A Lush Betrayal

by Selena Laurence

  A light knock at the door startles me out of my crushing thoughts. “Come in,” I say.

  Dave walks in, his body tense, hands shoved in the front pockets of his narrow khaki pants.

  “You got a minute?” he asks as he stands in the middle of the room.

  I swallow, feeling the nausea return with a vengeance. “Sure,” I choke out.

  He gestures to the chair Joss occupied earlier, and I nod, so he sits.

  “I’m sorry that you walked in during all of that,” he grimaces.

  “Look, if Joss forced you to come in here—”

  “Nope. As a matter of fact, I’m disobeying a direct order from his highness. I was told to stay the hell away from you.”

  I can feel my face flush. “I’m so sorry, Dave. He’s trying to protect me, but I know he goes too far. And I also know that I should never have gotten involved with him while the tour was going on. I’m—” I feel my throat thicken with regret. “I’m just sorry.”

  “You know I’ve got a daughter nearly as old as you,” Dave says, fingertips steepled under his chin, elbows resting on the chair arms. “She’s a senior at Notre Dame, twenty-two. I got to tell you, Mel, Joss Jamison is not who I’d pick for her. He’s not who I’d pick for you either if I were your dad.”

  I nod my head, looking at my lap so I won’t have to meet Dave’s gaze.

  “Don’t get me wrong, Joss is a pretty decent guy. He’s incredibly talented and bright and ambitious. But he’s also moody, reclusive, and highly unpredictable. And he’s too old for you, Mel. Even though the actual numbers don’t show it, he’s too old for you.”

  I look up at him, seeing a face full of fatherly concern.

  “Are you going to fire me?” I ask, cutting to the chase.

  He watches me for a minute before he gives himself a little shake and sits up straighter. “No, I’m not going to fire you. But I am going to tell you that if you’d been just any unknown twenty-four-year-old we’d hired to do this project I’d be sending you on your way at this point. Of course I would have also given you some pretty firm rules about getting involved with the band before you started the job. I didn’t give you that speech because you’ve known these guys since you were a kid and you’re here with your sister and Walsh. Frankly I didn’t think I needed to give you those rules. Guess I was wrong about that.”

  I feel the tears burning at the back of my eyes. I’m ashamed, I’m mad, and I’m scared. If Dave gives me an ultimatum, I’m not sure I can give up Joss for the job. It’s already too late. I have to admit, to myself anyway, that I’m in love with him, and if I lose him it will wreak havoc on my heart.

  “Look, Mel, I’d strongly suggest you table this thing with Joss until the tour’s over. If you’re both still interested after everyone’s back in Portland, then do what you will, but for the next few months you should end this before things get any more dicey than they already are.”

  I nod once again, too upset to speak.

  “And since I’m here, I’d like to see what pictures you’ve got so far. Meet me in thirty minutes in the green room?”

  I clear my throat and look anywhere but in Dave’s eye. “Sure. I’ll go grab my laptop.”

  He gives me a curt nod, stands up, and moves to the door. As his hand rests on the knob, his back to me, he speaks one last time. “These guys have what it takes to be the band of a generation, Mel. It’s my job to make sure nothing and no one endangers that. It’s not personal. I think you’ve got a bright future in photography, and you seem like a nice young woman. But there’s a lot more riding on all of this than your feelings, or even Joss’s. I’ll see you in thirty.”

  With that, he walks out, shutting the door behind him as I finally break down, feeling like my whole world has been ripped to pieces in one short afternoon.

  Joss

  IT’S FIVE minutes before the show and I’m waiting in my dressing room for Mel. The guy who never had a preshow routine now has one. I meet Mel in my dressing room, we walk hand in hand to the stage, and I set her up in her seat, give her a kiss, and go on. I’ve gotten used to it. I like it. Where the hell is she?

  When Walsh finally sticks his head in three minutes before the show’s supposed to start, I’m pacing up and down, sick with worry.

  “Hey, bro, what the hell are you doing?” he asks. “We’ve got to get out there.”

  I stop my lap around the room and look at him for a minute. “Have you seen Mel?”

