“Me too.”
We’ve texted each other hundreds of times since I left for The Voice, but I’m just now realizing it’s all been about me. She’s wanted to know about everything, from recording the CD, to where I was living, to how it was to tour with Roadkill. She must have been saving this for our face to face.
I shake my head. “Jesus, Lilah.” It seems like a pretty huge discrepancy, dead and jail, and I want to ask how she didn’t know, but Bran’s eyes find mine and in them I see his concern. There’s more to the story than the fact her dad’s dead. I want to ask her, but Bran’s look tells me now might not be the time.
She nods slowly, trying to put things together in her head. Behind her, Bran slides closer and rests his hand on her shoulder. She lifts her hand and lays it over his.
“Are you okay?” I ask.
She nods again. “I’m getting there.” Then her face brightens and she looks around. “So, tell me everything!”
“Why don’t you catch up over lunch,” Billie says. “I’ve called a car for you. Go get something to eat, but remember you need to be back for costuming and makeup at six.”
We find a pizza place that the driver recommends and we catch each other up on everything over pepperoni and mushrooms. My first release was Lilah’s song, so she’s made some money from that.
“Enough that Destiny and I moved out of our crap apartment to somewhere Bran thinks is safer,” she says with a glance at him.
“It’s in my building,” he says, a smile ghosting over his face. “So, yeah. It’s safer.”
“No one messes with Bran,” she says with a wily smile.
“Maybe someday I’ll get some time off and I can come out there,” I say. I’m still having trouble picturing Lilah in the sticks, but she seems happy.
We get back to the bus just in time for me to head over to the dressing room.
“Your passes should get you just about anywhere,” I say, giving Lilah a hug on my way into the arena. “You can just walk around or whatever. I’ll see you backstage before the show.”
At seven I’m onstage, and Lilah is dancing with Bran in the wings through the entire show. When I get to my finale, “More Than Nothing,” I drag her onstage with me.
“This is my best friend, Lilah Morgan,” I tell the crowd, “and she wrote this song. She’s amazing and I hope I get to record more of her songs for you.”
I make her stay out here with me through the whole song, and when we come off, Bran is waiting for her with the most incredible smile. There’s no doubt from that look how proud he is of her.
Which makes me so happy.
Billie grabs me as soon as we hit the curtain. “You’ve got a quick interview,” she says, pulling me toward the hall to the dressing rooms.
“I’ll be right back!” I call over my shoulder to Lilah.
By the time they’re done with me and Billie cuts me loose and heads back to the bus, Roadkill is already on stage.
I come up behind a dancing Lilah and grab her hand. “Let’s go.”
“Uh-uh,” she says, tugging back. “I’m backstage at the concert everyone wants tickets for. I’m not going anywhere.”
“Fine,” I say and keep walking. “Meet me at the bus after.”
She grabs my arm. “And so are you.”
I bunch my hands on my hips. “Why would I want to do that?”
“Have you stayed for Roadkill’s show before?” she asks with a tip of her head toward the stage.
I shake my head.
“You get that people are paying scalpers a grand a ticket to see this show, right?”
I glance toward the stage, where Tro and the guys are just hitting their stride on their next song, and take a deep breath. “I’ll see if I can find some chairs.”
She grins and starts dancing to the music. “I won’t need one.”
I sit next to Derrick, the stage monitor guy, while Lilah dances. After the song, Bran pulls her to him and kisses her. She sways in his arms for the next three songs.
Bran brought Lilah to L.A. for The Voice finals. I’ve seen tapes of the show, and when I’m singing my original song, the one Lilah wrote, the cameras cut to Lilah in the audience and caught her and Bran in the middle of a life-altering, Earth-moving kiss. Turns out, I found out later, that was the night that Lilah finally gave into Bran. She’d been fighting her attraction for months because Bran had dated Lilah’s sister and Destiny was still into him, but also because Bran was twenty-six and he didn’t know Lilah was only sixteen…which he found out the next night while they were in the audience for the results show.
But now…I’ve never seen Lilah so happy. And after everything she’s been through with her methhead parents, she deserves it.