Loving Ashe

Episode 23

The Real Thing

“What do you want to talk about?” Riley asked, walking cautiously toward the door, her arms crossed in front of her. “Why don’t you just move on and live your life without ruining any more of mine?” +

“We need to talk, Riley,” Gareth said. “Can you, at least, open the door and let me in so we can talk like two adults? It’s cold out here.”

“Then freeze. Or go back to your hotel where it’s warm,” Riley said. But Gareth only exhaled, hugged his arms around his chest and planted himself stubbornly outside the door. 5

“C’mon, Ri,” Gareth said, his voice softening. “Truce?” 3

“We already tried that, Gareth, and we didn’t get anywhere but the front page of some gossip rag. Where is this going to end up? Do you have your photographers with telephoto lenses waiting outside? In a car maybe?”

“Riley, you’re overreacting,” Gareth said, rolling his eyes.

Now, Riley was angry. How dare Gareth say she was over-reacting! No way was she letting him through the door now. He could freeze to death outside for all she cared.

“Over-reacting? You were already seeing Isobel when you kissed me and told me, ooh, baby, you’re so real, or whatever else you were lying about. You did that just to get back at Ashe, didn’t you? Well, I’m not falling for this ‘we’ve got to talk’ shit, alright? Just go, Gareth, and spare me the drama. I have enough drama right now.”

Gareth leaned against the window. “You’re not over-reacting. I’m sorry, alright? But we need to talk—get a few things straight once and for all.” He winced as thunder rumbled overhead. “C’mon, Riley, I’m getting cold and wet out here. Please? Just talk. We need to talk about us.” 3

“There is no us, Gareth. There hasn’t been any us since you put me on a plane back to New York three years ago and said you’d come back for me, but you never did,” Riley said. “So you can freeze your ass out there for all I care. Watch me.” 16

For the next ten minutes, Gareth stood outside, arms crossed in front of his chest, his shoulders hunched forward, waiting for her to open the door. He wasn’t giving up, not that Riley expected him to. He was stubborn when he wanted to be, which confused her. What did he want to talk about? And as much as she needed to put the books away, she couldn’t do it knowing someone was soaking wet from the rain outside the shop awning. Did she want him to freeze to death? Gareth wasn’t that stupid, but still—with Gareth, she’d given up figuring out why he did the things he did. What happened to his ever-present trucker hat, she wondered as she took a deep breath and opened the door. 11

“Come in then,” she grumbled then lowered the blinds of the door completely as soon as she shut the door. The last thing she needed was another photographer misconstruing their conversation for something else. 26

“And I’m not making you any espresso either,” Riley said as she walked past him to continue packing the books into the boxes. Gareth shrugged off his wet jacket and hung it on the coat rack next to the door, ruffling his wet hair and then stomping his boots on the doormat.

“What’s with all these books? You’re not closing up the shop, are you?” he asked as he crouched in front of her, the books forming a barrier between them. 2

“No, but someone wrote an online review claiming they’d seen a rat in here, and we had to clean up the entire back area, including the food service counters and pastry shelves, but we’ve yet to find a single rat or mouse dropping. So Allen figured that maybe it came from the bookshelves. I mean, look at this. It could be a perfect rodent condo, considering this is Manhattan,” Riley said, spreading her arms to her sides to indicate the shelves that were currently barren of books. “He decided that we’d better take everything down and wipe the shelves clean—maybe even get rid of them altogether.” 2

STORY CONTINUES BELOW

“If you do, you can’t call it the Library Cafe anymore, can you?”

Riley shrugged. “Better than having rodents live in the books.”

“Still, that’s a bit drastic, Ri,” Gareth said, frowning. “Did they leave their name? Those online reviews are usually linked to verified accounts—well, as verified as accounts can be verified, I guess. But still, what’s to stop some rival coffee shop from saying something that’s not true? I’m sure it’s not the first time it’s ever happened.” 1

“I didn’t check who left the review,” Riley said as Gareth pulled out his phone and tapped on the screen.

