Midnight Blue

  And I had questions. So many. All of them the wrong ones.

  Where was Indie?

  What was she doing?

  How was I going to make it work?

  Did I even have a chance anymore?

  I had one phone conversation with Fallon, and it was to tell her that if she wasn’t going to say anything about what had happened, I sure as fuck would. Consequently, Fallon had come clean and spilled everything to the police. She’d gotten a visit from plain clothed cops in rehab. Will had been there to hold her hand. She’d been given the opportunity to finish the rehabilitation process before being taken into custody. Blake said that legally, I was in the clear. Like I cared. Like I fucking cared.

  I texted Indie to let her know about Fallon, even though Blake and Lucas told me not to. She hadn’t answered. I didn’t know if it made it better or worse for her. On one hand, I reopened her wound. On the other, I offered her some closure.

  The doorbell rang three times. Old Alex—AKA Tour Alex—would’ve furrowed his brows. New Alex was the beast that didn’t care if Gaston was barging in. Someone was an enthusiastic bastard today. All the lads had a key to the apartment I’d rented when I got back to L.A. to be close to Indie, so it was probably a UPS bloke who was eager to get on with his route. Had I ordered something? I didn’t remember ordering anything.

  Two more rings and a knock. Peeling myself off of the couch felt like trying to remove a hundred-ton brick from my shoulders. Since when was my body so heavy? I hadn’t eaten all that much since Paris, and had probably lost a few pounds, which prompted me to believe the feeling was exclusively psychological.

  “I’m coming,” I groaned, shuffling to the door. I glanced through the peephole out of sheer habit. A guy with light brown hair and soft features stood on the other side. He was wearing sweatpants and a jersey and looked like a complete maniac. Beast or not, I wasn’t going to roll a red carpet down the hallway and invite him to slice me into pastrami.

  “Who is it?” I asked. It was encouraging to know I still had a logical bone or two in my body.

  “Craig Bellamy.” His head snapped up as he screamed—actually screamed—straight into the peephole, as if it were a mic.

  Stardust’s older brother. He existed in my mind as a ghost, a pivotal tool that had brought us closer by fucking up so I could clean after his mess repeatedly. I’d hardly considered he was even real. I was just thankful he was the one little shit who’d actually behaved worse than I had. I knew I had to open the door. Even if he wanted to murder me—understandable, and I considered it poetic justice—maybe, just maybe, I could still find out where she was. Hell, I was half-elated with the idea of being punched by a person who shared her DNA.

  I opened the door and said the stupidest thing to ever come out of my mouth, “Where is she?”

  Craig ignored my question, pushing me deeper into my apartment. I let him, even though we were the same height—I might’ve been slightly taller, actually—and around the same build. I probably looked like I’d been run over by every lorry in the state, but he looked like he’d been living in a damp cave in the Afghan mountains for the past couple years. Indie deserved so much better than the men in her life.

  “You know? My sister doesn’t open up to many people. She is guarded by nature. Growing up, every time I threw a party or had friends over, she’d lock herself not only in her room, but in her closet. And she would listen to music and sew. Some of the music she’d listen to was yours,” he said as he crowded me, making me walk backward.

  I didn’t know how to respond to that, but Craig wasn’t waiting for an answer. He gave me another shove, and this time I stumbled towards the open-plan kitchen.

  “I had parties almost every week to try to numb the pain away, but she never said anything about it. See, Indie is just that good. Even when I knocked Nat and dropped out of college three and a half years ago, and screwed up everything, she stood right by my side, squeezed my hand, and looked at me like I was important.”

  The third push made my back crash against the kitchen sink. I barely winced, too engrossed in his story and where he was going with it. Craig got so close to my face, I could see the little hairs in his nostrils. He smelled of alcohol and sweat and the kind of desperation I recognized, because I’d worn it like a cologne for years.

