Exile (13 page)

“Great. Thanks.” I head past the bonfire, where I get
side slammed by a beefy guy in a white baseball cap and a girl in swim goggles who proceed to fall in a giggly tangle. Their friends are laughing like it’s
hilarious
. I hate people.

Suddenly Ari appears in front of me, megaphone to his lips. “SUMMER,” he says, the electrified voice feeding back. “IS NOW THE TIME FOR THAT F—”

I snatch the megaphone, turn it so the wide mouth faces the sky, grab the coconut cup from the girl to my left, and dump the lightly flaming contents into the megaphone. It shrieks like a wounded duck and sparks jump from it.

“Dude . . . ,” says Ari sadly.

I keep walking. Ari probably didn’t deserve that. Whatever.

I trudge through the sand, wound so tight I’m barely breathing. I want to find him, but I don’t. What girl? What the hell happened to the Caleb I knew? Is this just because I didn’t kiss him before the set? Probably not, though that likely didn’t help. The last thing he needed was more uncertainty, with all the ghosts around him already. And yet . . .
he was with some girl
. . . suddenly I’m just feeling hamster-to-wheel again, Ethan to Caleb. But no. I know he’s not like that. Don’t I?

I reach the perimeter of the party, where the sound of the surf can actually compete with the music and voices. Couples have stumbled away to lie around pawing at each other. Some are splashing each other in the surf like
eight-year-olds. Or maybe it’s romantic. But maneuvering around the spray of their fun is unbearably annoying. Further up the dark beach, a drum circle drones. The sea breeze carries the echoes of their bong.

I get past the last party satellites, to complete darkness and sea. Stars and cliff-side homes glitter. Part of me wants to just keep on going, on through the night, to whatever new world seems certain to lie at the far end of the coast. Instead, I take a deep breath of the sour air and turn back, walking the tideline toward the firelight. I study the small groups and couples and pass the occasional loaner gazing into the dark. Some glance up, hoping I’m the other lost soul they’re destined to meet. Sorry.

Finally, I see a figure with the unmistakable outline of Caleb’s hair and nose sitting in the sand.

But then the silhouette moves and— oh, hell. He’s not alone.

Someone leaning on his shoulder. Firelight catches blonde hair, a petite frame . . .

I hear the murmur of their voices, and move as close as the rustle of waves will allow.

“It just didn’t feel right,” I hear Caleb saying. “I hate how it always has to feel right, like you have to be perfect.”

“You don’t. You can’t expect that of yourself.” Crap. Of course I know that voice, despite how it’s muffled by the contact between cheek and shoulder. Legs side by side . . .

“Jon and Matt are probably mad,” Caleb says.

“Just apologize. I’ll help. They don’t have the burden you do, being lead singer.”

Caleb shrugs. “Summer’s going to be pissed.”

“Obviously,” I hear Val say. “But you can’t expect her to get it. She’s not like us.”

Her head falls back to his shoulder, and her hand reaches out and rubs his knee.

“No,” I mutter. “Apparently I’m not.” Summer the bitch. But I don’t even care.

Caleb spins around, flinching away from Val. She looks up at me and glares, as if I’m wrong to be disturbing them. As if she actually has a right to feel that way.

“Summer—” Caleb begins.

I hold his gaze just long enough for him to know, to feel whatever guilt he’s capable of feeling, and then I storm off.

Back toward the stupid, stupid, party, back to last year, making the circle of failure complete.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

..................................................................

MoonflowerAM
@catherinefornevr 9:58pm
#wtf

I don’t want Caleb to follow me, except when I hear his footsteps, hear him calling, I realize that if he hadn’t, whatever shred of a chance of this not being over would have been lost.

“Summer.”

I keep walking, trying to breathe, to fight the tears. I don’t want him to see me like this. I don’t want him to think I’m this breakable. He’ll think it’s all because of him and that will only give him more power. These tears aren’t about him. They’re about me being an idiot.

“Come on, please.” He grabs my arm and I spin.

“Come on, what?” I’m nearly yelling. I can’t help it. “Is this where you try to convince me that what I just saw was
okay? That Val was just
being there
for you, that she understands you in a way that I couldn’t possibly—”

“No—

“—because the two of you are
burdened
with the great task of being lead singers? Spare me—”

“I was going to say I’m sorry! But also that . . . that wasn’t my idea back there. I—I didn’t even know what that was.”

