Chapter 13
Thirteen
Like the last time we left school early, Ryder strides out with a casual coolness.
Yet, when we leave the school building, Ryder doesn’t call the driver.
Shouldering his backpack, he walks toward town with a distinctive clip-clop on the pavement, and his guitar case has a slight jiggle against the handle.
I focus on these noises and the cars whooshing past on the road instead of wondering if I’m making a huge mistake.
Boutiques and galleries line each side of Main Street. Each window displays evening gowns, cocktail dresses, artisanal jewelry, and abstract paintings. The smell of freshly roasted coffee pours out of cafés, and delicately decorated desserts sit on stands inside bakeries.
Everything looks perfect, like it’s one giant painting, not a real place.
“You hungry?” Ryder asks.
I swallow hard, shaking my head. “Nope.”
He mumbles something, but I have no energy to question it.
A store selling hand-blown glass art catches my attention, and I struggle for the right words. “It’s very...”
“Pretentious?” Ryder supplies with a slight smile.
“I was going to say curated.”
He smirks. “Same thing.”
“Why do I get the feeling you don’t like it here?”
“It’s just tiring being around snobs all the time,” he admits. “But I’ll be graduating soon, and then I can get out of here.”
“Will Chase’s dad let you leave?”
“We’re only here for the school.”
“For the connections, right?” I clutch my backpack straps tighter. “Won’t he have a plan for where you’ll go after school? To keep those connections?”
For a moment, Ryder goes slightly green, and then waves it off. “Not helping, Alice. Thinking about graduating from here is the only thing getting me through.”
“Then I hope your grades improve.”
His expression hardens, clearly unimpressed. “Thanks for rubbing it in.”
“Well, it’s for your career. I’d assume you’d want to take it seriously.”
“I take the music seriously.” His voice gets sharper. “I’m doing all I can not to let this place suck the life out of my songs.”
I shouldn’t push my luck, but I can’t help it. “Then why did you move here? Why aren’t you with your family?”
His pace quickens, and I’m sure he’s about to leave me behind. I watch his shoulders bunch and then slump. He turns back to me, his backpack swinging against his side.
“I’m here for my family.”
“Oh.” It’s all I can think of to say. It feels like I should have a follow-up question, but the gold flecks warm his dark eyes with a vulnerability I haven’t seen before.
We continue walking in silence until Main Street opens up onto a small park area with benches and trail paths. Tall evergreens provide natural shade, and there’s a small pond where ducks paddle lazily.
“Wow, it’s so chill here,” I say, settling onto a bench that faces the pond.
“Yeah.” Ryder sits beside me, setting his guitar case on the ground. “This place feels more real.”
Ryder dumps his backpack on the ground, and then his phone buzzes. His face scrunches up as he reads the text message.
“Crap,” he mutters. “I forgot I’m supposed to post something today.”
“Post something?”
“Social media content.” He says it as if the words taste bad. “I had a photo shoot yesterday. Three hours of standing in different positions while someone told me to look ‘authentically brooding.’”
He scrolls through his phone, and I glimpse the professional shots. An assortment of Ryder in different poses and carefully styled.
He huffs, shaking his head. “Like there’s anything authentic about a staged photo shoot.”
He pauses on an image in his feed, and I notice his thumb hovering as he checks engagement numbers.
“Sounds exhausting,” I say.
“It is.” He locks the phone quickly. “Having to perform off stage is the worst part. But if we want the showcase to lead to a real deal… Ugh. Nevermind.”
I watch a duck paddle across the pond. “I don’t get it.”
“Don’t get what?”
“Why do you have to jump through all these hoops?” I turn to face him. “If Chase’s dad owns the record label, why doesn’t he just... give you a deal?”
Ryder’s jaw tightens. For a moment, I think he’s going to shut down, change the subject, and build the wall back up.
Instead, he says, “Because he doesn’t have faith in him.”
The admission surprises me. “What do you mean?”
“Before Miranda discovered me, Chase and Brooks’s band was going nowhere.
Their frontman was a joke, and their songs lacked originality.
” He kicks at a pebble near his shoe. “Miranda saw me performing and thought I’d fit.
She convinced Mr. Kensington to give the band a real shot, saying she could turn things around. ”
“Oh. So you were looking to join a band?”
His laugh is bitter. “Ah, no. But it’s a stepping stone into the industry.”
“Did you write the songs before you joined Sky Chaos?”
He turns to me with a tentative smile. “Some.”
Chills run down my arms before I realize what the warmth in his dark eyes is doing to me.
It’s just the music. I’m into the music.
