Incidental Happenstance (45 page)

            “Oh Tia, hi!” Bitsy squawked in her high-pitched voice as soon as she approached the table. She rose to give Tia air kisses, one of the things about her that drove Tia crazy.

           She smirked at Lexi over her shoulder as Bitsy planted the tiny kisses a fraction of an inch from her cheeks and took her seat at the table. “Hey Bitsy,” she said simply, careful not to use the unflattering nickname given to her by Lexi, and then added, “Jace.”

            He nodded at her and tipped his drink toward her in acknowledgement, but didn’t speak. Tia noticed two empty shot glasses sitting on the table in front of him.

            Tia tried her best to be cordial to everyone at the table, but focused her conversation toward Lexi and Ryan. She hadn’t seen him since she’d been back, and it wasn’t long before he asked about her summer.

            “Oh my God, Tia, that’s right!” Bitsy spurted as they waited for the salads to be served. “I heard you spent your summer in Europe! I’ve always loved the south of France—did you go there?”

            “No, I was in Paris, actually,” she answered, catching the look of disgust on Jace’s face from the corner of her eye.

            “Oh, I love Paris too,” she gushed. “Especially the Louvre.” It came out Lou-vree, and Tia had to hide her own smirk. “Did you go there?”

            “I sure did. I loved it too,” she answered.

            “That’s where Tia’s boyfriend first told her he loved her—at the top of the Eiffel Tower,” Lexi interjected, and Tia shot her a look. She hadn’t planned on broadcasting that information, especially not while Jace was still glaring at her.

            “Well isn’t that romantic,” Jace drawled sarcastically, “and so original, too. He must be quite a guy.” He downed his shot of cognac and ordered another.

            “They’re just the perfect couple,” Lexi said to Bitsy, ignoring Jace’s comment. “They’re absolutely adorable together!”

            Jace turned his back on Bitsy and turned his attention to Tia. “But he’s not here now, is he? He’s off on the other side of the world. What’s he doing, I wonder?”

            “Working, actually,” Tia said, glancing at her watch. “It’s two in the afternoon there right now.”

            “Playing with his little band?” he said sarcastically. “Breaking the hearts of girls all over the globe? Everyone knows about guys in bands. You really think he’s being faithful to you?”

            “Yeah, I really do,” Tia answered softly. She didn’t need to defend Dylan or herself to him, and she didn’t owe him any more of an explanation.

            “You don’t know guys then, do you, Tia? You could have had a nice normal guy right here, but you had to go traipsing all over Europe with someone you barely knew. And now look at you, alone again, tagging on to Lexi and Ryan and spending all your nights alone waiting. He’s not coming back, you know.” His words were slurred around the edges—they hadn’t even gotten salads yet and he’d already had too much to drink.

            “I do know a little about
some
guys,” Tia said angrily. “The ones who think they’re better than everyone else and that the world shouldfall down at their feet?
Those
kinds of guys are a bunch of pricks.” All the eyes at the table turned to Jace, but he seemed oblivious to the fact that she was talking about him. 

            Jace finished his fourth shot and handed his glass to the waitress who was placing salads on their table. “Fill this for me, will you sweetheart?” he said to her. Then he turned to Tia. “We’ll see,” he spat. “But don’t expect me to be waiting around for you.”

            Tia glared at him as she watched Bitsy’s face fall. He’d gone too far, and the pain was plainly written in her eyes. “If you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll go say hello to my parents.” She started to get up, but Jace put his hand on her shoulder and pushed her back into her chair. Bitsy looked as if she wanted to climb under the table and disappear, and Tia could see the tears that were starting to pool in her eyes. Jace’s next drink arrived, and he quickly downed it and motioned to the waitress for yet another refill.

            “We haven’t even started dinner,” he said. “You can’t go yet.” She glared at him, and he pasted a pout on his face. “Aw, I’m sorry, Tia. Did I hurt your feelings?” he whined.

            “No,” Tia said, “but you certainly are hurting Bitsy’s. And actually, I think I’ve lost my appetite. I’ll just go say goodbye to my parents.” She turned to Lexi. “Talk to you tomorrow?”

