33.2
Vi shows up on our doorstep, barging into the house without a word and walking straight into the living room like she owns the place. “Nice digs,” she comments. “Very grown-up for athletes.”
“Did you come here to comment on our interior decorating, or do you have news about Georgina?” I ask.
Nathaniel crosses his arms. “Like where the fuck is she?”
“She’s home,” Vi tells us.
“She’s home?” I ask. Un-fucking-believable. She’s been silent for a month, and now she’s home– not more than a hundred yards away from us– and we’ve had exactly zero communication from her. No text message, no email, nothing. “Like, right-beside-this-place, home?”
Vi nods. “She doesn’t know I’m here.”
Nathaniel groans his frustration. “So she disappears for a month and then comes back to her house, which is right beside my place, and doesn’t even bother to say, oh, I don’t know– ‘Hello, sorry I disappeared, I’m back’?”
“Look, don’t get all pissy with me,” Vi says. “Like I said, she doesn’t even know I’m here. In fact, I’ve been expressly forbidden to talk to you.”
“Why the hell would you be forbidden to talk to us?” I ask. “I can understand Georgina being upset about what happened– fuck, the media has been all over it. She’s been in every damn tabloid in the country. But she can’t be pissed off at us for not fessing up to being with her when she decided to run off to some bullshit rehab for the last month– ”
Vi interrupts me. “Her parents convinced her to do it,” she says.
“Yeah, we gathered that. We got a visit from the First Lady,” Nathaniel grumbles. “She made it clear that we shouldn’t have ever expected Georgina to slum it with guys like us. White trash athletes don’t get with girls like her, right? Georgina clearly chose her path, and that’s what she wants to do. So if you have something else to say that doesn’t involve rubbing that fact in our faces, say it so you can get the hell out of my house.”
“Georgina didn’t choose not to slum it with you two, as you so eloquently put it,” Vi says. “She chose not to take your careers down in flames with her image.”
“What the fuck does that mean?” I ask.
“Did you really honestly think Georgina would choose to walk away from you because you’re athletes and not billionaires or politicians?” Vi asks. “You can’t be that dense.”
“She could have come to us,” I say. “You took off with her that night. You could have brought her here, and we would have protected her. Instead, you ran off with her and the next thing we hear is from the First Lady. And the fucking newspapers. Everything else is radio silence– from both of you.”
“I’m her best friend,” Vi says. “But she’s a big girl who makes her own decisions. And her decision was to do what was best for you.”
“I don’t even know what the hell that means,” Nathaniel says, his voice loud. “How was this what was best for anyone other than her parents?”
Vi exhales loudly. “The First Lady had everyone who knew anything about the three of you together silenced– not killed, I mean, just paid off– in exchange for Georgina going along with the ‘nervous breakdown’ story.”
“Why would she do that?” I ask. “We would have come out as the guys involved. I’m not fucking ashamed of any of it!”
“Because of your contracts, obviously,” Vi says. “Georgina knew that Nathaniel was about to sign a contract worth millions –”
“I’d already signed it,” Nathaniel interrupts.
“What?” Vi asks.
“I’d already signed the contract. That was one of the things I was going to tell her at the fundraiser before we… before everything happened. I’d signed the contract earlier. It was a done deal. She went along with this because she thought it would protect us?”
“It’s Georgina,” Vi says, sighing. “Of course she went along with it. She’s always worried about helping everyone before herself. It’s her biggest flaw.”
“Why wouldn’t she just come talk to us about it?” I ask.
“Because if it came down to it, she didn’t want you to have to make the choice between her or your careers. She didn’t want you to resent her for it.” Vi exhales. “And I was okay going along with it, because it’s what she wanted. But she’s not happy, and I’m hoping you’re not happy either.”
“Of course we’re not fucking happy,” I snap.
“Well, then, do something about it. She’s right next door.”
“So we should break the door down and talk some sense into her?” Nathaniel asks, his voice gravelly.
“Well, my advice would be to finesse it just a little bit more than that,” Vi suggests. “She might have been misguided, but she still thinks that by staying away from you, she’s protecting you. And she’s been through a hell of a month. It was hard enough to convince her to come back to her house instead of living in hiding for the next year, or moving to the other side of the world.”
I think of the shit she’s been through– the stories that have been written about her, the names she’s been called– and realize that Nathaniel and I haven’t faced any of that.
And she did it because she thought she was protecting us.
