by Wendy Knight
"Moab is perfect! We'll just run home, grab some stuff… meet at my house in an hour?" Kim's eyes sparkled, and Harli had no doubt that she was already scheming. Adventures would be had this weekend, whether Harli wanted them or not.
But maybe some adventure was what she needed. Maybe that would finally make her broken heart shut up for thirty seconds so she could breathe without pain. Or close her eyes without seeing his face, and maybe a whole minute could pass without feeling like she might die without his touch. Or his smile.
Damn, she loved that boy.
Sucking back a sob, she nodded. "Moab it is. Meet you at Kim's in an hour, then?" she glanced at Jace, but his face had sobered, and she wondered if he could read the pain in her eyes the way she could read his.
It was different though.
She caused his.
"Yeah. See you in an hour," he said quietly, and turned to go.
"Bring a tent!" Kim yelled around Harli, and Jace chuckled, and Harli had to wonder if her eardrum was blown out, and the sadness passed.
She started the car, watching to make sure Jace made it to his before she left.
It was a ten minute drive to Kim's house, and then another ten minutes to her own neighborhood. She, as always, refused to look at the canal as she drove past. After Angela's death, some of the neighborhood had petitioned to have the canal filled in. But Angela had come from a dirt poor home with a drugged up mother. She fell through the cracks and people forgot.
Levi didn't forget, though. The first thing he bought when he started making money was a headstone.
Harli hit the button and waited for the gate to swing open. "Careful, Harli." she heard Angela's soft voice echo through Rust Bucket. Too late, she realized her yard was full of people. Since JoAnn hadn't been home in years and years, Harli was pretty damn sure it was Selicia, back again.
"Thank you, Angie," she whispered as she slid out of the truck. "I seriously need to start listening to you more."
"Yes. You do."
Harli thanked the heavens that she wasn't going to be around for the weekend. All she had to do was sneak into the house without anyone noticing, grab her stuff, and get the heck out of here.
"Forget your stuff. Just get out of here."
Harli bit the inside of her cheek. It would be a long weekend wearing one outfit with no pajamas, and her stiletto boots weren't exactly made for hiking… or even walking on soft ground. No, she had to get her stuff.
She made it to the door before someone noticed her. Unfortunately, the door at the top of the wide front stairs was higher than the lawns, so she was on a stage of sorts for all of her mother's guests.
"Excuse me! Excuse me, you can't go in there." A man, dressed in expensive clothes and shiny shoes bounded up the stairs after her. "You can't just go wandering in to famous people's houses!"
She gaped at him, and then turned horrified eyes on Selicia, who came smoothly up the stairs, ice in her blue eyes.
"I—I live here. I'm—I'm her daughter," Harli whimpered.
The man sucked his chin in, looking distinctly like a turkey. "Selicia, you have a daughter? She looks as old as you are!"
Selicia smiled flawlessly, but not at Harli. "Yes. She's my daughter. Takes after her father, though." She laughed daintily, because she was tiny and blond with blue eyes, and Harli was almost 5'10", wearing five inch heels, and had olive skin, brown eyes, brown hair. They looked nothing alike.
Everyone around them laughed with her, although Harli had no idea why. Escape seemed the best option here. Angela was practically begging her to run, but running from Selicia never turned out well.
"I'm just grabbing some things—"
"I know you!" Another man, this one tall and handsome with kind eyes, came slowly up the stairs, another member of their impromptu play of terror. "I've seen you on the Forums. You're the girl who can play anything." He turned to everyone else and Harli wanted to strangle him. "She hears a song one time and can play it. She can pick up any instrument and she can play it. It's incredible. Selicia, why didn't you tell us she was your daughter? Imagine the possibilities in our orchestra!" He stared at Selicia as though she'd committed the worst of crimes.
If you only knew.
Selicia's jaw clenched, and Harli could practically hear her teeth cracking.
Harli spoke quickly, backing toward the door. "Oh, she's asked. She's really sweet like that. But we both agreed that my education is the most important thing here."
"Yes," Selicia said, the picture of innocence so sweet it was terrifying. "What if she were, say, to lose a hand? Or the use of her arms? Without an education to fall back on, she'd be in serious trouble, wouldn't she?"
