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“You’re so fucking stupid, Riggins. Really.” My jaw goes tight.
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean? She ran and never looked back.”
“Never looked back? God, man, all she’s done is look back. She’s been writing all that time, hasn’t she?” Cold creeps into my gut.
“What?”
“What do you mean, what?”
“I mean, what the fuck are you talking about?” His face loses a shade of color, and panic starts to brew in my veins. He shifts on the couch so he’s better facing me.
“She didn’t tell you?” he asks, but it’s less of a question and more of a shocked statement.
“Tell me what?”
“I don’t… I don’t think it’s mine to share, Riggins.”
“Reed, I swear to fucking god?—”
“She’s been writing. Songs.Hits, Riggins. She ghostwrites hits.” I feel it then, the tingling feeling of shock as it washes over me, a mix of panic and excitement and… “They’re all about you, of course.”
He says it like it’s a foregone conclusion, but it takes the air from my lungs and fills me with hope and dismay.
“No,” I whisper, shaking my head, but somehow, I know it’s the truth. It explains so much, like how she afforded that money pit of a house, how she wasn’t worried when she lost her job, and how she knew so much about the industry she’s had nothing to do with for seven years.
Or so I thought.
“I mean, I can't confirm they’re about you, but….”
“Name,” I say, my voice not even sounding like my own.
“What?”
“What’s her name?” Reed looks to the side, his Adam's apple bobbing as he swallows, avoiding looking at me, and I know, somehow, it’s going to cut me deep, whatever her name is. “What’s her fucking name, Reed?.
“Marie Stevens.”
Marie Stevens.
Marie was my mom’s middle name, Stevens her maiden name.
How had I never realized that? Sure, both are pretty nondescript names, but how did I not put them together?
“She couldn’t have forgotten you if she tried,” Reed says low, his face filled with compassion and a hint of pity.
Suddenly, the path is clearer. My plan completely shifted and altered. Reed is right; I can’t play this safe, and I can’t let her stew. I’ve been letting her stew for too long. She thinks I let her stew because I didn’t care, and right now, I’m just proving that point.
I need to do something big.
I need to scream from the rooftops about what she means to me, who we are. Whosheis to me.
“Call Lee,” I say, grabbing my phone and opening a search tab, typing in Marie Stevens in the search bar. A long discography of songs shows up, songs she’s written, and speculation of who she is; none of them are correct. Some of the songs are familiar, songs that when I heard them on the radio or at awards shows, they hit me with a sense of longing and sadness I didn’t understand.
I should have known.
“What?” Reed asks.
“Call Lee. I need to get on a show,” I say, pulling up a music app and typing her fake name in there, my pulse racing.
