When I woke up, I couldn’t remember who I was. I sputtered, glancing around the mangled bedroom, blinking until it all came rushing back. My name: Jack Garrington, top-tier actor, model and billionaire. Why I couldn’t remember: an insane amount of drugs and alcohol, readily imbibed during the Brooklyn penthouse party I’d thrown the night before. (This was also, assuredly, the reason for the mangled bedroom.) Why I didn’t really want to remember my life: it had been general shit in the past few years, since my ex-wife had divorced me and increasingly threatened to take my daughter away permanently, not allowing even a weekend of visitation.

In the crook of my arm, I found a naked woman. Gorgeous, blonde highlights and thin frame. Her lips were lined with red lipstick, which I also found tracing around my chest, my shoulder, my shoulders…and other places. We’d clearly attacked each other in an animalistic way, without the least bit of reserve. In my head, I could wish it hadn’t happened at all. I was disgusted with myself.

Rising up out of the bed, I grabbed a pair of boxers and a white t-shirt from the side dresser and threw them on. Walking through the bedroom, I spotted several alcohol stains, cigarette butts, memories from last night’s party. I made a mental note to call the cleaner as soon as possible, to mop up this mess and make it wholesome again. If not for me, then for Gigi, my daughter.

Trying to combat my roaring hangover, I made a pot of coffee and sipped the dark liquid at the breakfast table. Memories of the raucous night continued to echo in my brain. Having just wrapped a movie, I invited half the cast and crew to the penthouse—gifting them with high-end food and alcohol. I remembered, at one point, standing atop the counter and making a toast to all of them. I’d been blubbering like a madman. “I want to tell you guys. You’re like family now.”

But sitting at the table in the light of the morning, I couldn’t remember a single one of their names.

The girl. She’d been a co-star. One of the cast of characters in the rom com we’d just shot, coming together every day to make semi-witty banter about “New York life” and “online dating.” I remembered kissing her on set, but couldn’t comprehend how we’d hooked up the night before. How had we ended up naked in my bedroom? I had nothing, memory-wise.

She appeared in the doorway moments later, wearing nothing but one of my white t-shirts. Her legs, long and spaghetti-thin, approached me. They glittered in the light of the morning. Reaching for a box of cigarettes on the counter, she drew one out and began to light it.

“Don’t,” I shouted as loud as my aching head could stand. “There’s no smoking in here.”

“That’s not what you said last night,” she laughed. Her voice was high-pitched. It sliced through my brain like a knife.

“Last night was off in a lot of different ways, I’m starting to see.”

She shifted, dropping the long, thin cigarette on the counter and approaching me. She slipped over my thighs, sitting on me backward, and cradling my head. I grew tense at her touch. “You know, I always had a crush on you,” she whispered, biting at the top of my ear and then kissing it with tender lips. “Ever since I was a little girl. I ca not believe I got to sleep beside you in bed.”

I knew this was meant to turn me on. I could feel the curvature of her breasts, rubbing up against my biceps. But instead of moving into it, I shifted away. I shook my head. “No, please.”

She hesitated, her voice growing tart. “You’re really going to turn me away right now? You were the horniest monster in the world last night. Now you won’t look at me?”

I glanced out the window, gazing out over Brooklyn. The June morning had opened up, becoming bright, offering the most serene, blue sky. “I think I saw your clothes near the bedroom door.”

She scoffed, pushing away from me and scurrying toward the bedroom. She dressed herself again in a slinky black dress, stabbing her feet into heels. I sipped my coffee, feeling like the loneliest man on the planet. As she cut across the room to leave, she whirled around a final time. They always did this. They always wanted to say their last words.

“You know, I wasn’t going to tell you about the newspaper article this morning. Didn’t want you to feel too bad,” she said. “But I think you’re going to have a huge shock coming to you.”

I frowned, listening as she slammed the door behind her. The newspaper article? What was she talking about? After a small hesitation, I got to my feet and hunted for my phone, and then my computer. Both were completely black and dead, the charge cables nowhere to be found. I donned a pair of jeans, and a hat, not bothering to change my shirt. If I could just read the newspaper article, maybe whatever it was could be contained. If I could just know about it.

When I reached the bodega downstairs, I bought a Pepsi, a pack of chips, a thing of licorice. Since we’d wrapped filming the day before, I didn’t have the constant watchdog attitude toward my diet, and wanted to inhale the horror of carbohydrates. Finally, I grabbed a newspaper and paid for it all with cash, tossing a fifty on the countertop and not waiting for the change.

Once upstairs, I spread the newspaper out on the antique dining room table I’d purchased from the dealer in Connecticut. “From the early days of the American Revolution,” he’d said. Now, it was coated in cigarette burns and grime. Back in the Celebrity section, I found the article.

A-LIST ACTOR JACK GARRINGTON THROWS MASSIVE PARTY, GIRL INJURED.

