Every Little Piece of Me

by Amy Jones

“We’re public property,” Ava said. “People think our stories belong to them.”

  Mags looked down at the paper, thinking about how many people had already read it, how many more people were now claiming her story for themselves. A scream caught in her throat, a scream that was still echoing inside her, gaining momentum the longer it stayed trapped.

  “This is it,” Mags said now, standing in front of a brick house, Christmas lights still twinkling even though it was almost March, snow piled in perfect snowblower lines on either side of a driveway. The Christmas lights were on but the house was dark. No car in the driveway, no shadows moving anywhere. “What do we do now?” she asked. She still had the newspaper in her hand, hadn’t let it go the whole time. She wanted to stuff it down his throat. She wanted to make him choke on it.

  “We ring the bell,” Ava said. “We ring the bell.” But she just stood there, staring.

  Finally, Mags pressed the doorbell. They waited, but no one came. “Come on,” she said. “Where are you, Jack?”

  They tried the door, but it was locked. Then they made their way around to the back door and tried that too. Nothing. No signs of life anywhere. Clearly, neither of them had thought this through at all.

  “There’s got to be a way in. Even if there’s an alarm, we can beat it.” Mags felt reckless, invincible. They could outrun an alarm. They could outrun the police. They could outrun anything.

  Ava took a step back. “You want to break in? And do what?”

  “I don’t know!” Mags began pounding on the door. “All I know is we’re in fucking Scarborough and I am really fucking angry and I am not going back until I do something.”

  Ava bit her lip. Then she turned and started walking through the garden, focusing on the ground. Before Mags could say anything, Ava had picked up a rock and smashed it through the window of the back door. Mags braced for an alarm, but nothing came. Nothing but silence and a dog barking off in the distance. Ava reached through the opening, unlocked the door, and walked into the back porch.

  Mags followed her. “What now?” she whispered.

  “Let’s find his office,” Ava said. “That’s a good place to start.”

  They walked through the house in the dark. It was a strange thrill, to be inside someone else’s home when you weren’t supposed to be. It made Mags want to go through his cupboards, see what she could steal, just for the sake of stealing it. They felt their way along the hallway until they got to what looked like it could be Jack’s study. Ava flicked on the lights. Behind his desk, there was a picture on the wall of Mags, in the middle of a performance, her mouth open, her face dripping with sweat. She knew it was probably a media photo, but in that moment, Mags felt Jack Francis had taken the last piece of her soul.

  As she took in the rest of the room, she realized there were similar pictures lining the walls, all of different female musicians, each captured mid-performance in that moment of pure, exultant joy that Mags knew so well, when they were giving all of themselves to the music, to the audience, when they were at their most vulnerable, their most open. Of course, she hadn’t been the first. And she was certain that she wouldn’t be the last. Jack Francis would keep getting published, and so would all the others—the ones with their names at the tops of the mastheads and captioned under the photographs, the ones in control. They would move on to the next bright young thing and chip away at her self-worth until she came to believe what they believed about her—that she was nothing more than tits and ass and a smile.

  A wildfire of rage swept through her, obliterating everything in its wake. “Fuck this,” Mags said, and ripped the picture off the wall, throwing it on the floor in the middle of the room. Then she knocked everything off the desk, including his computer, smashing it to the floor. She started going through drawers, pulling out notebooks, boxes of papers, memory sticks, and throwing them all into the pile, building it higher and higher toward the ceiling like a funeral pyre for Jack Francis’s career.

  “Here,” said Ava, throwing a stack of papers on the pile. “These were from that file cabinet over there.”

  Soon, they had a looming stack of papers in the centre of his office that was almost as tall as Mags and Ava. One man’s life’s work, smugly telling other people’s stories as though they were his to exploit however he wanted. The thought of it made her sick.

  “You know what the worst thing is? I do remember,” Mags said, staring at the pile, her brain suddenly clear, pin-sharp and focused. “I remember the show he’s talking about in the article. There was blood on my scarf from when Sam hurt himself falling down the stairs, and I couldn’t stand to look at it. Couldn’t stand to have it on me. So I threw it away. I’m tired, Ava,” she said. “I’m just really, really tired.” She gazed down at her hands, which were covered in newsprint. How easily these words could smudge, she thought. How easily they gave the illusion of disappearing.

  “What do we do now?” Ava asked.

