Just an Illusion, Side A: Side A

by D. Kelly

  “It’s fine. He and I talked it out and we’re all good. I think it just brought up memories of Marilyn, and you know how he gets when he thinks about her. He’s been journaling all morning, too.”

  “Ah, okay. We’ll just let him work it out of his system for the next few days then.”

  “That’s probably a really good idea,” Noah tells Darren, even though he seems a million miles away.

  It’s Thursday—my first official one-on-one interview with Sawyer. I’m nervous. He’s still keeping his distance, but he was a bit nicer to me yesterday. So far, the individual interviews are going great; I’m learning a lot about the guys. My day with Noah was half interview, half making out. It was fun, but next time it needs to be more professional.

  Today is also the fourth day in a row we’ve all worked out on the bus together. Each day they rotate whose music we listen to. I don’t think they wanted to hear Sawyer’s angry music all week.

  “Hey, Mel, give me your phone.” Noah holds out his hand and I pass him my phone, curious as to why he wants it.

  “Where’s that playlist you’re always listening to when you work?”

  “Why?”

  “Because today is your playlist day,” he says, scrolling through all my different lists.

  “You guys don’t want to hear my playlist, trust me. It’s just a mix of random stuff.”

  “Doesn’t matter, it’s your turn,” he counters.

  “Tit for tat, huh?” I ask him with a wink.

  “Exactly,” he replies as he turns the phone to me and waits for me to pick the right one.

  “Alright, but don’t say I didn’t warn you,” I caution as I press the list.

  With a smile, Noah messes with my phone until he gets it synced to the Bluetooth on the bus. When he presses play, the first song is NSYNC’s I Want You Back. I thought for sure they’d make fun of me, but instead, what unfolded next is probably one of the best things I’ve ever seen.

  All four of them, including Sawyer, started singing along. Wyatt, Darren, and Noah even popped off some pretty impressive dance moves. I’m pretty sure I stood there the entire time with my jaw on the floor.

  Once it was over, I even clapped.

  “You guys actually like boy bands?” I’m amazed, especially after Noah made his distaste for Eli known.

  “We like a boy band,” Wyatt corrects me.

  “Enough to dance like them?”

  Noah shakes his head. “Not exactly. We did it for our sisters … they were huge fans. One year, my parents said we spoiled everyone with gifts that could never be repaid. So the following year, they deemed Christmas a ‘themed holiday.’ We could only give something we could make or perform. They loved it, though, completely ate it up, and then Rory and Diane posted it to YouTube. We didn’t count on that, but they wanted everyone to know they had the best brothers in the world. They count Wyatt and Darren as family, too.”

  “Well now, that is definitely something worth Googling.”

  The song changes from NSYNC to The Eagles, and Darren seems to think it’s hilarious.

  “Damn, Mel, is your playlist bipolar? Talk about one extreme to the other.”

  “What? I told you guys I’m eclectic in my musical tastes. Actually, this is probably the biggest playlist I have. One day I started adding music and didn’t stop until hours later.”

  “There’s no better way to get to know someone than through their playlist. I’m curious to see what you’ve got, Princess.”

  “Sawyer’s right, music is like the key to your soul. You can learn a lot about a person from their playlist,” Wyatt says as he leans back on the weight bench.

  “Great, now I’m a little freaked out.”

  “It’s all good, Mel, we already like you,” Darren adds, throwing a cautionary glance at Sawyer. Out of them all, I think he and Darren are the closest as far as friendship goes. Sawyer and Noah are, of course, the closest, but when they pair off to do things, Noah and Wyatt seem to team up. I’m sure it’s because Noah is pretty calm and Wyatt is married and likes to chill.

  The next thirty minutes pass seamlessly, and the guys ruminate over my playlist, making random comments here and there. They laughed especially hard when my list went from a slow country song immediately into a DJ Quik song. When I hear the beginning beats of the next song and the first few lines come through the speakers, I almost fall off the treadmill.

