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  I eased out of bed and found my jeans on the floor where they’d been discarded so carelessly the previous night. Somehow, I managed to answer just before Chevy hung up. He chuckled into the phone as I grunted a hello. “I thought you had last night off, why do you sound like death?”

  “A man can still have a late night even when he’s not working, Son.”

  “Please, tell me you mean that late night happened with Mel, or just the guys,” he pleaded.

  It was my turn to laugh. “She’s still here,” I explained quietly as I moved away from the bedroom area of the suite and out to the combination kitchen-lounge area.

  “Well, that’s good news,” Chevy mentioned, though his voice was heavy. I knew he must have been calling with news of his own, and from the sounds of it, not the good kind. It made me almost feel guilty about the fact that I’d had such an incredible night with Mel, finally.

  “What’s going on, Chev?”

  “I talked to Opal, finally.” He sighed so heavily that I swear I felt it through the phone. “It took forever to get her family to let me in to see her.”

  “How is she doing?”

  “She’s getting better, but I guess there’s no feeling down the majority of her legs. The doctors think she’s lucky because she still has full function of her hips, bladder, and whatnot. Opal doesn’t see it that way though. She thinks she’s broken.”

  “Well, she has every right to feel that way, and it will take her awhile to come to terms with what that means for her life. From what you just said, it sounds like she was pretty lucky though.”

  “Yeah, I just wish she would see it that way. Opal doesn’t think we should be together anymore because a rock star can’t have a girlfriend in a wheelchair.”

  “Well, Chev, as much as you don’t want to hear this, it’s something you need to consider. She’s not comfortable with her outlook yet. Imagine the media splashing her issues on the front page of the tabloids. Imagine being out in public with her and being mobbed by fans. I’m not saying it’s not possible, but her condition will definitely require more planning on your part when your band starts to take off.”

  “I know all that. I talked to Phoenix about the logistics for her safety when she’s at home, school, work, or out on tour with me. I’m pretty sure we covered almost every possible scenario and how to handle it just in case.”

  Pride swelled my chest that my son was so forward thinking and also that he wasn’t willing to just toss his girl aside because she was hurt. “I’m so fucking in awe of you,” I told him.

  “What? Why?”

  “Do you know how many up and coming rock star little shits would think of all of that, let alone ask an expert to help them plan?”

  “No clue,” he replied.

  “None that I’ve ever known.” I thought a moment about Jay, from The Infinite Everything then. “Okay, well not many. I probably only know one who would have been thinking that far ahead about logistics. Most wouldn’t have seen her as a problem to keep around, the few who might have done so, would have made her safety someone else’s priority.”

  “Then those assholes wouldn’t deserve her,” he argued back.

  “Not denying that, Son. I’m just letting you know that I’m proud of you for being the standup man who would prove everyone wrong. Did you talk to her about already having a plan?”

  “Of course I did, but she just said that it wouldn’t matter. It’s only half the issue. She says that she wouldn’t be able to keep up with my lifestyle and I was already thinking about all the ways I’d have to change things up just to accommodate her.” Chevy grew quiet for a minute, but I didn’t think it was appropriate to butt in. He sounded like he was thinking through something. “What made you give up on my mom? You said you were in love with her, that if you had known about me, you would have given it all up to stay with her, with us. What changed that for you? How do you decide when the feelings you have aren’t enough anymore?” He was rambling, and desperation was beginning to crack his voice. “If you truly loved her, how could you just leave her behind?”

  “Kendra Kendrick was the love of my life,” I told Chevy. “She was everything to me, but I knew that her family would never accept me if I was out changing people’s oil, working at the local grocery store, or even joining the military. Blue collar work was never going to impress them. Hell, having no money, no fame, and no special name to speak of would never have impressed those people. For as much as your mom probably complains about them, I knew she needed them too. She loved them, despite their flaws and interference in our relationship.

