Rhythm, Chord & Malykhin

by Mariana Zapata

  “A few,” I answered almost guiltily. Then again, what did I have to feel guilty about? They’d opened their fat traps and said something that wasn’t their business to tell. “I missed you guys too but—“

  “I know we fucked up.”

  We looked at each other in silence. There really wasn’t much to say after that. It was the first time any of them had completely acknowledged that they’d done something to hurt my feelings. I’d pretty much woken up one day and decided to forgive them for being assholes. I was tired of being mad, and honestly, I really had missed them.

  The next time I saw them at my parent’s house during Thanksgiving, no one brought up what they’d done, and we went on as if that night had never happened. In reality, they’d told the members of the two other bands we’d been touring with that I was going to get breast implants because I had “one small one and one big one,” as I remember very clearly. They’d laughed afterward, drunk and high out of their minds, unaware that I’d overheard.

  It wasn’t even them telling people I was going to get surgery and implants that bothered me. Who cared if they knew? I wasn’t ashamed; I’d been ecstatic to finally be able to take this next step. What had reached deep within my soul and made me cry my eyes out in the venue bathroom for ten minutes straight, was that they’d laughed. They’d laughed at something that had bothered me so much for so long. I didn’t know of anyone else who had been called “deformed” at the age of thirteen at camp and then laughed at. No one understood what it was like to never be able to wear tank tops unless the neckline was high, or trying to find bras or bathing suits that could be easily manipulated with padding so that my irregularity wouldn’t be so noticeable. I never let anyone but my doctor see my chest, ever. Not even in a bra. I didn’t even let my mom or Rafe see me in a bra. Brandon had been the first person since my plastic surgeon and my gynecologist that saw my breasts since we’d started dating shortly after I’d gotten them worked on.

  And these three guys that I loved and that I knew loved me back, had laughed at my expense in front of other people.

  So yeah, I wasn’t going to apologize for not speaking to them for a few months. They’d deserved it. Since then, years had passed, and I wasn’t about to bring it up more than necessary.

  Mase smiled, as if sensing exactly what I was thinking, and patted the seat next to him. “Come here. Come sit next to someone who loves your wino ass.”

  “I’m not a wino.”

  He shot me a look. “You were drinking straight from the bottle, sitting in the dark watching one of your favorite movies. You’re really going to tell me you’re not?”

  The fact he knew Sabrina was one of my favorite movies didn’t escape me, but still. I blinked. “Don’t judge me.”

  “Too late.”

  That made me laugh. Before I could think twice, I got up and sat next to him, leaning into his shoulder with a resigned sigh. “I’m so stupid.”

  Did he assure me I wasn’t dumb? Of course not. “No shit, Sherlock.” He patted my knee. “If it makes you feel any better, I wasn’t surprised. After me, he’s the best-looking guy on the tour,” the modest ass explained. “The guy’s a pussy magnet, Flab. You know girls love singers. Gordo has to beat the girls off with a stick and he doesn’t even like them. And he’s an ugly motherfucker. What does that say?”

  Ugh.

  Of course I already knew all that, but still. He didn’t need to just blurt it out like that. There was a hierarchy of attraction in bands regardless of what the members actually looked like: everyone liked the singer even if he looked like he ran a heroin ring; next were the guitar players, the drummers, the bass players and finally the keyboardists. It was like actors that weren’t handsome but women liked them anyway because they were famous.

  “I haven’t seen him mess around with anybody, if that makes you feel any better,” he added. “But…”

  “Yeah, yeah. I know.” But he’d still hung out with that girl. A fact I had been trying to come to terms with for a week.

  I told myself what I’d been telling myself since then: he wasn’t my boyfriend, he was my friend, and I needed to get over this possessive, jealous crap pronto. I was going to get over it. I would.

  With another sigh I peered up at Mason who was still letting me lean into him and smiled reluctantly. “You really knew I was full of shit from the beginning?”

  “You’ve been my best friend my whole life. Of course I know when something’s up your ass,” he stated.

