Chapter 4
Chapter Four
Ava’s phone vibrated against her thigh, pulling her from the period drama she’d watched at least a hundred times.
She knew exactly when the duke would pour out his heart to his beloved, his every declaration etched into her brain.
This was her comfort show, and after today’s back-to-back flu patients, comfort was the only thing keeping her upright.
It wasn’t even October yet, and the city was already coughing itself into a fever.
Her half-eaten sub sat forgotten on the coffee table, the bread hardening. The apartment was quiet except for the show’s swelling score and Binx kneading the blanket beside her, purring softly against her leg.
Ava glanced down at her phone, ready to ignore whoever needed something from her now.
Unknown: hey. how are you?
She was about to swipe it away until the next bubble popped up.
Unknown: it’s Jay, btw.
The air in the room suddenly felt too thin. She adjusted her glasses, her heart doing a slow, heavy roll in her chest. He must’ve gotten her number from Mira. Or maybe he’d never actually deleted it.
She paused the show, the Duke’s silent, longing face frozen on the screen.
Ava: Wyler?
Barely a minute passed.
Jay: yeah. long time, no text.
Ava huffed out a laugh, the absurdity of it settling on her. She could be snarky. She could remind him that “long time” was a choice he’d made. But her Pop’s voice echoed from somewhere distant: Holding onto grudges only weighs ya down, sweetheart.
She tapped her phone against her leg, writing and rewriting the text in her head until she finally settled on:
Ava: Long day at work. Tired. How about you?
A burst of nervous energy drove her to clear away her dinner and wipe down the coffee table. She needed something to do that wasn’t staring at her phone and willing him to respond.
Five agonizing minutes later:
Jay: can i call?
“Why?” Ava whined to the empty room, her pulse already climbing.
Texting was a buffer. Calling was a bridge.
Then her phone began to hum in her hand. Binx’s fuzzy black ears flattened at the vibration.
“Uh…Jay—I—hi. Hello…”
“Hey, A,” he breathed. His voice was a low, resonant frequency that bypassed her brain and went straight to her stomach. “Thanks for picking up. I know it’s been…a while.”
“Understatement of the century,” she retorted. “What’s going on?”
“It’s been a weird day—well, week—and…seeing you the other day…” He trailed off, sounding embarrassed.
“No, I get it,” she softened. And she did. Ari and Mira were the only constants Jay had ever been sure of. Mira was likely drowning too. The band was just more pressure. Though Ava wasn’t part of that world anymore, she’d been close enough once that he could still lean into her without explaining.
“Where did you get my number?” she asked, needing to know if he’d carried her with him all these years.
His chuckle was laced with nerves. “I remember it.”
Warmth bloomed dangerously in her chest.
“So, you were at work today?” Jay pushed, steering them away from the ledge. “How long have you been at Vandy? What’s it like, doctor life?”
Ava swallowed past the awkwardness of diving into casual conversation. “It’s been a little over a year since I started my residency. It…keeps me busy.”
“Right. I remember you talking about residencies. It’s like a job, but not a job?”
She let out a small laugh, ignoring the bit of delight at his memory. “It’s definitely a job. I’m a doctor-in-training for now. Two more years until board exams.”
“Shit. More exams?” He whistled low. “How many tests have you taken at this point?”
“Countless,” she answered with another small laugh. She relaxed back into the couch cushion and reached out to run her fingers through Binx’s soft fur for moral support. “It’s not so bad though. It’s honestly fun.”
“I always knew you were gonna be a big shot.”
“Says the literal rockstar.”
“Eh. Rockstars are boring once you get to know them. We’re all jaded as fuck.”
She tilted her head. “Jaded, huh? Why do you say that?”
“I don’t know,” he said quietly. “It’s just…different now. We used to talk about ditching the van for a bus. Now we’ve got the bus, and I’d give anything to be back in that van.”
Her heart pinched. “I’m sorry,” she offered, hating that she still felt his pain as her own.
“Don’t be.”
Ava bit her lip, hesitant. “I saw that the band took a break last year. Did that not help?”
She remembered seeing all the news about them pushing back their sixth studio album due to a hiatus.
None of the members gave any statements on why they suddenly stopped making music, and all the label provided was a short message about them “stepping back to avoid burnout.” Ava had looked into it a little at the time, but she figured they’d been going so hard for so long that they really did need some time.
His laugh was hollow. “No. Just made things worse.”
“How?”
