In the Absence of You

by Sunniva Dee

  A shadow of a smile floats over Troy’s features.

  “Anyway, her eye looks fine. It’s just a little red right where it hit. She won’t be suing anyone.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding me. What happened?” Emil points at the bottle in front of him, too comfy to get up for a refill. I cross the room and pour for him. He thanks me, but his eyes don’t meet mine. My heart sinks at his avoidance. Usually, when Emil is in a good mood, he flirts a little and pulls me onto his lap here and there.

  Emil’s and my connection has to be secret because of Shandor, but at the moment only band members, Nadia, and Troll are in this room. With the crew out of sight and busy packing up, I can’t see a reason for Emil’s behavior.

  “One of the fans looked up right when all the chocolate flew through the air,” Bo explains. “She got hit.”

  “No fucking way,” Elias says while Emil mutters, “That’s insane.”

  Tonight is a hotel night. It could have been great. But the way Emil ignores me means I’ll be honoring our scheduled sleeping arrangements, with Irene and me sharing a room.

  This is pathetic. I’m trying to make it easy for him to come to me. I’ve rented my own room, spending precious per diem money on it, since Emil hasn’t made any sign of skipping out of his customary roommate set-up with Troy.

  I haven’t lost all pride yet, so I’m not telling him I did it for us. No, I tell Irene, with my back to Emil in the lobby, that I need a good night’s sleep and can’t be on the highway side of the hotel. She offers to ask for another room, but I say it’s fine, that I’ll probably spend a lot of time on the phone with family in Europe before bed, so it’s better that I don’t bug her.

  In my peripheral, I see Emil turn his head my way once before resuming his gentle flirting with a teenaged fan who lives at our hotel.

  “Twelve Oh Four?” I repeat, loud enough for Emil to hear when I receive my keycard from the receptionist. “Down to the left and I should take elevator B?”

  Pathetic.

  Emil hasn’t buttoned up his shirt yet. I want to go over and do it so the small pixie-cut blonde stops touching his chest. How old is she anyway? Fifteen?

  Jealousy is a bad sign.

  I grab my overnight bag and hike it onto my shoulder. I wave at the others, and feeling bold, I detour by Emil and give him a kiss on the cheek. “Goodnight, Emil,” I murmur. The teenager doesn’t take her eyes off him. She’s beaming hard.

  “Night. Sexy dreams,” he replies, a smile on his face though he still doesn’t meet my gaze.

  I’m in the elevator with Shandor and Irene. My cousin’s face is thunderous, but Irene chatters about the show, about her nephew at home in Chicago—he just took his first steps. I pray she won’t mention how we’re not sharing a room tonight.

  Shandor gets off on the sixth floor and mutters his goodnights. Irene stays with me until the seventh floor, and my heart hops at how easily their room arrangement could have been swapped.

  Once in my fabulous twelfth-floor room, I can’t sleep. I turn on the TV, browse channels, and even linger on a paid erotic channel long enough to get a glimpse of some half-censored action. I switch it off before I have to pay.

  My stomach churns, and it’s not from lack of food. Everything about today has been great. Until Emil brushed me off after Nadia’s arrival. I try to understand what’s going on. Maybe he feels the connection with his ex in a stronger way when Nadia’s around?

  I fall asleep but wake up a few hours later to stumbled snickering. Recognizing Emil’s drunken voice, my heart lunges into a sprint.

  “Iz here,” he slurs.

  A girl’s voice mingles with his. Is he bringing his latest conquest to my room? No, he wouldn’t do that. Holding my breath, I sit up in bed with the comforter drawn up my chest as if the door weren’t locked.

  “Got the key right here,” he says. “Hold on.”

  Now I’m really worried. Did he get a spare key from the receptionist? If anyone could do it, it’s Emil. I fumble for my clothes on what would be Emil’s side of my king-sized bed and get dressed in a hurry. I’ve got the chain attached, but with a key, my door could still slide open by an inch. I’d be forced to have an uncomfortable conversation with a horny, drunk Emil and his lay for the night.

  The squeak of a door opening jolts me upright. I hear him clearly, but the sound of his voice doesn’t get louder. “Welcome to my cassstle. Ladies first,” Emil husks, and the girl titters, breathless with excitement, and that’s when I realize they’re next door to me.

