As Dust Dances ~ Samantha Young

by Young, Samantha

  It was also the only song the band didn’t play with me. I did it solo.

  I took a shaky breath, exhaled, and strummed the opening chords.

  “Under my bed there’s a box

  Filled with these things

  My heart has saved.

  A photograph of a young man,

  Wearing green and a face of the brave.

  “And beneath that there’s

  A case my mother bought

  That she couldn’t afford.

  Inside, a CD of a song

  That made me realize what I was meant for.

  “Somehow one day, one rainy day,

  This boy found himself in that box.

  Somehow one day, one rainy day,

  He smiled his way into my thoughts.

  “I think of those moments I’ve kept

  Hidden and safe

  Beneath my old bed.

  And wonder if you ever knew

  They say all the things

  My mouth never said.

  “Somehow one day, one rainy day,

  I fell for a smile I can’t have.

  And yesterday, yesterday we found,

  We found ourselves on different paths.

  “Under my bed there’s a box

  Filled with these things

  My heart has saved.

  And even though we said goodbye

  I can’t help but keep hold to my faith.

  “That out there on some rainy day,

  In some other time,

  On some other plane.

  Our love is waiting for us,

  To give us a chance without all this pain.

  “Somehow one day, one rainy day,

  A girl and a boy will collide.

  But this time, this time they’ll stay

  Tied as they brave the landslide.”

  There was an unexpected hush as the last chord sang from my guitar, but then I felt him.

  I turned my head from the mic, confusion furrowing my brow at the sight of Micah standing guitarless by the stool. This wasn’t part of our show.

  I opened my mouth to say his name but it turned into a gasp as he clasped my face in his hands and bent down to crush his mouth over mine.

  The arena filled with the deafening boom of screams and catcalls as he kissed me with passion. But I knew those kisses. I’d tasted them before. They were Micah’s angry kisses.

  And all I could think, all I could fear, was how this was going to be all over entertainment news tomorrow. I couldn’t push him off or get mad at him in front of the fans because it would only make things worse.

  Instead I let him kiss me. When he finally let me up for air, he didn’t let go of my face. He had this smug, triumphant gleam in his eyes that fought with the anger. “Thanks for the reminder.”

  I put my hand over the mic so the crowd couldn’t hear. “What reminder?”

  “That no matter how many morons you fuck, you’ll always be mine.” He kissed my forehead, setting the crowd off even harder, and I swear it took everything in me not to throw my beloved Taylor at his back as he walked offstage.

  I fought for composure, turning to the crowd with a shaky smile. Sliding the mic into the stand, I slipped off the stool. “That’s all from us tonight, Glasgow. We’ll see you soon!”

  The yells that accompanied us offstage were different. They were even more explosive, fueled by Micah’s little performance. I met Brandon’s gaze as we walked offstage and he appeared ready to murder Micah.

  “You okay?”

  I shook my head. “Let me deal with it.”

  “What the hell was that?” Gayle cried as we gathered in the wings, the thrum of the crowd growing more frenzied. “Is this something that’s been added to the show that I didn’t know about?”

  I bet our manager was glad she’d decided to join us for the last leg of our European tour. She was going to be even happier when she heard what I had to say.

  I glowered at Micah who stared back at me defiantly. “What the fuck was that?”

  He shrugged. “Giving them a show.”

  “Do you realize that you’ve stirred all that tabloid shit up even worse?” I yelled to be heard. “Do you even care?”

  “Look, we need to get back out there,” Austin interrupted.

  “Yeah, we do. And now thanks to this idiot, I have to go out there and pretend that I don’t want to rip his face off!”

  “Oh, come on, Skylar, it was just a kiss!” he yelled.

  Brandon moved toward him but I clamped my hand on his arm to stop him. I stepped forward with deathly seriousness. “I am not yours. I don’t belong to you.”

  “Tell yourself whatever you need to hear.” His eyes burned in anguish. “But we both know the truth, and being apart is ridiculous bullshit!”

  “No, it’s my choice. And you know what else is my choice? Whether I stay with this band or not.”

  “Wait, what?” Gayle looked panicked.

  “Yeah, you heard me. You sort out your shit, Micah, or I walk.”

  Everyone stared at each other.

  “Guys, you need to get back out there!” the stage manager shouted.

  “Well?”

  “Fine!” Micah bullied past me and stormed up the stage steps.

  I shared an exhausted look with the boys and we hurried after him.

  As soon as I hit those lights, I plastered on a big smile and waved for the crowd. We immediately broke into the song that had exploded us into the stratosphere when it became the lead song on the soundtrack to a huge teen dystopian movie. Usually when I sang it, I plugged into how I felt sitting in the movies that first time, hearing our song on the end credits of a box-office hit. It was the kind of moment I clung to, to remind myself there were moments where all the stuff I hated about my life seemed almost worth it.

  That night I could barely focus on the lyrics, let alone that feeling.

  I got through it, trying not to buckle under the weight of failure. Not only did I hate this life I was so sure I’d wanted, but I was failing at it. Because of a toxic teen romance. We were a fucking cliché.

