Someone picks up after four rings. “Hello, Hub and Grub, this is Denny.”
“Umm… yeah, this is Ella. Ella Daniels. I was just wondering if my dad was there or if you’d seen him.”
“Yeah, he showed up here this morning.” He hesitates. “I thought he was in rehab.”
“Apparently he checked himself out.” I take the house keys out of my bag and unlock the door. “How bad is he?”
“I’m going to be honest with you, Ella. He’s pretty bad,” he says bluntly. “He showed up here this morning and he’s been drinking ever since. Nonstop. I offered him a ride home, but he refused.”
I close the door and toss the keys on the counter. “Can you keep an eye on him for a little bit until I can figure out what to do with him?”
“Yeah, I guess,” he says with reluctance. “Look, Ella, I understand your situation, but I got a bar to run and… well, when he gets this way he causes a lot of problems. I don’t mind helping, just as long as it’s not bad for my business.”
“I’ll get down there as soon as I can,” I promise. “And I’m really sorry about this.”
He sighs. “It’s okay. I know it’s hard for you. I mean, you’re just a kid.”
I was never a kid. Not really. I was doing the dishes and cleaning the house at six, cooking my own food at eight, and making sure my mom took her medications by the age of ten.
I say good-bye and hang up, sinking down onto the suede couch. The apartment is small, with white walls and tan carpet and a TV in the corner. There is a narrow dining area between the kitchen and the living room. The place smells like cinnamon and the kitchen sink is overflowing with dishes.
I press my fingers to the sides of my nose. “Shit… Who am I supposed to call?” I let my hand fall to my lap and call Ethan.
He answers after three rings. “Okay, so this is kind of weird. You never call me.”
“I have a favor to ask you.” I pause, working up the courage. “Can you go pick up my dad from the Hub and Grub and stay with him until I can get there?”
He’s silent for a second. “Yeah, I can do that.”
“Thank you,” I say, grateful. “I’ll head up as soon as I can. I promise. Twelve hours at the max.”
“Don’t kill yourself getting up here, Ella. I said it was fine, so come when you can.”
“Okay. I’ll call you when I’m on the road.”
“Sounds good.”
I hang up and drop the phone onto the coffee table, wondering where the hell I’m going to find a car. I start to call Micha, but then stop myself. I haven’t talked to him in over a day and the last thing I want to do is call him up and start bawling.
Besides, there’s nothing he can do about it.
He’s clear across the country.
Micha
“If you keep hitting the wrong note,” I warn Naomi, “I’m going to have to take the guitar away.”
We’re sitting on the bed in the studio apartment with our guitars on our laps. There is dirty laundry all over the floor and garbage all over the counters. Dylan and Chase are at the bar trying to get laid. I’m wearing my pajama bottoms without a shirt on and Naomi’s hair is balled up on her head, damp because she just got out of the shower.
“Don’t be a dick,” she jokes, tugging the rubber band out so her damp hair can fall to her shoulders. “The note I’m playing sounds a lot better than the one you think we should hit.”
I shake my head and strum the strings of my guitar. “That all depends.”
She plays a chord and talks over the noise. “On what?”
“Whether you’re playing for a roomful of tone-deaf people.” I smirk ruthlessly.
She rolls her eyes and sets her guitar down on the bed. “You’re such an asshole sometimes.”
She’s right, but it’s for a reason. About two days ago, I was walking around sightseeing and searching for a building that I’d heard my father worked at. I’d just gotten off the phone with my mom, who not only told me she was going on vacation with some dude half her age but that my father was now living in New York City.
I just wanted to see where he worked, for no other reason than out of curiosity. As I stood out in front of the building, a man crossed paths with me chasing down a taxi. It was my father and I started to turn away, but he saw me and waved. I wanted to return it by showing him my middle finger, but couldn’t do anything except stand there gaping like a little kid.
He strolled over to me with an uncomfortable look on his face. He was in a black suit with a trench coat over it and stared at me with eyes exactly like mine. “Micha, what are you doing here?”
“I’m living here for a little bit.” My tone was sharp. “What are you doing here?”
He pointed at the lofty building with a metallic exterior. “I just got transferred here for work about two weeks ago. I called your mom and told her about it.”
