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Ransom releases my arm and I sit back down, reaching back into my crumpled bag to finish off my now lukewarm fries. Might as well not let the food go to waste.
“After this, Muse, if it's still alright with you, I'd like to book that ticket,” I say casually.
“Sure thing, Cutie,” he says, but the way he looks at me, I get the feeling he can see right through my false bravado and straight into the depths of my tired, empty soul.
I take Muse's phone into the back room—what I guess they call the Bat Cave, probably because of the giant bat shaped headboard—and sit on the edge of the bed. Quickly, I look up flights from Denver to Phoenix and find one that leaves at eight tomorrow morning. It's cheap, too, a fifth of the price of the one to New York.
I feel a little better taking Muse's money that way, purchasing the ticket and then pausing when he appears in the hallway, padding down to stand in front of me with his arms crossed over the front of his white wifebeater.
“I had your car towed to an auto body shop. It should be ready by next week. It's my number they've got on file, so if you want to plug yours into my phone, I'll give you a call when they call me about it.”
My heart jumps and skitters a little with anxiety.
“That's really nice of you, but I can't afford—”
Muse leans his forearm against the doorframe and gives me a sad half-smile.
“I told you I was loaded; don't worry about it.” I find my eyes drawn to his silver hair. It's such a strange color; I wonder what it takes to dye it like that. Probably buckets and buckets of bleach. It's so ethereal and sexy, fading into the perfect darkness of his roots.
“Thank you,” I tell him, feeling this huge surge of relief. I don't feel like I have a right to accept such generosity, but who am I to look a gift horse in the mouth? I plug my number into his contacts and hand the phone back, feeling a cool wash of sensation when our fingers brush.
He smiles at me, but I have a hard time smiling back. There's something about Muse that says he gets it all, all the tiny, practical little life things that the others don't seem to be aware of.
“Are you sure you're going to be okay?” he asks finally, and this time, I make myself smile.
“Yeah, I'll …” Daddy is dead; Daddy is dead. “I'll be fine.”
“How are you going to get your car if you're in New York?” he asks casually, scrolling on his phone with his thumb. I see the screen reflected in the lenses of his glasses; he's looking at the travel site. I feel my throat get tight. “Ah,” he says, like he expected this all along, “you're not going to New York anymore.”
“She's already scheduled him to be cremated,” I blurt, shoving red hair over my shoulder. It's so long, halfway down my back. I just want to hack it all off with a pair of blunt scissors, take my frustration out on my hair. “My stepmom. She's having Dad cremated and she's not having a funeral and she's selling the house …” I trail off and force myself to take a deep breath, looking away, toward the framed records on the wall. All those awards for Beauty in Lies. Looking at their accomplishments, I feel sick. What the hell have I done with my life?
The answer is heartbreaking.
Nothing.
I've done nothing.
“May I come in?” Muse asks, looking down at me with his hazel eyes.
“It's your bus,” I say, but that's not a good enough answer for him. He crosses his arms over his chest and takes a deep breath. “Yes.”
“Thank you.”
He steps inside and closes the door behind him, crawling onto the bed and tossing his phone onto one of the shelves on the headboard. I kick off my heels and join him, my tight black dress riding up as I scoot across the bed and nestle into the pillows.
When I notice Muse watching me with dilated pupils, I get this hot, achy feeling all over my body. He must see something of that feeling in my face because his hazel eyes get wide.
“You don't owe me anything,” he says suddenly, holding up his palm. “I came in here to talk.”
“What if I don't want to talk?” I ask and he smiles again, reaching out the hand with the bat tattoos all over it, running his heated palm up my exposed thigh. I close my eyes and feel my breath rush out of me. Holy shit. My heart and soul feel dead … my body feels almost desperately alive. Like, if she can get all these touches and sensations inside of me, maybe they'll jump-start my heart?
“I'm more than happy to fuck you,” Muse says, “but I want it to be mutual.”
“It's mutual,” I say, and then I'm leaning over his chest and kissing his mouth again. He tastes smoky again, but not like cigarettes, not at all. Like Earl Grey tea maybe? Definitely tea. That's what that taste is.
