15. Bailey
bailey
. . .
The week after the wedding doesn’t feel real. It feels like I left part of myself in the orchard, knees in the dirt, heart torn open, phone shaking in my hands, and everything after that has been a performance I keep walking through because stopping would destroy me.
Airports. Meetings. Rehearsals. Security briefings.
A wardrobe fitting where someone tells me I look “fresh,” like grief isn’t a living thing under my skin.
There are cameras that aren’t supposed to be there.
There are fans with posters and glittering eyes who want to hold my hand and take a picture.
There are industry people who say my name like it’s currency.
Externally, I am on top of the world.
Internally, I am in controlled free fall.
Rachel is with me for most of it, always half a step ahead, always calm.
She keeps my schedule on her tablet and my life in her head like a map she refuses to drop.
When I stare off too long, she touches my elbow.
When my smile slips, she angles her body so no one sees.
When someone asks a question they shouldn’t ask, she answers in a voice that sounds polite and yet is all bite.
I do not cry, or say his name. I don’t even let myself think about it, most of the time. Thinking leads to remembering. Remembering leads to breaking. And I cannot break. Not here. Not now. Not with the world watching.
By day three, my body starts doing that thing where it pretends I’m fine until it can’t.
My hands go numb at random. My appetite disappears.
My throat feels tight all the time, like my grief is physically lodged there.
Every time someone asks me, “Where's Luke?” my stomach flips, but I keep my face smooth. The version of me the world buys.
I make it back to my hotel room after a long day of rehearsals and a meeting with Jackson’s team, and the door clicks shut behind me like a sealed vault.
The silence hits first.
Then the weight.
I set my bag down carefully, like if I move too fast I’ll shatter. My room is clean, expensive, and beige, it is nothing like home. There are blackout curtains drawn halfway and city lights bleeding around the edges. I stand in the middle of the room and stare at nothing.
I put my ring back on when I left the orchard, I instinctively play with it and then stop myself.
My hands shake as I slide it off slowly, the metal catching on my knuckle like it wants to stay.
My finger is pale underneath, indented, marked by years.
It looks wrong without it. Bare and exposed.
I hold the ring in my palm, and I feel physical pain in my chest.
I can't break. Not yet. But I feel hollowed out.
It’s incredible how grief can be quiet. How it can sit in you like a still lake while the rest of your life storms around it.
A knock comes.
I don’t answer at first because my voice is an unreliable thing right now. But she knows me. She waits, and then she speaks through the door.
“Bailey. It’s me.”
I open it, and Rachel takes one look at my face and steps inside without asking. There’s a gentleness to her movements that makes it worse. Like she’s approaching a fracture line. Her eyes drop to my hand, to what I am clutching in my palm... the ring.
I swallow hard and hold it out to her. She takes it, closing her fingers around it like it’s important, like it’s heavy. Like she's taking part of the weight for me.
“Have them leave it,” I say, voice rough. “In the house. Once they take the things on my list. Have them leave it on the dresser, with Luke’s things.”
Rachel’s expression doesn’t change, but I see the question in it anyway. "You are sure you don't want to keep it, Bailey?"
I can't answer, so I just shake my head.
“Do you want to leave a note?” she asks.
I let out a breath that sounds like it might be a laugh if my life weren’t on fire.
“No.”
Rachel nods once, like that’s the most reasonable thing in the world.
“Okay,” she says. “No note.”
My throat tightens. I turn away, walking toward the window because I can’t stand being seen too clearly right now.
“Did he call?” I hate that I ask. I hate that a part of me still hopes for something from him even now. Rachel doesn’t answer immediately, which is its own answer.
“No,” she says softly.
My stomach twists. I stare at the city lights and feel something cold settle behind my ribs. It shouldn’t surprise me, but it does.
How did we get here? I thought I was going to spend forever with him. How...
Rachel’s phone buzzes once in her hand. She glances down, and something crosses her eyes.
“What?” I ask.
She hesitates like she wants to protect me from information, and then remembers that protection isn’t possible anymore.
“The packing team is confirmed,” she says. "They will be headed over early tomorrow. Luke isn't there."
It should feel like closure. It doesn’t. It feels like I’m removing a piece of my soul.
Rachel pockets her phone and looks at me.
“You have ten minutes,” she says, gentle but firm. “Then we need to go downstairs. Jackson’s team wants to walk through the final details. No pressure. But we need to show.”
