SUTTON

 

June 10th

KBC Studios

Los Angeles, CA

 

 

“It’s an eight count, Ginger! Not a four! Back to the start, everyone!”

I hear groans all around me, but I don’t join in. I spring into action to move to the back of the stage where the group number starts. Clara is at the bottom, watching from the floor like a hawk stalking its prey. She’s picking us apart today. We’re four days from the next show and she’s not letting us get away with anything. Shane got yelled at just ten minutes ago for ‘making a stupid face’. It sounded harsh but it may have been true. Sometimes when he’s concentrating really hard, he runs his tongue along the front of his teeth, bulging his upper lip out. I wouldn’t say he looks stupid, I’d still hit that any day of the week, but he doesn’t look show ready. That’s what Clara is looking for at this stage – perfection. And we’re a far cry from it.

I’m doing better about giving Shane breaks from rehearsals when he absolutely needs them, but with his practices for the Kodiaks ratcheting up, he’s getting exhausted faster. I’ve cut our rehearsal time down from six hours a day to four to try and ease his load, but not all of the dancers are doing the same. I heard Melisandre kept Aaron Fitzpatrick here until midnight before he had to fly out to attend his own practice with the Broncos the next morning. These guys are racking up a lot of frequent flyer miles making the trip out here to film these episodes, and the wear is starting to show. I’m the lucky one with a local athlete. I guess I should be thanking Eric for pushing for that, but we haven’t spoken in almost two weeks. Not since he showed up at my door and Shane sent his ass packing.

His absence has been bliss. I feel lighter than I have in a year. I’m having more fun. I’m enjoying my job in a way I never thought a person should. And even though I know a lot of it is being free from Eric, some serious credit has to go to Shane. He has me laughing more than I have before. He has me smiling more than I have a right to be. And he doesn’t want anything in return. Just my joy, something he inspires in me with every word he speaks.

“Pee break!” he shouts to Clara. His hand is raised in the air like a kid in school.

Clara shakes her head stubbornly. “You can pee when you can get your timing right, Lowry!”

“On the stage? Because that’s where it’s going to happen. Soon.”

“Oh my Christ,” Clara mutters.

Shane’s hand wavers in the air. “Is that a yes or…”

“Go!”

“Me too?” Aaron asks.

“Yes! All of you! Please, children, use the restroom! Then get your asses back here for the rest of the number!”

Melisandre, Ana, and Derrick disappear as well. Everyone else mills around patiently waiting for the rehearsal to kick off again.

I sit at the end of the stage with Clara, out of earshot from the others.

“What’s up with you today?” I ask quietly.

She casts me an irritated stare. “Everything. I never want to do another one of these athletes-only productions again.”

“It’s tough with them leaving all the time.”

“Thank God you have Shane. At least he’s local.”

“Didn’t they have more free time earlier in the year? Why didn’t we do it then?”

“Because our producers are short-sighted asshats.”

I smile fondly. “That’s true.”

She glances over my shoulder to check that we’re alone. When she’s satisfied, she hops up on the stage next to me. “I shouldn’t complain about them.”

“They shouldn’t give us impossible tasks.”

“No shit.” Clara sighs, settling in. Settling down. “It’s been a long six weeks.”

“And there are still four more to go,” I remind her brightly.

“What an awful thing to say to me.”

I smile apologetically. “Sorry.”

“You should be. You’re half my problem.”

“How am I a problem? I’m the best dancer you’ve got.”

“Come on now. You’re not the only award winner here.”

“Are any of their awards Tonys?”

“Nope.”

“Then they don’t count.”

Clara laughs, shaking her head. “You’re such a snob.”

“So are you. It’s why we’re friends.”

She looks over her shoulder, scanning the stage.

I frown at her. “Who are you looking for?”

Her face snaps around to mine. “What? I’m not.”

“And now you’re lying. Seriously, what’s up with you today? How am I half your problem?”

“It’s Eric,” she whispers, giving me a jolt.

His name is the last thing I expected her to say.

“What’s he done?” I ask cautiously.

“Nothing that I know of. Not yet. But he’s on the warpath lately.” She looks at me curiously. “You haven’t noticed?”

