11. Eli
— ? —
Eli
I don’t feel sorry for myself.
I want to be really fucking clear about that, because I can already hear how it sounds, rock star standing alone under a streetlight, wife just left him, ring in his hand, whole world watching. Poor Eli. Poor famous, rich, handsome Eli who had everything and blew it up.
No.
I did this. I fucking did this.
I stand there for a long time after her taillights disappear.
Long enough for the people with their phones to get bored and drift away.
Long enough for the streetlight to flicker once, twice, like even the city infrastructure is judging me.
Long enough to turn every moment of the last year over in my head and see it clearly for the first time.
Stupid.
The word plays on loop in my brain, a drumbeat, a heartbeat, an accusation I can’t escape.
Stupid, stupid, stupid. My wife told me, in words, for months, and I called her crazy.
I chose Brynn’s comfort over Az’s peace of mind, over and over and over, because it was easier.
Because Brynn never asked me to change, never made me uncomfortable, never challenged the way I’d always done things.
Because Brynn made me feel like the good guy.
I promised Az a dinner without Brynn, then let Brynn talk me into bringing her so we could “clear the air.” I understood what Az had asked. I decided my way would be easier. That is worse than not knowing.
And now the love of my life is somewhere on the 101 with my daughter inside her, and I did that. I did all of it.
I get back to the house somehow. I don’t remember driving.
I don’t remember parking, walking up the steps, unlocking the door.
I just find myself standing in the living room, staring at the couch where Az curled up last weekend to read that pregnancy book, and I can still see the indent in the cushions where she sat.
Her ring is still in my hand.
I open my fingers and look at it, that tiny emerald catching the light, the vintage band she loved so much. She cried when I gave it to her. Happy tears, she said, pressing her face into my chest, and I remember thinking I would do anything to keep her that happy forever.
What a fucking joke.
My phone buzzes. I pull it out and see my mom’s name on the screen.
For a second I consider not answering. Letting it go to voicemail, dealing with it tomorrow, pretending for a few more hours that I haven’t completely destroyed everything. But I know Mom. She’ll keep calling. She’ll drive over. She’ll do whatever it takes to say whatever she needs to say.
“Hey.”
“Elliot.” Her voice is steady, but I can hear the anger underneath. The disappointment. “I just saw the video.”
“Mom-”
“I’m not going to comfort you.”
The words land like a fist to the sternum. I sink onto the couch, Az’s couch, the spot where she sat, and I can smell her shampoo on the throw pillow, and press my free hand over my eyes.
“I know.”
“I told you about that girl at your own wedding.” Her voice shakes slightly, the only crack in her composure.
“Do you remember that? The night before the courthouse, I pulled you aside and I said ‘that girl has been in love with you since you were children.’ And you laughed and told me I was being dramatic.”
“I remember.”
“Azalea is a good woman. A good woman, Elliot. She’s given you everything, her heart, her life, her child, and you made her feel crazy for seeing what I saw five years ago.”
I don’t have anything to say to that. There’s no defense. There’s no excuse. There’s just the truth, sitting in my chest like a stone: my mother saw it. Az saw it. Everyone saw it except me, because I didn’t want to see it, because seeing it would’ve meant doing something about it.
“I have to fix this.”
“You can’t fix it tonight.” Her voice softens slightly, just a fraction. “And you definitely can’t fix it by chasing her. She asked you not to follow her.”
“I didn’t.”
“Good.” A pause. “That’s the first smart thing you’ve done in months.”
We hang up. I sit in the dark for a long time, turning Az’s ring over and over in my fingers, wondering if she’s at the farm yet. Wondering if she’s safe. Wondering if she’ll ever let me close enough to apologize again.
Saturday Morning
I don’t sleep.
I lie in bed, our bed, which smells like her, which has the pregnancy pillow she ordered still taking up her side, and I stare at the ceiling and I think about every single thing I could have done differently.
The Bakersfield song, the crib, the shower.
The nineteen-year-old confession I buried because dealing with it felt harder than ignoring it.
