by Carina Adams
They’d all met him, of course, but he’d still been in the Navy, which made the whole thing more humorous to them. From that night forward, he was no longer Mike to them; no, he was PT, which eventually became Petey, or PTAF boy. He’d tried for years to figure it out, thinking it was an acronym for something flattering. He’d settled on Pretty, Tall, and Fuckable. I didn’t have the heart to tell him.
He smiled over at Nina, “Shrimp.” But, when his eyes landed on Cora, I saw him tense and his jaw clench. She smiled in his direction but didn’t look at him. Cort’s eyes caught mine and we shared a knowing look. We didn’t know what had happened there, and neither of us really wanted to. Cora was happily married and Mike, after being cheated on himself, was not the type of man that would come between a woman and her husband. But something was off between them and it had been since Mike got hurt and spent his first miserable month after discharge on my couch.
“I know you must have a really good reason to be standing here, wearing that”—Courtney gestured to his jacket—“so I would love to hear it. How long have you worked for Nate? And why’d you keep it from home girl?”
Mike shifted, looking extremely uncomfortable. “Because CeCe and Nate have a complicated history, and she didn’t want to know anything about him.”
“Does he know? About us, I mean?” I took a deep breath, not sure I really wanted the answer.
“No.” Mike turned to me, suddenly very serious. “And we need to talk about that.”
He meant we needed to talk alone. But there would be no privacy in this room. Not with my nosy friends. Or the fans that were being shown into the suite next to ours. “Are you allowed to take an old friend on a tour?”
He smiled. “You’ll miss the opener.”
I shrugged. I’d seen Molly Whatever last night, and after hearing Noah and Nate talk about her earlier, I didn’t need to see her perform again. He held out an arm and we waved goodbye to three annoyed looking women.
I followed him into the elevator and down and around, thinking he was taking me backstage. Instead, we ended up in a giant bar. He waited until we found a high table and had drinks in hand before he started talking about his boss. “Have you two had a chance to talk?” he asked and I shook my head as I poked my ice with the straw. There had been chances for us to talk to each other, but we’d blown them all.
Mike picked at the label on his beer.
“Should you even be drinking if you’re working?”
“I’m not working,” he shrugged. “I have the weekend off.”
I looked up from my drink, surprised. “I’m sure Jake would have loved the show. Why not bring him?” I watched as Mike’s features contorted, making him look like the dangerous man he was. That was a look I’d seen reserved for his son’s new stepdad. “Oh.”
Mike nodded, sighing. “I had him yesterday. Got to see him kick ass in his game. That kid can throw a ball like no one can.” He lifted the bottle, swallowing it. “I was going to surprise you tonight. Thought I’d call Cort and see where y’all were.”
I smiled at the “y’all.” Mike had picked up several phrases that made me smile, but now I wondered if they were from the Navy or from Neil. Nate. Good God.
“Coming to help me celebrate my spinsterhood?”
He laughed. “Yep. Figured since you were an old maid, you wouldn’t mind being seen with me now.”
“So…” I trailed off, not sure where to start. “I’m guessing you didn’t tell him where I lived.”
“Nate?” He bit his bottom lip before lifting his bottle again. “Nope. He called the car company.” He pursed his lips. “I didn’t know until today when Nikki called. It must have been a shock.”
“It was a fucked up morning,” I agreed. “If he’d gotten there fifteen minutes earlier, he’d have met Ben.”
Mike slammed his beer down. “What?” he whispered harshly. He’d met him once while Ben and I were dating and had warned me. I don’t remember the conversation exactly, but he’d called him something like, “an egotistical loose cannon.” Mike had been right.
“It’s fine. I took care of it. He left without a problem.”
Mike narrowed his eyes.
“Really. It’s fine. I’m just glad he was gone before Nate got there.”
“I thought you were gonna call me if he was a problem.”
“I was. But you’re here and I’m telling you now.” I offered a giant smile, even though I knew he’d see it was fake. “So you’ve really never told him that we’re still friends?”
