Interview with the Rock Star

by Rylee Swann

  Wow. That’s direct.

  To give myself time to think of an answer, I lift a bottle of water to my lips, turning to look over at Stephen, who is in the wings, glaring daggers at the woman. That, if nothing else, makes me smile.

  “I think that anytime we put ourselves out there for other people to judge, there’s a fear of failure. Fear that we’ll let someone down. But, to answer your other question… yeah, this new tour is necessary.” I look at her squarely. “I screwed up back then. Royally. My stupid and selfish choices stripped me of the future I wanted. I can’t get that back, as much as I’d like to…”

  Behind the blonde, a halo of red curls appears. I blink hard, wondering if it’s my imagination conjuring an apparition, a ghost of Tennessee past.

  “You’d like to what, Kace?”

  Giving my head a little shake, I step to the side, hoping to get another glimpse, but other reporters start firing questions at me, pulling my attention away.

  “Is this some type of forgiveness tour, Kace?”

  My balls tighten, and I peer into the darkness, trying to find the woman who spoke. Her voice takes me back ten years. No… it can’t be her.

  The blonde reporter has turned around, talking to someone behind her. I lift onto my toes, wanting to see. Needing to see.

  “Kace, how does it feel to be a one-hit wonder?”

  Out of the many questions being shouted at me, it’s the one that sticks out. Pulling my gaze away from the back left corner of the room where the blonde is still talking to someone I can’t see, I face the smirking man on the front row. He’s the one who asked the question, his expression makes it obvious.

  The fucking bastard. I just smile. “Considering that one hit still, ten years later, makes me more in a day than you probably make in a month… it feels pretty damn good.”

  The smirk falls away, but only for a moment.

  “Don’t you think your come-back tour…” he air-quotes the last three words, “is setting a bad precedence for young people, telling them that you can behave as badly as you want and it can all be swept under the rug if you’re rich and famous enough?”

  I glance again at Stephen, but he’s not paying attention to the question just batted at me. He’s looking at the back left corner of the room too. I follow his gaze. The blonde’s back is to me, and she appears to be gesturing wildly with her hands.

  “No answer, huh?” the reporter needles. “No excuse?” I try to ignore him, but the next dig gets through, piercing me right in the chest. “No apologies to everyone you walked over and left behind to make your millions?”

  “I am sorry,” I bark, but not to him. My attention is still in the back of the room where I’d gotten another glimpse of red hair.

  I step away from the podium, and the reporter sneers. “You just quitting? Leaving?”

  On legs that feel like I’m walking on stilts, I round the corner of the audience. There are chairs available, but no one is using them. They’re all on their feet, watching me closer, cameras and recorders in my face.

  Someone grabs my arm, but I shake it off, intent on the back corner.

  “Kace… what are you doing?”

  It’s Stephen’s voice, but I ignore him too.

  The blonde is still gesturing to the person she’s talking to, and as I move closer, I have no doubt who it is. Even if I didn’t get glimpses of the hair, I can feel her. I’ve always been able to feel her.

  Then I’m there.

  And I’m placing a hand on the blonde’s shoulder.

  The reporter turns, her eyes wide as she faces me.

  Then… she steps to her left and Presley appears before me like a vision.

  “Presley…”

  I’ve thought the name a million times in the past ten years, but it’s the first time I’ve let it cross my lips. As if a sword is attached to the word, it claws itself out of my throat, ripping and maiming on the way out before floating between us like a ghost.

  It’s really her.

  Her face has matured, but in its maturity, has grown even more beautiful. The riot of curls is a little shorter but moves around her face exactly the same. And those eyes. Green with little dots of yellow are now filling with tears.

  She blinks them away and lifts her chin. “Kace.”

  The blonde sticks a recorder between us, hoping to catch every single word.

  And I hope she catches these, because they’re a long time coming. “I’m so very, very sorry.”

  I know she can attach the apology to a number of things I did wrong, but I hope she understands that I’m sorry for it all.

  The blonde lifts the recorder higher. “Sorry for what?”

  There isn’t a sound in the room, and I manage to muffle the growl that tries to escape me. “Everything. All I did. All I should have done but didn’t.”

  A camera rolls around the crowd to the side of me. I don’t care.

  For years, I tried to get Presley to talk to me, to listen to me. I tried to get together, tried to explain.

  When she sent me her engagement ring, I sent it back. Over and over.

  “It wasn’t how it looked, Pres. I swear to you. It wasn’t.”

  The blonde leans forward. “What wasn’t how it looked?”

  Both Presley and I turn our heads slowly to look at the woman. The reporter that she is, she just raises an eyebrow, waiting for an answer.

  “This is private.”

  The first eyebrow is joined by the second. “I thought you were here to face the past. Wouldn’t it be cleansing to do it in a way that clears the slate clean both privately and publicly?”

  Presley answers for me. Well, if turning on her heel and leaving is an answer.

  It’s enough of an answer for me.

  I’m after her, right on her heels, then my hands are on her shoulders and I’m touching her for the first time in way too long. She tries to pull away, but I can’t let her go.

  Not yet.

  Not like this.

  “Pres, please.”

