When the clock on the wall read six in the morning, I slipped out from under the blankets. Billy’s sleeping form was so peaceful, his dark hair curling on the pillow. I wanted to reach out, to touch him. His smell filled my nostrils, masculine and gritty.

But I didn’t want to wake him. I didn’t want to hear him say that he didn’t really want to be with me. I didn’t want to hear him say that this had been a one-time thing.

I dressed quickly, wearing the same slightly wrinkled emerald gown that I had tossed into the corner, and ordered a cab silently, using an app on my phone. I pulled the door closed behind me, whispering a final goodbye into the silence of the hallway, then trudged down the steps barefoot.

Early mornings in Los Angeles are bizarre, as it’s still rather warm. The heat from the August sun radiated from the pavement, burning my feet. I picked up my abandoned heels and held them in one hand, waving to the taxi with the other. With a final glance up at Billy’s motel room, I slipped into the cab and told the taxi driver where to take me.

Silver Lake. Home.

At least, home until I could return to my real home.

Back at my apartment, my two roommates were zonked out. One was spread across the slumped couch, while the other’s snore came from the crack in his door. I collapsed in my bed, pulling the cheap sheets over my head, and tried to sleep for the few hours I had before work.

Unable to sleep due to thoughts of Billy and the night we’d shared, I stared at the light coming through the thin fabric, instead.

After scrubbing the scent of him from my hair and my skin, I dressed in one of my ragged dresses and drove to the agency. Exhaustion made everything hilarious. I walked in to find Jeremy carrying three cups of Silver Lake Coffee to the back room, rolling his eyes.

“Martin’s friends want coffee now too, can you believe it? But I’ve found a route that’s even faster. And dammit, if this coffee isn’t still warm!”

“Congrats,” I said, shrugging and chuckling. I checked the schedule and then took my stance behind the reception desk, beginning to organize files. My brain was chaotic, reliving the scenes of the previous night, over and over.

The way he’d held my face when we’d kissed. The way we’d cuddled close, in the moments after our climax. The way he’d gazed at me, with something I couldn’t have translated any other way but “with love.” Love was a game to many people, but it wasn’t so to me. I hadn’t had it often.

But I knew he was older than me. Wiser. He’d seen action in Afghanistan, and now he lived in New York, conducting business dealings I “couldn’t even understand.” How could I expect him to reserve any feelings for me?

Jeremy appeared at my desk sometime after noon, giving me an awkward smile. Despite our recent “understanding,” it seemed as though he wasn’t accustomed to smiling. It was like he was trying it out on me. Like he’d read about it in a manual and wanted to see how he’d do.

“Hi Jeremy,” I said, pressing my lips together. “What’s up?”

“I just wanted to let you know that we can swap, sometimes,” Jeremy said, gesturing toward the back rooms. “I’ve taken on more hours, to cover rent. You know how this city is.”

So, he wasn’t getting any parts either. I was right.

“I do,” I replied, giving him warm, understanding eyes.

“Like you, I’ll be here 40, maybe 55 hours a week, even. And if you ever want to switch, have me man the reception desk, and you do prop stuff, we can do that. I already talked to Martin about it, and he said he—”

“Probably doesn’t give a fuck,” I chimed in, laughing.

“Actually, yes. That’s what he said,” Jeremy admitted, looking at his shoes. After a brief pause, he stuttered. “You know, when you get into this job, you don’t imagine you’ll be here for six months, even a year. You think it’ll be what gets you through your tough time before you get your first role, and an agent. And then, you’ll laugh about it in interviews later. You’ll say you ‘can’t believe you had to do stuff like painting props and organizing Christmas decorations in the middle of August.’ And then, you’re still doing it. It turns into your career.”

Stretching my hand across the desk, I placed it on Jeremy’s. He flinched slightly, his eyes searching for anything else to look at. But in this moment, when I was still feeling hungover, and coming down from being around Billy, from being Claire, he was the only person I could relate to.

He was disappointed, just like me.

My phone buzzed. Glancing down, my heart leaped, hoping for a message from Billy. He’d ask why I’d left. He’d ask if I could meet for dinner, so we could talk about our victory over “men like Clark.”

No. The message was from my bank. With my heart sinking lower, I read it. One thousand dollars had been transferred into my account. The money I’d been promised. I officially had enough money in my account to head back to the U.K., if I wanted to.

I really didn’t have another choice, did I?

“What is it?” Jeremy asked, frowning. His eyebrows knit tightly together. I wondered if he was acting when he spoke to me, if he actually had the capacity to care. Did any actor?

“Hey. You two.” Martin came bursting into the reception area, clinging to his Silver Lake Coffee cup. He sniffed, assessing us. Jeremy hunkered down and retreated into the back room to complete his inane tasks.

I remained tall, my shoulders back. After a sniff of my own, I said, “Yes, Martin? Did you require something?”

“You and that British smart-assery,” Martin said, rolling his eyes. “As a matter of fact, I do. The minute you get off the reception desk tonight, I need you to organize my office. Papers, cups, plates everywhere. Doesn’t give me room for a single creative thought!”

