Chapter 5 Aurora
AURORA
“How’s it going so far?”
Brady’s words echo through the hotel bathroom as I finish getting ready for bed. I recognize the familiar gruffness of his voice. It’s his tired voice, and if I closed my eyes, I could almost imagine him here with me. He doesn’t sound nearly eight thousand miles away.
“Good,” I say. “I met Brynnlee, the girl I’ll be tutoring. That went...Well, it went fine.”
He yawns, and his words tumble out with it. “Just fine?”
“Yeah. I mean, I don’t think she’s excited to be tutored, but she wasn’t rude or anything. Just a little standoffish at first, but she warmed up to me by the end.”
I turn off the bathroom light and pad my way to the bed in semi-darkness. My body longs for sleep. I’m surprised I made it through the day, to be honest, but I read that napping makes jet lag worse.
“She’s going to love you. How could she not?”
“Thanks.” I pull back the duvet, climb into the soft bed, and sigh as my head hits the pillow. “I think we’ll get along okay. I actually ate dinner in the suite with her and her family.”
“How was that?”
“Weirdly normal. I don’t know what I was expecting—caviar and thousand-dollar bottles of champagne or something—but we ordered Margherita pizza. If I hadn’t been in the presence of a modern-day rock icon, it might have felt like any other random day.”
“Sav Loveless.” Brady draws out her name. “I had the biggest crush on her in high school.”
“I remember,” I say with a laugh. “You almost peed yourself when you found out Uncle Wade was her manager.”
“I didn’t almost pee myself.”
“Mmhmm, sure.”
He chuckles. “So what’s the queen of rock like?”
“Gorgeous. Intimidating. Larger than life. You know how her voice kind of vibrates through the radio? Well, it’s like that in person, too, except.
..I don’t know...more. She speaks and you can almost feel it in your chest. But she’s also really kind and surprisingly down to earth.
She was nice when we talked on the phone and all, but I wasn’t sure how she’d be in person.
I was afraid she might be a snooty, stuck-up celebrity, but she’s not at all. ”
“Your uncle wouldn’t have brought you on to work for someone who was snooty and stuck-up, Auri.”
“Yeah, that’s true. But still. I was worried, anyway.”
My husband hums, and I can hear coffee brewing on the other end of the phone. He had to wake up two hours early so he could talk to me right before I went to bed. The eighteen-hour difference is going to take some getting used to.
“What about the guys? Torren King and Jonah Hendrix. You going to leave me for one of those tatted, broody rock stars?”
The teasing tone in Brady’s voice has me rolling my eyes as I snuggle deeper into my pillow. “I have no interest in those guys, B, and they have no interest in me.”
“I doubt that. You’re hot.”
I snort out a laugh. “Torren King is engaged to the lead singer of Caveat Lover, remember? Long red hair? Voice like an angel? And Jonah Hendrix has a two-year-old with his girlfriend. Both of those very kind, very beautiful women are also on tour. I met them, too. Trust me, you have nothing to worry about.”
He gives me the same playful mmhmm I gave him, drawing another little laugh from me as my eyelids grow heavier with exhaustion. Silence stretches between us for long enough that I’m seconds from slipping into a dream world before his next question pulls me back to the present.
“Do you miss me?”
“Yes.”
My answer is immediate. I don’t even have to think about it. It tumbles out of my mouth like a natural reflex, and it’s not a lie. In this dark hotel room, with this giant, empty bed, I do miss him. I miss the comfort. I miss the security.
I don’t tell him that I didn’t think about missing him until he asked, though.
“Do you miss me?”
“Of course I miss you. You’re my wife, and you just left me to fly across the country with some depraved rock stars.”
The change in his tone has my eyes popping open and my brows furrowing. We were having such a good conversation before. Now the guilt is back, and my body has grown tight with tension.
“I’m sorry,” I say, digging my fingers into the cool, softer-than-soft bedsheets and squeezing. “I just...I didn’t want to pass up this opportunity. You said you were okay with it.”
“I was. I am.” Brady sighs. “It’s just harder without you here. That’s all.”
I nod even though he can’t see me, and my voice drops to a whisper that sounds timid even to my own ears.
“I’m sorry.”
“If I change my mind, if I’m not okay with it anymore, will you come home?”
I want to say no, but something else has me telling him the opposite.
“If that’s what you really want, I’ll come home.”
Brady goes silent for a moment, and when he finally speaks, his voice is quieter. “Would that be a selfish thing for me to ask?”
I want to say yes.
Yes, it would be selfish of you to ask me to leave. Yes, it would be selfish to take something away from me when I’ve given everything to you.
I want to say it, but again, I don’t. Instead, I force a swallow and try to keep my voice from trembling.
“I don’t know. What do you think?”
