Chapter 1
Wes
One, Maya Hawke has come to profess her undying love for me and is offering me a spot on her next tour.
Two, I won a lottery I didn’t know I entered and someone is bringing me a million dollars.
Three, someone is dying.
Crossing my fingers that it’s one of the first two, I begrudgingly roll out of bed, quickly swiping at my phone to see if there are any urgent messages.
When I find my notifications empty, I groan as I drag my half-naked ass to the door.
Whoever it is better not complain about my lack of clothes, considering they are interrupting my beauty rest.
As soon as I open the door I’m greeted by a familiar fidgeting boy with a mass of curly brown hair and big brown eyes.
Luke.
Panic sets in immediately because Luke always calls or texts when he comes over, and he’s never contacted me before ten o’clock on a Saturday.
“Luke. What’s wrong?” I demand as he shoves his way into my apartment, nervously pacing in the small living room.
“I’m sorry it’s early and I didn’t text or call, but I need a favor.” He mutters, looking down at his feet.
My anxiety increases the more I wait for him to explain. “Well? Spit it out, man!”
“Sorry.” He clears his throat and finally meets my eyes. “You know my girlfriend, Izzy?” I nod, “Well, her sister is moving to San Marcos and Izzy was able to convince her parents to let her come visit. We have a date tonight.”
My panic morphs into relief that no one’s dying, then immediately changes to irritation because I realize this isn’t a life or death situation. “And what does that have to do with me?” I ask, already skeptical.
“They’re Mormon.” He says plainly. I give him a questioning look and he rolls his eyes.
“Her parents have a rule about dating, and since she’s not eighteen, she can’t be alone with me.
” I can hear the exasperation in his tone, this is obviously a sensitive topic for him.
“And she doesn’t want her sister to be all alone while she chaperones, especially on the first night in a new place, you know?
And it would be really good for her to make friends since she’ll be living here.
I told Iz that I would ask Matt to come, but he has an emergency work thing tonight, so I was hoping that you would come? ”
I don’t know much about Mormons, but the women from the religion sound like prissy, holier-than-thou, entitled brats. I don't know Luke’s girlfriend, but I’d assume she’s not that way if Luke’s dating her.
“You walked your ass all the way here, banging on my door at an ungodly hour on a Saturday, to ask me to help babysit you and your girlfriend? This could have been a text, Lukas.” He hates when I use his full name, but I feel the situation warrants it.
“First of all, Mom’s not at work yet so I drove.
Second, if I had texted you, you would have said no without even hearing me out.
Third, I haven’t seen Izzy in person in a year, please Wes.
For me?” Luke pleads, placing his hands together in a prayer motion.
It would be funny if he didn’t look so damn earnest.
“Luke,” I groan, “you know I haven’t really gone out with anyone since Shelby. I don’t really want to go out with a complete stranger on my first date in over two years. Let alone one who will probably keel over the second she sees me. No way am I her type.”
I’ve had the “bad boy” label for as long as I can remember.
I’ve never so much as littered, let alone anything worse than that- unless you count defending myself when other people start fights- but people take one look at a tattooed, long haired, ripped jeans- metal band tee-wearing guy with a nose ring and ear piercings and automatically assume the worst.
As a kid, that label was given to me because I came to school with unkempt hair, raggedy clothes, and bruises courtesy of Kieth, the asshole my mom was with from ages nine to thirteen.
I had to steal lunch because I couldn’t afford to pay for it, and we didn’t have food at home for me to bring to school.
No one bothered to ask about it, they just assumed I was a bad kid who got into fights and had a stealing problem.
The other kids would pick on me for being poor, for having a drug addict mom, for not liking sports, or for “smelling weird.” Some took it a step further than throwing insults my way and started throwing fists.
What was I supposed to do except fight back?
Everyone was quick to blame the poor, addict’s kid, so I just accepted that that was the way everyone saw me.
I kept to myself as best I could, and I didn’t have any friends until high school.
When I was in college, I leaned into the bad boy act.
I drank a lot, got into a lot of fights, and fucked my way through the student body.
I found that a lot of girls wanted to blow off steam with a quick hookup with the bad boy.
