Hung (13 page)

T
he last six
weeks had been a haze of uninterrupted, filthy, primal sex.

I'd taken Alicia in every room in the mansion, laid out blankets in the courtyard and made love to her under the stars, and we'd even done it like teenagers in the passenger seat of my black Aston Martin – where it all began. We'd had sex on every day of the calendar month, even on the days where biology dictated it was impossible for Alicia to conceive, just in case.

I had plenty of faith in my little swimmers.

I was worn out, but there was no way I was stopping. Alicia's chocolate skin was like a drug to me, and I was showing no signs of building up a tolerance. The merest look, the wiggle of her perfect bubble butt as she walked by was enough to put my cock into a delirious spiral of excitement, and I'd taken her against the wall more than once.

It was a marvel that we'd got any recording done at all, especially since my home studio had a couch… But we'd managed to fit at least
some
recording time in between our periodic bouts of animalistic desire, and the EP was as good as done. It was good – damn good.

What was far less clear, however, was whether there was a label out there willing to take a chance on it, and so far, Mike had maintained an ominous radio silence.

I greeted him at the door, and he looked uncharacteristically disheveled. "How you doing, buddy?" I asked airily. I wasn't blind – I could see how he looked, and I wasn't stupid – I knew he was unlikely to be bearing good tidings, but there was something about getting laid three times a day for a month that had a way of making little things like that seem kind of irrelevant.

"Not good, Clay," he sighed, "not good at all. Can I get a coffee?"

I led him to the kitchen and poured him a steaming cup straight from the machine. "It's still hot." He accepted the cup with a grateful smile and sank onto a stool.

"Thanks, Clay. Sorry I haven't called – been busy."

"It's not good news, I take it?" I said, still hoping that perhaps I'd misread the situation, or like he often did, Mike was going to spring a pleasant surprise on me. It only took him a few words to dispel that hopeful notion.

"No, not at all. Where's Alicia? She should probably be here for this."

"At the florist." I smiled. "Said this place was lovely, but needed a feminine touch."

Mike looked around the kitchen and chuckled. "Yeah, I can see that. This place is a bit of a bachelor pad."

I laughed. "It's worked for me. So, what's the news, Mike?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Since when are you so eager to talk shop? I remember when I had to practically tie you down to get you to talk about anything that even resembled work."

"I've been doing some growing up, Mike," I said reflectively. "It was about time."

Mike chuckled. "And I suppose that gorgeous girl you’ve been sleeping with had nothing to do with it?"

I smiled ruefully. "Okay, okay – she's had a bit of influence on the decision… But, Mike, I can tell when you don't want to tell me something. Just spit it out."

"You've known me too long," Mike smiled, his turn to look rueful, "but you're right, you've got me. Here's the deal – none of the other major labels are interested in picking up the record; they're too worried about bad press."

Mike looked at me expectantly, as though he assumed that any moment now I was going to blow my lid and let the anger flow out of me. I couldn't blame him – for years, that was how I would undoubtedly have reacted. But I was a different man now – or at least, I was trying to be. The rage was still there, but I had a lid on it. I hoped I did, anyway.

"Understandable," I sighed. "So there's no one interested in picking it up?"

"You aren't going to like this," Mike replied, wincing, "but Atlantic's still sniffing around…"

I balled my hand into a fist and slammed it down on the granite island so hard that Mike's coffee cup shook. "No way, no how," I said forcefully. "Let me guess – he's offering a shitty deal?"

"You got it, Clay. Thirty percent less than he offered two months ago."

"No way that bastard gets it," I snarled.

"It might be them or nobody, I'm afraid." Mike sighed, leaning forward onto his elbows and massaging his temples. He looked stressed, and I felt terrible for making him work so hard – especially as it was my fault he was having to look for a new label in the first place.

"The way he spoke to Alicia," I said, still smoldering over the memory, "was unacceptable. The only way I'd ever go back to Atlantic would be if Fred Peters apologized to her."

Mike laughed bitterly. "Yeah, like that's going to happen."

"Then that's it," I said. "We’re screwed."