  She’s shaking now, and there are footsteps coming up behind us. Taking a quick inventory of rooms in the long hallway, I scoop her up and carry her into the men’s room, pressing my back to the door.

  “Put me down.”

  “Pres—”

  Her fists come down on my shoulders as she squirms and arches, clearly intent on putting distance between us. I put her down, holding onto her shoulders until she’s steady, thrusting my hands through my hair when she walks away.

  When she whirls to face me, there is fire in her eyes. Hate and hurt on her face.

  And it breaks my heart.

  “Why today?”

  I don’t even have to ask her what she means. I already know. I’ve asked myself the same question a hundred times in the past twenty-four hours.

  “I don’t know. Hell, Pres… I just don’t know.”

  She crosses her arms over her chest, and her eyes harden even more. “You didn’t arrange this on purpose? You expect me to believe that?”

  She has every reason to believe I would lie, so I try not to let the fact that she clearly thinks so little of me affect what I need to say. “No, I didn’t. I was in Memphis yesterday and was asked to fill in because—”

  “Phil got sick,” she finishes for me.

  I nod. “I said no at first.” Hurt flashes across her face for an instant, and I want to smash my own fist into my face. “I didn’t think I could come back here. Didn’t think I could risk…” I point between the two of us. “I’m sorry, Presley. I didn’t mean, didn’t want, didn’t… shit.” The words refuse to come.

  She presses her fingers to her temples, then pushes a section of her hair behind her ear. I focus on the delicate shell of it, remember how I used to bite and chew on that lobe. How it always made her either giggle or moan, depending on what else I was doing to her in the moment.

  So many memories.

  I remember the first time I saw her at a football game in this very stadium her f
reshman year. How I’d watched her cheer on the team or boo the refs from three seats behind her.

  She’d been impossible to miss, and when the game was over, I’d followed her like a stalker to her car. I’d said, “Hi.” She said the same in return. Then we began to chat, and I invited her to dinner. We barely left each other’s sides after that moment.

  When no other words will come, I fall back on the original one that began it all. “Hi.”

  She shivers, and I know she remembers too. But this time, when she says it back, the word is accompanied by a single tear.

  A metaphor if I’ve ever seen one.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Presley

  “Hi.”

  I hate myself when a tear slides down my cheek and quickly brush it away.

  It’s like I’m in a time warp, the old me and the new me swapping realities.

  I won’t shed more tears over this man. No, it’s more than won’t. I simply can’t. That well has run dry.

  But I can’t stop the other physical reactions that are exploding throughout my body. Damn it… he looks good. His hair is shorter than the shoulder length style he favored years ago. It’s still shaggy around his face but edgier, more fitting to his filled-out cheeks, his even squarer jawline.

  One of the first things I noticed when he walked out to the podium earlier was that he’d gained weight. In the best possible way. When the drug use was at its worse, his six-two frame had almost looked emaciated, his shoulder blades and ribs jutting through his skin.

  But when he picked me up to carry me into this nasty bathroom, I felt the muscle, the strength. Had he really gotten clean after all?

  “You look good, Kace,” I say, needing to fill the empty silence with some type of sound. “Healthy. I’m happy for you.”

  I exhale. That hadn’t been so very hard. I’d always wanted his happiness. I’d just wanted that happiness to include me.

  He reaches out a hand, and I take a step backwards. I can’t let him touch me again.

  It drops to his side. “You’re even more beautiful than I remember,” he says, his gaze sliding down my body and quickly back up to my face.

  The silence stretches again, the energy practically vibrating between us. I clear my throat. “Well, I guess I better go.” I run my palms down my pants and stick my right hand out for a shake.

  He just stares at it. “So soon?”

  Feeling silly, I run the palm down my pants once more. “Yes, it’s better this way.”

  He frowns. “Why—?”

  I jump when someone knocks hard on the door. Kace does too but mostly seems annoyed. We both just look at each other, both looking lost now that we have found one another again.

  “Kace… you need to be on the field in five minutes,” someone says through the door.

  “Damn,” Kace mutters, and a flurry of emotions settle over and around me. Relief that obligations cause whatever this is between us to be over. Sadness of what could have been. “Tell them to fuck themselves,” he calls out after a few moments, staring at me. “I’m busy.”

  That, more than anything brings forth the anger I need to survive this encounter, and rage boils out of me like a volcano that has been latent for years.

  I bark out a laugh so filled with bitterness that it echoes through the cinder blocked room. “So, you are the same,” I spit out, “Blowing off obligations because something better comes along. Why am I not surprised?”

  He blinks at me, looking lost for a moment, slowly shaking his head. “That’s not it. I—”

  I cross my arms over my chest. “You’re what, Kace? Willing to let down a hundred thousand fans who are excited to hear the great Kace Rymer belt out a few lines? So ready to blow more people off because you think you have something better to do. Are you still such a bastard that—”

  “No!” The word is so loud I feel as if I’ve been shot by it. “I… I… I… fuck!”

  His hands move to his hair again, anguish that couldn’t be anything but real lives on his face. But I can’t let him off this hook of commitment he’s on. I can’t make excuses for him. Can’t make decisions for him. Can’t enable his behavior one more time.