Mike held his bottle in the air, signaling the waitress to bring another. “You asked me not to.” He smiled at the waitress as she handed him another bottle and slid a second tequila sunrise in front of me.
I hadn’t planned to drink another. Fuck it. Go big or go home. Did that saying even apply to alcohol? Whatever. I would probably need to be half in the bag to make it through this weekend. “No. I told you that I didn’t want to hear about him. You wouldn’t stop badgering me, remember? I just assumed he didn’t want to know anything about me.”
“He did, though. He looked for you. He called your dad and your mom. He called me, begging me to get your dad to talk to him. Then he figured that when you were ready, you’d find him.”
“Why?” It seemed strange to be having this conversation now, years after it mattered. “You’ve heard the song – he hates me. Why would he look for me?”
“Maybe he does, Lee.”
I couldn’t swallow; there was a giant lump in my throat that refused to allow anything to pass it.
“But he loves you more.”
“You do realize how fucked up that is, right? You can’t love someone you hate!”
Mike reached out and covered my hand with his. “Yeah, you can. I fucking hate Jules and what she did to my family. I hate that she got pregnant on purpose. I hate that she married me even though she’d fallen for someone else. I hate that she doubted me so much that she fucked him while I was gone. But she gave me Jake. And Janet.” He paused, and I knew he was remembering how much it hurt when he found out his baby girl really wasn’t his. “And I love her.”
“You don’t love her, though. Not really. You tolerate her for your son. You would never take her back, would you?”
“Fuck no.”
“Okay, then. See? You cannot love someone you hate. You can love someone and hate things about them, but that’s it.”
“Fine. Then he hates that you left him. He hates that you just took off with no explanation. He hates that you hid from him and that he doesn’t know you or where you’ve been. You never let him have closure. You left. You made the decision. He didn’t get a say. Do you have any fucking idea how hard it has been to listen to him, to watch him wonder if you’re okay and not tell him I know?”
I’d never thought of it like that. I had tortured myself for years wondering about him, reading everything I could because I had to know what had happened to him. It made sense that he would have wondered the same, but I always assumed he hadn’t because I was dead to him. I never wondered about the rest of them; I could care less what happened to Ally or Missy or where they were now. But it never occurred to me that Nate would wonder about me.
“I’m sorry,” I told my friend, completely sincere. “I didn’t know.” I knew they talked and remained friends. But whenever he’d mention Neil to me, I shut him down. “I was embarrassed,” I explained, saying it out loud for the first time. “I made such a mess of everything, and then there was the whole issue with Craig.” I sighed as Mike growled. “We were kids, Mike. And I made so many mistakes.
“I was never good enough for him. If I had stayed, I was always going to be the trailer trash that he threw away everything for. I did what I did, and I feel horrible about it now, but I only did it because I loved him.”
“And because you were a chicken shit.”
I grinned. “And there’s that.”
A man and a woman started talking, introducing the opening act.
“Is h
e going to fire you when he finds out about us?” I asked.
“Yep. I’ll be lucky if he doesn’t kick my ass,” he said and I laughed, trying to picture anyone kicking Mike’s ass, but Mike didn’t look amused. “He’ll get over it. But he’s going to be pissed at first. I’m more worried he’ll fire me as his best friend than the head of security. I hate this job, anyway.” He smirked. “If he fired me, I could move home. Watch my kid play ball, beat up my friend’s sleazy ex.”
“You’re his best friend, so tell me, why am I here?” I asked as Molly started singing one of her twangy songs that instantly made me hate all country music. “Does he want closure? Does he want answers? I’m going to apologize, but then what? Do we become strangers again?” The idea of never seeing him again killed me. I fell back against my chair. “This entire thing is fucked.”
“What do you want?”
