In Love With a Stripper

(Jynx’s POV)

I tried to ignore the ring tone coming from my bedside table, but the more it rung the quicker I realized that it was Robbi’s ring tone. I grabbed blindly for the phone and flipped it open to release a blinding light.

“Robbi, what’s wrong?” I asked. The moment I heard her sobbing into the phone I shot up in bed. “Robbi babe I can’t understand what you are saying. Calm down okay,” I said. I heard her take a deep breath.

“Can you come get me from the airport?” she said in a weak voice.

“Don’t move,” I commanded. I got out of bed and quickly got dress. Then I opened the door to the guest room to find Gerard sleeping on the floor in front of it.

“Jynx?” he said looking up at me. “Baby…”

“Gerard I don’t have time for this,” I said stepping over him. He stood up I could tell he was stiff from sleeping there all night.

“Baby where are you going?”

“I have to go pick up Robbi from the airport. Don’t worry I’ll probably bring her back here,”

“But she wasn’t supposed to be back…”

“I know she’s crying at the airport right now. I gotta go get her,” I hurried toward the door grabbing my keys as I went. I jumped into the car and Gerard got into the passenger’s seat. “Gerard no.”

“What I’m worried about her too,” he said.

“She won’t want you there to see her falling apart. I…”

“I’m not letting you go out this early in the morning by yourself,”

“Gerard I promise to bring her back here…”

“You…Jynx you will come back right?” I just nodded and then he got out of the car. I pulled out of the driveway and sped all the way to the airport. When I saw her tears came to my eyes. I’d never been so happy and sad to see my best friend in all my life. I quickly got out of the car. I looked around and noticed that she didn’t have any bags. So I just led her over to the car and helped her in.

“Robbi what the fuck did he do?” I asked once I pulled off.

“He thinks that I want to be with Zacky,” she said she was starting to calm down. “Could you take me to his place? I gotta get my stuff.” I changed my direction thankful that she had given me an excuse not to go back home. I was trying hard to process why he would think that she wanted Zacky.

“Robbi I need you to explain this to me cause I know Brian wouldn’t really think that unless someone gave him reason to,” I said.

“Not you too? No one believes me…”

“Robbi don’t you dare, I didn’t say I didn’t believe you I just said I need to know the whole story to see if there’s anything I can do to fix it. Robbi even when you are wrong I will always take your side.”

“I know,” she took another deep breath to calm herself. “We were at a party and he was pretty drunk. We started dancing and then Zacky started grinding on me from behind. I got sick and ran outside for some fresh air…” we pulled up to the apartment building. “I’ll tell you the rest when we get upstairs okay,” I wanted all the information right then and there, but I knew she was trying to wrap her own head around the whole situation. We made our way up to the penthouse apartment. She pulled out a key and opened the door. I followed her back to the bedroom. I watched as she pulled out a few large pieces of luggage. “Can you fill this with the clothes from the closet?”

“Yeah, talk while we do this okay,” I said. She nodded.

“Well after I got outside I heard Zacky and he started saying crazy shit. Like that I wanted him and shit like that. Before I could tell him to go fuck himself he kissed me. Then Brian came out and said that Zacky had told him about us and to leave. That he wanted me to move out,” she broke down into more tears.

“You just wait till I get my hands on Brian. What did I tell him was going to happen?” she gave a small sad laugh.

“That you would cut off his balls and feed them to the others.”

“That’s right,” I said. “Now lets get your stuff and then trash this place okay?”

“No lets just get my stuff okay,” I shrugged.

“Fine I won’t bust all his shit up, but only cause you said not to,” I gave her a quick hug then hurried back into the closet and quickly packed her things into the bag. Then we both struggled to get the bags down the steps.

“Where’s Gerard when you need him?” She said as we finally made it to the elevator.

“Oh…uh…I…He’s at home. I didn’t think you would want him here for all this,” I said. Instinctively my hand went to my back pocket which held the picture from last night.

“Whoa why did that just sound like I a lie? Is something going on?” I ran my hand through my hair. “Jynx we are best friends don’t do that whole ‘she has enough problems without mine on top’ thing. What’s wrong?” I pulled out the picture and handed it to her. I watched as her mouth fell open. “That bastard… how did you get this?”

“Jared,” I said.

“Oh Jynx then you know that this is fake. I mean…”

“It’s Babs in that picture,” I said.

“That bitch I’m going to kick her ass,” I smiled. Robbi was at least a foot shorter than Babs.

“I’ll take care of her next time I go to the club, but…”

“Look I’m pretty sure that if Jared gave you this its not what it looks like. You can trust Gerard. He wouldn’t do this to you,” the elevator stopped at the bottom floor and the doorman saw us struggling with the bags. He quickly came over taking them from our hands and then loaded them into the car. I quickly handed him a healthy hundred dollar tip and then got in to the car.

“But Robbi he disappears for hours. He’s never where he says he’s going to be. When he comes back he smells like perfume. He tried to lie about it and now he just says that he can’t tell me where he goes. Robbi…I think I’m losing him. We had this fight last night. I made him dinner and then I was going to dance for him. You know remind him that I was there…”

“Jynx that sounds like you are underestimating his love for you. Like you think the only reason he loves you is for your body…”

“He called me Sue and said if he wanted to come home to Sue he would still call me that. Then we argued some more and I smacked him…”

“What did he say to make you smack him?”

“He said that he only reason said he was cheating on me was to get me to shut the fuck up.”

“Well were you doing that thing where you won’t let the other person get a word in?” she asked looking at me accusingly.

“Well maybe, but he already knew that was a sore spot with me.”

“And that was the only way to get you to shut up too,” I just rolled my eyes. “I’m not going to let you ruin this thing with Gerard. He’s a good man and he’s not cheating on you. If he is we’ll beat the shit out of the girl and she won’t be crazy enough to continue to see him.”

“Robbi I don’t want to be anyone’s second choice.”

“You are his first choice. He comes home to you every night,” I smiled over at her.

“God I know this is selfish to say, but I’m so happy you are back.”

“Me too,” She said as I pulled onto the beltway. After a moment I looked over to see she had fallen asleep. I was actually really tired myself. I had just fallen asleep a few moments before she called and I couldn’t wait to crawl back into bed. As soon as we pulled up to the house Gerard came out to greet us. He saw Robbi was sleeping so he swept her up into his arms and carried her into the house.

I grabbed one of her four bags and carried it into the house. Gerard came and grabbed two and I grabbed the last one. Then I headed back toward the bedrooms. I walked into the guest room and cursed quietly. Gerard had put Robbi into the guest’s bed which left me having to sleep with Gerard. I gave up on calling for help so I just went into our room and pulled off my clothes. Then I crawled into bed and under the thick plush comforter. I slowly started to drift to sleep.

I felt the bed move due to the shift of weight then I felt Gerard climb into bed with me wrapping his arms around me.

“I thought you were leaving me this morning,” he said burying his face into my neck.

“Not right now Gerard,” I said. “I just want to sleep okay,” his arms tightened around me and I snuggled closer to him. I closed my eyes and made a wish that this would all be a dream when I woke up. That Robbi would still be with Brian and I wouldn’t think Gerard was slowly leaving me. I’m so mad at myself, I let myself trust him. I knew better, but I let him in anyway. I knew I would regret it.