Chapter 3
three
Kate
Watching Josh interact with fans is heartwarming. He never tells anyone no, taking selfies and signing autographs for whoever approaches without complaint. He’s incredibly generous with his time, and it only adds to his charm.
When we sat down at lunch, a little girl who couldn’t have been more than eight years old approached and shyly asked for a selfie.
When he said yes, she lit up, then started telling him all about her desire to follow in his footsteps one day and be a famous rockstar.
She’d even started taking drum lessons last year because she learned that’s how he started and she wanted to be, and I quote, “exactly like him.”
“I knew coming to lunch with a rockstar would be an ordeal,” I stage whisper to Dani as I look over the menu and Josh re-takes his seat across from us.
“Right?” Dani says, rolling her eyes playfully. “He’s so attentive. Gag.” She mimes shoving her finger down her throat as I mutter my agreement and keep my eyes locked on my menu.
Josh bats me on the top of the head with his menu and I look up, gasping dramatically.
“Rude!” I say, dipping the tips of my fingers into my water glass and flicking the droplets at him.
“Shut up, you love me,” he says, grinning.
“I tolerate you,” I correct, rolling my eyes when he winks in response.
The rest of lunch follows suit with how it started—a few other fans approach and ask for selfies and autographs, and Josh smiles and obliges them all.
He pays for lunch before Dani and I can even think about reaching for our purses, and I can’t help but notice that our waitress wrote her number on the customer copy of the receipt.
I’m about to make a teasing comment about rockstars and their endless supply of single, attractive women, but Josh signs the restaurant copy—adding a very generous one-hundred-dollar tip—and leaves the receipt with her number on the table.
“Was she not your type?” I ask as we head through the restaurant to wait for our ride.
“I don’t do relationships,” he says, holding the door open for Dani and me. I thank him and glance down at my phone to see how far away the car is.
“What makes you think she wanted a relationship?”
He shrugs and slides his hands into the pockets of his hoodie. “They always do.”
“Oh, woe is me,” Dani says in an old-timey transatlantic accent, dramatically throwing an arm across her forehead. “I’m Josh Calloway and women just throw themselves at me. It’s exhausting, really. How ever will I survive?”
Back at the hotel, I sit at the desk in my room, put my headphones on, fire up a playlist, and start combing through Josh’s social media DMs and emails.
This is, hands down, my least favorite part of the job.
Every time I open an Instagram DM on his account, I do it with one eye half-closed, bracing myself for impact.
The sheer volume of nudes this man receives is downright ridiculous.
I used to think unsolicited nudes were just a problem women dealt with—turns out I was very, very wrong.
Thankfully, today’s plethora of unread messages are mostly inquiries about collaborations and radio or podcast interviews, which I reply to after I check the calendar for availability, then add them in as tentative until I receive final confirmation.
After the DMs are cleared out, I open his email account and start the process over again, leaving any personal emails in his inbox and moving others into their respective folders after I’ve responded to them.
After sorting through his emails, I move on to his calendar, filling in details for the events he has coming up over the next five days.
He has two solo podcast interviews and a radio interview with the band once we hit Atlanta, so I start adding relevant notes—names of the hosts, any recent personal milestones they’ve shared on social media, like engagements, weddings, pregnancies, or birthdays.
And since Josh is a total sucker for animals, I make sure to note if they have any pets.
It’s these little details that, when Josh brings them up in conversation, will show that he cares about the people he’s interacting with by taking the time to get to know a little about them beforehand.
I’m adding the last few details to the Atlanta event when I suddenly feel a hand on my shoulder. I let out a yelp of surprise and turn, smacking my knee off the leg of the desk.
“Son of a bitch,” I say through gritted teeth, sliding my headphones from my ears and gripping my knee in my hand.
“Sorry!” Josh says, laughing. “I was trying to get your attention from the doorway for like a minute. God, you’re jumpy.”
“I feel like that’s a normal reaction when people sneak up on me like a serial killer.”
“What are you doing?” he asks.
“Working.”
“On what?”
