30
DREW
I’ve lost count of the number of times Six has tried to hug me between leaving the trail and boarding this plane. He’s constitutionally incapable of believing he isn’t forgiven. I might have been able to put up with it all if I hadn’t seen my toiletry kit dumped out on the bathroom counter, my inhaler clearly visible.
I cried then, but my tears weren’t over him. I’ve always known what he is and what he is not, and any hope we had of a relationship died days ago. I cried because of me, because I’m fucked up enough to have put up with it all. And because somewhere in the world, Josh will continue to exist without me—big, beautiful, endlessly protective—and I’m the piece of shit who will never deserve him.
“What would you like to do tonight?” Six asks, tucking a strand of hair back from my face. I want to jerk away from him. I want to ask the airline attendant for a different seat. It’s only for Beth’s sake that I don’t, but I’m not sure how to keep up this charade through the final night of the trip.
“I think your parents made a reservation for dinner,” I reply. “And they want to do that sunset thing at the hotel.”
He groans. “Jesus, again?” As if the sunset is like Mount Rushmore, something you only need to see once. “We can do our own thing.”
“That would be kind of shitty to your parents,” I reply. “They probably want everyone together on the last night.”
He snorts. “Right. They want everyone together so my father can sit there and talk only to Josh? Hard pass.”
That chip he has on his shoulder, I wonder if he even means what he says anymore, or if it’s just a convenient way to blame someone else for his failings. “I’m staying with your parents,” I reply. “You can do what you want.”
And then my gaze moves past him to Josh, sitting alone across the aisle from us. He’s got his laptop out, feverishly typing.
He’s just…lovely. How did I never notice that flush to his cheeks, the way his tongue taps his lip when he’s deep in thought?
Or those hands. Jesus. Those big hands, calloused from doing God knows what and the tendons in his forearms that move as he types.
Ah, except you did notice, I think. You always noticed and you hated yourself for it while pretending it was him you hated instead.
We arrive in Oahu, grab our bags and walk out to the van waiting to take us to the hotel. Six, chatting amiably with our driver, starts to take the front seat.
“For the thousandth time,” Josh says between his teeth, “she gets carsick.”
This is what it’s like, I think, when someone actually cares about you. They remember you get carsick. They worry about your inhaler.
He catches my gaze and for a moment our eyes lock, and it’s like that moment on Kalalau Beach all over again. When I saw everything he was and he saw me back.
And tomorrow, it all comes to an end.
We check into the same rooms we had before. Six tries to pull me in for yet another hug and I push him away. “Please just stop,” I tell him and he stomps out of the room, irritated with me.
I open my suitcase but most of my nice clothes are looking rumpled and worse for wear. On a whim, I call downstairs and get them to deliver that white dress Josh and I saw in the window. For just this one night, I want to be that other girl, the one I might have been if my entire life had been different.
Once I’ve showered, I don the crisp white cotton dress—a sleeveless V-neck with an empire waist, draping loosely from my rib cage to my ankles. There’s a hint of cleavage, but it’s more girlish than sexy, and in the mirror I see a woman Josh would take to a work party, would come home to after a long day. A woman who isn’t a disaster, who’s happy with a simple life instead of a girl who’s unhappy with her complex one.
For a moment, I want to be her so bad I can taste it.
I grab my purse and room key and walk out the door at the same moment Josh does.
He comes to a stop, his eyes moving over me, head to foot. He pushes his damp hair off his forehead and releases a small breath.
“Is that the dress from the window?” he asks. His voice is like velvet.
“Yeah,” I say. I feel stupid now, as if I reached too far to be something I’m not. I shrug. “All my clothes were dirty and—”
“I like it,” he says. He coughs, looks sheepish suddenly. “I mean…you look nice.”
My cheeks heat like a preteen on her first date.
He looks past me. “Where’s Joel?” His brows pull together in consternation.
I exhale heavily. “He stormed out of the room a while ago. I honestly have no idea where he went.”
Josh’s nostrils flare and his mouth opens, but then—his jaw grinding with the effort—he stops himself from saying whatever he was about to and gestures toward the elevator. We walk side by side, the soft fabric of my dress swishing against his shorts. He holds the elevator door for me and pushes the buttons inside.
“So what happens when you get back to LA?” he asks.
My gaze flickers to his, uncertain if he means in general or with his brother specifically. “I’m only there through the weekend. And then I’m on to New York to pack up and leave for my apology interviews before I complete the tour.”
“I don’t know why you’re going along with that,” he says.
“I’m okay with people believing what they want,” I reply. “As long as it isn’t the truth.”
Telling the world I get panic attacks is like inviting them to research my past, beyond all the half-truths I’ve told. They’d dig and dig until they discovered where it all began—my mother’s affair, my father’s death. It was hard enough to live through once. I don’t need to relive it in every interview I give for the rest of my life.
We reach the bar just as the sun sinks behind the horizon. The crowd is already starting to disperse.
Beth, Jim and Six are all sitting together looking a little miserable, but Beth lights up as Josh pulls a chair out for me.
“Don’t you look lovely,” she says, so earnestly and with so much affection it leaves me feeling close to tears.
