Chapter 28 Keeley
Keeley
I’m at my parents’ house for the holiday, helping them chop vegetables for turkey soup when we get the news. Oliver is the one who sees it first, reading the headline on his phone from his perch at the counter.
“Fuck,” I hiss, dropping the knife. Fortunately, it hits the cutting board and not something more precious. My mind whirls as I try to make sense of what Oliver just read. I gesture for him to hand me the phone, and I read each line with more and more disbelief.
Tonya masterminded us. Again.
My blood boils with the urge to confront her immediately. She doesn’t actually want our masters; she just wants the revenue, and maybe some control over Valerie if she can get it. It’s diabolical. Tonya’s becoming cartoonishly evil at this point.
I grab my own phone, step into the dining room, and call Landon fucking Banks. Miraculously, he answers his cell, instead of passing it through an assistant.
“This is Landon,” he says.
“What the fuck?” I demand, pacing behind the table.
“Happy Thanksgiving to you too, KeeKee.”
My shoulders tense at the endearment. “Thanksgiving was yesterday.”
“Yes, I know. But it’s polite to say it.” When I don’t say anything, he continues. “I got right back to work today, of course. Had to catch up from my vacation.”
“I’m aware.”
“Sorry it didn’t go your way. That’s how this industry works—sometimes you go all in and still lose.”
My vision blurs. I knew better than to ever hope this man would let us win, but I chose to hope anyway. I chose to fight.
So the entire damn thing feels like a betrayal, but not by him. I feel like I betrayed myself by sinking so much time into this fight we were destined to lose. “This industry works the way you decide it does.”
He laughs, and it makes my skin crawl. “I’m glad we’re on the same page about that.”
“But how could you fucking sell our music to Tonya?”
“It’s just business.”
“Business, huh?” I scoff, working at a smudge on the kitchen table. But something still doesn’t add up. “How did Tonya know how much to offer to win outright like that? I thought all of the bids were supposed to be private.” The whole situation was weird from the start.
“Hmm,” he says. “I’m not really involved in the specifics.”
Like hell he’s not. “I see,” I say bitterly.
“KeeKee, I don’t understand why you’re upset with me. It’s not personal.”
It’s been personal for years. Art is always personal.
“You know what Tonya is capable of. She’s going to hold this over Valerie, over us, for the rest of our careers.”
He cackles, so cruelly it makes me flinch. “Oh, babe, I don’t give a fuck what she does with your masters. When Tonya said she was interested, I saw an opportunity, and I took it.”
“It’s our music!”
“The way I see it, it’s Tonya’s music now. Good luck with that, by the way.”
“Fuck you,” I say, and I hang up. God, I cannot believe him. He never planned for us to win.
Landon strung us along for months, just because his ego was hurt that we refused to sign another record contract in blood. Goddamn it, I hate this industry.
Fuming, I stride into the kitchen.
“Well, we’re fucked,” I say. I head over to chop more vegetables, but I can’t bring myself to pick them up.
“On the bright side, you’re saving a lot of money,” Mom says quietly from her spot at the sink, carefully drying the wineglasses she just washed.
I whirl on her. “Are you serious right now?”
“Sasha,” Dad warns from across the kitchen, where he’s pulling turkey off the bone. “Maybe now is not the time. She’s clearly upset.”
“Why not? Normal families fight over holidays. Let’s join in the fun!” I snap.
Mom raises up her hands placatingly. “Keeley, please, I’m not trying to fight with you.”
Ollie frowns. “Come on. You’re not really mad at Mom, are you?”
Shaking, I lean into the counter. “I am!” I turn to Mom.
“It just really fucking hurts that we lost our music to the one person who will hold it over our heads, and there’s nothing I can do.
I fought so hard to do this for the band.
I was willing to pour in a big chunk of my savings—and I know you thought that was a bad idea, but how can investing in the people I love be bad? ”
Mom sets the glass down and hurries over to me. “It’s not bad. Oh, I love that you have such a big heart. I’m so proud of you.”
“Then why have you been giving me such a hard time about this?”
“I just worry about you in that industry. You were on a path with security before you said no to college for your music, and now you’re nearly thirty and facing so many unknowns…I just want you to be okay.”
My eyes fill. “I’ll be okay, Mom. I made this decision with my eyes wide open, and…” I gasp. “Even though it didn’t pan out, I don’t regret fighting for the band.” Now that I’ve said the words, I know that they’re true.
