But that’s how it started before.
He takes a sip of his beer before standing, looking more energized now. I can’t help but wonder if he’s faking for my benefit. “Come on. We should get back to the hotel so we can get ready. When’d you make the reservations for?”
Since I can’t exactly demand he take my concerns seriously in a room full of people, I follow him. But I can’t erase the steady stream of fear that’s invaded my chest.
***
I spend most of the night trying not to look like I’m watching Lennon. He seems to be okay, if a little tired. He sits between Reed and Sam at dinner and appears to be an active participant in the conversation. I even see him laughing a few times. And when Reed stands up to toast their success, he grins as he clinks his glass against everyone else’s.
But he only makes it through one club before throwing in the towel. His brothers are out on the dance floor with their girlfriends, attracting quite a bit of attention, while Lennon, Karen, and I sit at the table in the VIP section, sipping our drinks in near silence. I feel bad for Karen, being stuck with such shitty company, but I can’t force myself into conversation. Not when I’m so busy keeping an eye on my brooding friend.
Lennon finishes his beer and wipes his mouth. “I’m out. Will you tell the guys I went back?”
“I’m coming with you,” I say automatically.
Lennon sighs. “I don’t need a babysitter.”
“I know you don’t,” I manage through gritted teeth. I can’t say much with Karen right here, and I’m sure he knew that when he chose this moment to leave. “But that doesn’t mean you don’t need company.”
“I’m going to bed.” Lennon laughs. “No offense, dude, but you’re not really the company I’m looking for in bed.”
Karen is watching the two of us, an appraising look on her face. “I wouldn’t mind leaving, too, actually,” she says. “I’m bored as hell.”
Lennon raises his eyebrows. “You love dancing.”
“I’m not in the mood to be out in all of that,” Karen says, nodding toward the dance floor. From here, I can see about two dozen people watching the guys, trying to inch a little closer, trying to brush up against them. I don’t blame her one bit.
“Looks like you’re stuck with us,” I tell Lennon. “I gots to do what my girl says.”
Lennon’s gaze flicks over to the dance floor. “I guess I should go tell them.”
“I’ll do it,” I offer immediately. “There’s less chance they’ll bully me to reconsider.”
“Yeah,” Karen agrees. “Just tell Daltrey. He’ll probably help you find the door.”
Lennon snickers. “Oh, you’re just so funny,” I tell her, flicking her knee under the table.
Karen grins. “I’ll just text Paige. Then none of us have to go out there.” She pulls out her phone and taps on the screen for a few seconds. “Okay, we have about thirty seconds before she comes over here to try to convince us to stay and do line dancing, or something. Let’s go.”
Frank gets us a cab outside the club, and we crawl through heavy traffic the few blocks to the hotel in silence. I spend the time trying to figure out how to convince Len to hang out with me for a while. But when we get to the hotel, he surprises me. “Up for some Halo in your room? Or were you guys ready to turn in?”
“Halo sounds great,” Karen says. “Can we order some food? That place was way too fancy for me.”
“They did seem to subscribe to the artsy, less-is-more approach of food plating,” Lennon agrees as we head to the elevator.
“Pretentious nonsense,” Karen corrects. “I need real food.”
We order burgers from room service and play video games for a good few hours. Again, Lennon appears to be just fine. He trash talks me and Karen, orders a second plate of onion rings, and generally acts like his normal self.
By the time he calls it a night, I’m exhausted from analyzing his behavior all night. “Thanks for the game,” he says, standing and stretching. “Call me lame all you want, that was much better than the club.”
“Agreed.” I stand and walk him to the door, determined to talk to him away from Karen before he goes.
“Night, Karen,” Lennon calls over his shoulder.
“Night, Len. Thanks for letting me intrude on your guy time.”
In the hallway, Lennon turns to face me. “I’m fine,” he says immediately, correctly guessing my reason for following him out. “I’m just going to go to bed.”