            “Sure…yeah,” she said, shooting daggers at Jace from her eyes. “I’ll call you in the morning.”

            Tia took a few minutes to chat with her parents, congratulating her mother and feigning a headache, then slipped out the door without a backward glance. When she walked into the parking lot, she was more than a little annoyed to see Jace there, waiting for her. She tried to walk past him, but he put his hand on her arm, stopping her. He swayed on his feet, and his speech was slurred. “Oh come on, don’t leave Tia,” he moaned. “I’m sorry. I just always seem to say the wrong things around you—you get me so flustered I can’t even think. I just missed you so much all summer, and you look so good, and I can’t stand hearing you’re in love with someone else…” He tried to put his arm around her, and she stepped away.

            “Give it up Jace!” she answered shortly. “What the hell is wrong with you? You just left your girlfriend sitting in there by herself after you treated her like shit in front of a bunch of people. I can’t believe you could be that rude!”

            “She doesn’t mean anything to me!” he bellowed. “I’ve told you that a dozen times!” His pathetic pout returned, and he lowered his voice. “It’s you I want Tia, it’s you I need.” He drew the last word out, making him sound like a whining child.

            “Damn it Jace, you just don’t have a clue!” she said. “This isn’t even about me—it’s about you not getting something that you want—you just can’t stand it, can you? I told you all this before. I don’t want you.” She enunciated every word and spoke slowly, making sure he had time to process each one through the fog of alcohol. A pained look crossed his face, but she continued. “You are not even close to being my type. You’re pretentious, rude, conceited, and any girl stupid enough to date you better be happy with being second best, because your life is all about you. My being in a relationship isn’t even a factor’t evedon’t you get it? Even if I didn’t have Dylan, I wouldn’t date you!”

            “That’s not fair, and you know it!” he slurred. “I was always very nice to you, and I always put your needs first—that’s why I didn’t make a move sooner. Your supposed boyfriend is on the other side of the world, and I’m here. We could be so good together if you just give us a chance. What can he give you that I can’t, Tia? I’m rich,” he started ticking off his qualities on his fingers, “I’m highly respected in my field, I’m good looking, I’m…”

            “A complete ass,” she finished for him. “And definitely not a guy I’d ever want to be with. Now get out of my way, Jace, and go back to your poor unfortunate girlfriend and start begging for forgiveness, before I have to yell for help.”

            “Fuck, why are you being such a bitch?” he growled, tripping back into the doors of the country club.

            Tia took a deep breath and headed straight for her car, locking the doors and starting up the engine immediately. She thought she’d rid herself of Jace, thought that four months with no contact would deaden any attraction he had for her. She was wrong, apparently, and she vowed that she wouldn’t be returning to the country club again for any reason.

            Dylan’s routine was simpler, and revolved solely around the movie. Filming was going well, and they were making pretty good progress. It helped that they’d set up a makeshift studio on the outskirts of The Village. Technology made it easy, too—they could film a lot of scenes in front of the green screen, and the techies could add backgrounds later. So far they’d filmed the flashbacks, which involved a lot of arguing with Penelope’s character to tell the story of their break up. They’d also done a lot of the main story that involved her character, and he had to admit that she was a good actress. She could cry on command, go from happy to angry in the blink of an eye, and she was doing a great job portraying the character as she was in the book—the audience would love it.

            Personally, she was keeping their relationship at a professional and friendly level, and he was finally starting to trust her; which was good, because he saw an awful lot of her. Bruce and Sadie, the other two actors who shared their spoke of the wheel, were now a hot item and were rarely around. Trent wasn’t scheduled to arrive for a few more weeks, and then would only be staying for a short time, and characters with smaller parts were rotating in and out of another set of trailers. Which left Dylan, Penelope, and their assistants the only constant presences on their spoke of the wheel. It seemed to Dylan that Penelope had some kind of uncanny radar that alerted her to his whereabouts—whenever he walked out of his trailer Penelope was either already there—sunning herself in a lounge chair or reading a book—or she stepped out shortly after he did. The closest town held little of interest, and it was a pain in the ass to get there, anyway. He was feeling claustrophobic, and after two weekends of sitting in his trailer playing cards with the director and dodging Penelope’s invitations to ‘hang out,’ he needed to get out and do something.

