Love Songs & Other Lies

by Jessica Pennington

  She nods. “And you’re staying at my house, right?” She gives me an exaggerated wink. “Did you catch my blink just then?” She sticks her tongue out and I try to grab it like we did when we were little kids. When Cam comes back into the living room I’m grabbing at Cort’s lip.

  Cam wedges himself between the two of us. “You good?”

  I eye the three shot glasses in his hand. “Are you? I thought you weren’t drinking.”

  “I’m not, but I found this idiot in the kitchen.” He nods behind him at Anders, whose vintage Ramones shirt is soaked in red liquid. I cringe thinking about what—or more likely, who—ruined one of his prized possessions. I have twenty bucks on the crazy-eyed blonde standing across from me.

  Cort grabs one of the tiny plastic cups from Cam’s fingers. “I’ll take that,” she says. I do the same, and Cort plucks the last cup from Cam’s hand and dangles it in front of me. “This one, too. You need to catch up.”

  I take the second cup, holding one in each hand, looking at them like they’re filled with worms. They smell disgusting.

  Cam is behind me, his warm chest against my back. He whispers in my ear. “You good?” I flinch, but fight the urge to pull away. No more hiding. I let myself relax against him. His lips are almost touching my ear when he whispers, “Whatever?”

  I nudge my shoulder into his side and my hand rests on his hard stomach. “Whatever.” My plastic glass clinks against Cort’s and the liquid slides down into my already warm, buzzing belly. I’m not sure if the heat is from the alcohol, or Cam’s hands.

  CAM

  “Truth,” she says.

  We’re sitting on an oversized chair in one of the house’s three living rooms, playing a two-person game of Truth or Dare. Vee is draped across my lap with her legs dangling off the side of the oversized chair she calls a Snuggler. “Because you’re forced to sit really, really close to someone,” she says. “Or to sit on them, in this case.” Her cheeks are red like she’s been standing in the cold, and all of her words are becoming soft, one sliding into the next.

  She lays her head against my chest while I think about what to ask her. Despite all of the time we’ve spent together, something about being with her still feels so finite. I want to make the most of every minute, each opportunity to know more.

  She drums her fingers on my leg. “Any day now.”

  “Tell me something no one else knows.”

  “Counter offer.” She thrusts her hand up in front of her, holding up one finger and tapping it in the air. “I’ll show you something no one else has seen.” She pushes herself up, using my chest to propel her, and holds her hand behind her as she begins to walk away from me without a pause. I grab it quickly, following behind. She doesn’t turn as she talks to me, she just yells loudly over the crowd. “As long as you’re up for a walk!”

  * * *

  “When I was really little, like maybe six or seven, my parents would walk me down to the water with one of them holding each of my hands.” Vee’s staring down at her feet as they sink into the silt along the edge of the water. Her toes wiggle under the surface. She looks peaceful.

  Definitely a little drunk.

  “We’d make footprints in the sand.” Her head turns, just barely, to face me, her eyebrows raised. “You know what they say about footprints in the sand?”

  “My gram has an embroidered pillow that says one set of footprints means God was carrying you.”

  She smiles, but looks confused. I can’t help but laugh.

  “If you let the water wash your footprints away, they’ll be transported to the other side of the lake.” She says this like it’s a fact. “That’s what my mom would always say, at least … It’s not on a pillow, or anything official like that, though.” She bites her lip, trying not to smile.

  And now she’s sitting down.

  Right in the water, where she stood just seconds ago, Vee is lying back in the surf, letting the water rush up her calves, lapping at her knees and up to her shoulders. With her arms stretched out at her sides, she looks like she’s making a snow angel in the wet sand.

  Maybe she’s drunker than I thought.

  “Did you eat anything before I picked you up, Vee?”

  She’s giggling as the waves pull at her, soaking her clothes. I don’t know what to do, so I just sit down in the dry sand behind her, making sure Lake Michigan doesn’t decide to rush up and drown her. Or wash her away, like her footprints. It doesn’t feel real being here with her. It feels like it’s a memory already—like one of those moments you know you’ll be looking back on, before it’s even over. I pull out my phone and take a picture of her, lit only by the night sky. She looks like a ghost. Her eyes are closed, every piece of her washed out into shades of gray by the moonlight. It’s quiet. The light whistling of the wind and the waves clawing at the shore are the only noise. We’re too far from the boardwalk to hear the familiar sound of the guitars and drums that usually keep us company.

