Lying In Bed by MJ Rose Read Free Book Online Page B

me closely.
    “I didn’t know Cole was having a show.”
    “A one man show,” he said clearly imparting the importance of it.
    “Do you know anything about this photograph?” I asked, holding my breath after I’d released the words, watching Jeff’s face carefully.
    “Nothing except how much attention he told me it’s getting.”
    He meant it. I could tell there was nothing he wasn’t saying. No duplicity in his eyes. No looking away, no embarrassment, which there would have been if he had known.
    “I would have thought your mom would have told you,” Jeff said.
    “I think she tried. A couple of months ago she started to tell me that something terrific had happened for Cole but I didn’t ask and she didn’t pursue it.”
    Jeff shook his head. “Neither of you has ever asked me to get involved. But I think it stinks. After how close we all were. After how much the two of you mattered to each other. That you can’t work it out doesn’t make sense.”
    “Cole’s never asked because he knows what a shit he is and doesn’t care. And I care too much to want to have anything to do with him anymore or to put you in the middle of it.”
    “It eats him up inside,” Jeff said.
    “Really?” my voice was as arched as my eyebrows.
    “Really. Does that surprise you?”
    “Most of what Cole does surprises me.”
    “Isn’t there any way for you two to work out whatever it is?”
    “Maybe a long time ago but…” I had to force myself not to look down at the invitation again but instead keep my eyes on Jeff. “Not anymore. So.” I took a long drink of the fizzy water. “Let’s not do this, okay?”
    “When
was
the last time you talked to him?”
    I shrugged. “Before Joshua died. He’s called since. I’ve erased his messages without listening to them.”
    “Why won’t you hear him out?”
    “Because the only thing that would matter to me is the one thing he won’t do. If he did it would interfere with his plans.”
    “I don’t understand that,” Jeff was clearly confused.
    “I know. But I can’t explain. Don’t want to, really. It’s the past. Or at least it was the past…” I couldn’t help it. I did looked at the invitation again. Quickly. Then I forced my eyes away. I didn’t want to go backwards. Didn’t want to deal with my stepbrother. It was too complicated. Too embarrassing. It had meant too much. To me. But clearly not to him. Never to him.
    Cole was on a one-way track to Cole’s success and nothing was going to get in his way. He had been devoted to his career to the exclusion of anything else as long as I’d known him, even if I didn’t always realize it. And I couldn’t imagine anything that would change the single-mindedness of his determination. I knew about wanting success but I didn’t understand how it could be more important than the people you cared about. He’d tried to explain it to me a long time ago, in different ways. None of them had been sufficient to clarify how he could be so insensitive. Bullshit. He knew what he’d done was wrong, and how to right it but to do so would have derailed his plans. And there were plans. There have always been plans.
    Cole, at this point, was 29 and one of the bad boys of photography. Sexy, clever, talented, and pushing every edge. His heroes were Robert Maplethorpe and Helmut Newton. His shots were sexual and progressive. Angry and beautiful. They made viewers uncomfortable, which made them think his work was important. Was it? I was too close to it to know. But Cole was getting attention and press at a time when most people felt everything had been done already. He specialized in photographing private moments in a way that made viewers feel as if they were intruding in someone’s life – stepping into a room where they were not invited and witnessing an act that was not for public consumption. And that was exactly what Cole did. He took your emotions, your longings, your wants, your passions, and he exposed them with a