  That had me cracking a real grin. We had been best friends our entire lives; this beautiful, moronic boy-man who once had a gap between his teeth and didn’t hit a growth spurt until we were almost sixteen. How many things had we done for each other? More than I could ever count and that alone made my heart swell with affection. Most people didn’t have a single best friend, and I didn’t just have multiple ones—I even had some that would commit crimes for me. This guy happened to be one of them. Was he perfect? Absolutely not. Neither was I.

  But who needed perfect when you had someone loyal, funny, with slight mental problems that knew you inside and out? I didn’t. “You know I love you, right?”

  He put his hand on my head and ruffled my already messy hair. “Yeah, I know, Flabby.”

  I smiled at him and he smiled back at me.

  Then he messed with my hair some more. “If it makes you feel any better, your boobs are way nicer than that chick’s were.”

  Was it rude? Of course it was, but I laughed anyway, and me laughing only made Mase do it too.

  “What would I do without you?”

  “Be bored to death,” he replied, tugging on my hair.

  I crossed my eyes.

  “I don’t like seeing you bummed, so cut it out. A week is long enough.”

  If only he’d seen me right after my breakup. Plus, he’d already done who knows what to Brandon’s car in retaliation. “See? And Mandy used to say you didn’t care about anything.”

  He frowned. “I forgot about her.”

  “I just remember her telling me that she was going to kick my ass if I didn’t stop text messaging you.” Then I’d told her I’d been in Mason’s life before her and I’d be in it afterward, just to be a bitch.

  He cracked up. “She hated your guts! I forgot about that!” He blew out a breath. “Most of my girlfriends—” for the record, he hadn’t had an official girlfriend in at least five years, “haven’t liked you, now that I think about it.”

  Of course they hadn’t. Most of them had always thought there was more to our friendship than what there was. It wasn’t like I could blame them, but I always tried to be extra respectful and not pinch his butt cheeks out of anger when he was dating someone.

  “Remember Teresa Martinez back in junior year? I broke up with her because she said you were annoying.”

  I blinked, knowing exactly whom he was referring to. She’d been one of his girlfriends that hadn’t gotten on my nerves. That fake bitch. While I realized it was dumb to be offended over a comment someone had made ten years ago, I couldn’t help but get a little grumpy about it. “She said that to you?”

  “Yeah. I couldn’t believe it. You’re a pain in the ass, not annoying.”

  I snorted. “Well, she was a slut, I remember that.”

  He elbowed me with a snicker. “I know. That’s why I dated her.”

  Oh God.

  Then he kept on going, as if I wanted to hear all the shitty things his past girlfriends had said about me. Which I didn’t. “You remember Crystal Hernandez? Senior year? She called you a bitch. I let her give me a blow job and never called her again.”

  My hands went over my face as I repressed the urge to laugh. When I finally had myself under control, I cupped my cheeks and shook my head. “What a noble, noble gesture. Seriously. Thank you.”

  Mason grinned. “Right?”

  Dropping my hands, I nodded up at him. There were tears in my eyes, and I didn’t even bother blinking them away. “I wouldn’t tra
de you for a million dollars, Mase.”

  His reply was to beam at me.

  “But for ten million, I’d work out some kind of visitation schedule.”

  * * *

  It was the pain in my neck that woke me up.

  There was also the fact that one of my legs was hot, my arm was numb, and I had a headache.

  I’d barely opened an eye to figure out what the hell was going on when I realized I wasn’t in my bunk. The cushion beneath me was harder than it should have been and there was way too much light. What the hell?

  I tried to think back on my last clear memory, and that was Mase and I on the couch watching infomercials and arguing over whether this bonding glue they were presenting would really work or not. After that I couldn’t remember anything. The only answer I had was that it didn’t take a genius to figure out that my head hurt from the entire bottle we’d polished off between the two of us.