  My eyes dart to the door by the desk. Oh God, I’m so close, that door is the only thing separating us.

  His bed creaks, and muffled talk seeps through the wall. I want to turn the TV back on so I don’t have to hear them, but I’d call attention to myself if I did that. I rummage in my overnight bag for my headphones. They’re not with me. They’re on the freaking bus.

  I get up. Tiptoe to the bathroom. She’s already moaning in there—he must be going down on her. Emil… is really good at that. My stomach hurts.

  I turn on the shower and get undressed. I jump in and draw the curtains, but I can’t bear to shut the door to the hallway. It’s okay. I don’t hear them anyway, with the shower rushing hard over my head and body. With a finger, I slide lavender soap through my folds, tentatively testing my own response, and I tingle even though Emil’s nearness isn’t with me.

  So twisted.

  In the morning, I remain in my room for as long as I can, skipping breakfast. When Troll calls, ribbing me out for acting like a lead singer, I tell him he doesn’t have to worry about me. I’m not hungry, and I’ll be on the bus ahead of time.

  We stop at a fast-food joint for breakfast twenty minutes later. I have no appetite, but Emil is hung over and pale and needs nutrition. I’m not a band member and shouldn’t be the one interrupting our travel day later, so I realize that I should eat too. Still, I can’t make myself sit by Emil’s window table.

  He’s uncharacteristically quiet. He hasn’t interacted with anyone since he got on the bus fifteen minutes after the set departure time. A livid Troll read him the riot act, but even that didn’t make him smirk and apologize. Now, he’s shoving hash browns into his mouth with eggs and toast. I don’t welcome my need to brush his hair with my fingers.

  Troy’s shadow interrupts my view for the second it takes him to sink down in front of me. I glance up and register how the golden chocolate of his skin makes his eyes glimmer olive green. Strong drummer’s fingers hug a takeaway cup, and he doesn’t drop my gaze while he sips his coffee.

  It’s strange with Troy. He’s peaceful. Balanced. Even with the fire inside me, with my constant disquiet, I don’t feel the urge to keep a polite conversation going with him.

  “Are you okay?” he asks, voice low so the other tables won’t hear us. “I know they gave Emil the room next to yours last night.”

  My lips start to quiver.

  “Shh,” he says. A quick look at Emil reveals him oblivious to anything besides the parking lot filled with trucks and buses. Troy reaches for me and dries the tear slipping to the corner of my eye.

  “I’m not going to tell you how unwise it’d be to get invested in something with Emil. I’d be insulting your intelligence. You’re a grownup. Right?”

  I bob my head, biting off a piece of my sandwich so I can flush my need to cry with it.

  “But you’re a sweet girl. We all love to have you with us, Aishe, not just Emil, and I hate to see you suffer.”

  I roll my eyes to downplay the sting of tears. I can’t speak while I chew another flavorless mouthful.

  “Which is why I wanted you to know that he and I fought last night. Over him wanting to bring a girl into our room and me being too tired to deal with it. It’s why he got a separate room. And he wasn’t lucid enough to realize that it was next door to you.”

  I haven’t seen Emil take a groupie up on her offer for weeks, and I hate that he didn’t come to me instead. Still, the ache
eases a little knowing that he wasn’t intentionally cruel.

  “He must have heard it though, when I got the room. He was right there with that slut.” I don’t know why I call the girl a slut. Troy seems to understand, his eyelids lowering in acknowledgment.

  “It’s just a room number, Aishe. And when you’re as drunk as he was last night, it’s hard to—”

  “Why do you defend him?” I interrupt, my voice louder than I intend. I instantly bow into my seat, covering my mouth. Emil looks up, meeting my stare for a second before returning to his food—like he’s a loner, like he’s not the most social person I know.

  Troy leans in, lower arms gliding toward me on the tabletop. “I’m not making excuses for him. Emil’s a good guy, but ever since he messed up with Zoe…” He shrugs, shoulders heaving under his dreadlocks. “He still refers to her as the love of his life, okay? Listen. It would be sad to have you hate him for acting like an asshole, but even worse if you thought someone was consciously disrespecting you. I’m damn sure that’s not what happened.”