I smile at her, hiding the lump in my throat. Beth is so much better to me than any member of my family is, and I’m desperately sad it’s about to come to an end.
“Thank you,” I manage to say. It’s such a nice moment, and I get the feeling that Six—leaning back in his chair, smirking the way he does when he’s drunk or about to be an asshole—is about to ruin it.
“You look like a preschool teacher,” he says.
Josh, behind me, stiffens. “Watch your fucking mouth,” he says, pressing me into the seat with his hand on my shoulder, his eyes never leaving Six’s face.
“What?” Six asks with a smirk. “It wasn’t an insult. I like preschool teachers just fine.”
Josh remains behind my chair. “Get up,” he tells Six.
“Josh,” his mother says gently. “Just take a seat, honey. He’s had too much to drink and—”
Six’s chair scrapes the cement as he pushes backward. “I’m going out,” he announces, looking at me. “You coming?” It’s more a statement than a question. He assumes I’m coming, and he’s set this up so no one can win. If I leave with him, Beth will be upset. If I stay, she’ll worry that we’re fighting. I can’t believe he’s doing this to me or her.
“It’s our last night here,” I reply, remaining in my seat. “I think we should stay.”
His mouth presses flat. “Fine. Have fun.” And then he’s gone. Beth’s eyes close and her shoulders sag.
Josh exhales. “I’m sorry, Mom.”
She waves him off. “I just wish the two of you got along. The day will come when you only have each other.”
She chokes on those last words and Jim takes her hand. “It’s been a stressful few days,” he says. “Let’s just head to the room.”
“No,” Beth argues, swallowing, “Drew was right. It’s our last night.”
But she looks sad and exhausted and it
’s clear she’s pushed herself too hard. “We have a very long day of travel together tomorrow,” I tell her. “Don’t stay on my account. I doubt I’ll be up that long myself.”
Beth allows herself to be led upstairs, and then it’s only me and Josh. He once said I was the glue holding them together, but it hardly feels that way. If I’d just left when Sloane did, maybe the four of them would be sitting at this table still. Josh sinks into the seat across from mine and kicks my foot.
“None of this is your fault,” he says quietly.
“It feels like it is.”
“I think you’ve just gotten very used to being blamed,” he says. “My brother started this by being a callous, spoiled little shit, and the only problem is that he continued to be one.”
“But your mom—”
“Wants the world for her boys. Every mother probably does. It’s not your fault she can’t give it to them.” He gives me a small smile. “We basically started this trip together alone. Might as well end it this way too.”
I smile against my will. “You want to hear something unsettling?” I ask, desperate to lighten the mood. “Your parents are the only ones on this trip who had sex.”
“That,” he replies “was so unnecessary.” And then he laughs, and as badly as this night has gone, I’m glad it’s turned out this way too.
We order drinks and food and it’s easy and hard at the same time. Being near him is like seeing exactly how happy you could be if you’d been born into someone else’s life. “Are you over there thinking deep thoughts?” he asks.
I smile. “I’m not smart enough for deep thoughts, only shallow ones.”
He shakes his head as he refills my wine glass. “That’s not true. And I don’t think I’ve ever met someone who hides as much as you do either.”
“Hides?” I ask. I pick up the wine glass and hold it to my chest. “I’m an open book.”
“Oh yeah?” he asks. “Then how’d you get that scar on your nose?”
“Taking down Bin Laden,” I reply, pushing my hair back. “I was a Navy SEAL before I went into music.”
He smiles. “That’s impressive. Especially since you’d have been, like, twelve.”
I shrug. “As you should know by now, I’m incredibly fit.”
He laughs and lets it go, thank God. Maybe I’m not an open book, but that’s how it is when you know every answer will only lead to more questions.
He excuses himself and walks up to the stage, to the guy playing guitar there. It seems bizarrely outgoing for Josh. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen him willingly speak to anyone aside from his family.
I raise a brow when he returns. “What was that about?”
“He wanted to know where you got the scar on your nose,” he replies. “I told him you were in a fight club and couldn’t discuss it.”
I grin. “The first rule of fight club…”
“Is don’t talk about fight club,” he concludes.
The guy on the stage taps on the microphone to get everyone’s attention. I turn toward him and he’s looking straight at me. “I understand we have a guitar player in the house,” he says into the mic. “Lina, come on up here.”
I blink, looking at the smattering of people still sitting here, before I turn to stare at Josh.
“Dude, what the fuck?” I whisper.
“You were able to astonish everyone last night playing an instrument you’d never actually played before. And you sing in front of thousands of people. How could this be a big deal?”
I swallow. “That’s different.”
“Because it doesn’t matter,” he says, rising to his feet and reaching out a hand to me. “Maybe it’s time you tried doing something that does. Play your new song. Play the old songs you wrote. Just promise me you won’t play Naked.”
I laugh. “God, you’re the worst.”
He just grins. “That song is such a trainwreck.”
I’m still laughing, still terrified, as I make my way up to the stage. Which isn’t even a stage, really, just a two-foot-high platform big enough for four people at most.