Harli wasn't stupid enough to pretend there wasn't a threat in Selicia's words. Gripping the door handle, she twisted and escaped into the house, Angela urging her to hurry every step of the way.
She grabbed her purple guitar Levi had bought her first. Then three days' worth of clothes, without checking to make sure they matched because it didn't matter. Her drumsticks were next, and the box with all her pictures of Levi through the years. A part of her wondered why, when she was trying to forget him, it was one of her most prized possessions, but she didn't have time for that argument.
"Move it, Harli."
She grabbed her makeup, toothbrush, brush, anything else she could find, and ran back downstairs.
"Almost there."
She skidded to a halt, though, when she saw Selicia standing at the front door.
"Think you're clever, don't you? Coming in here, making me look like the bad one. Think they didn't see right through that?" She wasn't slurring this time, and it was so much more terrifying. "They see you and think, 'Oh, what a great beauty, what a talent.' They don't see that to get there, you stole my beauty and my talent."
Harli stood silently, clutching her bags.
Selicia rushed toward her, grabbed her by the throat, hissing in her face. "Leave here, Harliquin, and never, ever come back. Or I will kill you. Do you understand?"
Harli struggled to breathe.
"Do you?" Selicia screamed. Harli nodded frantically, trying to free her hands from her bags so she could fight Selicia's grip.
But with a sudden, sharp laugh, Selicia dropped her and turned away. "You ruin everything you touch," she said carelessly as she stalked out of the room.
Harli collapsed on the floor, holding her throat, coughing and sucking in air as fast as she could through her shaking lungs.
"Get out of here before she comes back!"
She forced herself to her feet, fighting to see around the black splotches in her vision, and went out the back, through the kitchen and into JoAnn's gardens, full of tomatoes and wild roses. She wound her way through the paths, trying not to cry, until she reached the back wall. Slowly, she followed it around the massive house until she reached the front. She could see Selicia in the courtyard, laughing, preening, like she hadn't just threatened to kill her only daughter.
Harli watched her in silence, wondering why. Wondering how. Wondering what she could have done differently, and wondering if it would ever change.
"I'm so sorry."
She ran for her truck.
LEVI SCROLLED THROUGH HIS phone, finding pictures of Harli, tracing her cheek with his fingertip, memorizing her smile. He'd never gone so long without seeing her before. He'd never gone more than twenty-four hours without talking to her, either, but now it was up to weeks and weeks. All one big, painful blur.
He was bordering on obsessive. He checked her pictures daily, watched videos on the Forums, stalked her on-line to get an update, to know she was okay. Colin kept telling him that if he stopped thinking about her, the pain would go away. But it hurt more if he didn't—she was like a drug to him, and he was addicted to her — heart, body and soul. He was afraid if he stopped remembering her, she would forget him. And he would lose her forever. It didn't make sense, but he didn't care. His heart had never been the most reasonable organ.
"Lower the walls, Sunshine. Let me back in."
The words escaped, barely noticed, because suddenly they were swirling in his head, over and under and around his brain. More lyrics. Digging through his bag, he found the half-finished song he'd been working on for the past several weeks. He'd been stuck, but that one line fit perfectly. He scribbled it down, head bent over uncomfortably with the notebook on his lap, and it was like someone had bashed through the block and a flood of words came through. He couldn't write fast enough.
He wasn't sure how long he sat there, but the sun had set and his neck was seriously messed up by the time he was done. Sitting up, trying to stretch, he re-read what he'd written.
"Damn," he murmured, impressed with himself. It was good. Maybe his best.
Now if only he had Harli to write the music to it. She wrote the music to all their songs. Harli had given them a unique sound, one no one else could replicate because no one else had her genius. He stared at the words on the page, gnawing on the end of his pen, for several long minutes, a plot slowly forming in his exhausted brain. Swallowing his pride, he picked up his phone.
"Are you with Sunshine?"
Jace wrote back almost instantly. "Maybe. Why?"