            Being so far out of town, the cast and crew were forming their own little community, and it hadn’t taken long for people to start congregating at The Hub on Friday and Saturday nights; sharing pot luck meals, telling stories of home and work over beer at a bonfire, and generally entertaining each other. It was Dylanith Phird Saturday, and they’d just finished running lines for tomorrow’s scenes. He was done for the night, and Stan wasn’t available for a card game, which was fine with Dylan anyway—he’d already lost enough money to him. So when Dylan stepped out and heard the guitar and singing drifting over from the direction of The Hub, he was glad that he wouldn’t have to spend the evening alone or worse, listening to Penelope talk about how wonderful she was. He’d never met a more insecure person. She was constantly belittling others and talked down to everyone, and he was really getting sick of it.

            Jessa had hung out at The Hub the previous week, and had said that the people were all pretty decent—they’d been in the business long enough not to flip out if a celebrity was walking around among them—and he decided to grab his own guitar and head down. He’d hoped to slip out unnoticed, but Penelope’s radar was apparently working and she walked out just as he was tossing his guitar case into the back of the golf cart.

            “And where are you heading off to on this beautiful night?” she asked sweetly.

            “I thought I’d go down and check out what’s happening at The Hub,” he answered casually. “I hear a guitar, and thought maybe I could get a jam going. You know, get to know some of the folks we’re working with.”

            “Seriously?” she said. “I thought maybe we could watch a movie, or just hang out,” she pouted, making Dylan more even determined to spend some time with other people.

            “I’m sick of the trailer already,” he answered, “and we’re going to be here for a long time yet. Might as well get to know some of the people living in our little town.” He secured his guitar case into the back of the cart and climbed in. He wanted to just drive away, but the look on her face stopped him. He might as well invite her—there would plenty of other people around, and maybe he’d get lucky and she’d make a friend or two and give him some peace.

            “Are you coming?” he asked, starting up the cart.

            “Oh, I guess,” she said drearily, not wanting to miss an opportunity to spend time with him. It was better than being alone, she figured.

            When they pulled up, the music stopped and everyone turned toward them, silent for a moment before someone called out, “Hey! Glad you could join us! Grab a beer and pull up a chair!” He motioned to a row of coolers that had been set out.

            Dylan left his guitar on the cart for now—he didn’t want to upstage anyone who’d already been the center of the little group. He opened a couple coolers until he found a palatable brew, and took an empty chair between a girl he recognized from make-up and a dark haired older man he didn’t know. Penelope glared at the girl until she stood up and offered her seat, much to Dylan’s disappointment.

            “We wondered if you’d ever make your way down here,” one of the stage hands said. “We hoped you would,” another person added shyly.

            This was the part Dylan hated. He couldn’t just walk down here, introduce himself, and be one of the gang. The assumption was always that he thought he was too good for them, and it ticked him off. But he knew he couldn’t blame them for their opinions of movie stars. They’d been shunned by far too many of them to give him the benefit of the doubt.

            “Well of course,” Dylan said cheerfully, “we’re going to be spending a lot of time together over the next few months, so we might as well make the best of it. Next time I’ll bring the beer!”

            They cheered him, and then the guy with the guitar said, “Maybe next time you could bring your guitar? It’d be so awesome to jam with you,” he said, head bowed.

            “Well actually, I was hoping you’d say that,” Dylan replied, handing Penelope his beer and walking to the golf cart, pulling his guitar out of the case and slinging it over his shoulder. The buzz of the group rose to actual applause, and Dylan waved it away. “Hey,” he said. “I’m not a rock star tonight, OK? I’m just one of the guys, hanging out, playing a few jams.” He stopped, and added, “That’s actually who I am every day, alright? None of this star treatment rubbish!”