  When the sun rises up in the sky

  She wakes up with a twinkle in her eye

  Her smile is the light of my life

  She’s my Mellie sunshine

  I’ve turned the treadmill off and I’m frozen in place. I don’t know how I forgot I loaded this song onto this list. Probably because most days I skip over it; only when I’m sentimental do I ever listen to it.

  “Holy shit!” Sawyer exclaims.

  “That’s Joey Triton!” Darren cries out as he jumps off the bike.

  “It’s not just Joey Triton …” Noah begins, only to be cut off by Wyatt.

  “It’s an unreleased, long-lost Joey Triton song. The one he wrote for his little girl.”

  At least their excitement blocks some of the lyrics from reaching my eardrums. Not like it matters at this point. I grab my water and practically stumble over to the couch. It’s over. There’s no way I’m getting out of this without telling them everything.

  My heart is pounding out of my chest. Suddenly, there’s complete silence, and all eyes are focused on me.

  “How do you have that song, Mel?” Wyatt asks excitedly at the same time Sawyer points out the obvious answer.

  “You’re her. Amelia Triton. Your parents are Iris and Joey Triton. Holy fuck.” If I didn’t know better, I’d say there’s actually admiration in his eyes. Noah sits next to me and grabs my hand, but his eyes are filled with unanswered questions they all want answers to.

  “Yes, I’m their daughter, but I’m not that girl anymore. I’m not Mellie Sunshine, and I never will be again.”

  “No way,” Wyatt says, shaking his head. “This whole time we’ve had a legend’s daughter touring with us. This is unreal!”

  They’re stoked. I get it, I truly do. It’s exciting for outsiders to meet a celebrity. Even though I’m not actually famous, everyone groups me in “celeb status” because I came from them. Even celebrities can be dazzled by other famous people; it’s such an odd dynamic.

  “You look so different,” Noah says softly.

  “Yeah, well, I was a wild child back then. I dyed my hair a different color every few weeks. I dressed a lot more rock and roll and I partied as hard as I could. After they died, things got crazy, first with her death, and then with his. No one wanted to give me time to grieve. Interview requests were out of control, the phone rang constantly, and everyone wanted a piece of me. I was sixteen, I was just a kid, and I wanted to get away from it all, so that’s what I did.”

  “Didn’t you have to go through a background check to get this job? How do we not know this already?” Sawyer actually seems upset about this, but I guess I can’t blame him.

  “NDAs work both ways. Warren knows who I am, but we decided it would be up to me to tell you, when I felt ready. I was working up to it, but it’s a hard subject for me.”

  “Now it makes so much more sense,” Noah says with a half grin. I know he’s talking about Eli, but the rest of them don’t.

  “You suspected something was up?” Sawyer snaps.

  “No, I just knew something, but I couldn’t put it together.”

  “Look, guys, there’s no more secrets from here on out. I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.”

  “Good, start with what Noah knows,” Darren replies diplomatically.

  “Do you guys have tequila on this bus?” They laugh, and Noah goes into the kitchenette area and pulls a bottle out of the cabinet, along with some shot glasses.

  “Mel, there’s tequila on every bus,” he says as he comes back ove
r and pours me a shot. I toss it back and hold it out for a refill and down that one, too, before leaning back and preparing myself to tell them my story.

  Confessions

  A few minutes pass while I let the tequila settle into my system. They’re all waiting patiently, eagerly, to hear all about Joey and Iris Triton. I don’t blame them; they were the power couple of rock for decades.

  “Alright. I’ll tell you what Noah knows about my past so you don’t feel left out, and then I’ll go back to the beginning. Noah knows I used to date Eli Watts.”

  “Really, Mel? He’s such a skeezy fuck.” Darren almost sounds sad.

  “Yeah, I know. That seems to be the general consensus. Now, let’s go back to the beginning. This could take a while.” They nod their understanding and settle in around me—Noah on the couch and the rest of them sitting on mats on the floor.

  “When my parents met, my mom’s career had just taken off. She ended up being the opening act for my dad on his tour for a while. There was a time where my mom described their love as magical. Maybe it was because I was a little girl, or maybe it’s because at that time they really felt that way.”

