the coat—a loaner from Paige. Not sure it went with the red dress, but I had no plans to freeze my ass off out there.

I admired the sound my heels made as I walked across the loft’s wooden floor to the kitchen area where Devon stood in front of the open refrigerator, staring inside, a pick jabbed into his hair. He worked at The Beehive Salon, and was always changing his look. Recently he’d switched from dreads to a fluffy Afro that was still a work in progress.

He shut the refrigerator door, then opened it again, as if hoping the scene would change. I could relate. He gave up, slammed the door and turned, spotting me.

I wanted to get his reaction, and this was better than anticipated. There was zero recognition in his eyes. Zero. And that wasn’t my only reward. As I stared back, his face slowly changed, going from surprise at finding a stranger in his house, to bafflement, then interest, then extreme interest, followed by the dropping open of his mouth, the closing of his mouth, then some stammering.

“Hey. Hi,” he finally managed. “Are you a friend of… of… of…” I could see his brain sorting the few possibilities, wondering who’d brought me here. Carman or Ellie. Neither seemed probable, and he was coming up blank.

Yeah, I no longer even looked like I’d hang out with myself.

“Devon, it’s me.”

He continued to stare without recognition or comprehension. Really, he was adorable with beautiful eyes that were huge right now.

“Me. Ellie.”

Blank.

“Ellie Barlow. Your roommate.”

Click.

I was familiar. I was safe. He finally found his voice. “Good God. You are hot as hell. I’m not even sure your own mother would recognize you.”

My face must have darkened, because he rushed on in an attempt to erase what he’d just said. Devon didn’t know my full story. He only knew the relationship I’d had with my mother hadn’t been good. “I don’t mean mother. Friend. Roommate. Forget I said mother.”

I opened the black bag over my shoulder. No ratty backpacks for this girl. “I have rent money.” I placed five hundred-dollars bills on the island between us, not yet enough to catch me up on three missed payments. “I’ll get the rest to you soon.”

Devon looked from the money to me. “What’s this all about, Ellie?” Wheels turned in his head, and the word
hooker
floated in the air between us. “I could have given you another month.”

Ha! He said that
now
! Now that I’d signed a contract and sold my soul to a bunch of cheerleaders. Just a week ago he’d pulled me aside for a private conversation. “Rent by Friday or you’re going to have to move out.”

But it didn’t matter. Even if he’d let it slide, and even if I kept trying to avoid him, I needed to pay up or get out.

I had to admit the truth behind his assumption made me feel sick inside. I
was
a hooker, right? When you got down to it. Even if I didn’t have sex with Julian Dye, I was prostituting myself. I’d turned myself into an object of desire. Or was trying.

“It’s an acting job,” I told him.

“Where? West Bank?”

“No, a smaller venue than that.” Much smaller.

“What’s the gig? When’s the show? I’ll come see it.”

I hated to lie, but the contract I’d signed swore me to secrecy. And even if I could tell Devon what was going on, I wouldn’t. For one thing, he was a guy and wouldn’t get it. For another, I might find myself agreeing with his argument. When I was with the girls—I always called them the girls now—when I was with them, it all made perfect sense. But once I was away for a while, I began to doubt myself.

“It’s still in development,” I said. “Might happen, might not. Might end up in the Outsider Festival.”

“Okay. Gotcha. The creative mind and all that.”

Devon was a writer as well as a stylist. He totally got it.

“But wow, Ellie.” He shook his head. “Wow. You know who you kinda look like?”

“Scarlett Johansson?”

“No.”

“Amber Heard?”

“Gwen Stefani.”

It was just the lips, the eyebrows, and hair. Guys were so trickable. Oh, and the boobs. How had I forgotten the boobs?

My phone vibrated and I pulled it from my coat pocket. A text from Charlotte.

He’s at The Drink. I’ll pick you up! Be out front!

The Drink. The place I spotted him two days ago.

Normally I would have waited outside for her, but I felt self-conscious and chose to cling to the warehouse lobby until a white car pulled up and honked.

Seconds later I plopped down in the passenger seat, slammed the door, and Charlotte sped off.

“I’ve got a friend who sent me a text when Julian stepped into the bar,” she said.

This was happening so fast. “How should I approach him?”

“Don’t approach him. Not now, anyway. That was our mistake. See if you can get him to notice you somehow, then play hard-to-get. If hard-to-get doesn’t work, then you might have to make the first move.”

“What did you do when you guys met?”

We stopped at a light, and she looked over at me. “I asked him out.”

“That was bold.”

“I know, I know.”

She pulled up around the corner from the bar. It wasn’t easy getting out of the car in my tight dress, but it was dark and nobody was around. Upright, I gave her a wave and headed for the bar, my heart slamming in my chest.