  The relief was unreal as I walked off that stage. I shot past everyone, heading straight for my dressing room.

  It hadn’t even closed behind me when it burst open and Micah stormed in.

  “Are you kidding me with this?” I hissed.

  “I’m only here to say one thing. Don’t threaten the band because of us. It’s an empty threat.”

  “Meaning?”

  “You would never quit the band because it isn’t in you to give up.” His expression softened. “It’s one of the things I admire most about you.”

  I shook my head, feeling an overwhelming sadness embrace me. “I might give up. If it begins to hurt too much.”

  Micah immediately looked ashamed. “I fucked up,” he whispered. “Again. I . . . I get stuck in my own head and I don’t think. I didn’t think. I . . . I pissed all over you like a big dumb dog. And I messed up.”

  I nodded, my anger softening at his apology. “You promise this is behind us? That this won’t happen again?”

  After a moment’s hesitation, he nodded and turned to leave. But then he had to look back over his shoulder at me. “I’ll never stop loving you, even if you never stop punishing me for that night.”

  As soon as he walked out, my whole body sagged. I slid down the wall, pulling my knees into my chest. My head buzzed like always with the sound of the crowd. I went to bed after gigs and that’s all I could hear as physical exhaustion drove me into sleep. Sometimes the crowd was all I could hear when I woke up the next morning too.

  And now, whispering through the chaotic hum of the crowd, I could hear Micah’s whisper repeating over and over, “I’ll never stop loving you. I’ll never stop loving you. I’ll never stop loving you.”

  The messed-up thing was, as much as it hurt, I knew it would hurt worse if he ever actually did stop loving me.

  I wanted to call my mom and tell her all about it.
But then I’d remembered the time she sold her car and bought this cheap little thing that kept breaking down and making her late for work. And she did that so she could pay for me and Micah to go to California with the band for this spotlight competition we auditioned for. We got to play for a real label. We were only fifteen.

  We didn’t win a record contract.

  But she never stopped having faith. Brandon’s parents were so mad about it, they sold his drums and said we couldn’t practice in his basement anymore.

  So my mom worked overtime for three months while we all got part-time jobs after school. And between us and Mom, we saved enough to buy new drums for Brandon. She also stopped parking her crappy car in the garage and let us soundproof it so we’d have a place to practice.

  I remembered her yelling at Bryan that he could pack his stuff and leave if he wasn’t prepared to support me. He did leave. She cried for days. I didn’t like the guy, but I was never so relieved as I was when he came back.

  Still, she’d almost lost the one man she’d fallen for since my dad died, and it would’ve been my fault.

  Every hardship, every month we struggled to pay the bills, it was because of me.

  All our conversations, our planning, my guitar and singing lessons, everything was about me.

  About my dream.

  Three years of struggle because I wanted to be the lead singer in a professional rock band.

  And we did it.

  Only for me to no longer want it.

  How could I tell her that? And how could we talk now without her realizing that I was miserable? This was my mom, my best friend. She’d know. She’d know.

  Worse still, she had a good life now. I bought her a beautiful big house, an SUV, she had no mortgage, and a monthly stipend I paid into her account. I had plenty of money and a great financial adviser that invested it, but I knew my mom . . . if I left the band, she’d go back to worrying about money.

  I didn’t want that for her.

  I didn’t want Bryan to say “I told you so” and for her to have to hide the disappointment she felt at my failure.

  And then there was Micah. I’d sacrificed our love for our band and now we were so messed up, there was no fixing us. I couldn’t hate this life after choosing it over him.

  It was too much. I wasn’t thinking clearly, I—

  The door to my dressing room opened and Gayle poked her head in. She frowned at the sight of me on the floor and stepped in, closing the door behind her. “I’m worried, Skylar. What’s going on? What do you need?”

  “I need a break,” I blurted. “I need to be alone for a while.”

  “Where do you want to go?” She pulled her phone out.

  “Somewhere quiet. Secluded.”

  “And that’s all you need?”

  I felt her anxiety and hurried to assure her. “I’m not leaving the band, Gayle. I just need a break.”

  A break would help. I’d feel better after time apart from the guys.

  But the next morning as my phone exploded with notifications, including missed call after missed call from my mom, I knew a break wouldn’t help. My anger toward Micah was building and building as I stared at the multiple photos, taken from different angles, of him kissing me on stage. They were all over the internet. The fans loved it.

  I stared at one particular shot, taken from someone close to the stage.

  It looked like something from a movie. Micah kissed me with so much longing that an ache for him pierced my lividness.

  But only momentarily.

  Because it might look like a kiss of pure longing, but I’d tasted it. Tasted his petty wrath and immaturity in that kiss.

  And I wondered what this life we’d chosen would be like if Micah and I could break this toxic bond between us.

  Then I hightailed it to a summerhouse in Norway, hoping some space would make me feel less crazy about everything.

  Present day

  Glasgow, Scotland

  I GLANCED AWAY FROM THE Hydro, from the memories there. Just a few weeks after hiding out in Norway, I’d returned home to my mom and had that stupid argument with her only for her creepy husband to come on to me.

  Instead of the guilt I usually felt, anger suffused me.