  So, I stand silent, watching him suffer. It’s one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.

  It’s so much easier to enable. To put the Band-Aid on. To say soothing words. To do whatever it takes to make it better. Until the next time.

  He lets out a low, slow breath, drops his hands down by his sides, and turns to face me.

  “You’re right. I do have this obligation. I won’t walk away from it. Will you come with me and then spend time with me afterwards so we can talk?”

  I feel so cold.

  “Kace, I—”

  “Just an hour. We’ll set a timer and everything.”

  My willpower is peeling off me in layers.

  “I don’t—”

  “Please.”

  Tears burn my eyes, but I won’t let them fall. I’ll need them for later, I know.

  “Kace—”

  “I won’t touch you, I promise.”

  Goosebumps raise on my arms at the idea of it.

  I shake my head. “Kace—”

  “Presley, I lost you ten years ago today. The timing of us both being here today of all days must mean something.”

  I just stare at him, unwilling or unable to tell him no.

  “Please, Pres. This is what I should have done ten years ago. I should have begged you to stay. I should have never let you go. But I was so messed up. I didn’t remember what happened that night, so I didn’t know how to explain. I just knew at the time that I wanted another hit so I could forget and keep forgetting.”

  I raise my chin. “Did you forget?”

  “No. I—”

  I jump at the pounding on the door again. “Kace. You can’t do this. You—”

  “I’m coming,” Kace shouts, looking directly at me. “Come with me, Pres. One hour, and I’ll leave you alone forever if that’s still what you want.”

  “Are you sober right now?”

  There is no hesitation. “Yes.”

  “When did you last use drugs of any kind?”

  Again, no hesitation. “One thousand, six hundred and forty-three days ago.”

  He looks clean. He looks sober. One last question. “When did you last drink?”

  His eyes glaze over, and he looks down. Then he meets my gaze again. “Two nights ago. I busted one thousand, six hundred and forty-one days of sobriety the night before last.”

  At least he’s honest. In the past, he would have lied or avoided the question. He might not be proud of his slip, but he’s owning it, at least.

  But how many other times had he promised to quit?

  How many other times had he counted the clean days? I think back. Never.

  The knock comes again, and Kace exhales a long breath. “I need to go, Presley. I hope you’ll meet me upstairs. I hope that more than anything I’ve ever hoped for. But I won’t beg anymore. Not because I don’t want to. But because this needs to be your choice.”

  The hinges of the door squeak as he opens it. Cameras flash behind him, but I don’t care.

  “Goodbye, Kace.”

  The light of hope that had been alive in his eyes fades away, and his face contracts in pain.

  “Goodbye, Presley.”

  Then he’s gone.

  Gone to do the right thing. The wrong thing.

  I don’t even know anymore.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Kace

  “Oh, say can you see…”

  Bright flashes of light come from every direction, the football stadium seemingly alive like a million stars. I feel the lyrics rise from my chest as the Pride of the Southland Band plays along.

  This isn’t where I want to be, but it’s exactly the right place. Presley was right. I need to fulfill this obligation, do my best. I don’t need to let anyone else down.

  “…by the dawn’s early light.”


  How many concerts got cancelled in the past because I was too drunk or stoned to go up on stage? How many fans did I puke on? I don’t even know.

  I’m ashamed.

  “What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming.”

  I wasted so many years chasing a high I’d never find after the first one. I became a puppet to the craving. A puppet to the need.

  As I continue to sing the anthem, watch people watch me belt out the notes in a voice that has been called edgy and raw over and over, it feels raw. I feel raw. I feel as if layers of skin are peeling away, threatening to expose my insides.

  “And the rocket’s red glare…” I close my eyes, letting the heart of this song sink into my chest as fireworks explode up from the stadium walls, “…the bombs bursting in air.”

  I open my eyes… and there she is. I see her immediately, standing on the sidelines, her red hair whipping across her face in the breeze.

  “Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave.”

  Hope fills my chest. She’s here.

  “O’er the land of the free…” The note comes deep from every cell in my body, and I can hear the crowd cheer and scream as I hold it with all the hope I dare allow myself to feel.

  Presley lifts a hand and wipes at her face, a soft smile on her lips.

  “… and the home of the brave.”

  The crowd roars, the camera’s flash, but there’s only one person I see.

  Even as I wave to the crowd. Even as I hand over the mic and shake hands with officials, she stays in my line of sight. And when I’m done, I go directly to her.

  It’s a terrible risk, I know, but I hold out my hand in silent invitation.

  I don’t blame her if she rejects it, but when her fingers meet mine, I rejoice and feel as if I’m able to breathe for the first time in ages.

  Snap.

  Snap.

  Snap.

  If I could have planned this better, I wouldn’t have subjected Presley to this level of scrutiny. When we were together ten years ago, the press was hounding, especially during those six months after “Lie with Me” hit big, but it was nothing like it is today. And I know that, within seconds, our images will be trending and going viral, and there will be reporters and bloggers and vloggers and cut-throat paparazzi hounding her for a tell-all for the next few days. At least they will until a newer, better story comes along.