Kevin would've laughed cruelly if I'd offered him a cup of tea.
“I drink fucking coffee,” he'd bitch and I get frustrated and annoyed at him all over again, curling my fingers in Muse's shirt and letting him push my dress up in the back so he can cup my ass. He does it with a fervency that makes me feel like this is urgent, like I need to be touched and held or I might die. It's overdramatic, sure, but it feels so much better than the blank emptiness of shock.
I embrace it as Muse embraces me, the hot warmth of his body soothing as he rolls us over and puts a knee between my thighs. When he reaches up to take his glasses off, I put a hand on his wrist.
“Leave them on?” I ask and he laughs, but he obliges me, dropping his mouth back to mine, taking hold of the side of my face and savoring the taste of my mouth. Muse is a confident lover, and it's obvious he enjoys the physicality of sex, but there's … something else. It's hard to explain, but I get the sense that there's something more here, too.
He tastes almost as lonely as I feel.
Muse's knee presses up against the vibrant heat between my thighs and I find my body arcing forward of its own accord, rubbing against the black denim of his jeans. As we kiss, I feel him grinding his erection into my hip.
“Oh, Derek,” I moan and he stops kissing me for a moment, letting out this long, sharp breath against my ear.
“I like hearing you say that,” he whispers, kissing the side of my neck, making my body go pliant in his hands. “Nobody calls me Derek anymore.”
He drops his tattooed left hand down and slips it under the red lace lingerie covering my sex, slipping a pair of fingers inside of me before the door slides open behind him and I gasp. My fingers curl into Muse's shoulders as I find the plain-faced ponytail girl standing there, the one from backstage with the clipboard and the headset.
And she could not have interrupted at a worse possible moment.
“Oh, sorry,” she says, blushing profusely. “I didn't realize … I'll come back.”
The way her eyes sweep me, there's a sort of predetermined judgment there that feels heavy and ragged as it falls across my exposed skin. I don't like that, not at all. She's looking at me like I'm a slut. And … I don't think there's really anything wrong with that, but … that's not who I am either. Until yesterday, I'd basically only had sex with Kevin.
Ponytail Girl turns her face away, but she doesn't bother to actually leave like she says she's going to. Oh my god, but it's so damn awkward when Muse slides his fingers out of me, out of my panties, and sits up.
We exchange a long look as I adjust my dress and sit up, too.
“Lilith,” he says as Ponytail Girl turns back towards us with a disingenuous smile, “this is Octavia Warris, the band's manager.”
“We met last night,” Octavia says, still pretending to smile sweetly, but giving me that same awful look. “Lilith Goode, the Parade for Paxton contest winner, right?”
“Right,” I say as I tuck my legs up and try not to hate this woman. She's just doing her job, I'm sure. “It's nice to meet you. Sorry it's under such … unusual circumstances.” I gesture at myself, the bed, Muse.
“Oh, don't worry about it,” she says gently, and for a second there, I feel bad because I think I must've misjudged her a little. “These aren't unusual circumstance
s.”
I think my mouth pops open in surprise as Octavia turns her attention to Muse.
“I need to see you in the living room for a moment, please,” she says, but he holds up a hand—thankfully not the one that was inside my underwear.
“That was rude, Octavia,” he tells her, but she's already turning away and disappearing down the hallway. Wow. So it's not just Michael that wants me off this bus. I think about leaving now, getting a hotel room, but then I can't ask Muse for anymore money and I don't have a credit card … No, it just makes sense to stay here for the night. Ransom and Muse invited me; Copeland and even Paxton didn't seem completely opposed to it. “I'm really sorry about that,” he tells me and I shrug loosely. What one random stranger thinks of me doesn't matter in the long run.
Dad is dead; who gives a fuck what Octavia thinks.
“She's usually pretty nice, just not to gr—” Muse stops suddenly and gives me an apologetic look. “I'm sorry. I know you're not a groupie, not even close.”
