Chapter 11. #2
And he’s also decided to write me a letter of apology today—in the form of a voice message: “It’s been weighing on me for days and for whatever stupid-ass reason I’m just now putting it into words.
I am so fucking sorry for not showing up at the concert last week.
Wait, was it last week? Two weeks ago? Bro, I’m losing track of time out here, and—Sorry, went on a tangent.
Wish voice things were editable. Guess you’re stuck with me being a nerd.
Anyway, uh … what was I saying? … shit, right, Horseshoe.
I just wanted to say, that was seriously so thoughtful, so damned thoughtful, and I stood you up like an asshole, and I sure as fuck hope you enjoyed the good music anyway without me, because nothing speaks to me like Chase Holt’s older stuff …
well, I dunno, maybe his newer stuff, too, I just never gave it a chance …
but really, his old stuff, like, I seriously found my soul listening to his music.
My soul, bro. Anyway, I’ll make it up to you, promise.
We’ll get tickets someday—again—and I’ll be right there next to you in the crowd.
Just you and me, man. I swear it. I’ll …
What?” Now he’s calling out to someone else.
“Dude, in a second! I’m leaving a voice message thingy for—What?
Later! I said later!” He starts laughing.
“Seriously?? S-Stop! Okay, okay, okay, just—Hey, uh, so sorry bro, I’m, uh …
I’ll catch up with you better when I have time.
Maybe tonight? Or tomorrow? Or—” Then the voice message cuts off.
I lower my phone to my lap and seamlessly return to staring blankly ahead.
I don’t remember driving back home. But here I am, sitting in my room, staring at the blank screen of my phone and wondering why the hell I haven’t tried to call or text Austin.
Am I forgiving him and, as always, taking the blame for scaring him off?
Did some part of me know I was coming on too strong, so I just let him go?
I pull up his name. I type out a message.
Then I delete it.
I type out something else.
Delete that one, too, and set my phone away a safe distance from me on the nightstand, then throw myself on the bed.
Nothing speaks to me like Chase Holt …
The last person I need advice from is road-trip-hijacking AJ. Even if I low-key hope he gets closer to Paris during his time on the west coast. At least one of us can be happy.
I seriously found my soul listening to his music …
Though I could totally use AJ’s company right now to talk me off the edge. Even if he just makes fun of me and puts on a movie as a cheap form of distraction.
We’ll get tickets someday—again—and I’ll be right there next to you.
I sit up.
It still doesn’t feel right. The brief note after the night we had. Our time in Spruce. The calling and messaging back and forth. He would just throw all that away because we got a little intimate and I fell asleep on his chest?
I deserve more?
Don’t I deserve to say what the fuck I deserve?
I flip open my college laptop on the desk for the first time since I’ve been home. Open the website. Click and click and click. Then I’m staring at the screen with my breath held. With just one more click, my madness becomes a certain thing.
I flick my eyes to the windowsill.
To the hat that rests there.
Austin’s hat. Signed by Chase Holt.
It’s the sight of that hat that gives me the final push.
I swipe it off the sill, place it upon my head with the ceremonial respect that Austin gave it, gently and with intent.
Then I click that button. My phone dings with a notification, which I ignore.
I slap shut my laptop and, after one last look in the mirror, head down the stairs.
“Sweetheart, it’s supposed to rain tonight. Tell me you’re not planning on going out again?”
“I’ll be home later,” I promise her.
“How much later?” she asks, but I’m already out the door.
My car is barreling down the highway. It’s anyone’s guess who is at the wheel, because I sure as fuck am not. Dark clouds fill the sky behind me like a crowd of threatening onlookers, covering the afternoon sun, but no rain touches my windshield yet.
One hour turns into two.
The first drops tap on my car. Then many.
Only dull light remains in the sky when I’m parked, as if the daylight is fighting not to make room for the night.
I get out of the car with zero umbrella in sight—only the autographed hat for any protection—as I hurry across the parking lot.
I reach the front of a building called the House of Thunder, soaked.
I pull out my phone and thumb to that notification I ignored. Scanned. I head inside.
I fly past the merchandise table, where two cute male vendors are sitting on stools behind the counter, pretending to be scrolling on their phones while sneaking glances at each other.
It’s clear a whole secret love story thing is playing out between the two—a Chase Holt merch seller and his Soul Biter rival.
