Trying to clear his head after a long day spent with Kendall, Carlos (surprisingly did not hang out with his new skateboarding buddies like he had the first three days of the week), Jo, Katie and Mrs. Knight, James returned to what he dubbed Lucy's Park as it was the spot where they had their talk after the double date. He had been walking around the small pond but decided to take a rest on one of the benches on the path. It was a nice little park with some elderly women feeding some ducks at the other end of the pond.
It really hit him what Lucy had said. If his own girlfriend thought that he was so shallow and vain, which she tried to assure him she did not but he knew better, than what did other people think? Was it so wrong to care about how he looked?
He wasn't like other guys he knew, including his three best friends, including most other Hollywood guys. His hair was so important to him. He had to look just right, dress just right, and smell just right. He wasn't comfortable any other way. Was that so wrong?
He had tried this past week to not think about it. A few days he even wore Kendall's cap instead of fixing his hair. He still couldn't stop thinking about it. Would wearing the cap cause him to go bald earlier? What if he did go bald? Would he wear a toupee? Would he look good without hair? The thoughts drove him crazy. He finally went back to fixing his hair, which he claimed was to look nice for Mama Knight and Katie's arrival, but it was really to keep him from going insane.
Lucy had said there was much more to him than his love of his appearance, but he didn't know. Was she just saying that because she was his girlfriend? His friends often joked about his Cuda obsession and how his hair had to be perfect. They didn't talk about much else, except maybe that he wasn't the brightest bulb on the porch.
He wasn't stupid. No, he wasn't Logan smart and if he took an IQ test he would probably rank in the average range (he thinks, but who knows?), but that wasn't stupid. His knowledge aside from hockey and music was on fashion, hair care, and girls. Those were his passions and he didn't care to learn about much else. That didn't make him stupid.
A duck quack brought him out of his thoughts and as he looked toward the offender he spotted a book sitting on the bench. Picking it up he noticed it was The Holy Bible.
James had never read the Bible. His father was of Jewish heritage but he didn't exactly grow up in a religious home. His family was non-practicing. What he knew of Judaism he learned from his paternal grandparents and that wasn't much. What he did know they did not read the Bible. The Bible was a Christian book.
He flipped the book open to where a bookmark, an Aspen State student ID, lay.
The picture was of a young girl, perhaps eighteen, with long blonde hair and deep blue eyes, the opposite of his girlfriend, Lucy. She was pretty, James had to admit, but he no longer felt the sensation he got when looking at a pretty girl. He smiled knowing it was because his heart was with Lucy.
Fallon Maholm.
Pretty name. He knew he'd at least have to get the ID to her.
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God," James read. This was new to him. Well, he did know that God and the Word were one, but he'd never read The New Testament much less The Gospel of John. He was only very slightly familiar with anything in the Torah, so anything from a religious text outside the Torah was foreign to him. "He was with God," he continued to read.
He quickly closed the book and shook his head. Yes, the Word was God, but the He spoken of? No. James had been taught that he was just another man, not the Messiah. His parents believed Jesus was just another prophet, but that didn't make sense. If he wasn't the Messiah but went around claiming he was he was committing blasphemy. He couldn't just be another prophet.
James rubbed his head. All this thinking was giving him a headache.
He looked back at the ID. This was Fallon's book so maybe she had the answers. But, what were the questions?
"Hey, James," Mrs. Knight greeted him when he came home. The layout of the house to get anywhere from the foyer one had to pass the kitchen. "Dinner will be ready in five minutes."
He sniffed his nose. Smelled like hamburgers.
"Hamburgers and mac & cheese," Mrs. Knight clarified.
James spied a blue box on the counter. Good. After that debacle at the award show he never wanted to see another box of Sharky's again, even if Griffin was somehow involved in the company now. The other boys felt the same way, except Carlos. He credited the stuff for getting him and Alexa together.
"Are you okay?" Mrs. Knight asked placing ten glasses on the counter. "You ran off as soon as we got home and now you're standing there looking lost."
"I'm fine." James patted her head, not sure why he did that, which caused her to scowl, and then made his way toward the living room where Logan and Camille were flipping through channels on the television.
"Logan, do you know a girl named Fallon Maholm?"
"No." Logan looked away from the screen and at James. "Is that a Bible?"
"Yeah, I found it in the park. It belongs to Fallon."
"Why do you think Logan would know her?" Camille asked.
"She left her ASU student ID in the book. Maybe he has a class with her." James shrugged.
"Look her up in the student directory."
"I don't have one."
"It's online aspenstate dot com."
"Oh." James pulled his phone out of his pocket after placing the book on the end table near Camille. He quickly pulled up the website and began searching first for the student directory and then for Fallon Maholm.
As he was searching, the familiar strains of "Big Time Rush" played through his phone. Ah, someone was calling James. Maybe it was Fallon! Maybe she looked James up to get her book back. Wait, she didn't even know James had her book.
"James!" Lucy exclaimed before he had a chance to say hello.
"Lucy!" He exclaimed back. He walked up the stairs so he could have a more private conversation with his girlfriend than in front of Logan and Camille who were trying to watch TV.
"Just finished the music video for 'He Will Be Mine'."
"Does it have to be that one?" James whined.
Most of Lucy's album dealt with her relationship with Kendall. It wasn't that she was obsessed or in love with him. He just gave her great inspiration. James wasn't happy about that and hoped she could find more inspiration in him.
"My producer and I think it'll be a big hit. It has nothing to do with anything else, James."
"OK. OK," he said more to reassure himself than Lucy.
"So, what are you up to?"
"Searching the ASU directory for a girl named Fallon Maholm," he admitted without thinking.
"What? Why? James, why are you searching for a girl's contacts? Is something going on there that I need to know about?" Lucy frantically questioned. James knew beneath her tough exterior was a scared little girl. She hasn't had the easiest relationships so it was only natural for her to think the worst.
"Nothing, nothing, nothing. I found her student ID and want to return it to her."
"Get someone else to do it. Logan's taking classes there. He can do it."
"I need to talk to her." He could slap himself for saying that.
"Why do you need to talk to her?" Lucy asked with a tone of bitterness.
James didn't know how to respond. He wasn't comfortable discussing this issue with the Bible with anyone. He wasn't even sure he was comfortable talking to Fallon about it being that she's a complete stranger, but he had to at least return her ID and book.
"James! If you don't want to tell me anything then I can't talk to you. I'm sorry, but…"
"Lucy, don't you trust me?"
"I—I don't—I. I want to. Just tell me why you need to talk to this girl?"
"I have some questions I'm hoping she can answer," he admitted as little as possible hoping this would satisfy Lucy.
"And just what are these questions?"
"I—I—"
"If you can't tell me how do you expect me to trust you?"
"Because I love you?"
"I love you, too, but if you can't answer me I'm not sure I can trust you."
"Lucy? Lucy?" He looked at his phone. She hung up on him. Oh boy, this was not going well.
Yes, I am Christian. I am not trying to convert anyone to Christianity with this story. This is just the direction I want James to take. Is he going to become Christian? You'll see if you keep reading. I have heard that Maslow attended Hebrew School as a child so he would have had a lot of Jewish education whereas here in my story, Diamond did not, but I made him from a paternal Jewish family just like Maslow.
I'm actually very nervous about this chapter because I don't know how you all will react, but this is where I want to go with the story so that's where I'm going.
