Love at First Note (22 page)

Mom murmured her agreement. “It was quite good.
Thriller
, I think.”

So it wasn’t so much that Ava didn’t want to play. She just didn’t
want to play
like me.
“Too bad
Thriller
won’t get her into CIM.”

Mom shrugged. “She’ll make her own way. We’ve had some long talks the past couple of weeks. She isn’t exactly sure what she wants to do, but she’s pretty certain what she doesn’t want to do.
We have to support her in that.
We—
as in me, your father, and
you
.”

I heaved a sigh. “I know. I’ll talk to her.”

Mom raised her eyebrows. “That’s it? You know?”

“Don’t act so surprised. I’m not too prideful to admit when I’m wrong.”

“Are you too prideful to admit you’re in love with Elliott?”

My jaw dropped. “What’s gotten into you today? Call me out a little more, why don’t you?”

“Okay, I will. I think you’re making a mistake. I know Elliott’s fame is overwhelming, but you’ll get used to it. You’ll find a new normal together and adjust.”

“You make it sound too easy. And it isn’t just about his fame. It . . . We said some stuff. It wasn’t pretty.”

“
So fix it. Life is too short to waste on misspoken words and wounded feelings.”

I kissed her on the cheek and stood. “I really gotta go. See you Sunday.”

* * *

I barely made it through lessons. I was irritable, still a little bugged
from my conversation with Mom. That I managed to make it through
without making any of my students cry felt like a small victory.

After lessons I stopped at the grocery store to pick up a gallon of milk. In the checkout line, a woman approached me, a timid smile on her face. “You’re her, right? Elliott’s girlfriend? I recognize you from the picture.”

I gave her a tight smile but didn’t say anything in return.

“D
o you think I could get a picture with you? Just really quick before you go?”

Seriously? A picture with me just because I’d been Elliott’s girl
friend? “You know?” I finally responded. “It’s been a long day. I’d
really rather not.”

The woman’s expression changed, like she finally realized what she’d been asking. “Oh. Okay. Sorry for bothering you.” And then she turned and walked away.

I couldn’t stop thinking about her as I made my way home. It
wasn’t even a fifteen-second conversation, and yet somehow I felt like everything had changed. Because I realized the woman in the grocery
store wasn’t in control of me. She could ask to take my picture, ask
about my personal life and my relationship with Elliott, but I didn’t
have to respond. I didn’t have to let her in.

El
liott had tried to tell me I couldn’t play their game. I couldn’t let them get to me, but that was precisely what I’d been doing. Every
time I opened a browser and looked for new comments or new
blog posts or new articles about our relationship, I was feeding the
monster that was eating me alive.

But I didn’t have to play.

Elliott was right. Grayson was right. Mom was right. Everyone had me figured out. Everyone but me.

Except, not anymore.

I found Lilly in the
kitchen, still wearing her scrubs, her hair
pulled back in a loose ponytail. “Hey. Are you just getting in? How
long did they make you work?” I asked.

She nodded. “Twenty-five hours straight. It was crazy. I’ve never
seen so many babies on the floor at one time.”

“Is
it even legal to make you work that long?”

“Not technically. I slept in the on-call room for a couple hours. But I couldn’t leave. Seventeen deliveries in twenty-four hours. We set a new record.” She collapsed onto the couch, grabbing the blanket ha
nging over the arm and spreading it over herself. “How are you? Any new Elliott sightings?”

I hesitated. “I don’t know. I haven’t checked today.”

“For real? That’s progress, I guess.”

“Yeah.” I dropped onto the desk chair and pulled my legs up, wrapping my arms around them and burying my face in my knees.

“You know what’s different between you and all those women who look for pictures of Elliott on the Internet?”

“What?” I asked, my voice muffled.

“You actually have Elliott’s phone number and
can call him and talk to him anytime you want.”

“I can’t call him.”

“Why not?”

“Because I have no idea what I would say. Plus, I hurt him. I don’t know how to fix things.”