I shrug. “I haven’t seen him.”

“You’re lucky.”

“How is it my fault?” I demand.

Clara looks at me long and hard. She doesn’t say anything but her silence speaks volumes. Inside it, she tells me she knows everything. Maybe first hand from him or by deducing it from our actions, I don’t know. Maybe she saw us one of the times we had sex here in the studio. It was always late and we thought we were alone, but this is a busy space. Anyone could have walked in at any time.

It’s only now that I’m outside the situation that I see how truly careless we were. There wasn’t always a condom. There definitely wasn’t assured privacy. Even the way we treated each other after-the-fact was not discreet. It’s as though we wanted to get caught. Or, at the very least, like neither of us cared if we did.

I look away from Clara, feeling too ashamed to hold her eyes. “It was stupid,” I mumble. “It never should have happened. I wish to God it hadn’t.”

“But it’s over now?”

“So over. Dead and buried over.”

“He’s not taking it well.”

I laugh without meaning to. “Tough shit for him.”

“And the rest of us. He’s making us suffer for it.”

“What do you want me to do?” I ask sharply. “Sleep with him again?”

Clara’s eyes dart behind us before landing on mine again. “Keep your voice down. And, no, that’s not what I want. I wish you’d never done it. It was never going to end well.”

“I knew that before it even started.”

“Were you hoping he’d leave his wife for you?”

“I was hoping he’d leave me alone. I didn’t want to…” I catch myself and my breath, holding it all tight inside me. It gives me that familiar feeling like I’m drinking poison again. I can taste it on my tongue; bitter like lemons. “I wasn’t thinking. I didn’t plan it and I didn’t think it’d go on for as long as it did, but it’s over now and I never want it to happen again.”

“Because you’re in love with Shane?”

Her words should be a shocking revelation to me. I should be stunned or offended or wild with fear, but I’m not. Instead, I’m nodding. I’m sniffing softly as warm tears fill my eyes.

“It’s turning me into a basket case. Why am I crying?!” I whisper fiercely.

“Have you told him?”

I laugh shakily. “God no. I can’t even tell you that I love you. How am I supposed to tell him?”

She takes my hand, warming it between hers in that motherly way that she does. “The same way you just told me. You say the words, however you need to.”

“I’m back!” Shane shouts triumphantly behind us. “And my bladder is empty.”

“Good job, Lowry,” Clara calls to him without turning. She leans in closer to me, whispering, “Are you going to be okay?”

I sniff sharply, nodding my head. Willing my eyes to dry. I give her a winning smile that I almost feel. “I’m great.”

Clara squeezes my hand before letting it go. She leaps down off the stage to do a headcount on her performers. The fact that she comes up three short sends her into a rage-fueled hunt backstage to find them.

“Everything okay?” Shane asks gently.

I look up to find him standing over me. He looks a hundred feet tall from here. I feel deliciously small at his feet with his body wide as the sky above me. Nothing bad could ever touch me with him around. And the good I have in my heart has yet to run out. In fact, I think he refills it every time he smiles. He sustains me with his beauty and brilliance, and I wish I could bottle the way he looks at me so I could keep it with me always because I’m better when I’m with him.

“Sutton?” he asks again.

“I love you,” I whisper breathlessly.

If he has a reaction to my confession, it’s lost in the sea of tears swelling from my eyes. The world is underwater. The lights behind his head blur and distort his face until I can’t see him anymore.

I feel a little lost all of a sudden. I feel like I let some part of me go with those three words and I’ve no idea where it’s gone. I don’t know if I’ll ever get it back. That’s the scariest part about loving someone. At the start, you can never be a hundred percent sure that they love you too. Not until they tell you, putting you out of your misery. One way or the other.

“Sutton, I—”

“Sutton!” Eric shouts.

I close my eyes. Tears pour down my cheeks from my eyelashes. I brush them away as quickly as I can so I can stand and face what’s coming. Whatever it is, it can’t be good. It’s nothing I want to deal with right now with my heart on a platter at Shane’s feet and no answer yet as to whether he wants the damned thing.

This is the exactly wrong time for Eric to be messing with me.

“What?” I ask roughly.