  “I’ve heard their love story was pretty epic,” Sawyer says softly.

  “Yeah. Me, too. There’s no denying they had an amazing amount of chemistry. When the two of them were in a room together, their love filled it … at least when things were good. When things were bad, their hate was equally prominent.

  “The first few years after I was born, my mom continued working on her music. Her albums kept close rank to his on the charts and the labels milked their love story for all it was worth. It was the best of both worlds: mutual success, getting to tour together, and having the chance to stay together as one big, happy family. When I was about six, her career was running on fumes. Her label gave her an ultimatum: leave Joey’s tour and go into the studio and record a new album so she could do her own tour, or lose her contract.”

  I feel the tequila settling in over my senses; it makes it a bit easier to continue.

  “That’s harsh,” Wyatt says softly, and I nod.

  “She loved him with everything she had, and she believed him when he said he would help her succeed. So she told her label she was staying with her family. For the first year or so she was content, waited out the tour, and when we got back home, she wanted my dad to keep his promise. He didn’t.

  “They were one of those couples who loved so hard and so much they absolutely lost their individual identities in that love. It was like they were the same person, neither of them could work without the other. The problem when your identities blend like that is no one’s ever happy. Their relationship was controlled by passion, and when they weren’t consumed in their sexual bliss, they were miserable and hateful to each other.”

  Noah looks like he wants to say something but then shakes it off. I wonder what he’s thinking.

  “I started spending more time with my grandmother, which is how I know Belle. They were next door neighbors. She was my only friend, probably until I met Eli. We met when we were eight, and we’ve been best friends ever since. She’s my sister. One summer, when I was ten, my mom finally had enough, and we stayed with my grandma the entire summer while she recorded a new album.”

  “Good for Iris,” Darren calls out, and I smile with the memory. She was so proud of herself.

  “She had a hard time with it, but she finished it and she was proud of it. The problem was the content. The entire album was essentially a love song to my dad. It flopped, and no one was interested in signing her again. Her label only released it because it was the last album she owed them and they could write her off after that. Personally, I think it was her best music, but you can’t sign an artist whose most recent album was filled with twenty sad love songs.

  “My dad was the exception. He loved it, and the album brought them closer together, so we went back on tour with him. My mom struggled daily with her fleeting fame. She didn’t like being known only as Joey’s wife, or the second half of his soul. She wanted her own musical identity. She’d been bit by the itch and was willing to get fame, whatever the cost.”

  “Mel, it’s okay. You don’t have to keep going. This is obviously upsetting for you,” Noah tells me as he squeezes my hand in comfort.

  “No, I owe you guys. I can’t expect you to open up to me and not reciprocate. I want you to trust me, and if anyone would appreciate this story, it’s the four of you.”

  “Okay,” he whispers as the others wait with baited breath for me to continue.

  “Anyway, by the time I was thirteen, we had The Savages touring with us. They were almost as popular as my dad by then, but since Ryland Savage was my dad’s best friend, the tour was fun for them. Slowly, my parents started getting along better. My mom was extremely loving, and my dad was inspired beyond belief. They even wrote a duet, and she got to start performing with them occasionally.

  “Shortly after my fourteenth birthday, my parents got into a fight, a big one, and my mom started sleeping on The Savages’ bus. My dad knew she was safe there since Ryland and he had been friends since they were teenagers. And honestly, I think he enjoyed a break from her at times. Their love was suffocating them. It was like the attraction was so great their bodies were like magnets. They were always touching, kissing, and more, but it didn’t always look sweet.”

  “What do you mean? How else does attraction work?” Sawyer asks with a genuine interest.

  “I’m not sure, but at times it just looked painful. Like they hated each other but still couldn’t keep their hands to themselves, even if they wanted to. They were that physically drawn to one another.”

  Sawyer’s expression changes to a scowl, and I return to my story.

