Chapter 30
Nineteen Months Ago—Ellery
At least she had gotten dressed.
Ellery crawled into a corner of the couch in the living room, her sweatshirt and yoga pants hanging from her gaunt frame. No matter how much Dante and her friends fed her, nothing tasted right. Everything was sand and ash.
Dante took his place beside her, wrapping an arm around her shoulders.
She wanted desperately to melt into his side, but she had overheard him on the phone to his family the previous day.
His family. Brother, parents, support, love.
Dante was going to leave. She knew it in her bones.
It’s what she would do, if she had her family.
She needed to get herself together. The counselor kept telling her to focus on one thing, just one thing she had to do that day. One thing was easier than many.
Today’s thing was attending the band meeting.
Selene and Lorraine were already there, and Abe had arrived, perched on the arm of the couch. He was the only one she hadn’t seen regularly since—
She couldn’t think about that now.
“Anyone want tea? Coffee?” Lorraine wrung her hands. She and Selene sat close beside one another, but they weren’t touching. To Ellery, it looked like there was a row of fire between them, keeping them apart while the warmth drew them together.
She found the energy to shake her head.
“I’m cool. Thanks, Lo,” Dante said.
“I’ll get my own.” Abe headed into the kitchen. “Lo, you want tea?”
“Okay.”
The room fell silent again, and the weight of their stares bored into her.
She was the leader of the band, wasn’t she? Or she was supposed to be. It was all overwhelming. Someone else should be in charge, someone better.
“Is Logan coming?” Her voice was scratchy from disuse.
Selene and Lorraine exchanged a look. “He’s due in ten minutes. El, we should talk.”
“About what?”
Dante cleared his throat. “Is this the right time?”
“Maybe.” Selene leaned forward, resting her elbows on her knees. Abe emerged from the kitchen with two mugs in hand and handed one to Lorraine.
“Is this about Logan?” he asked.
Selene nodded. “It’s just, we always said that after the competition, we were going to…reassess Logan in our lives.”
Frost threaded through her veins. Logan had been helpful. Logan had gotten things done so she didn’t have to worry about them. “What do you mean? Logan’s been there for us. He—he helped us. He’s been nothing but supportive.”
“Not now.” Lorraine said it under her breath as she lifted her tea to her lips, but Ellery could hear. She clenched her fists into the fabric of her sweatshirt, knotting it around her hands.
It didn’t help. She was still freezing.
“El?” Dante rubbed her back in small, concentric circles.
“Please.” She hated begging, but it was all she was capable of at the moment. “He’s been so helpful these past few months. Please.” She would cry but her tear ducts were dry. “I can’t lose anyone else.”
Dante rubbed her back again, but it burned with loss. She knew he was leaving her and he wasn’t saying anything. She just wanted to cling to whomever she could.
A loud knock broke the waiting silence, but no one moved for a moment. Not until the second knock.
Please. Ellery squeezed her eyes shut, but every time she did, all she saw were her parents’ faces, all she heard was her sister’s laugh.
Abe moved first, taking his mug with him as he answered the door.
None of the rest of them turned, but she knew they all heard Logan’s tenor.
“Hey. Are we ready to get started?”
She was not in the best state of mind, which did not help when staring at the mock-ups Logan had set on an easel. The band waited on her, though, their tension thick and oppressive.
“I don’t get it,” she finally said. She tilted her head to read it from a different angle, but it still made no sense. There was a black-and-white photo of her, hair windswept, mouth open, and across the top of the poster the title read Elvie. “Where is everyone else?”
“What’s up with her name?” Dante stirred beside her. Ever since Logan had arrived, he’d changed, altered minutely. His face had settled into stony lines and his reassuring posture had stiffened.
Logan stood before them, incongruously polished in their small living room.
His bodyguard-black suit probably cost more than their monthly rent.
“We tested multiple options in different focus groups. There was a viral Buzzworthy article shared thousands of times that used this name, and it tests the best.”
Ellery looked over at Abe, Selene, and Lorraine.
Abe didn’t seem terribly bothered, but he was the most flexible of all of them.
He was older, closer to forty, and this was his seventh band.
Since they hadn’t been playing over the last few months, he’d taken a gig at a local theater, playing bass in the orchestra during their musical runs.
Selene and Lorraine were another story. They had all risen together, worked together, created the Vendetta from nothing. They had always shared in the band as equals.
Now they sat beside one another, jaws set with what appeared to be resignation.
“I don’t like this. They worked just as hard, harder, even.
Selene? Lo? What do you guys think?” Ellery worried at her lip.
She wasn’t sure she could make a decision, not one that impacted everyone.
Fatigue weighed her muscles and clawed at her brain.
She needed to go back to bed. Once this ended, she could rest. Once they came to a decision, she could be done.
Logan glanced toward the two women, but Ellery felt the heat of his gaze on her.
“It makes some sense.” Lorraine’s voice was low, but clear.
“I’m not going to lie—it sucks.” Selene pulled her hair into a knot, then let it fall down her back. “But I agree. If you are okay being the front person, El, we’ll stand with you. Lots of bands do it this way. We’ll try it out.”
Dante covered her hand with his in a supportive, reassuring way.
She didn’t want it. She didn’t want any of this. She wanted to call her mom. She wanted to ask her dad’s opinion. She wanted Samara to roll her eyes and tell her she was being an idiot and to go for it.
Tears pooled behind her eyes, but she hadn’t expected them. Why couldn’t she be the dried-out husk she felt like?
“El?” Dante said quietly, his voice soft against her ear. “You don’t have to decide anything right now.”
She had read once about people experiencing hypothermia. How they got so cold and delirious that they misinterpreted it as heat and started running around, taking off their clothes and freezing to death faster.
That was how she felt. Too cold, too hot, too everything. She was torn in multiple ways and couldn’t put herself back together.
And Dante—wonderful Dante, amazing Dante!—he was going to leave, and there would go another part of her.
She squeezed her eyes shut and then felt a shadow fall over her face, accompanied by a waft of expensive sandalwood cologne.
“Ellery?” Logan said.
She opened her eyes. He knelt before her, his hands on his knees, a soft smile on his face. “I don’t know. I don’t know what the right thing to do is.”
Dante stiffened beside her. “The right thing is what you feel in your heart.”
In her heart? Her heart told her to go back to bed and wallow until she withered. Her heart wanted to take Dante with her, but also knew that she couldn’t. She couldn’t drag him into her mess, no matter how badly she wanted him. He didn’t deserve that. He deserved his own identity, his own life.
“Ellery.” Logan took her hands from Dante and held them. “What would your family want? Would they want you to sit here and hide? Or would they want you to live your life?”
Dante twitched beside her again, but she ignored it. Logan’s question unlocked something in her. Her parents had never wanted her to hide who she was. They had wanted her to be famous. They had wanted her to play her music.
“If the band agrees with it, I will too. Only for a little while.”