The Rock Star Next Door, a Modern Fairytale (27 page)

“Jack--stop it
.
” Jessie was crying, sobbing so hard she couldn’t catch her breath.

Click.

“Oh God--” Jessie panicked, dropping the phone as hysteria engulfed h
er. “Oh, my God--oh my God--”  S
he sank to the floor
on her knees
, wrestling for the phone with shaking fingers as she tried to re-dial her mother’s line. It was busy, off the hook, a favorite ploy
their mother used. A
fte
r upsetting those about her with her telephone terrorism, Marcie
made it impossible to contact her. Jack shuffled into where Jessie was crouched on the floor, struggling to breath
e
, to make contact with their m
other before she did herself in
as she’d
always
said sh
e wou
ld
.

“
Jessie
.
” Jack knelt beside her. “Get a grip
. Come on
.
” His arms gripped her sho
ulders. He was shaking her
, trying to reason with her. He rose,
pulling her up
by the arms
with him
.
He marched her into the living room and plunked down with her onto the overstuffed sofa.
“Christ, Jess, you’re scaring me, here
.
Calm do
wn, you know she’ll never do it.
She’s been usin
g that
t
hreat since we were kindergarteners,
and has
she ever followed through?
” He drew back, then, looking at her with concern.

“But--but--you--you never
ch
-ch
allenged--
” Jessie stuttered.

“Yeah, I know. I never challen
ged mom
before, but think, Jess,
has there ever been
a time you remember mom
being rushed to the hospital because
she did take all of
her
sleeping pills
like she
always
threatened to do?”

“No.”
Jessie shook her head, “B-b-but Jack--”

“It’s manipulation,
Jess, nothing more. My therapist said
the next time she pulled this
stunt to tell her I was going
to call the
authorities and report her suicide threat.
He says it’s about
turning the tables on her, taking control
away from her. Mom
won’t want the police and the ambulance pulling up to her doo
r at three
in the morning, not to mention, h
ow is she going to explain all this
to dad?”

Jessie pulled her knees up, hugging them as she tried to still
her heart rate. It was useless. T
he adrenaline pumping through her body was making her shake like a leaf in the wind. Her head was starting to ache from raw nerves. Jack’s hand moved back and forth up her back, comforting, in the silence that followed.

The house phone
rang
again. Jessie jumped
. H
er heart did a full lurch. She felt as if she’d been punched in the stomach. “No--no
.
” She sobbed, as Jack hurried to the kitchen
to answer it.

“What?
” His
terse voice c
ommanded. “
Oh--Hi, yeah, she’s right here
.
”

Jack handed her the phone
. Jessie shook her head vehement
ly, whispering ‘no’.

“It’s Lex.” J
ack insisted. He put it on speaker so Jessie could hear his voice.

“
Is everything all right over there? Is Jessie okay
?” Lex’s voice echoed in the room.

“No,
she’s not okay, man.” Jack replied. Jessie put her hand on Jack’s shoulder, and shook her head insistently, begging him not to tell Lex who had just called them.

“
What is it? I’ll be right over
.”

“
A prank call, that’s all.
” 

“
I thought your house phone was unlisted
.”

“I
t is.
Some w
h
ack job
must have got it.
I just happened to pick up t
he same time she did.
Jessie’s shook up. J
ust come over, dude.”

Jack pr
essed the off button
.

“Why did he call s-so l-late?
”
Jessie asked through chattering teeth.

“He
said he woke up feeling you needed him. Now, how cool is that,
h
ey? The guy’s psychic
and
he’s in love with you
.
Oh,
don’t start
.” Jack chided as Jessie
glowe
red at him.
“Everyone
here has some weird
gig going dow
n. Hell,
it’s probably a coping mechanism for the rich and famous
” He waved at the ocean shore
as he spoke.
“It’s Ca
lifornia, they aren’t Baptists or Catholics like back--
”

The dogs punctuated barking stopped him cold. Jack signaled for Jessie to stay put as he
followed their
vicious snarls. Jessie stayed on the sofa
hugging one knee to her chest,
too
shaken and wobbly to move
. It didn’t take long for Lex to find her.

One look
and he was beside her on the sofa and
pulling her into his arms.
“
Jessie.
It’s okay.
I’m here
.
”

Jessie could only tremble. She was
too shaken for words. And how could she explain such
an emotional ordeal? She couldn’t imagine his
mother pulling such stunts to frighten Lex out of his mind in the middle of the night. 

“Jack and I won’t let anyone hurt you.” He soothed as she shivered in his arms.

Not even my mother?
Jessie thought, but couldn’t bring the words to her lips.