~ Ellie ~

The Drink had probably started as more of a neighborhood bar, but as the university grew it became one of those ironic spots where students and hipsters liked to hang out. The Budweiser sign with the circling horses still hung from the ceiling, yellow from years of nicotine stains, and the wood-paneled walls were lined with old advertisements. It even had a jukebox, which was currently blasting out a familiar song I couldn’t place.

The “glory” days of my acting gigs were over, but I still considered myself a pro. I’d show up and hit my mark, no matter what. Rain or shine. Flu or famine or fear. So when I spotted Julian at the end of the bar in what I guessed must be his favorite spot, dressed in jeans and that black leather jacket, I crossed the room and wedged in beside him. Catching the bartender’s eye, I ordered a beer. New Glarus.

“Beer, huh?” he asked as if I’d made a mistake. White shirt sleeves rolled up above tattooed forearms, the bartender gave off the aura of a sweet dude who could get tough really fast if the need arose. Older than most of the patrons, but not old old.

“This is a bar, right?” I asked.

“You just look like more of a mixed drink type, that’s all. Beer it is once I see some ID.”

Throughout our interaction, I was aware of the guy to my right, and once or twice I even bumped him with my elbow. No reaction.

As my drink was served and placed on the square card with the bar’s logo, Julian leaned forward, catching the bartender before he moved off to the next customer. “Have you seen a girl with an English accent in here?” he asked.

I perked up and took a sip of beer.

“She has dark, straight hair, about five-foot-six or seven.”

“That could be anybody, man.”

“She was a little… I don’t know… odd-looking and odd-acting.”

I inhaled as I swallowed, gasped, then the coughing started.

Now both guys were hovering, concerned, but not knowing what to do. I waved a hand in the air in a mimed attempt to indicate I was fine even though I was still coughing and tears were running down my cheeks. Not fine.

In desperation, I took another sip of beer—hair of the dog. That helped so I kept going.

The bartender handed me a napkin. I set my glass aside and wiped my cheeks. The napkin came away black with mascara.

Both men were still watching me.

“I’m okay,” I croaked. “Went down the wrong pipe. I do that sometimes.”

“Me too.”

That came from Julian. The first words he spoke to me.

So this was our meet. Our sexy meet. I hadn’t envisioned it like this, but I would try to improvise and go with the flow.

“You were talking about a girl…” I offered, hoping he’d continue even though the bartender had moved away to wait on someone else.

Julian shrugged. “Just somebody I met here a few days ago,” he said. “She forgot something. I wanted to give it back.”

I nodded as if I completely got it. His gaze moved on, taking in the room behind me. It was time for the dress. And the breasts.

I unbuttoned the blue coat and slipped it off, cool air rushing across my chest and arms. How did girls wear this kind of thing all the time? And it wasn’t even winter. What did they do in winter?

He didn’t even look
.

He
didn’t-even-look.

So I looked. I glanced down at my own chest to make sure it was still doing what it was supposed to be doing. It was. I put my elbows on the bar and leaned forward, giving him a better view. Nothing. Then I finished my beer and ordered another one.

Over the next hour I was able to engage him in reluctant conversation. I would start something, like the running topic, then the class topic, then, out of desperation, the bowling topic. Three beers in and feeling a strong buzz, I asked him if he’d mind watching my coat and bag while I went to the restroom. I think he said okay.

As I walked the length of the bar, I experienced the same thing that had happened at the coffee shop. Faces turned like flowers following the sun as I moved toward the restroom. And some of the men had a look in their eyes that made me wish for my boring dark hair and torn tights and baggy coat. This was so odd. So creepy.

So awful.

In the restroom I peed, then checked myself in the mirror, wiping a few stray smudges of black from my cheeks.

The night was a failure. He simply wasn’t interested. Kind of the response I was used to, but not looking like this. And yet his disinterest was welcome compared to the hungry wolf looks I’d gotten on the way to the restroom. I hated to even go back out there. I wished I’d brought my coat and bag so I could slip away.

Instead, I headed back.

When I opened the restroom door, the noise of the bar almost knocked me over. I hadn’t been aware of the way it had filled up while I’d sat with my back to the room, trying to draw Julian into conversation. But the place was packed, the majority of the patrons college guys being the logical guess. And like college guys on a Friday night, they were pretty wasted.

I approached the bar. As I did so, I felt a hand caress my butt. Before I knew it, I was crushed between two guys like the filling of a sandwich.

“Hello.” Guy in front, guy behind.

The guy in front grabbed my boob. Just reached out and grabbed it.

I slapped his hand away. It came right back, fingers biting into my arm this time. “Let’s move this out to my car.”

“Let go of me,” I said through gritted teeth while trying to wrench my arm away. From behind me, another guy rubbed his crotch against my butt. I could feel his erection.

