I’ve always wanted to meet Lucky De Luca. I did that already. It went horribly. And now I’m just over it.
I’m overeverything.
I put the photo book back on the coffee table, turn off my phone, and sip my sad little white wine in the boring solitude of my boring little life.
Three
Lucky
Squintingat the screen of Meyer’s laptop, I suddenly feel really inept at social media. “Is that really all the comments?”
He refreshes the page and shrugs. “Yeah. Five hundred-ish is pretty standard for when we’ve hosted giveaways before. What’s the problem?”
I smack his shoulder with the back of my hand. “Get up.”
He does, but just as I drop into the chair at the Edwardian era dining room table that sometimes serves as an office space, he swipes the smoldering cigarette out of my fingers and crushes it into a crystal ashtray. “I can’t tell you not to smoke in your own house, but keep this shit away from my Macbook.”
“Psshh…” I flit my hand at him like I’m shooing a fly. “Fuck off.”
He moseys away toward a side table that’s stocked with liquor, and I slowly scroll through all the selfies posted on the contest video. It takes me a number of minutes, and by the end, I still don’t see anything from Ava.
“What the fuck?” I mumble. “I literallytaggedher.”
Meyer returns to the table, perching on the side of it while swirling a glass of scotch. “What’s your problem?”
I lean back in the chair and flip my hand at the screen. “That girl I tagged hasn’t evenlikedthe post. She didn’t enter the contest.”
He finishes a sip of whiskey and points at me with the glass. “Why are you so hot to trot about this one chick entering this contest?”
“She’s gonna be one of the winners.” Picking up my phone, I open the app using the personal account I set up just so I could start my fan page way back in the day. I never actually log into my personal account, but I’m wondering if all this shit looks different when I’m looking at the page as a regular user. “I can’t pick her as a winner if she doesn’t enter.”
“Well, technically, we’re supposed to pick three atrandom.” Meyer sets down his glass and folds his arms across his chest. “But I digress. Why do you wantthischick to win?”
I look at him. He’s got a smug, shit-eating smirk on his face, and he knows why I want this chick to win.
Pushing up from the table, I set down my phone and pull my sterling silver cigarette case out of my pocket, clicking it open and slipping one into my mouth. “Don’t insult me by pretending like you don’t know,” I mumble, causing the cigarette to wag between my lips.
“I think that’s a bad idea.” Meyer picks up his glass and sits down at the laptop.
Cupping the cigarette with my hands, I shrug as I light it. “I don’t really care if you think it’s a bad idea.”
He taps his index finger on the table next to the laptop. “It’s one thing to bring a chick back to your hotel room while we’re on the road, but it’s—”
“Lemme ask you something, Meyer.” I take a drag and then gesture at him with the cigarette. “What part of who I choose to fuck has any direct effect on tickets and merch? I mean, I’m flattered that you think I have the sexual stamina to fuck and discard so many women that it could have any kinda negative bearing on the hundreds of thousands of people coming to the shows every year. But from where I’m sitting, it ain’t that many, and it’s even fewer than that who end up pissed off about it later.” I slip one hand in my pocket and take another drag while he eyes me with a deadpan expression. “Your job is to look out for my bottom line. So explain to me how hooking up with this one broad adversely affects that bottom line.”
I raise my eyebrows expectantly, looking down my nose at him while twitching the cigarette impatiently at my side.
He returns my stare, slowly bringing the glass to his lips and taking a long sip. “It’s one thing to bring a chick back to your hotel room. It’s something else entirely to bring them into your home and do it here.” He waves the glass at the cavernous dining room. “What if this one chickhappensto be a psycho?” He lifts his index finger off the glass to point at me. “If it backfires, she knows where you live, and then you got a stalker on your hands.” He gestures at me with an upturned palm. “You don’t shit where you eat. Even a friggin’ dog knows that.”
I let my brows lift and drop flippantly. “I ain’t a friggin’ dog, and she’s not a psycho. She wouldn’t have been so scared shitless of me in Austin if she were a psycho stalker.” I point the cigarette at the laptop. “If she were a psycho stalker, she wouldn’t have disappeared off the face of the planet after I specifically called her out on social media like I did. This little doll has retreated into her shell for some reason, and I’m gonna pull her back out, and I’m gonna have a grand ol’ fuckin’ time while I do it.”
Meyer looks back at the screen and shakes his head. “Seems like a terrible idea, but I know you’re gonna do whatever you want no matter what I say, so go ahead.”
“Iwillgo ahead.” Picking up my phone off the table, I head to the glass French doors that lead to the courtyard.
I sit down on the concrete edge of the large center fountain and scroll through the posts on my fan page until I get to the one that I tagged her in, then tap on her name. The name I used for my personal account isD. Luca. I almost don’t want to do this because it feels like I’m giving her too much access tome, but then again, I don’t have any shit on this glorified burner account, and I know she’s probably got way more personal information on hers.Andthis’ll give me a way to message her directly so I can see what the hell is going on with her.
That is, if she accepts.