Levi hated the way reading Jace's answer felt like he'd been punched in the stomach. He'd pretty much asked Jace to take his place, hadn't he? So what did he expect? "I need a favor."
"I think you've asked me enough favors lately, Levi. We're not even friends anymore."
Ouch. That one hurt.
"I'm sorry you feel that way. I didn't realize."
He lay back on his bunk and stared at nothing. When had he and Jace become not-friends? Jace was the first friend he'd had when his drugged up mom had moved their family in. No one else would come near him. They'd still been friends when Levi had given Jace's mom the car Harli wouldn't take. They'd been friends when he'd flown Jace and Harli to all the award shows…
Somewhere along the way, he'd lost Jace just like he'd lost Harli.
"Sorry man. That was harsh. I'm having a shitty day. What's your favor?"
"What's wrong?" Levi was surprised Jace had written back.
"I can't take care of her. Like you asked me to. I can't do it."
Levi sat up so fast he hit his head. Swearing, he tried to rub the goose egg while texting Jace back. "What's going on, Jace?"
"She's upset and she won't tell me why. She went home to grab her stuff and she was fine and she came back and she was upset. Now she's sleeping in the back seat and I don't know what the hell to do."
"Was her mom home?"
He could picture Jace shrugging. "I don't know. She didn't say. Is her mom gone a lot?"
"Not enough," Levi sighed, running a hand through his spiked hair. Gathering his courage, he slid his fingers over the keys and hit send. "Will she talk to me?"
Suddenly, his palms were sweating and his heart was pounding in his chest. It was incredibly difficult to swallow.
His phone buzzed. It was Jace's number, and his heart sank. Until he read the message.
It was Harli. On Jace's phone. He yelled, pumping his fist in the air, more excited about a text than he'd ever been in his life.
"You're using Jace now?"
She was not thrilled. He looked around, trying to find someone to tell him what to do, but all of his band was up in the front, playing video games.
"He's worried about you. If you won't talk to him, you have to talk to me."
Yes. That was good. That was diffusing. Right?
When his phone buzzed again, he nearly leapt out of his bed.
"I can't talk to him. And I don't have to talk to you. Not anymore."
He sucked in a breath. Okay. Okay, he could do this. It wasn't like their entire relationship hung on him saying the right thing. He ran his hand through his hair again, down his face, and stared at his phone. "No. You don't have to talk to me. But you can. You know that, right?"
There was a pause. In his head, she was watching Jace, mulling over her words the same way Levi was. When the phone buzzed, he already knew what she would say. And that was a relief, that he still knew her that well. "My mom's home. Same old thing. Just hurts, you know? But we're leaving for the weekend. Road trip to Moab for Spring Break. It's okay."
He was on familiar ground now. He wrote her back without hesitating, even though his heart was still trying to climb out his throat and when he'd passed a mirror just now, his hair looked like a mad scientist's. "I'm so sorry. Do you need somewhere to stay when you get back?"
He didn't have a home. Not anymore. His house had been foreclosed on when his mom had been sent to prison. He'd lived with Jace the year before he'd hit it big and gone on tour. But he'd buy her a whole freaking block in that town if she would let him.
"I don't think she'll still be around. Thanks though." And a smiley face. A smiley face! He felt better than he had in months. And then he remembered why he'd pestered Jace in the first place.
"Do you need a distraction?"
"No, Levi. We can't go down that road again."
He grinned like an idiot, remembering all the times they'd gone "down that road". "Not that kind of distraction. I need some music."
"New song?" She wrote back instantly. He had her intrigued. Music was her weakness. He should have thought of this months ago.
"Yes ma'am."
"Okay. I'd like that kind of distraction. Can you text me the lyrics?"
Levi sat back with a whoosh, his air escaping his lungs. Well. He hadn't thought this through, had he? She couldn't read the lyrics. Might as well open his soul and hand her a knife. He attacked his hair again, thinking idly that his hairstylist was going to kill him. "I can't. What fun would that be? I need something haunting, hollow but beautiful. Like sunset or rain during a funeral."
Anyone else would think he was completely insane asking for something like that.
But not her.
Instead she wrote back, "I'm on it." And he got another smiley face. Two seconds later, his phone buzzed again.
