When the Stars Come Out by Rob Byrnes Read Free Book Online Page A

the room retained a number of distinctly feminine touches. It was light and airy, the walls a periwinkle blue and the furniture spare and unimposing.
    He tossed his bag at the foot of the bed, then tossed himself on
    top of the off-white comforter, where he tried unsuccessfully to
    nap. He stayed there for a long time, wondering how he could es-
    cape and where he could escape to.
    A natural loner, Noah was not one of those people who prided
    themselves on collecting large numbers of close friends. He had a
    few friends—acquaintances, really—in Washington he could call
    when he really needed to get out of the apartment, but otherwise
    he was quite content to be on his own. His life had been quite similar when he lived in New York, but in the intervening years he had lost contact with his old crowd. He was now alone in Manhattan,
    and unless he went out by himself, he would be a prisoner of Park
    Avenue until it was time to go back to Washington and again face
    the hopelessness of The Project.
    There were always museums, movies, and theater, but he couldn’t
    think of them as solitary activities. Like dining alone in a restaurant, Noah felt uncomfortable flying solo at venues where everyone else came in multiples. Wandering the city might kill some time,
    but Noah had no great desire to wander.
    He tossed and turned on the bed for what felt like quite a while
    longer, mulling his undesirable options and weighing them against
    the alternative, which was uncomfortable boredom. When he fi-
    nally looked at the clock on the nightstand, only fifteen minutes
    had passed.
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    R o b B y r n e s
    “Fuck,” he muttered to himself. It was going to be a long visit.
    Even if he left the following day, it was going to be a long visit.
    And because of those thoughts, he was actually grateful when he
    heard Tricia knock lightly on the guest room door.
    “Come in,” he called out, turning slightly to face her as she eased the door open.
    “Are you as bored as I am?” she asked.
    He blushed. Was it that obvious?
    “Well . . . you know, it’s not my house, and I didn’t bring a book, so I’m sort of . . .” He smiled. “Yeah, I guess I’m a bit bored. Uh . . .
    no offense.”
    It was her turn to smile. “None taken. But I was thinking we
    should do something.”
    “Something . . . ? Something like what?”
    She frowned. “Anything to get out of this house. I’ve barely had
    a breath of fresh air since your father went into the hospital, and once he comes home . . . well, I might as well forget about having a life for a while.”
    “But the doctors said he’ll be back to normal in no time.”
    She blew a wisp of stray blond hair out of her eyes. “They always
    say things like that, but it never quite works that way. Your father was lucky, but he’s still going to need some time to recuperate.
    Especially with his personality. If he were a laid-back, calm man, it would be a lot easier. But he’s going to have to make an effort to relax, and I’m afraid there’s going to be a lot of stress around here.”
    “Hire him a nurse.”
    She laughed. “I can’t even keep a cleaning lady. Five years of
    marriage and not one has ever done a good enough job . . . according to him, that is. So let’s forget about getting a nurse, because I’ll be spending more time interviewing than he’ll be spending recuperating.”
    Noah knew she spoke the truth. “So what do you want to do?” he
    asked, vaguely fearing something worse than boredom.
    “I was thinking a bar.”
    That caught him by surprise. He thought she had been setting
    him up for a long dinner at whichever Upper East Side bistro was
    currently in vogue among the Park Avenue Trophy Wife set. Per-
    haps the glass of wine early in the afternoon should have been a
    warning to him. “His father’s wife” had, in the course of just a few W H E N T H E S T A R S C O M E O U T
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    hours, surprised him several times: she might have been a mistress, and she might be a