24. Summer
Summer
“Can we try that again from the top? Tim, can you layer a harmony on the bridge?”
“Got it!” He gives me the thumbs-up through the glass.
I adjust my headphones and close my eyes, concentrating on the melody in my head.
The red light flicks on, indicating we’re recording. I look toward Tim as his voice crackles through my ears. “Rolling. Take seven.”
I inhale a deep breath, digging deep to access the hollow ache I always write from, the sore spot I only allow myself to reach for when I need to create something beautiful. Then I open my mouth to sing.
In my periphery, Tim nods along as his hands float across the mixing desk, pressing buttons and turning dials.
The song flows out of me. You can cut the tension with a knife. It’s thick and heavy. I need to get this right. I nailed the chorus when the bridge builds and—
My voice cracks on the high note. Again.
Tim throws up his arms.
“Damn it!” I hiss, turning to the window.
Addie lingers behind Tim, coffee in hand, studying me.
“You okay, Sum? Want to go again?” Tim asks.
We’ve been at this for eight hours. I don’t have anything left in me. I shake my head.
“No, it’s fine. Let’s call it a day.”
He nods.
I hang my headphones on the mic hook and step out of the booth, reaching for the coffee Addie extends in offer. “You’re a saint, thank you,” I say.
“How do you feel?” she asks, moving to rub my biceps. I pull my arm away.
She drops her hand. “Oh, sorry.”
“It’s okay,” I reply with a small grin and take a sip, letting the warm liquid soothe my throat.
“How did that feel?” she asks.
“Like a massive failure?”
She pins me with a look, and I blow out a breath. “Good. It felt good.”
“Great, because we’re closing in on the deadline, so …”
I groan, tipping my head back. “Don’t remind me.”
“The label will have my ass and yours. You need to come up with something.”
“I know, I know.” I wave her off. “You don’t need to remind me.”
“As your manager, it’s my job to remind you. As your best friend, I think we should celebrate.”
“Celebrate what? My range is flatter than my chest at the moment.”
“Well, I have good news for you and your chest—there’s help available to improve both.”
“Ha-ha. Very funny.” I drain the rest of the coffee. “I need more caffeine.”
“Excellent. We should get espresso martinis.”
I brush a fake tear away. “That was beautiful. Was that Emily Dickinson?”
“That was an original Addison Walker.”
“Incredible. Let’s go.” I turn to Tim. “Same time next week?”
He swivels his chair to face me. “See you then.”
I snatch my leather jacket off the coat rack, slip into it, and follow Addie out.
The wintry New York wind bites at my exposed skin, and I fold my arms over my chest, trying to stay warm.
Addie hails a taxi and we slide in, heading to our favorite bar in Soho.
The venue hums with chatter and clinking glasses when we arrive, curious eyes following us as we head to our preferred booth in the far corner.
Once we have drinks, Addie starts her friendly interrogation. “So …” She swirls her cocktail. “You gonna tell me what happened back there?”
“What do you mean?”
“You never miss a note.”
“I don’t know, Adds.” I drum my fingers along the stem of my martini glass. “I think I’ve lost it.”
“Lost what?”
“It. My spark. Music’s always been my life and, I don’t know … it just isn’t speaking to me the way it used to.”
She scoots her chair in closer and leans in. “Is it because of what’s happened?”
“You mean my father dying?” I scoff. “No. This is different.”
Her eyes lower to her drink. “It would be hard on anyone, Sum. You aren’t a robot. You’re allowed to grieve him.”
I sigh. “He’s been dead to me for a long time. The fact that it’s official doesn’t change anything.”
I was at dinner with Tim last week, discussing the sound of my new album, when I received the call from Addie.
Rhonda had been on her evening walk when she spotted two police cars parked outside my old house. Being the busybody she is, she walked past, trying to gauge what was happening.
Turns out my father had died. Suicide.
Now, I have to live with the trauma he inflicted on me while he took the easy way out. The sick bastard. He even had the audacity to leave me a letter.
A fucking letter.
I haven’t opened it. I don’t know if I ever will.
I spoke with my psychiatrist, Dr. Kularatne, when I got the news.
I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to feel.