  Once I managed to pry another eyelid open, it was confirmed that I was still on the couch. My skull was using my inner bicep as a pillow and luckily I was facing the back of the cushion instead of outward where everyone could see my face while I was sleeping. It wasn’t until I tried to get to my knees that I realized why my leg was so hot. Mase was passed out halfway on top of me, half on his side. He was using my lower back as a pillow, and I think he might have been cupping a butt cheek.

  I groaned as I started shaking one of Mason’s shoulders blindly, trying not to savor the weird taste in my mouth. “I need to get up,” I mumbled, shoving at him until he grumbled and squirmed around. As soon as he shifted, I rolled off the couch and just barely landed softly on my hands and knees before settling onto my butt. I groaned, vowing never to drink so much wine again. That was when I looked up.

  Sitting on the opposite couch, staring straight at me with a bowl against his chest, was Sacha.

  Of course it was.

  I smiled weakly at him and got to my feet with a mumbled, “Morning.”

  I looked away before Sacha replied back with a “Morning, Gaby,” as I bent over and shook Mason’s shoulder some more.

  “Go back to your bunk, crackhead,” I told my lifelong friend.

  Mase groaned and rolled onto his back, opening up one sleepy eye. He waved me off, and I figured I’d done my best. If he ended up with Sharpie on his face, it was his fault.

  I staggered to bed, pulled the curtain across and went back to sleep.

  * * *

  “Gaby? Are you awake?”

  Yeah, I was awake. No, I still didn’t really want to talk to him.

  I’d been lying down in my bunk for the last hour, head aching, the curtain blocking everything and everyone out while I traded on and off between thinking and reading. I thought about my family that I’d just seen and how they loved me, about Eli who was my partner in crime for life, Laila, Mason and Gordo. I even thought about Brandon briefly. Mainly, I thought about Sacha, how I felt about him and how I needed to get over it. Or at least deal with my crush more effectively.

  I’d gotten over a big breakup already and this wasn’t even a breakup though to a certain extent, it felt worse. Maybe because there hadn’t been a single chance of anything. Or maybe just because I was crazy. More than likely it was just me being crazy and dumb and a sore loser.

  Regardless, I needed to get over it.

  “Gaby?” the voice whispered again.

  I glanced up like I could see through the materials separating Sacha’s bunk from mine and felt my lips purse together for a second. In that same moment, I wondered about what he’d want to talk about. I needed a few more minutes for my new mindset to really kick in, so I stayed quiet.

  I’d overheard them talking about how we were stopping pretty soon to shower, and I wasn’t really in the mood to talk to anyone yet.

  Get over it, Gaby. Deal with it. Quit being a little bitch.

  “Best of the Best?” Sacha whispered once more.

  I didn’t respond, but I did feel slightly bad.

  Was I being an asshole? I’d had guy friends in the past who liked me, and I didn’t like in return for one reason or another. But had I been awkward and rude to them? Of course not. Had they been upset with me for not wanting to date them?

  No. They hadn’t.

  In hindsight, I realized that I was being more of a bitch than I needed to. I had gone out of my way to avoid Sacha. When he made some kind of indication that he wanted to talk to me, I’d do something so that he couldn’t. I knew I was being immature, but I was so disappointed in myself that I didn’t have the heart to want to talk to him.

  That wasn’t his fault.

  All of a sudden, the curtain to my bunk swung open and the next thing I knew, this gigantic body caused an eclipse before rolling onto my bed, closing the velvety material behind him.

  And I knew it was a “him” even though my eyes hadn’t adjusted. I could recognize Eli’s scent in a landfill.

  “What are you doing?” I whisper-hissed at him, his head exactly five inches away from mine. His body crowded mine into the back paneling so I was on my side, crammed against the wall.

  “Are you awake?” he asked in a normal voice. I still couldn’t see his face clearly.

  “I am now.” I whispered back, conscious that a certain singer might still be in his bunk, listening in.

  He poked me in the forehead with his index finger. “Is your period over yet?”

