“Thanks, but you guys can resume your conversation.”
“We’re done. Don’t go.”
“Thanks, really. I’m just tired.”
After she left, Brad said, “Okay, so how’s this sound? Me, then Zane, Ethan, and Nick. And we’ll rotate that way from now on. And I like Zane’s idea, that you have the couch the night after you have the bedroom.” The guys nodded. “And I know you guys are gonna accuse me of being a hard ass, but it needs saying—cots and bedding in the closet after you get up. This place is way too small to leave that shit out all day.”
“Bradley, why the fuck you feel the need to be a dictator all the time?” Ethan put the emphasis on the first syllable, indicating in no uncertain terms that he thought Brad was a dick.
“Man, don’t give me grief. We gotta have ground rules. Otherwise, we’ll wind up wanting to kill each other.”
He looked at Brad through half-lowered lids. “Too late.”
Brad had just about had it. Zane said, “Come on, guys. Ethan, Brad’s right. This is the democratic way of doing things. It’s only fair.”
Ethan rolled his eyes. “Yeah, I guess so.”
He didn’t apologize, but at least he chilled out. Brad would settle for that. “Anything else we need to cover?”
Zane said, “I think we’re good.”
Nick said, “Movie time!” Brad got out his laptop and slid it over to Nick. Nick had a movie collection online and had a compilation of bad horror movies he liked to share. Brad got the last six-pack of beer out of the fridge and settled on the floor.
They started watching the movie—dumb by any standard, but Nick made it funny. The guy had so many zingers, it was hard not to enjoy the movie.
And that was why it didn’t escape Brad’s notice that Ethan left for a while. He realized Ethan might have just been using the restroom, but he had a feeling it was something else, something involving Valerie. And he bit his tongue and tried to shut off the part of his brain that still wanted her…because she wasn’t his and never would be, and the sooner he admitted that to himself, the sooner he could let her go.
* * *
By the end of their first week, Brad was feeling better about his whole life. He managed to get an interview, followed up with a job. He fucking hated changing oil and lubing cars, but it would help pay the bills until they could make serious bank with the band. If they could get a good following, they could record a quality EP instead of the shitty one they’d done during a practice session—but that was a far-off dream. For now, he lived for the shows.
And the two shows they played that weekend were incredible. They got better and better as a band, every time they played together. Brad knew it was just a matter of time before they broke big. He had to be ready—and have them all prepared—for that moment.
They were all chilling out Sunday afternoon. It had been a long week, but he could tell by the general mood that they all felt good about it.
They ate hamburgers and fries around the kitchen table, celebrating their first week. They were settling into a routine, getting used to working and living with each other, and they weren’t killing each other.
He had an idea for a song, and he needed a strong bass line to go with it, so he asked Zane to help him work it out. They went to the big bedroom and started working out a cool chorus. Nick asked to borrow the laptop to pick out some movies for later.
After a while, he and Zane got tired, wanting to return to it the next day, and Nick said he’d picked out three great movies for the afternoon. One was actually a comedy on purpose. So the three of them sat around the silly little laptop, and, after a while, Brad dozed off in the chair. His belly was full and he knew, starting the next day, he was going to have to start playing responsible adult again. For now, though, he wanted to chill.
He woke up sometime during the second movie, and as the day grew later, he, Nick, and Zane started talking about dinner. “Where’s Ethan and Val?” Zane asked.
Even though Brad had been sleeping, he was under the impression that they were gone. At a couple of points during the afternoon, the front door had opened and closed more than once. He shrugged and considered texting his friend, but somehow he knew. He got up, trying to look nonchalant, but he wanted to beat the shit out of something. Instead, he wandered to the bathroom under the guise of using the facilities, but he glanced down the hall and confirmed what he already knew—Val’s bedroom door was open. She wasn’t there.
The other bedroom door was open. Ethan was nowhere to be found.
They were together. He didn’t know what they were doing or when they’d be back, but he knew they were together.