The sun comes up. Wren comes for Whiskers at eight, packs the carrier without a word to me, and leaves. My phone keeps buzzing. I ignore most of it, but I see the names scrolling past: Abbie. Grayson. People from the label. Numbers I don’t recognize, probably reporters.
Brynn.
I don’t open her messages. I can’t even look at her name on my screen without wanting to throw the phone against the wall. Whatever she wants to say, whatever excuse she’s crafted, I don’t want to hear it.
By nine, I’m downstairs in clean clothes that don’t feel clean.
Abbie called an emergency meeting, damage control, she said, strategy, optics.
I don’t care about any of that. I don’t care about my career right now, don’t care about the headlines or the speculation or what this does to ticket sales.
I care about Az. I care about my daughter.
I care about figuring out how to be someone worth coming back to.
Dez is back from Ojai by the time the team assembles in the living room because the idea of going to an actual office makes me want to crawl out of my skin.
Abbie’s there, her Halo portfolio already open on her tablet, looking like she hasn’t slept either.
Grayson leans against the fireplace, arms crossed, his expression carefully neutral.
A couple of the crew guys hover near the kitchen, probably wondering if they should be here at all.
“Okay.” Abbie takes a breath. “Let’s talk about-”
The front door opens.
Brynn walks in like she still belongs here.
She’s dressed for a meeting, sleek pants, silk blouse, hair perfectly styled, and she’s holding a tablet with what looks like a press strategy already pulled up. She smiles at the room, this tight professional smile, and starts talking before anyone can stop her.
“I think we need to get ahead of the narrative. The video is everywhere, but if we put out a joint statement-”
“You’re fired.”
My voice doesn’t sound like mine. It sounds flat, cold, like someone scraped out my insides and left nothing but the words I need to say.
Brynn freezes. Her smile falters. “Eli-”
“You’re fired.” I stand up, and I feel something crystallize inside me, not anger, exactly, but clarity. The kind of brutal, too-late clarity that comes when you finally stop making excuses. “You’re off the tour. You’re off the payroll. You’re done.”
“You can’t-” She steps toward me, and I step back.
“I can. I just did.”
“But we need to-”
“Give me your key.”
Her face goes white. “What?”
“The key to this house. The one I gave you two years ago because I trusted you.” I hold out my hand. “Give it to me.”
She doesn’t move. Her eyes are filling with tears, her chin starting to tremble, and I can see her calculating, trying to figure out which version of herself will work on me now. The professional? The childhood friend? The pregnant woman who needs my help?
None of them. Not anymore.
“Eli, please.” Her voice breaks. “After everything we’ve been through-”
“And while you’re at it…” I talk over her because I can’t listen to this, I can’t watch her perform innocence when I can still see Az’s face in the parking lot, crumpling with every word. “My lawyer will arrange a paternity test. If you want to keep claiming that baby is mine, put it on record.”
“Why-”
“Because that sure as fuck isn’t my kid.”
The room goes very quiet. Abbie is staring at me with what looks like approval. Grayson has pushed off from the fireplace, his arms uncrossed now, watching. The crew guys in the kitchen have gone completely still.
Brynn’s face cycles through about six emotions in three seconds, shock, hurt, anger, calculation, more anger. Then her eyes go flat and hard.
“You’re going to regret this.”
“I already regret a lot of things.” I keep my voice steady even though my hands are shaking. “Giving you access to my life is at the top of the list.”
“I’ve been your friend since we were kids-”
“Dez.”
My head of security appears from somewhere behind me. I didn’t even know he was there, but of course he was. He’s always where he needs to be. “Yeah, boss.”
“Please escort Ms. Hollister out. And make sure she leaves the key.”
Brynn’s mouth opens, then closes. She looks around the room like she’s expecting someone to take her side, to tell me I’m being unreasonable, to remind me of all the years she’s been there for me. No one moves. No one speaks.
Dez steps forward and holds out his hand for the key.
She fumbles in her purse, pulls out the keyring, and drops it into his palm without looking at him. Then she turns to me one last time.