  Only he would think about asking me that. I’d swear Eli was the most desensitized man on the planet. There were times when I was younger that I think he seriously believed we were the same person in two different bodies. “Yes. Why?”

  “I want to know if you’re done being in a shitty mood.”

  At the mention of my shitty mood, I had a flashback of the scene I’d walked in on and my stomach revolted. I had no right to get so jealous but my brain and body didn’t see that point, apparently. I wasn’t going to tell him that Mase had told me he knew exactly what had been going on. If Eli hadn’t brought it up, I didn’t want to either.

  “I think so,” I answered honestly, poking him in the forehead like he’d done to me. “I hope so.”

  He made a humming noise in his throat. Neither one of us said anything for a long minute as we faced each other in my bunk, just barely fitting. We just stared until he broke the silence in a low voice. “You aren’t planning on going home, right?”

  “No.” I scrunched up my nose despite the fact he more than likely couldn’t see me doing it. “Why would you think that?”

  “Because you’re not happy.”

  And there went a point for me feeling like an extra douche. I bopped his nose with my fingertip. “I’m fine, E. Swear. I’m not going anywhere.”

  I could see the outline of him resting his head on his hand. “I haven’t told anybody anything about your boobs, you know.”

  I hadn’t thought once he had. That had been my second condition when I joined the tour, especially after he’d opened his trap the last time I’d been with Ghost Orchid. “Don’t say stuff like that out loud. I’m already sure half these guys think we’re having some kind of incest thing going on; don’t make it worse.”

  He let out a big laugh that had to have woken anyone still sleeping. “Fuck me, they do, don’t they? Mateo asked me a couple days ago if we really were related or if this was just some messed up lie we’d been telling everyone forever.”

  “Like I’d put up with your crap if you weren’t my brother,” I snickered. “Ugly.”

  “Bitch, you were blessed to be born alongside me.”

  That had me groaning loud. “Oh God. Shut up.”

  Eli just laughed that laugh that had been my favorite since we were kids. It wasn’t obnoxious or mean, it just… was. “We’re about to stop. Want me to braid your hair after?”

  Like I was going to tell him no.

  Then it hit me. How bad had I been that he was actually offering to do it? One more point against me.

  “Thanks, loser.”
/>   Right before he rolled out of the bunk with one final poke at my forehead, he said, “Your mom is a loser.”

  Some things never got old: like my brother’s crap, and the fact that the sun would rise and shine regardless of what was going on in my life. Or not going on, in this case.

  I was done being a mopey bitch. I mentally washed my hands of being this party pooper who had her feelings hurt because some hot guy had a maybe-sort-of-girlfriend. I didn’t have a chance. I’d never thought I had one. I was being a possessive sore loser.

  It didn’t matter. I’d get over it, like I had everything else in the past.

  I swear it was like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders once my inner serial killer went on vacation for the next three weeks. I waited until it sounded as if everyone had gotten off the bus for me to get out of my bunk, grab clothes and pay the restrooms a visit. I felt rejuvenated and more like myself than I had in what seemed like too long. Even my head stopped hurting, for the most part.

  It must have been pretty apparent I was back to normal because Gordo slapped me on the back when I got on the bus after my shower. “You look like you’re feeling better.”

  “I am.” I pinched him in the stomach as proof before continuing on.

  I made my way to the bunk area so I could throw my bag on the floor. In the middle of doing so, someone nudged at my lower back. With a glance over my shoulder, I noticed the pale gray eyes first.

  “Hey,” Sacha said, dropping his hand to his side.

  “Hey,” I told him, straightening up and shutting the curtain on my bunk. I didn’t know what to say or even how to act now that I’d come to terms with the fact that I wasn’t just attracted to him physically, that he didn’t feel that way toward me, and that I finally wasn’t going to let the worst of my emotions dictate my actions.

  Yeah. I could handle this. A lesbian could find herself having a crush on Sacha. There was nothing wrong with being attracted to him. Plus, it wasn’t like I was looking for a boyfriend either.