I pretended like I didn’t know it already. “Well, you really need to stop calling her. She doesn’t need to talk to you.”
He eyed me over and his expression turned cold. “So why are you living here?”
I fiddled with the chain hooked to my jeans, inching in my shoulders as a mob of people push past me. “My band and I have a gig at a club for the next month.”
A condescending look concealed his face. “Why am I not surprised? I should have known you’d turn out doing something like that.”
I clench my hand into a fist, fighting not to hit him. “What the fuck does that mean?”
He looked around at the people passing by us, like he was worried someone overheard me. “Look, Micha, I didn’t mean anything by it. I’m going to go.”
I turned my back on him and walked away. On the way back to the apartment, I realized that my dad was always a douche bag. Even when he was still my father, he would nitpick every little thing I did and tell me I was wrong a lot.
“Hello.” Naomi claps her hands in front of my face and I flinch. “You’re totally spacing out.”
I carefully set my guitar down on the floor and lean back against the headboard. “I thought you were going out tonight.”
She shrugs and stretches out on the bed on her stomach, crossing her arms and resting her chin on them. “I didn’t feel like it. Besides, you’ve seemed a little down lately and I didn’t want to leave you alone to drown in your sorrows.”
“I’m not drowning in my sorrows.” I take a gulp of my soda. “I’m just confused.”
“About what?”
“About stuff.”
She sits down beside me so we’re both staring at the foot of the bed. “It’s Ella stuff again, isn’t it?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.” I set the soda down on the nightstand and give it a little spin. “I don’t feel comfortable talking to you about her.”
She rubs her lips together, thinking heavily about something. “Why not? You have before.”
“Only because I was wasted and I tend to get a little chatty when I’m like that.” I can’t talk to Naomi about what’s going on in my head because I owe it to Ella to tell her first. “I basically talk to anyone when I’m drunk.”
“Don’t pretend like you hate talking to me, Micha,” she says. “I know you like to. You’re just too blinded by your own feelings.”
I’m lost. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Suddenly, she is leaning toward me with her eyes closed and her lips out, throwing me off guard as she tries to kiss me. Pieces of her hair fall in front of her face, and for a second, I’m motionless as I think about letting her kiss me—letting her take my mind off shit.
Then all my feelings for Ella catch up with me and I shift away, practically crawling onto the nightstand to get out of her reach. “What the fuck are you doing?”
Her eyes snap open and her pupils are large. “Come on, Micha. Don’t try to tell me you haven’t thought about it.”
I shake my head slowly. “Nope, I haven’t. Not even once.” Her cheeks turn pink and I feel like a douche bag. “Look, I’m sorry, but you know how I feel about Ella, so I don’t know why you’d even try it.”
She slides her legs over the edge of the bed and turns her back to me. “It doesn’t seem like you love her as much anymore. You don’t even talk to her on the phone all the time like you used to.”
“That’s because I’m trying to sort through some stuff.” I give her a pat on the back because I can tell she’s about to cry. The whole situation is awkward. “Are you going to be okay?”
She jerks her shoulder upward and shrugs off my hand before running into the bathroom. The door bangs shut and rattles the thin walls.
I collect my guitar from the floor and flop down on the bed, playing my favorite song. Eight months ago, I would have been all over her invitation, but not anymore. It was more of a turnoff than anything.
That’s when I realize the thing I’ve been wondering about for the last week.
Ella is it for me. The way I feel about her is never going to change. I will love her forever, but I need her closer to me, not thousands of miles away.
How am I supposed to tell her, though, that I’m ready to begin her future, when I know she has no clue what her future is yet?
Chapter 4
Ella
I’m starting to wonder if this is going to be my life forever, if I’ll always end up back in Star Grove at the house that clutches my childhood.
The house looks the same: a broken rain gutter, garbage bags piling up on the side of the house, and the Cutlass still balanced on the cinderblocks in front of the garage. The house’s siding is peeling and some of the branches have fallen from the tree beside the window.
Ethan’s truck is parked in the driveway and he’s sitting on the back steps playing around on his phone. I get out of the rental car that looks like the kind of vehicle clowns stuff themselves into.