“Well, your email inbox and Instagram DMs are officially safe places again. I cleared out all the business stuff, left a few emails from your family, and flagged a few things you need to take a look at. Eric sent a few files over, says he has an idea for a new song.
“I have also never seen so many boobs in my life. Like ever. If there’s an award for ‘Most Unsolicited Nudity in a Single Inbox,’ call off the competition, you’ve already won it.”
He chuckles and rubs the back of his neck with his hand.
“Oh, and there’s also an email from someone claiming to be your soulmate from a past life who says you were married in ancient Rome.
Says she’s very upset that you haven’t acknowledged her in this life.
Should I RSVP to your November wedding on your behalf, or do you want to take care of that one on your own? ”
“Go ahead and RSVP. Tell her I’ve been meaning to reach out, but reincarnation’s a bitch, and I lost her number somewhere around the Renaissance.
” He tilts his head, tapping his chin as he thinks.
“Actually, scratch that. Tell her I remember everything, and that I was devastated to learn that she moved on without me when I went to fight in the War of 1812. Really lay it on thick—maybe throw in a dramatic ‘How could you?’ for effect.” With a grin, he adds, “And while you’re at it, go ahead and draft a polite but firm rejection reply for the boobs. Just…all of them. Copy, paste, send.”
“You don’t want to see any of them? Not even the nice ones?” I ask, wagging my eyebrows.
“Tempting, but I prefer my boobs with a personality attached.”
I laugh so hard I snort, and I can feel my cheeks flush from embarrassment.
Shit.
Jesus, you sound like a barn animal. It’s embarrassing.
Anthony hated my laugh so much, he’d glare at me until I stopped. He acted like joy was something to be embarrassed about. I’d been suppressing it for so long, I’d forgotten what it sounded like.
He was right. It was obnoxious.
“You have the best laugh I’ve ever heard,” Josh says, grinning and flopping backwards onto my bed, tucking his arms behind his head as he stares up at the ceiling.
“W…what?” I ask.
“Your laugh,” he says, lifting his head to look at me.
“It’s great.” I stare at him, stunned into silence.
He smiles before laying his head back down.
“The next time I make you laugh like that, I’m recording it.
That way when I’m in a shitty mood, I can play it over and over.
It’d be impossible to be in a bad mood with that sound in my ears. ”
His words land harder than they should, sinking somewhere deep and seeping into the cracks that Anthony left behind. I don’t know what to do with that. I don’t know how to take a genuine compliment. One that doesn’t chip away at me in the same breath it’s delivered.
“Can I ask you a question?” I ask, shifting uncomfortably in my chair, desperate to steer the attention away from me.
“Always.”
“Earlier, when you said you don’t do relationships…is it because of your ex-wife?”
“Not her, specifically,” he says. “She’s a great person, and it wasn’t a messy divorce per se, I just don’t want to hurt like that again. Put all that time and effort and emotion into something for it to just…end.”
“You don’t like relationships?” I ask.
“I just don’t need them.” He shrugs. “There’s nothing I’d get out of a relationship that I can’t find casually.”
He says it so easily, like relationships are just something he’s outgrown. Like love is some archaic concept he’s already made peace with not having. And at this point in my life, I understand what he means.
Because what is the point?
Technically speaking, I did everything “right” with Anthony.
I was steady. Dependable. Submissive. Suppressed my own thoughts and feelings to avoid arguments.
I was the kind of person who never missed a birthday, never forgot an anniversary.
Bought and wrapped all the Christmas presents for everyone we knew—his family included.
I put in the effort and gave him everything I thought love was supposed to be while sacrificing pieces of myself in the process.
And it still wasn’t enough.
Maybe Josh is right. Maybe love—real, lasting love—is just a gamble with terrible odds.
Maybe it doesn’t matter how much effort you put in, how carefully you build something, or how meticulously you plan, because at the end of the day people will still look at you and decide you aren’t what they want anymore.
It’s a bitter pill to swallow, because deep down, I don’t want to believe it.
I don’t want to be the person who stops trying, who stops believing in the kind of love that makes someone stay, but as I sit here and listen to Josh say it like it’s the most obvious thing in the world, I start to wonder if I’ve been playing a losing game.