  “I left to make that name for myself, to earn the money that would impress them and allow me to give Kendra the life she’d grown up with. I knew what it was like to have nothing, Chev. I grew up with a mom who didn’t really care to figure out what her best was when it came to parenting. I watched different men float in and out of my life, which meant sometimes we had enough to eat and other times, I was going hungry while they burned through the money eating out and my mom took care of those assholes instead of me. Never in a million years did I ever want to become one of them and force your mom to have to look after me, or not have enough for her or any future children we’d have.”

  “Okay, I get that, but why didn’t you just take her with you? That’s what I want to do with Opal.”

  “Sometimes, life isn’t that cut and dry. I was offered the contract on the stipulation that I had to hop on the plane and leave that day. Kendra was at school, her dad wanted me gone. The plan was always to come back and get her once I had the signed contract in hand.”

  “Okay, so what happened?”

  “They didn’t want a solo act. Sure, the management wanted me as a songwriter, but they didn’t think I could carry a solo gig and take it to the top. So, the search was on for a few more guys to be a part of a group. Think boyband search for rock stars. John and I were thrown together immediately as roommates and hit it off. The rest came over the next few months. I went back to explain, once before, but she was on a date. Then, when I got the chance to go back and fight for her…” It was my turn to sigh like the weight of the world was on my shoulders. “Chevy, you need to know, that if I could go back and do it all over, I would have done everything so differently. Your mom and I would have been together, like we were meant to be, and all those years of you growing up would have been moments we spent together. Your mom, her love, you, it would have all been worth it. I would have given it all up. It’s something that I think about far too often.”

  I stood there, tracing a scratch in the table near the floor to ceiling window. “I never want you to know the feeling left behind when the only woman you ever loved, the only one you think you’ll ever love in your life, is in another man’s arms. It does something to you, breaks you. Knowing that I could have avoided that, if I hadn’t made a rash decision, no matter the cost, I would go back and change it.” I didn’t think I’d change a thing now, looking back, because I had a successful band and Mel now. He needed to know the seriousness of his actions moving forward where Opal was concerned though. Kendra and I could have been happy. There was no doubt about that. While I would literally give anything to have been a part of my son’s life as he grew up, all that regret could offer was a bit of insight into what to do in his situation. I was about to tell him as much when I glanced up, to look out at the city beyond the window and caught sight of a wide-eyed Mel standing there with her hand pulled up to stifle the gasp she’d just made. Shit.

  “Mel?” I called out, but I was too late, she was already on the move, dressed and heading toward the hotel room door. “Mel, wait,” I yelled out as the door slammed shut. “Shit!” I hissed between clenched teeth, forgetting I was even on the phone for just a moment.

  “Dad! Please, tell me you didn’t just say all that where Mel could hear you?” I couldn’t answer his question, because I most certainly had, and she had no way of knowing where I was coming from or why. “No! Hang up! You have to go afte
r her.”

  I did just that, but she wasn’t in her assigned room when I got there. Instead, I managed to scare Ev and had her contacting security to see if they could track my woman down. “What did you do?” Ev asked, but there was nothing I could say to make up for the fact that she had heard me tell my son that I’d never love anyone other than his mother. After the night we had spent together, that was the last thing she needed to hear the morning after, when we promised to talk about our relationship in the morning.

  14 – Bent & Bitten

  Waking up, feeling like my life was finally back on track and maybe I could be happy again, maybe truly happy for the first time in my life, and then to find out it was all an illusion, is probably the worst feeling I’ve ever experienced.

  I heard every single word. Well, not the beginning of his conversation, because I’d woken up alone and got dressed before I went to search Gabe out. I figured, by the tone and things being spoken of that he was talking to Chevy, but then… I choked on the emotion clogging my throat just thinking about it. He had admitted to his son that Kendra was the only woman he’d ever love. Despite my best efforts, I ended up making myself a tour toy after all, and now I felt as though I’d just be the laughing stock to everyone. Plenty of warnings had come my way, especially from the crew who knew what had gone on previously with Gabe and Kaylee – the makeup girl. Unlike that girl, I wasn’t about to turn myself into a full-blown nuisance though. I was soon to be 35 years old, had been through a shit divorce, lost my entire family, my job, and my peace of damn mind. I survived all that, this too would pass.