“If we nail the showcase,” Ryder says, his gaze drifting off to the mountains in the distance, “Kensington will really invest in us. I know he only cares about school because he wants Chase to become a business major and work in the office beside him. But if I can prove my worth, we can forget about grades and just focus on the music.”
“Do you really want to jeopardize everything by blowing off school? What if Mr. Kensington isn’t bluffing and graduating really will make or break your record deal?”
“You worry too much.” He playfully nudges me. “I have a nerdy tutor who’s gonna make sure I don’t fail.”
I wince, holding it firm so I don’t crack a smile. “Ha, yeah, right.”
Ryder leans back, patting his backpack and shifts on the bench. “I have a draft of my essay done. Maybe you could take a look at it?”
“Yeah, sure. We didn’t get to do a lot of tutoring. Speaking of which, it makes no sense. Why would you even have a photo shoot this week? Miranda knows you have an essay due tomorrow.”
“It’s a balancing act.”
As Ryder stares out into the distance, I notice the hunch in his shoulders. Whether the band succeeds is weighing on him. Chase and Brooks have proven they can’t do it on their own, and they’re all banking on Ryder’s talent.
No wonder he hasn’t put the effort into his studies.
The silence is different this time. Like I’ve gotten a peek behind the curtain at what makes this boy tick. The circumstances that can make him whiplash between cruelty and concern.
It makes me think about my own predicament. How nice it would be to voice it to another human being.
But I shouldn’t. I should keep my mouth shut around him.
Yet the urge is too strong. “I had dinner with Miranda last night.”
Ryder glances over. “Yeah? How was that?”
“Confusing.” I pick at a thread on my backpack. “I tried asking her about my mom.”
His posture shifts slightly. “Did she tell you?”
“No. She said I wouldn’t want to know.”
“I think she’s right.”
I flinch. “Why would you say that?”
“Well, when Miranda said social services called to let her know her sister had passed, and that you needed a home, she kinda…”
He leaves the sentence dangling.
“What?” I sit taller. “She kinda, what?”
“Blurted some stuff out,” Ryder says carefully. “She didn’t mean to, and I shouldn’t repeat it.”
I grab onto his blazer sleeve and struggle for a real breath. “Yes, you should. Tell me. I need to know.”
Ryder pries my hand off him. “No. Don’t put me in the middle of your family drama. I’ve got enough to deal with on my own.”
“Don’t be so selfish,” I snipe. “You do realize my mom is gone, right? I’ll never get to ask her myself.”
“Alice,” he mutters through gritted teeth. “Don’t. It’s up to Miranda.”
I collapse against the bench seat, pouting. “It’s like there’s this whole part of my mom’s life that I know nothing about.” I watch the ducks, yearning to trade places with them. “Miranda won’t tell me this secret.”
Ryder turns on the seat so he’s facing me. “About that day in my practice room.” He clears his throat and looks down at his jumping knee. “I know it was an accident, and I know I overreacted.”
I swallow hard, rearing back on the seat. “Where are you going with this?”
“You’d just moved in, you were alone, and I know it’s difficult to adjust in that creepy old house.”
I don’t budge an inch, skeptical of his seemingly kind words.
“Look, what Miranda told me about your family, it, like, colored my impression of you. I thought I knew you before I actually met you.”
“What did you think of me? What did Miranda say?”
Ryder shakes his head, settling a hand on his knee. “Look, I’m just sorry for making you feel bad. It doesn’t matter what went down in the past. Your family isn’t around anymore. I’m sure Miranda will lighten up soon.”
My brow lifts. “Lighten up?”
“She can’t be mad forever, right?”
I hug my middle, frowning at the ducks having a great time in the water. “I just wish I knew what happened.”
“Maybe you can’t see it because of how Miranda lives now,” Ryder suggests.
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing.” Ryder gets up, obviously regretting how much he’s already said. “It’s just, she and her sister were so different.”
I unbutton my blazer, feeling hot and constricted. “That’s putting it mildly.”
Ryder’s phone buzzes again, making him groan. “I really gotta post something before the guys from promotions start calling.”
Ryder ambles toward the pond, lifting his phone and opening the camera app.
Even if Miranda blurted some stuff out in front of Ryder, he still doesn’t know what my mother was like. But he knows Mom and her sister were so different?
Is that all it is? They were at odds because of how differently they lived?
Maybe Miranda was jealous? Maybe she wanted a simpler life? To be married? To have a child?
That big question mark over my aunt just splintered into a thousand tiny little ones.
I watch as Ryder holds his phone toward the pond, trying different angles. He snaps a photo and frowns at the screen.