Page 106 of Falling Like Stars

“You left me behind, that’s why! All those offers you were getting at the end of Godsent. All those projects you shot between seasons when I got nothing. You could barely make it to set for our show, and it meant everything to me! And then you canceled it. You just shut the whole thing down.”

“The hell…? I didn’t shut anything down. We talked about it. The show was getting stale and old.”

“To you, maybe,” she says tearfully. “But it was all I had.”

“Eva…” I run a hand through my hair. “We had that meeting with Rob, and he agreed it was time to move on. You were there—”

“What was I supposed to say?” she demands, furiously wiping up the spilled milk. “Keep it going for me, pretty please? You were supposed to stand up for me. You were supposed to tell Rob, because he would have done a hundred seasons if the great Zachary Butler asked him.”

“Eva, I can’t read your mind. And by that time, you and I had been falling apart for years. We weren’t talking, and you were just so fucking angry all the time—”

“Oh sure, I was angry all the time.” She hurls the milk carton into the trash. “Yes, everything was always my fault. My career was circling the drain, while yours kept skyrocketing up, and you never did one goddamn thing to help.”

“Why would I? You were fucking abusive, Eva. You were—”

“Abusive? Give me a fucking break, Zachary. I was not abusive.”

“No? Slapping, throwing shit at me, clawing at my face, and then there’s you trying to fuck me while I’m drunk out of my mind.”

She crosses her arms. “So?”

“So?”

“Why am I always the bad guy?” she shrieks suddenly. “You’re America’s sweetheart, and I’m the bitch. It’s not fair. You’re the one who kicked me out of the house after Oscar night.”

I scrub my face and set my jaw, trying to regain my composure. “What happened? Tell me everything.”

She scoffs. “There’s nothing to tell. You were pathetically drunk. I thought you’d passed out, but then suddenly you’re lurching for the stairs, to our bedroom where I was staying.”

“Probably because that’s what I’d done a thousand times.”

She continues as if she hadn’t heard me. “I helped you up the stairs and all the while you’re talking about her. Rowan. Whining about how sorry you were. To her, not me. And that was so unfair. I’d put in the work, for six years, and some random production assistant reaps the rewards?”

I clench my jaw. “What did you do, Eva?”

“Oh my God, what is the big deal? We’ve had sex a million times. What’s one more? And I wanted to rekindle us. We’re so good on the red carpet and you know it. That’s why you took me to the Oscars, isn’t it? You know we’re a real Hollywood couple, not like you and that Rowan—”

“Are you insane? I took you because you showed up in Alaska, crying about your career. I did it as a favor to you.”

“I don’t need your pity—”

“No, but you needed some leverage, is that it? So, you…what? Tried to get me to have sex with you?”

“Oh, calm down. Nothing happened. You couldn’t get it up.” She reads my face and snorts. “Don’t act all shocked. You’re a guy. Guys always want sex.”

“Jesus fucking Christ, do you hear yourself? And let’s pretend for a second that’s even remotely true. You and I had been fighting. You attacked me. You threw shit at my head and scratched up my face. What part of that little exchange made you think I wanted to sleep with you?”

“God, Zachary, you are so dramatic,” she says with a roll of her eyes. “First of all, I did not scratch up your face. I gave you a couple of nicks. No big deal.”

No big deal. She said that a lot after our fights, I realize now, and I adopted it as my fucking motto.

“Secondly,” she continues, “you were going to toss me to the curb as soon as the sun was up. I got scared, okay? Scared of being on my own since you obviously weren’t going to take care of me. But Rob is doing the spinoff so it’s fine. I’m good now.”

“You’re good now,” I repeat, my voice trembling with barely restrained fury. “What does that mean? So, you’re not pregnant? Give me a straight fucking answer.”

She makes a face as if I were crazy. “I never said I was pregnant. I was shopping for my friend’s baby shower when I made that Instagram post.”

“Bullshit. You knew for a goddamn fact what everyone would take that post to mean. What I would take it to mean…”

---