“It's fine,” I say with a tired sigh and even though I've been sleeping all damn day, it's suddenly all I want to be doing. “Don't let me hold you back from work.”
Muse scoots back towards me and puts his hand on my hip.
“I'd much rather stay in here with you,” he says and even though I know there's nothing between us but sex, it feels good to hear someone tell me something so nice. It might be the last time I hear something like that for a long time.
Muse kisses me, and my heart thunders at his touch, but the moment's passed and we both know it. He pulls away and looks at me for a long moment. I can tell that this is the part where I invite him back after he's done with his meeting, but it takes me a second to get up the courage and then he's pulling away with an understanding smile.
“If you need anything from the kitchen, feel free to help yourself.”
He scoots off the end of the bed, grabs his boots off the floor and disappears, closing the door behind him.
After a few minutes, I decide to take my dress off, shoving it back in the box and replacing it with Muse's t-shirt and sweatpants. I drag my phone from my purse and curl up in the dark, underneath the black silk blanket. I think it's stuffed with feathers or something because it's light as air, fluffy and soft, but warm, too.
I open up my gallery and start scrolling through pictures. Pictures of Dad and me, of Mom, of Yasmine. I should probably cry again, but my eyes hurt and I'm just done with tears for right now. There's a small possibility I could be in shock of some kind. I mean, tucked in here on this giant bed, in this room with its silver wallpaper, I feel like I'm in a different world.
Tomorrow, when I get off that plane back in Phoenix, that's when it'll all come crashing down; I'm sure of it. After a while, I decide I can't stand the silent, smiling faces of my dead family, and start some mindless sitcom on Netflix, staring into the tiny screen of my phone and wishing I could get sucked away into a happy, little world with a laugh track and a conclusion at the end of every episode.
Hours later, when the door opens, I see Ransom standing in the darkness in his hoodie and set my phone aside.
“Hey, doll,” he says, his voice warming up all the cold places inside of me. “I'm not looking for sex or anything, but could I sleep with you? I just … fucking hate sleeping by myself.”
I want to tell him no, to sit here and wallow in my own misery, but then I smell that faint violet scent that clings to his baggy black sweatshirt and I can't help myself.
“Sure,” I say, and like he did last night, this complete stranger crawls into bed with me and tucks me against him, like I'm something precious to be held and cherished. I don't want to admit that the sound of his breath, the feel of his heartbeat against my back, or his sweet scent are almost as comforting as one of my dad's bear hugs.
I squeeze my eyes shut tight and when I open them again, it's to the sound of my alarm going off.
Time to go.
Only … there's literally zero part of me that wants to leave this place.
It feels almost impossible to crawl away from the comfort and warmth of Ransom's arms—especially when I had to wake him up and soothe him back to sleep no less than six times last night. How does he manage without someone by his side?
I get a stab of jealousy as I realize how easily he cuddled up to me. He probably just picks girls at random and brings them back to the bus. If he could do it with me, there's a good chance he does it with lots of others, too. I wonder if it ever scares them away? He gets pretty violent in his sleep, although he didn't hurt me at all.
With a sigh, I push his arm off and crawl down to the end of the bed for the last time, taking my phone with me. After a quick perusal of the items in the top box, I realize there's nothing else in there that's black. Moving onto the next box, my breath catches sharply as a framed photo of my dad stares up at me. I have this exact same picture on my phone, but knowing that I almost left it behind in that rainy parking lot makes me sick.
I shut the top quickly, toss it aside and start on the third box. All in all, there are four total. Muse probably spent a lot of time in that parking lot picking my shit up. With a small sniffle, I drag a pair of black leggings from the tangled pile of clothes and wrinkle my nose. They smell musty, like clothing that's been left in a washing machine for too long.
“Fuck,” I whisper, deciding it doesn't really matter. I'm taking a two hour flight home and then … I'll probably be staying in one of those shitty motels that I'm so scared of. But it'll be fine. Just fine.