But I don’t have time for that.
I’m about a half hour late, well after the music’s started, when I head inside the concert hall.
Tiny spotlights poke holes through the otherwise dark and crowded room, now and then lighting up a face.
I keep my eyes peeled. Everyone’s focus is on the stage where Soul Biter is jamming out.
I keep seeing cowboy hats and baseball caps, but every face beneath them is either completely shadowed or not familiar at all.
It’s standing room only in here, just like at the Horseshoe, so I spend the entirety of the opening act wiggling through the crowds.
When the last song finishes and the lights come on, it isn’t his familiar face I nearly crash into.
“What the actual fuck?!” she screams, recognizing me. “I can’t believe you’re here! My precious savior! Dude, you’re all wet.”
Her black hair is twisted atop her head, held there by a set of purple chopsticks, neon green tips flared out. I thought I’d never see her again. Now isn’t the best time for a reunion. “Sorry, I’m—”
“I still hate Chase Holt,” she says, “but I’m pretty sure one of the guitarists of Soul Biter—Did you see it?
The opening act? I’m in love—I’m pretty sure he eye-fucks me the whole show.
It started at the Horseshoe, that show you got me into, the one with the scam artist scalper fucker,” she reminds me—I didn’t need the reminder—and then bites her lip and shakes her head.
“I owe you so much. I owe you so much and I don’t even know you. ”
“I’m TJ,” I tell her, then realize I forgot to say Timothy.
“Miranda, I’m fucking Miranda, it is so great to actually meet you officially.
” Then she throws her arms around me and pulls me into a hug that literally squishes my soul out of my body.
“Wait, is that a Chase Holt hat you’re wearing?
I didn’t think you were a big fan. Anyway, can I buy you a shirt or something?
I never got to say thanks! The Soul Biter ones are so bad-ass. I have money now.”
I glance off to the left, then the right, watching as everyone shuffles around forming their social clusters, several leaving for the restrooms or to maybe buy something from the table outside. Even with the room lit up, I don’t see Austin. Did he even come?
“Whatever, I’m getting you a fucking shirt,” she decides with a happy giggle, hooking her arm into mine and dragging me off.
My foot’s bouncing all over the place in the one line they have open.
It’s long and slow. Guess they’re short-staffed, only the two not-lovebirds working.
Miranda, whose presence I remind myself to appreciate since she’s helping me feel less alone tonight, won’t stop talking about Skeleton, the literal and actual name of the hot guitarist in Soul Biter.
I’m sure it’s a stage name, but she insists it’s not.
“Look, I know you’re probably here for Chase … ” she says.
“Actually, I’m here for someone else,” I tell her.
“… but I’m gonna get you a Soul Biter shirt anyway. Oh, and maybe a CD, too. Do you collect CDs? Or do you prefer vinyl? You need to get your head fucked now and then, y’know what I mean? I recommend their second album. Hits way harder than the first.”
My eyes are all over the lobby, on the hunt for someone I’m becoming increasingly sure I won’t find.
What am I doing, really? What am I expecting?
The more I stand in this line and think about it—and witness the vendors sneaking glances at each other while they’re working, appearing increasingly frustrated and horny for each other—the more I worry I have this whole thing wrong.
Maybe I messed Austin up in the hotel room. Drove him crazy. I’m sure he went all the way back home, abandoning the rest of the shows because of me. I went in too deep, too fast, and laid it on so thick, he could barely breathe by the time I was through.
How selfish of me. To expect him to become everything that’s missing in my life. To expect him to save me from myself.
I think he wrote the wrong message in that hotel note. I don’t deserve more. I need more. As in: a damned therapist. And a few more banana plushies to squeeze at night.
It’s hitting me now, the delayed tears, just like in the back of the Horseshoe, except it isn’t betrayal I’m feeling. It’s shame.
He doesn’t owe me anything. Least of all an explanation.
I should never have driven the first mile out of Spruce.
I don’t deserve a shirt.
The next second, one is being slapped against my chest. “Yeah I know, it’s two sizes too big, but that’s how you wear them,” says Miranda with authority, “and it’s gonna look so hot on you.”
To be fair, the shirt is pretty cool, even if it’s completely off-brand for me. Fiery eyes and snake tongues slithering out of skulls is going to struggle finding a spot in my closet. “Miranda … these are so overpriced. Please, let me pay for—”