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Riggins with a pop star, my brain screams, and even though I try to fight it, my gut knows.
My gut knows that when I click on the first result, I’ll see that, even though they can’t confirm the exact day or time, the photo submitted was allegedly taken on Thursday. This means while I was waiting in the coffee shop where we agreed to finally talk about what happened two years ago, where I had planned to confess about Las Vegas and the wedding, he was out gallivanting with a famous pop star, living his best life.
Forgetting about me.
I start to spiral.
For the first time, at the very least, I can feel the spiral happening. I can feel the dark blue waters creeping up on my ankles, lapping at my shins, but this time, I let it.
The numbness is better than this churning, this envy.
Envy.
How fucked is that?
My fingers start to move on the keyboard without my mind’s permission, searching for more photos of Willa, seeing a gorgeous woman, everything I will never and could never be. Gorgeous lush curves where I have none. Long blonde hair, the same shade my mother always told me I should get at a hair salon, while Riggins told me he loved my dark locks. A voice that wins awards, lyrics she writes about love and loss and life, more eloquent than anything I ever have been able to put on paper.
Can I even blame Riggins for choosing her over me? For choosing to spend a sunny day with this beautiful woman rather than dissecting the issues of our failed relationship in his hometown?
Fuck, I would choose her too. I think I have a crush on her, too.
Not just because she’s beautiful and talented and everything I’ll never be, but because she has him.
Instead of getting sick, completely dissociating, and curling up in my bed to cry when this all-encompassing pain crashes over me, I do something I haven't done since I left the tour.
I reach for a pen, paper, and my guitar, and I write.
And write.
And write.
And when I’m done, I pass out on the couch, sleeping until noon, those dark blue waters keeping me sound asleep.
When I finally wake up, I finally do what I’ve been putting off for too long.
I call the lawyer.
22 CAVES
NOW
STELLA
“We never dated, Stella,” Riggins says, pushing me out of my trip down memory lane. I sigh, closing my eyes as I do. When I open them again, somehow, the anger is gone. I’m just tired. Tired of this back and forth, of this digging up of the past. Of the disappointment.
“Riggins, you don’t have to lie to me anymore. Really. We were kids with big dreams, and in a way, we both got ours. You’re allowed to live your own life. Just... sign these papers for me, so I can live mine too,” I say, then reach into my large bag slung over my shoulder, gripping the envelope in my hand.
“It was all fake, Stella.” He runs a hand through his hair like he’s frustrated I’m not understanding. “After my dad died, the label threatened to drop us unless I went to rehab, but they didn’t want everyone to know I was going because what’s the fun of a sober rockstar?” His laugh is incredulous and angry. “It’s part of the reason that when our contract was up, we left Blacknote and went to Catalyst Records. The album after was all about my sobriety. About loss and... well, you. Blacknote didn’t like that; they liked the wild rockstar vision.” He shakes his head like this is just part of it, but I’m aghast. How did I not know this?
“Stella, I’m breaking about a thousand NDAs telling you this shit, so if you want to ruin my heart and my career, this would be a good place to start. But Willa doesn’t date, or at least not really. She has fake relationships for PR; the more interesting and controversial, the better. She doesn’t believe in falling in love, but the public won’t believe love songs if they don’t believe she wrote them about someone. So we were a perfect match. I needed to clean up my image a bit and hide out while I was in rehab, and she needed someone the public wanted to see her with. That was it. We’re just friends. Good friends who both used each other to get what we needed from the industry.”
I stare at him, noting the honesty in his eyes but trying to be strong and hold myself to the plan I made.
Come here, give him the papers, and end things forever.
The papers that have sat in a desk drawer for years. Papers I’ve never been able to send because a part of me never wanted to break that final thread that held us together.
But it’s time.