That called for a bottle of liquor. They had one or two somewhere. As long as he didn’t get drunk, he’d be okay, but he needed something to drown it out. And, as he took a swig, only pretending to watch the movie, he wondered when the wounds would start to scab over so he could get on with his life.
Chapter Thirty
BRAD’S PHONE ALARM woke him up bright and early Monday morning. He rolled off the couch and made some coffee. Then he headed to the bathroom. Sure as shit, Val’s bedroom door was ajar. Of course, there was only one cot being used in the living room too, but seeing that Val wasn’t there simply confirmed his deepest fear. Not only were she and Ethan together, but there was only one reason why they’d spend the night somewhere else.
Unless…
He knew how Ethan was. There was a chance that Ethan had overdone it on something illegal, and Val was keeping him safe.
He had his doubts, though. They hadn’t been living in their new city long enough for Ethan to establish new connections—or had they? Ethan was resourceful and, if he were desperate, he could have tracked down whatever it was he needed. He had a hard time believing Valerie would handle an OD on her own, though.
Brad was torn. As much as he wanted to believe Val and Ethan were friends only, he hated the idea of Ethan hurting himself with drugs…and yet, in the darkest part of his heart, he halfway hoped that was what had happened. It was better than the alternative, the option the rational part of his mind suspected was the truth.
But he wouldn’t know and had to pretend like he didn’t care or even know, because he had to go to work.
He was glad to have the distraction of a new job. Yes, he’d worked in a similar place before, but every business had its own way of doing things. That, and he had to get to know new people. Fortunately, the guys he worked with seemed down to earth and simple, guys he could relate to. For the most part, he was able to keep his mind off his problem.
The one drawback of the job was no girls. He could have used a distraction. Sure, plenty of girls and women got their cars serviced, but they didn’t have any females working with them. It’s not that women couldn’t do the work, but obviously none had applied or been hired at this particular job. He’d always thought the right woman in this kind of job could be downright sexy, but most women wouldn’t even consider getting themselves greasy and gritty, and he really didn’t blame them.
The job wasn’t bad. He hadn’t told his employer about his main goal in Denver, because he didn’t think it would ever interfere. The business closed at six. Most of the earliest shows he’d ever played started at seven, and the rest of the band could always set up without him if they had to. If he ever had to do a day show on a weekend, he’d ask for time off, but he wanted to settle into the job first. He needed to prove himself first before making requests or demands. And if this job was anything like his old one, turnover would be high. If Brad stuck it out, he’d be a veteran on the job before he knew it, and oftentimes employers would treat employees with loyalty better. Whether he liked the work itself or not didn’t matter. If he could get along with his fellow employees and keep his boss happy, he could make sure the rent was paid and continue pursuing his dream.
Another plus was this job paid better than the one back home, and he had to guess it was because of the local cost of living. Groceries didn’t seem
to cost more and gas was cheaper, but rent was higher, and he wouldn’t know about utilities until their first bills started trickling in. He wanted to be prepared.
When the day was over and he started driving home, it washed over him again. He was grateful he was in his little piece of shit car. He had few associations of it with Valerie and his mind was there anyway, but there was nothing tangible in the car to slap him in the face. He’d had Zane drive it behind him in the van when they came to Denver, and now he was glad. The car got better gas mileage and was easier to navigate. That kept the van reserved for shows only.
He managed to stay calm until he started walking up the stairs to their apartment. He had no idea what to expect. He stood in the hall for a few moments, focusing on his breathing. He had to put on a happy face. No, a neutral face would do, but he couldn’t let anyone know that whatever was going on between Valerie and Ethan bothered him. If he hadn’t been so fucking stupid—playing a chivalrous gentleman, both with Val and her dad—all bets would be off, but he’d pretty much told her he was cooling things off between them. He supposed then that it was only natural for Val to cozy up to Ethan. He was pretty sure, though, that Ethan had made a move, because neither of them had seemed interested in each other over the summer. Yeah, Val had bitched about the drugs (and, he supposed, that was a sign she cared), but nothing else had happened.