“You’ll be sorry,” she says. “When she doesn’t come back. When you’re alone. You’ll remember who was always there for you.”
“Get out.”
Dez guides her toward the door. I hear her heels clicking on the hardwood, hear the door open and close, hear the sound of a car starting in the driveway. Then silence.
“Well.” Grayson clears his throat. “That was overdue.”
I sink back onto the couch. My legs don’t feel steady anymore. None of me feels steady.
“The tour.” I look at Grayson, at the man who’s represented me for two and a half years. “Cancel the rest of it.”
He blinks. “Eli-”
“I know what it costs.” I do know. I’ve seen the numbers, the contracts, the penalty clauses. Walking away from thirteen remaining dates will hemorrhage money I can’t even think about right now. “I don’t care.”
“You know what this costs,” Grayson says again, like maybe I didn’t hear him the first time.
“Yeah.”
He looks at the fireplace for a while. Then he nods. “Okay.”
Everyone leaves eventually. Abbie squeezes my shoulder on her way out.
Grayson gives me a look that’s somewhere between respect and concern.
The crew guys mutter something about being available if I need anything, and then it’s just me, alone in my house that still smells like my wife, surrounded by evidence of the life I fucked up.
I sit at the kitchen table for a while. I think about calling Az. I don’t call Az. She asked for space, and I’m trying, really trying, to give her that, even though every cell in my body wants to drive to Ojai and beg her to come home.
Instead, I pull out my phone.
I open the camera.
There’s no script. No PR team. No carefully crafted messaging. Just me, at my kitchen table, in clean clothes with dark circles under my eyes and my wife’s ring sitting on the counter behind me.
I hit record.
“Hey.” My voice is rough. I clear my throat. “I, uh. I’m not making this because I want sympathy. I’m making it because I owe someone an apology, and she’s not here to hear it, so I figure the least I can do is say it somewhere public.”
I take a breath. The camera keeps rolling.
“I never cheated on my wife. That’s the part everyone keeps asking about, and the answer is no.
Never, not once.” I rub my hand over my face.
“But I did something worse, I think. I did something that made her doubt herself, made her feel crazy, made her think she couldn’t trust what she was seeing with her own eyes. ”
The words come easier now. Like I’ve been holding them back for months and they’re finally finding a way out.
“My wife set boundaries. She told me someone was standing in her place, someone was crossing lines, and I didn’t listen. I kept pushing that person closer. I told my wife she was overreacting. I told her she was jealous. I told her-” My voice cracks. “I told her she was crazy.”
I stare at the camera, at my own reflection in the dark screen.
“She wasn’t crazy. She was right. About all of it.
” I swallow hard. “We’re having a daughter.
My wife is pregnant with my daughter, and instead of protecting them both, I spent months defending someone who was trying to take her place.
I didn’t see it. Or maybe I didn’t want to see it.
Either way, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that the person I love most in the world told me she was hurting, and I made her feel like her pain wasn’t valid. ”
I pause. I should probably wrap this up, say something neat and conclusive, give the internet a clean ending they can clip and share.
But nothing about this is clean.
“I’m not asking anyone to forgive me. I’m not asking for sympathy or support or whatever. I’m just-” I exhale. “I’m telling you who was right. It was her. It was always her. And I’m going to spend however long it takes proving I can be someone she trusts again.”
I hit stop.
I watch it back once, just to make sure it’s coherent. Then I post it before I can talk myself out of it.
The video goes live. My phone explodes. I turn it face-down and walk away.
I’m standing at the kitchen window, staring at the empty driveway, when my phone buzzes again. I almost ignore it, but something makes me check.
It’s Dez.
Farm address. She said I could tell you.
And then, a second later:
She said it’s not an invitation. It’s not forgiveness. It’s just so you know she’s safe.
I stare at the screen.
She didn’t say I couldn’t know where she was. She said I could know. She let Dez tell me, even after everything, even after I drove her out of her own home.
It’s not forgiveness. It’s not permission. But it’s something.
I save the address.