  I ended up taking an Uber to Celebration Pointe for a little retail therapy. Not that I was ever much of a shopper, but I did only have a limited supply of clothing with me, and I’d already worn everything I brought with me so many times that even I was sick of seeing the same things on repeat. I tried to turn off that little reel inside my head where Gabe’s words were stuck on repeat, but it was difficult. Instead, I just sat down with some food for lunch, still having not found anything worthwhile to buy, and I really examined what he had been saying to his son. Maybe, I had overreacted a bit by running out. No.

  Even if he had been trying to give his son a reason to work things out with Opal, or to explain again how he wished he could have been a father to Chevy as he grew up, it still hurt for me to hear that he considered Kendra to be the only woman he would ever love. That meant that there would never be any room for me in his heart. I had already been down that road with another man before, and it was one I wasn’t willing to take again. My cell rang again, this time, it was Chevy trying to reach me. For the first time since I met him, I thought about not answering, but then I worried that something might be wrong with him and realized that turning away his call could never be something I did.

  “Hello?”

  “Oh thank God! Mel, where are you?”

  I laughed at the relief in his voice. “Shopping for something new to wear,” I told him bluntly.

  “Oh,” was his immediate response.

  “Is there something you needed, Chevy, because I haven’t quite found what I’m looking for and I need to be back before long in case anyone gets injured, or whatever.”

  “No, I, um…” he tripped over his words for a minute, no doubt wondering about my calm and collected voice. “I just wanted to check in with you because it’s been a couple days.”

  “I’m fine. Same old thing, different day. You know how it goes here,” I mentioned cheerfully, even though the falseness of it ate away at the food I’d tried to consume and made my stomach bubble up.

  “Okay, but I thought…” he started to say.

  “Is everything good with you and Opal?” I questioned before he could get it out.

  “Not quite, but I finally got to see her yesterday. That was at least a step forward, I think.”

  “Progress of any kind is always a good thing, honey. I’m glad you got to see her face to face. How is she looking?”

  “Too skinny, too sad, but she’s gained her color back and from what her mom said, she’s finally eating again now. The feeling is gone from the tops of her thighs down, Mel. That’s better than what you talked to me about before, right?”

  “That’s amazing, Chevy. It’ll help with her healing process tremendously.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I thought.” His mind seemed far away and preoccupied, and while I wanted to be there for him, I just needed a little space for myself too.

  “Listen, Chevy, I really want to hear more about Opal, but I have to get going if I’m going to make it back to the venue before the concert starts, okay?”

  “Are you alone?”

  “Yes.”

  “You know that’s not safe, Mel,” he scolded.

  “No one knows who I am, promise.”

  “Mel,” he started again, concern edging his voice.

  “Okay, well you take care of yourself, I love you.”

  “Love you too,” I heard just before I clicked off the line. My heart hurt a bit more, thinking about what might happen to my relationship with Chevy if I no longer had any at all with his father. Would he write me off in support of his dad?

  “Ugh,” I moaned as I stood and moved back toward the next store that might have something I’d be comfortable wearing. There seemed to be no middle ground in this shopping mall. Either there wasn’t enough material on the clothing offered to cover all my bits, or I’d drown in far too much material. There was never an option for the in-between women. The ones who wanted their clothes to fit while not revealing more of their bodies than a bathing suit was supposed to. I was about to chalk the shopping trip up as another slice of my shit-pie day, and then I saw the perfect outfit being worn by a mannequin in the window of a store I’d never heard of.