He’s saying this with a serious face but he also smells like beer. Not helping. I almost point that out to him, but then I’ll just sound like his mother.

“How could you not know what a girl leaning on your shoulder and stroking your knee was? Not to mention your ego.”

“She wasn’t stroking. She just sort of . . . patted me there.”

I just look at him.

Caleb throws up his hands. “I’m serious! She followed me after the set. I just wanted to be alone, but she was making sense. Val’s smart about stuff. I don’t mean you’re not, at all, just . . . I—”

“You guys speak the same language, yeah, I’ve noticed.”

“Well, I don’t know about that, but . . . whatever. We’d only been there for, like, a minute, when you showed up. I didn’t expect her to lean on me like that.”

“You didn’t stop her.”

Caleb glances at the sea, searching for words. “I was
still trying to figure out what to do about it.”

“What was there to figure out? We’re—or maybe we’re not.”

“Summer, we
are
, but she’s in the band, and I didn’t want to make her mad, especially after how I acted on stage. I still owe Matt and Jon an apology.”

“They left. And said the band was over.”

Caleb bites his lip. “Great.”

“They’re just mad. They’ll probably come around. You were saying, about Val . . .”

“Just that I think she meant it as kind of a friend thing.”

“God, Caleb. Girls never mean hands-on-knees as just a friend thing.”

“Well, okay . . . but what was I supposed to do? We need Val. And I am not good at holding things together.”

“I’m coming around to that idea.”

“Besides, you were weird before. What was with you shrugging me off right before the set, when I tried to kiss you? Were you embarrassed? ’Cause I’m not.”

“I—” I hate that he’s brought this up. It doesn’t feel fair, but maybe it is related to everything that’s happened, like I feared. “That was me feeling the pressure. Of being here, again. Of being exposed. Having people see me as a serial band groupie who should know better.”

“Which is ridiculous.”

“Or.”

He reaches for my shoulder. I don’t react one way or
the other. “You have to believe me. I was just trying not to screw anything else up. I don’t think Val was going to try anything. It didn’t feel like that. And if she had, I swear I would have stopped her.”

I shrug. Wipe at my stupid face. Look away, look back. “Tell me what happened onstage.”

Caleb opens his mouth, but then looks out at the water and sighs. “I just lost it. Being here, thinking about Eli, having Freak Show be so good. I let it get to me.”

“You should have trusted yourself. Trusted your songs.”

“I don’t know how to have that kind of faith sometimes. And I had this awful thought, too. I wasn’t just freaking out, and then being mad about the fact that I was freaking out, I was also thinking that . . . maybe I should fail.”

“Why the hell would you think that?”

“Because, I was thinking,
If this crowd likes you, loves you, then what if you’re starting down the same path as Eli?
What if success leads me to make a mess of my life, too?”

“Caleb . . .” Hearing this is so tragic I almost well up. I’d never even considered this fear of his, but it makes perfect sense. Add that to everything else . . . I almost want to laugh. “Could this be a bigger mess?”

“I haven’t drowned yet.”

“Sorry,” I say quickly. “Didn’t mean it like that.”

“I know.” Caleb’s gaze stays far out in the black sea.

I pull on his arm and we sit on the hard sand. But I do not put an arm around him or a head on his shoulder. Not
yet. “I already told you, you’re not him.”

“Eli or Ethan?”

“Ha. Neither. You need to know that. And I guess so do I.”

Caleb digs at the sand with his finger, drawing a ring. “I saw you talking to Ari’s older brother, after our set. Isn’t he from Candy Shell?”

“Yeah, and he’s a jerk.”

“Sure . . . I hate to ask, but did he say anything about the band?”

“Actually, he said he liked it. That you guys weren’t bad . . .” I should tell him about the touring offer. Wouldn’t a professional band manager inform her band about a huge opening gig? If she trusted the person offering. Which I don’t. Except he also offered me the internship . . . but I remind myself that I can do it without him. “That was it,”

We fall silent and I hate this. I’m still mad at Caleb and yet I’m keeping secrets. How is that any better? I don’t understand how things went so far sideways in one night. “I want a do-over,” I say.

“Me, too.” Caleb reaches over and rubs the back of my hand. It feels so excellent. Still not moving any arms or leaning my head though. Not yet.