I open my eyes when I hear him treading heavily toward me. I stare straight ahead as I wait, but I can feel Shane take a step closer to me.

When Eric stops just a few feet away, he glances up at Shane over my shoulder.

“Oh good,” he says evenly. “You’re here. Perfect. I need to talk to both of you about your number this week.”

“What about it?” I demand.

“It’s not going to work.”

“What part?”

“The music. We can’t get the rights for your song.”

I frown. “What are you talking about? It was on the list of licensed music we were given at the start of the season.”

“Legal made a mistake. It wasn’t supposed to be on there. We wanted it but we never secured the rights to it. We can’t air it. You can’t dance to it.”

“I’ve already choreographed it,” I snarl. “We’ve been practicing it all week.”

He opens his hands to show he’s defenseless. “I can’t change the law, Sutton.”

“Then get me the song, Eric.”

“Not gonna happen. You need to do something else.”

I leap off the stage to stand in front of him.

Shane jumps down with me, keeping close to my back. He’s letting me run the show but he’s making sure I know he’s there. That he has my back.

“This is bullshit!” I cry.

We’re being watched. Over Eric’s shoulder, I see members of the crew stop to check what’s going on. It doesn’t encourage me to lower my voice. If anything, I want to shout at Eric louder to let everyone know what a son of a bitch he is, because make no mistake, this is a lie. We have the rights to that song. Bill/Bob doesn’t make mistakes.

“I know you’re disappointed—” he begins coldly.

“I want to talk to Taj about it. Where’s Taj? Where’s Clara?”

“You’re talking to me about it. I’m the producer and—”

“Clara!”

Eric scowls. “You’re making a scene.”

“No. You’re making a scene. You did this, you unbelievable asshole. You’re trying to tank us. There’s no way in hell we can choreograph, rehearse, and perfect a new number in four days.”

“Last week you retook the number one slot on the board. The fans adore you. Why would I want to tank you?”

I bite my tongue even though I’m dying to say it. I’m dying to tell the room the truth, but I know better. I know how this business works. He’s being completely calm and rational while I’m shouting my head off. I’m emotional. If I go shouting to the rooftops that Eric is trying to sabotage me because I refuse to keep sleeping with him, they’ll all think I’m saying it out of spite. I’ll sound crazy and he’ll have won. He’ll get away with it. I cannot let that happen. No matter how much I want to rip his face off and burn it in the parking lot.

I take two steps closer to him until we’re nearly nose to nose. I look up at him with hate in my eyes and venom in my veins as I whisper, “You are a sad, pathetic man, do you realize that?”

He smirks at me. “I’m pretty happy at the moment, actually.”

“What is your end game? You want me off the show? Fine. I’ll quit after this season. But don’t do this to us now. Not after we’ve come so far.”

“No, Sutton, I don’t want you off the show.” He nods over my shoulder to Shane. “I want him gone.”

“It won’t change anything between us.”

“Don’t kid yourself,” he says severely. “He changed everything between us.”

“I’m not worth it.”

“No, you’re right, you’re not. And I don’t want your worn out ass anyway. But he threatened me. And I don’t like being threatened.”

“So this is a pissing contest?”

He shrugs, taking a step back. “Call it what you want, but I wouldn’t waste any more time talking. I’d get to work looking for a new song because the one you had is gone. You’re starting from scratch, guys. Good luck.”

It looks like Eric is leaving, but he stops suddenly, snapping his fingers together with a smug smile.

“Oh, and Shane,” he says quietly, his words just for us. “Enjoy my salty leavings, man. She’s busted in the head but she’s one hell of a ride, am I right?”

Shane shoves me gently out of the way, but when he gets to Eric, all tenderness is lost from him. I see it in Eric’s face when he realizes he fucked up. He thought Shane wouldn’t do shit in front of an audience, but it’s a bad assumption. Shane knocked another player out in the Super Bowl in front of the entire world. The man doesn’t give a shit.

He punches Eric in the face. Hard. It’s just once, but it’s enough. It lays Eric out on his back on the floor. His head rolls to the side. His eyes are glazed, but open and blinking. He’s still conscious. His face is turning red around his left eye and I have no doubt it’ll be purple within an hour.