  ~*~

  Later that evening, I dressed on the bus in my new outfit. It was a fresh pair of dark blue jeans that hugged my body, an off the shoulder, cream-colored shirt made of the softest damn cotton material I had ever felt, and the topper was the gorgeous ankle boots I found to match. I didn’t bother glamming up beyond the outfit. Instead, I pulled my hair up into a high ponytail, swiped on some waterproof mascara and dabbed a little tinted lip balm on my lips before I headed inside the venue to get my ass back to work. Honestly, while I didn’t wish anything bad on anyone, there was a nagging worry in the back of my mind that I’d have to sit backstage and listen to him croon those same songs I’d come to love, only now, they were tainted with a bit of heartbreak for me. This was going to suck, unless I had something to keep me busy.

  As I moved through the backstage area, the opening band was already behind the scenes making the best of their time, as were some of the crew members for the tour. I just worked on perfecting my tunnel vision so I didn’t have to see what they were doing in the dark recesses of the hallway, or behind any of the doors. There was almost always an emergency area in the back set aside for first responders to work on people while waiting on a bus to the hospital – just in case. That was where I usually stationed myself if I wasn’t watching the concert side-stage. Once I got back there, I started flipping through the emergency kit the crew left in there for me, to make sure I had everything I needed and if I didn’t, to add the supplies missing from the kit to a list of things that should get reordered.

  I’d been back there through most of Dusty Rose’s set when a man’s desperate yowling from out in the hallway caught my attention. “What’s going on?” I asked as I cleared the doorway and saw one of the crew members – Lonny – holding his junk with blood dripping from his fingers. “Oh my God, Lonny, what happened?”

  “That bitch,” he pointed with his other hand at a smug-looking brunette who had a little trace of blood around the edge of her mouth. “That psycho whore bit my dick,” he yelled. The woman laughed as she walked away.

  I couldn’t believe it. “What the hell possessed her to bite you… there?”

  “She thought I was in the band, and some asshole informed her
that I wasn’t. So, she bit down.”

  “Did you lie to her and tell her you were with the band?”

  “Nah. I never lie. I don’t correct their assumptions either though.” I waved away his response and tried to get him to sit, but there wasn’t enough light in the seat that faced the door.

  “Well, just so you know, even if you had lied, that’s not a good enough reason to ever do this to man.”

  “Don’t I fucking know it,” he hissed.

  “Lonny, I can’t see well enough right here. Do you think you could stand and move over to the backside of the couch? Maybe, use the back edge to lean against while I take a look and see if we need to get you to the hospital.”

  “I don’t want to go to the hospital. They’ll make fun of me.”

  “I hate to tell you, but you know how news travels on these tours, everyone of the crew is going to make fun of your dick getting bit.”

  He tried to laugh and ended up groaning in pain instead. “Come on, Mel, don’t do that. It pulls the wrong muscles.”

  It was my turn to laugh. “Sorry,” I told him as I gloved up while we moved.

  “Just so you know, I don’t care if these fuckwits on tour with us know. It’s just more street cred with them.” I raised my eyebrows in question so he went on talking while I forced him to let go of the hold he had on his very sore, flaccid penis. “You know, they’ll be talking about this for ages, but the assholes out there, who don’t travel, would never understand.”

  “I see, the joke stays among family,” I managed to clarify as I grabbed a simple saline wound wash to gently spray on the area so that I could wash the blood away.

  “Fuck!” Lonny hissed. “That was chilly, Mel.”

  “Lonny, I don’t have anywhere to warm it up. This isn’t a doctor’s office, and you don’t have time anyway.”

  “What’s that mean? Am I gonna lose it? Shit! I knew there was too much blood. Someone needs to kill that rabid bitch.”

  I couldn’t help the chuckle that escaped. “Lonny, you’re not going to lose your dick,” I told him. Judging from what I could see the top was less damaged, hosting just a small scrape. It was the bottom of his penis that had taken the brunt of damage from her teeth. “I need to get closer,” I told him. “Can you hand me a pillow?” The moment he handed it to me, I dropped down it on the floor in front Lonny and immediately sunk to my knees there so I could see the wound better, and figure out if I needed to sew anything up, send him on to the hospital, or what.