  “I used to come out here when my parents were fighting. Before they sold the house.” She stretches an arm over her head and points behind me, to where houses are set back into the dunes, crowded by trees. “We used to live in that little green one. It was my Grandma Miller’s house, before I was born.” There’s a long pause. “Anyways, I’d just lie here and wish the water would wash me away. That it would take me somewhere. Anywhere but here. I couldn’t stand the idea of being here.”

  “Because you thought they’d get divorced.”

  “No.” Her voice is barely a whisper. “I worried they’d stay together. That things would never feel normal again if they tried to put the pieces back together. A new version of them seemed like it would be better than a broken, poorly pieced-together one.” She closes her eyes and turns away from me before she continues. “They’re not together anymore. They won’t admit it, but I know it. Dad lives in Chicago, and when he does come home, my mom isn’t even around. And he thinks I don’t notice, because he gets up so early, but he sleeps on the couch. None of his clothes are even in the house. I used to think things were perfect, but maybe it was always a lie.” She’s rambling, one softly spoken word slurring into the next. “Still, I was horrible to wish for it. I am horrible.” She shakes her head, tears running down her cheeks.

  “You’re not horrible.” I lean forward and cover her hand with mine, the cold sand rough between our skin. I stand and pull her to her feet. Her soaked-through clothes hang heavy. Her eyes are glossy and distant, like she isn’t actually seeing me, even with her eyes fixed on mine. She looks at me under hooded lids as I hold her face in my palms. The warmth of her tear-stained skin seeps into my cold hands.

  I want to kiss her.

  Dammit. This is probably one of the most inappropriate times in all of history to want to kiss someone, but I want to. I guess I’m an asshole. Because all I can think about is pressing my lips against hers until she stops looking so sad and broken and barely held together. I want to, but even with her clothes clinging to her skin under the moonlight—her body so close I can feel the warmth—I know I shouldn’t.

  She’s drunk. And sad.

  And—probably more important than either of those things—I don’t want our first kiss to be associated with her crying. I don’t want to train her brain to cry every time I kiss her. Like Pavlov’s dog. Is that even possible? Or worse yet, she’ll forget everything when she finally wakes up tomorrow, hungover and miserable. My thumbs drag across her cheeks, ineffectively trying to dry them as water continues to spill from her eyes. It’s hard to tell the tears from the lake water, but maybe I’m just trying to convince myself she wasn’t just sobbing.

  “You’re drunk and emotional, but definitely not horrible. You’re one of the least horrible people I know. Not even top ten.” When she laughs it feels like a small victory. A tiny battle won against the sadness and guilt that I can tell is buried deep inside of her. Part of me wants to tell her that I’m a soldier in the same war, except that I actually deserve it. My p
arents are dead and it’s my fault.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  NOW

  CAM

  I had assumed that musicians on tour didn’t actually party every night. That it was just a stereotype perpetrated by the old VH1 rockumentaries Anders and Logan were obsessed with watching before we left for tour. But it turns out most shows actually do end with everyone out at the bars. Except for those of us who can’t get into bars. No one is letting us drink underage with a bunch of cameras trailing us. So we do our own thing. That usually means talking Pax and some of the other guys into buying for us, and setting up camp in one of the buses, or the backroom of the venue we’re rehearsing at. When your workday ends after midnight, and you have nothing waiting for you but a tiny bed in a cramped bus, anywhere else looks pretty good.

  “On the cover of the Rolling Stone!” Anders sings, with an exaggerated rasp, pounding his hands along the wood-paneled hallway as he walks into the dimly lit room. The Room, as they call it, is a lounge space inside The Tabernacle—a historic church converted into a music venue in the heart of Atlanta. In three days we’ll be onstage, tiers of balconies looming over us; but tonight, we’re camped out offstage, fresh off of an amazing rehearsal. From top to bottom, the Room is encased in wood. It covers the walls and wraps over the doorways, and across the bars that run along one side of the room. A line of wood booths is across from the couches we’re sitting on, and the wood floors are covered in huge red, green, and gold rugs that remind me of something in an old horror movie house.

