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“Just… stuff,” I shrug. “Ancient history.”
“Which is still killing you to this day.”
“It’s not… it’s not killing me per se,” I say, even though that is exactly what it is doing. “Well, it is, but the music helps. Or at least it did, until it tried to kill me too.”
“We’ll get over this,” Skye says. “I won’t let you cower in fear after this. I’ll get you therapy, and you’ll be fine.”
“I am fine!” I nearly scream. “Sheisn’t. She… She didn’t choose to be in the public eye, like I did. She was just trying to do her job, which, by the way, she is amazing at. And someone decided to throw her to the wolves. If... When I find the person who leaked this to the press, I am committing a crime.”
Skye is scrolling on his phone.
“Isaiah boy, I never once have encouraged you to go online,” he says. “But maybe you need to see what they’re posting about her—I have no way of knowing how much is true.”
“I can guarantee none of it is true,” I grind out. “Nobody, and I mean it no. body. Nobody knows what happened between us.”
Skye sighs long and hard. “Fine. Whatever. You know I respect your life choices, even though they are super weird…”
“What don’t you understand, Skye?” I yell. “These fans, they… They showed up at my father’s grave! A bus full of groupies. They assaulted my mom and my brother. They stalked my house, they… I couldn’t take it anymore. I hired an army of guards and I went off the grid completely. No possibility of being tracked or hacked or whatever if I just stopped existing online. I even stopped watching the news, scared of what I would see there about me or my family. I wouldn’t care if it had been just for myself, but I…”
“I know, I know, take it easy.”
Skye looks freaked out. Probably because I am freaked out.
But even now, it makes me panic to remember how much of my life was on the internet back then. I can’t even imagine the levels of intrusion and insanity they must have reached by now. I get dizzy just thinking about it. I only use my phone to text and listen to music. Social media and news websites are absolutely blocked on all my devices, so that I don’t accidentally stumble upon them. I listen to the radio for news, like any self-respecting ninety-year-old person.
“Oh, wait, Lou just emailed me,” he says.
“Lou?”
“She… Oh God. It was one of her friends.” He shows it to me. “This girl was apparently bitter for being kicked off the hotel… Also, she kind of comes off as fame-hungry. Anyway, look, Lou has sent me a complete Wikipedia page of apologies.”
I push his phone away. I’m not interested in Lou’s apologies, although for once, I think they might be sincere.
“I will murder her with my bare hands,” I hiss.
“It wasn’t her, man,” Skye says, but he also has murder in his eyes. “It was her friend. Well, former friend, according to this email. Also, you won’t be able to murder her, because I’ll beat you to it.” He takes a shaky breath.
I’ve never seen him so angry before.
Eden’s door opens a crack and my heart does a backflip.
“What can I do?” I whisper.
Jude has been in there with her since the medical team left, and I’m so grateful to him, I’m not even jealous. Well, not too much. There are other things killing me right now, so jealousy can wait its turn to do the deed.
Skye looks him up and down; Jude looks like crap, disheveled and pale, frown lines of worry over his usually sneering face. I can hear Pooh rustling in the room behind her. If Pooh can’t right what’s wrong in there, I don’t know that any of us can. There are some things only a dog can fix.
“You both still alive in there?” Skye asks.
Jude doesn’t reply immediately and my heart pounds.
“Almost alive,” he replies in a minute. His voice does not sound ok.
“What can I do?” I repeat, and it comes out warped, as if there’s a fist around my throat.
“Can you come in here?” Jude replies before disappearing back inside. The door clicks closed behind him.
I take a deep breath, trying to steady myself. Eden wants me to go into her room? Why? I fumble with the door handle and Skye tries to hide a chuckle as he opens it for me. I tumble inside and I hear him murmur ‘smooth’ behind me–I don’t even turn to give him the stink eye.
