Chapter 8
EIGHT
Lincoln spent the next two days on the couch, drowning in Netflix, and basically ignoring his phone.
He texted Melody, and he answered another call from Emily about setting up a conference call with the entire band at the end of the week—everyone except Tyson.
He’d cited family obligations, so Emily was getting them a stand-in.
Emmett didn’t text or call, and Lincoln didn’t want to be the loser who broke their awkward silence first.
After he’d spent his entire Saturday night with Melody talking about Emmett, she’d pressed him to go find him.
“You’re obviously crushing on the guy,” she’d said. “So lay it out. See if he feels the same.”
Lincoln would lay great odds on the fact that yes, Emmett liked him, and yes, Emmett was attracted to him.
Emmett was also so deep in the closet he might not even realize he was gay, much less into Lincoln.
But the way Emmett had spoken to him and looked at him .
. . he was hiding something else, too. Something he was terrified of facing.
Lincoln had no idea how to crack through that kind of wall.
His modus operandi when he wanted to sleep with a guy was to just go for it—a flirty smile, a touch on the knee, a kiss if he was feeling bold.
He didn’t want to do anything to Emmett that Emmett didn’t ask for, or to take something from him that he wasn’t ready to give. Not from someone who’d already lost so much.
So he ignored the problem, and when his QChord finally arrived on Tuesday, he took it out of the box, put in fresh batteries, and stared at it. And stared.
And stared some more, terrified to pick it up and try to play something.
What if it doesn’t work the way I want it to? What if I try to play and I get dizzy? What if my last hope at making music again fails?
He was still staring at the damned thing when his phone jammed out with “My Immortal.”
“Did you get it yet?” Dominic asked the second Lincoln picked up the call. The excitement in his voice made Lincoln feel like an ass for not even turning the thing on.
“I’ve got it.”
“And? How is it?”
“It’s sitting on the couch taunting me.”
“Huh? Oh, I get it. Lincoln West, you pick that fucking thing up right now and play for me.”
Lincoln couldn’t stop his laughter. “Yes, sir.” He placed the QChord on his lap and turned it on. His fingers hovered over the various rhythms, effects, and chord modes. All of those YouTube videos made it look so easy.
“Are you fingering it?” Dominic asked.
He snorted. “Not yet. Give me a second.” Might as well start simple. He’d memorized the settings for several songs, so he configured the synthesizer for “Wake Me Up When September Ends.”
“Put me on speaker.”
Lincoln did so and set his phone on the cushion next to him. “You do realize if I get dizzy, I’m going to be sobbing in your ear within sixty seconds.”
“You won’t. Think positive, babe.”
“Trying.”
He turned on the correct settings to create a backbeat for the song, then hovered his fingertips over the strumplate.
Counted. It was crazy weird not fingering strings with his left hand, but he drew his fingers over the plate at the correct time.
The sound wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t quite the note he wanted.
But the deeper into the song he played, the easier it was to get it right.
Tickling his fingertips over a flat surface would take some getting used to, but he made it to the end of the song without any issues.
“Well, I’m not dizzy.”
Dominic’s war whoop echoed over his phone. “I fucking told you!”
“It was one song.”
“Oh my God, will you try to see the sunny side, please? This is what you wanted, Linc. You couldn’t pluck six chords on your bass before you nearly passed out. This is huge.”
Crazy huge. So huge Lincoln felt immediately nauseated by the possibilities.
The chance that his future wasn’t this empty, yawning void of nothingness.
That he could keep playing. Maybe not ever in a band, not like he used to dream of, but he hadn’t lost music entirely.
His new instrument was a little weird, but it was his.
The QChord had become his new lifeline.
His eyes stung with grateful tears. “Thank you. I mean it, Dom.”
“You’re welcome.” Dominic coughed. “Don’t you dare make me cry.”
“I’ll try. So did you pick a song for Unbound?”
“Benji and I have been tossing ideas back and forth. Now that we know you’re good with the QChord, we can narrow it down.”
“Good.” Lincoln stared at the instrument in his lap, half afraid it would disappear in a puff of smoke and the last ten minutes would turn out to be a dream. “This really happened.”
“Yeah, it did. Look, I know it’s been nothing but one disappointment after another since the car accident, but this is a huge win. It’s your first step toward normal.”
“I know.” Whatever normal was nowadays.
“Cool. Now that the QChord is out of the way, what’s wrong? Roxy says you’re moping more than usual.”
I’ll strangle her.