“There they are.” We look up to find Randy. He drops down beside me. He’s soaked in red goo.

“Tell me you didn’t do that,” Caleb says, sounding equal parts awed and mortified.

“Had to try the fire pit!” He slaps Caleb’s shoulder. “Big old hairy guys are money for this crowd, especially when they fall in a sideways cannonball and soak half the audience.”

“That was your real goal,” Caleb guesses.

Randy salutes. “Just doing my duty to my stereotypes.” He wipes more of the sweet-smelling slick from around his eyes. “So,” he says, looking past me to Caleb, “got a case of the crazies up there, huh?”

“No, just messed up.” I catch Caleb glaring at Randy.

“What?” I ask.

Randy raises his eyebrows at us. “Nothing, I guess.” He starts running his fingers over his beard and flicking red goo off.

Caleb is back to digging in the sand.

“Caleb, what is it?”

“Nothing, it’s nothing. I just freaked. I already told you.”

Randy rolls his eyes. “Dude, stop being an idiot and tell her.”

“Yeah.” I turn his chin toward me. “You heard him.”

Caleb shrugs. “It’s no big deal!” He’s practically whining.

“Clearly it is.”

Caleb runs his hands slowly through his hair, then looks at me. “Fine. Randy is referring to my shrink-approved anxiety issues. Generalized anxiety disorder, technically. I
have medication I can take when it gets too crazy, but that’s not that often. And I don’t like how it dulls me.”

I feel my shields going down, and I rub the between his shoulders. “Why didn’t you tell me that?”

“I don’t know,” says Caleb. “I was hoping I could manage it and you wouldn’t have to know. It’s not a very cool thing for a potential lead-singer rock star to have. And I hate when people classify me.”

“I wouldn’t have classified you.”

“Yeah, but . . . once people know you have a weakness, they assume it’s always going to be an issue, which technically it is, but it can be an excuse. Not for me, for them. Like if the going got rough, you might decide to find a band who’s singer didn’t have a
condition
.”

“Jesus, Caleb . . .” I’d tell him he’s an idiot for even thinking such a thing, and yet, flash to earlier this week, when I imagined him dropping me because I couldn’t be his sing-in-harmony girl (though there’s still tonight’s display, but I’m thinking more and more that Val was the main instigator there). “I like you, not some idealized version of you. The anxiety’s part of what makes you, you.”

“It was part of Eli, too,” he says.

“You’re not him.”

Randy chimes in, “Listen to your manager, nephew. You are
so
not Eli. And I mean that in the best possible way.”

Caleb shrugs, as if he’s considering believing it, but that’s all. “The point is, every show feels like a high wire.
Which can be great, until you fall off. With everything tonight . . . Sometimes it swallows me up. And the worst part is I get how important a night like tonight is, like how the world is an enormous and constantly moving place, and I want to grab on to moments for all they’re worth, except then I get so worked up that it backfires.” He sighs. “It’s a lonely feeling.”

My heart is time traveling, applying this new information to everything from tonight. Not that tonight didn’t happen, but there was more to it, and I get why he didn’t tell me, and I just want it all to be over and for neither of us to feel lonely when we’re right here together. “Far comets,” I say quietly. I put my arm around him.

“It’s okay, nephew,” says Randy. “The great thing about rock ’n’ roll is that there’s always another gig.”

“I guess,” says Caleb. “Right now I’m just hungry.”

“Burritos,” says Randy, as if he’s making a wish to the sea.

“Reuben with pickles,” says Caleb absently.

“Ask for Vic,” I add, and I put my head on his shoulder.

There’s a moment of silence. I feel a strange sensation and turn to find Randy staring at us. His brow is furrowed like he’s heard something blasphemous. “What did you just say?”

“It was in a letter I found,” says Caleb, “inside Eli’s old bag. I’m guessing you didn’t know it was there.”

His expression contorts more. Now it’s like we’re saying
something blasphemous in a foreign language. “What kind of letter?”

“To me. From a few months before he died.”

Randy rubs his face slowly. “Holy crap, really? And it said something about Vic?”

“You know who that is?” I ask.

Randy nods slowly. “Vic is a legend.” To himself: “I mean, that’s gotta be who he’s talking about, right?” To the ocean: “Obviously, who else would it be?”