Love Out Loud

by Aimee Salter

  Crash is mine for real, now.

  I pull another dress from the hanger and toss it into the suitcase. My phone buzzes again and I smile. But this time it’s Tommy.

  Big night. You guys planning

  on texting your best friend

  anytime soon? You okay?

  Even with no one else to see, I can feel my cheeks heat.

  With a mental note to tell Crash to stop talking to Tommy about private stuff, I type I’M FINE and leave it at that.

  But there’s a goofy smile on my face.

  Two hours later I haven’t heard from Crash, but I’m telling myself it’s because he’s trying to sort out something big so we can be together.

  I’m at the little breakfast table in the nook at the end of the kitchen with a steaming cup of coffee that Holly brought back after she got my text that I was home.

  She’s smiling a lot, but her forehead’s pinched. She’s nervous.

  “I want this for you, Kelly. I really do,” she says, then takes another sip from her mug. “But you know Dan’ll fight this, right? You’re not even seventeen yet. He’ll try to talk you out of it. I mean, under any other circumstances, I’d be tying you up to keep you away from this kind of hair-brained idea.”

  “But—”

  She raises her hand to stall me. “Crash already talked to me. He’s serious about this. I could tell. That’s the reason I’m thinking it’s better for you than staying here.” She looks around at our living room, her nose wrinkling. “This place feels like a morgue. I know what Dan is. What he did to my sister—”

  “He never hit her. Or me.”

  Holly looks at me sadly. “He didn’t have to. My sister shrunk in on herself from the anxiety of trying to keep him happy. And what about your anxiety? Kelly, I why do you insist on staying with him? I don’t want to see that happen to you.”

  “It won’t. I really want to be here, Holly.”

  She picks at her nails. “Because of Crash, right? Well, I did my research.” I hold my breath. “I can sign the approval for your marriage license without Dan. It only requires one guardian. There’s nothing he can do about it.”

  I leap up, ignoring my complaining muscles, and throw myself around the table and almost into her lap as I hug her.

  She laughs and squeezes me back.

  “Thank you.”

  “You know you don’t have to do this if it’s only to get away from Dan? The offer to come live with me stands. You know that, right?”

  “No! No, the tears are happy!” I sniff. “I just can’t believe this is happening. Everything’s been so sad.” Since Mom died it feels like I’ve walked from one kind of despair to another. And Dan’s added to it. I know he cares about me, that he wants to see me “stay healthy” as he puts it. But honestly, he seems mainly concerned with what other people think of me.

  I’m so sick of being nervous all the time. Of constantly wondering what’ll piss him off. Of fearing to lose the tiny pieces of freedom I have. I need space. And Crash can make that happen.

  Gosh, I love him.

  “Look at you,” Holly says sadly, using one finger to trace a flyaway piece of hair off my cheek. “You’re in love.” She smiles, but her eyes pool.

  “Don’t cry! That’ll make me cry more!”

  “I just know how happy your mom would be. She thought Crash was good for you. Mostly. She wanted things to work. She was afraid when you two got together so young it wouldn’t last.”

  My face crumples. I don’t want to cry today! I want to be happy. But losing Mom and having to do all this without her has sucked.

  Then Holly clears her throat. “You slept with him last night, right?”

  My mouth drops open. Even though I know Holly’s really different to my mom, thinks differently about this stuff, there’s something in me that’s terrified of admitting that.

  “I—” I break off.

  “Was it okay? Are you okay?”

  I examine her. There’s no judgment. Only concern. “Yes.” I bite my lip. “It was amazing.”

  Holly throws her arms around me. “I’m so glad!” Then she holds me at arms-length. “I talked to him about taking responsibility for safety. That you wouldn’t understand all that stuff. Did he—”

  “Holly. Yes. Geez.” I can feel my face go up in flames. “He’s always careful with me. About everything,” I say, only just now realizing that it’s true.

  It’s why I feel safe with him. He always thinks about how things might affect me and tries to prepare me.

