Chapter 11 #2
Braden never asked about when or how Zack and I had talked about the music before he’d told the whole band, even though I’d figured out exactly what to say to keep it from sounding bad.
After all, we hadn’t done anything wrong that day; we’d just met for lunch…
and then Zack had warned me about “ruining” the band by dating Braden.
And it turned out that even the whole world knowing I was with Braden hadn’t caused anything bad to happen.
No. If anything destroyed the band, it would be egos or Zack’s refusal to give up drinking. Although we were practicing more overall—getting the songs tight and ready to be recorded—we spent the day before the festival practicing our setlist.
This festival was in the heart of Texas—which meant we’d be roasting.
But when I heard Roxy was going to be there, I didn’t care.
I was just happy I’d get to see my new friend in person again.
Like before, we appeared on the first day and had far more interviews scheduled than the first one—but we had lots more people in our audience.
And those people seemed to love the new songs we’d interwoven in the set.
Like the festival in California, Braden and I hung out most of the day when we weren’t in interviews and, just like with ones earlier in the year, Zack was getting more defensive with his answers, for lack of a better word.
Belligerent is a bit harsher than what he was doing, and he wasn’t being a wuss about it, but he was being a little more aggressive with his answers than the rest of us would have liked.
After all, the press could choose to paint us in a bad light and there wouldn’t be much we could say about it.
Roxy and I agreed to hang out again, so I gave Braden a sweet kiss before I met her outside the tent. “When will you come to our room?” he asked.
“I don’t know. It depends on if we drink and where we’ll be hanging. I’ll text you to let you know.”
“Okay,” he said before kissing me again. We’d decided, now that our secret was out in the open, official due to the press statement Russ had sent out, that we didn’t need to hide our feelings from anyone anymore. “I love you.”
“I love you too.” Now that we’d been together a few months, I found it easier to say those words—and I was beginning to believe them. Braden was truly the sweetest, kindest, most caring man I’d ever met, and—like Roxy had said the first time we’d hung out together—I was lucky he was mine.
Roxy gave me a huge hug when I approached her and I reciprocated, reminding myself that I was far more fortunate than I often realized.
And I was in a far better mental space nowadays—I had a healthy, functioning relationship with my boyfriend and an equally healthy friendship.
Zack had been a damaged boyfriend and he hadn’t always been the best of friends either.
Roxy fulfilled so many of the needs I’d had in the past, and I only hoped I could return the favor.
“So what do you wanna do?” she asked. “There are a few parties we could attend or—”
“No, thanks. No parties. I think I’m partied out.”
“I get it. And I usually wind up working when I go to those things anyway. So do you want to go to a bar or would you rather just go to my hotel room? We could drink or not. I can pick up a six-pack on the way.”
“That sounds great! No bars.” Soon we were in her rental car and she stopped by a liquor store and we debated which beer to pick. When I deferred to her judgment, she grabbed a pack of Bud Light and we split the bill before getting back in the car.
“Does Ferocity pay for your car and hotel room?”
“They didn’t used to, because I was more of a freelancer—but now that I’m on staff, they give me a per diem. A small per diem, so I’m pretty much a cheapskate.”
“Oh, my God. I get that. Our per diem is pretty generous, but we’re still in the hole with the label.”
“Jesus. I’ve heard about that,” Roxy said, accelerating when the light turned green. “So you guys haven’t turned a profit yet, even though your first album’s still kicking ass?”
I started to bare my soul and then said, “Off the record?”
“Oh, hell, yeah. Tonight is completely off the record. No work—just play.”
So I wound up telling her all the ins and outs of being indebted to the label—about how we’d dreamed of making it big, scrimped and saved playing in Denver clubs and bigger venues, how we’d actually started doing okay for ourselves just when the label snatched us up and then the expenses came rolling in.
While I told her our entire story, she parked in a spot at a Budget Inn.
By the time I was done talking, we were sitting in her small room, both with a beer in hand.
I sat in the little desk chair and she sat cross-legged on her bed.
“I wish I could tell you your experience is unique,” Roxy said, taking a drink from her bottle. “Actually, I take that back. I think it would be even worse if you were the only one getting fucked.”
“No kidding.”
“So…do you regret it?”
Oh, that was a hard question. Sometimes I did, and it would be a lie to say otherwise. “Overall, no—but there have been lots of moments where I’ve really questioned it all.”
“God. I can only imagine.” After she took another drink of beer, she said, “Do you think you and Braden would have gotten together if you weren’t in the band?”
“No.”
“What about you and Zack?”
I thought about it honestly. A few years ago when I’d been a virgin full of unrequited emotions for that even-then fucked-up boy, I would have wanted that—but I knew the truth.
“Nope. If I hadn’t joined the band, I would still be in Nopal and he and the guys and whoever he would have recruited as drummer would have gone to Denver without me and nothing would have happened. ”
“What do you think you’d be doing if you hadn’t joined the band?”
I chuckled. “You’re still a reporter, even when you’re off duty.”
She joined me, her boisterous laughter filling the small room, and I couldn’t help but laugh even harder. “You’re right. I guess I’m in the right profession, because I’m always curious. Or snoopy, as my mom used to say.”
“So tell me about you.”
“There’s not much to tell, Dani. I grew up in a two-parent household, one of five kids.”