"Thank you."
He fell back on his pillows, grinning at the ceiling like a deranged lunatic.
Holy hell, he loved that girl. Grabbing his phone, he wrote her one more time, already knowing that she wouldn't respond. If he'd played it right, she would be consumed by the music by now, and probably wouldn't even hear her phone. And things felt more right with the world than they had in a long, long time. But he wrote her back anyway.
"Always."
Chapter Seven
LEVI'S PHONE RANG RIGHT NEXT TO his head, blaring Shattered Assassin's latest release as his ringtone. Great song, but not to wake up to. He gasped, sat up too fast, smacked his head, again, and tumbled off the bunk. Swearing, he dug through his blankets for his phone, praying it was Harli.
It wasn't Harli.
He cleared his throat twice, but still sounded like a sick frog when he answered. "'Ello?"
"Hey, it's Keven."
Keven. Levi sat up straighter, juggling his phone. "Did you find out what happened?"
"She came to the ER about 5:30 PM with second and third degree burns on her arms, chest, and torso, claiming she'd fallen into a fire. When they asked who they could call, she snuck out at 3:30 AM. She went to the school and, I'm guessing, slept there until it started at 7:45 AM."
"She's a janitor there. She starts work at 6:30," Levi mumbled. "And Selicia?"
He hadn't asked for the information during the first call, but Keven had it anyway. "She left the estate at 6:02. Was pulled over for drunk driving in Salt Lake City at 6:58. Was bailed out of jail by a Stockton Debile at 11:45 PM."
Awesome. "Great. Thanks, Keven."
"Yep."
Keven hung up. He wasn't big on wasted words. Levi stood, dragging his blankets back onto his bunk. Usually, when she'd had a run in with Selicia, she would come to him. But not anymore. Now she hid it from him like she hid it from everyone else. But he remembered the first time. It was seared into his brain an
d haunted his nightmares.
Was that tapping? Levi sat up, staring around him in confused panic. His mom was passed out drunk on the couch. Her boyfriends were doing who knew what. Levi got up, inching around the room, and flipped on the light.
The tapping came again, hesitant and soft. From the window. Wondering what crazy person his mom had led home this time, he crossed the room and threw back the sheet covering the glass. Harli stood there, tears running down her cheeks, biting her lip.
"Sunshine? What are you doing?" he asked through the screen.
"My mom—my mom is home. Can I come in?" she hiccupped around a sob.
"Of course, baby. Hang on." He pulled on basketball shorts and ran through the house, meeting her at the front door. "Shhhh." He put a finger to his lips, taking her hand and leading her through the small living room to the back of the house. He shut the bedroom door and flipped on the lamp. A long scratch and a welt rose angrily on Harli's cheek. He pushed her bedraggled curls back so he could see more clearly. "What happened, Harli? What did she do to you?"
"I—I asked her for money to buy new drums. She said I couldn't play the drums and I—I argued with her. I shouldn't have. It's my fault."
Levi felt a protective fury rise, hot and overwhelming, up through his stomach and chest to curl in his throat. "This is not your fault, Harli. Do you hear me? She's angry that you're a musical genius and she's not."
Harli winced, crossing her arms over her chest protectively. "She's really good. She probably is a musical genius. Or she would have been, if I hadn't come along and screwed everything up."
"She's nothing compared to you, and she knows it. And she's a selfish, vindictive person who is pissed off that you're better than she is."
Harli sobbed. "I don't want to be better than she is. I just want her to love me."
Levi gathered her into his arms, holding her tight like he could protect her from the hurt. They'd only been together for a few months, but he'd suspected her mom was hitting her for over a year.
He could feel Harli trembling against him, and he pressed kisses against her forehead and her hair, moving down to kiss each of the tears soaking her cheek, until his mouth found hers. She clung to him, kissing him almost desperately, her hands clutching at his bare chest, her nails scraping at his skin. "Levi," she whimpered, molding herself against him. He wanted her, everything in him ached to push her further. He knew she wouldn't argue—she was sixteen and practically the only virgin left in the school—but now wasn't the time. He had to protect her, not take more from her.
