I shove him again, fury flashing white behind my eyes, but this time Ronan and Kiri both move fast. They grab us, separating flesh from rage, muscle from impulse. Kiri is shouting in Khmer, dragging Rithy toward the exit.
Ronan gets behind me, his arm locking across my chest, dragging me back until my feet scrape marble. “Calmthe fuckdown,” he hisses in my ear. “We’ve got an audience.”
It’s only then that I notice it, people everywhere. Phones up. Hotel guests whispering, staff frozen behind the desk. A half-circle of strangers recording our family falling apart in real time. Ronan doesn’t let go until the elevator doors close behind us. Inside the narrow space, I brace both hands against the wall, head down, chest heaving.
“Ronan, I didn’t mean to—”
He gives a rough laugh, shaking his head. “Oh yeah, you did. It’s not like he didn’t deserve it. He’s been asking for it all weekend.” He exhales hard, rubbing the back of his neck. “But now we’ve got fallout. You know the drill. We protect each other. Elise and Dawn are gonna want to spin this. Just be ready to play your part.” The adrenaline’s wearing off, leaving the ache behind. I nod, jaw tight.
“Fuck.”
“Yeah,” Ronan says, clapping a hand on my shoulder, steadying me. “Fuckis right.”
He keeps his hand there while the elevator climbs. I stare at my reflection in the brass panel, knuckles split, shirt wrinkled, pulse still pounding. All the calm I’d carried from her, gone.
But beneath the rage, under the guilt, something steadier remains. The memory of her voice, her promise, her “I’ll see you in Seattle.” And that, I know, is the only thing keeping me from breaking again.
Ronan ushers me into his room and slams the door hard enough to rattle the frame. He tosses me a towel before I can sit. It’s nearly soaked before I take notice of just how much blood there is, mine and Rithy’s mixed together,impossible to separate. Just like we used to be. The thought makes me nauseous. A pang of guilt presses in, so I press my hand harder. The noise from the lobby still buzzes inside my skull.
A second knock. Ronan opens the door and Kiri slips in, calm, quiet. He takes in the scene without a word: me on edge of the bed, the towel dripping red into a trash can, Ronan pacing. He sets a bucket of ice beside me.
“Front desk called Elise,” he says. “She’s on her way up. PR’s already spinning. There’s videos.”
“Ofcoursethere’s videos, from all angles,” Ronan mutters. “Every phone in Miami was filming.”
I press the ice to my hand and let the sting burn through.
Kiri folds into the armchair opposite, elbows on his knees. “How bad is it?”
“My hand?”
He shakes his head. “The fallout,you and Rithy. He’spissed, wouldn't let me near him to help clean up.What the fuckwas that, Rafe?”
The next knock lands like a gavel. Elise, our long-suffering tour manager, doesn’t wait for permission, she storms past Ronan, phone in one hand, folder in the other, her lanyard swinging like a weapon.
“Tell me you didn’tactuallyhit him and I’m trapped in some publicity nightmare,” she says.
Ronan raises a hand. “Oh, he hit him alright.”
She closes her eyes, exhales. “Okay. Damage control mode starts now.” She scrolls through her phone, then stops and flips her phone around. “The first uploads are coming in.” Blurry footage from a fan's Instagram plays, my fist connects, the sound alone makes my stomach turn.
“You’re lucky Rithy isn’tpressing charges,” she says. “Management’s panicking, sponsors are calling. This goes viral with a negative angle, Europe might be dicey.”
Kiri leans forward. “What’s the plan?”
“We’re drafting a joint statement,” she says. “Heated disagreement between bandmates, creative tension after months on tour, yada yada. We’ll call it brotherhood, passion, and artistic process. The usual bullshit. You’ll both apologize on camera. Whatever was left of your anonymity is likely gone after this. It’ll probably hit the news cycles, this is what we callhighly-clickable content. Don't be surprised if they approach your families for statements. ”
I don’t even argue. I just sit there, feeling the words settle like dust. I hadn’t thought about it when I did it, what it would cost. Our names were technically out there already; people figured it out if they cared enough to dig. Some recognized me by the eyes, the voice, the scar on my eyebrow from an old piercing that got caught once. But you had to look for it. You had towantto know.
Now you won’t have to. It’ll be everywhere, clips, captions, headlines cut to slow-motion frames of a punch that wasn’t supposed tohappen. Whatever veil we had left is gone. My parent’s number will probably be in a journalist’s call log before morning. I exhale, slow. My actions opened a door I can’t close again. It feels like losing something I’d been trying to protect for years, without realizing how much it mattered until it was already gone.
Ronan groans. “Rithy’s going to love that.”
Another knock. Rithy walks in, an ice pack pressed to his face, tissues shoved up his already-bruising nose, smirk in place like armor. He looks like both the wound and the weapon.
“Well,” he says, voice rough but bright, “family meeting?Adorable.”
I stand before I can stop myself. Ronan’s hand catches my shoulder. “Don’t.”