“Well, I’ll check it for you then,” he said. “Guaranteed it’s someone who’s trying to mess with you guys, nothing more.”

Five minutes later, Riley was stuffing books into the box in front of her when Gareth placed his hand over hers just as she was about to put a book titled How to Survive Betrayal next to one titled, Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse. At this rate, she probably had better luck surviving the latter.

“What?” Riley asked. At least, Gareth wasn’t being romantic, she thought. She’d have to kick him back out into the rain if he was trying to do one of his moves again.

“I’m sure the review is a fake,” he said, showing her his phone. “Look, the person just registered their account today and left that review. They haven’t left any other reviews for other places at all.”

“What if seeing a rat prompted them to get an account for the first time?” Riley asked, her shoulders slumping. She was relieved, but at the same time tired—exhausted, even. Why would anyone do such a thing? 5

“I doubt they’ve even been here,” Gareth said, frowning as he slipped his phone back into his pocket. “It could be some jealous girlfriend, who knows?” 3

Riley narrowed her eyes. “You better not be implying that it’s someone I know.”

He shrugged. “Or someone I know. Here, let me help you put all these back on the shelves, Ri. You don’t need to get rid of all these books because of one damn complaint about a non-existent rat.”

“What if there is—”

“And even if there is one, it’s no reason to take all these books down. It’s like someone burning down the house over a spider,” Gareth said.

“You think I’d do something that drastic?”

“Never mind, Ri,” he said, crouching in front of one of the boxes and pulling out three books in one hand. “Let me help you put them back, please. You were never one to give up so easily. Are these to be arranged alphabetically or just randomly?”

As Riley stared at him, she had to admit that Gareth had a point. Allen freaked out, and now she was freaking out, and not thinking clearly. What if the review wasn’t real? Then they’d won, whoever they were.

“The Health Department is coming tomorrow,” Riley said, looking around at the boxes and books scattered around her. “I have to get all these books back on the shelves by then, or they’ll think we do have a problem.”

“That’s my girl,” Gareth said, grinning. “Alphabetical by author?” 18

“No, just random. You know how it is, the fun of being here is discovering what’s on the shelves, especially when they’re in no certain order,” Riley said.

They spent the next two hours putting everything back up on the shelves and arranging the armchairs, tables and chairs back to the way they’d been. Throughout that time, Riley and Gareth barely spoke. When they did talk, it was only to say something about whatever book they held in their hands, whether it was part of a series, as so many of them were now, or whether they’d read it or not. Gareth said he had very little time to read books these days while Riley had read most of them. Sometimes Gareth only watched her as she put the books away.

STORY CONTINUES BELOW

Riley wondered what had brought him to the Library, but when she asked him he just told her to keep putting the books away so they’d be able to get out of there. What was it he wasn’t saying? 4

By the time it was all done, it was past eleven and Riley was hungry and tired, barely able to keep her eyes open. She would have loved to make herself a cup of coffee, but the last thing she wanted to do was get the counter area in need of another cleanup and then be wired up all night. No, she’d head home and heat a pot of ramen noodles. As they made for the front door, Riley stopped and turned to look at him.

“Are you happy?”

Out of all the questions she could have asked him then, Riley had no idea why she picked that question. But maybe it was just wishful thinking on her part, wanting to see him miserable.

Gareth paused. He pursed his lips and arched an eyebrow, his eyes gazing downward as he thought about it. He shrugged. “You know, I honestly don’t know anymore.”

“How can you not know?”

He shrugged again. “I haven’t thought about it. It’s not like I get to wonder about the mysteries of the universe these days, not like years ago when all we had was time—and ramen. Remember those days?”

Riley didn’t answer. Of course, she remembered them. Why else did she suddenly want to heat up some ramen noodles at home? She hadn’t had ramen in years. Riley opened the door, and they stepped outside, the crisp autumn air a welcome change from hours of being surrounded by the smell of books and coffee inside the cafe. It had stopped raining, although there was still a light drizzle.

“I came back for you, you know,” Gareth said as Riley locked the front door and slipped her keys into her jeans pocket. 4

“What?” Riley asked. He’d spoken so softly that she’d barely heard him.