"It's all right for you, Clay," Mike said, gesturing around the huge kitchen we were sitting in, "but I've got kids to feed. And this was Alicia's dream, wasn't it? Look, I don't need you to make a decision now, but at least think about going back to Atlantic, alright? I'll support you either way, but if I have to take another client to pay the bills…"

"But you're my manager, Mike," I said stupidly, barely able to process the idea of Mike working for someone else as well as me.

"And I don't want to work for anyone else, Clay," Mike said honestly, "but it's not managing if I'm just hanging out with you at home, you know?"

I joined Mike with my head in my hands. "Thanks for coming over, buddy." I groaned. "I'll think about it, okay?"

He stood up, ready to leave. "Clay – one last thing."

"Yeah?"

"It’s nearly the anniversary of Sarah’s death – don’t think I’ve forgotten. I want you to take care of yourself, okay?" He looked worried, like I was a child that needed protecting. On this topic, I guessed, I was.

"Thanks, Mike. That goes for you too, buddy. You know she loved you more than anything, right?"

Mike smiled wanly, the heartbreak of loss inscribed on his face. "I know."

S
elf-doubt had always been
other people's problem – not mine. After all, a decade of relentless success didn't leave much room for introspection. Perhaps that's why Mike's revelation that, barring a miracle, he'd have to look for another client hit me so hard.

The more I thought about it, the less I could keep my mind off it, and soon the idea was all that I could think about. The idea that I might no longer be a music star – the only thing I'd ever wanted to be, and the thing I'd spent my life dedicated to pursuing – wasn't too troubling. The worry hung over me loosely, in the same way an elderly man might from time to time contemplate his impending mortality.

What really worried me was not that Mike would no longer be able to manage me – because I knew we'd been through far too much not to remain friends. It was the fear that I might have cheated Alicia out of the only career that she’d ever wanted.

That
hung over me like a black cloud of depression. I paced the mansion for what felt like hours, but was undoubtedly far less before deciding I either needed a drink or a fight to work off my growing tension. I had my car keys in my hand and was walking into the basement to pick out a car when my eyes passed over the black Aston Martin in which Alicia and I had spent so much quality time, and the memory of Alicia hit me like a hammer.

I stopped in my tracks, realizing that what I was doing was wrong – it was self-sabotage. I tossed the keys away, watching them slide headlong under a row of expensive cars, and growled into the empty concrete room.

"Fuck!" I screamed into the silent air.

I couldn't do it to Alicia, I knew that much. But I had to work off this anger somehow. I walked straight to my home gym, lights flicking on automatically as I walked down the long basement corridor into a room I hadn't used in a while.

Boxing had once been a hobby – the kind of hobby rich people indulge in from time to time. I'd gone to a fight in Vegas and become, for a brief period, enamored with the sport. There was nothing, as far as I could tell, more noble than two men standing in a ring and hitting each other until only one came out. After all, there was nowhere to hide, and I liked it.

The good thing about being a multi-millionaire was that it only took a short call to my assistant to get a full-size boxing ring, several punching bags and more kit than I could have used in two lifetimes installed in my basement. Of course, I'd used it for a few months and then quickly bored of it, but the place was spotless – at least the cleaner came down here, even if I didn't.

I propped the door open with a dumbbell to make sure there would be enough air flowing through that I wouldn't choke on the smell of my own sweat, kicked my shoes off and cracked my neck.

I grabbed a couple of lengths of white tape from an open set of shelves and wrapped it around my knuckles. It wasn't the best job I'd ever done, but I wasn't in the best mood I'd ever been in, so it was about par for the course.

"Fucking piece of shit," I shouted at the punching bag, working myself up into an aggressive, violent mood by picturing Fred Peters' face drawn on it at eye level. I pulled on a pair of boxing gloves that hadn't been used in a year, fastened them, and kicked the bag for good measure.

All the darkest thoughts in my head kept running through my brain – my failure to make good on my promise to impregnate Alicia, the fact that I was screwing up her chance at success in the music business, and of course, Sarah's death, like always at this time of year, was lingering in the background. It all combined to create the veritable crescendo in my brain of a thousand voices screaming at me for my failure.