Security is everywhere in this building. All it takes is one shout from the crew by the coffin room, and two guards come running through the door. It’s easy to see what happened. Eric is flat on the ground and Shane is standing over him with his fist balled tightly at his side, his chest heaving angrily. I’ve never seen the look that Shane is wearing before. It’s the animal inside him. The one that plays at hitting men on the field and makes mountains of cash by being the biggest, strongest, angriest son of a bitch in the room. That’s who he is right now. That’s who I’m seeing. A month ago, it would have sent me running. I would have turned my head in disgust at the violence I’ve seen because it’s an intimidating, terrifying sight.

But I don’t run because I’m not afraid of him.

Right now, more than anything, I’m afraid for him.

“Back up!” a guard barks at him, his hand on the Taser at his side. “Back off! Now!”

Shane puts his hands up, taking a slow step backward. His face is resigned. He knows what he did and he knows the drill that comes after. He doesn’t fight it so I don’t either. I move to step in close to him, but he shakes his head at me sternly. His eyes dart from me to the Taser on the guard’s belt, then back again.

I hold my ground, holding my heart in my throat as the guards work together to get Shane on his knees. He goes willingly. He listens when they tell him to put his hands behind his back.

“Someone call the cops!” a woman shouts from the wings.

“Get the doctor for Eric!”

“We need to call his wife!”

“Where’s Taj? Find Taj and tell him what’s happened!”

The studio leaps into action around me, but I stay separated from all of it. I keep my eyes on Shane where he kneels between the security officers with his head down, his shoulders set stubbornly.

“Where will they take him?” I ask numbly. “How can I follow him?”

One of the guards looks Eric over before answering me. “I don’t think he needs to go to the hospital, but if he does, Valley Pres in Van Nuys is the closest.”

“No. Not Eric. Shane. Where will the police take Shane? Is he going to be arrested?”

“I don’t know, ma’am. That’s for the police to decide.”

I nod in understanding but I don’t say another word. I sit down on the floor right where I’m at, as close to Shane as he feels safe letting me get, and I wait.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper to Shane. I can’t look at him, but I can apologize. It’s the least that he deserves but it’s all I can manage.

I hear him sigh. I see his hands shift behind his back, testing the strength of the cuffs they’ve put on him. “It’s not your fault,” he answers roughly through a tangle of emotions.

“Don’t lie to me.”

“I’m not lying.”

“You never would have hit him if it weren’t for me.”

“Like hell I wouldn’t,” he laughs darkly. I can feel him look at me, but I can’t meet his eyes. “If I heard him say that shit about any woman, even one I didn’t know, I’d have done the same thing. I don’t regret it.”

“Not yet.”

“Sutton, stop. You—”

“Quiet,” a guard barks at us. He shifts on his feet, his black boots squeaking sharply on the floor. “Keep quiet until the authorities get here.”

I can feel the annoyance rolling off Shane in hot waves. They hit me like fire, burning my flesh until I feel like I’ll scream from the pain. I know it’s not directed at me, but I absorb it silently like a punishment that I wholeheartedly believe I deserve. It doesn’t matter if he agrees. He’s too good to agree, and that only makes it worse.

The police show up within six minutes. It’s an impressive time considering they had to come through the security gates. Then again, the studio guards were probably waiting for them. The entire lot is probably buzzing with what’s going down at the DNA building. During those six minutes, Eric is taken away to his office. He needs help getting up. His head wobbles on his shoulders like a doll without enough stuffing. Brett puts his arm under Eric’s and shuffles him away from Shane, followed closely by Taj and the show’s doctor. I don’t know if he’s going to the hospital or not. The only reason I care is because it matters to Shane.

The cops come in asking a lot of questions that only me and Shane have the answers to. I tell the basics of what happened without the details of my relationship with Eric. When they start to dig too close to that truth, Shane asks them if we can finish this at the station, away from the crowd that’s listening so closely. He’s not being arrested, the cuffs are taken off of him, but he goes willingly with the officers into the back of a police car. They ask me to come down to the station too to finish giving my statement.

I’m gutted as I watch the car pull away with Shane wedged in the back.

This is my fault. This is all because of me.

This is the ugly that is knowing me.