  Mags didn’t say anything as she pulled a Zippo out of her pocket and struck the flint.

  “Wait,” said Ava.

  Mags’s hand vibrated with tension, the flame dancing in front of her eyes. “Don’t try to stop me,” she said.

  “Of course not,” said Ava. From the wall, she pulled down a piece of fabric that Mags immediately recognized as her scarf. “I just thought you should add this.”

  Mags took the scarf and tossed it on the pile. For a moment, she hesitated. Something felt off, like even fire wasn’t enough.

  Mags moved the flame of her Zippo back and forth, her eyes trailing behind. Suddenly, she felt a vibration in the back pocket of her jeans. Sam’s phone. She was sure she had turned it off. But when she reached back and pulled it out, the screen was glowing and open to the video camera.

  Mags smiled. She knew he wouldn’t be subtle.

  She pressed record. Then she tossed the Zippo on the pile.

  burn it all down

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  Published on February 22, 2015

  You want to watch us set ourselves on fire.

  We’re not going to do that anymore.

  It’s your turn, motherfuckers.

  —Mags and Ava

  Comments have been disabled for this video

  Ava

  Monday, 12:34 a.m.

  The plane back to Halifax had been late, and by the time Ava had convinced the woman at the Hertz desk to rent her a car, it was already past 10 p.m. She hadn’t driven since she had gotten her licence in Season 4, Episode 14, “Tell It to My Hart,” and the roads were slippery after a warm spell followed by a deep freeze, so she drove slowly and carefully and didn’t get to the B&B until after midnight.

  She knew she didn’t have much time.

  The lights were off in the front of the house, but when she stepped up onto the porch she could see a glow coming from somewhere down the long hall, hear the faint sound of music wafting through an open window into the winter night. The front door was unlocked, so she stepped inside, following the light and sound.

  David and Bryce were in the kitchen. David was making pancakes—“Pancakes at Midnight,” they used to call it back when they lived in New York—dropping batter in a pan and then topping it with banana slices as the butter sizzled around the edges. Bryce stood next to him, phone clutched in his hand, his shoulders slumped, his eyes downcast. She couldn’t hear what he was saying, but when he was finished, David stared at him a moment before pulling him close, kissing his forehead.

  “Hey,” a voice said behind her. She turned to find Val standing in the hallway, in bare feet and pajama pants, a pair of headphones hanging around his neck. “You came home.”

  “Yeah,” Ava said softly. “So did you.”

  Val shrugged, grinning. “You know what they say.”

  “Don’t,” said Ava, raising an eyebrow, a smile playing on her lips. “Don’t you dare.”

 
“Trust me, I wouldn’t dream of it.”

  A peel of laughter came from the kitchen, piercing the silence of the house. They both turned to watch Bryce and David, who were now sitting at the table, eating the pancakes. “They look so old,” Ava said.

  “Well, you’re not twelve anymore either.” Val paused. “She’s upstairs, you know.”

  “I figured.” She turned back around to look at Val. She wanted to say something to him, to tell him how much he meant to her, to fill in all those gaps in every conversation they’d ever had. But he had his headphones back on, his eyes focused somewhere else, and Ava realized it didn’t matter. She didn’t need to fill in the gaps with words. With family, they filled in with something else.

  She moved toward the stairs, tiptoeing down the creaky hallway to the staff door. She had no idea if the B&B was actually running, if there were any guests there, real or pretend, but she didn’t want to find out. Finally, she reached Eden’s room. The door was ajar, and Ava could see Eden sitting on her bed, propped up with pillows, a book in her hand. When she closed her eyes she saw Mags’s face, her eyes reflecting the glow of the flames licking the ceiling, her lips parted in a soft smile as black flakes of ash fell around her hair like snow.

  Ava took a deep breath. Then she knocked gently on the door and went inside.

  Acknowledgements

  First and foremost, thank you to my editor, Anita Chong. I honestly don’t think I will ever be able to properly express how much your support means to me and how much you have helped me grow, both as a writer and a human being.

  I’m grateful to the extraordinary team who have helped make the book you’re holding possible: my agent, Chris Bucci; my publicist, Ruta Liormonas; Jared Bland, Joe Lee, Kimberlee Hesas, Erin Kelly, and the rest of the team at M&S; as well as Kelly Hill, Gemma Wain, Heather Sangster, Tyson Erb, and Ali Eisner.