In all of this chaos, the noise, the hands, the buzz in my head, I saw Julian and the bartender coming toward me, fighting their way through the throng of tightly packed people. Julian got there first and wedged his way between me and the boob groper.

“Out!” the bartender shouted to the two guys, while pointing in the direction of the door.

And the band played on…

Or rather, the jukebox played on. The song was fast and primal and seemed to drive the scene instead of accompanying it. Hands came from behind and covered both my breasts while the hard-on guy ground himself into me and breathed his hot breath against the back of my neck. He was so wasted I doubt he even knew where he was, and doubt he even knew he was in a public place.

Then all hell broke lose.

Julian dragged the guy off me. Groper swung. Julian flew backwards, but not far because there were so many people. Someone grabbed him, held him. And maybe it wasn’t intentional, but his arms were pinned by the person supporting him, creating an opportunity for boob grabber, who began pummeling Julian in the stomach.

This was totally instinctual and totally unscripted, but I screamed and jumped on boob-grabber’s back. Just kind of rode him like a horse, my legs wrapped around him as I grappled with his head, twisting and turning and kicking him in the sides, then finally the crotch.

He let out a cry of pain and threw me off.

By now the crowd had thinned, a large portion of the people running out the door. Which meant there was no one to catch me. I flew backwards, knocking over chairs and a bistro table until I finally came to a stop when I landed on the floor, my dress hiked up to my waist, legs spread, breasts threatening to pop out of my Victoria’s Secret bra.

Off in the distance, I heard sirens that grew closer and louder until they finally stopped right outside the door as more people scrambled.

“Here—”

I looked up to see a hand, then an arm, then a chest, then the face of Julian Dye. His nose was bleeding, and his lip was cracked open. But for some weird reason that totally escaped me, he was smiling.

I grabbed his hand and let him pull me to my feet. Once upright, I swayed, and he steadied me with a grip to both shoulders. He peered intently into my face. “You okay?”

Too freaked out to speak, I only nodded.

That earlier stuff that took place while we sat at the bar? That wasn’t the meet.
This
was the meet. Because he was looking at me. Seeing me with those intense blue eyes.

“You sure?”

“Yeah,” I finally managed. “What about you? You’re bleeding.”

He wiped at his face with the back of his hand. “I’ll live.” And then he laughed, as if his words really amused him.

“You were great,” he said. “The way you jumped on that guy. That was some crazy great stuff. I’m pretty sure they don’t teach that in self-defense classes.”

“Bareback riding 101.”

I thought about how it must have looked, me, on the drunk dude’s back. I started laughing, and Julian started laughing, and pretty soon we were both laughing our asses off.

Until we were interrupted by a couple of cops.

The bartender vouched for us, and we got off without having to share much information.

“I better go,” I finally said, looking around for my coat
,
finding it trampled on the floor. I picked it up, dusted it off, tossed it over my arm, then grabbed my bag.

“Need a ride?” Julian asked.

How a good fight changed things. “I can walk.”

“Let me give you a ride. You shouldn’t be walking home in the dark.”

He was probably right.

“My name is Julian,” he said once we were in his car, heading toward St. Anthony Main and my loft.

“Ellie.”

“You don’t look like an Ellie.”

“What do I look like?”

“I don’t know. Something exotic. An exotic name.”

He thought I should have an exotic name. That made me happy.

Without thinking, I almost instructed him let me out at my exact address, but at the last minute I had him go another block, to another apartment complex. Better that he not know where I lived, because who knew what would happen when this whole farce blew up.

My hand was on the door when he reached for me. I turned back, able to get a fairly decent look at him in the glow from the streetlamps. His hair was mussed, and his bottom lip was slightly swollen.
Be still, my heart.

“You were amazing back there,” he said.

“So were you.”

“I don’t think anything could compare to what just happened, but would you like to go for coffee sometime?”

I remembered how Charlotte had told me to play it cool. I didn’t want to play it cool. “Maybe.”

“I’ll bet you have a boyfriend. I understand, but it’s just coffee.”

I smiled. “No boyfriend, but it’s not a good time for me. I’m sorry.”

“That’s cool.” But I could tell he was disappointed, and I wondered if he’d ever been turned down.

We said goodbye, and I got out of the car and walked toward the apartment building where I didn’t live, hoping to hell he pulled away before I got to the door. He didn’t. He was going to watch until I was safely inside.

A door slammed, people laughed, and a young couple emerged from the side of the building. They punched in a door code, and I smiled and followed them in, turning and waving to Julian once I was inside the open door. He pulled away, and after his taillights were gone I stepped outside and walked to my place.

Once home, once back in my room, I pulled out my phone and entered a message to Charlotte:
He gave me a ride home.
With an icky feeling in the pit of my stomach, I hit Send.