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Since I was fine, I just settled in and used the runs to the gate to meet food delivery as a reason to head out. As it was, I’d slept late for my first day back on campus so the exercise would be good for me.
Loaded up with lasagna, ravioli, garlic bread, and tiramisu—because I definitely ordered while hungry, not my brightest move—I ran back up to the building—well, jogged. The run, wreathed in Italian spice, sweet garlic-infused bready goodness, and snow, filled me with a kind of simple peace I’d craved all week.
Seeing Bronson and Jackie had been amazing. They welcomed Aubrey and Yvette, including them in the holiday celebrations with Bronson’s rather noisy, extended family on his mother’s side.
I’d gotten to meet some of them before, but this time seemed to almost overwhelm me. I was never alone with Aubrey and Yvette right there. Bronson and Jackie had always felt like a home away from home, and Pen—well, I spent every hour I could at the hospital, gowned up and masked, visiting her.
She hated the mask and kept taking it off me. One of the nurses said it was all right, we just needed to make absolutely sure I wasn’t feeling off at all. If that meant taking my temperature each time to be in the room with her, I did. I also invested in a clear face mask. It still helped keep it sterile while letting her see my face.
It was almost acceptable to her sweet little brown eyes. Oh, I adored everything about her from the tight little curls on her head that I worried might fall out and they said would, to the chipmunk cheeks she made when she laughed.
On Christmas Day, Dix drove me to the hospital and came up while I visited with her. He kept a look out while I sang to her and played. She was asleep when I left, and I know Jackie was there regularly, Davina had been coming to see her for me, and Bronson swung by every chance he got…
I hated her in that hospital.
Hated. It.
Leaving the day after Christmas to come back here to think and to plan and to work in the relative quiet while Aubrey and Yvette went to see their families felt a little bit like running away.
Just a little.
Carrying the food toward the building, it still felt a lot like running away. No matter what, though, I’d have to just hate myself for it later. Right now, for the first time inmonths, I could take a deep breath. The leash of lies that had been choking me since the end of last semester had finally let go.
I could breathe.
I needed to be here right now. Just like I’d needed to be with Pen and everyone else the previous week, I needed to be by myself right now. Yvette and Aubrey had both known, hell, they’d known before I had because they hadn’t once tried to persuade me to go with them when I said I wanted to do this.
Then I walked in on…averyshirtless Lachlan ripping into a very naked Payton in the hall outside of Ramsey’s suite. My stomach lurched at the whole scene. Payton glared daggers at me. A momentary touch of pity for her rather unfortunate and humiliating situation died a rapid death.
“What are you staring at?” Payton demanded.
“No fucking clue,” I said, her words jarring me out of the shock. Unlike her, I had no desire to film her degradation. “And I don’twantto know either.”
Shifting my grip on the food bag, I turned and took the steps two at a time. I didn’t slow until I got to the fourth floor and back inside the “safety” of the suite.
Locking the door behind me, I put the food in the little kitchenette and got changed back into comfy clothes. While some of my peace had been disturbed, I refused to give into the unsettling encounter.
Honestly, if they wanted to play crazy sex games in the hallway while it was freezing cold—I seriously didn’t want to know anything about it. That was an uncomfortable image that would likely stick in my head for way too long.
Fortunately, someLove is Blind, garlic bread, and lasagna helped to chase away some of the discomfort from that whole thing. When I was done eating, I washed up and pulled out my guitar. The rest of the afternoon, into the evening, I worked on writing a new song of my own. I wanted to write one for Pen.
Or maybe I was writing it for me.
I worked to build the harmonies so the three of us could sing it for her. Whether we ever recorded again or not, trying to sort out all my conflicting feelings on the subject hurt…
Pen was too little to be fighting this battle. Jackie warned me from the beginning this would be tough and I had to deal with my feelings on all of it. It was okay to be overwhelmed and to need a break. That all of this wasn’t on me…
She was terrific, and I was so damn glad that Jackie had Pen’s back through all of this. She was precisely who Pen needed. Unsurprisingly, Dad had been a no-show.
I made it through the first third. It was going to be balladic. Nothing else was working for me right now. Most people wrote music before they wrote lyrics; I worked the other way around sometimes.
How it worked for me indeed depended on my involvement. Aubrey and Yvette were both way better at the basic music. I heard music, but always in lyrics. I could hear the words before the melodies. Jonas seemed to hear nothing but melodies.
It was kind of sweet.
My hand was cramping from playing and writing. It had also gotten super late. There was no sign of Lachlan or Payton—thank fuck—so I cleaned up, set the music aside to work on the next day, and crashed.
Knocking on the door woke me. It took a minute for me to even realize someone was knocking. The thump was muted; it didn’t quite carry through the closed door to my bedroom.
