Prologue #3
Adrenaline rushes through my veins, the blood pounding so loudly in my ears that I can barely hear the announcer on the TV telling us exactly what we’ve already read on our phones.
Short videos are shown over and over again.
A girl leaving a hospital in LA, the hood of her oversized sweatshirt pulled down over her face, her striking purple hair poking out from underneath.
Liam and Laura’s daughter. Her face is concealed; she keeps her head down.
Another video of two completely wrecked cars on the road, debris everywhere.
Then one of a visibly shocked representative of Lowlight Recording.
I can’t move. I can’t speak. I can’t do anything. I just sit there and try to understand what the hell just happened. How could Liam, who came to Boston just a week ago to ask us personally to be the opening act for his new tour, be dead?
Liam, who encouraged us to keep going, to keep getting better.
He helped me with lyrics. He wrote to us every now and then just to ask how things were going and if we were okay.
In the last few months, he was no longer just the singer of one of our favorite bands; he had also somehow become our mentor.
And now he’s dead.
It can’t be true. But it is. It’s not a bad dream that we can wake up from. It’s fucking reality.
One moment of carelessness, another driver who wasn’t paying attention, and it was over.
Tears threaten to overflow, and I can’t breathe.
My throat feels tight. I don’t remember the last time I cried.
It’s been so long, I’ve forgotten what it feels like.
Unlike Beck, whom I can hear sniffling quietly next to me, tears already running down his face.
He’s never had a problem expressing his feelings.
Colin is sitting on the floor in front of the TV, silent and pale as a ghost. Jax disappeared into the bathroom earlier.
The tap is running, but otherwise there’s no sound coming from the room.
But I guess that’s exactly how he wants it.
I feel sick when I think of Liam’s daughter.
I don’t know Rayne; I only know she’s younger than me.
Liam told me she just finished high school this year.
She found our videos on YouTube and showed them to her father, but we never met her.
Liam visited us a few times in Boston, but we never went to LA, and Rayne couldn’t travel with him because of her final exams.
She’s too young to lose her parents. Shit, you’re always too young for that.
And then I think of another girl, one whose favorite song is “Mockingbird.” I’ve been calling her “Birdy” because she never told me her name, even though we’ve been texting for months.
She chose her Instagram username after the song that brought us together.
She adores that song. She loves all of Liam Bellamy’s songs, and I know she’s been counting the days until his new album comes out. I know because we both were, together.
My hands are shaking as I open Instagram.
I need to know if she’s okay, even though I already know the answer.
There are people who hear about the death of their favorite musician and they’re sad and affected, but it’s too far away to really get to them.
After a few weeks, they don’t think about it anymore.
But Birdy isn’t like that. For her, Liam’s death isn’t far away. It’s way too close, because his music means the world to her.
I go to her profile and stare at her photos because I can’t bring myself to ask her the question I need to ask.
My heart sinks. I’m afraid of her answer.
I’m afraid of what this will do to her. Her pictures blur before my eyes.
I know every single one of them. The one where she’s wearing a faded Liam Bellamy tour T-shirt, her dark hair cascading to her waist. It only shows part of her neck and her upper body.
Not her face, which she never shows. We’ve been writing to each other for three months, and I’ve never seen her face.
But I know there’s a tiny tattoo of a mockingbird over her ribs.
I recognize the gold bracelets wrapped around her slender wrist. Golden stars and a delicate crescent moon dangle from them.
A slightly wider silver bracelet with something engraved on it that I can’t make out from the photos.
I know the rings she wears. Six on her right hand, four on her left.
I know she has the grayest eyes I’ve ever seen, with insanely long lashes, because she once posted a photo where only her eyes are visible.
She’s looking directly into the camera, deeply and intensely.
I know there’s a small mole on her right cheekbone from another photo showing her profile, half cut off, only her cheekbones and chin visible.
Her hair is tied up in a messy bun, she’s wearing very large headphones, and you can see the mole.
I know countless tiny fragments of this girl, but I’ve never seen her whole face.
But I don’t need to. I know her, and she knows me. Every thought, every insecurity. Every favorite song. That’s why I have to write her this message, ask her this question. Even though I already know the answer.
I tap the message icon, and my fingers find the letters all by themselves, without me even having to look.
JUL 11 AT 6:36 PM
eastcoleman:
You heard, right? How are you?
She doesn’t answer. She’s not okay.