“Yeah,” Jack agreed. He stood at the entrance to the kitchen, watching them. “R
elax, it’s cool.” He smiled hopefully at his sister. “I’ll leave you two to sort things out.
”

He went
into the kitchen, out of their line of view on the sofa
.
Within moments, she heard the steady, dete
rmined snuffling. He was doing that
line
he had prepped
, de-stressing, as Jack liked to call it.
She closed her eyes. God, she didn’t have the strength right now to deal with
her brother’s
a
ddiction. She could barely contain the pain in her
heart, much less try to tackle the resonating agony burgeoning up in her twin.

The
small
TV
in the kitchen
roared to life
.
She heard
the steady whir of channels
as Jack
clicked the remote in search of
something
to distract him from the circle of hell they couldn’t escape even in California. She took comfort in knowing
Jack
was
just
a few steps away
listening with his heart, his intuition telling him if his twin sister needed him
. Jessie could sense it
so easily;
his pain, his anger
and
his concern
for her
.

In
that instant it didn’t seem
so common
.
B
illions of other siblings didn’t share
that
peculiar
intuitive
link, only twins.
Yet, it was a
reality between Jack and Jessie. Something special
between them
they had come to take for granted. A psychic occurrence she
accept
ed
as normal in her experience
. Lex’s talk of being reunited soul mates wasn’t
really any different
than the rare
twin sense
she shared
with Jack
.

Jessie
trembled on and off, her body still suffering the effects of the adrenaline coursing through it from the sheer terror of her mother’s threat.

“W
ho was it? A f
an?” His gentled
voice caressed her ear.

Jessie didn’t answer. She buried her face in the soft, silk
folds of his bathrobe.

Bathrobe?
She pulled back slightly. Yes, his legs were bare, as if he’d jumped from the bed and co
me to her. “Y-you aren’t d-d-dressed.
” She made a sweeping gesture at his attire in a frustrated attempt to communicate what her lips failed to convey.

“Oh, Jessie
.
” He hugged her tighter against him, nestling his head on t
op of hers. “You’re so scared you’re stuttering.
Ja
ck’s in the kitchen, Steve’s upstairs
and I’m
right
here. No one can get to you, honey.
And n
o one can get into the Malibu Colony
without a guest pass or a community ID
, it’s secure.”

“H-h-how . . . how d-did you kn-kn-know?”

“
I
just sensed
you needed me.
Intuition.
Like in the old
Star Wars
movies.
Luke
and Leia
had a psychic link.
”

“
Yeah, but t
hey were twins.
Jack and I have that same gift.
”

“
Yes. Emotional and psychic bonds aren’t limited to twins. Lots of people have them. Meditation helps to strengthen and focus that energy.
” Lex corrected.
“I was dreaming you were being
chased through the dar
kness by some menacing force
.” The back of his hand stroked her cheek as he s
poke. “I know, it sounds very strange on the surface
,
like a B grade Sci-Fi movie. All I know is
I had
this gut feeling when I awoke. I saw the light on over here
and decided to call you.”

“You were right.” Jessie snug
gled into his comforting frame.
She couldn’t deny the deep bond between them, a bond
too power
ful for a man and woman who barely kne
w each other.
She didn’t understand all this past life stuff he talked about. It was part of his religious belief system, his reality. She didn’t know if she believed it, but she couldn’t deny the uncanny sense of e
ase
she felt with him, a feeling of familiarity, as if they had been friends forever, despite having met hardly a month ago.
And yet, did that mean they were lovers in a past life or did it merely mean they were compatible?

“Tell me who it is
. We’ll get a restraining ord
er and hire security
. T
his kind of thing happens
frequently in Tinsel town.
We’re used to it. We have resources to call upon to deal with it when it happens.”

“I can’t.” Jessie murmured. “You’d never believe me.” If not for Jack’s presence, the sharing of their nightmarish existence with their mother, she’d believe it was all i
n her head, that she was
bringing it all
up
on
herself. Jack
was
the only other witness to their mother’s frig
htening emotional tirades.

Lex squeezed her tighter, sensing the shiver that had gone through her. “Just tell me who
the guy is and we can figure out how he found
your home phone number.”

The
land line
phone rang, sending shards of terror back into Jessie’s heart. Lex grabbed for it. “NOoo
.
” Jessie clutched his arm with both hands, preventing him from answering it.

It rang a second time, then a third, each ring stabbing through her consciousness.

“Stop calling here
.
” Jack’s voice broke the tense silence from the opened portal of the next room.
“I mean it. This is harassment and telephone stalking. I’ll call the cops
if you c
all
here
again, understand?
Now fuck off
!
”