  “I knew she was going to give you her everything the minute she signed the contract. That’s my sister. A classic do-gooder. Always gets attached. I thought, fuck it. She ought to learn this lesson on her own, right? I thought you’d play with her, discard her, but we’d be there to pick up the pieces. And, eventually, she would move on and find a decent guy. You’d be a blip in her existence, a good story to tell her friends on a girls’ night out. Never in my life did I imagine you’d ruin her so profoundly. Not just her, but us. You and your cokehead girlfriend took a family, ripped it apart, and threw every single plan and dream we collectively had into the trash, then came back to cause more heartbreak. Now, you tell me, Winslow. How would you react if you were me?”

  We stared at each other. His eyes were a shade lighter than Indie’s. Bluer. Commoner. Softer. They lacked that smart zing artists have. Suddenly, the need for him to hurt me was overwhelming. He felt like an extension of Indie, and I wanted her to purge all the shit I’d put her through.

  “I’d kill me,” I said, my voice steady and dry. “Maybe not kill-me, kill-me, because jail time would be a drag, but I’d definitely leave a few forever marks. Fuck knows I left a few on your family.”

  I’m not sure I even finished the sentence before his fist flew to my face. It was exactly how I’d imagined it would be. Shocking at first, then came the burn, then finally, the pain. The warmth of the blood trickling down from my right nostril prompted me to lick my upper lip, and I straightened back into position.

  “You know?” He laughed to himself, shaking his head. “My mom could’ve been saved. She didn’t die immediately. If only she’d had the mercy of a selfish prick, she could be alive today.”

  Another fist, this time to my stomach. I folded in two, coughing whatever oxygen I had in my lungs. Shit. Guy had some strength in him. I jerked back, my eyes blurry. I could still see him. I could still fight back. I could maybe even take him. My sister’s words came back to haunt me.

  I’d lost the girl.

  I was a monster.

  And that was how Indie was going to see me. For the rest of our lives.

  Craig tackled my midsection and threw me sideways to the floor. I made no effort to fight him off, letting him pound his fists into my face repeatedly, until I stopped feeling anything from the neck up. His face—at this point nothing but a pink swollen thing spitting animalistic growls—was contracted in pain. I wondered if he realized how alike we were. How we loved the same girl—granted, in very different ways—and how the same girl loved us, and wanted to save us, mainly from ourselves.

  “Where is she?” I repeated, coughing up blood. Their mother could have been saved. I hadn’t known that back then. And if I had—would that have changed the way I’d reacted when Fallon came home that day? Yes. It would.

  I’d begged her to tell me the truth. “Come on, darlin’. We can fix whatever shit’s happening, but I need to know.” I’d replayed that night countless times in my head since it happened. Even before Indie and Craig walked into my life. The answer had always been the same.

  I would have compromised my relationship with my girlfriend and gone straight to the nearest police station to file a report. I couldn’t have done more than that—she’d been adamant that she hadn’t hurt any people, and maybe she’d been high enough to believe it at that time. But I wouldn’t let her get away with it, because that was where the spiral had begun.

  That was the final step into the abyss. From there, everything fell down and crumbled like an elaborate beautiful castle made of fucking cards.

  I had started snorting cocaine.

  And speed.

  And drinking even more than I ever had bef
ore.

  I’d distanced myself from Fallon, not quite willing to let her go yet, but depressed enough that I didn’t want to touch her anymore.

  I couldn’t write. Not anything decent, anyway.

  Cock My Suck, my failure of an album, was supposed to be a huge fuck you to the Suits I worked with, but really, it was a massive, angry dick pissing on my own career. Because it was full of angry, empty, soulless songs.

  Maybe I had invited Will Bushell to take Fallon away from me. Could I really blame her for choosing him? I hadn’t wanted to touch her. I was always too busy to actually deal with her. And he was responsible, smart, sober, and savvy. But this was ancient history, and now I had my future to worry about.

  “I hate you so much,” Craig spat the same words his sister told me in my face, yet again not answering my question. It was weird, how I couldn’t feel my flesh anymore, but I did feel his warm saliva dripping on the side of my cheek.

