2 Million Lies

Chapter 7

Despite her best efforts, Cyrah was late anyway. Mallory and Lacy were already sitting together on Lacy's couch, chattering about plans for Mallory's wedding in September.

Cyrah plunked down next to Mallory, who turned to her and said, "Bridesmaid, right?"

Cyrah nodded. "Of course. Just don't try to stuff me into some awful dress that doesn't fit right."

"Oh, you can pick your own dress, as long as it's close to this shade of purple." She held up a picture on her phone for Cyrah to see. "I wouldn't dream of forcing you into something you wouldn't feel comfortable wearing." She nudged Cyrah lightly. "I expect the same from you at your wedding."

Cyrah laughed. "Like that's happening any time soon. I'm not nearly as settled down as you two are."

"No shame in taking it slow. I mean Brandon and I decided that kids are definitely ten plus years in the future. We might have gotten married fast, but there's no way in hell we're ready for that."

Mallory nodded, and said, "Still trying out the sugar baby thing?"

Cyrah shook her head. She had actually deleted her profile on the site she had been using the night before.

"Oh, why not?"

"Yeah, you told me your first attempt didn't go terribly, why not try again?"

Crap, she had to explain this without talking about the deal. Cyrah shrugged. "I met this guy a couple of weeks ago. We actually went out today for the first time."

Lacy raised her eyebrows. "Oh yeah? You really think there could be something there?"

Cyrah nodded. "I think there could be, yeah. We're definitely going to go out again." Six months worth of something, a quiet breakup, and then two million dollars for Cyrah.

Mallory leaned in. "Oh, do tell us all about this guy."

"Well, he hates dogs and yoga, is a terrible surfer, but he says he can make good scrambled eggs, so he has redeeming qualities." She really had had a good time on their date. The awkwardness had fortunately been short lived.

"Oh, he hates dogs? That would have been a dealbreaker right away for me," said Lacy.

She wasn't planning on having a life with Shane, but Lacy couldn't know that. "I bet I can sweet talk him if it gets that far." She didn't actually know if she could or not, but it didn't really matter.

"What's his name? Is he cute? Do you have a picture? Can we google him?" Mallory reached for her phone.

Cyrah shook her head. There was no way in hell she could let Mallory google Shane, or even know his full name. Lacy would freak the fuck out, and Mallory would be displeased that Cyrah was even thinking about dating someone like him. Then she'd have to defend her choices to her concerned friends without giving away the huge amounts of money that were involved. "His name is Shane, yes he's very cute, no I don't have a picture, and no you may not google him, not even to make sure he's not a serial killer. Trust me, I know what I'm doing."

Mallory put her phone down. "Alright, if you don't have a picture, at least describe him."

"Well, he's got brown hair, basically the perfect shade of brown eyes, he's cute when he smiles, he's pretty tall, although it's not like that matters since I hate heels, and he's got tattoos. Whole sleeve on his right arm, and I bet if I got his shirt off there would be more." She initially began trying to talk him up and make this seem real for her friends, but as she continued she realized everything she said was true. His eyes were perfect. He was cute when he smiled. And she would like to get his shirt off and see if he did have more tattoos under there.

Lacy raised her eyebrows. "Sounds like you want to fuck him."

Cyrah smiled slightly. "Maybe I just to look at his tattoos."

Lacy shook her head. "Nah, you totally want to fuck him."

"Yeah, I do," Cyrah admitted. And she really honestly would. She wondered why he hadn't taken her up on it, she had basically offered herself up on a silver platter... Oh, of course, she was so stupid. If he wanted meaningless sex he had his pick of the lot. He didn't want or need another groupie, another easy fuck. She had to raise herself out of the crowd. She had to be something special, something memorable. And she wasn't going to make herself special or memorable by dressing up or offering sex. She needed to offer something that he couldn't get anywhere else.

She needed to do more research. Dig a little bit deeper into his life, read interviews, figure out exactly what makes him tick. And then somehow pretend that she didn't know way too much about him when they hung out together. How hard could it be?

She hung out with Mallory and Lacy for a while longer, before heading home and firing up her laptop to continue her research.

The farther she read, the sadder she got for him, as she read interview after interview and started putting little pieces and comments together into a bigger picture. Two absent parents. Lived with his mom after the divorce. Already an addict by the age of seventeen. Damn, how did that even happen? How would his parents not have noticed well before that got out of hand, even if they were absent?

She continued on, making notes in a notebook as she went. Eli's mother took him in at eighteen, when he couldn't take it with his mom anymore. She wondered exactly what had happened there. Nothing she read appeared to talk about what exactly the reason was.

She continued on, through the struggles of addiction that she had already read about previously, but with a different lense. This was a man that had somehow been failed by the people who were supposed to be there for him, and the effects of that reverberated throughout his entire life.

A comment midway through a more recent interview stuck out to her. 'Let the music speak for itself,' he had said. That was a damn good idea, actually. Why hadn't she thought to do that before? She reached for her headphones, and hit play on the first album. She pulled up the lyrics, and started making her way through. She knew he and Elijah wrote most of the songs together, so she didn't know how many of the words were actually Shane's, but there were some songs that were obviously entirely Shane's words, or mostly Shane's words, and she copied down the lyrics to her notebook to analyze for deeper meaning that what was present on the surface.

Between the first and second album, she googled Shane's mother's name, out of curiosity. The first thing she found was an obituary. She had been forty-eight. It had been an overdose. The final piece of the picture slid into place. That was why nobody had intervened. Of course his father hadn't, he was hiring his son a girlfriend instead of trying to help him himself. What Shane really needed was someone to care. That was how she would stand out.

And then she was going to break his heart. Hopefully she could do it with minimal pain. How attached could he get in six months anyway? Heartbreak was probably good music fuel, she'd sort of be doing him a favor. Deep down, although she tried to deny it and convince herself otherwise, she knew that this might not be worth two million dollars.

But honestly, what were the chances he'd get attached?

Probably pretty high, honestly. But she tried not to think about that. He was a rock star, he'd probably cheat on her the whole six months, that was the way it went. He was going on tour after his new album released, he'd be fucking a different girl every night while she played the perfect girlfriend over text message. He just wasn't himself at the moment, as soon as he was back to normal he'd be back to fucking around. A guy like that deserved to be dumped.