  My eyes fill with tears, and I can’t remove my hands from my face. I’m in plain sight in this small establishment with white walls, white tiles, and the sun reaching me through tall glass panes with merciless morning rays.

  We’re in tight quarters. Of course everyone is aware of what occurred last night—me in one room, Emil in the next with a girl. Like everyone else, Troy could have overlooked my pain. I’m grateful, really grateful, that he took on the discomfort of talking with me about it.

  Eyes calm on me, Troy waits until I can speak. When I do, I’m in control of my voice again. “Thank you. I appreciate that.”

  “Always.” He rises slowly, stretching and in no hurry to leave.

  He crosses his arms, broad shoulder tipping forward enough to showcase a solid upper back as he swings. All he does, every day, is bang on those drums. No wonder the man is fit.

  Four bites of an egg salad sandwich constitute a fine breakfast when all you want is to crawl into your bunk and shut your eyes. We’re ten hours away from the next show, and there’s nothing expected from me until I’m there. Maybe I should do that: take a Benadryl and sleep until we arrive.

  “Say, Aishe?”

  “Hmm?” I peer at Troy over the plates I’ve just shoved out of reach. From the door, his focus shifts to me before he jerks his head toward the outdoors and leaves.

  Emil shifts when I get up. I dig my teeth into my lip as I watch him watch me. My chest expands again, absorbing oxygen I’ve skimped on since last night. I count seconds.

  In the four seconds I wait, I see no sign of remorse, no sign he’d like to talk to me. Hungover limp, Emil is expressionless, and I exhale so deeply it feels like my entire torso deflates. I exit with his stare following me until the front door slaps me with its fast kickback.

  There’s a small nook at the entryway, all wooden beams and plants, and I halt there to let the plague reign freely on my face. This is a face I can’t show anywhere—a face I don’t want to see myself—but I’m not strong enough to stop it from cracking through.

  The plague.

  The plague.

  The love fire.

  I. Am. Inflicted.

  I turn and peer through the window, seeing Emil’s profile. Again, he’s lost in the ugliness of the parking lot. God, my insides simmer and burn. They shouldn’t be simmering and burning. Scorching love is not good, I know this, and yet I’ve allowed my embers to be teased by someone I deemed safe.

  Oh I am stupid.

  I need to talk with Shandor. Maybe we should leave. I have never been so close to becoming my aunt, my grandfather, my grand-aunt, my… sister.

  I’m crying when Troy’s hands cradle my face and raise it. I’d left the restaurant to find him, but I took too long. He must have returned for me. “Girl, come on. Don’t cry. Please?”

  I nod fast, knowing I need to keep it together in this world. In my community, we rage, we dance, we cry and love and laugh and howl, not what normal people do—Normal is what I broke out for, and out here, no one would understand. Normal is soothing, sweet, helpful to me, a Band-Aid on a heritage I desperately need to lose.

  Shandor and I haven’t discussed it, but it must be why he broke out too.

  For an instant, the musical lilt of Troy’s accent makes me catch on to the layers of a different people than mine. I want to smile at him, but I can’t just yet. “I’m not crying.”

  When I meet his eyes, he doesn’t avoid my tears. He stares right at me, unafraid and examining, compassion deep in each feature.

  “You’re so nice,” I whisper.

  “Aishe. You have a friend on this tour, okay? One that accepts who you are and what you want no matter what that is. I’m your friend, not your cousin or brother or father. Anything you need, from hugs to trips to the movies to brawls with assholes that treat you badly. Got it?”

  The muscles in my cheeks support smiles, it turns out. I feel it when the corners of my mouth curl upward, crinkling my eyes too. I bob my head. “Sweet,” I manage. “Can you take me to the hairdresser’s?”

  EMIL

  If I don’t count singing, life’s a crack whore dragging me into shit I don’t want to deal with. Who cares that it’s sunny outside and people are fucking beaming around me? The beaming is no surprise with Nadia around. Bo and she together are contagious, leaving everyone rosy-cheeked and on their best behavior, apologizing and offering assistance with random crap from the moment they step out of their bunks in the morning.