  “Rolling Stone, Rolling Stone,” Reese joins in as he drops onto the sofa across from me. Soon, Pax and a few of the other guys have joined in this god-awful eighties monstrosity that our bus driver Hal introduced us to. It’s just us and Caustic Underground on the bus now. We lost The Phillips after the third show, but one of the empty spots on the bus was quickly filled by Bri, who became a permanent fixture with Pax after showing up backstage at our last two shows. Hopefully she knows better than to divulge too much in the confessional interviews. I don’t think Jenn would hesitate to cast her as the country’s most pathetic groupie if it boosted ratings. Vee was adorably excited to have another girl on the bus, even though Bri spends most of her time attached to Pax’s face. Bri watches from a stool at the bar as Pax keeps singing this torturous song, but Vee and Logan are the only ones noticeably missing from the festivities.

  The room is already crowded with band members, crew, and even some fans, standing around in little clusters, eyeing us from a distance. Fans who don’t talk to us make me feel like a zoo animal. Like I’m on this side of the glass, and they’re out there—wondering what I eat and how I have enough room to run around. At the entrance, Marcus, one of the tour roadies, is dropping cell phones into a basket. Pictures floating around of bands drinking with fans is the last thing Jenn wants. And trouble with Jenn is the last thing any of us needs.

  Sometimes I feel like there’s a weird alarm in my head, because Vee has barely made it through the doorway before I notice her. Logan has his hand on her back as he gently pushes her through the crowd toward us, with Tad following close behind. Vee’s black dress is lower than anything I’ve seen her wear on tour. Or ever, maybe. It’s the sort of thing she would have hated to wear when we first met. A Dakota Gray outfit. Does she still think about her?

  In the two weeks since our behind-the-scenes clips started airing with each episode, Logan and Vee have quickly become a talking point. A hometown love story for everyone to drool over. Spare me. The comments on social media (which, I’m horrified to admit, I’m addicted to reading) run the gamut. There are those who gush: “They are so cute,” “Maybe he’ll propose on tour,” and “She’s so lucky!” Then there are the other comments: “She’s not good enough for him,” “Gold digger,” “He can do better.” There are ten times more of those comments, and I hope like hell Vee doesn’t read them like I do. Most of America seems to be waiting for Logan and Vee to crash and burn. And I’m not proud to say it, but I can’t help but agree. I’m ready for management to pull the plug. Will I bring popcorn to the breakup extravaganza?

  Vee takes a seat on the couch across from me, crossing her long, naked legs in what feels like slow motion. I shift in her direction. “Hey—” But as quickly as she came, she’s gone, following Bri to the other side of the room, where someone has set up speakers and there’s a group of people pressed together on the makeshift dance floor. A thumping, electronic beat saturates the room and vibrates under my feet.

  Anders and I are as alone as you can be in a room full of people—and it’s nice to have a break from the cameras—to be so boring they don’t even bother coming around.

  “Cheers to a kick-ass new song,” Anders says, holding up his glass. I do the same.

  “To the girl in the purple shirt,” I say, keeping my eyes on Vee, who is swinging her hips from side to side, dipping up and down, in rhythm to the music.

  Anders laughs. “The girl in the purple shirt.” He shakes his head, looking at me sympathetically. “Man, you’ve got it bad.” We’ve never talked about the meaning of the song. It’s a sort of unspoken agreement among us that we don’t pry when it comes to original songs. It started back when Vee wrote all their songs. If she’d had to talk through each of them, they wouldn’t have had a single original to play. Of course, the rule doesn’t apply to me.

  I set my glass on the table. “Don’t start.”

  “I don’t blame you, man, but Vee’s stubborn. You’ve got a long road ahead of you.”

  “Noted.” I give him a look that I hope says, Shut the hell up and move on.

  Anders has his phone out, absentmindedly typing as I grab a bottle of beer from the cooler Pax filled for us and hold another in front of Anders.

  “Beer?” I ask, but Anders doesn’t seem to notice. “Anders?”

  Anders nods idly and continues staring down at the screen.

  I smack the phone in his hand. “Who is that?”

  “Cort.”