  Holly pulls me in. “Grab your purse,” she says. “I made an appointment with Dr. Browne to get you on the pill. Then we’ll get ice cream.”

  “But Crash—”

  “Screw, Crash—figuratively,” she says with a grin. “I’m kidnapping you for a couple hours. Then he can have you back. He’s working anyway, right?”

  “Yeah.” I check my phone again. Still nothing new. It makes my stomach cold. But I know he’s just busy. He’ll call. Or text. Like Holly said, it’s only a couple hours. “Okay. I’ll go get my purse. We can take his car. It’s really cool.”

  Holly claps her hands and squeals like she’s twelve.

  I try to keep it together. But I can’t resist a little skip down the hallway on my way to my room.

  By four o’clock that afternoon I’ve stopped answering Tommy’s teasing texts because it’s clear he thinks me and Crash are together—so what’s Crash doing that’s so important if Tommy isn’t there?

  I keep telling myself everything’s fine, but I’m standing in the middle of my room, chewing on my lip, staring at my phone, trying to compose a message to Crash that won’t sound desperate or insecure, but also let him know I need to understand what’s going on.

  The suitcase is at my feet, full to bursting with clothes and books and stuff—including my ancient laptop. My school bag’s there too, though I’m not sure I’ll need it. School starts in three weeks. The tour is next week.

  It’s impossible to picture myself on a national band tour. But I also can’t imagine junior year with Crash travelling and always away.

  I wonder where I’ll be in a month.

  I look at the phone again and tap into the message app. I find his smiling face and start a new message.

  Everything okay? I type. But before I can press send the phone lights up with Crash’s face.

  Crash Calling.

  Accept or Decline.

  I leap to accept the call so fast I fumble and almost drop the phone on the floor.

  “H-hello?” I squeak into it.

  “Hey.” Crash’s voice is low, hard. Dead.

  My stomach freezes. “What’s wrong?”

  The line hums, waiting for his answer. The chill moves from my gut, towards my heart. My throat.

  “It’s bad,” he says. “Amber says the label wants to kick Tommy off the tour and just use studio musicians. Focus marketing on me.”

  “What?!” All my fears about me and Crash go out the window. “You can’t let them—”

  “I’m not! But there’s a lot I have to do to convince them to keep him. You need to come over here,” he says.

  “We’ll get the stuff in the car and come—”

  “No!”

  I stop breathing.

  “Sorry.” I hear the rustle of him rubbing his stubbled face with his free hand. “It’s been a helluva day. I just meant we’re in a hurry. Leave your suitcase and stuff and come now. We can deal with the rest of the stuff later.”

  Deal with it? Not pick it up?

  I tell myself not to be neurotic. That he’s clearly stressed and probably not thinking about his words. But he sounds so cold. So distant.

  “Okay?” I say in a small voice.

  He doesn’t seem to notice. “See you soon,” he says, in a voice that sounds like he can’t think of anything worse.

  Holly could tell something was wrong when I ran out of the house throwing excuses over my shoulder. But she let me go and said she’d work o
n getting some more of my stuff boxed up. I thanked her as I ran.

  I reach Crash’s house faster than I should have.

  He needs help. That’s all. Something’s happening in the band and he needs my support.

  I hit the little garage-door-type clicker on the visor of his car and the big gates swing open ahead of me.

  When I get upstairs I call his name. He doesn’t answer, so I kind of peek into rooms as I go, heading for the kitchen and the main living room.

  He’s standing next to the breakfast bar, staring out the big sliding door onto to the deck outside, the lawn and the trees. He’s got one hand in his pockets. And he’s smoking with the other.

  He hasn’t smoked in almost two years. He was afraid it would kill his voice.

  “Crash? What are you—?”

  He tenses, stamping the cigarette out in a bowl on the breakfast bar.

  I stop dead, still ten feet from him. “What’s wrong?”

  Brushing his hands like he’s got ash on them talks to the carpet. “We need to talk.”

  “Crash, look at me.”