  How much longer?

  At least I’ve wised up; beautiful Aishe can’t end up in my bed again. Most of the time, I operate from within a bubble where others’ responses sound muffled. Their anger and joys are hushed elevator music to my senses. Maybe I’ve been tricking myself from the start or maybe something changed, but the hurt in Aishe’s gaze after I slept with a groupie was the decibel distortion I needed to grasp her state of mind—this girl, she isn’t a detached motherfucker like me.

  There’s a bunk between us on the bus, but her scent shoots up to me whenever she shifts on the mattress. She’d be my number one choice for oblivion, which is my problem now. I’m trying to muster the willpower to not be the guy who takes advantage of the situation.

  She’s not Zoe.

  No one fucking is.

  I know I need to forget my baby. My love. The love of my drab-as-hell life. I know. I know. Bo tells me all the time. Troy too, whenever I give him the chance. But it’s hard when all I want is to get her back and I don’t like to breathe without her. If only Nadia didn’t keep visiting us on tour.

  Show nights are my absolution. The stage is a purge. I sing, scream, shout out the lava boiling in my chest. I don’t know where I would be if it weren’t for my fans. It’s crazy to keep this heartbreak imprisoned in my head.

  I don’t do drugs. I’m not an alcoholic. Since Zoe left, I’ve kept warm on the after-show chicks, but now there’s this special girl in a bunk beneath me.

  With its rounded sectional and big TV screen, the back lounge is the preferred hangout for video games. In a corner, there’s Troll’s makeshift office desk, and toward the back wall, two bunk beds hide behind thin, sliding doors camouflaged as wallpaper.

  I’m splayed out on my back with my elbow covering my face. I’ve been lying like this for a while. Everyone has left. Maybe I’m the reason, not sure, don’t care.

  “Emil?” Nadia’s voice reaches me from the doorway. “Sweetheart, let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

  This is old news. It’s been four months since Zoe sent me packing. I—

  I just can’t—

  “Never mind, Nadia. Go enjoy your time with Bo. I’m not redeemable.”

  Bullets. Round and smooth like women’s breasts. Orange brass tipped with shiny silver. And what about when they explode? Pow.

  I stretch my arms, touching the back cushions with my head bent backwards. What would it do to Clown Irruption if I vanished? Bo’s the real so
ngwriter here, and his voice is damn good too. I’m pretty sure he doesn’t upgrade from backup vocals because of my role in the band.

  His style is different from mine. Bo can’t copy others’ voices, but then again, most professional singers can’t. It makes no sense to do what I do anyway, because the fans prefer one recognizable sound.

  It’s just me being weird; David Bowie’s voice should remain on his records. Andrea Bocelli’s got nothing to do at our rock concerts, and though my latest noodling with a few Adams out there—Adam Ant, Adam Lambert, Adam Levine—left the audience awed, my friends were in stitches at the bizarreness of the gig.

  Zoe loved my imitations. No one could ask for a more supportive girlfriend than my Zee—not even Nadia could beat her. She was jealous though.

  Zoe and Nadia worked at the same restaurant, but Nadia left her job at Bo’s insistence. Dude’s following Nadia’s ex’s lead, making sure she gets the education she dreamed of in high school. Veterinarian.

  I grab my Mac and pull up Zoe’s Facebook page. There isn’t as much going on here as there was a month ago. Some dude tagging her in a photo of her looking tired. She always wore perfect makeup, deep lipstick against soft skin and that super-coiffed blonde ’do of hers. I didn’t care either way—I loved her in the mornings, especially if she hadn’t removed her makeup, the scent of sleepy skin and old hairspray making me fuck her hard.

  Her mouth. Zoe was genuine, kind, and super-bitchy. Nothing was hotter than to kiss that bitchiness off of her like lime from a toilet bowl.

  “Emil, no! Don’t you see how small my butt is? Look. Stop it—look at me.”

  Oh I listened all right when she bitched at me like that. My sweetest, bitchiest girl. Fuck. Fuck. She’s so fucking special. There are tons of not-bitchy girls out there. Tons of bitchy ones too. But the ones who are so genuine, so bitchy, but so sweet and mendable and bendable—