“Are you—”
“I am positive.” He places a hand on my shoulder. “I’m not feeling depressed or anxious at all. I had a good time with you guys. I’m tired, and I’m hoping that I sleep. Okay?”
I release the breath I’m holding. “Okay. You can call me any time if you—”
“Go back to Karen,” he says, releasing my shoulder and laughing a little. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
I watch him walk down the hallway to his door, not going back into my room until he’s gone. I lean against the door, eyes closed, tired and somehow even more scared than I was before we went out.
“What’s going on?” Karen asks. In my absence, she’s retrieved several small bottles of wine from the mini bar and is the process of lining them up on the coffee table.
“What do you mean?”
She raises an eyebrow. “Come on, Levi. You’ve been acting weird all night. You’re all edgy, like you’re waiting for something bad to happen.”
I sigh, joining her on the couch and grabbing one of the bottles.
“Is it being here?” she asks hesitantly. “In New York? I mean, after last time…”
It’s funny, but until she said that, I hadn’t even considered that being in New York again might be weird. This was where everything went down two years ago, where Daltrey got arrested, and I took Daisy away from the press at the hotel.
“No,” I tell her honestly, leaning back into the couch and taking a long pull of wine. It’s red and a little sour, but it will do. “I’m not upset about being in New York.”
“Then what is it?” When I don’t answer, she nudges my shoulder. “You can tell me. I am your girlfriend, you know.”
I snort and she pushes me. “Hey. I happen to be the best fake girlfriend ever, mister.”
I smile at her, feeling a little better, whether from the wine or Karen, I can’t tell. “You’re right. Thanks for saying you wanted to come back at the club.”
“I did want to come back,” she says. “And it was obvious you did too. I’m just not sure why.” She inches a bit closer on the couch, watching my face. “What’s going on with you?”
I’m overwhelmed with the urge to tell her. It all suddenly feels too big, too heavy to carry around on my own. “I have this friend,” I say, closing my eyes. “And he’s gone through some really tough times. He’s…hurt himself before. Pretty badly. More than once. And I just…I’m scared. He seems like he’s okay right now, but that scares me the most. Because he’s not asking for my help.”
She doesn’t say anything for a long moment. “That’s why you came back?”
I open my eyes and meet her gaze. She obviously knows who I’m talking about. I suppose I didn’t do much to hide it. I nod. “He asked for my help.”
“And now he’s not.”
“He’s saying that he’s okay. But what if… What if he’s just trying to keep me at arm’s length so I can’t stop him?”
“You need to call his dad right now,” Karen says, sitting up straight. “He needs to know this.”
“He does.”
She gapes at me. “The other guys?”
I shake my head. “He refuses to tell them. I have no idea why.”
“He’s probably embarrassed. They’re not the most sensitive people I’ve ever met.”
I pause for a long moment. “I don’t know. It seems more like…he’s trying to protect them from something.”
Karen swears. “Is he suicidal?”
“No,” I say quickly. T
oo quickly, maybe. “He just… He stops sleeping. That’s always the first thing. Sometimes he, uh, uses drugs.”
“Shit! Levi, you have to tell someone. Reed or—”
“His dad’s had him in treatment before. He’s not a drug addict.” I run my hands through my hair. “He doesn’t do it for the high. He does it to knock himself out. There’s something in his head he doesn’t want to think about. I don’t know what it is. But when he can’t ignore it anymore…he breaks down.” I wince. “He’s been in a…hospital before.”
“Like a mental hospital?”
I nod. “The first time this happened was way before he would have had access to any drugs. We were still in Ohio. He was seventeen. And he…hurt himself.” Karen draws in a very sharp breath. I know I should shut up, know that he would be pissed that I told anyone, but I find I can’t. I’ve kept this to myself for so long.
“Did he cut?”
“A few times. And…he has cigarette burns.”