Another long pause stretches that has my stomach roiling with nerves, and I halt my own breathing so I can listen more closely to his. He’s going to ask me to leave. I just got here, and now I’ll have to turn around and go back home.
My muscles grow heavier, defeat mixing with the exhaustion.
I look at the empty side of the bed. The blankets and pillow are smooth and untouched.
The room is peaceful, so different from the bedroom I share with Brady back home.
I usually fall asleep to the sound of my husband watching sports highlights on his laptop.
Tonight, it’s just quiet, and I was enjoying it.
The thought of being alone, of being blanketed in silence, used to terrify me, but not tonight.
“It would be selfish,” he says finally, catching me by surprise.
“What?”
“If I asked you to come back, that would be selfish.”
“Oh.” I blink. “Okay.”
“I’m being an asshole.”
“No. No, you’re not. It’s fine.”
He sighs again, this time sounding more frustrated than tired, and I listen as he pours himself a cup of coffee. I don’t have to be there to know that he’s probably using the blue Mr. mug we got as a wedding gift. He uses it every morning.
“Look. Let’s just forget I said that, okay? It’s not like you’re going to last the whole eight weeks anyway.”
I frown. “What does that mean?”
“Oh, c’mon, Auri. I can’t even get you to stay at a dinner party with my bosses longer than a few hours, and you haven’t had a job in years.
You can barely keep up with your chores most of the time.
Being responsible for someone’s education?
No. Either you’ll leave, or they’ll send you home.
” He chuckles to himself, then I hear him take a sip from his coffee and swallow before the mug clinks back onto the kitchen counter.
“I want you to enjoy this while it lasts. Forget I said anything.”
Sometimes, I wonder if he knows how much statements like that hurt me.
It doesn’t matter if they’re said with a smile or veiled as a good-natured joke.
My confidence is already fragile. One underhanded comment from him can beat it down for days.
I bite the inside of my cheek and close my eyes, giving my head a shake as if I can rattle the memory of his words from my mind. I can’t, but I still try. Every time.
I don’t want to argue with him. It never works in my favor, anyway. My stomach churns, and my forehead stays creased, but I force a lightness into my tone that I don’t feel.
“Sure. Yeah. Forgotten.”
“So what else have you done?”
“Not much, really. I’ve spent the majority of the time since leaving California in the air. I’ve only been on the ground for a handful of hours, and now I’m in bed about to crash.”
“Eighteen hours in the future,” Brady jokes. “I guess I’m in your past now.”
I huff a fake laugh. “I guess so.”
“What about the drummer? Mabel Rossi.”
“What about her?”
“Have you met her yet?”
I lick my lips and open my mouth to speak, but nothing comes out.
The question has me fumbling for words, and I don’t understand why.
I think about the jet. About the room swapping.
About our exchange in the hallway outside Sav’s suite.
I mean to tell him, but I don’t. Instead, I force a fake smile that he can’t see, and I mention none of it.
I lie. When I speak, I hope he doesn’t notice the odd, high pitch or slight nervous shake to my voice.
“Not really, no.”
“She’s always been kind of mysterious, you know? I feel like she’s the only one who hasn’t been mentioned in some sort of scandal.”
I swallow. “Huh. Yeah.”
“She’s hot, too, though.”
I force another light laugh, but this one comes out wobbly. “I guess. If you like the pixie punk rock thing.”
Brady chuckles. “Don’t be jealous. There’s nothing sexier to me than coming home to find my wife with soil stains on her knees and under her fingernails.”
His playful jibe draws a genuine smile from me. “Yes, well, I could do a mean winged liner back in the day.”
“Oh, I know. That’s how you hooked me. With the purple streak in your hair, black eyeliner, and ripped skinny jeans. It only took me a few years to earn my way out of the friend zone.”
I hum, my eyes fluttering shut as my body finally transitions out of fight, flight, or freeze.
“You’re still my friend, B. My best friend.”
“I’m just grateful the cool, popular, artsy girl finally gave the math nerd a chance. I’m so lucky.”
“Well, it was bound to happen when there were only five hundred people in our town,” I tease. “Statistics were in your favor.” A long yawn escapes me, and with it goes the very last dregs of my energy. “I’m going to fall asleep. Talk tomorrow night?”
“It’s a date.” Unlike mine, his voice has grown more chipper. “Oh, and don’t forget.”
“Hmm?”
“You should take a test soon.”
A jolt zaps through me, and my eyes snap back open. A test.
A pregnancy test.
“Right. A test.”
“Tomorrow?”
I swallow. “Sure. Tomorrow.”
“Love you.”
“Love you.”
“Good night, Auri.”
We hang up, and despite the way my body yearns for rest, my mind can’t seem to find it. When I finally do succumb to sleep, it’s after hours of staring at nothing in the darkness.