“I came back for you seven months after I saw you in LA,” he continued. “Someone else was living in the apartment, and you left no forwarding address, nothing. It made sense, though. I’d written you a few times, and the letters were all returned, but since the return address I used was my PO box, I didn’t know about the returned mail till I got back to L.A. I was filming Hell’s Kingdom then, so I was in England for seven months.” 4

As he spoke, Gareth took some letters from inside his jacket pocket and handed them to her. “I was cleaning up my stuff a few days ago, and I found these. You might as well have them, Ri. You don’t have to read them if you don’t want to, but I also don’t want to toss them, you know. Let’s say it’s an epistolary account of me and my first big break. You were the only one I could write about such things, even if you never answered me back.” 1

“When did you come back for me?” Riley asked, staring at him before gazing at the stack of envelopes in her hand, held together by two rubber bands. 1

“I just told you. Seven months after I made up that story that you were a crazy fan at that party,” Gareth replied. “Look, I got to thinking about what happened after we last talked, and I know I told you I didn’t remember, but now I do. I know I told Collette that you were some crazy fan, but I did that so I could get you out of that house. You were so high, you didn’t know which end was up, and some asshole was about to go down on you right there in front of everyone. That’s how crazy that party was, Ri, and…well, I just had to make something up.”

Gareth exhaled, before continuing. “I’m sorry it had to happen that way. I’m sorry that for seven months I never checked on you either, but I was just so scared of making a wrong move in my first ever real job. Hell’s Kingdom. But honest to God, Ri, I really did come back for you.” 6

Riley remembered Hell’s Kingdom. It was a big-budget cable mini-series and Gareth’s first big break, the only one he had needed before his career skyrocketed. He’d only had a supporting role, but his performance was so good, it caught the attention of a major director who then asked him to audition for a lead role in what would turn out to be his breakout movie.

STORY CONTINUES BELOW

“I tried calling you, but our old number was already disconnected,” Gareth continued. “I even tried calling Paige, but she wouldn’t even take my calls at all, or tell me where you were. If I’d known you moved back in with your dad, I would have called there, too, but I never even thought you’d go back and live there. Not there—not with him.”

“That’s because I had nowhere else to go, and Paige hates your guts, even now.”

Gareth’s face paled for a moment, but he took a deep breath and exhaled. “I even came here to the cafe, after I checked out the old apartment, but Allen told me you were gone upstate. So I thought you’d quit and moved on somewhere.” 8

“I was in rehab by then,” Riley said. “But did you really believe I was going to wait for you all that time after what you did? Even if I had wanted to stay in that apartment, you gave me no choice, Gareth. You sent your assistants to clean the place up and left me with only a damn mattress!”

Gareth stared at her. “I did what?” 27

“I can’t believe you don’t remember! You moved me out of the apartment,” Riley repeated. “I recognized one of the guys who came over. He was at that party in LA.”

“But why the hell would I do that?” Gareth asked. “I was in England.”

“Well, you did, Gareth,” Riley said, angry now. How dare he deny it?

As Riley walked away, not caring if it was drizzling, Gareth caught her arm, but she kept on walking. “Riley, what the hell are you talking about? I never sent any ‘assistants’ to clean up our apartment. You were still living there. I mean, why would I do that? Shit, I may be a cold bastard, but I’m not that cold.”

“Well, you did, Gareth. I wish you’d just stop playing this damn game,” Riley said, hurrying down the sidewalk, hoping a cab would drive by. The streets were slicked with rain, and some cars were splashing water against the sidewalks, but she didn’t care.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about, Ri.”

“Well, now you do, Gareth, so have a beautiful life. You came, and you’ve said your piece, now say, ‘goodbye, Riley, and enjoy your life,'” she snapped, raising her arm to hail a passing cab. As it stopped in front of her, she opened the car door but paused before getting in. “I have to admit, Gareth, the final insult was paying me all that money. I mean, was that all I was worth to you? Twenty thousand fucking dollars?” 3

She slipped into the back seat and closed the door, but Gareth held it open and this time, she saw the shock written all over his face, along with confusion.