  Also huge thank yous to Andrew F. Sullivan, Naben Ruthnum, Rudrapriya Rathore, Kris Bertin, Ashley MacCuish, Kevin Hardcastle, Jenna Illies, Kirsti Salmi, Sarah Ramsey, Nancy Jo Cullen, Peter and Natalie Smyk, Jeff Nichols, Laura Hanson, Tova Rosenberg, Jen Davidson, Jess Taylor, Taslim Alani-Verjee, Matthew J. Trafford, Trevor Corkum, Chantal Mittag, the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council, the Joneses, the Sullivans, and, of course, Iggy.

  Discussion Questions for Every Little Piece of Me

  1. The novel weaves together the compelling stories of two wilful young women who are often forced to conform to other people’s rules at great personal cost. In what ways is Every Little Piece of Me engaging with current conversations about what it means to be a woman in the world?

  2. How did the shift in time between the book’s prologue and the first chapter affect your reading experience? Did you make any assumptions at the beginning of the novel that were later overturned? Were there moments that surprised you in the trajectories of the characters?

  3. In the opening chapters, David and Bryce seem like loving, doting parents. But once they sign on for Home Is Where the Hart Is without the consent of Ava, Val, and Eden, their role in their children’s lives quickly begins to shift. What motivates David and Bryce as parents? What responsibility do they bear for the people Eden, Val, and Ava become in their teenage years?

  4. Mags is an orphan who, after falling out with her sister, Frankie, finds a tenuous home with Sam, whose own parents are far removed. Through her involvement with Sam, Mags becomes part of another “family” unit—the band. What parallels can be drawn between the relationships within the band and the sibling relationships depicted in the narrative? Which scenes in particular suggest similarities or points of divergence?

  5. Antonio is an adult and Ava is in her early teens when they first meet, and he has a powerful influence on her life and career. Yet Ava often defies Antonio, and she is not without agency in the events that unfold between them. Is Ava a victim of Antonio’s? Why or why not?

  6. The symbol of the deer, or the hart, threads throughout the novel. What does the hart represent? What do Mags’s encounters with the deer, in the van and during the rainstorm, portend?

  7. Ava and Eden play fictionalized versions of themselves on television. For Mags, singing is a transcendent experience, and when she’s on stage she’s “nowhere and everywhere all at once.” All three women have complicated responses to the public attention they receive from their success. Describe their respective relationships with fame. Also, given what we know about Sam, Paul, Zac, Val, David, and Bryce, what distinctions is the novel making between the effects of fame on men versus on women?

  8. Ava initially resists participating in Home Is Where the Hart Is, and then feels resentment and envy at Eden’s burgeoning fame when she plays by the rules of reality television. Through Mags’s involvement with the band, she quite literally finds her voice; and yet, as the front woman of Align Above, Mags struggles to be truly seen by the public and by her fellow bandmates. At different times in the narrative, both Ava and Mags find themselves unwilling participants in the stories that are being told about them. Are their perceptions of themselves as such accurate? Why or why not?

  9. How do social media feeds, email memos, and other online content function in the book? If these voices are like a twenty-first-century Greek Chorus, what are they saying about the fears, hopes, and judgments of the average person?

  10. In their own ways, both Ava and Mags become influencers. What has the greatest influence over Ava and Mags, respectively? How do external forces shape their stories?

  11. Mags is in the throes of grief when Jack Francis interviews her. How does the narrator’s description of the interview differ from the account in the National Chronicle article? What are the similarities in the dynamic between Mags and Jack and that between Ava and Antonio?

  12. Jack Francis and his article are a microcosm of the larger societal forces that have generated Mags’s and Ava’s particular notoriety. Arguably, Mags intends their visit to Jack Francis’s house to be empowering. How did you react to what they discover in his office and their response to it? What are the possible outcomes to their radical act?

  13. The last social media post in the book is authored by Mags and Ava. What is suggested by their video post, and by their disabling of the comments function?

  14. Near the end of the novel, Mags and Ava are completely isolated from their families—blood relations or otherwise. What do they learn from each other about being sisters, and about being themselves?

  15. What do you think Ava is planning to say to Eden at the conclusion of the book, and what do you imagine Eden would say in response?

  16. What does the future hold for Mags and Ava? In the last chapter, why does Ava know that “she doesn’t have much time”? What do you think is her final destination?