37. Riot
Riot
Kelsey stiffens into a statue in my arms. Her rib cage doesn’t move for a good twenty-two seconds before she takes her next breath.
I wasn’t planning on getting into what I learned from her diary and memento box tonight.
Okay, I definitely was ready to drag her out of her bunk and confront her, but then the storm had started, and I remember how freaked out Kelsey would get. I didn’t really understand why until tonight. Until she begged me to pin her down and obliterate memories she refused to talk about.
Whatever Marco did to her—and I don’t need the details to hazard an educated guess—left her terrified of storms.
Too many of the women who are my friends and family have been through things they shouldn’t have had to.
Things they would sooner forget. Attacks that have left them feeling weak—like my sister-in-law Summer.
Turned into shells of themselves—like my friend Rochelle.
Or even left them a little psycho—like my sister-in-law Dizzy.
Kelsey had always seemed untouched. Okay with her body and sexuality. It lulled me into falsely believing that her past with her piece of shit foster brother had only been mildly harsh instead of the absolute nightmare it was.
I never had cause to put the pieces together.
I thought I knew the woman who was my best friend. I believed her fear of storms was just that. Making sure her fear didn’t overwhelm her became my priority.
Until I realized we didn’t use a condom.
Which is neither here nor there at the end of the day. I’m clean, and I believed her when she said she hasn’t had anyone else. The contraceptive angle can be taken care of with the morning after pill.
But the baby she was carrying when she left me... I need to know.
“You called her Harlowe Maddox,” my daughter’s name falls from my lips.
Harlowe is a beautiful name. One that we would have chosen together had I had a fucking clue about her.
“You have a lot to confess, don’t you, Kelsey?
More than I thought. And you want to make sure you only tell me the truth about this. You were pregnant. At the wedding.”
She stays silent for a very long time. Eventually she says, “I was.”
“You found out the night we left for Heart Ranch.”
“Sam made me test. I didn’t believe for a second that I would be.”
“But you were.”
“Yes,” her voice is a mere whisper, labored with emotion.
“But you didn’t think I deserved to be told?” I can’t keep the bitterness out of my tone. I should have been the first person she came to.
“I wanted to tell you.”
“Why the fuck didn’t you?” I tamp down on the tension increasing inside me. This conversation is too important for harsh words and screaming.
“Because you asked me to be your girlfriend. You were telling your brothers about us.”
“That shouldn’t have been a reason to keep her from me. It should have been a reason to tell me. We were together. We were supposed to be together.”
She flips over to face me. “We were so together you ended up fucking another woman at your brother’s wedding.
I wanted to tell you about the baby. I wanted to share that news with you, but it didn’t seem like the right time or place.
I didn’t want your family to assume you were with me because you knocked me up. ”
“They wouldn’t have.” They would have believed we were in love and that we were happy.
“They might have.” She glares at me. “I never thought our entire friendship could blow up in one long weekend. I was going to wait until we got back on the plane to tell you. Only I never got back on the plane.”
Her admission lands like a gut punch. If I hadn’t ended up on the couch with Sonatina the entire last two years would have been completely different.
Unlike my own father, I would have been there every step of the way for Kelsey and Harlowe.
Kelsey and I would have stayed together.
I fucked it all up when I slept with Sonatina.
How can one moment that I can barely remember cause this much damage?
“I get why you didn’t tell me that weekend. But you could have told me at some point. You could have come to me.”
“How? There’s no way the label would have let me near you?”
“Then you could have gotten to me through my brothers. You know they wouldn’t have turned you away. Keeping my child from me—”
Kelsey starts to shake her head vigorously. She pushes away from me and moves to the edge of the bed. “Why do you think I stayed in L.A. to start with. I was never going to keep her from you. I wouldn’t do that. I wanted her to know you.”
I snag her wrist. “Then where is she, Kelsey? Did you put her up for adoption? Or did you send her to foster care? Please tell me you didn’t put our daughter at risk of ending up in a situation like the one you were in.”
She sobs. “No. I would never. I wanted her. I wanted to be a family. I wanted it with you.”
“Then tell me where she is. We can go get her. Or we can at least check on her. If she was adopted, I’ll convince her parents to—”
“She wasn’t adopted.” Her tears fall thick and fast.
I get off the bed and kneel between her knees. “I can’t not be there for my child, Kelsey. You have to tell me—”
She sobs wetly into her hand.
“Kelsey, I am on my knees begging. Please, tell me.”
“I lost her,” she says.
“Lost?” My ears fill with static as Kelsey’s head drops and her shoulders shake. “Lost as in—”
“I was nineteen weeks. I’d had the ultrasound and found out Harlowe was a girl that morning.”