I sat across from her in that maroon chair and waited for something to arrive—grief, maybe, or regret or something somewhere stuck in between.
What came instead was a kind of stillness.
And underneath it, two emotions side by side that I couldn’t quite reconcile.
Relief. And anger.
Relief because it was over and the knowledge that he existed somewhere in the same world was finally gone.
Anger because his life just … ended. Without him ever being fully accountable for the horrible things he’d done. Without ever looking me in the eye and admitting what he did. He took whatever baggage he carried to the grave and left me standing here still holding mine.
I wondered whether it weighed on him the way it weighed on me. Had he spent years replaying it the way I had? I’ll never know. And I’ve had to make peace with not knowing.
I was twenty-four when I received my formal diagnosis.
Post-traumatic stress disorder. I already knew.
The hypervigilance, the flinching, the way certain things sounded or smelled could pull me back into that house—that time—without warning.
But having a name for it meant I could finally start treating it properly, when I could afford to.
I started with my psychiatrist. Then a therapist specializing in trauma. EMDR. Somatic work. Journaling. I threw everything I had at it because I was so desperate to stop feeling like a hostage to something that had already happened and something I couldn’t control.
My journey hasn’t been linear. I don’t think I’ll ever be fully healed, but I don’t think anyone ever is. We’re constantly learning, changing, growing. That’s just what it means to be human.
Not every week has been positive. There were periods I felt like I’d taken two steps forward only to be knocked four steps back.
When I first started medication, there were stretches where I felt numb to everything—not sad, not happy, simply existing.
Moving through the days disconnected and detached and taking up space. A warm body. But I kept going.
I’m not the same person I was at fourteen. Or eighteen, bleeding on a kitchen floor while my father walked away. I’m not who I was at twenty-four, trembling in a doctor’s office as a label was finally put to the burden I’d been carrying for a decade.
I’m something brand new now, built out of everything that tried to break me.
I still speak to Dr. Kularatne every month. I always thought—people go to the gym for their bodies without a second thought. Why wouldn’t we do the same for our minds?
It’s been one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. And the most rewarding.
Dr. Kularatne told me that I don’t need to do anything with the letter.
That I don’t owe my father anything. I’ve been yo-yoing back and forth with myself about whether I should read it.
But I don’t think I want to know what he has to say.
It’s too little too late. Nothing written inside that envelope will undo the years of abuse I endured or tears I shed.
It won’t erase the trauma or everything that came with it.
I’d rather leave the past in the past.
I want to bury it along with the stained memory of him.
“I know I reminded you of the deadline.” She rests her hand over my thigh. “But if you need more time, just give me the word. I can probably swindle you an extra month or two. The label would understand.”
“No. Don’t be ridiculous.” I wave her off. “I can do this.”
“Sum.”
My eyes snap to hers.
“You haven’t written a single song in twelve months. I’m sorry, but whatever your method is, it isn’t working.” I open my mouth to speak but she stops me. “I think you need to process everything’s that’s happened.”
“Nothing has happened.”
Her brows shoot to her hairline. “Are you forgetting that you ran away, busted your ass, signed with a major record label, and put out three incredible folk-pop albums?”
“I’ve processed that,” I say, taking another sip.
“Before today, it’s been twelve months since you finished anything inside the booth. Something needs to change. Maybe a change of scenery? Getting out of Manhattan might do you some good.”
“What are you suggesting?”
“I don’t know. Somewhere quiet. Somewhere you can breathe.” She hesitates. “Maybe Ocean Grove?”
My stomach somersaults. “No.”
“It inspired your first album. The one that went platinum … remember that one?” By it, she means him.
“Smart-ass.”
“Closure might help, Sum—”
“I said no.”
“But the funeral—”
“Is next week. I don’t care. I already told you. I’m not going, so drop it. Please?”
She gulps and bobs her head. “Yeah … Yeah, okay. I’m sorry.”
I stare into the dark liquid.
“Maybe you have a case of writer’s block. Every artist gets it.”
“I don’t think it’s writer’s block, Adds.” I push the glass away. “I can write. I just can’t feel anything when I do.”
Addie doesn’t respond. She reaches across the table in silent invitation. I take her hand and squeeze it three times.
You’re okay.
Only this time, I’m not sure I believe it.