My heart hammered. Martin wasn’t a creative. He ran the agency, sure, but he had other casting directors review the talent. Rumor had it that he occasionally wrote spec scripts, sending them out to Hollywood friends. Nothing had come of any of them, assuring the rest of the agency workers that his talent was middling, at best.

“Do you really need any space for creative thought?” I asked him.

Martin stopped, caught off-guard. He analyzed me, bringing his arms across his chest. His nostrils flared. “What did you say?”

“I said, are you actually creative in that office of yours? Or is that just the place you go and wank off, thinking about all the things you’re going to make us do? Drive a half-hour away just for a cup of coffee? Drive to San Francisco to give your cat a massage? What else do you want, Martin? Please. Tell me.”

I’d lost my mind. With the money in my bank, I had a free ticket back home, and I wanted to burn down the life I’d built in Los Angeles. Martin was a perfect first choice for burning.

He slammed his fist against the desk, his eyes glowering. This was a new side of Martin. I had obviously clipped a nerve.

“If it wasn’t perfectly clear to you already, I quit,” I said, tossing my ID against the desk. “You’re a shitty little man, Martin. But I think you know that, don’t you?”

I tossed my hair over my shoulder and sauntered to the glass doors, thinking I might go grab a cup of Silver Lake coffee for myself, with milk. As I walked out of the office, I felt free, alive. I felt the way I did when I was given the chance to act. Like I could draw up my own destiny if I wanted to.

I heard my name moments later. Whirling around, I found Jeremy standing at the door, his eyes large, looking like a deer in headlights. “Hey. Ruby. What…what did you just do?”

“I quit, Jeremy,” I told him, my voice confident, assured. The words seemed to echo in my head. “And you should think about doing the same.”

“It wasn’t about what I said, was it?” he asked, taking another tentative step from the door. “About not living up to your dreams?”

I sighed and stretched my arms wide. “Jeremy, I don’t know what I want in this life. But I know it’s not in there, with that jerk and his coffee.”

I left Jeremy dangling at the door between worlds, gazing out at me, unsure. I had been him, only a few days before. I hadn’t known how to get out of my predicament. I hadn’t understood a different state of mind. But somehow, since Billy Jay Johnston had crashed—literally—into my world, my view on life had changed, and I had decided that I couldn’t linger there a moment longer. It was a waste.

Back at the Silver Lake house, I used my half-busted computer, which I’d brought with me from my university days, to purchase a $615 flight that left in just a few days. That would be enough time to say goodbye to anyone I liked (though I couldn’t think of anyone, except for Billy), drive all the streets I used to love, eat my last meal of Mexican food, and pack.

In less than a week, I’d be safe and sound in Coventry, sleeping on the twin-sized mattress of my youth. My dreams of being an actress would die in Los Angeles.

Brian, the pizza baker and stoner roommate, slid out of his room as I slung a load of laundry into the washing machine. He scratched his stained t-shirt and looked at me strangely. “You look different,” he said.

I pressed the ‘ON’ button and listened to the washer crank up. I pressed my hands on either side of my waist, taking a good hard look at the roommate I’d had for years but barely even knew.

“Brian, how old are you?” I asked.

“Uh, what?”

“I’ve lived with you for two years, and I still don’t know anything about you. I don’t know your birthday. Or your hobbies. I barely know anything about you except that you make pizza. And you smoke weed.”

“And I party!” Brian exclaimed, lifting his arms in the air.

“Right,” I said slowly. “But Brian, don’t you want to do anything with your life?”

“I’m 32,” he said, shrugging. “And I feel pretty good about how things are going. The pizza place is doing well. Our revenue is up, the new advertising is performing well...I’m looking at opening a second location next year.”

“Revenue?” I asked him, my eyebrows raising. “Wait. I thought you just worked there.”

“Well, I own and operate it. But the best kinds of bosses are the ones who get their hands dirty, right? Plus, I love making pizza. It’s a lot less boring than doing paperwork.” Brian continued. With three long, easy steps, he appeared in front of the fridge. Digging in the back, he found a slice of cold pepperoni and slotted it into his mouth. “There’s always a time and a place for pizza.”

“Damn,” I whispered, genuinely shocked. All those years, I had assumed that Brian was a literal slug. But, in fact, he owned and operated his own business—one he was passionate about.

After a pause, as I listened to Brian’s soft chewing, I asked, “So, what do you think I do?”

“You’re one of them,” Brian said with a shrug. “You’re a wannabe actress. And I bet you’re damn good, too. But you need more gumption.” He snapped his fingers, staring at me. He looked as if he’d seen a ghost. “That’s what’s different, if you don’t mind me saying. You have some fucking gumption, right now. You’ve been flat on your ass for years. Since I’ve known you.”

This was bizarre. Brian and I hadn’t spoken to each other outside of asking each other to do the dishes or him offering me pizza leftovers. Yet here we were, acknowledging the truth.