  “I don’t know, man. She’s around somewhere. On the catwalk maybe. She’s getting some new angles for shots tonight. Joss, dude, we’ve really got to go.”

  “Yeah,” I concede. “Coming.” I grab my bottle of water and follow Walsh out of the room.

  When we reach the stage, Mel isn’t in her seat. I’m pissed but also worried. The whole thing with Dave earlier wasn’t tied up as tightly as I’d have liked. I’m afraid she’s upset about it and might do something nuts. Like leave. I look up at the catwalk—the section of metal grid that crosses the air above the stage—no sign of her.

  “Miguel!” I shout to a roadie who’s walking by texting on his phone.

  “Yeah, boss,” he says, pausing in his frantic tapping.

  “You seen Mel?”

  “Um, yeah. She went back to the hotel, but she said she’d be around for the show.”

  Back to the hotel? Without telling me? My heart pounds a frenetic beat in my chest. Visions of Mel hopping on a plane back to Portland have me breaking out in a sweat.

  “Find her,” I direct Miguel. “Figure out where she is and get her here. Don’t take any excuses. Tell her it’s an instruction from her boss. The next time I see this chair,”—I point to Mel’s seat—“I want to see her little ass sitting in it. You got it?”

  Miguel looks like he’s trying to keep from smiling. He’s doing a shitty job of it. “Gotcha boss. One redheaded photographer, ass in chair, coming up.”

  I nod curtly at him as I take the microphone being handed to me by a backstage tech. The lights in the house go down and I hear the booming voice of the announcer echo through the venue.

  “Memphis, you’ve been waiting, and it’s time!” The crowd goes wild. A roar begins at the back and rolls up to the front before a second wave of sound surges forward. “It is my pleasure to introduce The. Hottest. Sensation in rock and roll. The band Rock Steady magazine calls ‘rock’s future.’ The men who’ve been taking the country by storm—Joss Jamison, Walsh Clark, Mike Owens, and Colin Douglas. Memphis! This! Is! Lush!”

  The lights onstage go up, highlighting Walsh, who’s seated at his drum set, banging out a heavy flourish of rhythm. Mike, Colin, and I jog out onstage, waving to the audience. Mike and Colin get set while I raise an arm in the air and say the world’s most clichéd opening line. “Memphis! Are you ready to rock?!”

  WE’RE MIDWAY through the first set when I glance offstage to find Mel finally in her seat. A rush of relief washes through me followed quickly by intense anger. I can see by her body language that she’s not okay. I stroll around stage a little, working my way closer to her, trying to get a better look at her expression. She refuses to look me in the eye, and I feel my frustration rising.

  Mike notices that I’m looking at Mel and subtly shakes his head at me. Colin’s on the other side of the stage and Walsh is focused entirely on his drums. Neither one of them seems to notice my agitation.

  As the song comes to an end, I head back to center stage. “You know, normally at this point in the show, I’d ask you all to give us a rhythm for She Snake…” I hear people screaming, “She Snake!! She Snake!!”

  I laugh. “But I’ve run out of water,”—I hold up my half-full water bottle, hoping they can’t see how much is in it—“so I’m going to ask to have the lights brought down for about two minutes and we’ll be right back.”

  I hear grumbles starting and girls screaming, “Don’t go, Joss!”

  I chuckle. “Two minutes, and I promise we’ll play an extra song to make up for
it.” That gets them, and they start to cheer. I hold a hand up and motion to the lighting techs to bring the lights down as I turn and stalk offstage. I see Mike and Walsh out of the corner of my eye, both watching and wondering what the hell I’m doing.

  I get offstage, double-checking that the mic I’m holding is switched off, then hand it to the nearest roadie. Everyone is watching me, not knowing what to think, as I’ve never veered from our planned show before.

  When I reach Mel, she’s looking at me with her blue eyes big and round, her hands clenched in her lap.

  I put a hand on either armrest of her barstool, boxing her in, then lean down and talk in her ear. “Where the hell were you before the show?”

  Her head jerks back a little in surprise. The anger in my voice is impossible to miss.