  I never saw it coming. Not once had Bryan ever made overtures toward me. Looking back, I remember he’d compliment me more than he used to but I thought he was being a douchey sycophant.

  It was his fault I felt this guilt. He’d put me in the untenable position of either having to break my mother’s heart and gain her anger, or keep the secret from her. I chose wrong.

  The secret tore us apart anyway.

  “‘Oh, I wish that I had told you, all the truths locked inside me, instead of cutting you out, like a knife through our lives,’” I sang softly under my breath. Tears burned in my eyes.

  There was no going back, I realized.

  All these months of hiding, some crazy part of me held onto some hope that I could go back and fix everything. But I couldn’t. She was gone and there would never be any closure. The only way to get through that, I thought, sucking in a shuddering breath, was to believe with every bit of light left within me that my mom died knowing I loved her. That I loved her the best. Always.

  Tears fell slowly down my cheeks and I let them. I had months of tears locked inside me. I would no longer be afraid of releasing them.

  Bracing my head down and into the wind, I walked slowly back toward my apartment. I knew it wasn’t really my apartment but rather a haven. A place where I think I was finally ready to heal.

  * * *

  AS SOON AS I LET myself into the apartment, I knew someone was there.

  I froze at the threshold. “O’Dea?” I called.

  “In here,” his deep voice rumbled from the front of the apartment.

  Relaxing, I closed the door behind me and wandered down the hall to find him. His coat and scarf lay draped over the couch and he was standing in the kitchen drinking coffee.

  “What are you doing here?” My eyes landed on the guitar case lying on the island and my heart sped up. “Is that . . . ?”

  O’Dea studied me as he put his coffee mug down. “The police returned it. They wanted to release it to you but I convinced Calton you didn’t need to make another trip to the station.”

  A well of emotion churned deep in my gut as I walked over to the case. My hand trembled as I took my time unlatching one side, then the other. And then my breath faltered as I opened it and found my Taylor lying inside, right where I’d left it. Grasping the neck, I lifted it out carefully. O’Dea saw me struggling to turn it one-handed for inspection and stepped in to help me. I took in every inch of it as he held it up for me.

  There wasn’t a scratch on it.

  I focused on the personalization etched on the back along the curve of the body.

  “Music is the outburst of the soul” and your soul is beautiful, my darling. Love you always, Mom.

  And it hit me with the force of a car knocking me off my feet. She had known. When my words failed me, my music spoke, and it told her everything she needed to know.

  She’d known I was unhappy and all she’d wanted was for me to say it out loud so she could help me. I knew it.

  I could feel my throat closing with the need to keep the mass of emotion inside of me from exploding out in front of O’Dea. I didn’t want to have a meltdown in front of him.

  “I need a minute,” I managed to whisper and hurried into the bedroom.

  My body shuddered as I tried to lock the feelings down. I’d made the decision to let all the tears out whenever they wanted but not here, not in front of him.

  “Music is the outburst of the soul” and your soul is beautiful, my darling. Love you always, Mom.

  No, no, no, no! I squeezed my arms around myself but I couldn’t stop it. The sob got past my throat but I clamped my mouth shut, holding it in.

  My heart was pounding so hard, the blood whooshing in my ears deafened me. That’s why
I didn’t hear the door open and nearly jumped out of my skin at the touch of O’Dea’s hand on my shoulder. I whirled around, taking in his unsure, uncomfortable expression.

  “I’m okay,” I said, sounding not okay at all. “I’m okay, I’m okay.” My voice grew shakier and shakier with each claim and I felt it coming again. God, get out, leave me! I wanted to scream. “Please, I’m o—” but I wasn’t okay.

  She would have forgiven me. I knew it.

  My mom would have forgiven me, so why couldn’t I forgive myself?

  The sobs racked my body. I couldn’t hold them off any longer.

  “Fuck, Skylar,” I heard O’Dea whisper.

  I held up my hand to ward him off, but he gently knocked it out of the way and then my cheek was pressed to his hard, warm chest. His strong arms bound tight around me.

  It was permission to let go.

  So I did.

  I cried, wrapped up in his strength, wondering if the tears would ever stop now that I’d really let them loose.

  IT WAS BECOMING FAMILIAR TO wake up in bed momentarily confused about how I’d gotten there. It was still light out, daylight streaming in through the open curtains.

  The last thing I remembered was sobbing in Killian’s arms.

  Ah, shit.

  He was Killian again.

  Why did he have to be such a complicated asshole? Just pick a personality, I grumbled to myself as I got up and wandered into the bathroom.

  My face was splotchy and my eyes swollen from crying so hard. Using my good hand, I splashed water on my face, not caring about my makeup since it had already bled off with the tears.

  Feeling exhausted from my emotional release, I wandered back out into the living area, stumbling to a stop at the sight of Killian sitting on the couch, typing something on his phone.

  I’d expected to be alone.

  “You’re up,” he said, his eyes assessing if I was going to have another meltdown.

  “Yeah.” I looked away, embarrassed. The clock on the oven told me I’d only been out for an hour or so. “Coffee?” I asked, shuffling into the kitchen.