Luka asks, “Can we start working on it tomorrow?”
“No. You start tonight.” He laughs once, his lips hiking, almost mockingly. “Why? Do you have a date or something?”
My face drops. He heard the Kotovas shouting date night at us.
Didn’t he?
Luka restrains emotion, not giving him more satisfaction, but Geoffrey spins around like he won a round in a battle and saunters out of the physical therapy room.
He ruined our baseball date night on purpose. “God, I hate him,” I say.
Luka nods, his jaw muscle constricting. “Me too.”
SUMMER
Act Forty-Six
Luka Kotova
“Be responsible today.”
That declaration has rained down from Vince, Aerial Ethereal’s marketing director and no longer a Corporate spy.
(Hallelujah.)
He’s dreaming though. I may suck at math, but adding a hundred AE artists + the hottest July afternoon + free drinks + a massive Masquerade pool with hotel guests = a scenario with 0 responsibility.
In the same breath, Vince said, “Have fun.” I’m sincerely trying to figure out how responsibility and fun intersect on the Venn diagram.
Three Amour artists understand the decree well enough. Taking running starts, my cousins do full-in full-outs, splashing into the water and garnering thunderous cheers from guests. The DJ increases the volume of a remix to a summer pop song, and people cheer and dance.
The Masquerade hosts very few promo parties a year, but when they do, they always ask AE artists to perform and to “blend in and drink and have fun”—that way we’ll surprise the guests when we finally unleash a trick. Ticket sales normally skyrocket after these events.
Mandatory or not, stressed or relaxed—I don’t bail on pool parties. The Nevada summer is too brutally hot.
This year, it’s even better. I wade in the five-foot end and Baylee is standing on my shoulders, not a cousin.
I clasp her calves, completely secured, and she juggles eight mesh balls in a clean arc. She lets me catch one that falls, and I toss it back up to her.
In our section of the pool, the inebriated, sunburned guests stare open-mouthed and clap their hands to their margaritas and beers.
I meander around the pool, the water cool on my skin, and I ache to dip under. I know Bay must be scorching from the heat. No clouds in sight.
I chew a piece of gum and eye a dude who zigzags in the water towards us, his trucker hat says beer me.
“You have to stay back, dude!” I yell over the music, my voice nonchalant.
He floats slowly toward us now.
I almost laugh, and I look up.
In a red Adidas swimsuit, Baylee looks beautiful and in her element. She lowers, sitting on my shoulders, and she never breaks tempo. Balls sail in a new crisscrossing pattern, and I catch sight of her smile—which has been more fleeting this summer.
Infini isn’t selling out. We fill more seats than Amour, but our auditorium holds more bodies. There’s mutterings about music changes, too.
On top of that, Geoffrey has given us almost no time to recuperate and breathe. We’re both losing precious sleep. I’m down to five hours a night, and she’s not much better. But she works herself harder than me, deathly afraid of Infini’s end.
I run my hand up her leg, and the trucker hat dude yells at her, “I wanna hold your balls!”
I lost count of how many times she’s been heckled. I raise a hand at him in warning as he creeps closer, shaking my head.
(Drunk people, honestly. I have no other words than that.) Baylee forces a smile. “Do you know how to juggle?!”
“Yeah!” he laughs and reaches out to grab Bay.
I splash him in the face. “That’s not an invitation! Back up!”
He drifts back a little, and I end up walking backwards, putting space between him and Baylee. Look, the place is swarming with security and I’ve dealt with these kinds of personalities my entire life. My level of paranoia is low, confidence high, and I’m too used to this to be an overprotective, over-alarmed asshole.
“If you can juggle, then get your own balls!” Baylee shouts, her tone serious.
He puts his sunglasses on top of his trucker hat, laughing. “Baby, I can show you my balls. I have ‘em right here!”
Baylee raises her brows, still juggling, and she watches the drunk Vegas guest out of curiosity. It’s entertaining to see how far they’re willing to take their wild vacation.
(What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas. For them. Not me. This is my whole life.) One second later, he actually commits.
Swim trunks down, dick out. Luckily, we are all saved by the image since five-feet of his body is submerged under water.
Girls squeal nearby and splash him for exposing himself. Others unhook their bikini tops.
“Skinny dipping!” a guy hollers, and more swimsuits fly off.
My hand slides up Bay’s thigh. “You started that, you realize?”
“And Brenden said I fail at fun and relaxation,” she says seriously. “Here, I just started a naked pool party.” That must’ve been a recent conversation with her brother.
She does fail at relaxation. Around my neck, her muscles are tensed up again, even as I rub her thigh. Bay lets her balls drop in her palms.
I hoist her off my shoulders, and she instantly dunks beneath the water and then breaches the surface.
“You okay?” I ask, my hands on the curve of her hips. My back is to the trucker hat dude, shielding her from him, and we drift into the masses, their fists pumping at a popular song.
We bypass the in-pool bar. Bay switched her antidepressants, under advice from her therapist, and the new kind have bad side effects with alcohol, so I don’t ask if she wants any liquor.
Baylee drapes her arms over my shoulders. “I want to be happy.” She tries to release a heavy breath. “I just can’t stop thinking about what happens if Marc says Infini is done. It’s not just the music and my mom. It’s so much more.”
I frown. “Like what?”
She shrugs. “Where do I go? What do I do? It’s the only show I’ve ever been in.”
“Krasavitsa.” I give her a look like it’s obvious what would happen.
“Don’t say what I think you’re going to say. It’s so farfetched.”
I say it. “AE will hire you for another show, and it’s only unbelievable to you because it hasn’t happened before.”
She seems uncertain.
“They will hire you again.”
Baylee leans her head back like her head weighs a million pounds and groans. “You don’t know that. I’m not a Kotova.”
“They will,” I say again, my lips rising.
She smiles off of my smile. “I’m being realistic here.” Her smile leaves really fast. “All so when I’m without a job and a roof, I’m not crushed to pieces.”
“Look.” I cup her face in my hands, and her worried eyes meet my assured ones. “That’s not going to happen. I’m not letting Corporate crush you. I’m not, okay?”
She nods, and I wonder if she really believes me.
Do I even believe I have that kind of control?
For now, I’m going to pretend to.
*
I thought I picked a somewhat quiet cabana to disappear into with Baylee. Not to screw around, we’re literally sleeping. I wake to familiar voices.
“My quota of drunk old men has been reached, surpassed, and pissed on profusely,” John says.
I open my eyes and make sure they haven’t woken up my girlfriend. My arms are around Baylee while she sleeps on my chest, head tucked in the crook of my arm to block out the sunlight. She’s practically passed out, needing this.
“Old men must attract more old men,” Timo says, his smile breathing inside his words.
They walk into view and nearly approach my cabana, but they’re distracted by each other’s presence.
(I’m not kidding.)
Timo is checking out John like he’s not his boyfriend that he sees every day. And John is fit. I mean, a six-pack, toned, and he’s bigger built than my little brother who has lean muscles. His dark trunks contrast my brother’s neon-orange Speedo.
Most Kotovas are in Speedos. Mine is blue. Be warned: Dimitri will show off his muscular thighs to every woman he passes. He thinks they’re god’s gift to humanity.