  He gives a tiny shake of his head. I freeze. I don’t know what happened. I don’t know why. But I know what he’s about to do.

  Last night flashes through my head and makes my heart beat faster, and my body thrum. Then it all tightens into knots and steel and death.

  “Tell me,” I say, mentally cursing the tears already clouding my vision.

  Crash looks at the breakfast bar. Plays with the edge of it, his black thumbnail flicking on it like he’s trying to get something off it. “Amber had some news.”

  “I don’t want to hear about Amber. What’s going on with you. Why won’t you look at me?”

  He scowls. “If you’ll let me get a word in, I’ll tell you.”

  I take a step back. Then another. Certainty wars with hope. He needs to speak so I know, without a doubt, what I’m dealing with.

  I fold my arms when he still doesn’t talk, and push my lips together, and wait. If he’s gonna be a jackass, he can swim in his own stink.

  I wait. And I ache. Silently pleading with him, with God, or whoever, to make my instincts wrong. But deep down, I know I’m not. I put iron in my spine so he won’t see me fall apart.

  He knows he was rude. His Adam’s apple bobs and the motion makes me ache for him. He’s in pain. He’s angry. He’s afraid. Why? What did Amber tell him? Are they saying I can’t go on the tour?

  “The label wants to fire Tommy because the fans aren’t connecting with him,” he says in a black voice. My heart breaks for my friend. “I fixed it.” Crash’s tone is dark. “They’ll keep him. But it’ll be a hard tour. There are lots of logistics and because some dates are sold out, lots of press. Amber told me—” his chest jumps convulsively. “She said there’s no room in the schedule. That we’ll only have time work and sleep. No time for people, or school, or anything. That I need to give up on the idea of having you there.”

  The line in my heart that had been shivering, threatening to break, snaps in two.

  At that moment I hate him.

  “You’re breaking up with me.” It’s not a question.

  His eyes find mine but swing away again before I can hold them. He turns to face the living room, arms folded. “It’s just while we’re on tour.”

  I choke on the taste of his lie. “How long is the tour?”

  His lips get thin. “The last show is next May, I think.”

  “That’s almost a year!”

  A year without him. After all those lies about forever and marry me and after I gave myself—

  “What are they making you do?” It must be awful if he doesn’t want me there to see it.

  “Nothing. I’ll be working hard. I had to agree to a bunch of publicity shit.”

  “Look at me.”

  His lips tighten, but after a second he does.

  “Is this Tommy thing true? Or was all this just to get me in bed with you?”

  “What?! No!” It’s the first time there’s been any real emotion in his voice, and it’s anger. He’s glaring at me now. “I didn’t know any of this last night. I didn’t know I’d have to—” He breaks off, wrenches his gaze away from me.

  “Have to what?”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  “Of course it matters! You’re breaking up with me! Unless you’re lying. Did you have Amber call you so you’d have a reason to get rid of me? And now it’s awkward as hell because you don’t want me following you around.”

  “Kelly—”

  “You must have been so bored last night.” I don’t really think that’s what’s going on, but I’m desperate. I need to push him. Make him see what he’s doing. Make him tell me what’s really happening—but the words are harder to say than I expected. I have to drop my face into my hands as pain splits me in half.

  Dan’s been telling me for years, guys only think with one head at a time.

  “Kelly, no. That isn’t it.” There’s a pleading in his voice that makes me look up. He has come close enough to touch. But his hands are fisted at his sides.

  Why would he stop himself reaching out? Does he think I don’t love him?

  “Crash, please don’t do this.” I throw myself at his chest, burying my face in his collarbone and grip his waist. He stumbles back half a step.

  I grab his shirt and my tears wet his chest. But he doesn’t touch me.

  “It’s for the best.”

  “What is wrong with you?! Why would you do this?” I slap his chest, then close my fist and slam on it like I would on a door. “Why? Crash?” I’m pathetic. I’m panicking.

  “Kelly—”

  “Tell me!” I yell right in his face, ready to pound on him, force him to answer. His hands fly up to grab my wrists and keep me from hitting him again.

