Page 4 of Songs for Libby

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“I’d love to hear all about how sorry you are when you’re sober.” I pointed to the bathroom, which was filling up with steam. “Now go. I wasn’t kidding about the shower.”

He nodded mutely then stood and stumbled toward the bathroom, stripping off his shirt as he went. “I still love you the most, Libby,” he said over his shoulder.

“Yeah, I know,” I muttered to myself as I left the room, shutting the door behind me.

I forced a deep breath to keep the tears at bay then walked over to the couch and sank onto it, resting my head in my hands as I berated myself.

I’d been so stupid. So naïve. As a teenager, I’d had star eyes and winged feet, and I used them to push Sean into the limelight. I convinced everyone that it would be good, that he would be great and I’d keep him out of any trouble. And he had been great. He’d been better than great for a couple of years.

And then his twin sister died.

And his mom fell apart.

And Sean clammed up, refusing to talk about it.

And he wrote an entire album in less than two months.

Those songs.

Those. Songs.

The most honest, open-hearted, soul-wrenching songs I’d ever heard—like his bleeding heart lay beating for everyone to see, but in the most beautiful way. People ate them up. Then they wanted more.

And more.

And more.

At first I thought it was a good thing. It was his way of coping. He would work through his grief by writing out his feelings, right?

And it probably would have worked that way. If he hadn’t been a celebrity. If he hadn’t had fans falling over themselves for any scrap of him. If the record label vultures hadn’t constantly demanded more.

If I hadn’t given him to the world, he probably would have done just fine.

A knock at the door pulled me from my half-awake stupor. I went into defensive mode, ready to beat off any overzealous fan or reporter coming to invade Sean’s privacy.

“Room service,” someone called from the other side of the door.

Right. It was the food I had ordered. I opened the door, and with the help of Will, convinced the girl delivering it to just hand over the tray instead of coming inside. I didn’t trust people coming into Sean’s room. They tended to look around and linger.

I shut the door and padded back across the plush carpet in my bare feet, my shoes having been discarded next to the phone when I’d first ordered. I pulled off the cover and found a juicy filet mignon and a cute little scrap of paper with a phone number, the name Megan, and a smiley face.

Yeah. This was why I didn’t let employees in. I ripped the paper into tiny little bits with more venom than necessary and tossed them in the trash.

I was halfway through my steak when Sean came out of his room, his wavy hair damp, still unsteady on his feet. “You ordered room service,” he said.

“I didn’t get to eat dinner tonight.”

He blinked and shook his head, as if trying to get that information to settle into his brain. “Right. Sorry.”

I wanted to brush him off, but my need to take care of him was ever present. “Did you eat tonight?”

He shrugged.

I sighed the kind of sigh that comes from deep down within your soul, and then I scooted over. “Come eat something.”

He sat obediently, acting like the derelict child I treated him as. I shoved a water bottle in his hands. “I don’t care how much you eat, but you need to drink that entire bottle before you go to sleep.”