  “Around this time, I met Eli at an industry party. He was sweet and funny and honestly the first boy I’d ever had a friendship with. His band had just been signed, and their tour coincided with ours on most of the major cities, so we were able to spend a good amount of time together.

  “One night, a few months after my mom started riding on the other bus, Eli and I were hanging out on my bus playing video games. My dad came in screaming and yelling. I’d never seen him so angry. We were stopped in L.A. for a show at The Forum. After the show that night, we were supposed to go home for some down time. I was really excited because Eli and his parents were going to crash at our house over the Thanksgiving break.”

  “But the show never happened,” Darren fills in for me.

  “No, the show never happened. My parents and Ryland got into a massive argument. It was the day my dad found out my mom had been having an affair with Ryland. It had started even before she moved onto their bus.

  “At first, she was screaming at him, telling him he drove her to it. Then she was dropping to his feet and begging him to take her back. It’s fucked up as a kid to watch your mom tell your dad no one can make her come like him. Listen to her cry about how no one can fuck her like he does, how no one owns her the way he can.”

  My skin crawls even repeating the words, and what’s worse is Eli heard it, too.

  “Ryland convinced my mom to go with him so everyone could calm down. Eventually, she agreed, and they left. From what the police could tell after they compiled all the witnesses’ statements, my mom and Ryland were fighting in the car. Somehow, he lost control of the Corvette, took out the center divider on the 405 freeway at ninety miles an hour, and the car flipped multiple times. They’d been driving erratically for some time, and other drivers were holding back because of it. If they hadn’t been, it wouldn’t have been just the two of them killed.”

  “God, Mel, that’s so messed up.” Wyatt’s voice is filled with sympathy.

  “Yeah, pretty much. My dad went off the rails after that. He couldn’t cope. Losing his wife and his best friend after learning of their betrayal … it fractured his soul. Eli became my rock. He’d seen it all unfold and knew what I was going through. He got me
through it all. He stayed with me over the break, called off a few tour dates for the funeral, and when he was forced back out on tour, he called every chance he could. I fell head-over-heels in love with him. My dad took a few months off to regroup after everything that happened, but I couldn’t take it. The sadness was just too unbearable, so I hopped on Eli’s bus and toured with him.”

  “I still can’t believe you slept with Eli,” Wyatt says, shaking his head.

  “Looking back on it now, even after how it all ended, I wouldn’t change it. The two of us crashed and burned, but what we had was real while it lasted. If it weren’t for Eli, I would have never made it through that time. He saved me from myself. Even Belle couldn’t get through to me the way he could.”

  “So what happened? Why aren’t you still with him?” Sawyer asks, genuinely interested.

  “Sawyer, you know as well as I do, these relationships have a hard time surviving. Tack two fifteen-year-olds into the mix and it’s a recipe for disaster. We dated almost two years. I got pregnant, Eli freaked the fuck out, and he cheated on me to cope. I’m not sure if I would have kept the baby, probably not, but I miscarried a few hours after I found out he cheated. Back then, I blamed him, but now I know better. It was just something that happened because it wasn’t our time. Not because he stressed me out by cheating.”

  “That bastard cheated on you while you were pregnant?” Noah’s less than pleased, and from the scowls on the rest of their faces, he’s not the only one.

  “Yeah, it’s why we don’t talk. He tried, he felt horrible, but I couldn’t hear it back then. I knew he loved me, and that’s what made it hurt so bad. By the time I realized I forgave him, years had passed. It wasn’t his fault. He was sixteen, I was fifteen. We were babies.”

  Noah’s hands are balled into fists. I’m not sure I even thought such a sweet-tempered man could get this pissed. So I quickly continue with my story, hoping he’ll relax.

  “After the Eli mess, my dad was back on tour. So after a short stay with my grandma, I went with him. He was all I had left, and this was our life. It wasn’t the same, it was never the same. He partied hard. Harder than I’ve ever seen anyone go. Coke, alcohol, speed, heroin here and there, but nothing numbed his pain. I was helpless to stop it, but I couldn’t leave him alone in the state he was in.