I watched the bag swinging gently in front of me, still swaying from my kick, pulled my shoulder back and punched it as hard as I could.

"I."

I hit the bag again, punctuating every word with a punch.

"Am."

The bag swung back towards me, and I hit it with a thunderous blow.

"Not."

I laid a sharp jab down with either fist.

"A."

I let swing with a haymaker, punching the bag back further than I'd ever managed before.

"Failure."

This time I let loose, punching and kicking and hitting and screaming at the bag for as long as I could. The blood was raging in my ears, and I'd beat the heavy, swaying, inanimate object until the sweat was trickling down my forehead and stinging my eyes, flowing down my back in streams, and pooling on the floor.

I'd always found something truly cathartic about boxing, which is probably related to the fact that it was the only sport that ever truly exhausted me. As usual, beating the bag within an inch of its life left me clinging for my own, hunched over and wheezing into the floor.

The room smelt acrid, it stank of the sweat that was falling off me and leaving puddles everywhere. I sank onto my haunches, panting.

"Clay?"

I spun around on exhausted legs. "Alicia! I didn't know you were home…"

"What are you doing?"

I looked at myself in one of the mirrors that lined the walls. I was a mess – how could I possibly explain this to her? My face was strained red, half from anger, the other half sheer exhaustion. I was still in the clothes I'd put on this morning, but the white T-shirt was soaked in sweat, and I looked like a wounded, hunted animal.

"You okay?" she asked again, her voice full of worry.

"I'm fine," I growled, turning away from her so that she couldn't see my face. I felt ashamed – ashamed of what she must think of me, and ashamed for failing her. I didn't look away fast enough to avoid seeing the look of hurt cross her face at my curt reply, and that hurt me even more.

"You're not fine, Clay. I've seen you fine, and this isn't that." She crossed the distance between us and put her hands on my shoulders. "Tell me what's going on, Clay. Don't you dare hold it inside."

I couldn't if I had wanted to. It burst out of me like a gathering storm – all my failure, all my inadequacy, all of my worries.

"I've fucked up, Liss. I've failed you, Mike, hell – everyone who's ever relied on me."

"What are you talking about?" she asked, a curious smile lurking on her lips. "You've been nothing but exceptional these past few weeks. You've beat every expectation I have had of what this could be."

"I've ruined your chance of ever having a music career," I burst out. "You'll never forgive me."

"What are you talking about, Clay?" Alicia smiled. "You've given me more of a shot at a career in this business then I'd ever have had without you…"

"And I've also taken it away," I replied morosely. "I should never have blown up in the Atlantic meeting like that. Mike warned me not to, and I ignored him."

Alicia put her hand on my chin, raising it up and moving my gaze up off the floor where I'd anchored it in my depression.

"You know," she said softly, "you doing what you did in that meeting was what convinced me to give this a shot."

I looked up in surprise. "You're not mad?"

"Mad?" She laughed gently, stroking my cheek. "How could I be mad? You've given me everything I ever imagined."

I hugged her tightly, so relieved to hear that she wasn't about to leave me, the thing I'd feared most, that I didn't parse the deeper meaning of what she'd just said.

"Clay," she said in a warning, queasy voice. "You stink!"

I looked up and saw that she had her jaw clenched shut. "Alicia, are you okay?" I asked, worriedly. She looked drawn and ill – pale even, nothing like the gorgeous chocolate beauty I normally saw prowling the halls of the mansion.

"I need to sit down," she said sharply, "quickly." I didn't need asking twice. I picked her up as though she weighed less than a feather, even as exhausted as I was, and carried her to a chair on the edge of the room.

I hovered over her worriedly. "Can I get you some water? Should I call a doctor?"

"It'll pass," she said in a strange, strained voice as though she was biting down waves of nausea. Two whole minutes did pass as she fought off the affliction, and I was just about to dial the emergency number when she finally lifted her head out of her hands.

"Are you okay?" I asked desperately. "Do I need to get you to a hospital?"