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I walk around like a goddamn zombie, staring at people as they talk to me. I try to focus on their words. Respond when it’s my turn to talk. Everything feels so fucking draining. Every heartbeat takes a toll. Every breath sucks the life from me. I ignore my texts. Phone calls. I pass by familiar faces without a word, and I go back to what I know.
The lyrics on my notepad have been fucking with my head all week. I can’t get them right, so I’ve been obsessing over them. When staring at the messy scribble fails me, I close my eyes and murmur the words instead. It’s not a conscious act, and I don’t realize it until I’m halfway through the song that I’m in the middle of the courtyard. At some point, I guess I must have stopped giving a fuck where I am or who hears me.
“It’s good to see some things haven’t changed.”
The voice in front of me drags me back to reality, and when I open my eyes, the afternoon sun blinds me. At first glance, he’s just a blur in the shape of a man. But as my eyes adjust, the details register one by one—inked arms, crutches, and a stump where his leg used to be. My gaze moves to his face reluctantly as I swallow the acrid taste of shame. It’s Kieran O’Brien.
“You’ve been avoiding everyone,” he says.
I shrug in response, and he takes an uninvited seat on the bench across from me. His eyes drift over the fading burn marks on my arms and then to the cane beside me. For a minute, we just stare at each other. Words aren’t needed to know this moment of silence is for what happened. For who we lost.
“I’m glad to see you’re okay,” he tells me. “I’ve been texting you.”
“Sorry,” I mutter, strumming my guitar to avoid his gaze.
“I get it,” he says. “It fucking sucks. I think about what happened every day. If I could go back and do something different, I would.”
I force a nod. Kieran deserves more than that from me, but I don’t have the energy to tell him so.
“Don’t shut us out,” he says quietly. “We’re still here, and we want you around.”
I dip my head and close my eyes. “I don’t know how to do this shit anymore.”
“What?” he asks.
“Exist.”
There’s a long pause before he responds. “I don’t have it figured out either. But I think the way it works is you get up every day, and you do the things that need to be done, and eventually, it gets easier. It has to.”
I appreciate his encouragement, but we both know it’s a crapshoot. For some guys, it never gets easier.
“How are you feeling?” I nod to his stump.
“I’ll be like the Terminator in no time.” He taps it with his fingers. “Still figuring it out, but the doctors say I’m doing good. I’ll be fitted for a prosthetic in two more weeks and then training on it after that.”
He seems optimistic, and I’m glad for it. I want him to be okay. That’s all I want for any of the guys who were there that day.
“And Kelly?” I ask.
“Ryan’s here too. He wants to see you.”
Another wave of guilt settles over me. Ryan saved my life, and I never thanked him for it. It’s a hard thing to do when you aren’t even sure you want to be alive.
“You working on some new songs?” Kieran gestures at my guitar.
“Yeah.” I shrug. “Something to pass the time.”
He leans forward on his elbows, whistling the tune I just played like he captured it to memory. He always had a knack for picking up shit fast like that.
“I have a set of drums,” he tells me. “And Ryan’s probably done with therapy by now. You want to jam with us for a bit?”
My first instinct is to turn down the offer, but then I consider the alternative, which is going back to my room to replay memories I’d rather forget.
“Sure, I guess we could do that.”
“Cool.” He grins.
Chapter 49
Lyric
I’m curled up on the couch, my head stuffed beneath a cushion, when his boots echo across the floor. It hasn’t even been five minutes, and I don’t think I can possibly face him. But he gives me no choice when he lifts me into his arms and carries me out the door.
He hauls me to his bedroom, where he deposits me onto the bed and looks down at me with tormented eyes. My gaze drifts to the shrine of photos on the wall, and my stomach sinks.
“Please, just let me leave,” I beg. “I can’t stay in here with those—”
Before I can finish, he stalks over to the wall and starts yanking all the photos down, tossing them into a pile on the dresser. It leaves me in a state of shock, and despite the agony that still lives inside me, it relieves me, too. When he’s finished removing every trace of her, he dumps the whole pile into a drawer and slides it shut. Then he comes back to the bed, turns on the lamp, and shrugs off his tee shirt and jeans.