“Why do you and I have the same trouble with falling for guys in the closet?” Lincoln asked.
“Huh? You’re falling for someone? Dude, how am I just finding out about this?”
“Because it wasn’t really anything until this weekend, and now I don’t know if it’s even a thing anymore.”
Dominic huffed. “Okay, start at the beginning.”
He did, laying out the whole thing from Van’s introduction at Off Beat to the pepper-spray incident, ending with the epic failure that had been his advance on Saturday.
“I’ve never felt so immediately connected to someone before.
It’s really weird, and sometimes I think he feels it too, but then he pushes me away.
It’s insanely confusing.” The other end of the phone stayed silent. “Dom?”
“Sorry, dude, I’m still stuck on Roxy pepper-spraying your date.”
“Will you focus on the Saturday night part, please? I gave Emmett every single opening, but he still backed off. He’s scared, but I don’t know what he’s scared of.
I mean, Beatrice wouldn’t give a shit if he’s gay, and his parents are dead, so that isn’t an issue.
I don’t know, maybe this is all in my head, and he’s backing off because he isn’t gay and wants me to back off, too. ”
“It’s possible he doesn’t know that he’s gay. Or he could be bi and confused by that.”
“Maybe.”
“You’re the one who walked away on Saturday, right?”
“Yeah, so?”
“Maybe he hasn’t reached out in the last three days because he thinks that was you being done with him. If he’s as scared as you say, then he’s probably used to hiding to avoid the pain of rejection. He won’t seek it out.”
Well, shit, that makes sense.
“I’m an asshole, aren’t I?” Lincoln asked.
“Not on purpose. You don’t pursue friendships, pal.
Hot hookups that you need to scratch an itch?
Yes, you’re on that like salsa on chips.
But not with friends. When they push you away, you stay away until invited back.
You did the same thing back when I was depressed and didn’t want anything to do with anyone.
You kept your distance because that’s what I wanted. ”
Lincoln had never forgotten the strange, epic fight they’d had the summer after Dominic’s junior year of high school.
Dominic had said anything he could, used everything in his arsenal against Lincoln, and Lincoln had left.
He’d stayed away until Dominic reached out months later—after Dom had made a fucking suicide attempt.
“I’m sorry I did that,” Lincoln said. “Maybe if I’d been persistent about staying friends, I could have gotten what Chambers did out of you sooner.”
He could practically hear Dominic shrug his shoulders. “We can’t fix the past, but you can learn from that mistake. Don’t let Emmett push you away without a conversation. In private where you can lay out how you feel, and he can say what he needs to say to you.”
“When did you become the wise one in this relationship?”
Dominic laughed. “When I almost lost Trey because I was too stubborn to see past my own hurt. Don’t do that with Emmett, okay?”
“Okay. Thanks, Dom.”
“Not a problem. Listen, I gotta go but we’ll talk again soon. Keep playing and talk to Emmett.”
“I will. Later, man.”
“Later.”
Lincoln checked the time—too late in the afternoon to make anything happen before Emmett went to work. He could plan for tomorrow, though. Plan something epic. He thumbed through his contacts until he found the person he wanted, then dialed.
Emmett closed down with Van again, who’d watched him like a hawk all evening, and it was starting to make him insanely self-conscious.
Two minutes after Aunt Beatrice went into the office to run figures, Van thunked two shot glasses onto the clean bar and poured measures from a bottle of Maker’s Mark.
Never before had Emmett seen Van drink on the job.
Van took him gently by the elbow, led him to the other side of the bar, and pushed him into one of the empty stools. Opposite the alcohol. Van took the stool next to him, then nudged one of the shots in his direction.
“I’m nineteen,” Emmett said stupidly. He had no idea what was going on.
“Yeah, well, I started drinking when I was eleven, so I won’t tell anyone.” Van threw back his shot with ease. “Don’t worry, I’ll pay for the liquor.”
“I’m not worried.” Emmett had never drunk alcohol in his life. His parents didn’t keep it in the house, and he’d never been invited to any parties cool enough to have alcohol present.
Okay, scratch that. Once. Last summer. With Adrian. Not that he remembered anything about the actual drinking or what he did that night, so in a way it didn’t count.
“Then what are you? You’ve been acting weird ever since you talked to Lincoln on Saturday. What happened?”
Emmett blinked hard, surprised Van cared enough to notice a shift in his mood. He hadn’t realized he’d been acting differently since Saturday. “Weird how?”
“Sad, I guess. You guys not seeing each other anymore?”