Something's Gotta Give - Original Verison

Jade's Point of View

A week had passed and I was back to dodging Michael’s calls again. I had spent the last seven days in front of my laptop almost non-stop, only taking breaks to go to the bathroom, eat, sleep, and occasionally socialize with the group when forced. I’d placed a ban on Jack coming within ten feet of my bedroom door until I’d gotten at least fifteen pages down, and still, I had nothing to show for it. The amount of calls Michael was placing had gotten so out of hand, that instead of being an adult and checking my messages to see what he wanted, I’d switched my phone off for several days. By the time I turned it back on, I knew Michael would be beyond pissed with me, but he’d definitely be even more pissed if I told him that I didn’t have a single word written yet.

The blank document certainly wasn’t that way for lack of trying – I had actually written the beginning to my novel a few times. But whenever I went to revise, it all sounded like shit, so I would erase everything and start again. I was starting to get beyond frustrated with myself. No wonder so many writers took drugs and drank themselves to death.

By the eighth day, I had decided to turn my phone back on and face whatever wrath Michael could throw my way. I checked the twenty-some messages that he’d left me, ranging from at first a casual, “Hey, how’s the writing going?” to “Jade, you better call me back right away, I’m freaking the fuck out over here and I need something to tell the publishers. You better not be answering because you’re working on something absolutely genius.” Some were more neurotic sounding than others, but the most amusing (or concerning) were the texts he had sent, most of which looked like keyboard smashes and long strings of punctuation. He was clearly panicked, and that didn’t make me feel any better.

I decided that I really needed to kick it into high gear that night. Jack was out for the evening and I had no idea what he was doing, but I figured that he wouldn’t be back for a long time, if until morning. It at least allowed me some peace and quiet, not having to worry about him screaming at the oven everytime he overcooked his pizza rolls (which happened at least once a day). I spent about two hours in front of the computer, typing, backspacing, and retyping until I was ready to walk outside onto the beach and launch my laptop into the ocean.

I slammed my laptop shut and decided to take a shower to clear my mind. I did some of my best thinking in the shower – that’s where I had come up with the idea for my first novel. Maybe one would help now.

By the time I was done showering and toweling off, I was even more pissed off than I was before. There had been no stroke of genius, no burst of creativity. The only interesting thing that had crossed my mind the whole time was a string of curse words when I’d dropped the shampoo bottle on my toe.

Frustrated, I went downstairs and got out the bottle of Jack Daniels that Alex and I had been drinking, about three-fourths empty. I poured myself a drink and downed it as quickly as possible, then immediately poured another and swirled the liquid around in the glass. I stared at it, thinking about the last time I’d had a drink, and that had been the night Alex and I had slept together.

Alex. Maybe that was what I needed to get this shit-storm of a novel moving.

I grabbed my phone and swiped away any of Michael’s texts (now being sent in all capital letters), and dialing Alex’s number. I didn’t even give him a chance to say hello before I rushed out, “I need you to come over.”

“Why, what’s wrong?” he asked, sounding concerned.

“What’s wrong is that I can’t write a fucking word,” I replied, ready to tear my hair out. “It’s been a week, and everyone is starting to freak out. I have six days to turn in fifty pages to my editor or I think he’s going to have a stroke.”

“And I need to come over because…?” he prompted.

“Because we need to have sex so that I can write,” I blurted out and felt embarrassed right away. I started talking again quickly so that I didn’t sound so desperate. “I mean, because the last time you spent the night, I got that outline done that I’d been trying to write for like, ever. There has to be some correlation between the two.”

He didn’t say anything for what felt like a very long time. I started gnawing at the inside of my mouth, mad at myself that I’d even called. Finally I could hear wheezy laughter on the other end. “I’m sorry, give me a minute.”

“Oh my God, Alex, shut up,” I snapped. “I’m sorry I even asked, Goddamnit.”

“I’m sorry, I just think it’s funny that you’re actually asking me to come over and have sex with you,” he said, finally calming down. “I’m not some hussy that’s just ready to go on command.”

“Okay, one, that’s not true – you’re ready at the drop of a hat,” I replied. “And two, trust me, I wouldn’t be asking if I wasn’t desperate to get something done.”

