The Hook-up

Chapter 74

Bruno sat in the back of a hot celebrity spot for lunch. He looked over the menu glancing up at two people he had worked with in the past, Ceelo and Adam Levine. "I'm going to get the turkey thing. What are y'all going to get?" he asked taking a sip of his water.

"The salad." Ceelo answered.

"Really?" Adam looked at Ceelo perplexed.

"Yeah, dude. I'm watching my figure." He said patting his stomach.

"Well, if you're going to get the salad I'm getting the triple giant cheeseburger." Adam joked.

"Enjoy your heart attack." Bruno said sarcastically without a laugh.

"Brunz, what the hell is fucking wrong?" Ceelo asked him. "Is there trouble in paradise?" he laughed.

"When isn't there trouble in paradise?" he asked with a sigh.

"Oh. You're not even kidding." Adam said to the both of them.

"I don't get her. She gets mad at the smallest things." He told them.

"And you get mad at her too, right?" Adam answered.

"It's like we do it so much that we've started to keep score." Bruno told them as little as possible about the night before trying to wrap his head around the events.

**

"Dude...go left...." Bruno heard his friend yell at him from the side of the punching bag.

"Go left?" Bruno asked his friend, Omar, who was a professional boxer.

"Always go left first. They won't suspect it. And their left, not your left." Omar replied. "Are you ready?" he asked Bruno pointing to the boxing ring.

"Will it help me get out how fucking just angry I am?" Bruno asked him.

"It helps me." Omar responded. "Just keep hitting shit." He said half joking as they walked toward the ring together. "I'm gonna go easy on you." Omar said watching the spectators gather. Someone jumped up in between them telling them to back away from each other counting down and then pushing them together. Bruno felt his arms move toward his friend's face and his ear all at the same time all the frustration from the album, Lauren, his family, his everything get pushed and pulled in the punches he was throwing and punches he was receiving. He was pulled away several times and instructed about what to do by different people taken aback by the overwhelming sense of freedom and release that he would only feel when he was singing to thousands of people. "Bruno!!!" he heard someone yell throwing him back into his reality. "Your nose is bleeding..."

Bruno rubbed his nose feeling the blood dripping down his nose. "Damn." He sighed taking the paper towel Omar was handing him throwing his head back to stop the bleeding.

"No, keep it forward..." he heard a female voice come up behind him. He had never seen the girl, she was dressed in work out shorts and a t-shirt with her hands wrapped as if she was going to fight someone.

"Are you for real?" he asked the girl.

"For real." She smiled at him. He looked at her thinking that she was attractive. But all that anger and all that anger and rage was gone. He was peaceful for once. "Thank you." He said politely standing up from the chair to go back to Omar.

"That felt so good." Bruno said wiping the sweat off his forehead.

"So you're going to come back next week, right?" Omar asked.

"Shit yes." Bruno responded picking up his phone seeing no messages from anyone on his phone. "I think I can record my album now." He told his friend as he got up to go to the locker room to take a shower. He looked down at his phone to text Lauren.

Put on something pretty. We're going out tonight.