  “I had to go back to the hotel for another camera.” She sounds miffed, incredulous. Somewhere deep inside I know I’ve stepped over a line here, but I can’t seem to stop myself. The idea that she might have left me is so overwhelming I’m ripped to pieces from it. Shredded, like something that’s been through a meat grinder.

  “And you couldn’t give me the consideration of letting me know that?” I keep my volume low, but there’s no disguising the unchecked emotion in it.

  “I didn’t think it was a big deal,” she hisses out, glancing around at everyone standing there as if I’d hit pause on a streaming movie.

  I struggle to get my rage under control. Seems like I’m always struggling to get something under control when I’m with Mel.

  “I was worried,” I finally say, trying to soften this explosive moment I’ve succumbed to. “And I thought we had a preshow routine. It’s kind of tough to go onstage and perform when your girlfriend seems to have vanished.”

  She looks at me as her sweet mouth opens then snaps shut. She’s speechless.

  “We’ll talk about this more after the show. Don’t. Go. Anywhere.”

  She nods mutely.

  I cup the back of her head and kiss her hard on the lips before I take the mic back from the roadie and say, “Well, what’s everyone standing around for? We’ve got a show to finish.”

  Mike shakes his head and sighs. The crew members shout instructions to bring up the spotlights and we stroll back onstage, where I keep my eye on Mel the whole time and realize that if she ever does decide to leave me? I’m totally fucked.

  Mel

  IF MY humiliation weren’t complete already, Joss stopping a multimillion-dollar concert to chastise me would have finished it off. However, Dave’s words earlier pretty much took care of any self-respect that was lingering. My self-loathing is so high by the time the guys give their encore I can barely look anyone in the eye as the crew all start to congratulate one another on a show well done.

  Joss is in front of me before the lights from the stage have completely dimmed. I cross my arms and stare down at my lap.

  “Hey,” he says softly as the chattering goes on around us. He puts a finger under my chin and gently lifts my face so I’m forced to look him in the eye. “Can we talk?”

  I twist my head away from his touch. “Not sure what there is to talk about,” I mutter.

  “C’mon, Mel. I know you well enough to know you’re pissed at me for my little temper tantrum earlier. Which,”—he holds up a hand as I open my mouth to tear him a new something or other—“is completely understandable. I was out of line. But I’d like to know why you disappeared on me. So can we please go somewhere and talk?”

  “What do you want from me, Joss? You want me to wear a leash? Or maybe a tracking device so you’ll always know exactly where I am?”

  He scratches the back of his head and looks abashed. “Okay. We’ll do it here. I was a douche. I panicked and I overreacted. I’m sorry. But that doesn’t change the fact that you kind of vanished on me. I mean, you’ve never done that before.”

  I stand up, trying to bolster myself for what I’m going to do next. “You know what? I don’t think this is going to work. I’m here to do a job, not stroke your rock star ego. Maybe it’d be better if we put this on hold at least until the tour is over. We can talk about it more then.”

  Joss’s face turns hard, his jaw set. “What?” he booms. Luckily, when I look around I see that most of the crew and band have drifted away, heading back to the green room for the after-party.

  I scope the area as I look for how I’m going to make my grand exit. “You heard me,” I announce. “I don’t think this is going to work—you and me being involved. I want to take a break until the tour’s over.” I tip my chin up, trying to project everything I’m not feeling—confidence, firmness, decisiveness.

  He reaches out to touch me and I step back, away from him. He blanches, and I see pain skitter across his perfect features.

  “Don’t do this,” he says, his voice much softer now.

  “I’m sorry. It’s just the way it has to be.”

  “No, it doesn’t,” a voice says from behind me. Both Joss and I jerk and look to the source.

  Walsh stands there, a pair of drumsticks in his hand. He shrugs and says, “Sorry. Forgot my sticks onstage.”

  “It’s all right, man,” Joss answers unconvincingly, looking down at the floor and scuffing one of his boots.

  “Look, it’s none of my business, except, well, since Tammy’s the one who set the wheels in motion—without my knowledge, I’ll add—I feel a certain amount of responsibility for all of it.”

  I look at Joss, who almost imperceptibly shrugs, indicating that he doesn’t know what Walsh is referring to either.