“Five?”
“Yeah—in Montana. My parents are kind of religious so they’re not huge fans of what I do or how I look…
but they still love me and I love them. I go home at Thanksgiving and Christmas and we talk once a week.
I keep in touch with my brothers too. I’m already an auntie!
” At that, she whipped out her phone and started showing me pictures of her family, including several photos of small nieces and nephews that looked to be between the ages of newborn and eight or nine.
We spent more time talking about family and our childhoods and, by the time we each began drinking our third beer, I was completely relaxed. I said, “This is gonna sound really weird, but you are my first real female friend. Seriously. In my whole life.”
Roxy scootched to the end of the bed, draping her legs over the side.
“Me too!” Her blue eyes grew wide, full of sincerity and happiness.
“I was always a bit of the outcast in school. I think it was the religious shit that made them look at me differently. And now, in my current position, traveling a lot, hardly working with the same people—and, when I do, they’re guys—I just figured I was destined to not have close friends.
About the best female friendship I have is with my cousin who lives in Wisconsin—and we only talk on Facebook. ”
We felt like kindred souls, and my heart swelled even more.
I told her all about Ava and how my desire to stop her from controlling me so much led to my friendship with Zack.
“So…Zack and me…we’re kind of complicated.
He was such a good friend through most of high school—until he started dating Ava. ”
“No fucking way.”
“Yeah. I guess that should have been my first clue.”
“God, don’t blame yourself for that. You loved and trusted him—and, even if you hadn’t had a crush on him, that feels like a huge betrayal.”
I had to stop myself from crying. It was so gratifying to feel validated by someone who hadn’t been there—and, even though I knew her judgment might have been biased toward me by that point, it was so good for my self-esteem. “It really did—but Zack was thinking with his—”
“Dick,” she said at the same time I did.
We both laughed. I said, “Yeah. I think he does that a lot…which is a big part of why I broke it all off.”
“But Braden—he’s a good guy, yeah?”
“He really is. He is the sweetest, most sensitive man I’ve ever met.” Tipping up my bottle, I took a long draw of the beer.
“But?”
Had she sensed that little catch inside me? That I-love-him-but-can-only-commit-ninety-nine-percent weight on my shoulders?
I’d been so honest with her up to this point—and it felt so freeing, as if I’d been in a cage for the better part of a decade and she was helping me learn to walk again outside its confines.
So I decided to tell her things I was having a hard time telling myself.
“I should love Braden body, heart, and soul. I should love him completely. He’s been the one man I’ve been able to trust, and he treats me like a princess. ”
Roxy leaned forward again, almost in my face, her eyes twinkling. “But?”
“But…I don’t love him completely. I want to. God, I want to. He deserves nothing less.”
“Does he know you feel that way?’
“No. I don’t want to hurt him.”
“Don’t you think he’ll find out eventually?”
I was silent for a moment as I pondered it.
“I’m sure at some point I’ll fully embrace him.
When we…first got together, I thought it was just a one-night thing.
Zack had completely ripped my heart out, threw it on the ground, and set it on fire—and Braden was there to put out the flames, tend to my wounds, and make me feel loved more than I ever had.
He’d seen everything Zack had done and knew exactly what I needed. ”
“So what’s the catch?”
“I…I think on some level, I’m convinced Zack and I will get back together someday. But I know that’s the worst possible thing that could ever happen.”
“Has he indicated that it could?”
I took another drink, wishing now that we’d gotten a twelve-pack instead of six. But maybe it was better this way, baring my soul sober instead of drunk. Even if I regretted it in the morning, I would know I’d been of sound mind when I’d done it.
Well, mostly sound. After all, it wasn’t like the beers were non-alcoholic.
“Not exactly. But right after Braden and I hooked up, Zack asked me to not give up on him.”
“Hmm.”
I nodded. “I probably should have interpreted it as asking me not to give up on him as a friend—because he was in bad shape by that point. He’s…
an alcoholic, and he was struggling during the third leg of our tour.
So that might have been what he meant—but I got the feeling he was asking me to save my heart for him. ”
“Oh, Jesus. So your heart—no logic involved—can’t fully commit to Braden because it’s waiting for Zack to wake the fuck up.”
“Yeah, I guess so. And I’m not sure how to make that last little bit let go.
” Roxy shook her head, indicating that she didn’t have any advice for me.
After polishing off the bottle, I said, “So I keep hanging on with Braden, letting myself feel gratitude and love for him every day—and, as much as my love for him has grown over the past couple of months, I believe with all my heart that he will eventually become my everything.”
“Oh. That’s so sweet.” Roxy finished her beer too. “We should have gotten more.”
“I was thinking the same thing!” After we laughed again, I was desperate to change the subject. After all, I’d been completely honest with her and myself, and it felt exhausting. “So what about you? Are you seeing anyone?”
“Kind of. I’m dating another reporter with Ferocity—but he’s a bit of an asshole. Kind of like Zack. I need to find my own Braden.”
I smiled and impulsively leaned over and hugged her. “You will, Roxy. You deserve nothing less.”
“Same with you, girlfriend. You need to remind yourself of that.”
“Oh, I do. Every day.”
I just had to keep on believing…because, more than me, Braden was the one who deserved nothing less.