After a few meaningless hookups though, I felt shitty and unfulfilled.
I didn’t want to be a check mark on a bucket list anymore, I wanted a connection.
The issue was I had already gained a reputation, and girls thought that it would be a fun challenge to see who could “fix” me.
Rarely did any of them want to get to know me, they just wanted to be the one to “tame” me.
If they weren’t trying to fix me, they were too scared to talk to me because of my reputation or my looks.
“I’m not asking you to go steady with her or whatever.
I just want you to keep her company so I can spend time with my girlfriend.
Please Wes, I’ll do anything.” Luke literally on his knees begging is something I’ve never seen.
The kid’s pride is astronomical, so this must be extremely important for him.
After my mom passed away when I was fourteen, my grandma took me in.
Then she died when I was seventeen, and Luke’s mom basically adopted me.
Jessica and my mom were basically sisters so when my grams passed and I had no one else, Jess didn’t hesitate.
Luke was ten at the time, and Jess worked a lot, so I spent a lot of time looking after him and he became the little brother I never had.
Some of Luke’s friends have siblings my age, and somehow we became one big happy mismatched found family.
They’re the closest thing to an actual family I’ve got, and I would do anything for them.
I protect the people I love fiercely because I’ve lost so many people already.
“Fine. But you owe me, big time.” I relent, hoping this doesn’t go poorly.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you Wes!” Luke tackles me in a hug, and I realize just how tall and strong he's gotten.
Gone is the baby-faced little boy. He’s almost a man, and that makes my heart ache a little bit.
“We’re picking them up from her place at five so come get me at four forty-five. Don’t be late. And try to look less…grumpy. Elliana’s not like the girls you’re used to.” He says.
Elliana.
Even her name sounds prissy.
“Yeah yeah. I’ll be there. What exactly do you have planned?”
Luke tells me about his “romantic” date: a night at the arcade.
I guess it is romantic for a seventeen year old, but I don’t know what Elliana and I are going to do.
I hate the arcade. It’s sticky and loud.
I guess loud wouldn’t be bad because then I don’t have to try to make small talk with Elliana as much, but I don’t know if that’s worth the headache of the crowd.
When Luke leaves just before nine, I really just want to go back to sleep, but I’m too awake now.
I sit down on the floor with my trusty acoustic guitar, who I have affectionately named Dolly after the queen herself-Dolly Parton.
I tune her, then open my notebook to jot down chords and lyrics as they come, but the same thing that’s happened for the last six months happens.
Which is nothing.
No lyrics.
No melodies.
No inspiration.
This is the worst block I’ve had in a long time, it’s like all of my creativity and inspiration is just gone, and with summer gigs starting I really need to get my shit together so I’m not replaying the same covers and old songs over and over.
I used to have music playing in my head constantly. Whether it’s a song from my childhood that I used to blast in my headphones, or a new song idea, my head was never empty.
I thought at first it was my anxiety medication dulling my creativity, but I’ve been on that for years and the music left six months ago. Just vanished one day and hasn’t returned.
I let the Instagram notification that pops up distract me, Robin has tagged me in some giveaway for some abstract art piece she wants, so nothing important.
I see Luke’s story counting down the literal seconds until he sees Izzy again.
I roll my eyes at the sappiness. I click on Izzy’s profile, curious to see if she has any pictures of Elliana, so I know who I’m meeting tonight.
I see that Izzy posted a picture yesterday of her at a “Welcome to Texas” sign, and to my luck, she’s tagged none other than Elliana herself.
Her profile doesn’t have a bio, and a quick scroll through shows there’s about a six month gap of posts, which is strange since she posts at least every two weeks before that.
Her latest post is of her and her parents, making a joke about moving.
They don’t look happy, don’t look sad, just kind of… annoyed. Or indifferent.
There are hardly any pictures of her. It’s mostly pictures of family or scenery, the occasional book.
The pictures she’s in show her in dresses, hair curled to perfection, and meticulously posed for the camera-prissy and stuck up, just like I thought.
Although her smile doesn’t quite seem to reach her perfectly lined eyes. I’ll admit, she is kind of pretty.
But so was Shelby and that didn’t make her a good person.