“What money are you talking about?”

“Oh, Gareth,” Riley groaned, rolling her eyes. “Twenty thousand dollars in cash. I’m sure you don’t remember because you’re what—worth millions now?” 3

“This is insane,” Gareth said, staring at her in shock. “I’ve done a lot of shitty things, Ri, but never anything like that, especially not to you. Twenty grand! Where the hell would I have gotten that kind of money three years ago? I was so broke then even my manager had to loan me money just to buy new clothes and shit. I had to pay Collette back a hundred thousand on top of her commission.” 2

As he stood outside the taxicab, getting drenched for it began to rain again, Riley was grateful that Gareth hadn’t tried to get into the cab with her. She wouldn’t have known what to do though the cab driver was shouting at him to close the door before his upholstery got wet. But as she told the driver her address, the sound of the rain drumming on the roof made her reconsider.

“Get in!”

The order momentarily took Gareth by surprise, drenched again from the rain, but he got in and shut the door, brushing the droplets from his hair.

“Where are you staying? I’ll drop you off.”

“Soho House,” he said.

For a few seconds, they sat as far apart as possible on the seat of the cab, glaring at each other. Riley didn’t know what to think, but Gareth’s eyes told her that he was telling the truth. Still, it left her confused. If not Gareth, then who moved her out of the apartment and left her all that money? 18

“I may be all fucked up from here to Sunday, Ri, but I would never, never do such a thing to you. Is that why you ended back at home living with your dad, because you believed I sent my guys to move you out of our place and pay you off?”

Riley didn’t answer. She crossed her arms in front of her and watched the lights outside the window, neon lights that splashed the darkness with bright shades of red, yellow and blue, the sound of the windshield wipers a musical refrain that accompanied the silence between them.

“I don’t know what else to tell you, Ri,” Gareth said, shaking his head. “I don’t know what the fuck is going on. But I sure as hell will find out who did that to you.” 9

“You’ve said enough, Gareth. Maybe it’s time we bury the hatchet and move on. It was a good thing that you came over, really. This way, I can get that closure people always talk about,” Riley said, scrubbing at the tears that streamed down her cheeks. Why did she have to cry?

“I’m so sorry, Ri,” Gareth said before the silence could come between them again. “I wish I could make it up to you after all these years. If I’d known-“

“Don’t worry about it,” said Riley. As Soho House loomed in the distance, a place that completely suited Gareth with its eclectic decor and hip crowd, Riley knew that Gareth would soon be gone from her life—forever, if she wished it.

“Congratulations on getting the role, by the way,” Riley said. “The Conley Brennan one.”

“Oh, that,” Gareth said, chuckling. “Thanks.” 2

Riley wanted to say a lot more but remembered what Ashe had told her. It was only business.

“He’s a good man, Ri,” Gareth murmured.

“Who? Conley?”

“No, I mean Ashe,” Gareth said, slowly touching her hand that lay on the seat between them, their fingertips now touching. “I know you guys are seeing each other, and while you guys are just starting out and all, I mean it—he’s a good man, a decent man. A keeper. He won’t play you, and if he does, I’ll ream him a new one.”

Gareth interlaced his fingers with hers, and Riley felt nothing but the warmth of his hand, no electricity, no tingling up and down her spine, and no butterflies in her stomach. She felt only the warmth of someone she had once known and trusted and loved so long ago. 1

“I wish you two the best, Ri. I really do,” he added.

“I wish the same for you and Isobel. You make a beautiful pair,” she told him just as the taxicab stopped right in front of the Soho House and Gareth let go of her hand.

“You can’t buy everything you read in the tabloids, Ri. Just because you see it in print doesn’t mean it’s true. Remember that, okay?”

“What do you mean?”

Gareth leaned toward her to kiss her on the cheek.

“It means that when you’re fucking your girlfriend’s brains out and she calls out another man’s name, what you think you’ve got isn’t real. It never was,” Gareth said, shrugging his shoulders. “Sometimes, it’s only business.”