18. You’re Gonna Go Far – Stella
“Over easy, right Mrs. Marcuso?”
“You’ve got it, sweetie! You’ve got a great memory.” I don’t tell her my memory had very little to do with it since she’s been coming in every morning since I was 20 and ordering the same thing.
Turning toward the kitchen to give Frank my order, I stop short, watching Amelia get increasingly flustered at the man standing in front of her despite this not being his first time in the diner. He points at me and smiles wide. I roll my eyes, walking over to him.
“Stella Bella!” he says, using the old nickname, and then pulls me into a big bear hug. Reed always gave the best hugs, and with everything going on, I really need one. Badly.
It’s been four days since Riggins last came to the diner, four days since I asked him to leave in a fit of anger.
It has been four days since I spoke to him.
Funny how you can go years without seeing someone, they come back into your life for a few weeks, and suddenly you feel that loss all over, like it’s fresh and painful.
“What are you doing here?” I ask when I pull back from the hug.
“Why do you think I’m here?” he asks reasonably. I make a face without my brain’s permission, and he laughs before his face goes serious. I know he’s here because of Riggins, but I also have to wonder in what respect? Is it because Riggins sent him here, or maybe because he’s worried about him? Is he spiraling?
“Come on. Eat lunch with me,” Reed says, genuine hope on his face. “It’ll be like old times.”
“I’m working,” I say, even though a part of me wants to say yes so, so badly.
I miss him. I miss my old life, a version of me that I’ve packed away tightly, but I’ve slowly been picking at the tape and keeping it shut this past week. It’s been nice having them back in my life, but it also feels like opening a door that needs to stay shut to keep what”s left of me safe.
“You have your break coming up, Stell. It’s slow now. You totally can slink off for an hour or two, and we’ll be fine,” Amelia says. I turn to my employee and glare, but she’s so starstruck, it bounces right off of her.
“See! You’ll be fine! Come get lunch with me, tell me all about your life since I last saw you.”
That sounds about as enjoyable as having my eyelashes plucked out one by one. Can’t wait to tell the guys who have been touring the world and going to awards shows and living their dream that I’m stuck in the hometown we all swore we’d leave, working in the diner my mother owns and as lonely as humanly possible.
I shake my head.
“Actually, you have to leave. If my mom finds out you’re here, she’s going to freak.” She hasn’t been in since that call despite her threats of needing to get my divorce rolling by Friday, but I know round two of that argument is lying in wait.
Reed looks momentarily confused.
“The Stella I knew didn’t care about what your shit of a mother thought,” Reed accuses, and if it were anyone else, I’d be mad, but he says it with his signature smirk and goofy boy face; I can’t be mad.
“Yeah, well, now she pays my bills,” I say, lying just a bit, but what does it even matter anymore? “And considering Riggins is back in town, I’m already walking on eggshells, waiting for her to find out he’s been coming in here after he punched Parker.”
“Let me guess, she has no idea?” Reed asks, that same cocky smile tugging at his lips. I shake my head. “Would be a shame if everyone in this place finds out you’re ma—“ I slap my hand over his mouth, and he laughs the deep, loud laugh that used to wake me up in the middle of the night under my hand. He was never able to hide his laugh, make it quieter even when he tried his hardest.
“I’ll go,” I whisper, then say louder, my hand still on his face, to Amelia. “I’ll be back, an hour tops.”
“Two!” Reed says with a wide smile.
I roll my eyes and ignore Amelia’s, take as long as you need! before I let Reed lead me out the front door.
Lunch is on the outskirts of town at a burger joint we all used to go to way too late at night. I haven’t been here since I came home; the memories are too sharp, but when I walk in, the smell alone brings them in on a wave.
Good memories.
Sweet ones.
We stand at the counter and order, Reed insisting he pay for my meal despite my arguing. “I’m a famous rockstar, Stella Bella. I can handle the cost of a burger and fries.”
I know better than to argue, so I let it go.
“So, what have you been up to? Anything exciting?” Reed asks, his smile genuine as he sips his soda from an old translucent red plastic cup, the same ones the place had when we were all kids. I shake my head.
“Nope. Just the normal. I’m working at the diner. Living in Ashford. I’m boring. But you—you’ve got an exciting life,” I say with a smile. “How’s life been?”
He shrugs. “Same old, same old,” he says, his face going a bit sad as he does. “You know how it is. New city every week, shows and fans and… all that. Just bigger now. Wilder.”
I can’t even fathom wilder. His lips tip up with the words like he can see my mind working.
“A different kind of wild, though. Fans screaming our names, trying to get backstage. We have full-time security now, which is wild.” I laugh at the idea, the mental image of a 6’5”, built as fuck grumpy Beckett needing a bodyguard. Reed laughs. “Beck hates it.” I smile at the way he still can sense what I’m thinking. “But it’s not the same partying wild. We drink, me and the guys, but not blackout drunk every night anymore.”
“Riggins?” I ask. It’s a multi-part question: Did you stop because of Riggins? Does Riggins drink on tour? Reed shakes his head.
“Riggs doesn’t drink anymore, obviously. But he’ll hang with us when we do. It wasn’t always like that. It took a bit for us to believe it would be okay if we drank around him, but eventually, he convinced us. We all met with his AA sponsor about a year after he was sober and asked him questions until we felt comfortable.” There’s a heavy silence that comes with the reality of acknowledging Riggins’ addiction.