“Hi, Elliott. This is Emma. I know I hurt you. I’m sorry. You’re
worth everything. I love you. Please come home.” Lilly fired her
words at me in rapid succession, though in her tired state, they hardly sounded convincing. She yawned. “See? Easy.”

“Not easy. Maybe you can call him for me
.”

“Yeah. Not happening. So have you decided that’s what you want? You want to call and work things out?”

I moved to the couch and sat beside her. “Someone stopped me in the grocery store tonight and asked if she could take my picture. Said she recognized me from the photos online.”

Lilly pushed herself up. “That’s it? She just asked for a photo?”

“Yeah.”

“You know what? Big hairy deal!” She turned sideways so we were facing each other. “I’m gonna speak the hard truth to you here. I think you’re maybe being a little selfish. So what if people want to take your picture. You can say no. You can choose to be a private person even if your boyfriend has a public career. You don’t have to play the game. I mean, yeah, sometimes stuff will happen and you’ll
have to ignore it, but that’s just it. You can
ignore it. If you like this guy, I mean really, truly like him, and you think he’s a good fit for
you, you can’t be so selfish that you cut him out just because you don’t want some girl in the grocery store to take your picture.”

“Um, I guess there’s no question about where you stand on the issue. Are you finished?” I asked after waiting patiently for her tirade to end.

“Yes,” she huffed.

“Good. ’Cause I think you’re right.”

“I am right. Wait. I’m right?”

I nodded. “So she asked for my picture. I declined and kept
walking, and she went away, and it didn’t matter. I was in control, not her.”

“Good girl,” Lilly said.

“And maybe there will be some stuff I have to get used to, things about our life together that will be different, but different isn’t a bad thing. Different can be a good thing, right?”

“Yes, yes, right! So if you realize this, why are we still sad? Why aren’t we calling Elliott and telling him how stupid we’ve been?”

My shoulders fell. “Because I don’t just like this man, Lilly.” Mom would be so proud I was willing to say it out loud. “I really love him, and I’m afraid I’ve ruined everything. I’m scared.”

“Oh, honey. Don’t let fear win.”

“What if he went back to L.A
. just to get away from me?”

“His suitcase was already packed when you insulted him. Try again.”

“What if he got to L.A. and realized he was wrong about me and he really loves his record label and wants to live in L.A. covering boy-band music forever?”

“Then he’s not the man you thought he was, and it’s a moot point.”

“What if he’s fallen for someone else?”

“In two weeks? You think?”

“What if he’s decided I’m not worth it?”

“But you are. And he’s told you that enough times you have to believe it.”

“What if he can’t forgive me?”

“What if you never ask him to and you live a lonely, miserable, Elliott-less life and die a spinster? You want to keep playing this game?”

“But he’s in L.A., and I’m here. What if we can’t make that work?”

“People make long-distance relationships work all the time. Why are you making things so complicated?”

“Because it is complicated. This is my future we’re talking about. I don’t want to screw it up.”

“Oh my word! I swear you Mormons make everything so serious. Why are we talking about your future? Why can’t we just
talk about here, now, what you’re feeling this minute? You don’t
have to be able to see the future clearly. You don’t have to see this perfect rose-colored path to your wedding day. You can just let stuff happen and see where you end up. You’re overthinking, Emma. You
just said you love him. Why are you being so stupid about all of
this?
”

“Me? I’m being stupid? You want me to just let stuff happen, but I’m not like you. There’s a reason we Mormons make everything so serious. It’s because relationships
are
serious. We can’t just try one on for size to see how it fits. You may take it to the bedroom on the first date just to see how it’ll go or be fine waiting around for your juvenile boyfriend to decide if he’s going to grow up, but I’m not like that. It’s not what I want.”

“Did you seriously just say take it to the bedroom? Is it 1937 inside your brain?” She stood and flung a throw pillow back at the couch, missing my head by mere inches. “At this rate, you’re not going to make it to the bedroom
ever
, happily Mormon-y married or not, if you’re not willing to risk a little bit. And I didn’t even
kiss
Trav on our first date. You’re tired, and you’re stressed
, and I know you’ve had a bad couple of weeks, so I’m gonna forget you just insulted me and my boyfriend. But I’m not going to apologize for calling you selfish. Because that’s what you are right now. Maybe Elliott deserves something better.” She stomped down the hall and slammed the bathroom door with a thud that echoed through the apartment.