That was a loaded question. I wanted to know the man Nathaniel Kelly had become because I missed the boy he was. I wanted to tell him I was sorry and let him know I often thought about the life we could have had. I wanted Nate Kelly to love CeCe Foster the way Neil Kelly had loved Lia Merrill. I wanted a goddamn do-over.
Instead of telling him those things, I shook my head. If I were honest with him, he’d admit me to a damn psych ward. “Right now? I want to see my favorite musician kick some ass.”
Mike stood up, throwing a bill on the table to cover our drinks and the tip. Holding out a hand to me, he smiled. “Let’s go see him then.”
*****
The stadium had completely filled up while we’d been gone. I sat at the counter in front of the giant glass windows with my best friends in the world and watched as the crowd roared for Nate. It was loud. Deafening loud. Almost sixty-nine thousand fans had crammed into the stadium to see him, and they were rowdy. We saw five people get removed from the stadium by the policed in the short amount of time between Molly’s set and Nate’s.
“Wow.” I nodded in agreement with Cora’s explanation. I didn’t have any more words than that.
The crowd roared as the ‘Bama Boys came on stage one by one. Mike told us who each one was as they picked up their instrument, giving us a little story of each as they got settled. They started playing before Nate joined them. The entire stadium went dark and Nate’s deep voice filled the air.
The drummer started to beat out a rhythm, the lights came up, and Nate was in the middle of the stadium on a catwalk. The women around him went nuts; he laughed, kneeling to offer them his hands. As the song ended, he stood and walked back to the main stage, singing the last few words as he joined his band.
He waited for the screams to die before he waved a hand in the air. “Hello, New England!” More screams as he introduced his band. They were all dressed similar to how they looked last night; most of them, even Nate in his worn jeans, normal red tee that showcased his tattoos, and perfectly messy hair, seemed to be going for the rocker look.
“When I was in high school, my best friend brought me to my first NFL game right here in Foxborough. She told me she was going to see me play here one day. She meant as a football player.” He smiled in our direction and I felt like he was smiling directly at me. “I think she’ll take this instead.” Thousands of whistles and screams filled the stadium.
Mike reached over, ruffling my hair in an annoying big brother sort of way.
“I could have played here tonight without you, Red, but I told you if I was here playing, you’d be here watching.”
He didn’t give the crowd time to react, rolling right into his next song instead. We sat quietly, in the best seats in the entire stadium, and watched as Nate put on the greatest show I’d ever seen. He bounced around the stages, dancing with an energy that made me feel tired. And when he slowed it down, the stadium lit up with the lights from cell phones as thousands of people sang his words back to him.
After the third encore, when he finally told the audience good night, my friends and I sat still, mesmerized. All that music, and he hadn’t played my song. I didn’t know what to think. We watched as the wait staff moved in and out of the suites, cleaning up after the fans next to us had hurried out.
Mike was the first one to speak. “I’ve never seen a show from this side.” He chuckled. “I’m always backstage or on the floor, watching the fans. Kelly kicks ass,” he said and I totally agreed. “Okay, ladies.” Mike stood, stretching. Slipping on his jacket, he watched us. “Time to get you outa here.”
Nina threw back what was left of her drink and stood, grinning at me. “That wasn’t as painful as it could have been.”
I laughed. “Yeah, it was okay.”
Cora ignored Mike, leaning closer to the glass. “There are still so many people out there. It’ll take hours to get out of the parking lot.”
“Good thing we’re not going to their parking lot.” Mike walked up the steps, pausing on the upper level and we slowly followed. I didn’t know about the other girls, but I was exhausted from the lack of sleep and on a little bit of a letdown now that the concert was over.
Mike waited for us at the door, holding it open until we were all in the hall. Then he led the way down the stairs, avoiding the elevator, continuously glancing back at us. When we got to the bottom floor, we were joined by two other men that greeted Mike by name. Mike nodded to them but kept walking, opening the door into a parking lot; we trailed behind him, the other men bringing up the rear.
