It was an hour and a half later before all the guests left and the venue was tidied up to my satisfaction. Tessi had driven into town with me, and we got into my SUV and headed north to Lubbock. We were both too exhausted to even speak much. I dropped her off at her house, and instead of going straight home like I wanted to, I headed drowsily toward Flips.
I hadn’t been there since my first lesson with West. That felt like a lifetime ago.
Still, I was surprised they’d picked this for the band. It wasn’t exactly under the radar. Not by any stretch of the imagination.
To my horror, I realized precisely why they’d picked it when I stepped inside. It was karaoke night.
“What is happening?” I whispered.
My brother—my rockstar brother—was onstage, singing a rendition of “Pour Some Sugar on Me” with Viv and Santi.
Yorke stood off to the side with West. Both looked disturbed by the display. Not because they were bad. No, they were excellent. Campbell had a killer voice. Viv and Santi were both good, too. Though not quite as smooth and dreamy. But it was the ridiculousness of the entire situation.
Within the hour, this would be all over social media. Flips would have a surge in patrons, hoping to catch rockstars making fools of themselves more often.
I barreled through the crowd to West’s side. I nudged him. “What the hell is going on?”
I could tell at once that he was a little drunk. Not falling-over drunk, but they’d clearly been here for hours.
“Nora!” he cried, sliding his arms around my waist.
I sure hoped that Campbell wasn’t paying attention. I hastily pulled out of his grasp. Despite the butterflies going off in my stomach.
“Why are you doing karaoke?”
He shrugged. “Can you contain Campbell?”
No. No one could. Except maybe Blaire, who I noticed was on the other side of the stage with Hollin and Piper. They were all laughing. I waved at them. Hollin waved back. Blaire pointed at Campbell and cackled. Oh, she was enjoying this. Well, good for them.
“It’s late,” I said around a yawn. “I’ve had, like, a seventeen-hour day. I’m going to bow out of…whatever this is.”
“Wait, wait, wait,” West said quickly. “I asked you here for a reason.”
“And that is?”
“I was invited to join the band.”
The butterflies’ wings snapped off and plummeted to their death in my stomach. Everything crashed to a halt. The music drowned out my own thoughts. This was…it was really happening.
Despite my own distress, I knew that I had to be happy for him. No. I was happy for him. I wanted him to have the band. I wanted him to have all his dreams come true. This was the best thing that had ever happened to him.
So, I threw my arms around his neck. “Oh my God, West!”
“I know. I know,” he gushed. He put me back on my feet and stared down at me. So much unsaid in that look. “We’re leaving tomorrow.”
“T-tomorrow,” I gasped. “Like, in the morning?”
“Early afternoon.”
My stomach took a nosedive. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. I had to tell him. I couldn’t hold this in forever. He needed to have all the information before he left. As much as I wanted to contain all of it, I knew that I couldn’t. It wasn’t fair. None of this was fair.
I wanted to cry.
But I couldn’t.
Not here, surrounded by all our friends, when he was alight with excitement.
“That’s incredible, West. This is everything you’ve ever wanted.”
He opened his mouth and then closed it. Finally, he nodded. “Yeah, a dream come true.”
I wanted to run away and not have to face this. I wanted to wake up from this nightmare. I’d known he was going back to LA. We’d agreed from the start, but it had changed. It had all changed. I didn’t know how to be okay with this anymore. I didn’t know how to fake it. But fake it was exactly what I had to do.
“Stay for one drink,” he pleaded. “I know you’re dead on your feet, but we can go home afterward.”