She swears softly under her breath. “I know what you’re thinking,” I tell her. “You’re thinking I’m a shitty friend for ever leaving.”
“I wasn’t thinking that.”
“Really? ’Cause I think it every day. I convinced myself that he was fine now. When I left the tour, it had been more than a year since he’d had a…breakdown. Drugs that time. And his dad got him help then. I thought… I thought it was okay now.” I realize that I’m pleading, like I’m trying to convince both her and myself that walking away from the tour, fight with Daltrey or not, hadn’t been the worst thing I’d ever done.
“You can only help someone as much as they’ll let you,” she says. “He came to you when it got bad again, right?”
“His dad did. Will called me before the tour started, so I flew to Ohio to see him for myself. That’s when Len asked me to come back.” I think about the ignored calls before that and feel sick to my stomach. “I abandoned him. I knew he couldn’t get help from his brothers, and I left anyhow.”
“You were going through a rough—”
“You think that would matter if he hurt himself again? He used drugs last time, Karen. He overdosed. He could have...”
She doesn’t respond. Instead, she grabs another bottle of wine and takes a long gulp. She sets it on the table and takes a deep breath. I’m sure I’m about to get some lecture about not holding myself responsible. Instead, she grabs the hem of her sleeve and pushes it up past her elbow.
“You asked me once if we were ever going to talk about this,” she says, her voice soft. “I think now is probably the time.”
I stare down at the little white scars, the sick feeling growing. I had tried hard not to think about those scars since I first saw them. Even without the situation with Lennon, I knew what those scars meant.
“You did that to yourself?” I ask.
“I did. I cut from the time I was fourteen until the time I was seventeen.”
I swallow. “Did Paige know?”
Karen surprises me by laughing. “Of course she did. You think I could hide something like that from her?” She pauses. “Speaking of that, how did he hide it?”
I gesture toward my knees. “Any time he… It was always on his legs. He doesn’t have many scars. It really was only a few times.” Because for Lennon, the cutting or the cigarette burns or the drugs weren’t the problem. He didn’t make a habit of any one thing. Instead, he was constantly looking for something else, something different to numb whatever it was he was dealing with. Booze, pot, pills, fights, working for days without rest, long after his brothers called it quits. It was rarely the same with him. The only thing that was the same was the blank look that I would see on his face after.
And not sleeping. It always started with not sleeping.
“Well, it wasn’t a few times for me,” she says. “Cutting was my drug of choice when shit got too bad to deal with.”
“What got so bad?” I ask, not sure I want to know.
She shrugs a little. “I told you about my parents.” She makes a face. “It’s pretty cliché, actually. My dad abandoned me for a new family, so I started looking for attention elsewhere. Probably didn’t help that my mom’s main concern was finding another man to take care of her.” Karen snorts. “You could say that, when it comes to my expertise at chasing around after boys, I learned from the best.”
“That’s why you hurt yourself?”
“I slept around. Way too young. I was ashamed of myself. And when none of the guys—all older, by the way—wanted to stick around, I was even more ashamed. And sad. And pissed at my parents for not being there. I think a lot of the sleeping around was trying to get their attention. When that didn’t work, I started binging and purging. Whatever I could think of to feel in control.” Her smile is bitter. “Basically, I was a giant mess, and the only thing holding me together was Paige.”
I try to imagine a sick and scared Karen, desperate for someone to love her, to take care of her. A Karen who would hurt herself. I feel like throwing up or punching something. She seems so strong and tough. So damn beautiful and together. Suddenly, the brittle wall that I’ve noticed her put up makes a lot more sense.
“I grossed you out,” she says.
“No!” I reach for her hand, not caring when I knock her near empty bottle of wine, spilling a few drops on my pants. “I wasn’t grossed out. I was sad. I hate to think about you feeling so bad.”
She squeezes my hand. “I’m okay now, Levi. I figured out a way through it. With Paige’s help.” Her expression turns sheepish. “Me being so upset about her leaving makes a lot of sense now, huh?”