  “I know,” I ground out. Despite everything, it hurt to hear it. Not that I normally cared. I had people telling me I ruined music, people making voodoo dolls of me, and endless stalkers trying to harm me, and their existence was meaningless to me. But this was different. This was the guy whose sister I was in love with.

  That was the first time the thought hit me fully, a wrecking ball straight to the brain, denting it well and good in the shape of Indie. I was in love. I’d known it, I’d felt it, but using the exact word at the exact time made everything clearer.

  “You need to go to the hospital.” Craig sniffed, righting himself with a high stool by the kitchen island and standing up.

  I made a humph noise, not bothering to move. The floor felt quite comfortable at that moment.

  “Where is she?” I asked again.

  He shook his head like I was a lost cause. “Seriously, man, what the fuck? Why didn’t you fight back?” He started coming back to my vision inch by inch. He looked like hell with stubble and dripped sour sweat right into the open wounds on my face. But he’d asked a question, so it was only fair I give him an answer.

  “Because I love her,” I said. There was nothing to worry about when you told the truth. The truth was factual, and facts are things you can’t change or bend to your will. “Because I love your sister and because I deserved to get my arse kicked,” I finished.

  Craig squatted down, squinting at me like I was the most ridiculous thing he’d ever seen. Maybe I was.

  “You love my sister?”

  “Probably more than I love sex and The Smiths and my Les Paul Gibson guitar combined.” I tried to nod, but that was a mistake. It hurt like a thousand bitches in heat.

  “Then what the hell are you doing here sulking like a pussy? Didn’t you Brits write some good-ass, solid love songs back in the day? Get your ass in rehab. Get clean. Find her. Grovel to her. Win her back. And love her.”

  “Rehab,” I repeated. The plan had always been to get her first. Who had time to rehab when you were on the edge of love?

  “Rehab”—he gave me a curt nod—“That’s my plan anyway. I can’t lose what I have. I just needed to beat the shit out of you, making one last huge mistake before I start doing things right.”

  It filled my stomach with something. Maybe it was an internal organ that had exploded there, but perhaps it was hope. Call me optimistic, but I suspected it was the latter.

  Craig stood up again. “I’m calling you an ambulance.” His voice was detached.

  I shook my head, but even that prompted me to wince. Had he broken my neck? I wouldn’t be able to breathe if he had. I tried to tell myself it was going to be one of the things we’d laugh about in the future. When Indie was pregnant with our kid and we’d be barbecuing in someone’s backyard. ‘Remember the time you almost broke my neck?’ Ha. Ha. Well, shit. I really did need rehab.

  “Don’t call an ambulance,” I grunted, finally wiping his saliva from my face. “I deserve at least an hour more of sulking on the floor. But do me a favor and bring me my fags, yeah?”

  He walked off and slammed the door behind him.

  I started laughing.

  Hysterically.

  Madly.

  Illogically.

  The beast had a reason to wake up tomorrow morning. That was, if he’d ever make it to it.

  Three days after Alex got back to Los Angeles, I got a visit.

  It wasn’t from him. He still didn’t know where I was—with Clara, at her Santa Monica home. It was Jenna, Blake, Lucas, and Hudson.

  Jenna had a small baby bump that made my heart burst and ache at the same time. Blake looked like he’d won the lottery when he held her hand in his, barely containing a grin he knew he needed to wipe off—my situation wasn’t as great as his. Lucas looked like Lucas, and Hudson…in short, Hudson looked like the fourth lost Jonas brother who’d had too many discount vouchers to the tanning salon. Clara, who was upstairs in bed, told me I could treat this as my own house, so I did, and made them tea with milk and cookies. We all sat in her living room.

  “Nice place,” Jenna said coldly, rubbing her little bump, an addition to her otherwise slender figure. She was wearing a crisp, white suit, blazer and all. Blake grinned at her like she was the sun, and again, I found myself aching to be looked at that way. Alex didn’t really count. He was a full-blown drug addict at this point, so who knew if what he felt for me was genuine.

  “Thank you.” I tucked my hands between my thighs. “Why are you here?”