Right... the show must go one...
I nod again because nodding takes less energy than speaking.
Rachel turns toward the door, then pauses. “Bailey.”
I look at her.
“You don’t have to do the party after,” she says. “You can do the onstage moment, and then we can get you back here.”
I open my mouth and almost say yes.
Almost.
But then I see it in my mind: headlines, speculation, the whispers...
No.
He does not get to make me small in public after making me bleed in private, not while he's out with her.
“I can’t,” I say, voice steady in a way that surprises even me. “I have to do this. I have to keep moving.”
Rachel studies me, then, “Okay,” she says. “Then we keep moving.”
She leaves, and I stand very still. Then on an exhale, my knees buckle and I barely catch myself on the edge of the bed, fingers digging into the duvet like I can anchor myself through fabric.
A sob tries to climb out of my chest, but I swallow it back.
Another wave threatens to come, so I press my fist to my mouth, hard.
My eyes burn, and my throat hurts.
I shake once, silently, like my body is trying to purge something poisonous. It doesn’t help.
I wipe my face, because I won’t go downstairs with red eyes. I won’t give anyone that.
I give myself sixty seconds, one minute. I count as I take deep breaths, and then I stand.
Jackson’s team has been exactly what Rachel said it would be: strategic and respectful.
No chaos or ego-circus. We meet in a small room off the venue, with bottled water lined up neatly and a schedule printed and placed in front of each chair with security notes, stage marks and timing. It’s so… controlled and easy to be a part of.
It makes me realize, with a strange flash of clarity, how much of my career has been built around managing other people’s instability. The constant negotiation between what I want and what I’m allowed to want without causing a fight.
This isn’t like that.
Jackson isn’t here yet. His team is. Two assistants, his tour manager, a PR rep and his security lead. All of them are polite, and they seem genuinely excited about this collaboration.
Rachel sits beside me, an unspoken protective wall. My team is next to her, eyes bright with adrenaline. They’re excited. They should be. This is huge. This is the kind of collaboration you don’t just get.
The door opens, and Jackson walks in without ceremony, he walks around the room shaking hands, and thanking everyone for their time. He makes a small joke that loosens the room and then turns his attention to me.
“Bailey,” he says warmly. “Good to see you.”
“Jackson,” I reply, “Thank you for doing this.”
He gives me a look that says he knows what my thank you actually means.
When the meeting starts, it’s business. Timing. Song choice. Announcement phrasing. A full album collaboration, not a one-off feature. A strategic rollout over the next months. Studio blocks. Co-writing options. It’s all clean lines and clear plans.
It should feel like safety. Like my exit plan is all coming together. I can see it. So close. And it also makes my grief spike, because safety is unfamiliar right now. Safety used to look very different.
The room breaks into smaller conversations, and Jackson steps closer to me, just slightly to the side, like he’s giving me privacy without isolating me.
“Can I ask you something?” he says quietly.
I keep my smile in place. “Sure.”
“Why now?” he asks and I get a sense that there isn’t any judgment, just curiosity.
My breath catches, because this is the first time anyone has asked me directly.
I could lie. I could say timing. Momentum. Strategy. But my body is exhausted from carrying secrets, so I tell the truth in the smallest way possible.
“I didn't turn down the offer before because of me,” I say softly. “It was a request... It was out of respect to Luke... and now...”
I don’t finish. Jackson’s gaze doesn’t budge from my face. He nods once like he understands exactly what I’m not saying.
“Okay,” he says.
I swallow.
He continues, still quiet. “You need anything, you tell me. Not management or PR. Not the machine. Come to me.”
My chest tightens.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
Jackson’s mouth lifts into a small, steady smile.
“You are done dimming your light, Bailey,” he says. “Not for anyone. Not anymore.”
Something shifts inside me at those words... small, but true.
Jackson steps back as someone approaches, and the room resumes its structured hum.
I sit there with my hands folded in my lap, posture perfect, smile in place, but inside, a part of me whispers: No more.
Backstage before the announcement, my body feels like it’s vibrating. Like I’m holding myself together with string. Rachel stands beside me, adjusting my mic pack with calm hands.
“You good?” she asks quietly.
“Fine,” I lie.
Jackson’s stage manager does a final countdown. Security checks positions. Jackson is on the stage already with his band.