“You rely on her.”
She nods. “I do. Like Lennon relies on you. Here’s the thing, though.” She turns on the couch, pulling her legs up under her, so she’s facing me directly. “Paige couldn’t save me, Levi. She helped me. She was there for me. She supported me. But she couldn’t save me. I had to do that for myself.”
“You’re saying I can’t save him.” The near constant fear in my chest melds into sadness. “If he wants to hurt himself, he will.”
“If he wants to get better, he will,” she corrects. “And the fact that he asked you to come on this tour tells me that he does want to get better. All you can do is be there for him.”
I nod, knowing it’s true. I had never been able to save him. Not when he asked his dad to take him to the hospital when we were seventeen. Not when he took so many pills after recording the first album that he ended up in the ER.
“He asked his dad,” I say aloud, realizing the importance of that errant thought. I look up at Karen. “When we were teenagers, the first time things got bad, he asked his dad to take him to the hospital. He knew he needed help. And he told him about the drugs last time.”
Her gaze is steady on mine. “See? He wants to get through this, whatever it is he’s dealing with. You just have to be there when he asks for help.”
I hadn’t been there for the past two years. And I would regret that for the rest of my life. But I wasn’t going to make that mistake again. I would be around to help Lennon, no matter what.
“I just hope he keeps asking,” I whisper, and suddenly Karen’s arms are around me, pulling me close.
“I hope he does too.”
I squeeze her tightly against me. It feels so nice to be comforted for once. To not have to be the strong one or the helpful one. To let someone else take a little bit of the burden.
“Will you stay with me?” I ask without thinking. Karen goes still in my arms. “I don’t mean… I just could use a friend tonight.”
She relaxes, squeezing me. “Sure. I could use one too.”
“God, I could fall asleep right here,” I mutter into her shoulder. “I’m exhausted.”
Karen releases me and jumps off the couch. She grabs the duvet from the bed and returns, pulling me down until I’m lying behind her. She spreads the duvet over both of us and pulls my arms around her middle. “There. How’s that?”
“Perfect
,” I murmur into her hair. I can’t help but think that this is the way we slept that night we shared back in my apartment. But somehow, this doesn’t feel romantic or strange. It just feels…right. I reach a hand up to the lamp next to us, flipping it off and plunging the room into darkness. And then we lay there, together.
“It’s going to be all right, Levi,” she whispers into the darkness, and I tighten my hold around her waist. I don’t know if she’s right. But I do know that for now, for tonight, I’m not so scared anymore.
Chapter Seventeen
Karen
I wake up in the morning confused about where I am. There’s a crick in my neck from my head resting on the arm of a sofa all night, and the blanket half covering me is unfamiliar. And then I realize that there’s a broad and very familiar chest behind me.
I fell asleep next to Levi, I think, the evening rushing back to me. Everything he had told me about Lennon. Explaining to him about my scars. He had been scared for his friend, tired of carrying that worry on his shoulders. So he asked me to stay, and I did so without a second thought.
After all, it was Levi. He needed me.
But now, in the bright morning light streaming in from the windows in his hotel room, I feel strange. Strange to be lying so close to him. Strange to feel his breath hot against my neck, his regular breathing moving his chest behind me. Strange to feel his arm draped haphazardly around my waist, his hand only inches from my breast.
The only other time I woke up in his arms was after our night together in Colorado. I had been massively hung over that morning, worried that we made a huge mistake.
I feel similarly now, minus the hangover. But I am worried that I made a mistake in staying here. Because I like this too much. Like the way it feels in his arms, our bodies pressed so closely together so we fit on the couch. It feels right. It feels real. In fact, it’s way too easy to pretend that it is real.
I somehow manage to squeeze out from under his arm without waking him and end up on my knees next to the couch. My shoes should be around here somewhere. I grope around under the coffee table until I find them and then turn to make sure he’s still asleep.
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