Oreos for Breakfast

“Rache?” AJ said, and I looked up, shutting my notebook.

“Yes?”

“I- we- can I come in?”

“Of course.” I sat up and he lay across my bed, staring up at the ceiling. He’d been talking to Sarah for at least an hour. I’d wanted to go to sleep, but I knew he’d just come in to talk to me after he got off the phone with her. That had become our pattern over the last couple of days.

He was quiet for a minute, and I concentrated on the sound of his breathing. “She’s moving all of her stuff out of the house.”

“Oh.” He’d only been here two days. That didn’t take long.

If he’d stayed in LA, would she be moving out? Did I fuck everything up for them?

“She found a little apartment in West Hollywood that takes dogs, and she can afford it, so she snapped it up. I tried to tell her that I would help her get a better place, but she didn’t want to do that.”

“Smart woman, that Sarah.”

“Too smart for me. She said it’s not over, that we can still work on it, but… she’s moving out.” I was surprised he wasn’t crying. But he just stared up at the ceiling and I cold see him concentrating on keeping his breathing steady. Maybe he was all cried-out?

“Probably a good thing. The two of you need some space.”

“I’m across the fucking country! That’s not enough space?”

I shrugged, even though he couldn’t see me. “And she needs to feel like she can take care of herself.”

“Why?” He asked, like it was the greatest mystery of the world. “I have plenty of money. I want to spend it on her.”

“And what if you go away?”

“I won’t! She’s the one that’s going away. I want her to stay!”

“She shouldn’t stay just because you’re paying the bills. Does she have a job?”

“She’s a waitress.”

“Really?” I couldn’t keep the shock out of my voice.

“She doesn’t want to just sit around and paint her nails.”

“Smart woman,” I repeated.

“I know,” he said with a sigh. “I told Nick when he first met you that we can’t love women with lives of their own. I really hate that I was right about that.”

“You can love women with lives of their own. You just can’t treat us like shit. That’s not our fault, it’s yours.”

“I didn’t say it was her fault!” He sat up, looking at me. “And I thought you were on my side.”

“I am. But you’re the one that fucked up, AJ. Don’t blame Sarah for trying to protect herself.”

“I’m not. I just don’t want her to leave.”

I shrugged. “Maybe she needed to leave. If you love something, set it free.”

“Shut up,” he said, lying down again. “You’re not helping.”

I let him be quiet for a minute. I wasn’t sure what else to say. I knew he wanted me to say that everything was going to be okay, and that she shouldn’t move out of their house, but I couldn’t. I wasn’t sure that they were going to make it. I was actually pretty sure that they weren’t. I’d been shocked when they got engaged. I thought AJ had to work on himself a lot more before he could be a good husband. It wasn’t his fault or hers, it just… was.

“Good night,” he said, rolling off the bed.

“AJ,” I said, and he stopped at the door, not looking back at me.

“I’m fine, Rachel. I just need some sleep.”

“Do you want to talk?”

“I’m talked out. No. See you in the morning.”

Four o’ clock sorta counted as the morning. But since I hadn’t slept, it just felt like a continuation of the same long night.

“What are you watching?” AJ asked, sitting next to me on the couch.

“Nothing,” I said. “Literally nothing.” I’d been flipping through the channels for a while, not able to concentrate on anything. “Did I wake you? I’m sorry.”

“I wasn’t sleeping.” He said, grabbing the extra blanket off the back of the couch and wrapping it around his shoulders.

“Me neither.”

He watched the juicer infomercial with me for a second. “Did you order it yet?”

“Considered it. But the phone is too far away, and I’d have to talk to someone.”

“The cool thing about QVC is that you can do it online. Just click on ‘item currently on air.”

I looked at him. “Do that often?”

He smiled. “I have a lot of addiction problems, remember? I have been known to buy some crazy stuff.”

“I think I can resist the juicer.”

“But it will change your life! All you have to do is juice all your fruits and vegetables and presto! You’re healthy.”

“How many juicers do you have, AJ?”

“Just one,” he said defensively.

“Do you use it?”

“I’m not really sure where it is. Maybe Sarah will take it when she packs up her stuff tomorrow.”

“Nick stole back the Porsche he gave me.”

“No way!” he said, his attention finally diverted from the TV.

“It was last sighted in Long Island by my nieces, right after we broke up. They thought we were coming for a visit, but I think he was trying to find me.”

“How so?”

Right. That might not make sense to AJ. “We broke up here in NYC, the night of the VMAs. JC and James took me to JC’s place in Florida the next morning, and I’m sure when Nick couldn’t find me, he figured I was home in Long Island. He had a key to James’ place, and that’s where the keys to the Porsche were. So I think he got the keys and drove up to Long Island. And broke in.”

“He broke in?” AJ asked, shocked.

“I changed the hiding place for the key,” I told him. “When Mom went out the next day, or a couple of days later, the front window was broken. And the girls had seen the Porsche.”

“Or someone stole the Porsche and broke into your house.”

I shook my head. “Nothing was gone. And come on. I’m not the only one who thinks that’s pretty typical Nick behavior, am I?”

“No,” he agreed. “He ran away from the tour the last time you broke up.”

“So, while I’m gratified to know that he tried to find me, evidently that didn’t last long, because he was out with Paris the night after we broke up.”

“Is that why you slept with Justin?”

“No, that’s why I set up a fake date with Justin right after we broke up. I slept with Justin later. The date was to piss Nick off, not the sex.”

