The Stars Will Shine (27 page)

In the end, I do take Trevyn’s advice and stay out of the shop for the remainder of the week. As self-destructive as I feel, I don’t actually want to bring the guy down with me. He’s been my only constant this summer.

By Friday, it has been a week since I last saw Aiden. He hasn’t texted me, didn’t drop by the shop when I was still working, hasn’t even sneaked into the Kyler’s house to hang out with Dylan. Tomorrow, I leave for home, and a part of me wants to see him again before I do—at least to apologize for…I don’t even know what exactly—throwing his heart in his face? But a bigger part of me is scared to see him again because, despite everything I say to convince myself I don’t want what he wants, my heart knows it’s a lie. My soul weeps when I tell myself I can’t have him. Only my head knows it will never work. That I’ve been too far gone in the shadows to ever love the light. And that in the end, if he doesn’t manage to hurt me first, I will hurt him.

My phone buzzes at my side, and I feel it through my bed—the bed I’ve been sulking in for days on end. The message is from an unknown number, so I open it expecting spam.

Cheer up, Sunshine :) Excited to see you…It’s been way too long. - Tommy

It takes only an instant for the blood to drain from my face and then another before it drains from the rest of me. I feel it all rush out from my feet until every part of me feels cold. Until my heart has nothing left to pump out but the darkest feelings.

Who the fuck does he think he is?

With a rushing return of blood, I chuck my phone across the room, seething.

Dylan happens to walk out of his room at the exact moment my phone crashes into the closet door. He lets out a low whistle and comes to the doorway, where he grips the top of the doorjamb as he leans in to get a look at the phone on the ground, its battery popped out but no more damage done.

“Now, now,” he says and clicks his tongue. “What’d your phone ever do to you?”

I don’t answer, just stare distantly at the pieces on the ground.

“Can I come in?” he asks, his tone softer.

I’m still not looking at him when I nod. He takes a seat beside me on the bed. My legs dangle off the mattress, toes touching the carpet, and my palms press stiffly against the tops of my thighs. He sits next to me for a long while before either of us says anything.

“I’m playing at your next event again,” he says, looking sideways at me. I’m still staring at my phone, broken apart on the carpet but not even a fraction as broken as I feel. “Aiden and I are.”

“It’s Trevyn’s event,” I say, my voice tired.

Dylan nods a little. His fingers curl in his lap as he tries to think of more to say. For a second, I wonder if he knows more about me and Aiden than he’s letting on. I close my eyes against the feel of my heart slipping.

Dylan fidgets beside me, and my eyes open only to once again stare absently away from him.

“Well, Trevyn says he owes it to you.”

“I don’t know if I even work there anymore. But good luck, not that you need it, whenever the event is.”

“It’s next Friday. You should come, you know, regardless of whether or not you still work there.”

I stare straight ahead, straight through the orange wall. I wish I could tear the color off. “I’ll still be in Arizona.”

“Oh, that’s right.”

Silence consumes us again, and when it reaches the point at which I’m sure Dylan will get up and leave, he reignites the conversation instead.

“I heard you might be interested in learning guitar.”

I scoff. “Yeah, who told you that? Trevyn?” I mentioned it to him once, I guess.

“Aiden actually.” My head stays forward, but my neck tightens. Tentatively, he glances up at me from where his head is bowed. “I can teach you…if you want, you know. After all, you’re the reason I started learning in the first place.”

Slowly, I turn my head and narrow my eyes at him. “What?”

He laughs a self-deprecating laugh.

“Yeah. After that one summer when we visited you guys in Arizona and my parents dragged us to your piano recital.” He laughs again at the memory. “Boy, was I so mad at you. That you had to have this damn recital when all I wanted to do was play flag football with your brother and his friends.”

I go rigid, but Dylan doesn’t notice. It’s not a stretch to say one of those friends was probably Tommy. The Before Tommy. The Tommy I looked up to and followed around and painted pictures for. The Tommy who only ever thought of me as his best friend’s baby sister.