A guitar is placed in my hands and I mess around tuning it simply to drown out the noise in my head. I’m tempted to simply play something old, something from the 70s that my father taught me. Fleetwood Mac, maybe, or The Eagles. It’s an older crowd. They’d like it and I could slink away.
But Josh is right. This is a chance to be that other version of myself, the real one I’ve spent so many years hiding, so I start with one of the songs I used to play, an original I submitted which led to my first record deal but never made it onto the album. Not sexy enough, Davis said. I should have known right there we had painfully different visions for my career, not that it would have mattered. I was hungry and desperate back then. I’d have sung anything if it led to a record deal. I was tired of being broke, yes, but mostly I wanted something to throw in my mother’s face after the years she spent telling me I was wasting my life.
I’ve played it so often that it comes now with no thought, but there are goosebumps on my arms. When the words are your own, it’s like standing naked in front of the world with no idea if they’ll cheer or boo at the end.
I play the final notes, and the applause comes fast and loud and sharp. It’s the sort of applause that comes when you’ve surprised people, in a good way. I remember this feeling from when I was a teenager, and the quiet hope that accompanied it: that maybe I was slightly less useless than I’d been led to believe, than I’d allowed myself to believe.
Before the applause starts to die down, I turn and try to hand the guitar back to the musician, but he waves me off. “You play way better than I do,” he says.
I hesitate, but then I glance at Josh and he smiles at me, and that’s all it takes. I sling the guitar strap over my shoulder and face the crowd again.
I play two more of the early songs, and then, with a deep breath, I strum the first few chords of the new song, trying to get a feel for it again.
I’ve played around with it, of course, but I’ve never performed it before and the two things are night and day. I’ve always kept the vocals simple and spare, whispered almost, because I’ve been singing them in hotel rooms, terrified of being overheard. “Umm, this is something I’ve been working on, but it’s a little rough,” I warn the crowd. “Bear with me here.”
My heart beats hard. It’s not simply that it’s mine. It’s that this song is more earnest and heartfelt than anything I’ve ever sung. It’s about knowing exactly the life you’d choose if you could step out of the one you were in, and it reveals more about me than I’d like to share.
I begin tentatively, still considering ditching out even as I begin to sing. But toward the end of the first verse, it suddenly starts to feel right. As if I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be, doing exactly what I’m supposed to be doing, and it can’t go wrong because…I love this song. I love it more than I’ve ever loved anything, and in a way, it doesn’t even matter if anyone else feels the same.
The crowd is on the edge of their seats. I can feel the excitement in the air. Those baby fine hairs on the back of my arms stand on end as if electrified as I head toward the chorus. And then I look at Josh and realize something: I wrote these words about him. I thought I was writing it about my career, about how I’d choose a different life. But no, it was simply him. He’s what I would choose.
The song is still brief, since I’ve only got two verses. It ends quickly and then people are jumping to their feet, clapping for me, and it means more than any standing ovation in a sold-out arena ever has because they’re actually clapping for me. For Ilina Andreyev, the nobody daughter of a fuck-up who is falling for the wrong guy.
“That was amazing,” says a woman, gripping my arms as I walk off the stage to get back to Josh. “Don’t let all that talent go to waste.”
I smile at her but I’m shaking, so high from the experience I feel like I can barely put one foot in front of the other. I stumble forward, past all the back p
ats and the shoulder slaps and fall against Josh, standing near our table, like he’s home base, like nothing can hurt me if he’s near.
His arms wrap around me. “You were perfect, Ilina Andreyev,” he says quietly.
I could argue that it could have been better, that I went into the first verse too late, but I don’t. In an imperfect life, it—and this moment—are as close to perfect as I’ve ever come.
We walk back to our wing slowly. The breeze rustles through the palms, the crickets chirp. I wish we were running in the morning but our flight leaves too early.
“So what are you gonna do?” he asks as we walk into the elevator.
I blink up at him, unable to imagine any question he isn’t the center of. Am I going to tell him how I feel? Am I going to think about him every single day after we leave here? “Do?” I repeat.
“With the song,” he says, and something inside me deflates. But really, what did I think he might ask me? “Are you going to push to add it to the new album?”
I give him a sad smile. In order for that to happen, I’d have to fight for it, and then it would get turned into overproduced garbage, and I’d have to share the writing credit with four assholes the record label brings in to ‘help’ and it’s my song. Plus, it would never be a single. It would be the song everyone skips past to get to the next Naked. “Nah. It would never work.”
“I don’t get you,” he says. “You aren’t happy with the way things are going. Your manager is a dick. You’ve been pushed into singing shit you hate, and you just keep signing up for more of it. Why not just step off the bus and get on a new one, going somewhere you want to be?”
I blink up at him. He’s co-opted my theory about love, but I guess it works here as well as there. “Because I know where this bus goes. That one could lead me to a super bad section of town and dump me there.”
We’ve reached my door. It strikes me this may be our last moment alone, and I want to say something big to him, but the words just don’t come. “Thanks for making me get out there tonight,” I tell him instead. “I’m glad I did it.”
The Devil And The Deep Blue Sea Page 15