When he finally forced himself to enter the apartment, his nose was assaulted with the smells of dinner. It smelled good. Then he saw Val in the kitchen at the stove, working away. He could hear the guys in the big bedroom playing something new too, so that made him happy. They weren’t screwing around—they were starting to see that they had to work hard to get to where they wanted to go.
Part of him wanted to go straight into the shower, but there were several reasons why he couldn’t. The first would be that it would make him obvious. Brad wasn’t antisocial, for starters, but he also had the problem of needing clean clothes he’d have to get out of the big bedroom. So he mustered up as cheerful a face as he could manage and said, “Smells great.”
Val turned from the stove, smiling. She looked radiant but tired. “It’s really nothing.”
“I’m sure it’s fine.” He started moving toward the hallway.
“New job start today?”
“Yeah. Overalls give it away?”
She laughed. “The powers of deduction.”
He smiled and walked toward the bedroom. It was too painful. He walked in the door, and Ethan and Zane were sitting on the edge of the bed, hunched over a sheet of paper, both with their instruments resting in their laps. Nick was sitting in front of a tom and a snare with two sticks, probably just to give them a beat, but without the entire set up, he couldn’t envision the magic percussion Nick could give something. He knew already that they were going to have to push the bed against the wall to set up the entire kit. There was no room for it at the moment.
For now, he was just going to grab a t-shirt and jeans. He had a couple of pairs of coveralls from the company, but he was going to have to do laundry every three days. There was no way to keep them from getting too filthy. So he figured he’d have to do laundry twice a week. As he walked to the dresser, Zane and Ethan deep in discussion, Nick looked up at him and said in a high-pitched voice, “Honey, I’m home.”
The other guys looked up. Zane asked, “First day, right?”
“Yeah.” He walked over to the dresser and opened up his drawer to grab underwear and socks. Then he made his way to the closet. He had folded his t-shirts and jeans into boxes so they didn’t have to fight over space. He pulled out one of each and headed toward the door.
“That bad?” Nick asked.
Brad shrugged. Yeah, Ethan’s silence was telling. Something had happened the night before, and considering the guy didn’t look any worse for the wear, Brad concluded it wasn’t drug-related. “I wasn’t holding my guitar, so yeah.” And he headed for the shower, ready to wash the day off himself.
He had to act normally too, so as he stood under the warm water in the shower, he tried to shove it all down deep. He had, whether he’d wanted to or not, become their leader, and, as such, he needed to let his angst go. He himself had done it and expertly so. He’d told Valerie—and then assured her father later—that nothing would happen between them. What else had he expected when he’d basically let her go?
So he got out and toweled off, dressing and then throwing his dirty clothes in the box in the closet where he kept his soiled laundry till he could wash it. The guys had already left the bedroom. He forced himself again to take a deep breath and let it all go. Out there, at the kitchen table, were his four best friends, and they were his band, his family. No matter what happened, they were his life, and he had to find a way to get past this. He had to.
* * *
After dinner (which wasn’t anything to write home about but edible—and he’d never say that to Val), he wasn’t as convinced that anything had happened between her and Ethan. They hardly even looked at each other. And that night at bedtime, they weren’t together. Brad started to doubt his earlier suspicions. Yeah, they’d been gone for a night together, but he was starting to think maybe they hadn’t consummated anything. They were acting too normal around each other. True, Val no longer acted permanently pissed at Ethan, but she hadn’t acted that way in a while.
It was like old times—if he could say they had them yet. They were all laughing and joking and having a good time. Val said she had an interview the next day, and everyone asked about Brad’s job. Then they talked about the three shows planned for the weekend, and they all got pumped. The guys started talking about writing new material again.