“What’s the difference, then?” Brian continued, chewing at the stale crust. “What happened in your little life that makes you stand so much taller?”

I sniffed, choosing to ignore his “little” comment.

“I quit my job,” I said. “And I’m going back to England. Because this life I have going right now?” I gestured around the room that stank of stale pizza and beer. A full bottle of vodka had sat atop our mantle for the past three months, untouched. No pictures were hung. Nobody had bothered to vacuum in weeks. “It’s not much of a life for me. And I need to figure out what I want. Like—it seems—you have.”

Brian studied me for a long time. “Have you ever been in love?” he finally asked me.

I blinked twice. Could he see how deeply I was thinking about Billy? Could he see his fingerprints, still stamped onto the skin of my shoulders and chest? I swallowed and shook my head. “No. Have you?”

Brian nodded, his eyes growing serious. “I’ve been dating the same girl off-and-on for three years,” he admitted.

My lips parted, showing my sincere shock. I hadn’t seen him with a single friend, not in two years. Girls didn’t exactly come in and out of the house and, as far as I was concerned, Brian gave off an almost asexual air.

How wrong I was.

“If you want to hang onto something, just do it,” Brian told me, his eyes flickering with an intensity I hadn’t expected. “There’s really no other way to live. That’s why I’m still in Silver Lake, even though I know there’s a whole world out there. I’m cultivating what I like and what I love, and I’m hanging onto it. You should do the same.”

I glanced into my bedroom at my computer, still sitting open on my bed. The money was gone, the tickets were mine. I had an end-date to this failed period of my life. But as I spoke with Brian, Billy’s voice, laugh, and the feel of his body against mine, slipped through my mind.

I had to see him one more time.

“Listen, I was going to order some pizza, since I don’t work tonight. Why don’t you and I split a pie?” Brian continued, searching through the back of the fridge for any final slices. “We can talk about what you want from L.A. Why you feel you need to run away. If you like, I have a job open at the pizza place. It’s only a few blocks away. Gets real packed. We’re even getting in on that craft beer scene. You might like it.”

What was happening? I couldn’t link this “new” Brian with the one I’d vaguely ignored the past two years. I shrugged slightly, walking back toward my room. I didn’t feel hungry in the slightest. “Thanks...but I think I’ve already made up my mind, Brian. I think I just need to lay down for a bit. I need to focus on the next steps of my life, I guess.”

Brian shrugged. Showing his unique ability to juggle lives, he switched into his business voice and dialed his pizza place, inquiring about how the manager, Ronnie, was handling the new shift, and whether or not the kegs had come in or not. Feeling incredulous, I fled the kitchen for my bedroom. I shut my door behind me and crumpled to the ground in a huff.

I decided to text Billy, thanking him for the money and asking to see him again before I left the country. Almost instantly after the message sent, my phone buzzed, and I snatched it up off the mattress, wondering if he had texted back asking to see me again, asking me not to go back to England. When I opened the message, I sighed.

Error: the number you have tried to reach is no longer in service.

He’d used a burner phone for our contact. Of course. So there was no evidence of our little meet-up with Clark. And probably also because he never expected to see me again—our deal was done, and he had no other reason to talk to me.

We’d been pure, physical beings, and then we’d parted. Two ships in the night, and all that. I thrust myself beneath the covers of my bed, still fully-clothed, waiting for sleep to take me. But I was restless, and my feet twitched. I needed something to happen.

As Brian said, I needed to make something happen myself.

Dressing in a low-cut V-neck shirt and a short skirt that I found in the back of my closet, I rushed from my bedroom, past Brian and our other roommate, Connor, and slid into my red pickup-truck. Driving towards downtown, I felt my arms begin to shake with apprehension.

Billy would want to see me again. Surely, what had happened between us mattered, in some sense? Right?

When I slid into the parking lot behind the motel, I searched the area for his sister’s car. Thinking that perhaps he’d returned it to her, I ran up the steps and knocked on his door, feeling like a stranger. It had been less than 24 hours since I’d stood in front of this door and whispered my goodbye. It felt like years.

After knocking three times, I knew he wasn’t there. After several moments of panic, I walked to the main office. There, the strawberry blonde said that the occupant in room 233 had checked out that morning.

He was gone.

“Did he say where he was going?” I asked, trying to draw breath. It felt like a rock was against my chest, crushing me. “Did he say he’d be coming back?”

It couldn’t be over. What about the scam with Clark Lambert, whatever it was? Was it finished?

The woman chewed her gum too loudly. “You know, it’s funny,” she said, sounding sarcastic. “We don’t actually ask our guests anything about their personal lives. Think we should change our policies?”

I sighed, knowing I sounded absolutely insane. I turned away, muttering, “Thanks anyway.”

Any other clue? Had he said anything? Could I go to Brooklyn, ask around? Ha. That was desperation incarnate. I leaped back into my car, driving fast around the downtown area and then speeding through Silver Lake, my eyes scanning the sidewalk. A few times, I thought I saw him. Black jeans, long legs, and thick shoulders. But each time, it was just some other guy, heading some other place.