  I struggle, try to hit him anyway. He doesn’t hurt me. Just stops me from hitting him. He won’t look at me. His face is blank. The warmth of his skin on mine is the best feeling in the world and a blistering burn.

  “Crash, please.” I’m still struggling to reach for him. My fingers are open, my palms want to find his chest, his neck, his cheek.

  But he just waits me out.

  I’m shameless. Desperate. Worthless. “You’re breaking me.”

  He doesn’t respond.

  I try to sink into his chest. But he takes an abrupt step back, then another, his expression wild. Terrified. I don’t know what to do.

  Why would Crash be afraid of me?

  But I never get the answer. No matter how I plead, he just shakes his head. And when I stop asking, stand there crying because I’m at a loss. I can’t stand the idea of walking away, knowing when I do, that’s it. Done. Over.

  In the end, he takes the final step.

  “It’s better if we wait until you’re older,” he says in that dead voice. “Y-you finish school. We’ll go on tour. Then we can talk.”

  “Why are you lying to me?”

  “Because I need you to leave and it seems like the only way to get you out of here.”

  The words slice me open like a whip-crack. I stumble back, turn, almost fall, save myself by putting a hand to the wall. See the ring glinting on my finger and make a strangled noise. Yank it off, throw it at him. It bounces off his chest to clatter on the tiles.

  “I won’t put you through anymore. G-goodbye, Crash.” Somehow have the presence of mind to check that I’ve got my purse—it’s still on my shoulder. How can that be? I stumble towards the door, choking on my own sobs.

  Even after all that, a part of me thinks he’ll run after me.

  But he doesn’t.

  I get to the entryway, digging through my purse to find my phone, which is hard to do through tears. Then I’m outside and walking down the path from the first-floor door, down to the driveway level. I quick-dial Holly, and I’m crying so hard she can barely understand me.

  “Y-you have to c-come get me. C-Crash b-broke up with m-me.”

  Now that I
’m away from him, I can’t stand being on this property. I hit the button to open the gates, run through it, and half a block down the road before I stop, tears sliding down my cheeks as I realize anyone could see me.

  I find a little knot of bushes at the base of a tree near the sidewalk and pray whoever owns it doesn’t have security cameras as I wedge myself next to the trunk to wait for Holly to arrive.

  Because if anyone sees me, they’ll stop.

  Then what will I say?

  What just happened?

  Chapter Nineteen

  August, Last Year

  Crash

  I’m sitting on the couch, staring at Kelly’s ring when Tommy walks in, buzzing. I hurry to shove it in my pocket and pretend I’m examining my hands instead.

  “Isn’t this insane?!” Tommy booms, coming in from the deck. His hair’s wild—he must have had the window open in his truck.

  “That’s one word for it.”

  “Amber just called me, she’s on her way over. This is nuts! Have you told Kelly?”

  “Yes.”

  There’s a moment’s hesitation, then his boots show up on the carpet in front of me.

  “What’s wrong, bro?” Tommy asks.

  I’d planned to tell him the truth about Amber’s threat to his future. Tell him to watch out for her. But then I realize if I tell him what happened and that I fixed it, he’ll want to know how.

  And then we’re both up shit creek.

  So I swallow the lump in my throat and tell him the part that will stop further questions. “Kelly broke up with me.”

  “What?!”

  I have to handle this right or he’ll take off to confront her. “I-I need to talk to you, dude. She told me not to tell you until we left. She didn’t want you mad.” Filthy Judas.

  Tommy doesn’t respond, which is worse than swearing or yelling. It means he’s ready to hurt someone.

  “Please, Tom.” He must hear my desperation because he sits down.

  “Why?” He’s struggling to stay calm.

  That makes two of us. “Things got weird. Amber made her leave because we had to talk about the tour, and I think last night freaked her out. But she turned on me, dude.” Lies, lies, lies. All lies. My hands shake. “She’s not coming on tour.”