“Why the sex, then?” he asked.

“What, everything in my life now has to be in reaction to Nick? I can’t just fuck a guy because I want to fuck him?”

“That’s not what I- yeah, you can fuck a guy because you want to. But Justin Timberlake is different.”

“He’s not.” I said, changing the channel. Maybe I needed this grilling machine instead.

AJ gave me a look, and I shook my head.

“I’m not part of that war, Alex. Honestly, when I fucked Justin, it was because I wanted to. I might have given Nick a passing thought, but I wasn’t doing it to piss him off.”

“Justin might have been doing it to piss him off.”

“I don’t think that Justin spends a lot of time thinking about anyone but Justin.”

“True,” he conceded, making me smile. “Was he any good?”

I laughed. “Yeah. Lousy kisser, though. Too much tongue. But the other stuff… that was good.”

“When was it?”

“November. Near the end of the No Doubt tour and then one night in JC’s apartment.”

AJ shuddered. “Does JC know?”

“Many things which are probably untrue, because Justin loves to torture him. And I haven’t exactly corrected the story.”

“That’s mean!”

I shrugged. “You were sitting on the couch tonight.”

“Ew!”

I laughed at him, then switched off the TV, considering AJ for a moment. “Do you really think Nick will be upset to know that I slept with Justin Timberlake?”

“Yeah,” he answered, matching my serious tone. “But does it matter? I mean… you’re not with Nick any more.”

“Yeah,” I said, looking down at my hands in my lap. “I know.”

“Do you want to be?” he asked quietly.

I shook my head, then shrugged. “I fucked it all up, AJ. We had this deal for six months, and I was supposed to figure out what I wanted, but I haven’t. I just slept with random guys on the tour, and then there was Ben. I really wanted that to work, but I ended up just hurting him. I never should have done that. So now my six months are almost up, and I don’t know what I want. I fucked it all up.”

AJ stroked my hair, but I didn’t look up at him. “Rachel, baby, what are you talking about? What six months?”

“I’m supposed to see Nick on March sixth. We have a date. I don’t know why. It seemed like a good idea at the time, I guess. A break.”

“Not a break-up. Just a break.” He said, like he was starting to understand.

“I don’t know,” I admitted, looking up at him. “It was this crazy ass idea of James’, and even he admits it was stupid. But I couldn’t be with Nick any more, because he just kept hurting me. And I was becoming that jealous, clingy girl I hate, so something had to change.”

“But you couldn’t just let go.”

“No,” I said, blinking back tears. “Because I’m stupid and weak and even when he was treating me like shit, I couldn’t let go. And I don’t want to go back to that.”

AJ gathered me into his arms, and I tried to fight back tears. “You can cry, sweetheart,” he whispered, and I shook my head against his chest.

“I’m tired of crying about Nick.”

He settled back into the couch, still holding me. “Nick has a lot of growing up to do before he deserves you, Rachel.”

“I know. But I still love him.”

“We all do. And he’s a shit to all of us.” He stroked my hair, and I took a deep breath, tears at bay for a moment.

I was so tired. It was four in the morning and I had physical therapy in a few hours. And wasn’t I supposed to be taking care of AJ?

It felt nice to just sit here, leaning against him, though.

“I think you’ve got two months left to figure it out, baby. You don’t have to do it all at once. Maybe the random guys and Justin and Ben were part of helping you figure out what you want.”

“I thought I wanted Ben. I really tried.”

“He was the lawyer, right?”

AJ and I hadn’t really talked about Ben. I had mentioned him in our infrequent calls, but no details. “Yeah. I tried to be normal and nice for him, but I ended up as my normal bitchy self.”

“You’re not a bitch.” He said.

“You never dated me.”

I could feel his chuckle through my cheek on his chest. “True. And Nick may have complained about you once or twice. Hey!” he protested when I whacked him. “He didn’t complain much. Mostly he was happy and silly about you. Maybe he will be again.”

“No,” I said, shaking my head. “If he can be with Paris, he doesn’t want me back.”

“I doubt that. She’s a distraction from- okay, do you want me to convince you that he wants you back?”

I pulled away from his embrace, sitting up. “I don’t know. That’s the problem. I need… I’ve never really been on my own. There was Jeremy, and Damon, and Nick, and in between them a lot of one-night stands and Dad dying and other fucked up shit. I’ve never just been on my own and my life was okay. So I don’t know if I just want Nick back because I don’t know how to be alone, or because everyone in my band is suddenly hooked up and really happy, or what.”

“You’ve got two months to figure it out, Rache. Really. You’re not seeing him tomorrow.”

“But in two months, what do I want him to say?”

AJ shrugged. “Maybe you need to work on being okay with whatever happens in two months.”

I considered him for a moment, then nodded. “Maybe that’s it. I need to be strong enough on my own to either be with him or not.”

“I think you are strong enough already, for the record. Maybe you don’t know it yet, but you are not the sort of girl that needs a man to take care of her.”

“Is Sarah that sort of girl?”

He snickered. “She’s moving out of our house tomorrow. No, she’s good.”

“Maybe you need to stop trying to take care of her, then.”

He looked at me for a moment, pouting slightly. “I thought we weren’t talking about me and Sarah right now.”

“It’s the circle of life, Aje. It all comes back to you and Sarah.”

“Go to bed, Rachel.”

“You too, then.”

“I think I need to watch the end of that commercial.”

I laughed, getting up off the couch. “I’m taking the phones with me.”

“Bitch.”

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