“The photo in your box.” My chest is tight. My heart is cracking at the pain washing off Kelsey.
She nods. “And there you were, with Sonatina, in a poster on the wall. Taunting me with your perfect life while mine was floundering in every way, except for her. And I knew I had to reach out and tell you, even though I was scared of how you would react to the news.”
She goes quiet.
“I need to know,” I plead. I need to be as broken as she must have been.
I don’t want to be spared the pain that she must have lived with these last couple years.
I should have been there for her. I should have held her while she was in agony.
I should have the details of what happened to my family while I was stewing over the hurt I thought she’d caused me.
“I was bumped. Or maybe pushed.” She wrings her hands together in the sheets. “It all happened too fast.”
“Marco?” Had she crossed his path and not realized?
“Maybe, but I don’t think so. No one saw anything, and I can’t be certain.
But it seemed like Marco thought luck had put him in my path when he chased me from the Scarlet that night.
If he’d been aware of where I was—and that I was on my own—all this time, he wouldn’t have left me alone.
He would have tried to take me. That’s not what happened. ”
I clasp her face between both of my hands. “Tell me.”
“All I remember is it felt like I was shoved. I lost my balance, and the next thing I knew I was falling off the curb. A car hit me... or clipped me. There was so much noise. Horns and screeching and glass breaking. People screaming. Someone yelling for 911. And then I was laying in the middle of the road. The pain was excruciating.” She presses her hands to her temples as though she has a headache.
“I must have lost consciousness because I woke up in the hospital a couple weeks later. And our baby was dead.”
Her pain destroys me.
I was supposed to be there. I should have protected her. Or if I couldn’t, I should have at least been there while she was going through this heartache. We should have grieved our loss together. “I’m sorry you went through that alone. I’m sorry I failed you. Forgive me? If I had known—”
“I can’t forgive you,” her voice turns cold. “It’s likely I will never be able to forgive you.”
For a while there I had let myself believe she could be mine again. I didn’t think she would let me Dom her, fuck her, and she’d hate me through it all. “But we—”
“There is no we. There will never be a we. I needed to be fucked, and you’ve made it clear that I can’t go to anyone else but you, unless you say so.
” She pushes me away, and I fall on my ass.
“Tell me how I am supposed to forgive you when you chose that bitch over me? You let her get between us. You let her ruin my life. Everything that happened to me after L.A. Riot happened because you couldn’t keep your cock in your pants. ”
I crawl back to her. Reach for her hand. “Kelsey, I—"
She snatches it away from me. Crossing her arms, she stands.
“What’s worse is that you didn’t fight for me.
Not when Carmine made it impossible for me to get a job in the industry.
Or outside of it. Every single time I finally convinced someone to hire me, I’d get a couple of weeks in, and my new boss would hear a rumor and decide it was best to let me go. ”
I’ve been hurt and lost since she left. Hating her for stealing from me, for almost damaging the band’s upward trajectory, and walking away like we were nothing. Assuming she was fine. Assuming she deserved whatever came her way. I was wrong. Possibly about everything.
She collects her pajamas. Shimmies into the shorts and yanks the tank top over her head.
“You didn’t want me enough to fight for me.
You let me go like I meant nothing. Like I was another groupie in a long line of groupies.
I was fighting for us when I punched Sonatina.
I was fighting for us from the minute she showed up at that concert.
And you acted like I was going crazy. Like I was the problem.
I would have fought for us after her if you’d chosen me. I would have forgiven you then.”
She sobs as she turns her face away, like she can’t stomach to look at me.
“I am never going to regret anything more than not fighting for you.” Even though she put L.A. Riot in jeopardy, I could have played the whole situation differently. “I should have stayed clear of Sonatina.”
Her gaze is brutal. Full of animosity. “It doesn’t matter.
It’s too late. It doesn’t negate the last couple of years.
I had to sell my car and most of my things.
I had no idea how I was going to afford to have a baby.
But I was going to love her enough for both of us.
I was going to find a way to make it work.
You took her away from me. I would not have been on that street, in that spot, if it hadn’t been for you. You can never give her back to me.”
She rushes out of the room.
I can’t get off the floor. Can’t breathe. Can barely stand being in my own skin. All this time I’ve been hating her... I should have been hating myself. I can’t fix this. I can’t change the past. I can’t undo sleeping with Sonatina. I can’t bring back our child.
I can’t ask her to stay... what can I do? Is there even a way to earn her forgiveness? Do I let her go? Let her try to find happiness elsewhere? No. I can’t do that either.
Fuck.