I don’t regret a second of fighting for our music. Even if I knew we were going to lose, I wouldn’t have let that stop me from trying.
“Oh, honey,” Mom says, and she pulls me into her arms.
“But what if this is it? What if we can’t come back from this?”
It feels like everything is spinning wildly out of control, and I’m just holding on for dear life.
I can’t stand the thought of losing the Glitter Bats again.
I don’t think I can survive losing Jane.
This past week apart has been torture. When she was crying on the floor of my condo, all I wanted to do was pull her close and tell her it was going to be okay.
All I wanted was to kiss her and hold her and protect her.
Instead, I had to let her walk away. Because that’s what she needed.
Just…what if she realizes she does want to break up? I’ve loved this woman since we were kids, since we barely knew what love was. Maybe it took us more than a decade to find each other, but I survived years of wanting her from afar.
I’ll survive the rest of my life like this if I must. I want her safe. I want her whole. Short of making Ryan Tate erase that article from existence, doing what she asked is literally the bare minimum. It doesn’t matter if I’m breaking my own heart in the process.
Everything is breaking my heart this week, though, so might as well. With a squeeze, Mom lets me go, but she doesn’t leave my side.
“Have you talked to Jane recently?” Oliver asks, as if reading my mind. People joke about twintuition, but it’s a thing.
“I want to know that too,” Dad says out of the blue.
“Pete!” Mom protests as my cheeks heat. Oliver rolls his eyes, as if this is the silliest conversation in the world, but Dad just pours us all some wine and passes it around as we stare at him.
“What? I want to know what’s going on in my baby girl’s life. Girlfriends, boyfriends, nonbinary friends…tell me the juicy details.”
I take a sip, then set the glass down. “My personal life has been all over the internet, Dad. You’ve seen the latest update.”
His shoulders fall. “But it didn’t come from you.”
God, he’s right, and that’s the whole problem. I wanted to be able to tell my parents that I’m with this woman I really care about, and instead they found out from the fucking internet.
“I always thought you and Jane would be sweet together,” Mom says quietly. “The way it all came out, though…I would very much like to have a conversation with that Ryan boy and give him a piece of my mind. That was…some bullshit.”
Mom and I are polar opposites, in that swearing is part of my vocabulary while Mom uses profanity as often as, well, Jane.
So, naturally, Oliver chokes on his own wine at her comment. “Sorry, I’m fine. Just…yeah, it was bullshit.”
“I’m sorry, but there’s no other way to put it,” Mom says. “How’s she doing?”
My neck flushes. “I, uh, don’t know. We’re taking a bit of a break.”
“What?” Dad asks. “Why?”
I let out a long, extended sigh, staring at the wine on the counter deliberately, avoiding all the questioning gazes of the people who love me the most. “Because us being together was hurting her, and she asked for space to figure a few things out.”
“I hope you know that’s not a reflection on you, sweetheart,” Mom says.
I shrug. Deep down, I wonder if maybe it is a reflection on me. Jane wouldn’t need a break from me if I was helping her. But all I’ve done is hurt her.
“She may just need to emotionally process what’s happening,” Mom continues. “Jane didn’t grow up with the support system you had. And, well, being publicly outed must be very traumatizing.”
“Yeah, that’s the issue. I just don’t see a reason she should stay with me.”
“And why not?” Dad demands.
I shrug. “She has this incredibly impressive career while I’m just playing my little drum kit. And fuck, like Mom said, she got outed because of me. I can’t be the one holding her back or causing her pain.”
“Oh, Keeley, that’s not how any of this works,” Mom says softly.
She leans on the counter beside me, wrapping an arm around my shoulders again.
My eyes sting, but I blink hard, trying to force away the sadness.
“We can’t avoid hurting the people we love.
That’s part of loving someone—choosing them even when it gets hard. ”
“This feels different,” I say, sinking into my mom’s embrace as the vegetables lie forgotten. “I can hardly breathe, knowing that I hurt her. Maybe now, this will all blow over and she can keep living her life on her terms. Without me.”
“Is that what she wants?” Dad asks quietly, as he dumps turkey in the stockpot.
“I don’t know,” I say quietly. “She said it wasn’t, but…maybe she was just sparing my feelings.”
My voice breaks, and all the despair from the last few weeks comes crashing over me like a tidal wave. I can’t remember the last time I cried like this, wrapped in my mom’s arms, safe in the family home that still overflows with security and warmth and love. “I just don’t want to lose her.”