“He’s changed,” Reed says after a few beats of silence, and it twists a knife.
“I know that,” I say in a whisper. Just a week or two of being around Riggins, and I can see it. I see the version of him I fell in love with is back, no longer a cloud of alcohol and addiction hanging around him.
But it still doesn’t ease my worries, doesn’t cure my anger or the pain he caused.
“I was pissed for a while, too,” he says, and my head moves back in surprise.
“What?”
“I was pissed. How he was, how he threw his life away, threw our life away. He threw you away. It pissed me off. It took him a while to prove he was sober, that he really meant it. There was a year there, before his dad died, where he would try to get sober and then relapse. It was a cycle that felt like it would only end in tragedy, but we were young and scared that if we talked to him about it too much, it would backfire.” He looks beyond me like he’s lost in memories. “I wish we’d talked to him sooner. There was that one time, but after that, we never said anything, not outright. And it only made him want to hide how bad it had gotten. It made him hide his drinking.”
I remember that part all too well, the final nail in the coffin of Riggins and my relationship.
The confusing concoction of emotions that continues to swirl in my gut twists again, and I’m back to being annoyed with Riggins for putting all of us through it.
“It’s not fair, you know,” Reed says, his tone turning once more gentle and concerned. His hand reaches out, and he grabs mine. “Holding his mistakes against him this long, holding this grudge.” I open my mouth to argue, but he shakes his head. “No, I’m not saying you can’t be mad. Be mad forever, Stella. But let him tell his side first. You two… there’s too much there for you to just throw it out. That’s what I had to come to terms with. Our friendship was too old, too valuable to throw it out. I heard him out, and we talked. It was good. And he’s better now. My best friend is back.”
I give him a sad smile that wavers with my effort not to let a teardrop. “I’m happy for you, Reed. Really, I am. You were as worried as I was about him back then. I’m glad you got your best friend back, glad you guys got the career you always dreamed of, and glad you get to tour the world. But me? I’m also better,” I lie. “I’m better because I got space, I got to breathe.” I shake my head, trying to fight the tears. “I lived for him for so long; it took me a long time to learn to live for myself.” That hangs in the air between us before, finally, he tips his head to the side, furrowing his brow, and asks me something that shakes me to my fucking core.
“Are you, Stella? Are you living for yourself?”
I can’t breathe, much less answer.
“Or are you living for everyone else? Because this?” His hand moves up and down my body, indicating who I am now. “Is not my Stella Bella. This is not the girl who daydreamed about the stars and would make stories about pretend worlds just to make us laugh. This isn’t the girl who wrote songs that could tear me in two before she even lived life before she got out of the small town that was holding her down.” He shakes his head.
I don’t speak because I don’t know how to answer.
He’s not wrong.
I’m not the version of myself he knew, not the free, comfortable version. I’m my mother’s version. The safe version.
“Knowing you were writing, it was a bit of a comfort.” My gut jumps at the knowledge that Reed knows I still write songs. “Knowing that even when you were far from us, doing your own thing, you were still following your dreams the way you could.” I don’t respond, ripping apart the paper wrapper of the straw instead.
“But seeing you like this?” My gut drops. “I don’t feel as good about it.”
“Well, we all have to grow up sometimes, you know? The real world isn’t as forgiving as daydreams,” I say through a tight throat. He smiles at me sad before nodding. There’s another beat of silence like he’s waiting for me to say more, but I won’t.
I’m relieved when two large burgers and a mountain of fries are placed in front of us, giving me a much-needed distraction.
Unlike his friend, Reed knows when to stop pushing, knows if he doesn”t stop I’ll shut down and cut him out, so he changes the subject to my relief and we spend the next twenty minutes chatting about nothing of importance.
Finally, when we’re all finished, I stand, knowing I have to get back to the diner.
“This… this was great, Reed. Really. I missed you.”
“It’s good to have you back in my life, Stell. Our life.” I know he means the band, and he means Riggins, but I shake my head.
“This is the last thing I’ll say on it, Stell,” he says, and I take a deep breath, trying to brace myself. “Friendship. Give him your friendship. Even if you can’t ever give him what you both really want ever again, if you”re too afraid to get hurt again, we’ll all understand. But you both need each other, even if it’s just as friends. You’re in the same room together, and for the first time in seven years, he’s whole again, Stella. His light is gone when you aren’t around. And I haven’t seen you over the past few years, but I think the same goes for you, too. Did you shine the past five years, Stella?”
I think about it, but I already know the answer.
I built my armor up so high, so thick, there was no chance for any light to get through.
But Riggins and the band being back has cracked it wide open, making me question everything again.
“I have to get back to work,” I say instead. He stares at me for a bit before nodding and leading me out of the burger joint and to his car. But as I try to leave, he grabs my wrist, his fingers touching the heart tattoo with the small letter ”R” on my wrist.
Riggins’ heart on my sleeve.
“Give him a chance, Stell.”
I can’t respond, through the lump in my throat, so instead, I give a noncommittal nod and open the door.
I think about Reed’s words through the rest of the day.