  “Scary ex-girlfriend Cort?”

  He grins. “That’s the one.”

  “She telling you what a dick you are?”

  “Nah, she’s sexting me.”

  I nearly spit out my beer. “Shit, seriously?” The last time I talked to Anders about Cort before we left LA, he said they hadn’t spoken since they broke up the summer after graduation. The fact that Cort is now sending him lewd messages gives me a twisted glimmer of hope that maybe Vee and I can get back even a fraction of what we used to have. Though I really don’t expect I’ll be getting a “touch me here” text from her any time soon.

  My eyes drift over to where Bri and Pax are dancing, their faces interlocked. I spot Vee in a group of fans, talking and laughing, as she throws back the last of a beer. It’s hard to take my eyes off of her, even when she catches me staring, and things start getting uncomfortable.

  VIRGINIA

  If Cam wants to stare at me, I’m going to give him something to watch. Something to really think about. As much as I hate to admit it, when I put on this little sundress, this is the moment I’d had in mind. Him thinking about what he could have had, what he missed, what he wasted.

  Tad is standing at the edge of a pulsing group of people, and it’s weird to see him without his camera. I put my hands up in front of my face like my own imaginary camera, and weave through the tangle of bodies toward Tad. He’s smiling at me.

  “What was your favorite thing about today?” I say, still pointing my imaginary camera at him, doing my best impression of the confessional interviews we’re always doing.

  He scrunches his lips up like he’s thinking really hard, and my eyes drift to his chest tattoo on full display in his V-neck shirt. “This moment is pretty high up there,” he says, and I can feel the heat creep up my neck.

  “Wanna dance?”

  His sexy grin says yes, so I pull him by his wrist to where there’s a crowd dancing. I love this feeling, like my head is half detached, like I’m watching myself being so
bold, letting the stress float out of my fingers as I wave them above me. I feel a hand on my waist.

  “Babe—” I turn to find Logan sheepishly holding a plastic cup. “You left your drink.”

  “Did you just call me babe?” I shake my head. What is this life right now?

  Tad looks embarrassed, and I don’t know why, because I’m sure he was flirting with me. He’s probably embarrassed for Logan—the way he’s shyly trying to wedge himself between us like he’s a middle school dance chaperone or something. I take the glass from his hand and take a long drink—the tangy liquid biting on its way down my throat.

  I smile at Tad again, but he’s not looking at me the same.

  Logan takes my elbow and wraps my arm around his waist. “Dance with me, Vee.” It’s weird to hear, the way his voice sounds like he wants this but doesn’t. I start to pull away and he pulls me closer, his mouth to my ear. “Dance with your boyfriend, Vee.”

  I close my eyes. “I’m an idiot,” I mutter.

  “You’re just a lightweight.” Logan pulls me into a hug. “Just lay off the crew, okay?” he jokes.

  “Don’t leave me alone with Bri again,” I say, thinking about the shots she was so excited about when we were getting dressed. Of course Bri doesn’t have to worry about a fake boyfriend, or an ex-whatever, or anything, really.

  “Deal,” Logan says.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  THEN

  VIRGINIA

  I thought he was going to kiss me. There was that look—the moment of hesitation just before a guy kisses you, when they’re giving you a chance to run away. At least, I think that’s what that moment is for. Otherwise, why hesitate? Just go for it. But Cam isn’t a creep, and I just spilled my guts and cried. And … Oh, God, did I ugly-cry? My tears had felt delicate. Sure, there were a lot of them, but I’m not snotty or hyperventilating, or exhibiting any of the other telltale signs of the ugly-cry. Thanks to the ever-present lake breeze, my face is already dry.

  Taking my own advice, I don’t hesitate. Just do it. There is no chance for him to run, as I slam my lips into his, grabbing fistfuls of his shirt to steady myself. His reaction is immediate, as his hands slip around my waist, pulling me tight to him. Warm hands slide under my shirt, landing on the cold skin just above the waist of my soaking wet jeans. It sends a shiver through me as hot meets cold. His tongue brushes along my lips and just as mine part, I feel his body go rigid. Still holding me by my hips, he pushes me back, and suddenly there’s a foot of space between us. My hands fall away from his neck at the abrupt movement, landing on his shoulders.