I struggle through the boxes one more time, trying to find a pair of shoes that aren't shiny, loud red heels, and come across a pair of pale pink leather Docs. The inside of both boots are wet, but I decide that's better than wearing heels to the airport and slip them on.
I toss my purse over one shoulder and grab the top box from the stack.
Muse is waiting for me when I step through the hall door and into the kitchen.
There are two cups of tea on the small table between the two swivel chairs, steam rising from them still.
“Sit and talk with me a sec before you go?” he asks, leaning against the counter. His silver-black hair is styled into a perfect mohawk, eyes dark with liner and strangely bright without his glasses to block them. He's even dressed up like he was onstage, wearing a pair of skinny jeans with pins all over the right thigh, a plain green t-shirt and a dark denim jacket over an unzipped hoodie. That, too, is covered with pins. He looks very punk rock, and I find myself smiling a little.
“I don't have a lot of time before my flight,” I say as Muse stands up and takes the box from my hands.
“If you still want to go after our talk, I'll drive you. One of the roadies drives a truck with a trailer on the back, but it's unhitched right now. I could take you straight to the terminal.”
“Our talk?” I ask as Muse puts the box down by the front door and gestures to one of the chairs. I decide to sit down anyway and take the warm cup of tea between my palms. I hadn't realized how cold I'd gotten since I pulled away from Ransom until I was holding this mug. “What do you want to talk to me about?”
I watch him as he takes a seat but for the life of me, I can't imagine what this could possibly be about.
“You're going back to Phoenix?” he reconfirms and I nod slowly. “To what?”
“What do you mean to what?” I ask as my heart starts to beat uncontrollably and I stare into the kaleidoscopes of color that make up Muse's eyes. He sips his tea carefully and watches me like he already knows the answer to my question. “To nothing, okay,” I say and it feels so goddamn good to get it out that I keep going. “No apartment, no job, no family, no friends, no boyfriend. I'll be getting off that plane with two hundred bucks and everything I own.”
It occurs to me in that moment that I probably don't even have enough money to cover the baggage check fees for my boxes, and my entire body goes cold.
“I've been where you are right now,” Muse tells me as I sip my
drink, and the sweet clove-orange spice of the liquid reminds me of his hot mouth on mine. He leans back in his chair, looking impossibly young and hopeful, the four black piercings above his brow catching my attention. “I don't have any family left either. When I auditioned for Pax's band, all I had was my guitar and a gun with three bullets in it.”
I raise my own eyebrows, but all Muse does is stare into his cup.
“I'd tried out for a lot of spots in a lot of bands, even tried starting my own. It was,” he pauses to laugh and drink some of his tea, still not looking at me, “it was a clusterfuck, let's just leave it at that. I had no place to live, no job, and no family. I figured if I didn't make Paxton's band, I had two more bullets than I needed to make it all stop.”
“Derek,” I start and he shivers a little, glancing back at me, the green in his shirt bringing out the flecks of emerald in his eyes.
“My point is, why are you going back there? What are you going to do when you get there? I see too much of myself in you to just let you go without asking.”
“I'm not going to kill myself,” I say because I don't feel suicidal. If anything, beneath the icy cold numbness inside of me, all I want is to fucking live. I look away sharply, but I can feel Muse's eyes on me still. “What else am I supposed to do? There's nowhere for me to go.”
“Stay here,” he says and I snap my attention over to him, spilling tea into my lap with a curse and then pausing to push some red hair away from my face.
“Stay here?” I ask, heart pounding, this strange feeling taking over me, burning me up from head to toe. “Like, as a …” I start to say, but I'm not sure how to finish that sentence except with the word … “Groupie?”
Muse shrugs, and even the heavy jacket and sweater he's wearing can't hide the muscular breadth of his shoulders or the strong biceps hiding underneath. He continues to stare at me, making me feel like I need to fidget. I tuck my legs underneath me and then untuck them again.
“No, not like that. You wouldn't be expected to do anything you didn't want to. If what you want is to just camp out in the Bat Cave and sleep, you could do that. You could also come to our shows; I'll get you a backstage pass and you can hang out.”