“I don’t know,” Alex said, ignoring my digs at him.

“Please,” I practically had to beg. “If you do this, I’ll help you egg Isabel’s car at any time of your choosing.”

He mulled this over for a second. “And you’ll give me a shout out in the acknowledgements?”

“Yeah, sure, whatever.” I waved him off. “Are you coming over or not?”

“Give me thirty minutes and I’ll be there,” he answered and hung up. I hoped to God that Skye wouldn’t ask where he was going, and that if she did, he wouldn’t blurt out that he was coming over to sleep with me. The last thing I wanted was for anyone in the group to find that out.

About an hour and a half later, Alex was leaning shirtless up against my headboard flipping through my Netflix as I typed away furiously on my laptop.

“My dick is an inspiration,” Alex teased, glancing over at the computer. “Can I see what you’re writing?”

“No,” I said, turning the laptop out of his line of vision, choosing to ignore his stupid comment. “If you want something of mine to read, I’ve got a copy of Lines on the bookshelf. Nobody’s gonna see this draft until after my editor gets it.”

“Then why did Jack get to read Lines before anyone else?” he complained.

“Because I never thought that was going to actually go anywhere,” I told him. I waved him towards the bookshelf. “You’ve done your job; you can keep yourself busy now.”

“Sheesh,” Alex teased. “Now I definitely feel like a cheap hussy.”

“You’re distracting me,” I said, pausing to frown at him a little. “I appreciate you helping me out, but now I’m on a roll.”

Alex shrugged. “Well, it was fun.”

He headed off to take a shower and I cranked out a few more pages, mostly because he took some of the longest showers ever. I took a small break to get dressed again and cleaned my room up, moving downstairs just in case Jack came home early or anyone else decided to stop by. If anyone caught Alex and me in my room, they’d definitely know something was up, but if we were sitting in my living room, they wouldn’t think anything of it.

When he came back downstairs, he was holding my copy of Lines. He didn’t say anything, mostly staying silent for the next few hours as he read except for the occasional laugh. Around one in the morning or so, he’d finally finished the book.

“So do you have an acceptable page count, or do I have to wait so we can talk about this book?” he asked, setting it down and leaning forward eagerly.

I glanced down at the page count, which was thirty-two. I could live with thirty-two pages for now. I nodded and set the laptop down. “What do you want to talk about?”

“Okay, is this Nic Keller guy supposed to be based off of me, or no?”

“Jesus, what an ego,” I laughed. “I mean, you’re not a cocaine-sniffing, self-destructive womanizer, so it’s a safe bet that the answer to that is no.”

“I just wanted to check,” he said. “But can I tell you how absolutely brilliant this was? Like holy shit.”

“It’s not pretentious?” I teased, thinking back to my Amazon reviews.

“Maybe slightly,” Alex laughed. “But I think that’s what made it so good though. Have you ever read a Bret Easton Ellis book that wasn’t pretentious as hell?”

“Considering I’ve read American Psycho about twenty times, nope,” I replied. “But really, you liked it?”

“Loved it,” he confirmed, nodding sincerely. “I’m gonna go buy a copy of it first thing in the morning and you’re gonna have to sign it for me. Now I definitely can’t wait to read the new one.” He shifted on the couch, kind of looking down. “So, uh, what did Jay think of it?”

It was my turn to feel uncomfortable. “He wasn’t a huge fan.”

“Really,” Alex deadpanned.

“I’m not sure it had anything to do with the book itself, I think it had to do with everything surrounding it,” I explained. Alex said nothing, waiting for me to continue. “Around the time the book got published and started getting attention, that’s when things started to kind of go wrong with us. Like he was really supportive at first, but then I had to do so much traveling to meet with Michael and my agent, and then there were book tours and talk shows, all sorts of shit. I mean, you know the life, but he wasn’t used to it. I think he just kind of started to resent everything since it was taking me away all the time.”

“So he kind of had the issue with you that you’d had with me,” Alex compared. “Like the last time we got back together, you weren’t sure we would work because of the distance and me not being around. It sounds like he kind of thought the same thing about you.”