  They told me they were there because of the whole Fallon thing. They wanted Craig and me to know she would be tried for her crime. I thanked them—and I meant it—I was seriously relieved to know that Lankford would see justice. At the same time, I didn’t have it in me to actually be happy.

  “Also, we’re pregnant,” Blake announced.

  I smiled. “I knew.”

  “You did?”

  “Yup.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” Blake’s cheeks pinked. He looked like a child himself in that moment.

  “Lies kept the tour running, right?” I took a sip of my tea. “Letters from the Liars. That’s what this tour should have been called.”

  “Also, I’m gay.” Lucas tried to lighten up the mood by raising his arm and wiggling his fingers.

  “I know that, too.”

  “Alex?” Lucas sighed.

  I shook my head. “I saw the way you looked at him in Paris. It was the same way I looked at him. Like I would kill for him. I knew you would, too.”

  And wasn’t it the ultimate irony? The idea that I would have killed for the man who was connected to my parents’ deaths? I decided not to think about it that way. I’d been given a gift—the rare gift of loving wholly and entirely—and it had been good while it had lasted.

  “I’m gay, too.” Hudson mimicked Lucas’ raised hand, and we all burst out laughing. Then Blake asked everyone if we could have a moment, and we walked out to Clara’s patio. We stood in front of the perennial shrubs when he opened his blazer and produced an envelope from an inner pocket.

  “Your check.”

  “I’ve already gotten paid.” I scrunched my nose. Fully, actually. Even though I bailed on them three weeks before the tour was over. Though no one could blame me, for obvious reasons.

  “Yeah. That’s a bonus for suffering through the madness.” He smirked.

  “You mean, it’s silence money so I won’t talk to the press about Alex’s connection in the case.” I smiled sweetly back. Somewhere along the way during this tour, I’d become a bit of a cynic. Craig said it was a good thing. He said I’d needed that in order to grow.

  Blake tilted his head, furrowing his brows. “Not at all. He never spoke a word to me about it, and he talks about you all the time. You should know one thing, Blue. He loves you. In his own, fucked-up, dysfunctional way. He does. This tour changed him. He looked more present than he did the entire seven years since he got big. And I’m not here to make you change your mind—hell, I’m not even sure you should. He is a drug addict a
nd a screwed-up soul beneath it all. But don’t regret a moment of what happened there. It was the real deal, Indie. It was what great albums are made of.”

  I told him I couldn’t accept the check.

  Then I told him I thought he was going to make a great dad, and he blushed—Blake actually blushed—and told me quietly that he’d bought a ring. I smiled. They were going to make one beautiful, highly functional, extremely put-together family.

  I hugged everyone—especially Hudson, time and time again—before they left.

  When Lucas squeezed me, he whispered into my ear, “I know I can’t have him, so I don’t mind if you do. But if you ever take him back, please make him happy.”

  I told him I would never take Alex back, and Lucas dragged his index finger from his eye to his mouth, like he was sad about it. I was, too.

  After they left I picked up my phone—my new phone, not the cracked one, I couldn’t look at anything broken anymore without thinking about Alex—and called Craig. I’d been meaning to do it for a long time, but the visit from the guys made me resolute.

  “Hello?” Craig coughed into the phone.

  “Alex is back in Los Angeles.” I drew in a shaky breath. Craig had been asleep when Alex had come to see me three days ago, and I’d asked Nat not to tell him, but her loyalty was with him. Always with him.

  “I know. The air already stinks of self-indulgent cockiness.”

  “Don’t do anything stupid,” I warned.

  “Too late. Did you really think I wasn’t going to seek him out? He hurt me just as much as he hurt you, and Nat knew I deserved to know.”

  He was wrong, but arguing this point was futile.

  “Jesus, Craig. What did you do?”

  “Messed him up a little. Don’t worry, your lover boy will still survive. Why are you calling me, Indie?” He sounded cold. All business. I blinked away my tears, looking up, at the patio, at the shrubs, at the beauty in the world. I am doing this for you, Craig. And you just made my decision a whole lot easier. “Pack a bag. You’re going to rehab first thing Monday morning.”