Dylan’s still talking, not having noticed my discomfort—“But when I sat there, sulking in that dark room among a crowd of a hundred people, and you hit your first chord on that grand piano under that soft spotlight, it was like something breathed life into me, lifted me higher in my seat, opened my ears to every note you played, to every string of melodies that made up your song, until I felt joined with it. From that moment on, I never could separate myself from music. As soon as we got back to California, I asked my parents to buy me a guitar. And the rest is history.”

And the rest is history.
Aiden had said that, too.

And then we started learning guitar together in fifth grade, and the rest is history.

Only, I had no idea that I was the unintended inspiration.

“Dylan, why are you being nice to me?” It comes out sounding worn by his efforts. And maybe I am just exhausted by everything—by being mad at myself, by being angry with Aiden for no reason other than the fact that he cares about me.

“I’m…” He lets out a breath and runs his hand down his face. “Trevyn called me.”

I pop my thumb knuckle. “Of course he did.”

“He’s only looking out for you,” Dylan says. “He”—he stops talking to stare down at his hands for a moment—“he said you could use someone to talk to.”

I growl in frustration and push myself from the bed. “There’s a reason I didn’t talk to him.
Because I don’t want to talk.”

Dylan slowly stands to his feet as well.

My eyes press shut; my head falls forward. Legs shaky, a heavy wave moves through my chest. I feel like I’m going to be sick.

“Just go,” I get out weakly. “Please, just go.”

Dylan doesn’t stay in my room a moment longer, but he pauses just outside the door and says, “Okay, well, if you ever want to learn guitar, I’m just a knock on the wall away.”

***

“Another.”

The bartender eyes me, wary. “Another?”

I slam my glass to the bar, feeling reckless.

“Yes. Another.”
Jesus, can’t a girl get a drink in in this place?
I just want to forget about everything…about Aiden, about Miles of Vinyl, about Tommy. Tommy…I keep thinking about him and wondering how it is he still has a hold on me after all these years. That moment when I realized he betrayed me…It still drives me to my knees. It’s the moment I realized there’s always a side to people you can’t trust.

And, more importantly, that there’s always a side of yourself you can’t trust to know what’s good for you.

“Dave
,” I said.
“Take me to the mall, please.”
My tiny voice echoes in my head. A pang in my chest sinks me lower in my barstool as I relinquish control of my thoughts, defenseless against the memory.

It’s Christmas season, and I still have to buy gifts for Dad and Tommy. Dave got his license six months ago, but he still never wants to drive me anywhere. Lately, I feel like I’m just an annoyance to him.

Dave pleads with Dad, who is busy tapping away at the keys of his work computer, even though it’s a Saturday morning.

“But I’m meeting Tommy there,” he whines. My heart leaps at the mention of Tommy’s name. Scratch what I said before…I need to buy a gift for Dad while I’m at the mall; I want what I’m getting for Tommy to be a surprise. “And Delilah always wants to go into the
girl
stores and try on all the dresses.”

“I promise, Dave! I promise I won’t! I just want to do Christmas shopping this time.”

Dad gives Dave a stern look and points his pen at him. “Take your sister with you.” Dave eyes my puppy-dog expression with a look of disgust.

“I’m leaving in five minutes,” he says in a way that suggests he’ll be leaving without me if I’m not ready by then.

But I’m ready with three minutes to spare. I’m waiting by his car when he comes out. I suppose he thinks he got away with it because he saunters out of the house with an air of arrogance that dissipates the instant he sees me. He rips open the driver’s side door and slams it after he gets in. But he doesn’t drive off until I get in, too.

At the mall, we shop for twenty minutes before Dave receives a text from Tommy that says to meet up in the food court. These days, Dave and I don’t seem to have as much to talk about, so we wait in silence at a small, two-person table until Tommy finally shows up.