The next day, in fact, the three other guys put something together. Brad was glad they were being productive, and it felt different, making it even better. When they were done playing it (raw and unpolished, but Brad could hear the potential), Ethan looked at Val and asked, “Think you can pen some words to it pretty quickly?”
“How quickly?”
“By our next show?”
“Well…probably…but getting it down is another story. We’ll need to practice it together some like we always do.”
He was glad to see some drive, but what game was Ethan playing? Every once in a while, the guy felt the need to upstage Brad. It was some deep-seated desire in his friend, one he’d never understood. He got why Ethan could so often be self-centered and even cruel, but the need to one up his best friend in the world never made any sense. Still, he didn’t need this to be a source of contention between them. It wasn’t important enough. So, after considering it for a few moments, he said, “I need some time too…unless you’re wanting me out of this one, man.”
Yeah, and there it was—the flare, the challenge. Either Ethan was pissed that he hadn’t gotten the rise out of Brad he’d wanted or he knew Brad wasn’t responding on purpose, and that was making him doubly desirous of pushing him. But then his features softened as though it was no big deal, and he said, “Nah. I’m just excited to play this one.”
Brad hoped that was all it was. He wanted his friend to know he wasn’t blowing him off, and he hoped Ethan was sincere. “Me too. It’s fuckin’ awesome. Good stuff. Maybe we could shoot for next weekend.”
And, maybe by then, everything would feel right again, because the only time it did anymore was when he was onstage. That was the only time everything in his world was perfect.
Chapter Thirty-one
BURY HIMSELF IN the music—that’s what Brad had always done when things in real life weren’t going the way they were supposed to. And that’s what he’d do now. Unlike back at home, he had to drive longer to get to and from work and the traffic took some getting used to, so those things took away from the time he could sink into music. Fortunately, he could spend the drive thinking. That was sometimes also a downfall, though, and today had turned out that way.
He needed time. He didn’t understand why not having Val was bothering him more now than it
had all summer long.
That wasn’t true. He knew why when he admitted it to himself. It was because she was now fully on Ethan’s radar, and Brad didn’t know if Ethan cared enough about her to treat her right. Still, it was what Val wanted, and he needed to stay out of it.
He was going to try. He wasn’t going to look for significant glances between Ethan and Val or try to determine anything. It was better if he didn’t know. If they would both go off somewhere, he’d try not to think about it. He had to let it all go and just give the music his undivided attention.
So that night, while he was trying to drift off to sleep in spite of the guys watching yet another horror movie on his laptop with the sound turned halfway down, he didn’t force himself to sit up when he heard…what sounded like a woman having an orgasm.
It could’ve been across the hall, right? It might not have even been what he thought it was. And, the next morning, he tried to convince himself it was something on the movie the guys were watching the night before. He wouldn’t ask, because he didn’t want to know. It didn’t help that Ethan wasn’t in Val’s room the next morning, leaving Brad full of more doubt.
God, this was bad, and he had to find a way to let it go. He was making himself miserable.
What made it worse was he wasn’t able to book many more shows per week than he had living farther away. One or two more, maybe, but not like he’d wanted. One plus was they were finally running a decent merch table, and he made the rest of the band run it. No one complained about it, but it was the one thing he didn’t want to be responsible for. He put Zane in charge of purchasing t-shirts and other items. The guy had found a company that would make them bulk buttons, but they were going to wait to buy them. Nick, their artist, was designing a better logo for them, so they didn’t want to buy all the buttons they’d have to purchase to make it a good deal if it wasn’t with their final logo. Zane had also had bumper stickers and smaller stickers made, but the bumper stickers weren’t selling for shit and the little stickers they’d just decided to give away. Zane thought they might want to make a poster too, but they were still discussing that one. Val was going to sit at their table for the first time that weekend, and then all of them would have done it at least once. But he told them it was their responsibility, their baby, and they swore they wouldn’t let him down.
Bullet Series Box Set Books 1-8 Page 113