“Probably,” I said. “Although Jay never read my journal.”

“Okay, it’s ancient history and I’m eternally sorry for it,” Alex sighed. “I don’t know how many times I have to say it.”

“Relax, I’m just teasing you,” I said, knocking my knee against his. “Honestly, I think he got kind of jealous of all the time I was spending with Michael.” I was kind of surprised by how much I was telling Alex. I hadn’t given anyone this many details about the last year Jay and I were together (except, ironically, Michael, because when I wasn’t avoiding calls related to work, we usually talked about pretty much everything). Everyone seemed to assume that everything was going perfectly, and I hadn’t wanted to admit anything different to anyone, including myself. I knew something was off with us, I just didn’t know how to fix things. “Like, I can’t really blame him. Michael’s a good-looking guy and we were together like all the time when we were working on the editing and tours and whatnot. But Jay had to know I’d never cheat on him.”

This made Alex frown deeply.

“Sorry,” I apologized. “Jesus, Isabel really did a number on you, didn’t she?”

“Like you wouldn’t believe,” Alex said, sighing again. “I don’t want to talk about her.”

“You can if you want,” I offered. “I just went on a little Jay rant. You’re welcome to go on one about Isabel…”

He cut me off. “I said I don’t want to talk about her, okay?”

I was kind of surprised that he’d snapped at me since we hadn’t really been like that with each other in years. “Okay, we don’t have to.”

Alex nodded, sitting back. “Thank you.”

“I think I have an idea,” I told him, grabbing his hand, pulling him up, and leading him out of the room.

“Are we going to have sex again?” he asked. “I’m not sure I’m ready for round two.”

“No,” I laughed. I grabbed my car keys and dragged him outside. I pushed him into the car and we drove over to the gas station. Without telling him what was going on, I got out of the car and went inside to buy some eggs. By the time I came back, Alex had caught on.

“I thought you agreed we could egg Isabel’s shit at my request,” he pointed out, though he accepted the carton of eggs I thrusted at him.

“You’re bumming out,” I said. “I made an executive decision. You need to cheer up and I need a little break from writing. This is the perfect solution. Now tell me where this bitch lives.”

Alex gave me the directions to Isabel’s house and within a few minutes, we had pulled up outside. There were no lights on outside or inside, so Isabel was either gone or asleep. As long as we had a little bit of time, Alex could get away with some egg throwing therapy. I’d initially decided let Alex egg the house alone so that I could drive the getaway car, but once he had thrown a couple of eggs, he paused and turned back to the car.

“This is great, you have to try this!” he whisper-shouted to me and beckoned me out. He turned and threw another egg at her garage door. It landed with a cracking splat, and the sound made me start to laugh.

Alex shushed me and handed me an egg. “We’ve gotta stay quiet, we don’t want anyone to hear us.”

I nodded, fighting another laugh off and threw it at her garage, hitting one of the outside lights.

“Nice one!” Alex said quietly, giving me a high-five. He handed me two more eggs and threw the rest himself, both of us trying not to crack up as they landed (no pun intended). We headed back to the car and quickly drove away, finally free to laugh as loud as we wanted.

“I would just die to see their faces tomorrow,” Alex said through giggles.

“Their?” I asked, and then felt stupid for asking, my cheeks flaring hot. “Oh, the guy, never mind.”

Alex cleared his throat awkwardly and then brightened again. “Anyway, this was an awesome night. Thanks.”

“No, thank you,” I said, making a turn. “You’re probably saving my writing career.”

“At least you’re starting to acknowledge the magical powers of my penis,” he said, making me laugh again. “No, but really, thanks. I needed that, definitely.” He hesitated for a moment before speaking again. “Maybe we should make this like a regular thing.”

“Sleeping together?” I asked, kind of surprised at the suggestion.

“And hanging out,” he added quickly. “Like a friends with benefits kind of thing. Clearly we could both use a distraction.”

I thought this over for a moment, but it didn’t take long for me to agree. Alex needed someone to lean on while he tried to get over Isabel, and I needed someone to keep my mind clear so that I could write. We’d be using each other essentially, but it would be a perfect arrangement. “Oh, fuck it. Why not?”