I didn’t answer right away. I was feeling touchy and upset and I couldn’t pin down the exact reason.
Was I mad at Cole? Hell yeah. Though to be fair, he hadn’t been doing anything unusual. He had just been behaving in typical Cole Brandt fashion. But that had been the problem.
The typical was getting old.
Because this time, instead of being angrily aroused, I had felt painfully empty.
Gracie had finally returned to the room and being the great friend that she was, she didn’t ask about Cole or mention what had happened after I had left the restaurant. We had gotten our things together and taken a cab to the airport. And then we had flown back to home.
I had spent Monday trying to get my head straight. Maysie had called and said the show was great. She mentioned that several local newspapers and online blogs had covered the concert and the boys had gotten some great press. The indie label they were signed with was already pushing for a bigger album release than they had originally planned given the increase in media attention the Rejects were getting.
Great things were coming. We all knew that.
I was really proud of the boys I had known for years. I was proud of Cole most of all, stupid bastard that he was. I knew how much this meant to him.
So when he called me the next time I had answered. We spent the first ten minutes going through the customary banter
“What the hell is your problem?” Cole had demanded.
“You’re my problem, dickhead!” I had responded.
Insults were hurled, frustrations were voiced. And then when our anger had finally abated and when we normally would have run out of things to say to one another and hung up, we actually began to talk.
Cole started telling me about the concert. He began to share with me what it was like to sing up on stage in front of a crowd that wanted to own him. It was as though he were desperate to share this important part of his life with me.
His excitement was infectious. It filled me and spilled over. I was happy for him. And that felt so much better than the anger.
And we had, just like that, fallen into something better than our usual. Because for the first time in the history of our relationship, we were talking to one another. Or Cole was talking and I was listening without wanting to tell him to shut up.
It was disconcerting how easily it happened. And by the end of the phone call I was in a good mood and more than willing to engage in a boisterous round of phone sex.
I should be annoyed with how quickly I was turned around by Cole. That despite all of my strong resolve, it was no match for a sexy laugh and a great set of pipes.
Why did Cole have to make it so damn easy to forget that I wanted to hate him? Why didn’t I have any sort of self-control? Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I was the cutest doormat in Bakersville, Virginia.
Gracie nudged me out of the way and started rummaging through my walk in closet. I loved our apartment. It sat on the bottom floor of an old Victorian house in the heart of historic Bakersville. It had been completely renovated before we had moved in and was open, light, and airy.
My room was painted a soft, pale yellow and had French doors that led out onto a small, stone patio. My large four-poster bed that sat in the middle of the room had been a gift from my parents when I started high school. They had loaded it up with the rest of my bedroom furniture and driven it over four hundred miles from Pennsylvania the weekend Gracie and I had moved in.
My mother helped me to arrange my room and even had a hand in choosing the tastefully framed artwork that adorned the walls.
My parents really were wonderful.
This room screamed Vivian Baily. You only needed to walk through the door to know everything about me. My personality, my passions-they were all there.