“I checked into rehab for a few months. I’m the one who forced the band to take a break.”
That explanation never crossed her mind as a possibility. The Jay she knew would have burned the whole world down before admitting he was the one on fire.
“Jay…”
“I know,” he mumbled. “I fucked everything up.”
“That’s not—”
“I quit the band today.”
Her mouth went dry. “You what?”
“They want to replace Ari and keep the tour going. They wanted me to keep singing while my brother is hooked up to a ventilator.” His voice hardened. “So I told them I quit.”
The words were like a kick to the stomach. Wicked Smile was his and Ari’s dream. She’d watched Jay lose sleep to write songs, Ari working multiple odd jobs to afford mixing software. Countless hours were spent in Riley’s musty garage rehearsing and perfecting every little thing.
“That—that had to be a difficult decision,” she managed.
“It wasn’t,” he retorted. “If there is no Ari, then there’s no me. End of discussion.”
He was serious.
He’d quit just like that. For Ari, he’d walk away from everything they’d built in an instant. But for her? He’d chosen the band every single time—chosen the dream over the girl who’d been there since before the dream even existed.
“So what happens next?”
“Hell if I know. I’ve got nothing but the band. I don’t know how to be a person without a microphone in my hand.”
“Maybe this is a chance to reinvent yourself.”
“How the hell do I do that?”
“I don’t know.” She scratched under Binx’s chin, and he let out a merp of delight. “The industry’s always been messed up. Maybe you can find a way to make it better somehow.”
“What if I don’t belong in it anymore?”
This made Ava laugh. “The music world without Jay Wyler? Be serious. Wicked Smile fans would lose their minds.”
He paused, his voice softening. “Remember before we even had fans—when we thought a hundred people at a show was massive? That dive bar in Murfreesboro…what was it called?”
“The Boro Barracuda.” Ava remembered that night well. “You banged on my apartment door at midnight after that show. My roommate thought someone was breaking in.”
“Julie hated me,” he recalled, and she could hear his grin. “Pretty sure she threatened to call campus security…and called me a delinquent.”
Ava started to respond, then stopped. The second she’d opened the door that night, he’d pulled her into a crushing kiss, even though he was still sweaty from performing.
She’d barely had time to process before he was lifting her off the ground, spinning her in the tiny doorway while Julie yelled at them to keep it down.
“You knew,” he continued. “Even back then, you were the one who said we’d make it big someday. You believed in us before anyone else did.”
That was back when his excitement meant running to her first…back when a good show ended with her in his arms.
She let the silence sit for a moment before she found her footing again. “That’s why you can’t walk away from music. I mean, Ari wanted you both to—”
“Don’t.” His voice cracked. “Don’t talk about him in past tense. Please.”
The shift was immediate, and the warmth that had been building between them evaporated. He wasn’t angry, but Ava could hear the exhaustion.
“Jay, I didn’t mean—”
“I know.” He sounded far away now. “I know you didn’t. I just...I can’t think about him like that. Not yet.”
The distance between them settled onto her like the cold. She’d thought they were getting closer, inch by careful inch. But there it was: the version of Jay she’d hoped had gotten better—the one always teetering on the edge of not okay.
“I’m sorry,” she said softly.
Silence. Then the sound of him breathing.
“I shouldn’t have called.” His voice was quieter now, almost ashamed. “You’re probably working tomorrow, and I’m—I’m dumping all my shit on you again. Like always.”
“Jay, it’s okay—”
“It’s not though. You don’t deserve that.
You never deserved any of what I put you through.
” She could hear him trying to pull himself together, could practically see him running his hand through his hair.
“I was a black hole, A. I just didn’t realize I was taking you down with me until I hit the bottom. ”
She took a deep breath, not ready to broach this subject. “We don’t need to talk about any of that right now.”
Really, Ava didn’t want to talk about it. It was too soon. The anger and disappointment were rushing back from the carefully organized corner of her mind where she’d buried them.
The worst part wasn’t the emotions resurfacing. It was that she could already feel herself doing it again—listening for the dip in his voice, measuring his words for what wasn’t being said. She was still taking his emotional temperature without a second thought.
“We never talked about it though,” Jay insisted, but even that sounded tired.
“We never talked about it because you cut me out, Jay.” Tears blurred her vision, the duke on the screen dissolving into a smudge of color.
“That was a mistake.”
“It doesn’t even matter. That’s all behind us.”
A brief silence fell over them, heavy with five years of static.
“Is it, though?” he asked.