***
“I’m starting to have second thoughts about all this,” I confess to Miles as I unbutton my shirt and turn, allowing him to strip it from my back and fold it perfectly over his forearm. I half-smile at how every muscle on my chest pops after Roxanne’s work on them. “I didn’t think this would be about me,” I explain. And that’s true. I don’t lie to Miles. “I thought the whole point of this show was to have fun and pretend to be rich.” I move stiffly and heavily as I shirk my pants, distracted and hampered by my own rage. “We’re supposed to go to the opera, and horseback riding, and things like that! That’s all! Easy!” I kick my pants off, and Miles plucks them from the air, dutifully folding them over his forearm.
“You’re a special case,” he comforts me. “You haven’t spoken to anyone about what happened. People are inquisitive.”
“It’s no one’s business,” I grumble, stalking to the bathroom in my boxers and a light shirt. I splash my face with hot water, and Miles has already produced a damp towel for me. He knows I’m going to wash my face and shave, then brush my teeth. This has been our routine for almost twenty years, and of course I can fill a dish with shaving cream by myself, but I choose not to. I like having Miles around. Things are a little less lonely.
I drape the towel over my face for a moment and let my pores open up.
“You handled it expertly,” Miles promises me. I hear the tinkle of my toiletries being arranged on the tray, and then: “I noticed you with a dark-haired staff member several times today.” A beat of silence. “A pretty young girl,” Miles adds.
“She’s not that young,” I say, peeling the towel from my face. He dips and stirs a silver boar bristle brush into a tin of cream and offers it to me. I paint my chin and cheeks with it, and he passes me the straightedge. “We, uh, met a few years ago at a charity event before Candace got this show picked up,” I explain. My razor slides gracefully along the angles of my face as I speak.
For some reason, I feel an urge to guard the story of Roxanne from Miles, just as I wish to guard the story of Arthur from the world.
“I like her,” I add lightly. “She treats me like a regular person.”
“Well,” Miles says, beat. I wash my face and rake fingers through my hair, examining myself in the mirror. The fresh shave leaves me looking predatory and angular, like a big jungle cat. My lip quirks. I like it. Roxanne better look out. “Just be careful of her. You know women.”
“Not all of them,” I remind him with a wink, turning from the sink and striding out of the bathroom and into the master bedroom. “We’re filming in France tomorrow. I’m going to see a play with some school teacher, and we get to meet the cast of the show afterward, so. That will be…nice.” I sigh, and my shoulders sag slightly as I really think about the next day.
What have I gotten myself into?
A split-second decision to sign away two months of my life for this insipid reality television show, all because I thought I recognized a staffer.
Who, it turns out, has no desire to know me. She said it herself. I’m Bachelor #6. I’m Sir Berringer. Not Blake.
I glance at the double glass doors leading out onto my balcony, and wonder if I can see her trailer from here.
“Blake…” Miles says behind my back.
I clear my throat, remembering his presence. I don’t know why I thought he left… “Yes?”
“Why are you doing this? You hate this sort of thing.” I stride to the glass doors and push them open, letting the dark night come seeping in. The chirp of crickets serenades from the shadows below. “The Blake I know would have seen Madden escorted through those gates as soon as he spotted the vans.”
I stroll out onto my balcony and survey my kingdom as Miles speaks–the hedge maze to the south, the wide, open lawn to the north. Past the hedge maze are the lake, the butterfly pavilion, and the bird sanctuary, which my mother insisted upon. Fountains. Rock gardens. It goes on and on until I can’t see it anymore. There’s a golf course somewhere out there. Stables. Everything.
But my eye gravitates instead toward the little huddle of trailers in the distance.
Roxanne’s is the size of a pebble, a small light propped on a fold-out table in front of it.
I see her, hunched, blurred by shadow, sitting alone.
“The girl,” I answer him, spreading my hands on the rough stone balcony railing. I wonder what she’s doing right now. Writing a letter home? To a boyfriend?
Miles leans beside me on the railing and shakes his head. “May I have permission to speak freely, sir?”
“Always, Miles. What are you thinking?”
“She’s just a girl.” Miles shrugs and leans back off the railing. “There are a million of them.”
“This one is different,” I assure him. “She hates me.”
Then I hear it in the wind, so soft and small: guitar strings. Then, even more faintly: a husky, sultry song.
Amazingly, my dick stirs, and I bid Miles goodnight so I can watch her unknowingly serenade me in peace.
I eventually go in, frustrated with staring at this girl in the distance, struggling to hear her song.
I’m going to have her. She just doesn’t know it yet.