Olivia felt like her brain had melted and was oozing out her ears. She’d told him about her parents, of course she had. But other than a cursory overview that he could have googled on his own, they steered clear of the topic. They rarely even toed the line, and now he’d walked right up and kicked it. “Are you serious right now, Chuck?”
“Yes. You’re like the first nepo baby in history who doesn’t want the title.”
She blinked at him, completely gobsmacked by what he was saying. “No onewants that title! It’s insulting and reductive, and I honestly can’t believe you just said that.”
“Well, it’s true. You have this industry at your fingertips,and you take it for granted—and I don’t only mean the film industry. I know you don’t want to be on camera. But you could use their story—yourstory too—to launch the career you actually want as an author.”
She jolted up from the bed and clenched her fists, nearly shaking. “Why onearthwould I want to welcome that attention?”
“The attention doesn’t have to be negative. With the right team, you could spin it so that you’re positioned in the best light.”
She blinked at him in shock. “Chuck, my life story—my parents’ deaths—is not something to bespunby Hollywood smoke and mirrors for consumption. Where is this even coming from? Why are you saying all this to me?”
He stood too and held out his arms. “I don’t know, Liv. Maybe I’ve always wanted to say this, and now I can because for once, you can’t run away, and you have to listen.”
She sputtered and felt like she might explode. “Anything else you want to get off your chest while you’re at it?”
“Yeah, actually. I think you’re scared. You pretend you want nothing to do with this world, but deep down, you crave validation. Confirmation that youmatterand will leave a mark. That you are bigger than your parents’ legacy. But you’re afraid to do anything about it, so you act like you’re above all this and that none of it is important to you.”
In true Olivia and Chuck fashion, they’d gone from zero to sixty in five seconds flat. The vein in his forehead throbbed, and she felt its mirror keeping time in her neck.
She sucked in a hard breath. “Okay, if we’re trading honesty here, how about a few things I’ve always wanted to say toyou?”
“Sure, I’dloveto hear them.” He scooped his arms towardhimself in a welcoming motion and then folded them over his chest.
“I think you care about this worldtoomuch. To the point that you lose sight of everything else because you’re so obsessed with your career. You missed my grandma’s birthday party to go to an audition, for example. And you live in an apartment that you can’t afford for appearance’s sake. Also, I think what you’re saying about my parents is unfair. You haveno ideawhat it’s like for me because your parents think the sun shines out your ass! I think—”
“Do you know how much fucking pressure it is to have my parents think I’m perfect?” he shouted, and threw out his arms.
Olivia flinched, not realizing that particular button would be the hottest one.
Chuck took a breath and put his hands on his hips. “They don’t even know I got fired—they don’t even know we broke up! I couldn’t bear the thought of telling them either thing because I didn’t want to disappoint them.” He sank to the bed and held his face in his hands.
This normally would have been the point where Olivia ran away. She’d spin on her heel and slam a door, leaving the unfinished emotional dregs trailing in her wake. The urge thrummed in her limbs, pumped in her pounding heart. But the sight of his distress, the memory of his accusation last night about her always running—and the fact that she had nowhere to go—made her stay.
She sat beside him on the bed and spoke softly. “How do they not know either of those things? They were both literally in the news.”
Chuck popped up out of his hands, looking truly surprisedto see her still there. It took him a moment to speak. “They don’t keep up with celebrity news; I told them not to. And I’ve never told them that we fight at all. They were so happy that I was in a serious relationship when we got together. I wanted them to think things were perfect. With them focusing on my dad’s health, I didn’t tell them when I got fired or we broke up because I didn’t want to add to their stress on top of it all. I asked Chelsea not to say anything either.” The pain threaded through his words made her chest ache. She almost reached out to touch him but remembered the rules.
“You’re a good son, Chuck.”
He huffed a strangled sound. “I try to be.”
“No, you are. And I can’t imagine Sam and Barb Walsh ever being disappointed in you. Like I said: sun out your ass.”
A quiet chuckle bubbled from his mouth. “I can’t tell if you’re deflecting again or making an honest effort.”
“Somewhere in the middle?”
He turned to her with a soft, warm look on his face. “I’ll take it.”
Her heart leapt with that familiar bungee-jump hiccup that only he could incite. It felt dangerously close to a feeling she was no longer supposed to have because they’d broken up.
She pushed up from the bed, ready to flee, but he reached out for her. His hand brushed her wrist withoutreallytouching her, but it was enough to make her turn around.
“Wait, before you go. Sorry I called you a nepo baby.”
Olivia snorted. “Yeah, well, you’re not wrong.”