We walked around a gate and came to a stop at the curb. A man dressed in all black nodded at us and then called someone on his cell. Mike and the other men didn’t say a word; instead, they stood around us in a triangular barrier, each watching their designated side.
Minutes later, a limo pulled up. Mike didn’t wait for the driver to get out, pulling the door open himself and hurrying us inside. After we were all in, he turned and spoke to the other men before climbing in behind us.
“Well, that was weird,” I whispered to no one specific as we started moving.
Nina nodded furiously. “Dude, this entire weekend has been weird.”
I listened to my friends gush about the show and how great of a performer Nate was, but I didn’t join in the conversation. Instead, I leaned my head back, letting memories from my past flash through my mind. It was amusing how I had always separated the Neil that I loved from the Nate we just saw. To me, they weren’t the same person. I knew they were, yes, but it was easier to think of them as two very different individuals. When Nate kissed me earlier, in the way that no one other than Neil had kissed me, I realized I wouldn’t be able to keep them separate anymore.
The conversation around me lulled me to the space between sleep and conscious thought. When the car finally slowed down, I wanted nothing more than to climb into bed. My brain was fried and I needed sleep before I faced Nate again. “Thank, God. I am exhausted. Straight to bed for me,” I mumbled.
“Oh, no you don’t. No rest for the wicked.” Mike nudged me with his arm, smiling when I opened my eyes. I blinked sleepily, glancing past him. We weren’t back at Nate’s house; instead, were in front of an old warehouse. “Night’s just gettin’ started, kid.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
~ Nathaniel ~
I was starting to feel the lack of sleep and getting irritated with everyone by the time we got to the club. After most stadium shows, there was a mandatory after party at a private residence or hotel suite that we had to attend. A small get together with the performers and few hundred of the promoter’s closest friends. Once in a while, like tonight, the celebration was held at a bar.
When we were younger, these parties had been a blast, filled with crazy moments we only half-remembered the next day. Now, they were rarely fun. Most of our time was spent tolerating people we despised and fending off horny fans, all the while smiling for the cameras we tried to avoid, hoping someone didn’t catch a picture that twisted the truth beyond what we could explain to those we loved.
Tonight was different. Boston was one of my favorite
cities and it was always nuts, but we’d never played at Gillette before. The owner of a popular club had offered to shut his place down to everyone that wasn’t invited just so he could say he’d hosted the event. Everyone from local celebrities and athletes to the people that had made both last night’s and tonight’s shows possible had been invited to join us.
Molly talked excitedly all the way to the old factory-turned-local-hotspot. She’d given fans one hell of a show during her set and she was on cloud nine. She should be; she was on her way to becoming a household name. A year from now, she’d be the headliner and fans would be flocking to her shows.
When she started to tell me about all the people she’d heard were going to be at the party, my mind drifted. There was only one person I wanted to be there. Sam assured me that Mike was making that happen, but I didn’t know if she’d be there or not; the party scene had never been Lia’s thing, and I wasn’t sure if the adult version of her felt the same.
I saw Courtney as soon as I walked through the door; she stood a head above the women around her. They were on the dance floor, drinks in hand, shaking their honky-tonk badonk-a-donks, and getting a shit ton of attention from almost every man in the place. Lia, however, was not with them.
After our obligated meeting with the suits was over and we’d posed for the necessary pictures with the promoters so they could prove they’d not only met us, but that we were great friends, the boys scattered, heading in all different directions. Before I could follow, some big-time Bruins player grabbed me, talking my ear off. I didn’t know the first fucking thing about his sport; give me a Patriot or a Red Sox and I’d probably be asking for their autograph. But hockey? They got to beat the shit out of each other, which sounded fantastic, and under normal circumstances, I’d probably be asking him a million fucking questions. Nothing about tonight was normal.
“Have you met Finn?” I asked the crazy Canadian as I snagged my brother-in-law when he tried to walk by us to get to the bar. “He played hockey in college and actually got drafted.” I didn’t wait for either of them to respond before disappearing into the crowd.