Surprisingly, I’m met with no resistance as they individually and enthusiastically agree to the name. My chest lights up as we toast to the decision while what if drifts through my psyche and the road ahead expands beyond the mental barrier I set.
Clinking bottlenecks with my band, I process the fact that I finally have the backup I’ve been holding out and hoping for since I started. Even if we didn’t find each other in some sort of kismet way like I’ve read about in countless other stories, there’s a reason we chose every single one of them. There’s a place for them and for me. Though the shift from me to us is uncomfortable, the payoff of relinquishing control marks our true beginning.
In this moment, I realize there’s only one person I want to call and share my elation with. It’s the unanswered phone calls in the last month that keep me from attempting to do so.
She’s barricaded us on opposite sides of a dead end.
Victory diminishing by the second due to her blatant rejection, I finally understand the crushing weight of defeat in the word I most despise—can’t.
I decide to hate her a little for it because her refusal has made the word part of my vocabulary. The attempt to get back to that euphoric place we created has proved futile. The more she sticks to her stance, the more frustrated I become. This only leads to me concluding she’s far more villain than she believes herself to be.
Daily, she’s stealing my peace of mind with her cruel indifference and purposeful absence. Try as she might, I’m positive I wasn’t the only one who felt a sort of revelation, an undeniable shift during the time we spent together, especially the last few hours. She can feign ignorance and apathy all she wants, but I felt it too substantially—and from her as well—to believe otherwise.
What she’s made abundantly clear is that I’m no competition when it comes to her love and loyalty for Nate Butler. Over that, I have absolutely no control.
She may be a vulture too, for picking me to the bone and consuming my waking thoughts. Draining my beer, anger simmering for the list of can-nots when it comes to Natalie Butler, I do the only thing I can and numb the imprinted details of her face to a blur with my new band.
Here with Me
Susie Suh, Robot Koch
Natalie
One Month Later…
“Earth to Natalie.” Holly impatiently snaps her fingers in front of my face and I find myself ripped from another daydream. The budding summer sun burns hot on my shoulders as I lower the fork raised halfway to my mouth.
Mere seconds ago, I was in Easton’s truck, hair whipping around my face just as he glanced over and our eyes locked, resulting in the inevitable jolt. Crashing back into my current reality, I dart my gaze over to Holly, ready with a quick apology. “I’m so sorry. What were you saying?”
“That’s the third time you’ve spaced out on me in fifteen minutes. I’m not rehashing all of that again,” she utters dryly, glowering at me. “What is with you lately?”
Easton called, again, and I didn’t answer, again.
“It’s like every time I talk to you, you space out when I get to the goods.”
“I’m sorry,” I offer weakly. “I told you I’ve been working my ass off. I’m just tired.”
“Yeah, well, you aren’t the only one, or did you forget I just graduated?”
“I know. I was there,” I grin, “and I’m so proud of you.”
Seeming satisfied for the moment, she runs a manicured finger through her glossy dark brown ponytail, her matching eyes imploring.
“We need to have some fun. I don’t start my internship for a few weeks. Want to take off this weekend?”
“I’ve got a lot of work to do. It’s not the best time.”
“You always have a lot of work to do,” she whines. “Come on, if I get Damon in on it, we can hit Nola and get a stupid expensive suite on his dime.”
“Maybe,” I avoid looking at my phone that rests face down on the table. Easton’s called me twice a week for the last two months. Every time I don’t answer, he lets it ring to voicemail. Every time I check it, the message is full of dead air and background noise as if he wants to speak but stops himself.
No texts, just two weekly calls without a message which I consider just punishment since I’m vying to hear any word from him but can’t bring myself to answer.
By the time I touched down in Austin, Easton had released his first single. I’ll never be able to wrap my head around the shock of hearing the news on the ride home before frantically scanning the radio to listen to it playing. It wasn’t just any song, either, but the one we’d made crazy, life-altering love to a few hours before. It felt like he was calling me back to him.
As soon as Easton’s single hit the airwaves, it went viral on every forum and media outlet. Even ESPN made a comment about it during a sportscast.
In the end, no marketing ended up being the best imaginable marketing, gaining him consistent airplay and respectable nods from other artists. Both his music and the news of his sudden and unexpected release spread like wildfire through the media. Rosie was furious she’d been scooped by none other than the man himself. A fact that still brings a secretive smile to my face—daily.
Less than a week later, he published the entirety of his album along with the would-be article I’d typed on the plane and sent via text. He’d rearranged parts of it and managed to turn it into more of a blanket statement-type press release while protecting my anonymity.
The second I saw it, I ran to the bathroom and tossed up my breakfast, tears streaming down my face, phone in hand, wanting nothing more than to call him. That, combined with the fact that I could barely look at my father, had me going home early that day. It was the lone day I allowed myself to wallow in my misery like a lust-crazed teenager and let the ache rule me wholly.
“Okay,” Holly says, her fingers flying over her phone screen. “I just shot a text to our boy to see if he can manage an impromptu trip.”
“He might be our boy, but he’s your man, remember? So, when do you plan on telling him?”
She pauses, pulling sculpted brows together. “How about never. I’m getting over that crush.”
“You think eight years is a crush?”
“It is if I deem it so,” she sasses.
“Do you even know how beautiful you are?” I prop my hand under my chin, eyes gliding over the fit of the slinky halter dress she’s pulling off so effortlessly. She pauses, a fork full of chicken salad halfway to her mouth, her expression bemused.
“He’s a fool, Holly,” I emphasize. “Because I’m not just talking about your appearance. You have the heart he needs.”
“He’s not looking. He’s too busy hustling for his career and fucking for sport.”
The familiar words jolt me back into that hotel restaurant.
“Do you fuck for sport?”
“Women aren’t a game to me, so I fuck because it feels good.”
God, did it ever feel good.
So damned good I’ve had actual wet dreams—which I swore were a myth—good. An image of Easton flitters in, above me, inside me, hazel eyes intent, jaw slack. An image I’ve replayed an embarrassing number of times. Slamming my fork down in irritation, I let out a long exhale, and Holly jerks back.
“What the hell?”
“It’s just…” I’m losing my focus over the gorgeous, budding rock star I slept with two months ago, and I would like my sanity back. “I’m…just…tell the man you love him already.”