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What the actual fuck was that all about? I get that I’m pushing Sloane away for her own good, but that felt incredibly specific about something I have no clue about. I don’t ever see her? Where did that come from? My head hurts too much from all the shots last night to allow me to go through the mental gymnastics necessary to figure out what that’s all about.
I’m surprised to not see Ethan already in the classroom since he’s been early for almost every lesson. As I turn the lights on, I get an odd sense of wrongness that makes me stop and inspect the room. Nothing seems out of place or different from how I left it yesterday, so I don’t know why the feeling is growing the longer I stand here.
“Don’t be an idiot,” I mumble and cross the room to my guitar to prepare for the lesson.
As I snap open the latches on the case and lift the lid, my heart stops, and time seems to slow. I can’t be seeing what I’m seeing.
I shut the case and open it again as if it will change something.
It doesn’t.
“Are you fucking kidding me?” I repeat the words over and over as I take in the destruction in front of me that used to be my guitar. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
The neck was forcefully separated from the body since it’s a relatively clean break. Steel strings curl broken and untethered, far removed from any melodic expression. The tuning pegs look like they’ve been individually bent out of shape with precision. Shards of fractured wood lay in an inert pile.
This is no longer an instrument. It’s just garbage. A pile of wood and bits of metal.
My hands tremble as I pick up shattered fragments of the guitar. Each piece pulsing with memories - late nights writing songs, early gigs at hole-in-the-wall bars. This guitar has been with me from the beginning, before the fame. Before the record deal. It was an extension of me.
As if this destruction isn’t bad enough, the word ‘LIAR’ is cut jaggedly into the crushed velvet fabric of the interior lid. My hand reaches up to run along one of the tears, and I see my fingers shaking. All of my body is vibrating.
I catch on to something tucked into the lining and pull it out, stumbling backward as I see what it is. It’s the corner of the early Murderous Crows photo I kept here.
Just the corner.
It’s obviously been ripped. I start furiously digging through the case, searching for the rest of the pieces, but only immediately find a few.
This was no random act of violence. It was personal and meant to devastate. What about the other photo that was stashed inside? Me as a grinning kid with my brother and mom. One of the few untarnished memories of my childhood. That one is completely gone. Probably forever.
Whoever did this knew just how to twist the knife in deep.
I can’t think straight. My mind can’t wrap around the idea that anyone would do this. Has done this. I wade through the jumble of thoughts rushing around my brain, trying to imagine who hates me this much.
While I’m sure plenty of people would line up for a chance to do this to me, not everyone has access to this room or my guitar. My mind first travels to Nyx, who would do something like this in a heartbeat. But how the hell could she get in here? I don’t think she could and not be noticed.
So, who here is mad at me?
Sloane.
The shock that jolts through me is devastating.
How could she?
I slam the lid shut and haul the case across the hall, my blood boiling. I can’t believe she would be this spiteful, but her disdain for me was more than obvious a minute ago. I don’t understand it, but I saw it. And now I see what it can do.
Pushing through the door, Sloane and Penny jump up from the piano bench in surprise at my loud entrance.
“Cooper? What is it? What’s wrong?” Sloane asks, shock and concern in her dark eyes. I almost believe it.
Knocking over several chairs and music stands on the way to the center of the room, I throw the guitar case on the floor between us and kick the lid open, my stomach clenching in pain as I see the devastation again.
“What’s wrong?” I laugh, but it’s not my voice. I don’t know where it’s coming from. Everything about me at this moment is disjointed. “What’s wrong? Seriously?”
Her eyes widen as she looks down at the remnants of my guitar with an almost convincing gasp. Penny, at least, looks horrified and goes pale.
“Oh, my God…” Sloane whispers, a hand flying to her heart.
“Don’t fuck around. I saw how pissed you were at me this morning. I have no clue what that was all about, but come on. This? This is beneath you.” I point to the lid. “And, liar? What the fuck? What did I ever lie to you about? I may be many things, but a fucking liar isn’t one of them.”
