9. Chapter Nine
Chapter Nine
Lila
Someone had really tried to make the green room feel fancy.
There was a tray of fruit on the counter, all perfectly cubed and sliced, looking like it belonged at a spa, not backstage at a show.
Bottled waters lined up like little soldiers.
And the sandwiches? Cut into triangles, which felt like a level of optimism I could only aspire to.
I was halfway through pretending to be fascinated by a pineapple chunk when the door creaked open behind me.
I didn’t even have to turn around. My body clocked it before my brain could file a formal complaint. The air got tighter. Or maybe that was just me, shrinking by the second.
The low chatter near the couch kept going. Someone laughed by the mini fridge. Finn was across the room arguing with Harper about whether bananas counted as "tour-safe fruit" or "nature's wet chalk."
And behind me, Evan Walker strolled in, looking exactly like a bad decision with a shiny laminate pass.
I turned.
Hoodie shoved up to his elbows, tattoos peeking out like they were eavesdropping.
His hair was still damp at the ends, like he’d run wet hands through it on autopilot.
His jaw was set in that stubborn way I used to kiss soft when we were alone and he forgot how to act cool.
Casually infuriating. Heartbreak in human form. Unfairly, annoyingly alive.
My body reacted before my pride could even get its shoes on. Heat curled in my stomach, a tug under my ribs, that stupid, traitorous recognition of him. Of us.
His eyes found mine.
I raised a brow, because sarcasm was still the weapon easiest to reach. "Wow. Still doing the whole brooding rock God thing, huh?"
He didn't smile. "Still avoiding emotional accountability with sarcasm?"
Touché. Rude touché, but touché.
Before I could dig for a comeback that didn't expose anything tender, Finn swept in.
He moved fast, bright, loud, the human version of a glitter grenade deployed in an emergency.
He slid an arm around my shoulders and pulled me in like we were best friends, lovers, partners in crime, and possibly co-defendants.
He pitched his voice up, projecting as if he were onstage, which was the point.
"Babe," Finn said loudly, "did your ex tell you how good you looked today? Because if not, I'd be happy to."
I choked on a laugh.
Evan's face didn't change much, but his attention dropped to Finn's arm around me, then back to my face.
"Classy," he said.
Finn grinned like he'd been waiting his whole life to be insulted by a famous man in a green room. "Thanks. I try. A good moisturizer goes a long way."
"Does it help with boundaries?"
"I wouldn't know. I don't use those."
Harper wandered closer, chewing on a grape. "Okay, this is already better than soundcheck."
"Don't encourage him," I said.
"I always encourage him. It makes him easier to aim."
Evan's gaze flicked to my mouth for one second, one stupid second, barely anything, a blink, a flinch, a memory wearing combat boots. It hit anyway.
I took a step back, because the urge to reach for him was still there and I absolutely hated it.
Hated that my hands remembered the shape of him.
Hated that I could pick out his cologne under the fabric softener and the ever-present whiff of backstage coffee.
Hated that some embarrassing, lizard-brain part of me still wanted to ask if he’d eaten.
I stabbed a chunk of pineapple with the world’s tiniest plastic fork and pretended to study it like it held the secrets of the universe.
"So," I said. "This is fun."
"Yeah," Evan said flatly. "A real dream come true."
The silence that followed was brutal. Not empty; empty would have been kind. This was full, packed tight with every unsaid thing trying to claw its way out of the walls.
Finn’s arm stayed draped around me, but he stopped squeezing. Harper’s chewing slowed to a suspicious crawl. Even the pineapple chunks looked like they wanted to make a run for it.
I forced myself to look at Evan. Forced myself to stand tall, even though my hands were itching to shake.
"You didn't have to say yes, you know."
His eyes narrowed slightly. "To what?"
"The tour."
A muscle moved in his cheek, not a clench, not quite, more like his face had edited out the first thing he wanted to say.
"Yeah," he said. "I did."
"Why?"
The question came out sharper than I meant. Or maybe exactly as sharp as I meant. Hard to say.
He looked at me for a beat too long. Then his mouth tightened, and the answer scraped out of him. "Because you deserve it." He looked away for half a second, then back. "And because apparently I'm still stupid enough to help you leave me."
Well. Cool. Great. Just a casual emotional grenade lobbed straight into the fruit tray.