I didn’t want to admit she was right, but the second the words were out of her mouth, I knew she was. I wasn’t trying to be selfish, but I was scared. I knew what I wanted. I wanted Elliott. But I had no idea how to get him back
, and fear was winning big time. Every single thing I’d said was colored by that one emotion. I pounded
after her. “Fine. You’re right. What am I supposed to do differently?”

“Pick up the phone, genius,” she shouted through the door. “And stop being such a whiny . . .” The water turned on, and the
shower rings slid across the rod, so I couldn’t hear what she called me. But I had a pretty good idea. I leaned against the wall across
from the bathroom and slid to the floor. I was a mess. A stupid mess saying stupid things that I didn’t really mean. I stayed in the hallway
until Lilly emerged from the bathroom wrapped in a towel, her dirty scrubs tucked under her arm.

I followed her to her room and stood in the doorway, blocking her from shutting the door.

“You know I’ll drop this towel and get dressed in front of you if you don’t let me close
my door.”

“I’m sorry,” I said.

She turned, tossing her laundry into the hamper by the wall. “For what?”

“I’m sorry I accused you of having loose morals, and I’m sorry I called your boyfriend juvenile. I was a jerk, and I didn’t really mean it, and I really love you both, so I hope you’ll forgive me because I can’t stand life without you, and I don’t want you to be mad at me.”

She rolled her eyes.
“Oh, whatever. I might have loose morals if I didn’t have a Mormon best friend to keep me in line. And Trav totally is juvenile. But he’s juvenile with potential, so I’m not giving up hope yet.”

“Thank you for being my friend,” I said. “And for not staying mad.”

“Blah, blah. Go call Elliott.”

I smiled. Lilly and I had had our share of fights. We couldn’t be friends from fourth grade on and
not get into it every once in a while. But we’d never stayed mad at each other longer than five minutes, a reality I was grateful for every time Lilly forgave me so readily.

It took twenty minutes of pacing up and down the hallway to
muster enough courage to just call already. Lilly was dressed and standing across from me when I finally dialed the number, my
hands shaking the entire stupid time. I listened to the ring—two, three, then four—then breathed out a sigh of relief when his voice mail picked up. The sound of his voice made my heart swell. Oh, I missed him. I dropped the phone from my ear like I was going to hang it up, then caught Lilly’s eye.

She shook her head angrily, motioning the phone back to my face. “Leave him a message!” she whisper-yelled just as I heard the beep.

“Hi. Um, hi. So I know it’s been . . . I don’t really know what to say. I just was hoping we could talk. Sorry. This is lame. Gah—me and words. I’m so not good at this. Okay.
I just wanted to say . . . I miss you. And, well, the thing is, I can’t figure out . . . I just know there are some things that I should say. That I want to say. But how?”

Lilly slowly reached for the phone. “You’re all done. Just say good-bye,” she whispered.

“Okay. So yeah. Call me back. Bye.” I looked at Lilly. “How was that?”

She grimaced. “It’s possible I pushed you into that a little too quickly.”

I groaned. “Was it awful? It was really awful, wasn’t it?”

“What if you just play something for him?”

I scoffed. “Why do people keep suggesting that? I can’t play an apology. Uggh. I’m hopeless.”

“You’re not hopeless. And if this guy loves you, that message
will mean something to him anyway. It’s not like he hasn’t witnessed
your unique
mastery of the English language before.”

Ha. Ha. Ha.

“Thanks, Lil. Thanks for that.”

She put on her serious face, placing both of her hands on my shoulders. “Listen to me. You’re strong enough for this. You’re strong enough to say the right thing. You’re strong enough to tell this man you love him. And you’re strong enough to deal with what life with Elliott will bring. It’s time to put on your big-girl pants and just do it already.”