“Hey, man,” Dave says, standing up and smiling at someone behind me. I turn around with a huge grin on my face, expecting Tommy to be as happy to see me as I am him. But when I meet his eyes, they are wide, panicked.

That’s when I notice the girl he’s got his arm around.

He doesn’t remove his arm from her shoulders, but I see his muscles inadvertently stiffen, and the girl, who mistakes it as him wanting to pull her closer, nuzzles her face into his neck while he stares in horror at me.

Dave doesn’t notice anything. Neither does the girl hanging onto Tommy.

But me, I feel a hundred punches to my gut.

I drop my eyes when the girl smiles at me and says, “Oh my God, she’s adorable, Dave. Is this your little sister?”

A hundred more punches to my gut.

Dave sighs. “Yeah, Dad said I had to bring her along.”

Make that a thousand.

“I’m Anna,” the girl says and holds out her hand to me. It’s the first time I learn to mask my feelings, even as my heart is being ripped from my chest.

“Delilah,” I offer as I meet her hand. Her skin is soft and sun-kissed. Her smile spreads across her perfect face with a perfect curve, showing off her perfectly straight, white teeth. She’s tall with long legs and long blonde hair that probably moves like a weeping willow in the wind without ever getting tangled.

I glance at Tommy, but he looks everywhere but at me. He still has his arm around Anna, and she still leans into him.

“Babe,” Anna says to him as she digs into her purse and pulls out her cell phone. “Remind me to get my Aunt Rosa a present while we’re here.”

“Put a reminder in your phone,” he mumbles, hardly looking at her either. She huffs a little and rolls her eyes at him.

“I’m going to go to the restroom really quick,” I tell Dave quietly, my voice on the verge of cracking. He makes a motion as if to shoo me off, and I don’t wait a second longer. My walk is brisk at first, but by the time I near the bathroom, I’m full-out running, the air about to rip sobs from my throat.

Twenty more feet. Ten more feet. Five more feet.

I burst into the restroom and break for the first open stall I see.

Falling against the door, my knees give way beneath me, and I sink lower and lower until I hit the floor. Sufficiently curled in on myself, I finally let the heartbreak burst free.

When I emerge from the restroom five minutes later, I’ve carefully molded the features of my face into an impassive front. With my reappearance, I’m treated to an eyeful of Anna sucking face with Tommy. He doesn’t seem as into it as she, but he doesn’t push her away either. A part of me wants to point out how funny it is that he was just doing the same with me three nights ago. But it’s not funny at all.

I end up calling Dad fifteen minutes later and asking him to pick me up because I don’t feel well. The truth is, I
am
sick to my stomach. In fact, I’m pretty sure I will throw up if I have to see Tommy with Anna—kissing her, holding her hand—for a second longer.

I wait for Dad outside the mall—which is a long while because he said he had to finish the spreadsheet he was working on—and the entire time, I compare myself to her. How young and inexperienced I am, how much prettier and more physically developed she is, how Tommy wants us to be a secret yet makes out with her in public. Why can’t I be her? Why am I not good enough? What does he see in her that he doesn’t see in me?

A sensation of pain and embarrassment burrows itself into the pit of my stomach. Four years. Four years, and he still does this to me.

A young man slides onto the barstool next to me. I know he watches me, but I don’t spare him a glance.

“What?” I let out as I watch the bartender make me my third Old Fashioned. The young man says nothing, but he doesn’t turn away either.

The bartender sets the drink in front of me, but before he lets go, he surveys me slowly with narrowed eyes and says, “How about you show me that I.D. one more time.”

“Jesus,” I mutter as I reach for it again from my purse. I fumble with the clasp of my wallet, and when I get it open, a few old, crumpled receipts slip out and float to the floor. I manage to slide my fake I.D. out of its slot, making sure to hide from his view my real I.D. behind it, then slap it to the counter in front of him, along with a ten dollar bill to pay for the drink. He picks it up and examines it carefully, flitting his eyes between my face and it.