My chest caved in around the words. Not because he said them cruelly; he didn't- that was the problem. If he'd sneered, if he'd thrown it at me like a weapon, I could have thrown something back. But he said it like a fact he hated. Raw, bitter, too honest for a room with mini sandwiches.
Finn's arm went still around my shoulders. Harper whispered "yikes" and immediately pretended she hadn't.
I didn't know what to do with the guilt, so I did what any emotionally stable adult woman would do.
I swung.
"If I deserved it so much, why did you take the lead song for my parents' movie?"
Evan's expression snapped open, just for a second. Shock, hurt, something hotter under both.
"What?" he said. "I didn't."
"You didn't?"
"No."
"You expect me to believe the studio just magically picked your song? Out of every song in the universe?"
"It wasn't magic, Lila. It was a label, a studio, and a bunch of people in suits making calls about a movie neither of us controls."
"Convenient."
His laugh was short and humorless. "Yeah. Super convenient. I definitely planned to turn the worst night of my life into a soundtrack single so I could stand in front of you while strangers sing along."
That one landed hard. I hated that it landed.
Finn cleared his throat, the sound sharp and pointed. "Okay, this is cute and all, but let's be careful what we say in front of the pineapple chunks."
I nudged him with my elbow, grateful for the buffer, for the ridiculousness, for anything that kept me from falling apart in front of a green room packed with crew, fruit, and people pretending not to eavesdrop.
Evan's eyes stayed on me. No stage smile, no charm, no soft devastating look that made me forget what I was mad about. This was worse. This was the version of him with all the lights turned off.
"You really think I did that to you?" he asked.
My fingers tightened around the tiny plastic fork until it bent.
I wanted to say no. I wanted to say I didn't know. I wanted to say I had listened to the song on my couch with his old note in my hand and cried so hard I almost called him, and maybe blaming him was easier than admitting I missed him badly enough to make me stupid.
Instead, I lifted my chin. "I think you're Evan Walker. And the world has a habit of handing you things I have to fight for."
His face went quiet. That hurt too. Because he didn't argue right away.
He didn't tell me I was wrong, didn't rush to defend himself with the kind of righteous speech that would have made me feel better about being angry.
He just absorbed it. Then he nodded once, barely, like I'd confirmed something he already feared.
"Right," he said.
I hated it. I hated him a little for making me feel guilty when I was supposed to be the one bleeding here.
I hated myself more because some part of me wanted him to step closer, to fight, to demand I admit the thing under the accusation.
That I was hurt. That I was jealous. That I was terrified the world had chosen him again, and this time it had used my own family's story to do it.
Finn shifted beside me. "Evan..."
Evan's eyes flicked to him. Whatever Finn saw there shut him up.
Evan looked back at me. His gaze dropped once to my bent plastic fork, then to my mouth, then away. "I didn't take your song," he said. "But I guess you already decided what version of me you need."
The words hit soft. Too soft. Like a door closing in another room.
Then he turned and walked out without another word.
The green room door clicked behind him. For half a second, nobody moved.
Harper exhaled. "Well. That was emotionally illegal."
Finn let out a low whistle. "That man would burn the world down for you."
"Don't," I said.
He held up his hands. "I was going to say it's hot, but I can read a room."
"You cannot."
"I can occasionally skim one."
Harper plucked another grape from the tray. "For the record, the pineapple chunks did not consent to being witnesses."
I stared at the closed door. My pulse was everywhere. My skin felt too tight. My stupid hand still held the stupid bent fork like I was planning to duel someone with it. Maybe myself.
Finn's arm slid off my shoulders, but he stayed close. "You okay?"
"No."
"Valid."
"He said he didn't take it."
"Yeah."
"He also said I already decided what version of him I need."
Finn winced. "Yeah, that one had teeth."
I looked down at the pineapple chunk I'd stabbed and never eaten.
I had wanted Evan to explain. No, lie. I had wanted him to fight.
I'd wanted him to slam the door, turn back, demand an answer, make me say out loud that I still loved him, that I had never stopped, that the song had gutted me because every line knew where to cut.
But Evan didn't do drama. He did silence. He swallowed the ugly thing, walked away, and left me standing there with all the noise.
Silence hurts louder than anything.
Evan
I made it three steps down the hallway before I had to stop. Pathetic, but at least measurable.