Girl injured? My eyebrows drew low over my eyes. I was sure my heart would bound from my chest. I read on, trying to inhale the information.

The article read: “BROOKLYN—A-list actor and celebrity, Jack Garrington, who was previously involved in a four-year marriage to popular actress Kelsey Bonner, has been a bit of a playboy since their well-publicized breakup. His last night tirade at his Brooklyn penthouse was a rough one, involving several members of the cast of his recent rom com film, which just finished wrapping. One guest, a woman who says she was ‘involved’ with Jack Garrington, says she took a tumble outside the steps of his party afterwards, breaking her ankle and putting her out of the acting game for at least seven weeks, maybe more. Asked if she blames Jack Garrington for her demise, she said, ‘In all honesty, Jack is a completely asshole, who led me down a dark path of drugs and alcohol. I can’t imagine a worst person on the planet’.”

Jesus. It didn’t list who was injured. But it also didn’t pin me as the reason for her injury, per se. The title alone would cause problems for me, though. I knew that already. As the article continued, it listed my many “exploits,” famous women I’d slept with recently, ones who’d stated I’d broken their hearts. Many of these women had understood, from the get-go, that I was uninterested in settling down. That I was more or less living that “playboy lifestyle,” never getting too attached. That my entire life, outside of my acting career, was completely and totally devoted to my daughter.

My daughter was the only important thing on the planet.

After plugging in my phone, it didn’t take long for it to begin to blare with messages from friends. “Hey man, what’s up with this girl who got hurt at your house?” “Which girl was it? Melanie? Man, she really threw you under the bus.” “Wasn’t that the chick who snorted a line of E and then passed out on the couch for a while? She was loaded!” I shook my head, wishing myself as far away as possible.

The call that came five minutes later, however, was the one that chilled me to the bone. It was my ex-wife, Kelsey Bonner. I remember her back when we’d first met, both of us just starting to make our marks in the movie industry. She’d been absolutely adorable, with curly blonde hair, this tight waist, and these enormous breasts. Despite having tons of guys rushing around her all the time, she chose me to sleep with. And then, a few years later, she chose me to marry.

But it hadn’t lasted long. We’d been apart for much of the time, with her taking movies in Los Angeles and me focusing on my television show out in New York. When she’d gotten pregnant, eight years ago, we’d been overjoyed, thinking, perhaps, that this would be the link that would keep us together. But that was never so. And news of her cheating scandals, out in Los Angeles, rang through my ears, sending me immediately into the arms of another. Our four-year-old daughter, Gigi, was caught in the midst of our ugly divorce. I hadn’t been able to stand Kelsey since.

“Well, well.” Kelsey’s voice had changed, grown more insistent in the years since we’d divorced. As always, she was nagging me. “I see you got a girl hurt last night?”

“Did you even read the article?” I asked, sighing. “She just fell down some steps. I wasn’t around. Nobody pushed her.”

“Well, you pushed drugs down her throat. That’s for sure,” Kelsey scoffed. “The newspaper says it really clearly. Don’t think I don’t know what kind of house you’re running over there. A brothel, more like. Women coming and going, just when you fancy them. It’s disgusting, Jack. It’s not the type of environment I want Gigi to be a part of.”

I rubbed my fingers over my forehead, irritation fueling me. “You know I’ve never had anyone over when Gigi was here. I wouldn’t do that, Kelsey. Mind reminding me how many men you’ve been engaged to in the past four years? Men you’ve forced Gigi to get to know and then say goodbye to?”

Kelsey just barreled through my insults, having so many more of her own. She clucked her tongue, saying, “You know, I spoke to the custody lawyer. He thinks that full custody, on my end, isn’t necessarily out of reach. Especially in the wake of all these newspaper articles. I mean, your reputation is horrendous, Jack. Why do you push it so much?”

“It’s not like you want full custody, Kelsey,” I spouted. “You only want it because you know how much Gigi means to me. You know that she’s the only person that matters to me in the world. And you want to see me suffer.”

I caught her off guard. She stuttered, knowing I was telling the truth. But as she regrouped, poising to strike, I hung up the phone. My heart was growing blacker with each beat. I needed some kind of release.

Drawing my phone to my ear again, I dialed the familiar number. The school secretary, Janis, answered, recognizing my name. “Jack? I can get Gigi down here right away.”

“That would be great,” I said, falling into myself. “I just wanted to give her details for who’s picking her up at school.”

“You’re always careful about that,” Janis said.

Moments later, I heard her cute little voice on the phone. Gigi, blonde-haired and blue-eyed, who looked far more like my sister than like Kelsey. She scrambled to tell me all she’d been doing the past few days, since she’d gone back to her mom’s, with tales of winning a board game, jumping off the swing, and even getting an A-plus on her spelling test. My heart swelled. I wished everything could be so simple.