  “Mel,” Walsh says as he steps closer. “I heard what Dave said to you earlier. I was in the hallway outside. Tammy’s the one who called him and told him about you two. She presented it to him in the worst possible light she could. I’ll admit that when I found out I was pretty pissed. I haven’t been real stoked about you two, but I respect your right to decide who the hell you’re going to date, and I have to admit, I’ve never seen Joss like this.” He looks at Joss briefly, something like regret passing over his features. “This is different for him. I can tell.”

  Joss nods, darting a little look at me as if to say, I told you so.

  “What Dave was saying, Mel? He thinks he’s responsible for holding the band together, but that’s only on us.”

  He looks at Joss again, and this time I see their gazes meet, a silent conversation ping-ponging between them.

  “It’s up to us to make it or not,” Walsh continues. “The fans can’t do that, our girlfriends can’t do it, and neither can Dave. This band is about four guys and some music. Until it isn’t. And then no one can help us. Don’t let Dave put that on you, Mel. No matter how strongly Joss feels about you, it can’t ruin Lush. Only we can do that.” Then Walsh tips his chin to Joss. “See you on the flipside, brotha’,” he says quietly as he walks away.

  “Walsh,” Joss calls out.

  “Yeah,” Walsh answers without turning back.

  “Thanks for the reminder.”

  “Any time.”

  Joss turns to me and gingerly takes my hands in his, obviously afraid of how I’ll react to his touch. “What did Dave say to you?”

  I shiver, feeling like a bone in the midst of a pack of hounds. Tammy, Dave, Joss. Who’s going to win the right to chew me to pieces?

  I sigh. “He pointed out that, if he’d thought I would do something so stupid as to date one of the band members, he would have made it clearer ahead of time that my job couldn’t survive the choice. “

  “Baby,” he says, stepping closer to me as I feel my resolve of moments ago drift away like so many feathers in a stiff wind. “I told you that isn’t going to happen. He’s all bluster. He works for me too. Everyone here does. And no one is getting fired. Everyone needs to quit worrying about what might happen and do their jobs, and we’ll all be fine.”

  “He also told me that he wouldn’t let anything or anyone get in the way of you becoming the ‘band of a generation.’” I wilt as Jos
s puts his hand into my hair and pulls my head to his lips, where I give in to him wholly, my brief fling with sanity now over. He kisses me gently on the cheek.

  I want to resist him. He’s an overbearing ass and everyone I know hates me being involved with him, but when his lips touch my skin, I find it hard to breathe, much less think. I’m drawn to him in a primal way. It’s not conscious or planned or controlled. I’ve never been much of a game player with men, but with Joss, I couldn’t even if I tried. He gets close and I react—physically, emotionally, viscerally. It’s not something I decide, it just happens.

  “None of it’s true, Mel. Whatever tape you have playing inside that beautiful head of yours. Repeating Dave’s words or Tammy’s or whatever. None of it’s true. What’s true is this,”—he lays his head next to my face and rubs his cheek on mine—“I love you, Mel.”

  My heart skips at those seemingly simple words that change everything. “I love you too,” I answer softly.

  He whispers, “Thank God,” then he breathes me in and tenderly licks my earlobe, making me sigh and press closer to him. “This is real, baby, you and me. We’re the realest thing I’ve ever known. The way I feel when I see you across a room, the way you taste when I lick your skin, the way you sound when you gasp my name. That’s what’s real. That’s all that matters.”

  I moan as his hand reaches under my shirt and finds my breast, stroking my nipple that hardens instantly.

  My neck arches as he continues his exploration of my ear and neck, nipping, licking, kissing. I feel my core begin to ache, and I know any ideas of doing the mature, responsible thing are dead. I won’t be taking Dave’s very pointed suggestion. I won’t be doing what my sister is desperate for me to do. I won’t be leaving Joss today. And really, I’m not sure if I ever will.

  AS MUCH time as Joss and I spend together, there are two things we never talk about—my sister and his father. That’s why I’m surprised when he walks into our hotel room in Atlanta as I’m packing for the plane trip we’ll be taking later in the day and asks, “You didn’t happen to get a phone number for my dad when he came to the show in Denver, did you?”