Chapter Twenty-Six
Phillip, Aspen, and Leon are all pumped up before their first concert, but Jake Moody’s distracted.
He keeps peeking through the curtain and out at the audience, eyes on the crowd gathered at the barricade.
“Looking for someone?” I ask—he seems too intense not to be.
“Old flame, maybe?” Jake searches the crowd one last time, sadness crossing his face.
“No,” he says, that enigmatic mask slipping back into place.
“It’s pointless to stay in the past.” Well, that’s certainly one take on things.
Perhaps I’d misread him, and Jake Moody’s merely feeling pensive before his big debut.
—“Behind the Scenes with Bianca Friese”
After Marie hung up, I went out back for a moment, trying to process the flurry of emotions and truth bombs our conversation brought.
I had four whole years of my life to rethink. I’d been living with the idea that Jake ghosted me, but he never did.
It was like listening to a song you’d heard a thousand times only to discover there was one more line.
A line that changed its meaning entirely.
The door behind me creaked, and I turned to see Jake, looking dazed.
“Hey,” he said softly.
“Hey,” I echoed, just as quiet.
Jake waited a beat, then came over next to me, so we stood parallel to each other under the summer sun.
“I didn’t know,” he whispered. “I had no clue. When I texted you I got in the band and you didn’t reply, I thought you were mad at me for leaving.
Or I’d made things awkward between us after the kiss and you hated me.
” He sunk his teeth into his bottom lip.
“I even wondered if you just didn’t care about me anymore if I couldn’t be there with you in person. ”
An ache spread through my chest at how untrue all of it was. But I could easily see how Jake thought that. He’d texted me the most exciting news of his entire life, and from his perspective, I didn’t even care enough to say congratulations. I just vanished.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I felt the same. I thought . . .” I took a deep breath, then blew it out, all the emotions I felt four years ago flooding back to me twice as strong.
“When you didn’t answer my texts, I figured you had new friends and were on your way to becoming famous.
It made me feel like I wasn’t anything more to you than a pit stop on the way to your dream. ”
“Never,” Jake vowed. “I thought you were giving me the silent treatment and I felt so bad you were upset with me. I was so overwhelmed those first couple months. All I did was rehearse. I lost track of how many days I let go by because there was no time to think or breathe and I-I—” He stuttered, his voice cracking.
“I lost you. When I worked up the nerve to reach out to you again, it said your number was disconnected.”
I ran my hands over my face. “Mom added me to The Tiny Tiger’s business bundle for a discount, and I changed my number.” A sob threatened to spill out of me. “I never bothered texting you the new one because it seemed clear you didn’t want to hear from me.”
“No,” he said empathetically. “I’d never think that. Ever. I even tried sending you tickets to my first concert.”
“You did?”
Jake nodded. “Along with a note that said I was trying one more time to fix things between us. I wrote that if you didn’t come to the concert, then I’d know you didn’t want to have anything to do with me anymore, and I’d stop trying to contact you.”
So that’s what he meant when he mentioned tickets. I hadn’t understood then.
“Jake.” I reached out for him instinctively, my hands catching his. “I never got those tickets or your letter, I swear.”
He laughed mirthlessly. “I know. I figured just as much. I asked Marie to send them since she’s in charge of the comps.”
Close to tears, I admitted, “I thought you moved on.”
I saw my pain echoing in his own eyes. “I thought you forgot about me.”
We grew quiet again, sitting there with the truth.
“After all these years, even when you thought I ghosted you, you still reached out to me when you needed help,” Jake said softly, his eyes searching mine. He took a breath, before pausing, as if timing out a measure of music, then asked, “Why?”
“Because it’s you,” I admitted.
Deep down, despite my doubts, turning to Jake had still been instinctive. Thinking of him always was.
“I wrote you, and you came—even when you thought I ghosted you,” I said. “Why?”
“Because,” he whispered, “it’s you.”